The candle guttered—but not, as Garric first thought, because the wizard’s movements were fanning it. The flame pinched in and expanded the way ale spurts from a full barrel, sucking the bunghole closed and reopening rhythmically. The light grew brighter but took on the chill red tinge of wizardry.
“Maskelo,” said Metron. “Maskelon maskelouphron.”
Thalemos came into the room, wearing a more settled expression than Garric had previously seen on his face. The boy had been snatched from his cell and carried through a chaos that would’ve disconcerted anybody facing it cold; no wonder he’d seemed dazed most of the time. Now that Garric looked back on the events of the night, he marveled at the thought he’d really been involved in that.
“You wanted me, sir?” Thalemos asked Garric.
Garric hooked his thumb at Metron. “He did,” he said. “I think he just wanted to be sure you were safe.”
“Besro, uphro, bolbeoch!” Metron said. He held out the ring in his left hand so that the jewel glittered in the wizardlight.
There’d been a pause in the noise from the front room. Now there was a crash that must have been the main shutter giving way, followed instantly by the shriek of steel on steel. A man cried out on a rising note.
Garric turned and started forward. His sword was still in his hand.
“Bring them here!” Metron shouted hoarsely. “I’ve opened the way, but we’ve got to leave quickly.
Garric looked over his shoulder. The wizard was trying to get to his feet, still holding up the ring so the candleflame fell on it. The sapphire’s facets scattered light in an oval of bright points against the plaster wall. For a moment Garric thought he was looking at the starry sky; then the pattern blurred into an outrushing void.
“I’ll get them!” he said. He stepped into the main room.
The bandits hunched, facing the front wall of the shop. Echeon’s men had battered through the center of the shutter, and the dovetailed vertical slats to either side slanted loose. Lanternlight from the street silhouetted the bandits and the men trying to fight their way in.
The Protectors were in half-armor, but the shop’s lintel had tripped several of them. Their bodies lay in the opening, a fresh barrier for their fellows, and Mersrig had snatched up one of the fallen shields.
“Metron’s got the way open!” Garric shouted.
A Protector gave wordless cry and rushed the opening, his shield held before him at arm’s length. Toster met the charge, swinging his axe sideways to clear the low ceiling. The edge split the round of laminated wood with a crash, staggering the Protector. Two spearpoints and Hame’s sword bit the man’s knee and lower legs, bringing him down in screaming agony. His helmet rolled off; Ademos stabbed him through the back of his neck. None of his fellows had followed.
“The way’s open!” Garric repeated. “Head for the back room! I’ll hold them off!”
He didn’t know why he’d said that, not consciously at any rate; it just didn’t cross his mind that he wouldn’t be the rear guard in this situation. The bandits were all familiar with weapons, but these tight quarters were sword territory. Garric was the only trained swordsmen among the Brethren…and besides, he was Prince Garric of Haft, descendent of Carus, the greatest ruler and man-of-war in the Old Kingdom.
A dozen Brethren looked at Garric, then scrambled toward Metron in the other chamber. They were the men on the fringes of the fight. There hadn’t been room enough for the whole band in the opening. The Brethren had sorted themselves into those who wanted to face the first rush of Echeon’s minions, and those who preferred someone else take that duty.
The others didn’t retreat. Their blood was up, and they knew well that turning their backs now was likely to signal their own slaughter. The Protectors were massing in the street, in great numbers and under the control of officers who’d had time to assess the situation. Overhead, swords hacked at the roofing. Prada had barred the trapdoor when he came back down, but the tiles wouldn’t last long under determined assault.
One-handed, Garric tugged the shield from a dead Protector’s grip, tossed it up, and caught it by the paired handles in the center. It was a buckler, not a target that would’ve been strapped to the man’s arm.
“Get into the back room!” Garric shouted. “Quickly, for the Lady’s sake!”
“Stand clear!” said Vascay. “I’m going to throw out the last of the cave dust! That’ll kill everybody in the street, and we can get away!”
“What!” shrieked Halophus. “Are you crazy?”
Vascay flung a bag overarm. The Brethren who faced the opening now scrambled back in panic. They knew how indiscriminately dangerous the spores were.
The Protectors stood in a double rank, their small shields held forward. As an officer shouted an order, the bag caught the upper edge of a shield and burst in a spray of dust. The men pushed away, screaming in fearful agony. Their serried order disintegrated as though a volcano had just erupted in their midst.
“Go, boy!” Vascay said, clapping Garric on the shoulder. “They’ll figure out it was plaster fallen from the ceiling soon enough, and I don’t want to be around when they do!”
Only three of the Brethren remained in the side chamber with Thalemos and Metron when Garric followed Vascay through the doorway. Toster stood beside the roiling blur where the wall had been, his face screwed up in terror. He started toward the vortex, then flinched back. His axe trembled; the head and upper helve were slick with Protectors’ brains.
“Get through or get out of the way!” Metron screamed. “How long do you think I can hold this?”
Garric tossed down the shield he’d appropriated and sheathed his sword without difficulty. He stepped in front of Toster and backed the big man away, keeping his own body between Toster and the wizard-door.
With a hand behind his back, Garric gestured the other bandits to go. To Toster he said, “You saved my life when I came back over the wall, Toster. I was done up from what happened inside. Without you to take care of Thalemos for me, they’d have had me there in the street.”
Prada and Mersrig passed through the vortex, each pausing for a moment before jumping in. The void flashed with rose, then azure, wizardlight as the men vanished.
“Lord Thalemos!” Vascay said. “You’re next! Except for you we could’ve stayed where we belonged.”
“I’m afraid,” Toster whimpered. “I won’t do it! I won’t do it!”
Thalemos shot Garric a look of uncertainty. Garric waved him fiercely on, afraid to turn away from Toster. Vascay grasped Thalemos by the waistband and the nape of the neck. He half walked, half threw the youth into the vortex ahead of his own entry.
Metron stood and stumbled toward the wall. When the sapphire no longer winked in the candlelight, the portal began to shrink. The wizard disappeared into it with the usual double flash. It continued shrinking.
Toster wore a short cape. Garric twisted the garment, then raised its cowl to blind the big man the way he’d have concealed fire from a terrified horse.
“Come on, Toster!” he shouted, holding the man by the left wrist and shoulder. “Run! With me!”
They lumbered forward, Toster sobbing like a child behind the thick wool. There was still a chance….
“Now duck!” Garric cried, forcing down the big man’s head at the same time he lowered his own. “And jump!”
It was like diving through a skin of ice over the millpond, hard and cutting and colder than life could bear. Garric tried to scream, but his flesh was a mist of atoms exploding across time and space. He had no being—
With a shuddering haste Garric was back in his body: gasping, lying on soft dirt in a forest like none he’d ever seen. He still held Toster. Around them were the other members of the band. Some—those who’d passed through early in the process—stood and looked nervously to their weapons.