the foyer in a few more steps, regardless. Maldynado wouldn’t count on those jaws being plagued with the same slowness as the legs.
“All right,” Maldynado said, backing farther. “Explosives. Any idea where we can find explosives in a warrior- caste resort?” Books would probably be able to mix something up in the kitchen, but he wasn’t-”What are you doing?” Maldynado barked, his thoughts interrupted by Yara running toward the alligators.
She stopped at the threshold and grabbed one of the heavy oak doors.
“Oh, good idea.” Maldynado darted for the other door.
He expected it to be heavy, but not so heavy it wouldn’t move when he pulled. The shoulder he’d nearly dislocated earlier stabbed him with pain, and he gasped. He gritted his teeth and tugged harder. The door inched away from the wall. Too slow.
Maldynado was about to suggest running into the castle and letting the nude bathers deal with the alligators when the door gave way. Both doors did, snapping shut so quickly Maldynado almost lost his nose. Yara tumbled onto her backside. The doors slammed closed with a thump as one smashed into the lead alligator’s snout.
Basilard waved to a spot on the wall and signed, Switch.
“Steam-powered doors, right,” Maldynado said.
Thuds nearly drowned out his voice. The alligators ramming against the oak. At first, Maldynado didn’t think they’d have a chance at breaking in, but the wood planks shuddered under the assault. It sounded like all four constructs had started banging away.
“Who’s up for finding a back door?” Maldynado asked. “Maybe we’ll stumble across our gear on the way.”
“I just hope you don’t find that hat with the ludicrous feather.” Yara jogged into the courtyard before Maldynado could respond.
Bare feet slapping on the stone floor, Yara veered around benches and potted plants only slightly less densely placed than in the Grotto. Maldynado and Basilard raced after her. She headed for a back wall where a hallway, sets of stairs, and closed doors offered numerous options. She chose the hall, something that might lead to the kitchen perhaps. Kitchens had back doors, didn’t they? For throwing scraps out to dogs or man-eating mechanical alligators?
They found a swinging door at the end. Maldynado peeked inside. A trio of chefs and bakers gaped back at him.
“How do you get out?” Maldynado figured it couldn’t hurt to ask. Meanwhile his comrades checked other doors, only to find them locked.
“You don’t,” a man in a flour-dusted apron said. “You use the garbage chute. Otherwise the gators will-”
An older man shushed him and gave Maldynado a suspicious squint. “Who are you? You don’t look like guests.” He grabbed a butcher knife.
“Just visitors.” Maldynado smiled and shut the door. He looked at the others, hoping they’d found a way out, but Yara and Basilard merely shrugged. “We’ll try another way. I don’t want a fight with the kitchen staff.”
Someone thrust the door open behind him. A glimpse of that butcher knife convinced Maldynado to thrust the door back with enough force to send the chef staggering.
“This way,” Maldynado barked and ran back toward the courtyard. Those stairs ought to take them up to the parapets. If nothing else they could climb down an outside wall.
He lunged out of the hallway, ready to race for stairs to the right, but a man stood there, a forty-year-old flintlock musket pointed at Maldynado’s chest. It was the old fellow they’d seen in the towel. He was wearing clothes now, and an officer’s saber hung from his waist.
“Watch out,” Maldynado said, throwing an arm out to stop the others, even as he skittered back, intending to duck into the hallway.
Someone grabbed Maldynado’s shoulder. The musket fired, but he was too busy being pulled to the floor to worry about it. Basilard leaped over him and barreled into the old man. Maldynado rolled over and jumped to his feet. Basilard had already knocked the fellow down and taken his musket. He stopped at that. Good. They didn’t need to leave a pile of dead resort-goers behind.
“Thanks for the help,” Maldynado said, realizing Basilard had been the one to yank him down before the musket ball found his chest.
Basilard nodded once. What do we do with him?
The white-haired man wasn’t done doing things himself. After a moment of lying quiescent, he tried to hook one of his own legs around Basilard’s to throw him off. In his younger days, he might have managed the move, but Basilard reacted quickly. He used the man’s momentum against him, flipping the old officer over and pinning him to the floor.
Maldynado pointed for Yara to lead the way up the stairs. “Let’s just-”
A bevy of footfalls pounded the hallway floor behind him. The chef with the butcher knife burst around the corner. He’d added a heavy copper skillet to his arsenal. The rest of the kitchen staff-no less than six men-crowded after him.
“There they are!” the chef cried.
“Run,” Maldynado blurted, finishing his sentence.
He used his rifle like a staff to block a surprisingly adroit skillet-knife combination attack. Maldynado stood his ground for a moment, giving Yara and Basilard time to race up the stairs without anyone throwing sharp kitchen utensils at their backs.
After blocking another attack, Maldynado teased out an opening and jammed his rifle butt into the chef’s stomach. As the man doubled over, Maldynado kicked a young dish boy trying to get at his side. Both attackers stumbled back, hindering the rest of the staff.
Maldynado wheeled about and sprinted up the stairs.
“Duck!” Yara yelled when he was halfway up.
No sooner had he obeyed than the butcher knife cracked against flagstones a few steps above him. Basilard fired from up top. Not to kill, Maldynado hoped, but he dared not pause to check. As soon as he burst onto the top, he, Basilard, and Yara took off, racing down a long landing that was-unfortunately-open to the courtyard below. More knives and sharp utensils clanged off the railing and the walls all about them.
“Unbelievable,” Maldynado muttered, pausing to try a door, one of many along the landing. “Only in the empire would the kitchen staff rally to chase off intruders instead of hiding in the pantry.”
Basilard ducked a hurled pan and gave Maldynado a quick nod as he tried another door. Both were locked.
“Here!” Yara flung open the last door.
Maldynado and Basilard ran to join her. The kitchen staff had taken to the stairs and the fastest were surging onto the landing.
Just as Maldynado reached the door and grabbed the jamb, intending to propel himself around the edge, something with the heft of a wrecking ball slammed into his back. He staggered forward, and his face smashed against the doorjamb.
“Cursed ancestors,” he growled.
A marble rolling pin clunked to the floor at his feet.
“Unbelievable,” Maldynado repeated as he darted through the doorway. “Why me? Nobody would throw rolling pins at Sicarius.” He was starting to rethink his decision not to shoot anyone on the kitchen staff.
The door lacked a security bar or a nearby armoire he could shove in front of it, but it did have a lock, albeit the flimsy type made only to keep an honest man honest, not deter a serious intruder. Or determined chefs. Maldynado thunked it into place, hoping it would slow the mob.
“Move! I see security coming!” someone yelled from the direction of the stairs. “They’ll have guns.”
Erg, repeating firearms would make short work of that lock. Maldynado spun, hoping Yara hadn’t led them into a walk-in closet.
A short hallway led away from the door. At first, all Maldynado could see was a chest of drawers against a wall, but a few steps took him into a bedroom brightened by candles. A man and woman were entangled amongst sheets. The candlelight was bright enough to give Maldynado a view of bare breasts; under normal circumstances, he would have stopped to gaze in admiration. As it was, he only noted that the naked couple had no weapons nearby, though with the night he’d had thus far, he wouldn’t be surprised if one of them yanked a dagger out from
