Hecht was seconds behind. Just the length of time it took to shed a mail shirt and weapons. Terens Ernest was seconds behind him.
Hecht did not think about his actions till later, though the cool water was an encouragement to reflection. He saw Ephrian floundering, a poor swimmer but safely separated from his mount. Hecht went after Katrin, who had gone under while still trying to separate herself from her animal. He got her loose. Her horse drifted on downriver, shrieking at first but soon getting it together and striking out toward the lower northern bank.
Terens Ernest tried helping with Katrin. He was a strong swimmer.
Captain Ephrian made it to the embankment but could find no decent handhold so he tried to stay near the stone while the weak current carried him somewhere more felicitous.
Ephrian would be overlooked despite all the would-be rescuers gathering above.
Hecht was not as strong a swimmer as he believed. Nor was Terens Ernest. They reached the embankment only to face the same problem as Captain Ephrian. There were few congenial handholds.
People up top yelled about hanging on because ropes were on the way.
Ernest lost his weak hold and followed Ephrian downstream. Hecht could not help without abandoning the Empress.
Eyes tearing, he drove bloody fingers into a crack between blocks while keeping Katrin’s face above water with his other hand.
He lost consciousness.
***
Piper Hecht, Commander of the Righteous, wakened in an unfamiliar bed. A headache and upset stomach told him he had been sedated for some time. His left hand ached. The fingers were bandaged. The crust on his eyelids kept him from opening those. He tried to rise.
“He’s starting to wake up!” That voice belonged to Vali. It brought several people quickly and others within minutes. Head throbbing, Hecht made noises that were senseless even to him.
A hand went behind his head, lifted. Sweet, cold water filled his mouth. A damp cloth daubed at his eyelids. Anna said, “Relax, Piper. You cheated Him again.”
A heavy hand pushed on his chest, forced him back down.
He did will himself to relax. Relaxing had to be good. He would not be in these circumstances if something dire had not happened.
Lamps got lighted. His surroundings became less obscure.
He was surrounded by family. Pella. The girls. Anna. Heris and both old men. What were they doing here?
He remembered. He wanted to ask questions but knew the sensible course was to conserve energy. They would tell him what he needed to know.
The smell of fresh coffee hit hard, like a kick in the shin, wakening memories.
Anna and Pella lifted him and propped him with pillows. Heris put a small cup into his right hand. “You gave us a scare, little brother.”
“Yeah?”
“You wouldn’t let the woman go.”
Anna said, “She drowned. Before you pulled her free. You and her horse were the only survivors.”
Hecht teared up. This was insanity. He did not mention Katrin’s mother. These people did not know, nor would they understand.
Ernest did not make it? That was just plain wrong.
From somewhere out of sight the Ninth Unknown said, “Piper, you need to quit lying around feeling sorry for yourself. Pinkus Ghort is at the gate.”
“Really?”
“Not literally. Not exactly. But he could be knocking by this time tomorrow. We need to take steps to eliminate his motivation.”
“Excuse me. Why are you and Heris here?”
Heris said, “We came to drag you off to watch us wrap our job.”
Februaren said, “She killed a god, Piper. Just went after him till boom! Like that worm on the Dechear. Only this was no pup. This was a true Great Old One.”
“Why do you need me?”
Heris said, “Later, Piper. Double Great, quit gushing. And, how about we go give Serenity a double dose of Ostarega the Malicious?”
“Works for me.”
With no further discussion the pair turned sideways.
Hecht was on his feet and dressed when they returned, but was woozy. Anna had begun changing his bandages, saying, “This isn’t as bad as I thought when they brought you. You’ll be good as new in a couple weeks.”
Februaren appeared, running. His hair was smoldering. If he had not encountered a wall he would have gone down. Heris arrived bent over. She collapsed into a crouch. Her breath came loud and ragged. Had she been male Hecht would have pegged her for a victim of a skillfully delivered groin kick.
The Ninth Unknown eased over to lean on a table. He gasped, “I think that went well.”
