“This way,” Brandon urged, giving Gretchan’s hand a tug. They raced down the street, past the Cracked Mug. A crowd, attracted by the commotion, was gathering outside the bar. Brandon was gratified as the dwarf citizens parted for them then closed in behind, providing another few seconds’ gap between the fleeing fugitives and Lord Heelspur’s Enforcers.
Brandon aimed for the nearest of the connecting stairwells, reasoning that they would have a better chance of losing their pursuers if they could escape from that level of the city. But as soon as they veered around another corner, he saw more of the black-garbed agents standing guard before the landing leading into the stairwell. There were something like a dozen of the dwarves in that detachment, and seeing Brandon and Gretchan, half of them charged while the others held their position at the stairwell.
“How many of those bastards are there?” Brandon wondered out loud, looking back to see more of their pursuers emerging from the crowd outside the Cracked Mug. He spun around, momentarily at a loss for direction, and was startled again when Gretchan barked an order and took off running. “Follow me!”
He was swept along, quickly sprinting up to her side. “You should let me lead!” he insisted. “I know this city!”
“I have a plan!” she shot back. More of the Enforcers appeared in front of them, so detachments were closing in from three sides. Gretchan startled him by tugging him around another corner.
“Not this way; we’re going to be trapped!” he cried out.
She plunged on, while he felt he had no choice but to follow. They ran down a narrow lane between bustling shops selling food, fabrics, drinks, and tools. Dwarf merchants and customers dodged out of their way, cursing. Kondike’s sudden appearance caused a young dwarf maid to scream, and Brandon knocked over the handcart of a vendor selling savory mushroom tarts.
“Sorry!” he called over his shoulder, still plunging onward behind Gretchan.
The fugitives approached one last intersection, beyond which loomed a wide plaza and the lip of the great Atrium of Garnet Thax.
Brandon was momentarily relieved as Gretchan skidded to a halt at the last side street before the Atrium. They could turn right or left and keep running; if they continued straight ahead, they’d be trapped at the lip of the sheer cliff wall. She whistled sharply, and Kondike stood rigid, staring at her with upraised ears.
“Kondike-go!” she commanded, pointing down the side street. “Run!”
Immediately the big dog spun about and sprang away, his long legs carrying him quickly along the lane, parallel to the edge of the Atrium. Crouching low above the street, the dog stretched out and sprinted in a blur of speed, dashing among the startled dwarves to all sides. In a flash he was gone from view, though Brandon could track his swift progress by the startled reactions of dwarf pedestrians who scrambled to get out of his way as the dog ran farther and farther away from his two companions.
They heard shouts from up the street and saw a whole company of the black-clad Enforcers, more than a dozen of them, charging in their direction.
“Halt!” cried the one in the lead, brandishing a short sword. “Stop them!” he exhorted the crowd. “They’re under arrest!”
As happened with the crowd outside the Cracked Mug, the pedestrians showed no inclination to tackle the wild and dangerous-looking fugitives, though neither were they so rash as to try to obstruct the large group of weapon-brandishing Enforcers. Once again Gretchan pulled Brandon along, running right onto the plaza beside the Atrium until finally they halted, facing their pursuers, with the stone railing, barely thigh-high, crowding their backs. Brandon was acutely aware of the treacherous plunge, the shaft leading into the very center of the world, yawning a mere step or two behind him.
“Now what?” he demanded, raising his axe, holding the haft across his chest as he prepared to make a last stand. As the dozen or more agents closed in, he remembered Gretchan’s stories to his parents, in which she had inflated his battle prowess. He glanced at her in exasperation. “Just how good of a fighter do you think I am?”
He was startled to see that she still carried the large cloak he had used as a disguise, apparently having tucked it under her arm as they had fled the Bluestone house. She extended it toward him. “Trust me,” she barked as she sat down on the stone railing that marked the edge of the bottomless pit. “Here, tuck that axe in your belt, take two corners of this cloak, one in each hand, and hold on tight!”
Every instinct in his body urged him to confront her, to refuse her mad plan-whatever it was. The shouts of the pursuing Enforcers rang in his ears as the king’s men warily started to close in.
“Get down from there! Come away from that edge!” snapped an officious dwarf with a neatly trimmed black beard. His voice was shrill, nearly cracking from the high excitement as he gestured to the dwarves of his company, pointing at the two fugitives.
“Take him, men! Surrender, you!” he squawked, waving his arms wildly.
The pursuing Enforcers didn’t exactly rush to obey, for they had slowed their charge and spread out to form a semicircle, blocking any path of retreat Brandon or Gretchan might have chosen.
Instead of running or fighting, however, Brandon did as Gretchan commanded, stowing his axe and hastily taking the corners of the piece of rough cloth. He saw that she held the other two corners of the square fabric. Looking into her eyes as he sat down on the railing beside her, he was startled to see a flash of amusement in her expression. Then her face grew deadly serious and she quickly swung about on the stone railing at the edge of the Atrium, extending her legs so they were dangling dangerously over the edge.
“What in Reorx’s name …?” he muttered even as he imitated her actions. The Enforcers, only a dozen steps away, watched them skeptically; none of them seemed willing to charge toward the edge of the pit.
Somehow Brandon wasn’t surprised when she gave him her next command:
“Jump!”
What else was he going to do as he saw her start to slide off the railing?
He jumped.
Meanwhile, back in Pax Tharkas-well, actually deep below Pax Tharkas …
Gus had been spending a lot of time in his throne room-the throne being the large, flat rock upon which he sat when he was pondering the heavy responsibilities that were incumbent upon him by virtue of his exalted status as highbulp of Pax Tharkas. His prime task on that day was to determine what manner of food he would send Berta out to fetch. She had a keen eye and a steady hand when it came to bonking rats over the head with a well-aimed stone, and she invariably gave the meatiest, most tender morsels to her lord and master, the highbulp. But in point of fact, Gus was getting a little tired of rat meat.
Of course, if he had been an introspective fellow, it would have dawned on him that never before, in his life or any imagined Aghar existence, would he ever have imagined that he could get tired of any kind of food, much less good old reliable rat meat, so long as said food wasn’t actively poisoning him. (Even gully dwarves tended not to favor foods guaranteed to make them sick, though in a pinch such sustenance would do.)
Berta, as usual, was sitting attentively at his feet, waiting for him to make his wishes known so she could serve him. For a long, long time-during the first two days of his reign at least-she had assumed that posture with a beaming smile, knowing that merely to serve the highbulp was an honor beyond comprehension. Lately, Gus had noticed-for the past two days at least-she had not been smiling so much. Again, if he had been one to think carefully about things, he might have noticed that the expression on her face was actually closer to a scowl than a cheerful smile. But, of course, he didn’t notice.
“I think big dwarf food be nice, for change,” he said finally in a proclaiming voice. “You know, you steal meat and cheese and stuff from Hylar kitchens.” He breezily pointed toward the ceiling. “Up there, two times up from here.”