He rushed out of the office. Nothing stirred within the cavernous building. But the far door, through which he himself had entered, stood ajar. It leaked a pane of light. He had not left it that way.
Rider reached it in a time that would have shamed most athletes. He paused before stepping outside, every sense probing for signs of an ambush.
He detected only the fading disturbance of the powerful cycle of magicks that propelled airships.
"Feeble and high-pitched," he murmured. "A small ship driven by someone self-taught." He stepped into the glare of day, caught a glimpse of an airship hurrying down the Golden Crescent, flying low.
He thought about taking one of his father's small ships in pursuit. But none were ready. It would take an hour to charge one with gas. The murderer of his father's murderer was safely away.
He went back and searched Vlazos. There was nothing of interest on the man except a key of the sort which fit the safe chests at the imperial treasury. He pocketed it.
He found no satisfaction in the fact that his father's killer had himself been slain. Vlazos set the wheel rolling, but now it was Odehnal's toy.
Where had the dwarf learned the spells to move an airship? How? That complex was a closely guarded secret, taught only to men whom Jehrke trusted absolutely.
Rider strolled toward the Citadel. The sun was into its westward plunge. About time he sought an audience with the King. The man needed to know, to prepare for the storm. And Rider hoped for his blessing in his assumption of the Protector's role.
He decided he'd better get himself a chariot. All this walking and running—even he was subject to cumulative fatigue.
But first, before anything—even before seeing the King-be had to restore the web. When an enemy could bring a pirate airship within a few hundred yards undetected, the situation was desperate.
Just how tired he had become, and thus unalert, was demonstrated when he reached his father's laboratory. He failed to notice the pop-seeds scattered in the hall. His feet stirred a rapid-fire racket.
The door swung inward. "Rider!" Chaz said. "We've got company."
He saw the golden-skinned woman in the doorway to the library. She saw him for the first time.
Her eyes widened.
"You catch him?" Greystone asked.
"Yes. It was Vlazos."
"And?"
"He died before he could say much."
"Oh."
Rider heard the hollow sound in Greystone's voice. "No. Not me. His confederates. With a strangulation spell. They fled in an airship."
Greystone looked properly astounded.
"Yes. First order of business now is to restore the web. Where are the others?"
Chaz explained about Emerald.
"I told them to stay here. Well. I suppose they have to learn the hard way."
IX
Emerald shambled along with his hands in his pockets, grinning and whistling. He had made clowns of those guys again. Too bad he had not had men enough to ambush them. Ten or fifteen guys with crossbows waiting behind the illusory wall. They wouldn't have known what hit them. But he had no men now, because the Master and that Vlazos fool insisted Rider's gang be taken alive. That damned Vlazos better find some local talent.
Someone stepped into his path. Emerald halted, lifted his gaze ... and squawked.
Preacher grinned.
Emerald looked around wildly.
The other three closed in. Spud was next nearest, about twenty feet away, popping a fist into a palm meaningfully.
The gnarly man was quick! Preacher just had time for a startled squeak. Then he was in the air, flailing toward Spud. Emerald put on speed. More than a touch of panic drove him. He did not know what to do. There was no provision in the plan for his not being able to shake his pursuers.
The wall of illusion should have worked.
It was a failed plan anyway. Not all Rider's men had left the Citadel.
The Master would know what to do. But he could not run to the Master. That would lead these men to him.
He grimaced. Then grinned. He would lead them away from the Master. Wear them down, till the Master became disturbed by his failure to report and investigated.
Soup gasped, "Are we going to keep this up all day? Or are we going to catch him?" He stopped at a chandler's shop. The others paused. As long as Su-Cha could sniff Emerald's trail they would not lose him. "Let's get organized. He isn't going to lead us anywhere. If he gets too tired and scared he might try picking us off. We've got to capture him."
"How you figure on doing that?" Su-Cha demanded. "Preacher and Spud already blew it."
"Buy some rope. Rope him like a steer, bind him up, and carry him back to the Citadel."
Su-Cha cackled. "Great. Get it! Reams or bales or bundles or whatever rope comes in. A mile of it! We'll turn him into a human cocoon."
Three minutes later they were on the trail again, armed with coils of light line. Fifteen minutes later they had Emerald surrounded.
The gnarly man saw their intent. He darted this way and that. A wicked knife sprang into his hand. He feinted toward Preacher, rushed Spud.
Hands and feet flashed. The knife flickered away. Spud and Emerald rolled over and over, grunting and yelling. Su-Cha pranced around them, trying to slip a noose over Emerald's head. Soup got one on an ankle and pulled.
Preacher looped an arm, took off. Emerald stretched out, cursing and flailing. Spud thumped his head a few times. Soup got another rope on. The four of them began baling the gnarly man.
All this took place on a busy street. Passersby pretended blindness. Shasesserre was that kind of city still, centuries after Jehrke began trying to turn it around.
"Hi ho, hi ho," Soup laughed as he and Spud hoisted their prisoner. "Off to gaol for you, friend. Let's somebody find a wagon. This sucker's pants are full of lead."
Preacher hired a rickshaw. Emerald rode. The others ran alongside, laughing and clowning.
Chaz answered the laboratory door. He grinned when he saw Emerald, but held a finger to his lips. "Keep it down. Rider is mending the web."
Soup and Preacher plopped Emerald down under the open window, where he could look at the Protector and contemplate his fate. They joined the crowd in the library, where Rider had spread his father's extra web charts atop a table fifteen feet long and five wide. Rider neither welcomed them nor upbraided them for leaving the Citadel. He gave them jobs to do.
Hours passed. The sun dropped to within two diameters of the horizon. The rope divers were just a few stages short of the tower's top. Rider finally rose, sighing wearily. "That's enough for now. We'll put the final touches on after we finish this business."
"Got you a present, Rider," Su-Cha crowed. He pranced around, made smoke come out his ears.
"In the laboratory."
Rider followed the imp to the other room.
Emerald sat where he had been dumped.
"He's the one who did the deed," Su-Cha said. "It was him on the tower last night."
"Cool one," Chaz remarked. "If he can sleep now."
Rider darted forward, afraid he had lost another prisoner. But Emerald was asleep. "There would have been a tug on the web," he told himself. He closed his eyes, allowed his being to flow out the web's strands, and the web to fill him. He sensed every magic within five miles of the Rock. Each was legitimate. He could detect nothing of Kralj Odehnal.
"Get the gag off him," Rider said. "Untie him. Let him get some circulation back. There's nowhere he can go."