You’ve lost your mind! Hamil said, but he climbed out as well.
Another thunderbolt pealed across the hilltop, and in the single brief flash of light Geran saw something completely unexpected. The Veruna mercenaries ran this way and that, hugging boulders and tufts of high grass for cover as they confronted a single man-the horned sorcerer that Kara, Hamil, and he had met up with at the barrow where Jarad had fallen. He stood in midair fifteen feet above the ground, surrounded by a storm of fire, his coat of scarlet and gold billowing in the wind. One of the Verunas shot at him with a crossbow, but the sorcerer batted away the bolt with a gesture and turned a fearsome glare at the fellow who had shot. The crossbowman staggered back, his clothes smoking, and then he burst into flame. Screaming horribly, he flailed away into the night fog.
Two of the Veruna armsmen still crouched nearby, distracted by the battle raging a short distance away. Then one glanced down and caught a glimpse of Geran by the light of a blast of fire. “The others!” he shouted. “They’re making a break-” Then a short arrow took him in the face and sent him staggering backward.
“Shhhh,” Hamil said. “That’s a good fellow.”
Geran quickly bounded up the steps as the armsman waiting there scrambled to his feet and launched himself down. They met on the top stair; the man parried Geran’s thrust at his midsection and replied with a vicious cut at Geran’s head that the swordmage simply ducked under before surging up and scoring with a long passing cut to the neck as he shouldered the man out of the way. The Veruna man spun half around and fell where he stood.
From the foot of the barrow, a man Geran hadn’t noticed before raised a wand and pointed at the sorcerer in scarlet and gold. A trio of shrieking blue missiles screamed out of the wand, weaved their way through the sorcerer’s fiery aura, and hammered home against his side. The horned man cried out and staggered in midair, clamping a hand to his injury. The Veruna mageling shouted in triumph and aimed another burst at him. Geran had no idea whether the horned man-the tiefling, that’s what his kind was called-was an enemy or not, but for the moment the mercenaries of House Veruna were a common foe, so he raced down the side of the mound and hurled himself at the unsuspecting Veruna mage. The fellow sensed danger and started to turn just in time to see the swordstroke that decapitated him. Hamil followed a step behind him, now with knives in his hands since he’d shot all his arrows. “Are you sure this is our fight, Geran?” he called.
“I’m making it ours,” Geran answered. He found himself engaged with another Veruna swordsman and fought a furious duel for several long moments, Mulman broadsword against elf-wrought backsword, blades flashing in the darkness and firelight. Hamil skirmished against another swordsman who moved in to attack Geran’s back while Geran was battling the first, and managed to slash the man across the knee badly enough to put him on the ground-at which point the halfling swarmed over him and finished him with a dagger through the visor of his helm.
For his own part Geran almost stepped onto his opponent’s swordpoint but saw through the feint at the last moment. He beat his adversary’s point up into the air, and ran him through beneath the arm. The swordmage quickly spun clear, searching for another foe, but no more Veruna men remained on their feet nearby. He caught a glimpse of Urdinger and half a dozen men galloping away into the darkness, pursued by flaming bolts the tiefling hurled after them. Then the battlefield fell silent except for the low, smoldering crackle of grassfires kindled by the sorcerer’s fire. The tiefling snarled something after the fleeing mercenaries and allowed himself to drift back to earth. Then he caught sight of Geran and Hamil.
“Hold!” Geran called. “We’ve got no quarrel with you.”
“That remains to be seen,” the tiefling answered. He held his curved metal rod at the ready, but he did not move to attack. “The book!” he demanded. “Where is it?”
Geran studied the tiefling for a long moment before answering. The man was obviously a very capable sorcerer, but Geran knew that his spell-shields would stand up better to blasts of flame and bolts of lightning than the mundane mail the Veruna men wore. He took his time answering in order to make sure that the sorcerer would understand that he did not answer out of fear. “If you’re speaking of the Infiernadex, then the lich Aesperus has it,” he said. “The Veruna men followed us to this barrow, and I think Aesperus followed them. He took the book from me and departed not more than half an hour ago.”
“You should take up the matter of the book with him,” Hamil offered.
The tiefling’s face darkened, and he turned away, snarling something in a language that Geran didn’t know. He kicked at the ground and slashed his weapon through the air in frustration. “You led them right to this place! Aesperus never could have removed the book from the Lathanderian’s barrow by himself. You have delivered his prize to him, you fools!”
“The Verunas were searching barrows all over the Highfells,” Hamil retorted angrily. “Sooner or later, they would have found the right one. Don’t blame us because you didn’t find it before we did. For that matter, I’d like to know how you found us here too.”
“I followed the Verunas. I was going to let them remove the book then take it from them.” He glared at Hamil. “Your meddling has cost me six months of labor. You halfwits have no idea what you’ve done!”
Geran decided to let the sorcerer’s sharp words pass for the moment. “This is the second time I’ve met you on the doorstep of a barrow,” he said. “I am Geran Hulmaster, of the harmach’s family, and we have laws against disturbing burial mounds in these lands. Who are you? And what do you want with Aesperus’s book?”
The tiefling calmed himself with a visible effort, and looked back to Geran and Hamil. “I am Sarth Khul Riizar,” he answered. “My interest in the Infiernadex is my own affair. But if Aesperus has found it at last, I doubt that I will ever be able to lay my hands on it. He is a foe beyond my strength.”
“We’re in your debt, Sarth Khul Riizar,” said Geran. “Your arrival distracted the Veruna men from the task of figuring out how they were going to kill us.”
“Such was not my intent,” the sorcerer said bitterly. “Still, I suppose you made yourself useful in the fight, and you have my thanks for that.” He frowned at the two companions again, then shook his head and muttered a spell under his breath. With a single bound he leaped into the sky and shot off eastward over the fells. In a moment he was completely out of their sight.
“Did you hear that? We made ourselves useful,” Hamil said. He sighed and looked around. A cold drizzle began to fall. “Ah, wouldn’t you know it? Our horses ran off with theirs.”
“Rosestone is three or four hours off by foot,” Geran said. He sheathed his sword and took a deep breath. “If we start now, I think we can be there before sunup.”
FIFTEEN
26 Ches, the Year of the Ageless One
Council Hall was one of the largest and most striking buildings in Hulburg. Its lower walls were made of thick, strong stone every bit as sturdy as a watchtower’s, and its upper stories were well-fitted hardwood, with beam-ends carved into leaping dolphins and vigilant hounds-images of commerce and good fortune. Sergen Hulmaster glanced up as his coach rolled under the expensive carvings overhead; there was a gold dragon’s head over the front door that he liked best of all. In the fading afternoon light it took on a striking orange gleam.
“We’re here, Lord Hulmaster,” his driver said. The coachman reined in the team, and Sergen’s footman hopped down to hold open the door for him. Two Council Watch guards who rode on the coach’s running boards climbed down and arranged themselves on either side, ready to fall in and escort him. The watchmen looked competent and crisp in black tabards over breastplates of browned iron. They might not have been a match for the professional sellswords Veruna and the other companies employed, or even the harmach’s Shieldsworn, but Sergen intended to remedy that soon enough. Besides, an armed escort was one of the trappings of privilege, and he insisted on it.