perpetrated upon her. She might be a godling, but the flesh and heart was that of a young girl. Though she was stricken by the bloodshed, he suspected it also helped return a part of what was stolen from her. Blood for blood.
“Come,” he said softly. “We must clear from here.”
She nodded. She kept one hand in his. But her eyes were on his chest. She pointed to the black print there.
“You also carry something with you,” she said. “I can see it stir.”
Tylar stared down at the mark. It seemed no more than tattooed flesh. Plainly her eyes saw more than his did. As she could see Pupp, her sight must also allow her to peer more deeply into him. Uncomfortable with that, he shifted his shirt to cover his mark.
She glanced to his eyes. “Does it make you any less a man?”
Tylar met her gaze, knowing she wondered the same of herself. He again saw the age behind those young eyes. He knew they deserved an honest answer, rather than one that falsely comforted.
“I don’t know.”
Dart kept behind the others on the stair. The occasional crossbow bolt struck the stones and rattled at them.
“It’s not much of a plan,” Tylar said.
“And we’re not much of an army,” the bearded man answered.
Tylar sighed. Dart watched him, sensing an odd connection to him. She remembered his arms around her, his sweat. She had feared the godslayer when she had first heard about the murder in the Summering Isles. Now she wanted him close. Even Pupp sniffed at his heels, hovering around him.
Dart sat on a step, arms tight around her knees. The terror of the rookery had ebbed with each step down from above. She knew the slaughter was justified, but she had yet to balance the horror of the act with the gut- level satisfaction she also felt.
Laurelle also remained quiet, staring without a blink. She kept to Dart’s side, but she did not offer her hand as before.
Dart knew her friend was still seeing Paltry torn asunder by the fiery Pupp. Though the act saved them both, the blood was hard to clear from one’s eyes.
“We must open the stairs,” Rogger repeated. “It’s the only way.”
“Fine. Let’s try it. But it still seems too simple to work.”
“The more complicated a plan, the more likely it will fail,” Master Gerrod countered.
With no other argument, the group retreated up the stairs, winding around a bend and out of direct sight from the lower landing. Only Rogger remained below.
The bearded man cupped his mouth and shouted. “Dark knight,” he called. Dart was startled by the bass tenor bursting forth from his thin frame. “Retreat to the healer’s cell! We’ll hole up there until nightfall!”
With those words and much clatter of boots, Rogger ran several steps down the hallway in the direction of Paltry’s room, then kicked his boots into his hands and ran barefooted back to the landing and up to them.
Tylar simply shook his head at the simple diversion.
Rogger kept a watch at the bend in the stairs.
A few more crossbow bolts cracked up to them.
Rogger ducked back around. “Here they come,” he mouthed.
Whispers and the tread of boots sounded.
“Door’s shut at the other end,” one of the guards called from the landing.
“Get those axes up here,” another answered. “Now’s our chance to flush the bastards.”
More commotion and the trot of boots followed. Guards raced from the landing and down the hallway. Upon reaching the far door, one of the men shouted back, “I can hear them inside!”
A final rush of guards pounded past the landing below. After a moment of silence, Rogger and Tylar both peeked around the bend.
“Way’s clear,” Tylar said, sounding vaguely bothered that the plan had succeeded. “There’s sure to be a few strays on the stairs, but nothing we shouldn’t be able to handle. We push all the way to the streets and away.”
They fled silently. The two knights, Yaellin and Kathryn, led the way, utilizing the shadows. With the guards focused on the healer’s door, their party slipped past the landing without being spotted. As they descended, the crash of an ax into wood echoed behind them.
They did not have much time until their ruse was discovered.
They raced downward.
As Tylar had guessed, a few guards still manned the stairs, but Yaellin and the castellan swept down upon them, shrouded in shadows. The guards were swiftly dispatched and left sprawled on the stairs.
They had no time to mourn their acts. There was no telling the innocent from the guilty. But all of Myrillia was at stake.
Cringing at each death, Dart fled with the others, Laurelle at her side.
Rogger dropped back to Dart and held something in his hand. “You left this behind.”
Dart stared at the black blade. It was the cursed dagger Yaellin had given her. She had thought it lost forever. If she’d had it earlier… with Paltry…
Rogger winked at her. “As a thief, I know better than to leave a weapon behind.”
Dart took the blade with a nod of thanks and returned it to her sheath.
They descended floor after floor.
A shout erupted as they crossed one floor’s landing. Dart turned to see a tall man in the neighboring hall. He was dressed in the gold and crimson of the castillion guard, but from the finery of his dress, he was clearly the captain of this guard.
Before the captain could shout a second time, Rogger threw a dagger. It struck the man in the throat and tossed him back, gurgling. His fall revealed a girl behind him.
Dart and Laurelle met her gaze. The girl’s guilt was plain.
Here was the one who had alerted the guards, who had betrayed them.
Margarite.
Before a word could be spoken, Master Gerrod hurried Dart and Laurelle down the final two flights. They broke into the open courtyard. A handful of guards were posted here, but they were too few to block their escape through the back gate and out to the alleys beyond.
Shouts followed, but they quickly faded away among the maze of alleyways and side streets.
Laurelle glanced to Dart. The pain of Margarite’s betrayal still shone brightly in Laurelle’s eyes.
Friends had become enemies. Whom could they trust?
At last Laurelle reached for Dart again.
Dart took her hand, gladly, gratefully.
It would have to be enough.
23
Releasing hold of the scaling rope, Tylar dropped to the soil beside Kathryn and Gerrod. The tree limbs overhead creaked and shivered from the winds gusting over the crumbled wall of ancient stones. The sky had darkened with lowering clouds. The air smelled wet and heavy.
A storm was coming.
Tylar stepped aside as Yaellin flew down a second rope with the two girls. Dart carried Pupp under one arm. She had used a touch of her blood to give him substance, so the wall would not separate them again. Landing, Dart lowered her strange companion and stood. As Pupp faded, neither child looked pleased to find themselves back in the Eldergarden.
