“Uhn!” Croaker was still angry but I could see the changes taking place behind his eyes, see the focus of his anger shifting like a ship changing course. “The bitch. The deceitful, conniving, treacherous bitch.”
“Way she talked, she’s planning on moving into Overlook and making it home.”
“The bitch!”
“I wish I could tell you more. Smoke refused to stay around where she was at. Think you better tell Lady?”
“Of course I’d better tell her. Shut up. Let me think.”
“Hey in there!” Swan yelled from the other side of the hangings keeping the wind out. “You guys better come and see this.”
“Now what?” Croaker snarled.
“I’ll check it out. Write them a message they can take to Lady.”
“Damn it. It may be too late. She was going to try to sneak up on Longshadow herself.”
Shit. We were in the brown stuff deep. Maybe.
I made a wobble-legged dash for the open air. I slipped on the steps going up to ground level. The earth was still soggy, even up here on the hillside.
I did not have to ask Willow what troubled him.
The biggest fireworks show of all time was going on over by the Shadowgate. Maybe the dustup at Lake Tanji was a match but I got to see that one only from the inside. “Gods damn!” I swore. There were so many fireballs flying around that no expletive could do the event justice.
I flung myself back down the muddy steps.
Croaker was wriggling into his Widowmaker costume. I told him, “It’s started at the Shadowgate. You have to see it to believe it. I hope those guys have enough bamboo.”
“Lady gave them everything she could. It’ll be a matter of numbers. Which we’ve known from the beginning. If we have more fireballs than they throw shadows, we win. If we don’t, we end up sorry. But not for long.”
“Longshadow didn’t seem to do much. If that tells you anything positive.”
“It doesn’t. I don’t have any idea what he would or wouldn’t have to do to unleash some or all of the shadows. And there’s no way I can guess how he’d think about it. Except that he wouldn’t want to let go so many that they’d come after him, too. He’d want to be able to control the survivors after he got rid of us.”
“He doesn’t know that he doesn’t have any more shadowweavers. Singh and Howler have been feeding him very selective information lately. The true extent of what Lady accomplished the other day is a complete mystery to him.”
“More treachery from our friend Soulcatcher, no doubt.”
“I’d bet on it.”
“You need to get back out there. She wouldn’t do just that one thing. It would leave her too vulnerable.”
“Huh?” My turn to make funny noises.
“She’s got to know we can get in and out of there whenever we want. She has to cover her sweet little ass. Go see what she’s up to before she really gets going.”
“On my way, boss.”
I drank some sugar water and went out.
Smoke did not want to go back to Overlook. I got my way. I tricked him, sort of, by ducking back to before Catcher pushed her way into his awareness. Then I zipped forward and watched the shadow explode off Longshadow’s pinky.
It went for Howler. It hit Howler. Howler howled. And fought it off somehow. It darted at Narayan Singh, who shrieked as it struck him. Howler and Catcher together forced the animate darkness away from the Deceiver. Singh lapsed into unconsciousness immediately.
The shadow was not whipped yet. It struck at the Daughter of Night.
The instant she screamed the ghostworld began to fill with the stench of Kina. A cyclone of rage roared toward Overlook. Smoke squeaked she is the darkness and away we went, streaking out of there like a shaft from a ballista. We went high and we went north and we went fast. The fireworks at the Shadowgate vanished behind the Dandha Presh. We were north of Dejagore before I could exert any control.
The ghostworld had become one protracted whimper from my steed. He was fleeing somewhere where he expected to be safe. Somewhere that the deepest part of him recalled from days when he was still an ordinary mortal.
He had only just begun to respond to directions when we drifted into the Palace.
The place was a beehive. Priests and Guards and functionaries rushed everywhere. There was excitement out on the city streets, too. Shadar watchmen roamed in packs, making arrests by the score.
This bore closer examination.
I checked the prisoners. A few seemed vaguely familiar. I dipped around in time and discovered that they were being collected in the empty Black Company barracks. I found some definitely familiar faces in the crowd there.
They were all people who had been friendly to the Company.
I zipped around for a look at the Radisha, ran back in time to the beginning... Near as I could tell her adventure had been going on for only a short while, though she had spent hours earlier getting her assets positioned. Actual arrests commenced just about the time Soulcatcher strolled into Longshadow’s chamber at Overlook.
Sleepy!
Shit! I sped to Banh Do Trang’s warehouse.
Sleepy had not been arrested. Not yet. Several Shadar were in the neighborhood. They were looking for Sleepy. Their curses left me no doubt that they were after him specifically. But they could not find his hiding place.
I went after the kid. I gave it everything I could. If it worked in the swamp it ought to work in the city. I got right down there in his face and screamed. I tried to mess his hair and pull his ears.
He spooked.
So he did happen to be out of the way when the watchmen arrived, though he was still close enough to overhear and understand.
I did not wait around. He had sense enough to saddle up and get out of town and never mind waiting for an answer from Sarie.
I grabbed Smoke by the ectoplasmic short hairs and headed south. He was not even a little bit eager to go.
I returned to my flesh. The Old Man was waiting for me. “What’s the word?”
“Kina was coming. Smoke spooked. He headed north. I just got back. The shit’s flying up there, too.”
“Oh? How so?”
“The Radisha is rounding up anybody who ever smiled at one of us. She started at almost exactly the same minute that Soulcatcher jumped on Longshadow.”
He did not ponder that. “We’ve got a problem, then. Get back out there. I want to know if anything else is going wrong.”
I sucked some sugar water and went.
What else was going wrong? Right here in Kiaulune the Prahbrindrah Drah was trying to disarm Lady’s troops. She was inside Overlook. She did not know yet. I did not know how to get word to her quickly. I decided to try the same tack I had with Sleepy. Maybe I could startle her into doing something.
I found her already in the stairwell leading up to Longshadow’s crystal chamber. Several of our best Company brothers were with her.
I dropped down in front of her and screeched, “Booga! Booga! Booga! Get your ass back outside!”
She jumped. She squinted into the darkness right about where the eyes of my viewpoint floated. “Murgen?”
“Get your butt out of here, woman. It’s a trap. And the Prince’s troops are trying to disarm your men.”
She turned and barked orders.
Damn! She was a whole lot more sensitive than the others.
I whipped out of there. The stink of Kina had begun to fill the stairwell.
