Shadow Chaser (35 page)

“There’s someone there,” I said, stating the absolutely obvious.

“You think I don’t know that? How easy do you think it was to steal that cat from the fat cook?”

Why hadn’t I realized that the kitchen would be working? The cooks in houses like this rarely went to bed. One kept the fire going in the hearth, another one decided what delicacies to prepare for Balistan Pargaid this fine morning, and another cooked for the guests.… With all this fuss and bother, I’d completely forgotten about that.

“Then why in the name of darkness did you bring me here?”

“You asked me to, so I did. And don’t you look at me like that, Dancer in the Shadows! As if I didn’t know you’ve got three little bottles of muck for putting people to sleep in that bag of yours! Or are you just too plain cheap to use them? You carry that stuff around for much longer, and it’ll go sour!”

One of Kli-Kli’s little weaknesses is that he likes to rummage through other peoples’ things while the owner isn’t there. So it’s not surprising that the goblin knew all about the contents of my bag.

I had to start clinking the bottles about, looking for the right one. Then I opened the door and flung the bottle in, catching a brief glimpse of the cooks’ startled faces before I slammed the door shut again. There was an ominous-sounding
oomph!

I’m afraid Count Balistan Pargaid will have to go without breakfast this morning.

“And now what?”

“We wait.”

“Now accept it, Harold. Without my help you’d never have got out of here alive.”

“Okay. And now shut up!”

“Oh, how serious we are! And how fierce,” the goblin muttered to himself. “Listen, Harold,” he snapped after a short pause, “we can’t wait any longer. We really can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because,” Kli-Kli grunted, and pointed behind me.

My old friend the imperial dog stood at the far end of the corridor. His face looked a bit battered, somehow. The look he gave us wasn’t exactly beaming with benevolence, either.

“It looks as if he didn’t catch the cat,” Kli-Kli said.

The dog came dashing at us, taking huge bounds. The goblin squealed like a five-year-old girl who’d just found a live mouse on her plate.

“Hold your breath!” I shouted.

We tumbled into the kitchen and slammed the door shut right in the dog’s face. The beast responded to this dirty trick by barking deafeningly. Kli-Kli slammed home the bolt and ran along the line of tables and hot stoves, jumping over the bodies of the sleeping servants.

The remains of the sleepy fumes were still swirling around on the floor, and I tried not to breathe. Kli-Kli pushed open the door at the other end of the kitchen, and we found ourselves outside.

“Well, he really went wild!” Kli-Kli exclaimed admiringly. “I wonder what’s going to happen to us if he manages to break out?”

I could hear the barking even from there.

“Someone’s bound to come to check why the count’s dog is making such a racket. We need to clear out as soon as possible. Move it!”

We had to run across to the park in short bursts, hiding from the guards in the shadows and the bushes. Kli-Kli almost ran straight under the feet of one of the guards, and I just managed to save the goblin from disaster at the very last moment.

The gentle whispers of the night welcomed us into the dark park, with its sleeping trees.

“Where are the others?” Kli-Kli whispered, turning his head right and left.

“Let’s get to the wall, we’ll figure things out there.”

When the count found out the Key was missing, he’d be furious—and that’s putting it mildly. As for the way Lafresa will feel, I won’t even try to say—she let the Master down again, so now she would be in really hot water.

Egrassa met us halfway to the wall.

“Is the job done?”

“Yes.”

The elf gave a call like a night bird. There was an answer from somewhere beyond the trees.

“Let’s pull out.”

When we reached the wall, Arnkh and Alistan had already clambered over it, and Ell was waiting for us with his bow at the ready.

“The goblin first.”

Egrassa jumped up onto the wall. I tossed the goblin up, and the elf caught him and passed him into the arms of the men standing on the other side. Then it was my turn. I jumped, and Egrassa and Ell pulled me up. When Little Bee saw me, she whinnied in greeting. I took the Key out and tossed it to Alistan. He caught it and nodded.

“Well done, thief.”

Oho! That was the first time I’d ever heard a note of approval in his voice.

“We have to get clear of Ranneng tonight,” the count said, striking his horse with his heels to set it moving.

I offered up thanks to Sagot. In the few days we had spent in this city, I had learned to hate it with all my heart.

10

THE BLACK RIVER

By my reckoning, it was only four in the morning, at the latest, but the Learned Owl was abuzz with preparations. We rode into the yard of the inn to find Hallas and Deler arguing furiously as they loaded up the packhorses for the road.

“Harold, I knew you could do it!” said Uncle, giving me a friendly slap on the shoulder.

Thanks to the elfin shamanism, the wound in the sergeant’s arm, where it had been hit by a crossbow bolt, was now completely healed.

“Well, I didn’t,” I said.

“Take it,” said Miralissa, handing me the Key. “It’s best if you have it.”

The last time she had tried to give me the artifact to keep, I had refused, but now … Maybe it really was best to carry it around with me.

Without saying a word, I hung the Key round my neck and tucked it under my clothes.

“Lafresa tried to break the bonds, but she couldn’t manage it,” I told the elfess.

“That was to be expected. It’s not that easy to break the bonds with the Dancer in the Shadows. The Master still does not know that the goblin prophecies have started coming true.”

“So you believe in all that nonsense our jester spouts?” I asked sourly.

“Why not?” asked the elfess, tossing her braid back over her shoulder. “So far his prophecies have not misled us.”

Uncle walked across to us.

“Milord Alistan, Tresh Miralissa … Everything’s ready, we can start.”

“Good. Master Quidd!”

“Yes, Lady Miralissa?” said the innkeeper, hurrying up.

