The Tower of Fear (45 page)

The room was a deathtrap. Better move to the top of the tower. Their sorceress couldn’t do them much good if he got the Witch and the kid forted up there. All he’d have to do would be sit on the trapdoor. They couldn’t get the leverage to push him off.

He rifled his pack, found analgesic powder, washed it down with water from a small canteen. Bitterness remained in his mouth. He relaxed five minutes, hoping it would start to work fast. He almost drifted off.

He jerked awake. None of that! They wouldn’t get him by default.

He checked the boy’s pulse, afraid he might have whacked the brat too hard. The kid hadn’t stirred. He was all right.

Better get on with it. He could nap afterward.

He took the boy up first. The ladder seemed a mile high. His leg was killing him when he got back down, the pain powder doing nothing at all. He recalled his impulse toward the sinkhole country. Why hadn’t he had the plain damned sense? He had no more brains than that idiot Torgo.

That one cut was leaking again. It wanted rest badly. There was no time. He adjusted his bandages.

He took the Witch up next, limp as a fish. Why the hell couldn’t she help out a little? Dumb bitch wasn’t worth all this.

One more trip to go, his supplies and the stuff she’d need to finish up. He rubbed his leg and again told himself he could lie down afterward.

He did not think he would complete that final climb. He suffered leg cramps. His shoulder muscles tightened into rocky knots. The bleeding worsened. He tore others of his wounds open. He suffered vertigo. He was sure he had done himself permanent damage. But he couldn’t quit. He was what he was, ridden and driven.

The force within triumphed. As always. He completed his climb, dropped his load, closed the trapdoor, for a moment faced into the rain. It hadn’t wakened the woman or boy. He covered the Witch the best he could, though that was only a gesture. Thunder cracked as he settled on the trap. He’d rest and let the analgesic work before he tried to waken the woman.

He glanced up. Hard to tell through the rain but it seemed the clouds were low and moving fast, swirling around the tower.

He lowered his head and closed his eyes. Ten minutes ought to be enough rest.

*   *   *

Zenobel stared at the cage in the great hall. He recalled the place as it had been before Dak-es-Souetta. It had gone to seed. Become shabby. That was sad. Say whatever about Nakar, he had made the citadel Qushmarrah’s glorious crown.

King Dabdahd hustled up. He had the citadel staff besieged in the Witch’s quarters. He said, “They won’t surrender. They won’t even talk.”

“Is she up there?”

“I don’t know. We tried breaking through the wall to get around the spells on the door. I lost two men. They didn’t see her. That doesn’t mean anything.”

Zenobel grunted. “What about those damned Dartars? Any sign of them?”

“None but their dead.”

Zenobel considered the children he had had rounded up. Were they settled down enough to talk sense? He rose from his seat.

Carza trotted up. “We found the Dartars. They’re barricaded in the temple. They broke through a wall to get inside. Should I finish them?”

“You want Fa’tad to kill
us?
”

“Huh?”

He did not know. Neither did King. They had been busy when the news had come. “He sealed the gateway behind us. Bricked it up. Only way we can get out is through the windows. If the drop doesn’t kill us his archers will.”

King went pale. Carza looked bewildered.

“You don’t get it? Al-Akla has done it again, this time to Herod and us both. Bel-Sidek wouldn’t laugh at fools but he’s sure won the right. He warned us.”

Carza just frowned. It surpassed him. “We have a mission, Zenobel. A holy mission. If you won’t carry it out I will.”

“Go ahead. Waste all the lives you want. I don’t care anymore. Nothing we do will change anything now.”

*   *   *

Bel-Sidek did not look around when the Dartar arrived. The nomad was polite. “Fa’tad would like to see you, sir.” The steel wore a velvet mask.

Bel-Sidek took Meryel’s hand. “If I’m to be executed let it be done here where I’ve known my only happiness.”

“Fa’tad has no wish to slay anyone, sir. He said only that he wishes to speak with you.”

Meryel squeezed bel-Sidek’s hand gently. “Go, Sisu. Maybe you can do something yet.”

Bel-Sidek nodded, though he doubted it. Wearily, he followed the Dartar out into the rain. Maybe Fa’tad did just want to talk. He had sent only the one man.

The day was nearly gone. Very little light remained. The clouds hung low above the citadel, turning and churning. He could not get interested. It had been a day as long as forever piled on a week a hundred times as long as that. The end was in sight now. At last.

