He cried out and fell back.
At that moment, motion stirred at the corner of her eye. Pupp burst through the latched door. He was a molten glow, a blur of impotent fury.
Though relieved, Dart kept her focus on Pyllor. He wobbled, clutching himself with one hand, but the other lifted his sword.
“You’re dead,” he hissed.
Pupp danced up to her, but she had no time to bloody him, to use the Grace in her most essential humour to call him forth.
Pyllor came at her again, more hobbled and more cautious. She read the cunning reflected in his eyes. She readied herself, but she knew he was the better swordsman.
He thrust, testing her this time.
She parried, but he smacked back her blade and came in with a feint, followed by a savage thrust. She barely nicked her hilt up to block the tip. Still, the blow reverberated up her arm and knocked her back a step.
Pyllor sneered and lowered his sword.
Dart took advantage of the satisfaction in his expression. She lunged out, sweeping into the opening. He dropped his hilt even farther, lowering his guard. Dart realized her mistake—but it was too late. She was committed. Her momentum carried forward her attack.
Pyllor suddenly shoved out his elbow and twisted his sword’s tip in the opposite direction. Dart recognized the opening maneuver. A perfectly executed Naethryn’s Folly.
And she had been drawn inescapably into it.
He looped his sword in a side-sweep, trapping her thrusted blade—then tugged his elbow to his side and turned on his back heel.
Dart’s sword sprang from her fingertips with a ring of steel. It sailed, hilt over tip, through the air, and clanged against the stone floor.
Pyllor did not wait—he drove his sword for her belly.
Dart had only one lesson left. One again taught to her by the squire. She grabbed bare-handed for his blade. Her fingers closed over the steel. She shoved with her palm.
Steel sliced with a painless kiss.
She would lose fingers.
Before she could react, a crash sounded to her right, and the door cracked open with a pop of its latch. Pyllor faltered in surprise. Dart pushed his sword aside and dropped back.
Light flooded the dim room from the hall outside. A dark figure stood limned in the doorway. In the stunned silence, he took in the scene before him.
Pyllor turned his sword toward the intruder. He eyed him, judging him. This was no knight, but someone in a rather plain cloak. Someone of no consequence.
“Begone! This is none of your concern!”
Ignoring him, the figure stepped inside. The blinding light fell from his shoulders and revealed face and form.
The bronze boy.
Brant.
How…?
“Let her go,” he said with a dread calm.
Dart glanced back to Pyllor. Surely this was over. Agony flared up her arm from her sliced palm. She clenched a fist against it, trying to squeeze it away.
Pyllor refused to back down. His fury, stoked by the thwarted attack, found a fresh target in the intruder, believing the younger man to be no more than one of the faceless underfolk, what with his worn leathers and scuffed boots.
Pyllor dropped his sword lower. But Dart knew this was another feint, a trick meant to dull an opponent’s guard. At his back, Dart spotted a dagger, hidden out of sight.
“Don’t—” she said and reached with her injured hand. Blood spattered from her fingertips and spilled from her palm.
But it never struck the floor.
The humour splashed upon the waiting form below.
Dart felt Pupp appear, blessed with blood, drawn fully into this world. He burst into solidity with a flare of ruddy fire. He leaped toward Pyllor at the exact time the squire twisted and flung his dagger toward the intruder.
Pupp sailed through the air, a molten bronze arrow. He hit Pyllor in the arm, taking it off at the elbow. Pyllor screamed.
The attack, though late, proved unnecessary. The thrown dagger missed its intended target as Brant sidestepped it, as if anticipating it all along. It clattered into the hall outside.
Pyllor fell back onto his rear, holding up his severed arm in disbelief. The edge of his shirt still smoked. The stump of his limb stuck out, blackened and seared.
More shouts of horror rose from Pyllor’s companions. They fled toward the door, away from Pupp, who now circled Pyllor on the floor.
Brant allowed the others to flee as he moved toward Dart.
Pyllor cowered, wide-eyed in terror and shock. He blubbered incoherently, scooting away, abandoning his sword as he pushed with his remaining hand.
Brant touched her arm. “We should be away. Now.” His eyes were on Pupp, but he seemed little surprised.
Dart allowed herself to be drawn toward the door.
“Call off your daemon,” Brant said.
Dart had no strength to argue. “To me, Pupp.”
His fiery form continued to circle Pyllor, hackles raised, snarling fire.
“To me,” Dart urged more firmly. She remembered what had befallen two other men, back in the rookery in Chrismferry. She had witnessed Pupp’s mercy then. A part of her wished the same for Pyllor.
