The streets were filled with the dead and dying. Some victims, caught in the fiery breath of the dragons, had been reduced to lumps of charred flesh, unrecognizable as human. Others had been cut down by swords, shot with arrows, or spitted on spears. Bodies of men, women, and children lay in pools of blood that mingled horribly with the melting snow. The gutters of Tarsis ran red.
Some people were still alive, but to judge by their tortured screams they were the unlucky ones. Some were still fighting, some had managed to escape into the hills, and some had found safe hiding places where they hunkered down in terror, afraid to breathe too loudly lest they be discovered.
Kitiara had seen dead bodies before and she stepped over and around them, feeling neither pity nor compassion, paying them little heed. The baaz who accompanied her had been among those who were in the city prior to the attack and they knew where the Red Dragon Inn was located. They led Kit, who had lost her way in the smoke and the rubble, to her destination, hoping to get rid of her as quickly as possible and get back to their fun.
Arriving at the inn—or what was left of it—Kitiara ordered her troops to halt. This street was oddly quiet compared to other streets. No roving gangs, no looters. The fires had been put out. The inn was in ruins, the upper stories smoldering. No one was about. The spies she’d planted here were nowhere in sight.
Kitiara pulled down the scarf she’d tied over her nose and mouth to keep out the smoke, thinking she’d give a yell to see if anyone answered. Before she could call out, however, smoke flew down her lungs, and she could do nothing for a few moments except cough and curse Toede.
By this time, she had been seen and recognized. A shadow detached itself from a building and came strolling over to her. It was a sivak draconian and at first she thought he was one of hers, but then she noted the sivak wore the insignia of the Red Dragonarmy.
“Where is Malak?” Kit demanded.
“Dead,” said the strange sivak laconically. “A red torched him by accident. Dumb-ass dragon,” he added in a mutter, then, straightening his shoulders, he saluted. “Malak relayed your orders regarding the assassins to me, Highlord, and since he was dead and there was no one left but baaz”—the sivak made a disdainful gesture—“I took command.”
“So what is going on here?” Kitiara asked, looking again around this part of the city that was oddly quiet, a haven of peace in a storm of chaos.
“I deployed the troops at both ends of the street, my lord,” the sivak replied. “I figured you’d want the area around the inn cordoned off until you caught the felons, especially since there’s money to be made off them,” he added, as a seeming afterthought.
“Good idea,” Kitiara said, eying the sivak with more interest. “Have you captured any of those on the list?”
“Some escaped on griffons—”
“I know that!” Kit interrupted impatiently. “What of the others? Are they alive?”
“Yes, Highlord,” the sivak answered. “Come with me.”
The sivak led the way down a street filled with rubble. Not a building was left undamaged. Kit had to climb over heaps of stone and broken beams and shattered glass. She could see, as she went, baaz draconians standing guard, warning away other troops who might have ventured into the area.
“We located the rest of the party,” the sivak informed her as they made what haste they could among the rubble. “They’re all together. I posted guards around the area to protect them, awaiting your orders. Otherwise they would be dead by now.”
“Wait for me here,” Kitiara told the baaz who had trailed after her. The baaz squatted down on their haunches, not sorry to have time to rest.
She and the sivak continued on for about a block, arriving at an intersection where the sivak called a halt. He pointed down a street that angled off the one on which they were standing. Kit peered through the swirling smoke. A house had collapsed into the street. A small group of people stood huddled around something lying on the ground. The group seemed nervous, continually glancing over their shoulders in fear of being attacked.
The sivak explained what had happened. “One of them—the kender—was pinned under a large beam. The rest managed to drag him out and now, near as I can tell, that guy with the beard is praying over him, trying to heal him.” The sivak gave a disparaging snort. “As if any god would bother himself to heal one of the little squeakers.”
The street was dark with smoke and shadows. Kitiara had to draw nearer in order to see. She recognized two of her old comrades—Flint Fireforge and Sturm Brightblade. She could not see the kender from where she stood, but she guessed it must be Tasslehoff. She gazed long at her old friends. She had not thought of them in years, but now, seeing them again, she felt a flicker of interest—Flint because he was Tanis’s closest friend and Sturm because… well, that was a secret she kept buried deep inside, a secret she had never told anyone, a secret she didn’t even trust herself to think about lest somehow it should slip out.
Flint was grayer, but otherwise much the same. Dwarves were long-lived and aged slowly. But she was shocked at the change in Sturm. When they had traveled north together five years ago, he had been handsome and youthful, albeit grave and solemn. He looked to have aged a quarter century in those five years, though, of course, part of his haggard pallor could be due to the fact that they were trapped in a city under enemy attack and his friends might be dead or dying.
Kitiara’s gaze glanced off Flint and Sturm and rested on the only female in the group—blonde and obviously an elf.
“Laurana.” Kitiara growled the word in her throat.
This woman, like the others, was covered in soot and dirt, her clothes sodden from the rain, filthy and bedraggled, her face streaked with tears. Yet even as Kitiara could look into the sky and see through the clouds of greasy, ugly smoke the bright radiance of the sun, so she could look through the dirt and grime, fear and sorrow and see the bright radiance of the elf woman’s beauty.
Kit eyed her, wondering if such a dangerously beautiful rival should be allowed to live. Now was the perfect opportunity to kill her. Tanis would never know Kit had been the cause of his beloved’s death. He would think his childhood sweetheart had died in the assault on Tarsis, just one victim among many.
Of course, her other friends would have to perish, too. She could not leave them alive to tell the tale. Kit felt a twinge of regret at that. The sight of Flint and Sturm brought back memories of some of the happiest times in her life. But their deaths couldn’t be helped. They might recognize her and tell Tanis she had killed his lover, and she didn’t dare run that risk.
What should be her plan of attack? The knight was the only one who was armed. Flint should have been carrying his ax, but he must have dropped it in his efforts to free the kender, for he didn’t have it on him. There was another elf—a male, whose resemblance to Laurana made it apparent that he was some relation, perhaps her brother. He was covered in blood, however, and though he was standing, he looked weak and ill. Nothing to worry about there. That left the vaunted cleric of Paladine—a thin, gaunt, middle-aged man, kneeling in the dirt and blood, praying to his god to heal a kender.
“I want them dead,” said Kitiara, drawing her sword. “But first I must interrogate the elf maid. While I do that, you slay the others.”
“Begging your pardon, my lord,” said the sivak, “but Toede’s put a bounty on this lot, and he’ll pay up only if they’re brought in alive.”
“I’ll pay double what Toede has offered. Here, take this,” Kit added, seeing the sivak look skeptical. Reaching to her belt, she detached a purse and tossed it to the draconian. “There’s far more in there than what these wretches are worth.”