The sivak took a quick glance into the purse, saw the glint of steel coins, hefted the weight of the purse, did some quick mental calculations, then tied the purse securely to his battle harness. The sivak made a motion with his hand, and the baaz left their posts around the street and came to join him, moving silently on their clawed feet.
“Give me time to snatch the elf, then you attack,” Kit ordered.
“Kill the knight first,” the sivak advised his troops. “He’s the most dangerous.”
Kitiara did not have much time. Red dragons were still flying overhead, taking their time, pausing on their way out of the city to destroy anything still standing. She could hear screams, shouts and explosions. Any moment, some fool red might knock down a building on top of her. Either that or a squad of goblins, mad with battle lust, could come along and ruin everything. Kitiara slipped from shadow to shadow until she had taken up a position directly across the street from where Laurana stood.
Kit waited. Her moment would come. It always did.
Tasslehoff was sitting up. His head was covered in blood, but he was most definitely alive. The cleric raised his hands into the air. A pity his triumph wouldn’t last long, Kit thought. Flint put his hand to his eyes and rubbed his nose. The dwarf would never let the kender see he was touched; he’d be shouting at Tas about something in a minute. Sturm knelt beside Tas and put his arm around him. Laurana stood watching and weeping quietly. She stood apart from the group, seemingly overcome by grief.
Kitiara darted forward. She ran swiftly on the balls of her feet, so that her footfalls made little noise. The sivak watched her bear down on her prey. He gave her a moment’s head start, then raised his voice in a gurgling shout. The baaz, swords drawn, surged forward. The sivak, keeping one eye on the Highlord, ran with them.
Kitiara grabbed Laurana from behind. Clamping one hand over her mouth and shoving the point of a knife into her ribs with the other, Kit started to drag her off.
The woman was an elf, lovely and delicate. Kit half-expected her to faint in terror. What she didn’t expect was for the delicate elf maid to sink her delicate teeth into Kit’s hand and to kick her, hard, in the shin.
Kit grunted in pain, but she didn’t let loose. She tried to haul Laurana away, but it was like trying to haul off a half-starved cougar. The elf maid twisted and writhed. She drove her nails into Kit’s flesh and lashed out with her feet, almost tripping her. Kit was losing patience, starting to think that she should just knife the bitch and be done with it, when the sivak appeared.
“Need help, my lord?” he asked, and before she could answer, he had grabbed hold of Laurana’s feet and lifted her off the ground. Between them, they carried her, kicking and struggling, into a nearby alley.
Here Kit released her. The evening sky was red with the lurid light of flames, and by that light, Kit could see blood welling from bite marks on her palm. She wrung her hand and glared at Laurana, who glared defiantly back at her. The sivak had the elf-maid pinned to the ground. He held his knife at her throat.
“Keep her quiet,” Kit said. “I’m going to see what’s happened to the rest.”
She watched as the baaz bore down on their victims. Sturm was on his feet, holding his sword, as Flint had hold of his axe and stood protectively over Tasslehoff. The elf lord and the cleric were searching about, shouting Laurana’s name.
“Elistan, get behind me!” Sturm called out.
The small group faced twenty baaz, eager for blood. Still, Kit knew her old friends. They wouldn’t go down without a fight. She sucked on her hand, cursing Laurana, and watched. She had no doubt of the outcome, but the battle should be an interesting one.
Sturm was continuing to shout at the cleric to take cover behind him, but the cleric wasn’t listening. He stood his ground and turned to face the baaz draconians, who shouted and slavered with glee at the easy kill. The cleric lifted his hands to heaven and raised his voice in a thunderous exhortation.
“Paladine, I beseech you! Send down your wrath upon the enemies of your most holy light!”
Kitiara chuckled, sucked on her bleeding hand, and waited for the baaz to spit the cleric.
A cascade of flame, white and dazzling and awful, thundered down from the heavens. The wrath of the god engulfed almost half of the attacking baaz. Half blinded, Kit could hear screams and horrible popping and sizzling sounds. When she could see again, she watched in shocked amazement as the scaly flesh melted from their bones, the bones blackened and withered away. The holy flame died, and there was nothing left of the draconians except greasy spots on the pavement.
“Damn!” said Kitiara, impressed.
The wrath of the god gave heart and strength to the others. Sturm and Flint ran to attack the remaining draconians, who, having witnessed their comrades die a horrible death, slowed their rush toward the cleric. Laurana’s brother continued to shout her name.
“I’ll find her,” shouted the cleric, and he turned and looked in Kit’s direction.
Kitiara took to her heels, hastening back to where the sivak was still holding fast to Laurana, keeping his knife at her throat. He’d bound her hands with a strip of leather cut from her own tunic.
“What was that bright light and all that screaming?” the sivak asked curiously.
“Your baaz going up in flames. Apparently Paladine is not the weak and sniveling god our Dark Queen claims,” said Kitiara.
The sivak shook his scaly head. “Baaz,” he muttered in disgust, “what can you expect?” Shrugging, he grinned and patted the purse she’d given him. “Fewer ways to split the take.”
“We don’t have much time. The cleric’s headed this direction, looking for the elf.” Kit squatted down to put herself eye-to-eye with Laurana. “Hand me the knife. You keep watch. Let me know if he gets close.”
The sivak did as ordered and dashed off to the end of the alley. Laurana made a sudden lunge, tried to struggle to her feet.
Kitiara gave her a light tap to the jaw with her fist, not enough to knock her out, but enough to stun her. Laurana fell back and Kit put her knee on Laurana’s chest, holding the knife at her throat. A trickle of red blood ran down the alabaster skin.
“I’m going to kill you,” Kitiara said matter-of-factly. She was hoarse from coughing, her voice gruff.
Laurana glared at Kitiara, not in fear, but in defiance.
“I just want you to know I’m not some ordinary cutthroat,” Kit continued. “I want you to know why—”
Movement at the far end of the alley caught Kit’s eye. She glanced up and saw three men emerging from the smoke. They carried bloody swords in their hands, and one them held a burning torch to light their way through the smoke and gloom of coming night. The torch light shone full on his face. Kitiara recognized him immediately.
She swore almost every curse word she knew.
Derek Crownguard and his two friends were striding purposefully down the alley. She had no idea what they were doing here when they should have been out questing after dragon orbs, but that didn’t matter now. What mattered was that he must not see her. If he did, if he recognized her as belonging to the enemy side, he would immediately wonder why the enemy was sending him on a quest for a dragon orb. He’d be suspicious, perhaps even refuse to continue, and that would be the end of Ariakas’s pet plan.
As if this weren’t trouble enough, the sivak was hissing at her from behind.
“Highlord! Best hurry with your killing. That cleric’s coming!”
Kitiara put her knife to Laurana’s throat.
“Go ahead, kill me,” Laurana said, choking with tears. “I want to die. Then I’ll be with him.”
Tanis, Kitiara said to herself. She’s talking about Tanis. She thinks Tanis is dead! They all think Tanis is dead!
She saw it so clearly then—the inn collapsing, Tanis buried beneath the rubble, these people escaping, the group of friends separated. Of course, each must think the other dead, and Kit would be the last to disabuse her rival of that notion.