Pupp seemed to sense this, glancing back at her. Beyond the fire of his eyes, she saw her own fury reflected. And again something not of this world. Beyond her ability to fathom.
Dart met that fiery gaze, acknowledged the bloodlust, both in Pupp and in her own heart. Still, she felt Brant’s touch on her elbow, urgent but patient. She responded to it.
“To me,” she commanded again. “Now.”
Pupp turned back to Pyllor. The squire moaned and pushed against the wall. A trail of wetness flowed from under Pyllor as he fouled himself in his terror. But Pupp finally obeyed. He swung around and trotted sullenly and darkly back to her. He brought with him a whiff of burnt blood—her own and perhaps Pyllor’s.
Brant led her to the door.
Down the hallway, a sharp cry of daemon rang from the central stair.
Brant glanced at her. Dart noted the flecks of gold in his emerald eyes. “Where?” he asked.
“This way,” Dart said and hurried away from the shouts. She led him toward the far end of the hallway. A back stair led to the warren of rooms and narrow halls of Tashijan’s underfolk and small staff.
“It fades,” Brant said beside her, staring at Pupp’s form.
“The Grace that gave him substance has been consumed.”
Pupp slipped back into his ghostly form. And none too soon. A door flew open, revealing an elderly manservant in house livery, drawn by the commotion. Dart and Brant hurried past, while Pupp padded through the man’s legs and the open door as if they were air.
Once they reached the back stairs, they ran down a full flight. Brant asked her as they fled, “What Grace is this you speak of?”
“Something…” She shifted her wounded fist, wrapped and snugged in her half cloak. “Something in my blood.”
Dart knew that what she had revealed was supposed to be kept secret, but she had neither the strength nor the will to roust up some fabrication. Besides, the strange young man seemed to know more than he expressed.
Like how he had come so opportunely to the door a moment ago.
It seemed both had secrets neither was ready to fully bare.
Brant slowed them and drew Dart into a niche. He pulled a bit of scarf from an inner pocket of his cloak. It was mere roughspun. He nodded for her hand. She held it out, and he deftly wrapped her palm, cinching it tight to hold the wound closed.
“Can you move your fingers?”
She demonstrated that she could, though it hurt.
“Nothing appears deeply maimed,” he mumbled. “But you should see a healer.”
She withdrew her hand from his, suddenly uncomfortable with his touch. “I will.”
They stepped back onto the stairs. Voices echoed from above. Inquiries called out, from shadowknights drawn by the commotion. A voice ra
ng through, edged with panic.
“They fled that way with the daemon!”
Pyllor.
Brant sighed through his nose. Dart sensed that maybe he was reconsidering his mercy. They headed down before any pursuers closed in on them.
With the shock worn away, the enormity of what had happened struck Dart. Pyllor and his two cohorts, members of the Fiery Cross, would soon have the story of Dart and her daemon fluttering to the top of Stormwatch, to the Warden’s Eyrie and the castellan’s hermitage. Kathryn would be furious. Dart despaired. In a moment, all had come to ruin. There would be no hiding from accusations of summoning daemons. Her life here was over. She would either be exposed or have to flee again.
Until then, she needed a moment to sit, to think.
“They don’t know me,” Brant said. “We have to go somewhere where they won’t think to look for you.”
But where? Dart could not force her thoughts into any order. She simply ran, winding down the stairs, bumping her shoulders due to the narrowness, dodging a few of the under-staff who were busy with their own labors. Their flight was ignored.
Brant finally slowed her. “I might know a place. I was headed to the Citadel’s houndskeep and kennel. My lord arranged a private pen, one under guard. We could hole up down there.”
Dart nodded. She had been down to the houndskeep only once. It was unlikely anyone would recognize her. “I know a shorter route through the courtyard,” she said.
With a goal firmly in mind, she headed off at a faster pace. Once safe, perhaps she could get a letter to the castellan. Kathryn would know best how to handle this matter.
They fled another three flights to reach the level that separated the upper Citadel from the subterranean realm of the masters. She escaped the stairs through a warren of kitchens, passing baker’s ovens, simmerpots, and spitted roasting fires. Savory scents assaulted them at every turn: rising yeast, bubbling spiced oils, spattering fat, brittling sweetcake. They had to skirt around a team of cooks lifting a full boar from a massive hearth.
“Mind the tusks!” the chief cook hollered, meaty fists on his hips.