Qushmarrah was passing into a new age—not that which he and the General had envisioned. “Warrior. Have they finished Nakar yet?”

His companion drew in upon himself. “I can’t say, sir. There’s been no word from our men inside the citadel.” Later, he added, “Nor any from yours.”

“Oh.” That did not sound good. Bel-Sidek eyed those busy clouds for as long as he could take the rain in his face. Nakar’s last hour had come during a ferocious rain, with clouds whirling around the citadel. He had been a prisoner elsewhere then, but … Hadn’t it been something like this? Was this precursive of the resurrection of the Abomination?

Bel-Sidek and the Dartar passed through and walked parallel to a file of bedraggled Herodians being escorted from the Shu. Fa’tad was accepting the surrender of those he had entombed in the labyrinth. Maybe the Eagle was not interested in a total blood baptism.

Bel-Sidek spied General Cado among the captives. Ha. Now the man would know how it had felt for the vanquished after Dak-es-Souetta.

Cado met his eye, recognized him, smiled wanly, winked as though they were fellow conspirators. Bel-Sidek snorted. Coconspirators in defeat. Pawns who had let themselves be manipulated by the old genius of the Khadatqa Mountains. The gulled and downcast.

Whatever else, he thought, you had to admire the Eagle’s daring.

*   *   *

Yoseh was scared again. They had looked everywhere, over and over, and had found no sign of the Witch or child-taker or Arif, no hint of a hidden exit. Every minute fled meant a greater danger.

Nogah observed, “The sorceress probably could find it but she’s too busy making like udders on a bull.” She could not be diverted from the corpses she was cooking. The stench was enough to gag a vulture.

Yoseh said, “Maybe she knows what she’s doing.”

“Like hell. She’s riding with her eyes shut same as the rest of us. What’s keeping the damned veydeen?” The Qushmarrahans had not yet tried to get in.

Mo’atabar made periodic sallies toward the bonfire, to remind the sorceress that she had said the Witch could recall Nakar without his body. She showed no real interest. Yoseh hoped she knew what she was doing.

“They’re here,” said the man posted where they had broken in.

Mo’atabar hustled over, listened, said, “They’re not in any hurry.”

Once they got the carpenter calmed down Nogah decided to stop waiting on the woman. “Aaron. What would you do if you were going to put in a secret exit?”

“Eh?”

“You’re a carpenter. Think like a carpenter. A carpenter probably did the building. Wouldn’t you think?”

The man thought. “I’d use a cabinetmaker. I’d put it where it wasn’t obvious and I’d demand the finest possible joins so nothing would show.”

Yoseh said, “Tamisa told me that’s the kind of stuff you do.”

The carpenter nodded.

Impatient, Nogah snapped, “So prowl around. Think like a cabinetmaker. Show us where some other carpenter might have put a hidden door. The fix we’re in it won’t matter if we tear things up.”

It took only minutes. “Got to be this wardrobe,” the carpenter said. “Best place for it.”

Medjhah ripped the wardrobe apart. Nogah went after Mo’atabar. Mo’atabar came and crawled through the wreckage. “There’s a room back here, all right. But there isn’t anybody in it.”

“There would be a way out,” the carpenter said. “The room is just to buy time.”

The sorceress appeared. She exchanged words with Mo’atabar. Mo’atabar said, “She tells me there are three ways out. One is in the floor, here.” He stomped. “One is in the wall, here.” Thump went a fist. “The other one is in this wall, here. Open them up.”

Medjhah tried brute force again, without luck this time.

“Let me,” the carpenter said. He had pulled himself together. Other than thunder nothing had happened for so long he was starting to hope again. Maybe the sorceress’s lack of haste encouraged him.

It took him just a minute to open the secret doors.

“Good.” Mo’atabar studied the openings. “Kosuth, down you go. Medjhah, you take this one. Yoseh, you take that one. Be careful but don’t waste time. The Living have started in on that wall.”

The sorceress said something, went away. Yoseh hoped she was going to delay the veydeen. He could not worry about them, though. He stared at that little doorway, scared stiff. It barely seemed big enough … Mo’atabar kept talking, did such a good job making it sound routine that he felt shamed by his reluctance. He swallowed, crawled into the hole.

