“This passage runs beneath the walkway. It will take us to the next tower. They’re probably yet not looking for us there.”
“You seem to know the premises well…”
“My knowledge is newly gained.”
At the end of the passage they came to another door.
They listened, opened it cautiously, and emerged behind a sentry. Laincourt slit his throat and held him as he sagged. They heard a great commotion on the lower floors, found only locked doors, and were forced to climb some very steep steps in order to raise a hatch that gave them access to the roof.
They were fortunate it was deserted, although they could see torches and silhouettes moving about on one of the other towers, the one where Savelda and his men were finishing their search. Beyond, in the tormented sky, the spectral dragon had been replaced by a fury of uncontrolled magical energy. The red and golden flashes had redoubled in intensity. Interspersed by thunderclaps, a deep roar rumbled above them that could be felt in the gut and increasingly threatened to unleash itself upon the castle itself.
“Quick!” yelled Laincourt.
Seeking cover behind the crenellations, they took the walkway toward the third tower. They went as fast they could without running upright and started to believe that they might make good their escape when a strident cry rang out nearby: the vicomtesse’s dragonnet was beating its wings level with them and giving away their position. Heads turned their way. A hue and cry was raised.
Laincourt brandished his pistol and shot the reptile down with a single ball that ripped off its head.
“A wasted shot,” commented Agnes.
“Not entirely,” replied the cardinal’s spy, thinking of the hurdy-gurdy player who had been captured thanks to the dragonnet.
They were halfway between the second and the third towers, toward which Savelda’s swordsmen were already hurrying. They ran under sporadic and badly aimed fire, reached the tower before their enemies, and tried to open the hatch.
Locked.
“Merde!” Laincourt swore.
Agnes took stock of the situation. Savelda and his freebooters were coming toward them from the first tower by the walkway. Others were already emerging from the second tower and blocked any possibility of retreat. The ground was fifty metres below. They did not have time to force the hatch.
They were trapped.
Agnes and Laincourt placed themselves en garde, back to back… and waited.
Cautious now, the hired swordsmen slowed down and surrounded them, while Savelda, calm and smiling, walked up to them.
A circle of blades closed in on the fugitives, who were resolved to die rather than allow themselves to be captured.
“Usually,” Agnes muttered to herself, “they show up about now…”
Laincourt heard her.
“What did you say?” he asked over his wounded shoulder.
“Nothing. Delighted to have met you.”
“Same here.”
And then rescue came from the sky.
22
Outside the keep, the castle was plunged into a state of chaos that was dominated by the roiling storm of energies released by the destruction of the Sphere d’Ame. Sizzling lightning bolts fell from the ragged night sky, igniting trees and bushes, raising sprays of earth, pulverising stones, and knocking down sections of wall. One of them split the altar open and set it ablaze as Gagniere fled from it, now rid of his ceremonial robe and carrying the unconscious vicomtesse in his arms. People were screaming and panicked horses whinnied. Followers of the Black Claw and its hired swordsmen were running in every direction, not knowing where to seek refuge or even who or what, exactly, they needed defending against.
Because the Cardinal’s Blades had gone on the offensive.
Using Malencontre’s information, La Fargue and his men were quietly surrounding the keep when Agnes interrupted the ceremony in such dramatic fashion. As desperate as it was, her initiative proved invaluable in diverting the attention of everyone present to the torments of the great spectral dragon. La Fargue, who was moving alongside a sunken path bordered by a low wall, hastened toward the enclosure where the two wyvern riders, who had been idle since the end of the day, were guarding their beasts. With a pipe in his mouth and a heavy sack slung round his shoulders in a bandolier, Ballardieu climbed to the top of a rampart, broke the neck of a lookout, and discreetly took his place directly above the main gate and its sentries. Further off, Saint-Lucq stepped over another sentry’s dead body and approached a campfire around which five swordsmen had gathered, all of them gaping up at the extraordinary display taking place in the night skies. At the same time, Marciac was slipping toward the stable.
In the keep, Agnes and Laincourt were moving from one tower to the next in an effort to stay ahead of Savelda’s search parties when, outside, the first lightning bolt struck the ritual site. At first paralysed in terror, the Black Claw’s followers scattered, ducking their heads as more bolts came down, while the hired swordsmen watching over the ritual finally began to react to the alarm.
Ballardieu judged that this was the right moment to take action. Digging into his bag, he took out a grenade and lit its fuse from his clay pipe before hurling the object blindly over the parapet against which he was crouching. A second and a third immediately followed, their explosions ringing out amidst the screams and the roar of the supernatural storm. He risked a glimpse at the scene below, was satisfied to see the bodies of sentries lying there, and then spied a wyvern rising from the enclosure. Standing, he began bombarding the milling crowd with more grenades.
The freebooters gathered around a campfire saw the grenades exploding in the distance, grabbed their weapons and-
– froze.
A man dressed in black, his eyes hidden by red glasses that reflected the flames, was standing before them. He waited and pointed his outstretched rapier at them. He seemed both relaxed and determined. Apparently he had been there for some time. They realised they would have to get past him. And in spite of all their experience of suffering, fighting, and massacres, a feeling of dread came over them.
Their guts clenched with fear; they knew for certain that they were going to die.
Panicked by the dazzling flashes of lightning and deafening thunder, the Black Claw’s followers and their hired swordsmen were running toward the stable when its doors opened wide to reveal the fire ravaging the interior and a stampede of horses that Marciac had freed. The terrified steeds knocked down and trampled the first arrivals, and shoved the rest aside, whinnying in fear before they dispersed.
The silhouette of the Gascon was outlined against the blaze as he emerged in turn, gripping his rapier. He rapidly dispatched the few disoriented freebooters who remained, slitting one man’s throat, running his blade through the chest of another and splitting open the face of a third.
Taking advantage of a moment’s respite, he lifted his gaze to the sky which seemed to have gone mad, and then noticed Saint-Lucq dashing off, barely slowing down to eliminate the men who brandished swords in his path. At the end of one assault, the half-blood turned toward Marciac and pointed to the dark mass of the castle keep, which was where he was headed. The Gascon understood and nodded, thought of following him, but was immediately distracted by defending himself against two more opponents.
***Surrounded at the top of the tower, Agnes and Laincourt believed they were doomed when, thrown from above, grenades with blazing fuses bounced among the stupefied swordsmen who were threatening them, provoking panicked pushing and shoving before the missiles exploded one after another in clouds of fiery powder, their burning shards ripping through those who had not been able to retreat toward the keep’s walkway.