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fighting below, but they were doomed.
"Clear them out!" Tracka ordered, indicating the Brothers. His troops went
after them. They were too panicky to use their sorcerous skills. Tracka told
Gathrid, "Hell of a mess, isn't it? Now they get a shot at kicking the door
in."
"Uhm." Gathrid stepped back outside.
Rogala, with Gacioch hooting him on, Was tottering toward the doorway.
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Bleibel's face appeared over the marble horizon of the veranda. Combat clamor
continued among the Pillars and Victories.
The lower slopes of Galen were carpeted with citizen corpses. The mounds of
dead were only lightly freckled with bodies in Brigade uniform. Sartain would
have much to mourn.
"You lied to me!" Bleibel panted.
"When? I didn't say I'd save the Raftery. I told you I'd get the Brigade to
leave without fighting the Guards. But you wouldn't let me."
"Why did you do this?"
"Because Nevenka Nieroda is running this place."
"The Emperor sent orders to seize you. You have to answer for treason and the
murder of Count Cuneo."
Gacioch guffawed. He made rude remarks concerning the intelligence of a prince
who expected Daubendiek to swear fealty.
Gathrid smiled at the Colonel. "Did he tell you how you were going to arrest
me?"
"Unfortunately, no."
"But, being as stubborn as everyone else, you're determined to get yourself
killed trying."
"Who knows?"
"You're too late to rescue the Raftery. Tracka is cleaning it out. Tell Elgar
that."
"I'm supposed to take Tracka in too. He's Ahlert's most likely successor.
He'll have to answer for Venti-miglia's crimes."
Toal-sword in hand, Tracka tried to push past Gathrid.
"Easy, General. Colonel, did your orders come from Elgar himself? In person?"
"His messengers brought them."
"That's not the same. Doesn't tell me what I need to know. Tell you what. Give
us fifteen minutes. Then we'll come with you."
Tracka protested.
Bleibel muttered, "I don't know...."
"It's better than getting yourself killed, isn't it? All I want is a chance to
find out why someone is so desperate to keep us away from here."
Bleibel surprised Gathrid. "It may mean my head. You've got fifteen minutes.
No longer. I'll do what I have to when they're up."
Thirteen of Gathrid's minutes swifted past without result. He and Tracka swept
through chamber after corpse-choked chamber on level after bloody level. There
were a stunning number of rooms secreted beneath Galen. They contained nothing
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but the mundane. Tapping the walls turned up nothing but solid stone.
"I'm beginning to think you outguessed yourself," Tracka growled. "Or were
misled. That's the woman's style."
"No. There's something here. She doesn't want it found. I'm positive."
The lowest level was a small, dank chamber footing a long, jagged stair.
"This's got to be it," Gathrid said. "It can't just be a dead end. Look
close."
Had the entrance not been left open by Brothers fleeing Tracka's soldiers, the
downstair's itself might have gone undetected.
Tracka found the concealed doorway when he noted scrapes in the slime on the
floor. Rogala then located a trigger mechanism hidden beneath a wrought bronze
sconce.
"We're cutting it fine," Gathrid observed. "Just a minute left."
"You won't get back to Bleibel in time," Rogala grumbled.
A great slab of a door stuttered open. Its rusty hinges howled like a chorus
of singing dragons. Light exploded from the other side.
Gathrid flung Daubendiek ahead of him and charged.
The sole occupant of the chamber was Gerdes Mule-nex. The fat Fray Magister
lay on his back on a stone bench, breathing shallowly. His bloated face was
pale and without character.
"Let me," Rogala said, gesturing them back. He approached the fat man. After
prodding Mulenex with a blunt finger, peeling back eyelids and smelling
Mulenex's breath, he announced, "A Toal. With the demon on vacation."
"That explains a few things," Gathrid said. "And I think I know where the
demon is. Hold it!" Tracka was about to use his blade. The youth pushed it
aside. "She'll know what's happened if you do. We can't let her. Not yet."
Slowly, like a sleepwalker, he eased round Mulenex and stalked toward the
source of the brilliant light.
"Theis, look at this."
Rogala grunted. "No wonder Count Cuneo was pushing us about betraying
Anderle."
Gathrid probed the glow with his left hand. "He knew this was here."
"Undoubtedly. Yes. No wonder."
Gacioch had grown strangely silent. Till now he had been providing a barrage
of unsolicited suggestions. Gathrid frowned. Gacioch silent was more an
attention-grabber than Gacioch with his normal logorrhea.
"Misplaer would have known," Gathrid reasoned. "And Eldracher, Elgar and
Ahlert. This was why the Mindak wanted Sartain so bad. Mulenex probably didn't
know till the end." The youth's fingertips brushed what felt like solid,
polished iron. "The Shield of Drie-brant."
He found the Shield's handgrip and armstraps. Laying Daubendiek aside, he
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