“Yeah.” Heris tried to laugh. She fell over. “You should see the other guys.”
Hecht asked, “What happened?”
“We didn’t surprise them. Doneto has some clever friends.”
Anna finished wrapping Hecht’s fingers. She found a chair for Februaren. He settled gingerly. “We tamed them up some, though. You can get in through the tunnels now, if you want. Unless they flood them. They could always do that.”
Hecht kept after them but could not get no more sense out of either. He said, “First chance we get we need to let Princess Helspeth know what happened so she can be ready when the news gets to Alten Weinberg.”
Heris and Februaren both groaned and glared.
Lila said, “I can do that.”
“No. You can’t,” Hecht told her. “You’ve taken enough risks.”
The Ninth Unknown said, “I’ll do it. In the morning. I’ll need tokens from you and the Empress to be convincing, though.”
“I’ll write you a letter. That should do. She’ll recognize my hand.”
43. Alten Weinberg: Bad News, Bad News
A short man in dirty brown stepped out of the shadows in the Princess Apparent’s private bedchamber. She had just risen. Her women shrieked and fled.
“You.”
“Me. I have news. Listen closely. It’s critical. You’ll only get to hear it once before the guards arrive.” He told her what had happened to Katrin. He handed her a letter from Piper Hecht, now her Commander of the Righteous. He vanished seconds before Algres Drear burst in.
“He’s gone, Captain.”
“Who?”
“A sorcerer. The same one who took Ferris Renfrow. He brought a message. Get these people out and close the door. With you on this side of it.” That done, she said, “Katrin is dead. She fell into the Teragi and drowned. There were twenty witnesses, half of them her own lifeguards. There’s more to the story, I’m sure. The sorcerer brought a letter from the Commander of the Righteous. I haven’t read it yet. Right now, this very minute, I want you to start getting ready for whatever happens when that news gets back here.”
“You believe this sorcerer?”
“I do.” She gripped the letter from the Commander tightly, already willing Drear to leave so she could read.
“Then you’re right. I’d better get started. And stop talking. It won’t be long before someone or something moves in to spy.”
“Yes.”
Helspeth held on barely long enough to let Drear get out of the room. Then, in her haste to get to read it she fumbled the letter twice. And a moment after that she spit like an angry cat to get her women to leave her alone long enough to find out what the Commander had to say.
44. Great Sky Fortress: Heris’s Game
Operations in Brothe turned anticlimactic. First came word that Pinkus Ghort, literally outside the gates and getting set to storm them while, at the same time, preparing to tame the Grand Duke, had, suddenly and inexplicably, ordered the levies to go home and his own men to stand down. He did not disarm but said he would not fight unless he was attacked.
Meantime, the Righteous captured Krois. And did not profit after making history. Never in its twelve hundred years had that island fortress been taken.
“They’re gone!” Vircondelet complained. “We went over every inch of the place. They’re just plain
not there.”
Some staff remained, people who were, in essence, part of the physical plant. People whose families had been part of Krois for centuries. They reported that Serenity and his associates had slipped away during the night, aboard three boats. They had fled to a ship waiting downriver. The servants did not know where that ship was headed.
Hecht cursed softly. Doneto’s boats would have sailed right past the Castella. Brotherhood sentries would have seen them. Would have ignored them. All night traffic on the Teragi was ignored.
***
Heris and the Ninth Unknown got into some sort of squabble. They did not explain. Hecht thought the old man wanted to go find ships and sink them while Heris wanted to get on with her own project in the realm of legend, myth, and devil gods.
Heris said, “Piper, I need all those eggs you collected after you killed those Instrumentalities.”
“Why?”
“Instrumentalities have two souls. One they bring into the world with them and one they leave hidden in the Night. The eggs are their middle-world souls. If an egg and a hidden soul got together your success could be undone.”
“How about the thing in the catacombs?” The egg from that had not been collected.
“Double Great is sure it’s still down there, under the rubble.”
