All Spell Breaks Loose

“Imala, would they listen to you?” I asked. “Or would they think you were still working for Sathrik?”

“Shit,” she swore mildly.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

Part of why Imala Kalis had been able to gather so much inside information on King Sathrik’s plans was that, technically, she still worked for the guy. For goblins, maintaining dual alliances came as naturally as breathing. But this wasn’t a game for the men and woman Sarad Nukpana had imprisoned in those dungeons, and Imala telling them she was one of the good guys might not go over well.

“Think you could convince them that you wouldn’t set them free just to turn around and set them up?” I asked.

“They would listen to you,” Tam said quietly.

I blinked. “Me? You know I’m an elf, and I think that’s going to be fairly obvious to them, too.”

“You’re also the Saghred’s bond servant.”

Imala nodded. “Our people know who you are, and that includes what you look like.”

“But I don’t have any magic.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Tam said. “They know what you’ve done to thwart Sarad Nukpana, and they know that he wants—and needs—you dead. You’re here to destroy the Saghred. Mychael is the paladin of the Conclave Guardians, the keepers of the Saghred for the past thousand years.” He flashed a grin. “The two of you have the hero credentials; we’ll just be there as your trusty sidekicks.”

I snorted. “Yeah, right.”

“That we’re trusty or sidekicks?”

I gave him a crooked smile. “Either one.”

“I haven’t spent all of my time in this house,” Badru said. “I’ve been out, and there are some people I still trust to talk to. From what I’ve heard, Sarad’s keeping those prisoners healthy and well fed. Apparently that rock doesn’t like weak food. I’m sure those boys and girls would like nothing better than to pay Sarad back with interest for fattening them up for the slaughter.”

“Okay,” Mychael began. “I’m not saying we’re going to do this thing, but how many cells are there and how do they open?”

“A dozen cells on two levels,” Tam said. “All but a few of them open with the same key. The chief guard and his senior officers each have one.”

“How many officers?”

“Usually four.”

“Think we can get our hands on one?” Mychael shot Tam a meaningful look. “Quietly?”

Tam’s grin was slow and borderline evil. In that moment, he looked entirely too much like Talon. “He’ll never know what happened.”

Kesyn Badru’s instructions for getting out of the house were simple: run like hell and don’t look back. Throughout my professional career, I’d successfully used that strategy many times. I was glad to be able to say that it worked this time, too.

It was full dark once we got outside. The streets would be busier, and the odds for getting stopped and/or captured would be greater. We were still cloaked and hooded, and Kesyn Badru was sporting a battered, wide-brim hat. Since we were headed for the harbor, then the sea cave, the most direct route would have us going under a place I’d heard a lot about, and had absolutely no desire to visit.

Execution Square.

It had another fancy-sounding name, but over the centuries, it’d been used to make public examples of anyone unlucky or stupid enough to piss off a Mal’Salin monarch. If we managed to get Chigaru on the throne and he started pulling that all-powerful crap, he’d be getting another visit from yours truly. Only I’d have the family fleet backing me up. Phaelan and Uncle Ryn would happily blast his butt off of that throne. If I risked my life to help put someone on a throne, they damned sure better behave when they got there.

To get to Execution Square, Badru led us through parts of the city where you hoped you were carrying more steel than the thugs waiting around the corner, in the next doorway, and down the alley you just passed. Between the five of us, we must have been packing enough, because no one jumped us. While it didn’t exactly give me the warm fuzzies, it did lessen the white-knuckled death grip I had on my dagger.

Badru stopped at a narrow stair that ran against the side of a building. The stairs went down to somewhere. The first four I could see; the rest disappeared into the dark.

He readjusted the brim of his hat. “There’s twenty steps with a door at the bottom,” he said. “We’ll make some light once we get inside. Watch your step.”

A storage room led to the sewers, which led to a cobweb-filled tunnel. Before we’d left the house, Badru had filled a small knapsack with odds and ends he said would come in handy. He’d given us each a ball not much larger than a die, an invention of his. You shook it and the liquid inside made almost as much light as a lightglobe. Plenty of light, no heat, and, best of all, no magic. If you needed to put it out quickly, you just stuck it in your pocket.

Fire of any kind would have been bad walking through cobwebs. But the nice thing about them being here was that it meant no one else had been. I briefly wondered if Magh’Sceadu could flow through cobwebs. We moved fast and in complete silence. We had a destination and we wanted to get there as quickly as possible.

I estimated we’d been walking for nearly an hour, when Kesyn Badru stopped and we did likewise. I couldn’t see much in the dim light, but I could hear plenty. Voices, footsteps, a lot of both—and all coming from directly over our heads. Quick glances darted between Badru, Tam, and Imala. Though this time, I didn’t need anyone to tell me that something was happening in Execution Square and crowds were gathering to watch. I didn’t see any way that this could be good.

Tam and Imala extinguished their lights and ran in absolute silence down the dark tunnel toward the square. While we waited, Badru fished around inside his knapsack and pulled out a square of cheese. I’d thought the old goblin’s breath had smelled bad enough from drinking, but that stink couldn’t begin to compare with that cheese. I was more than grateful when Tam and Imala came back soon after.

“Sathrik’s about to give a speech from the palace balcony,” Tam said.

Mychael blew out his breath. “We might need to hear this, but at the same time, I don’t want to waste the opportunity of having everyone’s attention focused on the king.”

“Sathrik’s usually good at getting to the point quickly,” Imala said. “An orator he’s not.”

“Where’s the closest and safest place to listen?” Mychael asked.

Imala started back into the dark. “Follow me.”

The voices got louder and more numerous, and I tried my best not to think about hundreds, maybe thousands, of goblins standing just a few feet above our heads. Imala glided silently to a storm grate set in the roof of the tunnel. Light from torches or lightglobes in the square above flickered down to the dirt floor. She stood just beyond their glow, perfectly still, listening. Elven eyes were no match for goblin night vision, but our ears were just as good. So what she heard, we all heard.

“The outer perimeter is secure, sir,” said a voice from above.

“And the streets beyond?”

“Closely watched.”

“Good. Assume your post, Captain.”

Palace guards or Khrynsani. Either wasn’t good if we were found, but we weren’t going to be found. We were here to listen and leave. As far as I was concerned, we couldn’t get to the leaving part soon enough.

Imala turned toward Tam and flicked her index finger under her nose.

“Khrynsani,” Tam barely whispered.

I raised a questioning brow.

Tam’s grin flashed in the shadows. “Imala’s always claimed she can smell the stench. The incense they burn in the temple could choke a horse.”

I gave Imala a smile of my own as my pulse sped up at the thought of Khrynsani directly above me.

Imala motioned us forward. Another ten minutes or so passed as the sound of the crowd in the square above grew even louder. Usually in a crowd gathering to hear a speech, there were snide comments and jokes about the dignitary about to speak, laughter and idle chatter. I didn’t hear any of those things.

“How many?” I mouthed silently to Tam, pointing up.