Staggering, Kintour allowed himself to be moved towards the fireplace. He was like a puppet, with no will of his own.
"We climb," Will urged. "You first. I will follow to hold off any pursuit."
Kintour was leaden, his fingers feebly feeling for handholds. Will put his shoulder to the man's behind and launched him up the chimney, climbing quickly behind him while bracing himself against the sooty stones with his legs. Black showers rained down all around.
In the room, the door crashed open and the heavy beat of boots crossed the boards. A wild barking followed in the wake.
"Where are we?" Kintour's dazed voice floated down to Will.
"On the road to freedom. Now: climb faster!" He gave Kintour a rough shove as the sound of canine scrabbling echoed from the fireplace below.
In the dark, Kintour began to panic. Will patiently explained what was occurring as they inched along the flue.
"What if we become trapped here?" The edge of fear in Kintour's dreamy voice was eerie.
"I came down. Ergo we can climb out," Will shouted up.
The snuffling and snarling began to rise up the chimney. Somehow the dog was climbing after them.
"No dog at all, then," Will muttered to himself before calling, "Climb faster, now."
As they drove up through the flue system, Will looked down between his boots and glimpsed the glint of the dog's teeth as it snapped only a few feet below him. Finding near-invisible footholds, it climbed with relatively little purchase on the blackened stone, so that it almost appeared to be gliding upwards.
"What is happening?" Kintour cried. The edge in his voice grew more intense as he surfaced from the spell.
Finally, they broke out into the chill night. Disoriented, Kintour almost pitched off the roof until Will burst from the chimney and caught hold of his shirt. The dog wriggled up the final few feet, snapping its jaws like a gamekeeper's trap.
"Along the roofs," Will urged. "We can be away from here before-"
"No!" Kintour clutched his head as though in pain, his legs buckling. Will held on to him tightly as his feet slipped on the tiles. "I ... I remember now," Kintour stuttered.
Clambering fully from the chimney, Will attempted to guide Kintour along the roof's pitch. "Do not look down," Will said. "Keep your eyes on my face." The fingers of the gusting wind tugged at them. At their backs, the dog's snarling echoed from the chimney.
Kintour looked up at Will with an expression of devastation. "They told me ... I could never ..."
There was a faint poof and Kintour burst into silvery-grey dust. In shock, Will grasped for the glittering power, but it drained through his fingers, was caught on the night wind, and blew out across the city. Within a second, where a man had stood, there was nothing.
For a second, Will was rooted, aghast. His incomprehension at Kintour's sudden fate was eventually supplanted by the certain knowledge that the Enemy-the unholy, Unseelie Court-were capable of any atrocity. He was shocked back into the moment by the dog thrusting its head out of the chimney. Eyes glaring, it thrashed savagely as it attempted to extricate itself.
Will threw himself rapidly along the pitch of the roof as he heard the dog crash onto the tiles, slipping and scrabbling until it found purchase and balance. Caution was no longer an option-the dog's speed and strength would punish even the slightest hesitation-but at the speed he was travelling, one misstep meant certain death.
At a wynd, Will threw himself across the gap without slowing his pace. Tiles flew out into the void under his heels. He half slipped, caught himself on the brink of careering down the roof and over the edge to the cobbles far below, and almost fell the other way as his weight shifted. The dog thundered along the roof behind him.
When he landed on the roof of the haphazard construction he had passed through earlier that night, it swayed beneath his feet. A notion struck him. Casting an eye towards the dog bounding along the roofs and the Hunter loping with supernatural ease in its wake, he hammered a foot through the tiles and yelled at the two occupants he spied inside to vacate their rooms.
At the edge of the next roof, he braced his back against a chimney and pressed his feet into the shuddering roof he had vacated. After a second, it began to move.
The dog slammed onto the roof, only feet away from him. It was too late to escape now. Grunting, he drove all his strength into his feet. The roof shifted away from him, gathering speed as it moved, and with a lurch and a loud rending, it tore free from its slipshod moorings and slid off the top of the building. Frantically paddling to keep its balance, the dog continued to snap savagely, even as it fell away with the roof, over the edge and down. The cries that rose up from the ragged remnants of the tenements' lower floors were drowned out by the explosive boom of the entire floor smashing into the street.
Feet kicking, Will dragged himself up onto the next roof. As he caught his breath, he looked back to see the Hunter standing on the far side of the newly formed gulf, watching him with a cold, malicious eye, the gaping wound on his cheek visible in the moonlight. Will had no doubt that the dog had survived the fall, but it felt like a small victory and a marker for what he would do the next time he encountered the Hunter.
With a sardonic salute to his adversary, he continued along the roofs, filled with conflicting emotions, but sensing he had come a step closer to stopping the Enemy's plans.
CHAPTER 22
ill made it back to Reidheid's house on Cowgate within twenty minutes, taking care to scan every street and wynd he passed for the Enemy who would soon be flooding in pursuit.
"You have protection here?" Will asked as he bounded over the threshold when Reidheid opened the door.
Reidheid indicated the trail of salt and herbs across the doorway. "Every entrance to this house is defended. The Enemy will never enter. It is a safe haven."
"That is reassuring. I fear at this moment that the Enemy may well be consumed with a desire to see the inside of your house."
"Your mission was a success?" Reidheid guided Will into the drawing room, where Nathaniel and Meg sat in deep, quiet conversation. They left quickly at Reidheid's gesture.
"The Silver Skull is here in Edinburgh, as we presumed. Unfortunately, the time was not right to bring it back with me, but it is clear the Enemy is not ready to use the destructive force it carries with it. They need the Shield to complete their plan, and they have not yet located it."
"And do you know what this plan is?" Reidheid asked.
"Not yet. But now I have my own plan."
Reidheid smiled broadly. "Of course. I would expect no less from the great Will Swyfte! Could you enlighten me?"
"I am going to find the Shield myself."
Reidheid's eyes narrowed as he tried to ascertain if Will was serious. "But the Enemy have been searching for the Shield without any result."
Will shrugged. "But I am not the Enemy. And there are places I can go where they cannot. Do you know a man by the name of Kintour, a keeper of the records at the palace?"
Reidheid nodded. "He has been missing for a long time ... since the days of Mary. Many felt he was loyal to the queen and fled when she fell from grace. That, or dead."
"He is dead now, another thing for which the Enemy must pay." From his pocket, Will withdrew the parchment Kintour had given him. He studied the scrawled writing. "He had found a guide to the whereabouts of the Shield, but had not yet broken the cipher."
"Oh? May I see?"
"Perhaps later. You have a library? With books pertaining to Edinburgh and the palace?"
"Of course," Reidheid said. "I have many books. Come."