It became an upward shaft immediately, that had to go all the way to the sky, up and up and up, into silence, into darkness like Nakar’s own heart.

It got scarier. After he climbed so far he lost count of rungs, thunder shook the citadel. He felt the vibrations. For a moment he was afraid the place would fall down around him.

He climbed more slowly, conserving his strength. The ringing cleared from his ears—and what at first seemed imagination proved to be a genuine whisper that frightened him more till he realized it had to be rain falling on a surface overhead.

He paused, rested, marshaled his courage, resumed his climb. Three rungs higher his hand closed on slick moisture. It remained sticky when he pulled it away.

The crown of his head bumped something hard and cold. He felt around. Rusty iron? The rain drummed away. It would be thick and heavy.

This was the final test. He could retreat and report and suffer no questions but he would always wonder, was he a Dartar warrior or some cringing veydeen mouse?

He pushed with his head, increased the pressure till the metal gave. Nothing happened. He pushed again, slowly, steadily, till his eyes rose above the edge—and he was face-to-face with someone just a foot away.

He nearly let go. He did squeak. That was the child-taker, lying dead or sleeping in the rain. Nobody could sleep in the rain, could they?

He pushed till his shoulders reached roof level. He saw Arif and the Witch, sprawled in the rain, dead or sleeping, too.

What now?

He reached for his knife, to make sure of the child-taker, then changed his mind and reached for Arif’s ankle. If he could drag the boy over and carry him down …

Something hit him so fast he never saw it coming. He slammed back against the side of the shaft, then fell.

*   *   *

Squeak. Azel remained motionless only because of the watery state of his flesh. Weak as a newborn, he couldn’t betray himself when he wakened.

He cracked an eyelid, saw the Dartar kid from the Shu. That little bastard was everywhere. Haunting him. How the hell had he gotten up here? Azel realized he had rolled off the trapdoor after he’d fallen asleep.

Gorloch or luck gave him the moment he needed and the energy to capitalize. The Dartar turned, reached for the Arif brat, got him by the foot. Azel put everything he had into his punch. The Dartar flew backward, fell, the brat’s shoe flipping after him. “Hope you land on your head, asshole.”

He didn’t have energy enough to stand. The rainwater where he’d lain was red. Clots of blood floated there. Damn! He was bleeding to death. Wouldn’t that be ironic? He rolled into a sitting position atop the trapdoor. Thank Gorloch it had fallen shut. He would not have had the strength to close it had it fallen the other way.

He fiddled with his bandages till he got the bleeding stopped. One more small effort, then he would put down roots.

He eased over to the Witch. “Wake up, woman.” No response.
Whap!
He cracked her cheek with his palm, rocked her head halfway around. “Come on, damn it! This is it. You get on the stick and call up Nakar or kiss your ass good-bye. They know where we’re at and we got nowhere else to hide.” He popped her again. This time he glimpsed a flash of eyeball.

That was it. That was all he had, except an ounce of iron will that let him guide himself as he collapsed, so his torso sprawled across a corner of the trapdoor.

*   *   *

The first blow reached her but the drug held her. The second sent alarums of pain coursing through her. She opened one eye far enough to see her tormentor.

Azel? But how…? She was soaked. She lay in a pool of water. Rain fell upon her still. Thunder stalked overhead. The chill followed the pain inside her, opening channels through which thought and sense began to flow. She gained control as Azel fell as if he had melted.

She shoved her upper body up to the length of her arms, turned her head slowly. Her thoughts did not run crisply but she could reason. And she could remember some of what had been happening around her while the drug ruled her. She understood where she was and why and how she had come to be there and for one moment she actually appreciated Azel and his stubbornness.

She had yielded to weakness, perhaps to defeatism, and had permitted herself too much of the drug. Fool. Maybe she was as crazy as Azel claimed. Maybe she didn’t deserve Nakar back. Maybe she was too weak.

Her body would not support itself. She collapsed. But she resisted the allure of sleep, of escape. The hour had come. Time had run out. Azel had said they knew where she was … Her gaze fell on the boy.

He was asleep. More than asleep. Unconscious. She felt Nakar in there, quiescent, in a twilight of near-awareness, reluctant to come nearer the light.

Ala-eh-din Beyh.

Of course! That was it, as Azel had insisted. Nakar dared not come forward. To do so meant facing the consequences of total defeat. He
had
lost that struggle … Her fault. Her fault completely.