Hal took a moment to comprehend the scene before him. Three rings of guards were standing in protection of their respective monarchs, while everyone who could get out of the great hall was scrambling for the nearest exit. The centre of the hall was a surging mass of movement that took Hal a moment to make sense of, for three alien figures stood in the midst of a litter of bodies.
Lord John Worthington stood motionless, in his hand a bloody knife. His son lay at his feet, his throat obviously cut as blood pooled around him. Lord John appeared transfixed, staring off into the distance, while Roldem’s palace guard formed a barrier between him and their King.
Then he saw that Lord John’s Isles and Kesh counterparts stood motionless as well, arms down and out before them, hands turned palms up, their eyes closed as if in prayer.
And in the centre of an invisible triangle between those three men raged something dark and murderous.
Hal could not quite make sense of what he was seeing. Whatever was forming there was a blur of motion and a shifting of light. Then Lord John and the other two advisors collapsed as one, and something was released.
The three shimmering silhouettes suddenly threw themselves at the three monarchs. Those not behind the wall of shields and swords screamed in agony as sudden wounds appeared on their bodies, or died silently from instantly killing blows. Blood fountained and spattered everywhere as the apparitions appeared moved around the room in a mad caper of murder, cutting and slashing in all directions.
Hal looked and found the Princess standing behind her father, Lady Gabriella and Ty and a dozen royal guardsmen. Jim and Franciezka were standing between that group and the Isles guardsmen protecting King Gregory, both of them had a pair of impressive-looking blades in each hand.
The Keshians were forming a wall of iron shields and scimitars around Emperor Sezioti who had drawn his ceremonial sword and looked poised to use it if need be. Hal tried to make sense of the mayhem, but had trouble getting the dark figures in focus.
They moved oddly, disjointedly, but even so, their progress was deadly. Blood was splattered on gowns and fine uniforms, giving the entire tableau an otherworld quality. Moreover, the keening sound the creatures made was unnerving. Hal fought down an urge to turn and run and took stock of his next move. His duty lay to his king and he knew he should move to defend Gregory, but his heart was Stephane’s and he wanted nothing more than to hurry to her side.
He judged his best choice to join with Jim and Franciezka. He ran past the royal dais and came to Jim’s side. ‘What are they?’
‘I’ve never seen their like,’ said the Kingdom’s spymaster. ‘But I’ve read about them. They are called death- dancers, and they are a bastard to kill.’
Looking at the way they flailed about, Hal saw a pattern emerging. ‘Then we’d best be about killing them as quickly as we can!’ He took three steps forward and as he had anticipated, what appeared as an odd man-shaped hole in the air swung a wide arc of what seemed to be a blade. Hal lunged and impaled it, felt the sword cut deep, felt resistance, then withdrew and knelt as a wildly swinging blade cut through the air where he had stood a moment before. A warbling cry, a sound nothing mortal could make, cut through the air, a sound of raw pain and anger.
‘Good!’ shouted Jim. ‘I think you’ve really annoyed it!’
The nearest death-dancer turned and seemed to be trying to locate Hal, who backed away ready to move in whatever direction took him away from this thing’s attack. He had run it through, somewhere in the lower torso, but it seemed merely agitated, showing no sign of injury.
‘How do you kill one of these things?’ Hal yelled.
‘I don’t know, but I do know you can’t let it cut you! Its touch is poison!’
‘Now you tell me!’
‘I’m not the one racing in there, am I?’ shouted Jim.
Hal played keep-away with the closest death-dancer and noticed another behind it. There was something dissimilar between the two, but he was too busy dodging to notice. He yelled, ‘Jim, what’s the difference between this one and the others?’
Jim tore his attention away from the closest as it lunged at Hal who barely leapt away in time. The flickering, featureless creature was difficult to see, and only the young duke’s quick reflexes saved him.
‘The other one has some sort of lash. Yours a blade, I think.’
‘I can’t see it well enough to hurt it!’ Hal shouted. ‘It’s like fighting in the dark.’
A noble on the other side of the room, one of the visiting Kingdom lords, screamed and clutched at his cheek as the lash from the other dancer found its mark. He fell to his knees with blood running between his fingers, then his eyes rolled up into his head and he collapsed to the floor. Colour drained from his face, his forehead beaded with perspiration and he seemed to be fighting for breath.
A third death-dancer reached the line of shields protecting the Emperor and was repulsed by the sheer number of blows directed at it. Enough struck that it echoed the warbling cry of the one Hal had wounded and retreated.
Jim watched the frustrating combat, as Hal and Ty and the others defending the monarchs attempted to counter blows from enemies that were at best dancing shadows and at worst nearly invisible. Jim said, ‘We need to see them!’
Franciezka said, ‘I have an idea!’ She turned and for a brief moment thought about dragging the King and Princess Stephane out of the door behind them, until she realized that corridor ended in a terraced garden. The only other way off that terrace was over a low stone wall, then a fifty foot drop to the marshalling yard below.
She ducked behind the throne and made her way through cowering nobles who were trying to stay as far away as possible from the murderous magical beings. A servants’ entrance was hidden behind a tapestry and she ducked through it. It was not an effective escape route for those in the great hall, as it immediately wound down in a spiral to the kitchen three storeys below: there would be a stampede on those stairs as people tried to get out.
She reached the kitchen and found the staff oblivious to the mayhem above as the chief cook oversaw a banquet for over five hundred guests scheduled to begin in less than two hours. Servants were already beginning to organize large trays of delicacies and cups were being arranged for wine service. Finally a baker’s apprentice noticed Franciezka and his eyes widened at the sight of this woman with her hair dishevelled and a large knife in either hand. Before he could speak, she shouted, ‘Flour? Where is the flour?’
The boy pointed as other eyes turned to stare at the intruder. She saw a five pound sack of flour sitting on a large rolling table and another unopened beneath the table. She threw both knives point down into the table and said, ‘Don’t anyone climb those stairs to the great hall until you’ve been told it is safe!’
She grabbed both sacks, one under each arm, ignoring the one that was spilling and hurried back up the stairs. A fit woman, she was nevertheless panting by the time she reached the top. How did the servants manage to make that climb dozens of times during a feast, she absently wondered?
She pushed her way past nobles crowding the entrance, and saw a young woman look at her with wide eyes. As that woman took a step towards her, Franciezka said, ‘Don’t go down there! There are more of them!’
The woman immediately pulled back and screamed. It was hardly noticed in the bedlam. Franciezka reached Jim and said, ‘Cut this one!’ as she dropped the unopened bag at his feet.
She reached into the open bag and took as large a handful of flour in it as she could, then shouted, ‘Hal! Close your eyes!’
Out of breath, perspiration dripping off his brow from dodging and slashing at the invisible creature, Hal shouted back, ‘Are you daft?’
‘Shield your eyes!’ Jim yelled.
Franciezka threw flour in the general direction of the shifting shape and the flour exploded into a white dusty cloud. Suddenly there was an outline Hal could see.
In a fury of blade work, he darted in and started cutting at the creature, retreating when necessary. Then another blade joined his as Ty leapt past Gabriella and stabbed the creature when it turned to confront Hal.
Quickly Hal and Ty forced the closest dancer to retreat, while some of the more bold guardsmen pressed