“Have you done everything?”

“Yes, exactly as you told me.” Quidd started counting off his tasks on his fingers. “I’ve sent the servants home for two weeks, taken all my relatives out of the city, I’m closing down the inn, and will leave soon myself. I never saw you, or rather, I saw you, but I have no idea what you were doing, I’m too unimportant…”

“Precisely, Master Quidd. Don’t delay, leave as soon as possible; you could get caught in the backlash. Take this for your trouble.”

The innkeeper accepted the purse full of coins and thanked her effusively.

“Allow me to give you some advice, Lady Miralissa. Better leave by the Muddy Gates, they are never closed for the night, and for a coin the guards will forget that you were ever there.”

“Well then, we’ll do that, and now—good-bye!”

Quidd bowed once again, wished us a safe journey, and went back into the inn to conclude his final pieces of business.

“For a coin they’ll forget us, but for two they’ll remember us only too well,” I said, not talking to anyone in particular.

“Good thinking, thief. Let Master Quidd think that we will leave via the Muddy Gates. That won’t do any harm to him, or to us. But we’ll try to leave the city through the Festival Gates.”

Bass was sitting on the porch and watching our preparations curiously. The darkness take me, I’d completely forgotten about him.

“Your horse,” said Ell, holding out a bridle to Snoop.

“Thank you, but I place more faith in my own feet. I’ll walk home. Harold, can I see you for a moment? I need to have a word.”

Ell blocked his way.

“You’ll have plenty of time for talking. You’re going with us.”

“With you?”

“With us?” I gasped. “Why in the name of darkness should he go with us? That’s the last thing we need right now!”

“You and I are in complete agreement there, Harold. I also think your friend should be left here. Preferably buried under the pigsty. But Tresh Miralissa thinks otherwise.”

“Curses!” I exclaimed loudly. I didn’t really like the idea of traveling in the same group as Bass. But I definitely didn’t want him to be killed.

“It’s very simple, Master Bass,” said the elfess from the House of the Black Moon. “We simply cannot leave you here.”

“You’ll start gossiping,” Ell went on. “And we don’t want that.”

“I promise I’ll be as silent as the grave.”

“You men make lots of promises, but you don’t keep many of them. But you’re quite right; if you decide to stay, you’ll be exactly as silent as the grave.…”

No more explanations were required—the choice was a journey on horseback with us, or a crooked elfin blade in the throat.

“Harold! You say something to them!”

“I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do,” I said, shaking my head regretfully. “I think it will be best for everyone if you go with us.”

Miralissa was right, even if Snoop didn’t blurt out the truth on his own, the count’s men could find him. To the elfin way of thinking, it was simpler just to kill him, but since I put in a word for him and he’d helped us, the dark elves made an exception.

“This is insane! It must have been the Nameless One who prompted me to get involved with your gang!” Bass said, and spat angrily, realizing that he had no way out and now he would have to share our journey with us. “And where are we going?”

“You don’t need to know that, man. Get into the saddle and keep your mouth shut. And if you get any ideas about trying to escape, remember—I’ll be right there beside you.”

Ell had taken a very great “liking” to my friend from the first moment they met.

“This is what I get for giving someone a helping hand!” the cardsharp exclaimed, still furious as he climbed up onto the horse. I must say, he did that rather clumsily.

“Don’t take it to heart, it could have been worse,” I consoled him.

Little Bee reached her muzzle out to me, looking for a dainty tidbit, but I didn’t have anything in my pockets and just shrugged.

“Here,” said Marmot, handing me an apple.

The horse gobbled down the treat and gave me a good-natured sideways glance, looking for more.

“Harold!” said Kli-Kli as he rode up to me, looking like a little hummock on the back of his huge black steed. “Do you think you could give me back my medallion?”

“Ah, of course.” I’d forgotten about Kli-Kli’s little knickknack. “Here. Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.” The goblin hung the trinket round his neck. “Right then, ready for the road?”

“No.”

“I understand,” the jester said with a laugh. “Nights spent out in the open air and gruel brewed up by Hallas aren’t what you like best, then?”

I didn’t get a chance to answer, because just then Deler appeared, cursing the green goblin to the heavens: “Kli-Kli! Was it you who took the last bottle of wine?”

“Harold, I think I’ll get started now,” the jester said hastily. “No, I didn’t take anything! What would I want with your Asmina Valley?”

“Then how do you know what it’s called?” the dwarf asked, squinting at him suspiciously.

“Oh, it just came to me.”

“Kli-Kli, stop … stop, I tell you! Ah, you thieving little squirt!”

*   *   *

We rode through the Festival Gates without running into any kind of trouble. The sleepy guards swung the gates open for us as obligingly as they could manage and let us out of the city, without asking a single question about the reasons for our hasty departure in the night.

The gold handed to the corporal worked better than any official charters with the seal of the city council.

We covered the distance between Ranneng and the Iselina in the next two days, galloping at a furious pace all the way, in order to put as much distance as possible between us and any pursuit sent out by Count Balistan Pargaid.

The main road we rode along was very busy. There were travelers and artisans hurrying to Ranneng and away from Ranneng, and strings of carts carrying all sorts of things to be sold. We came across a village about every league, so our squad didn’t have to spend the night in an open field.

Bass was gloomy. He had either Ell or Uncle behind him all the way. Luckily, my old friend didn’t think of trying to escape—he realized what the risks were. When I asked if Snoop was really going to go all the way to Hrad Spein with us, Miralissa said she would find somewhere to put him.

“There are many guard posts and fortresses on the border. He can wait there until we come back, and then he can go anywhere he wants.”