as a fist impacted his ribs.
Eligio had no sense of humor. “When you reach a pool,” he said, “you’re at the city, so keep your heads down. The river enters through five tunnels under the wall. They’re closed at the city end by gratings, and the current is strong enough to pin an extrinsic against them to drown. Understand now why I wouldn’t let your sister come with you, my lord Orlad?”
“You are starting to make sense.”
“Middle grating has been cut. Can you imagine what that cost? Dive, rasp until you’re close to drowning, then battleform to swim back out against the current, surface, recover, repeat. Again and again, all night long, every night for a thirty. Don’t betray this to the Vigaelian scum!”
“Brave men. Were you one of them?”
“No. Had friends who drowned doing it, though. Now, listen! The middle one of the five! At the bottom of the grating! Retroform, because the gap is narrow and there are sharp edges that can rip you. You’ll need your head more than flippers there. We don’t call this the Heroes’ Gate for nothing. After you’re through, float until you see the triple fountain on the right bank. It’s an easy landmark, in the grounds of the palace. Can you tell right from left in battleform?”
“Half the time,” Orlad said.
“Then you’d better be human. If your brother hasn’t left clothes at the fountain, you’d best come back here and try again tomorrow. Do not try to leave downstream. There’s knives on the weir there. Leave by the same way you got in. Broken pot at the fountain means danger. Any questions?”
Waels said, “How many men have entered Celebre this way?”
“How should I know? None from here ever came back to tell me.”
“I was afraid of that.”
Orlad removed his sandals and chlamys, handed them to Eligio. Not ready to enter the river, he sat down in his collar and studied the dark rushing water. Excitement and disbelief fizzed through his veins. He was certainly going into extreme danger, but he was also going to change his life. He was going to lay claim to the coronet wearing a rebel’s collar, while Stralg was still in nominal control of the city.
He realized that Eligio had gone when Waels sat down close and put an arm around him. The night was far from cold, but the contact was welcome.
Orlad said, “I’ve never been so scared in my life.”
“ You, scared? Never!”
“Scared peeless. This is not like King’s Grass. Then I knew I was going to die because my lord had set the hunt on me. I was just so bloody-eyed mad that I had no time to be frightened. I wanted to kill as many as I could before they killed me. This is different. If we have to fight at all, we’ll have failed.”
“A man about to meet his mother for the first time is entitled to feel nervous,” Waels said tactfully.
“You not scared?” Orlad asked.
“I’m always scared. I just follow you and trust you. If you can do it, whatever it is, then I must do it to be worthy of you. Much easier.”
That made it worse. How could he drag Waels into mortal peril just to further his own ambitions?
“Buddy… I want to say… if this doesn’t work out for both of us… I’m very grateful. You’ve taught me so many things-love, loyalty, friendship.”
“We discovered them together.”
“You don’t have to come with me tonight.”
“Yes I do.”
“That’s what I mean. Thanks.” Pause… “Waels?”
“Orlad?”
“You do not have to come with me! I’m only doing this because I don’t want Fabia staking her claim while I’m not around.”
“Nonsense. You’re taking me home to meet your parents.”
Orlad exploded in laughter. Waels returned the punch he owed him. The laughter turned into a wrestling match and they rolled down the bank together into the river.
No Hero had ever managed to swim up the waterfall at Nardalborg, although many had tried. (In winter it froze and the garrison held climbing races on it instead.) The Puisa seemed pleasantly warm by comparison. A standard amphibious warbeast was shaped much like a seal, a black seal in the Florengian case, but it would be folly to waste so much energy when they had a long way to go. Orlad contented himself with webbing his hands and feet and closing off his nostrils. He adopted a leisurely stroke that he could keep up for a couple of pot-boilings if he had to. He could feel Waels moving in the water at his side. Once in a while their heads would break surface together and flash toothy smiles.
He was surprised when the current changed. He surfaced and looked up at the towering walls of Celebre. The pool, already? Then a hand caught his arm. Waels retroformed beside him, with a finger on his lips for silence. He put lips to Orlad’s ear.
“We have company!”
For a moment they drifted together and then Waels pointed downward and sank. They submerged together, holding hands, moving as little as necessary until they reached the bottom and could take hold of weeds as tethers, to stop them floating back up. Starlight failed to reach down there, so far as human eyes could see, but a Hero’s eyes were negotiable. In a moment Orlad made out the faint glow of the surface. He saw fish… driftwood… and then a line of dark shapes heading toward the city. He wondered how Waels had known.
Soon after that the two strangers surfaced in some reeds near the shore. “Florengians?” Waels whispered.
“Think so. Yes. Not Stralg, then. Mutineer didn’t tell us he kept a force in the city.”
“Maybe it’s new.”
“Maybe it is.” Orlad wondered about treachery, but he could have been captured much more easily at Montegola. “Let’s go and see what’s happening. If we’re parted, we’ll meet at the triple fountain. If you find a broken pot there, head straight back to Eligio’s.”
OLIVA ASSICHIE-CELEBRE
hurried along Wheelwrights’ Alley with her cloak clutched tight so that the hood concealed her face. Every day she came to the Vigaelians’ barracks close to sunset, because Huntleader Purque was almost always there at that time. None of the other ice devils would speak civilly to her. He would, although he would not answer her summons. She had to come to him.
She uncovered her head as she stepped through the open door. The room was dingy, stinking of urine and dogs, just a vestibule with a few ramshackle benches and a barred window. Three ice devils were sitting there, growling in their guttural speech and gnawing on meaty ribs. The floor was half covered with mangy street curs waiting for their turn at the bones.
One Hero looked up at her and said something he thought was funny.
Another, wearing a flankleader’s sash, gestured at the inner door. “Go in. He wants you.”
Her heart jumped-she would have said it leaped and sank at the same time, were that possible. Purque had news for her? Good or bad? She stepped carefully between dogs. The hall beyond was where the Werists exercised, and she was relieved to see it deserted, because they usually did so naked and used that as an opportunity for more coarse humor at her expense. She crossed to the huntleader’s room and found him there, talking with a couple of his men. In contrast to the general squalor of the rest of the barracks, his quarters were clean and fully furnished with fine-quality chairs, no doubt looted from their legal owners. He gestured and the men jumped up and left. Oliva closed the door. He did not suggest she sit down.
“You have news of my son?” she demanded.
He shook his head. Sitting with his half leg propped up on a second chair as if it hurt, Purque looked wearier and older than usual, but certainly no wearier and older than she felt. It was almost two sixdays since Chies had disappeared. If he lived, she should have received a call for ransom by this time.