“I don’t know how much good I can do, Heris. I never kept those eggs myself. Rhuk and Prosek collected them. They sealed them up in metal boxes but I don’t know what they did with them after that.”
“Find out. I’ll make arrangements to collect and transport them.”
“What’re you going to do with them?”
“Get rid of them.”
But she had to get them to the Great Sky Fortress first. And she could not move them there by translating. The trapped souls might escape while she was cutting the chord.
Hecht was confused. But he did not need to understand so long as Heris and the Ninth Unknown did.
***
Hecht spent a few hours with Pinkus Ghort, watching his friend get drunk and listening to him complain. “I’m unemployed, Pipe. I’m glad we didn’t have to butt heads, but, shit, man, I’m out of a job.”
“That won’t last. They’ll need an experienced man to run the City Regiment.”
The Grand Duke had entered the city to maintain order. The Righteous were already moving out, headed for Alten Weinberg with Katrin’s casket at the head of the column. Hecht would catch up later.
***
Hecht visited the Bruglioni estate. He winced at all the damage his troops had done despite their best efforts.
He told Paludan Bruglioni and Gervase Saluda, “The curse of Piper Hecht keeps coming back on the Bruglioni. Gervase, I couldn’t talk Principaté Delari into it so I volunteered you to take over Krois. Somebody has to be in charge there till everything shakes out.”
“You’re making me Patriarch?”
Paludan laughed out loud. Saluda was not religious. He had gone into the Collegium only because the Bruglioni had had no better man.
“Pro tem. So there’s somebody with a hand on the reins. I’m in a rush. We need to get hold of the reins in Alten Weinberg, too.”
“But …”
“You’re it, Gervase.” Hecht did not stay to argue.
***
Things came together fast when the rich and powerful were frightened. Within thirty hours the Commander of the Righteous and the Grand Duke Hilandle jointly proclaimed Bayard va Still-Patter Imperial viceroy in Brothe. Pinkus Ghort became master of the City Regiment, which was to be reinforced by men from his disbanding Patriarchal force. And Gervase Saluda, numbed, moved into Krois.
After everything that the Princes of the Church had suffered lately, and with all the grim pressures toward honesty now obtaining, Hecht thought Saluda might well win an election. If an election were held. If the temporal Church chose to impeach Serenity, something that never had been done before. Traditionally, bad or unpopular Patriarchs were assisted in making an early transition to the afterlife. But this latest unpopular Patriarch could not be found to help along. And, as soon as the fear began to wear off, his friends would begin to resurface.
“Hopefully in the river,” Hecht said.
“Can you leave now?” Heris barked. “Can you goddamned well leave now, Piper Hecht? You bark at Grandfather because he has to be there for every goddamned little detail, but you’re twice as worse as he is. Come on! Let’s go! Now!”
Hecht’s cheeks reddened. Heris was right. And what she implied probably was, too. As he got older he became less comfortable trusting details to others. That was not good. That was not what had won him his reputation. That was not what had lifted him up to the heights he occupied now.
The Ninth Unknown snickered. “Some big-time kettle calling the pot going on here, Heris.”
Heris started pushing people together. There was a plan. Lila and the Ninth Unknown helped her. Hecht ended up in the middle, with Anna, Pella, and Vali pressed against him. They were surrounded by the other three, arms on each other’s shoulders, facing inward, squeezing everyone tighter.
The Eleventh Unknown observed, smiling benignly.
Smashed up inside all that friendly flesh Hecht suffered only a touch of nightmare during the transition to a strange gray place where his amulet became extremely excited.
He saw very little color, except for a gaudy ship tied up not far away. He did not at first look up.
People came out of a genial building not far away. Some were familiar, most were not. All were armed with huge mugs, and they all seemed friendly.
Hecht recognized Ferris Renfrow and the ascendant. The short, wide, extremely hairy people, all helmets, beards, mail, and cutlery, he knew only from stories heard from his sister.
What madness, this? He had been brought up a devout Praman. This was impossible.
