A Dance of Chaos: Book 6 of Shadowdance (41 page)

“My son is safe at home,” she said, but it sounded like even she did not believe it.

“No, he’s not.”

Alyssa motioned for her men to make way. Guessing her intent, Zusa led her so that Alyssa was dangerously close to a dangerous man.

“If this is a lie, I will have my men string you from your innards from the top of a lamppost,” Alyssa said. “Now where is my son?”

The Ash Guild rogue licked his lips, then grinned.

“Follow me,” he said. “And tell your men to ready their swords. They’ll be needed.”

   28   

T
hren finally slowed his run as he neared the explosion caused by one of Muzien’s tiles, and Haern was happy he had. Besides giving Haern a chance to catch his breath, it also meant Thren didn’t plan on just blindly running into what was certainly an ambush.

“You’re not tired, are you?” Thren asked, looking at him sideways.

“I can fight for hours more,” Haern said, and he wasn’t lying. “Worry about yourself.”

Thren shrugged, dismissing the matter as quickly as he’d brought it up. The two were beneath an awning erected before a tannery, momentarily safe from the soft rain. Peering out from underneath, Thren stared at the lingering smoke of the explosion, which continued unabated by the rain.

“If it’s an ambush, he’ll want to spring it when we’re completely surrounded,” Thren said, musing aloud. “That means his men must be hidden so we do not see them on our approach.”

“He’ll also have to be ready from all directions,” Haern added. “There’s no way for him to know where we’ll be approaching from.”

Thren frowned, thinking.

“They’ll be inside at least two different buildings,” he said. “Possibly even the ones that tile just wrecked. I bet they have a few on the rooftops as well, just decoys to make us think the ambush isn’t as heavily manned as it is.”

“You act as if you can read his mind.”

Thren glared at him.

“I was his pupil for many years, Watcher. I have a feel for how he thinks. Right now he’s hoping we come rushing in across the rooftops, kill the few up top, and then drop down to the street to investigate. Which means we’re going to do the opposite.”

Haern joined him in looking at the smoke, which rose on the other side of two more buildings.

“And what is that?” he asked.

Thren drew his swords, stretched his back.

“Stay low, stay together, and scour the nearby buildings while leaving the scouts up top alive and unaware.”

Haern couldn’t help himself.

“And what if Muzien anticipated you seeing through his plan and prepared an ambush for us doing just that?”

Thren let out a snort.

“Then he’s the god he pretends to be, and trying to outthink him will be like chasing our own tails. Forgive me for not buying into the elf’s legend. He’s not perfect, he’s not infallible. That’s what tonight is all about, Watcher. Tonight we prove that bastard’s mortal.”

Haern drew his swords, and he saluted his father.

“To noble goals,” he said, grinning.

Together they ran, crouching low to keep their profiles as minimal as possible. Upon crossing the street, Haern slid around the side of the tall building, back pressed against it. Given the darkness and the rain, seeing him would be all but impossible. Above him was a window, and he turned about, put a boot on Thren’s offered hands, and then leaped to catch its windowsill. Pulling up, he crouched on the windowsill and peered inside. The room was incredibly dark, but the magic of Haern’s hood let him see as if soft starlight bathed the interior.

He was in an upstairs storeroom filled with crates stuffed with various metal bits and screws. On the other side was a second window, and peering out of it with his shoulder pressed against the wall was the dark outline of one of Muzien’s thugs. Carefully Haern crept down from the window and then slowly crossed the distance. Given the little light coming from the windows, he knew only sound could give him away, and between the boots Brug had made him and his own lengthy training, no sound would be made. Bathed in darkness, he felt his Watcher persona stirring. Tonight was a night for murder, an art he had long perfected.

Once he was a few feet away, Haern drew his dagger and held his breath. So far the man still peered out the window, no doubt hoping to catch a glimpse of Thren or the Watcher. Now much closer, Haern could see he was incredibly young, maybe fifteen at most. Strangely enough, he was very softly whistling, no doubt thinking the storm would overwhelm the noise. The song was even cheerful, not nervous as Haern had first assumed. To kill him was to end the song. Haern knew this should give him pause, perhaps guilt, but instead the confidence of it angered him further. All across the city, men and women were dying. At the gates soldiers fought for their lives. In the streets the old guilds were rising up, slaughtering the new that had taken their place. Yet here, in this hollowed section of the city, members of the Sun waited for him and Thren like it was just a game? As if victory were already assured?

Sickened, and with his pride wounded, Haern burst into movement. He clamped a hand over the man’s face, then jammed the dagger into his back. The whistle turned into a gargle. Yanking out the dagger, Haern thrust it again and again, each stab more vicious than the last as he felt the Watcher persona fully take control. Dragging the limp body away from the window, Haern gently let it drop, then returned to the window he’d entered from. Thren remained outside it, patiently waiting.

Leaning out, Haern offered him his hand. Thren leaped, caught it, and then climbed up with his feet as Haern pulled.

“Just one?” Thren whispered once he was inside.

“Up here, anyway,” Haern whispered back. “The stairs are over there. Can you see them?”

“I can’t,” Thren said. “But I don’t need to. Lead the way, and I’ll follow.”

To the stairs they went, Haern realizing that his father had grabbed the bottom of his cloak and was using it to guide himself. At the top of the stairs, Haern peered down and saw that someone must have lit a small fire or torch given the way red-and-yellow light flickered against the wall, casting shadows. None appeared to be of men or women, leaving Haern with no clue as to how many were downstairs. Moving down three steps, the farthest he could go before he might be visible to those downstairs, he tensed for action. They’d need to act fast, just in case the numbers were far greater than they expected.

