"You gutless bitch," snarled the hobgoblin with all the lash scars. "Always whining, or tattling on the rest of us."
The hobgoblin had already freed itself, and it lunged at her, swinging a length of broken chain like a morning star.
Aeron and Miri sprang forward and grabbed the goblin-kin, which, biting and thrashing, struggled madly to break free. It was surprisingly strong despite the mistreatment it had endured.
"Easy!" Aeron said. "Take it easy!"
So intent was he on restraining the creature that when the other thralls cried out, it took a split second for the warning to register.
When it did, Aeron looked over his shoulder, just in time to see the Red Axes pull the triggers of their crossbows. The weapons clacked, and he dived forward with all his strength, bulling Miri and the hobgoblin down to the ground.
The goblin-kin grunted as one of the bolts pierced its body. Aeron was unscathed. He hoped Miri was, too, but didn't have time to check on her. It was more important to assess the threat. He scrambled around to orient on the marksmen.
He saw five Red Axes, three human, one long-legged, hyena-faced gnoll, and an orc. Perhaps they'd been prowling around the city hunting him, or else some other business had called them forth from the mansion on the river. Either way, they must have heard the clank of the thralls breaking their fetters and come to investigate, entering through the gate Miri had closed but neglected to relock.
A couple ruffians reached for their quivers.
A big man with a boil on his neck shouted, "Don't shoot! That's him, Aeron sar Randal. Take him alive."
His companions obediently dropped the crossbows and readied their cudgels.
Aeron was glad of that, at least. Their reluctance to kill the one person who could lead them to The Black Bouquet was the only advantage he had. As he scrambled up, he plucked a throwing knife from his boot. He faked a cast at the gnoll, whose eyes widened in alarm, then he pivoted and flung the dagger at a human wearing a foppish slashed doublet and fancy sash instead. The knife plunged into the bravo's chest, and he reeled backward.
At the same moment, however, the orc lifted a tiny metal bottle, threw back its head, and gulped the contents. The man with the boil tossed what looked like a little brass toy to the ground. It scuttled forward under its own power, and as it advanced, it grew larger, swelling into a clattering metal preying mantis two heads taller than Aeron himself.
The slaves kept on screaming. He didn't blame them.
Aeron couldn't imagine a throwing blade damaging the enchanted apparatus, so retreating, he reached for his heavy fighting knife instead. That wasn't likely to do much good either, but if was the best weapon he had.
Miri shot the mantis twice. The first arrow glanced off its long, thin body. The second stuck for a second, then drooped and fell away, leaving a shallow pock mark in the brass. She nocked a third shaft, registered the foes of flesh and blood rushing in at her, pivoted, and let fly at them instead. The arrow plunged so deeply into the torso of a human Red Axe that half of it popped out of his back. The outlaw dropped.
Her next arrow flew at the orc, whose flesh emitted a sickly greenish light-a product, no doubt, of the potion it had consumed. The shaft hit the creature squarely in the neck, but simply snapped in two without even slowing its target.
The orc had figured out that the Red Axes didn't need to take anyone but Aeron alive. It still carried a long club in its left hand, but had drawn its scimitar with its right, and as it scrambled into the distance, it slashed at Miri's knee. She retreated, avoiding the cut, tossed the longbow away, and snatched for the hilt of her new broadsword.
Aeron watched it all from the corner of his eye, directing most of his attention to the metal insect mincing toward him, graceful despite its size and the clanking that attended its every move.
The mantis leaped, its long hind legs straightening explosively and hurling it through the air.
Even though Aeron had his eye on it, the move caught him by surprise. If the mechanism landed on him, the shock would break bone, and the sheer weight of it would pin him to the ground even if it didn't crush him outright. He sprang desperately backward.
Even so, the mantis crashed down right in front of him, the impact jolting the ground. Up close, it smelled of oil. Long serrated pincers opened to snatch him up.
He dodged one set of claws and riposted with a stab. The Arthyn fang grated along brass, merely scratching it. The other forelimb leaped at him, and a hand shoved him out of the way. The pincers snapped shut on empty air.
He glanced at his rescuer. It was the gaunt hobgoblin with the whip marks. The creature had a crossbow quarrel sticking in its left shoulder, but apparently wasn't too badly wounded to fight. It lashed the mantis with its chain. The construct twisted its head, evidently considering the thrall through its bulbous faceted eyes, then it returned its attention to Aeron.
It chased him across the yard, snatching for him relentlessly, occasionally dipping its head lower in an effort to seize him in its mandibles. The other slaves scurried to stay clear. Aeron thrust and hacked with the knife when he could, which wasn't often. It was hard enough just to stay out of the constructs clutches and keep it from cornering him against the fence. He supposed the lack of offense didn't much matter. As predicted, the blade wasn't doing the device any real damage, any more than was the hobgoblin still gamely flailing away at its flank.
When Aeron was facing in the right direction, he caught glimpses of Miri and her opponents, who'd spread out to attack her from two sides. The orc pressed her hard, trusting the magical elixir it had consumed to keep her blade from penetrating its flesh. For the most part, the gnoll fought more defensively, hanging back a little until it judged that its comrade had her distracted, then attacking furiously. So far, neither of them had succeeded in penetrating her guard, but her manifest skill notwithstanding, Aeron was sure she was in trouble.
She was in no more trouble than he was in himself, but the hobgoblin's attempts to save him weren't helping. It was possible the slave could aid Miri, however, so he gasped in the air to shout and tell it to go to her.
But before he could get the words out, the goblin-kin left off battering the mantis and grabbed one of its middle legs. The thrall was either trying to tear it off, use it to heave the mechanism onto its side, or simply immobilize the thing. Aeron couldn't tell which.
Whatever the hobgoblin intended, the maneuver finally served to distract the mantis. Pausing in its pursuit of Aeron, it jerked its leg, shook the slave loose, pivoted, and snatched it up in its pincers. It gave the thrall a shake, then flipped it across the yard to slam into the front of the shack, after which the hobgoblin sprawled motionless.
Though the goblin-kin's effort had failed, perhaps it had given Aeron a chance. While the mantis was concentrating on its other foe, he dashed around to the back of it, the end it typically carried so low it nearly brushed the ground. Without hesitation, he clambered straight up its narrow body, the years he'd spent scaling sheer walls and traversing treacherous ledges and rooftops allowing him to maintain balance and traction on the slippery, rounded surface.
He straddled its neck like a rider sitting a horse. While he stayed there, he hoped, it couldn't reach him with either its claws or mandibles. Looking down, he saw a gap where the head connected to the body. He jammed his knife into the crack, and when that had no appreciable effect, he threw his weight against the blade, prying as if it were a lever.
The mantis pitched sideways, and he realized that if he remained where he was, it was going to roll on him. He leaped clear, and landed hard. Metal crashed. Numb, half stunned, he forced himself to his feet, and the apparatus did, too.
Flinging itself to the ground had damaged it. One side was dented, and its left forelimb protruded at an angle. Still, it pounced at Aeron as agilely as before.