He looked up the mountain now, gawked at the rainbow bridge and the impossibly huge and impossibly tall castle.
Heris edged in beside him. She whispered, “How was that transition? Better?”
“Much. But it wouldn’t have been if you hadn’t put me in the middle. Pella! Freeze. If you even think about wandering off …”
Pella took one good look at the dwarves, then sidled over between Lila and Vali.
Vali indicated Renfrow. “I remember that man. He was at the Knight of Wands.”
Anna had been stricken dumb. Hecht took her hand, entwined fingers, and held on, afraid she would bolt or faint.
Heris made the introductions. Ferris Renfrow, known in myth as the Bastard. Asgrimmur Grimmsson, soultaken, ascendant, and the once upon a time ferocious Andorayan pirate Svavar. Khor-ben Jarneyn Gjoresson, also mythical and better remembered as Korban Iron Eyes, crown prince of the Aelen Kofer. Behind Iron Eyes: his father and his son, Gjore and Copper. Then this dwarf and that, all of whose names she had harvested and quietly memorized, to their consternation. Then, suddenly, in a dark and dangerous temper, with taut throat, because the mer had both surprised her and had arrived in her most toothsome form yet, leaving a wet trail across the quay, “And Philleas Pescadore, who speaks for the people of the sea.”
Anna nearly crushed Hecht’s hand. He was so glad she had hold of the uninjured one.
Pella drooled. His sisters hung on and hated the mer for her naked perfection.
All of which went right past Philleas.
Heris said, “We need to get on with this. Most of us have critical obligations back in the middle world. Iron Eyes, Asgrimmur, talk to my brother while I talk to Renfrow.”
Hecht wanted to deliver a vigorous kick to his sister’s butt. She had said that deliberately.
The Ninth Unknown collected the ascendant and Korban Iron Eyes to one side. It was obvious they were old cronies. Hecht felt left out. And, while he understood that was not deliberate, neither was he accustomed to being an also there, in the margins, not part of what was happening.
Heris just wanted him here to witness. Wanted him to see how c
lever she was.
Hecht decided he was all right with that. Heris, like Lila, needed validation. Let her be the shining star. She deserved it.
He suspected, though, that several others might consider themselves the star.
He was wrong. Even the ancients deferred to Heris. Heris was the central force. They considered her the real Godslayer, hero nonpareil. Piper Hecht was a passenger.
***
Heris insisted that they all climb the mountain.
Hecht asked, “But if the Windwalker is already extinct why do anything? Why not just let them rot in Limbo?”
Did she blush? That did look like a bit of color in her cheeks. “I foresee useful results if I take it the rest of the way.”
“And those would be?” Unable to keep a taint of suspicion out of his voice.
“Piper … If this works out I’ll push those soul eggs into Asgrimmur’s pocket universe. I’ll free him of his haunts. And I may be able to enlist some serious Instrumentalities in our cause.”
“Uh … what?”
“We could end up having some of those Old Ones help us in return for their freedom.” She told him about the captive gods, name by name, as she had that information from dwarves who had known the gods personally. The Aelen Kofer bore the Old Gods no love — with two exceptions.
Hecht grunted, scowled, thought this was all just too unlikely to be true. Though it would be marvelous to have an Instrumentality for an enforcer that could gobble a bogon without blinking or burping.
Anna stood around, basically lost. Piper Hecht was a mite less confused only because he had heard so much from Heris. But he still felt like a half-blind spectator. The children took to the Realm of the Gods as though it had been crafted for their entertainment.
One short sleep after a period of planning that Hecht thought went more like a drinking contest and, suddenly, a whole mob headed up the mountain. The Aelen Kofer brought goat carts. Nobody got left behind, though Anna volunteered. Even ancient Gjore trudged along. It had been several millennia since he had poked around inside the Great Sky Fortress.
Anna told Heris, “I wasn’t made for adventures. Not of the outdoor kind. All I’ve ever wanted is a quiet life. And I had that till Piper Hecht turned up at my door one night, calling himself Frain Dorao.”