Sefris threw herself to the side, carrying him with her. An arrow from on high streaked past them. He didn't think she'd been looking upward, but somehow she'd sensed it coming.
A second shaft flew at once. Heedless of the danger to the man Sefris still clutched against her, Miri was shooting as fast as she could. Ironically, at that moment, it was the daughter of the Dark Moon who had the greater care for his safety. She flung him aside to smack down on the ground.
Unencumbered, Sefris shifted back and forth, her spinning arms a blur, either dodging the arrows or batting them aside. In a few moments at best, the wounded ranger's barrage must inevitably slow down, giving the sorceress the chance to cast another spell.
Which was to say that Sefris was still going to win the fight, and hurt as he was, Aeron had no idea how to change that. Even if he could muster the strength to find his fallen knife and attack, the monastic would just swat him down like a fly.
Unless…
He couldn't seem to catch his breath but forced himself to crawl. It was easier than walking and less likely to attract Sefris's notice.
As he neared the dead orc, Sefris lashed lengths of black ribbon through the air. Up on the roof, a ragged bulb of shadow exploded into being. Caught in the dark flare, Miri wailed, lost her footing on the slanted tiles, fell on her rump, and slid. She plunged partway off the edge, then managed to snatch hold of something and catch herself. Her bow and most of the remaining arrows from her quiver tumbled toward the ground.
Aeron had to find the strength to rise. Otherwise, in just another second, Sefris would surely finish off the helplessly dangling ranger. He staggered up and charged the agent of the Dark Moon, shouting-or croaking… making noise, anyway-to divert her attention. She pivoted like a demonic dancer and lunged to meet him.
If the leather-and-copper gloves he'd removed from the orc's body had needed him to speak a trigger word or make some special mystic gesture to activate them, he couldn't have done it, but it turned out that the mere intent was enough. And if Sefris had been standing just a couple yards away, he was certain she could have dodged the magic. Fortunately, however, she herself was pouncing to close the distance, and the blaze of lightning caught her square in the middle of the chest. She shuddered and twitched, then fell. Aeron thought she clutched at him as she went down, but maybe it was just his imagination, for she didn't stir after she hit the ground. She simply lay inert, a contorted husk giving off a sickening stink of burned meat.
It certainly looked like death. But Aeron found the Arthyn fang and drove it into her heart anyway, just to make sure.
Only then did he look up. Miri had hauled herself back from the brink.
"Are you all right?" she wheezed.
"Better than I expected to be, certainly. What about you?"
"The same."
She knotted a rope around a gargoyle and used it to clamber to the ground, where she stood peering at Sefris's smoking body as if she too couldn't quite believe the Shar worshiper was dead.
"I think that if she hadn't already been wounded," Miri said, "we never could have beaten her, not even with the magic gloves."
"I think you're right."
"Thank the Forest Queen it's over."
He took a deep breath, preparing himself for further exertion, and said, "Not yet it isn't"
When Kesk staggered around the bend, he met three halflings slinking in the other direction. Lynxes, beyond a doubt. He would have known even if he hadn't encountered them in the Underways, where honest people had no business. It was obvious from their abundance of weapons and the hardness in their wary eyes.
He knew the small outlaws could tell plenty about him as well. They could scarcely miss his broken tusk and fangs, his pulped, bloody features, or the anguished way he hobbled along bent half double. Accordingly, he knew what they must be thinking. There was their chieftain's hated rival, alone, wounded, and ripe for the murdering at last.
Kesk had regained consciousness on the ground surprised to find himself still alive. Sefris must have rushed off somewhere in a hurry. Maybe she'd felt a need to chase after Aeron without further delay.
Thanks to her sneak attack, Kesk had lost the redheaded thief and Nicos, too. He was grievously hurt, as the agony in his vitals attested. The wizard had deserted him. Apparently off battling Sefris, pursuing the sar Randals, or simply blundering around lost in the conjured fog, none of his underlings were at hand to help him, either.
Still, he told himself, he was going to be all right. A priest of Mask could restore him to health. He just needed to return to the safety of his stronghold before the Gray Blades or any of his other countless ill-wishers found him in his current vulnerable condition. Accordingly, he rose and groped his way through the mist to the nearest entry to the tunnels.
To no avail, perhaps, for thanks to pure foul luck, the three Lynxes had discovered him anyway. He glared at them as ferociously as he'd ever glared in his life, and brandished his battle-axe, still wet with Sefris's gore, for good measure. The haft almost slipped through his numb fingers. He certainly didn't have the strength to swing the weapon.
"Do you think you can take me?" he snarled. "Me, Kesk Turnskull? Come on and try."
The halflings gazed back at him for what seemed like a long while.
Finally, when he was sure they were going to call his bluff, the one in the lead said, "Why dirty our hands? You're dead already, or so it looks to me."
The Lynxes edged around Kesk, giving him as wide a berth as possible, and prowled on.
Kesk started to laugh, but it hurt his chest like the jabbing of a knife, so he choked it off. Once the halflings disappeared around the turn, he too trudged onward.
The mansion is close… the mansion is close, he told himself over and over again, to keep one foot shuffling in front of the other.
Finally he spied a glowing scarlet lantern and realized the encouraging words had become true. He felt a swelling of relief, and naturally, as if some malicious god was having a joke at his expense, it was at that moment that a familiar voice spoke his name.
Kesk stumbled around. Aeron and the female archer had crept up behind him. Apparently the lone-wolf robber hadn't sold her to Melder after all. The report to the contrary must have been another trick.
It was immediately apparent from their level stares that Kesk had no hope of intimidating that pair of enemies. The woman was aiming an arrow. Aeron had his arms extended. After a moment-his eyes kept wavering in and out of focus-Kesk realized the red-haired rogue was wearing the lightning gloves that he himself had extorted from the wizard. It was quite possible that that same magic was going to kill him. The thought gave rise to a bitter mirth, and once again, he had to stifle a laugh.
"Track me, did you?" he asked.
"More or less," Aeron replied. "It was obvious where you'd try to go."
"Where's the other bitch?"
"We killed her." The human outlaw hesitated, then said, "If it was your axe that cut her shoulder, I guess the three of us did it together."
"I'm glad of that, anyway. Now I suppose it's my turn to die. Do it, then. But if you do, you'll never know who my partner was."
"I don't care who he was," Aeron replied. "You're the one I want."
Kesk centered his attention on the ranger. He knew she was his only hope.
"The wizard told me Dorn Heldeion wants to change how we live in Oeble," said the tanarukk, "by bringing in a new and lawful way to make coin."
She frowned at the mention of the name of her employer, a prominent member of the Council of Nine Merchants, chief deputies to the Faceless Master. Kesk realized that she must have kept the secret of the rich man's identity from Aeron, and he'd given it away. If the lanky thief was even interested, he didn't show it