“Get to cover,” Sarnax told the others. “We’ll let you know when we’re ready to attack; we’ll have to deal with whoever fired that shot, first.” He looked at the dead body on the floor, exclaimed angrily, and hurried to the ascent tube, springing upward.
Verkan Vall replaced the small pistol in his shoulder holster and took Olirzon’s belt, with his knife and heavier pistol.
“Well, there you see,” Dirzed said, as they went back to the gun room. “So much for political expediency.”
“I think I understand why your picture and the Lady Dallona’s were exhibited so widely,” Verkan Vall said. “Now, anybody would recognize your bodies, and blame the Statisticalists for discarnating you.”
“That thought had occurred to me, Lord Virzal,” Dirzed said. “I suppose our bodies will be atrociously but not unidentifiably mutilated, to further enrage the public,” he added placidly. “If I get out of this carnate, I’m going to pay somebody off for it.”
After a few minutes, there was more shouting of: “Assassins’ Truce!” from the descent tube. The two Assassins, Erarno and Kirzol, emerged, dragging the gamekeeper, Tarnod, between them. The upper-servant’s face was bloody, and his jaw seemed to be broken. Sarnax followed, carrying a long hunting pistol in his hand.
“Here he is!” he announced. “He fired during Assassins’ Truce; he’s subject to Assassins’ Justice!”
He nodded to the others. They threw the gamekeeper forward on the floor, and Sarnax shot him through the head, then tossed the pistol down beside him. “Any more of these people who violate the decencies will be treated similarly,” he promised.
“Thank you, Sarnax,” Dirzed spoke up. “But we lost an Assassin: discarnating this lackey won’t equalize that. We think you should retire one of your number.”
“That at least, Dirzed; wait a moment.”
The three Assassins conferred at some length. Then Sarnax hooked fingers and clapped shoulders with his companions.
“See you in the next reincarnation, brothers,” he told them, walking toward the gun-room door, where Verkan Vall, Dalla and Dirzed stood. “I’m joining you people. You had two Assassins when the parley began, you’ll have two when the shooting starts.”
Verkan Vall looked at Dirzed in some surprise. Hadron Dalla’s Assassin nodded.
“He’s entitled to do that, Lord Virzal; the Assassins’ code provides for such changes of allegiance.”
“Welcome, Sarnax,” Verkan Vall said, hooking fingers with him. “I hope we’ll all be together when this is over.”
“We will be,” Sarnax assured him cheerfully. “Discarnate. We won’t get out of this in the body, Lord Virzal.”
A submachine-gun hammered from above, the bullets lashing the fountain pool; the water actually steamed, so great was their velocity.
“All right!” a voice called down. “Assassins’ Truce is over!”
Another burst of automatic fire smashed out the lights at the bottom of the ascent tube. Dirzed and Dalla struggled across the room, pushing a heavy steel cabinet between them; Verkan Vall, who was holding Olirzon’s submachine-gun, moved aside to allow them to drop it on edge in the open doorway, then wedged the door half-shut against it. Sarnax came over, bringing rifles, hunting pistols, and ammunition.
“What’s the situation, up there?” Verkan Vall asked him. “What force have they, and why did they turn against us?”
“Lord Virzal!” Dirzed objected, scandalized. “You have no right to ask Sarnax to betray confidences!”
Sarnax spat against the door. “In the face of Jirzyn of Starpha!” he said. “And in the face of his zortan mother, and of his father, whoever he was! Dirzed, do not talk foolishly; one does not speak of betraying betrayers.” He turned to Verkan Vall. “They have three menservants of the family of Starpha; your Assassin, Olirzon, discarnated the other three. There is one of Prince Jirzyn’s poor relations, named Girzad. There are three other men, Volitionalist precinct workers, who came with Girzad, and four Assassins, the three who were here, and one who came with Girzad. Eleven, against the three of us.”
“The four of us, Sarnax,” Dalla corrected. She had buckled on a hunting pistol, and had a light deer rifle under her arm.
Something moved at the bottom of the descent tube. Verkan Vall gave it a short burst, though it was probably only a dummy, dropped to draw fire.
“The four of us, Lady Dallona,” Sarnax agreed. “As to your other Assassin, the one who stayed in the airboat, I don’t know how he fared. You see, about twenty minutes ago, this Girzad arrived in an airboat, with an Assassin and these three Volitionalist workers. Erarno and I were at the top of the dome when he came in. He told us that he had orders from Prince Jirzyn to discarnate the Lady Dallona and Dirzed at once. Tarnod, the gamekeeper”—Sarnax spat ceremoniously against the door again—“told him you were here, and that Marnik was one of your men. He was going to shoot Marnik at once, but Erarno and I and his Assassin stopped him. We warned Marnik about the change in the situation, according to the code, expecting Marnik to go down here and join you. Instead, he lifted the airboat, zoomed over Girzad’s boat, and let go a rocket blast, setting Girzad’s boat on fire. Well, that was a hostile act, so we all fired after him. We must have hit something, because the boat went down, trailing smoke, about ten miles away. Girzad got another airboat out of the hangar and he and his Assassin started after your man. About that time, your Assassin, Olirzon—happy reincarnation to him—came up, and the Starpha servants fired at him, and he fired back and discarnated two of them, and then jumped down the descent tube. One of the servants jumped after him; I found his body at the bottom when