Wait
, he mouthed to Thren, who was one step behind him. Just in case the light from downstairs was not enough, he held out his right hand, blocking Thren’s way. Tensed and ready to run, Haern waited, knowing it shouldn’t be long. When lightning flashed, filling both floors with momentary light, Haern rushed down the steps two at a time. Thunder rumbled, and combined with the rain, he hoped the noise might mask their descent. Upon hitting the bottom, he pivoted, leaping with sabers leading.

Four members of the Sun were gathered in a store, two men waiting at the door across from Haern, two more holding crossbows as they peered out the nearby windows. A lantern burned from a hook in the center of the ceiling, casting amber light across the two rows of shelves. It seemed they had not heard their approach, and Haern grinned with grim amusement at their intense concentration. As he crossed the room, he hopped atop the shelf, which was pleasantly thick and sturdy. A spare glance behind showed Thren climbing the other, and together they crouched along. Halfway there, they stopped when Thren was directly beneath the lantern.

On your signal
, Thren mouthed as he reached up to touch the lantern. Haern nodded, and he could not help himself. He counted to three, then let out a soft whistle, the same song as the man upstairs. Out went the lantern, flooding the store with darkness.

“Shit,” he heard one of them cry, coupled with the
twang
of a crossbow string. Haern heard it strike the wood of the far wall, no doubt somewhere near the staircase. They didn’t realize how high up they were, how fast they rushed toward them. Thren leaped first, and Haern followed, the two descending upon the four before they could realize the danger they were in. Haern extended his legs, his heels slamming into the chest of the other crossbowman. The body crumpled beneath him. Just to be sure, Haern jammed his sabers downward until they both hit flesh. The man to his right swung at Haern’s face, but he dipped below, yanking free his sabers and then whirling, both blades cutting across his foe’s chest and waist. As the rogue cried out in pain, Haern completed his turn, bringing his sabers back down, this time across the neck and shoulders.

The man crumpled, and having finished his opponents, Haern looked to see Thren having done likewise, one of his short swords still sticking out of the back of a Sun member lying facedown beside the window.

“Did they hear us?” Thren whispered. Haern almost admired how quickly he could put the dead out of his mind, always focused on the task at hand.

“I’m not sure,” Haern whispered. They’d only allowed a single cry of pain. Swiping clean his sabers on a dead man’s coat, he leaned against the wall and peered out the window. He saw only an empty street, the two buildings on the other side appearing dim and empty. Not far to his left was the destruction left by the exploded tile, the street turned into a crater, the nearby buildings crumpled into ruin. They, too, were dark. The realization made Haern’s nerves tingle.

“This was the only one with a lantern,” Haern said.

Thren caught his meaning immediately.

“Drawn like moths,” he said. “Upstairs, now.”

This time without need for stealth, they ran as fast as they could, and by the time Haern set foot on the bottom stair he heard the door to the store bang open. A crossbow bolt thudded into the wall behind him as he followed Thren into the upstairs storeroom. The windows both had grappling hooks attached to them from the outside, but so far no one had made the climb.

“Take the windows,” Thren said. “I’ll hold the stairs.”

“Sure, claim the easy job,” Haern said, rushing the window to his left. As a woman grabbed hold of the sill and started to pull herself up, Haern took advantage of his momentum and leaped into a kick. His right heel slammed into her chest while she was still halfway inside, and against such force she could not maintain her grip. With a cry she fell back outside, returning to the rain and the dark. Landing on his side, Haern ignored the jolt to his elbow, rolled to his feet, and then leaped to the other window. An ugly man with the four-pointed star on his chest hopped into the room, and he drew his daggers just before Haern tore into him, making a mockery of the man’s defenses. Two vicious hits, and the man staggered back to the window. Feinting a thrust to put him out of position, Haern cut across his groin, the pain breaking whatever concentration the man had had. When he instinctively doubled over in pain, Haern uppercut him with the butt of his saber, then stabbed. His sabers buried themselves halfway to the hilt in the man’s chest, and with a kick, Haern sent him tumbling out the window to the ground below.

Haern was tempted to cut at the rope of the grappling hook but knew he had no time. Rushing to the other window, he caught sight of Thren battling two at once, using the limited space and his height advantage to keep them bottlenecked at the top of the stairs. Trusting him to hold, Haern engaged the two Suns who had made it inside. They stood shoulder to shoulder, trying to form a defensive perimeter to protect the rest who climbed. Despite how young they looked, each had seven rings in his left ear.
Skilled for such youth
, Haern realized. The Sun Guild was throwing its very best at them in one last-ditch attempt at victory.

That number stops at seven
, Haern thought as he spun. With such little light, he knew the twirling of his cloak would be an indecipherable jumble of gray and black. They tensed, unsure where his attack would come from and not knowing he had fallen to his knees.

Swiping sabers wide each way, he jammed the blades through their boots and into the tender flesh just below their shins. He yanked the weapons free as he pulled back, spraying blood across the floor. The two unable to evenly brace their weight, Haern assaulted the one on the right, beating him away from the window with a flurry of slashes. When the other tried to aid him, Haern immediately switched targets, parrying a thrust high and then kicking him in the stomach. The window now unblocked, Haern pivoted, stabbed the throat of a third still trying to climb through, and then returned his attention to the one on the right. One hand pushed aside the frantic attempt to block, the other plunged a saber into the man’s chest. As he dropped, Haern left the saber embedded, drew a dagger from his belt, and then flung it across the room. He’d hoped merely for a distraction, but luck was with him, the throw embedding the dagger in the eye of a man pulling himself up from the other window. The body slumped over, half in, half out.