Then they were gone, out a door, escaping the ringing din of banging pans and sweltering heat. Brant closed the door against it. They sheltered a moment in an arched doorway, open to the central courtyard.
The cold struck Dart first, like jumping into a cold creek. She shivered all over and must have made some sound, for Brant turned toward her.
“Storm’s already here,” he said quietly and shifted his attention to the gray-cloaked skies above.
Snow sifted down, softly, gently. Sheltered by massive towers on four sides, the winds failed to reach here. Heavy flakes, like downy heron feathers, floated and drifted, almost hanging in the air, refusing to touch land. The snowfall filled the courtyard like sand in a well. Dart could barely discern the giant wyrmwood tree that graced the center of the courtyard. Its lower branches were caked with mounding snow. Its upper branches stretched upward, toward the top of Stormwatch, as if the ancient tree were trying to claw its way out of the courtyard, smothering under the thickening blanket.
Brant held out his hand and let a few flakes settle to his palm. The heat of his body melted them. He dried his hand on his pants. Dart noted a glint of suspicion in the narrowing of his eyes as he studied the skies for another breath.
“The true storm has yet to strike,” he mumbled and headed out into the snow. “The worst is yet to come.”
Dart bundled her cloak tighter and led the way across the courtyard. As she aimed for the far side of the massive trunk of the wyrmwood, she noted one of their party holding back, still sheltered in the archway.
“Pupp—to me,” she said and patted her hip.
He huddled his molten form low to the ground. His usual ruddy bronze had dulled to a wan shine. The spikes of his mane trembled as he shook ever so slightly.
“It’s only snow,” she said, stopping fully to turn to face him.
Brant halted with her. “Your daemon?”
“He’s not my daemon,” she said with a note of irritation. “He’s…he’s…” What could she say? “Never mind. It’s complicated.”
Dart had no desire to tell this emerald-eyed boy who she actually was. And unlike the gods of Myrillia, she was born whole and unsundered. Then again, maybe that wasn’t totally true. Pupp was birthed with her, joined to her, and in some aspects, a part of her. In fact, she grew deathly ill if Pupp was too far separated from her. Sundered yet still together was how Master Gerrod had once described it.
But for as long as Dart could remember, Pupp was just Pupp, her ghostly companion, champion, and forever a piece of her heart.
That was good enough for her.
Though right at this moment, his stubbornness piqued her growing impatience. She didn’t want to be in the storm any longer than necessary.
“Pupp, come here!”
“You can still see him?” Brant asked, his brows pinched as he searched the snowswept courtyard.
Before she could answer, Pupp finally obeyed. He shot out from under the archway and sped low to the ground, skirting side to side, as if trying to avoid any snowflakes. But the path he scribed formed a sigil of panic. He hurried to Dart and past, continuing across the yard.
Now Dart followed, almost running, dragging Brant with her.
At least Pupp must have understood where she wanted to go. He aimed for a short flight of descending stairs. He vanished down them.
In her hurry, Dart’s left boot slipped on a bit of black ice on the top step. She tumbled into a headlong fall—but Brant caught her around the waist and righted her back onto her feet. She hung a moment in his arms.
“Are you all right?”
Despite the cold, Dart felt her face warm. “Yes…sorry…”
Brant released her and led the way down the stairs to a low, wide door. He hauled the door open for her. Pupp had already passed through it in his haste to escape the snow.
“It’s not far from here,” Dart said, sliding past him. She kept her eyes from his, lest they betray her. She pushed into the dim hallway.
The heat inside stifled after the icy storm.
She headed to a cross passage and turned left. Already the barking and bawling of the Citadel’s stalking hounds reached them—as did the smell of wet dog and soiled hay. The entrance to the houndskeep lay only a few steps farther down the hall. The door was a gated grate of iron.
Dart stepped up to it.
Beyond stretched a cross-hatching of low passages, lit by torches, carved out of the stone that underlay Tashijan. It was said that the kennels here were once the dungeons of the original keep, before the coming of the gods, during the barbarous time of human kings.
Dart had a hard time imagining such a dungeon. Each carved niche barely held room enough for a pair of hounds, long-legged though they might be.
As they stopped before the gate, their arrival did not go unnoticed.
“’Bout time you got your hairy arse down here!” The keeper turned from a slop bucket. He was naked to the waist and appeared half bear himself with a back and chest covered in a pelt of curly hair. In some cruel trick of nature, though, his head was bald, his pate shining with sweat. “Like I have time to sit a couple wild whelpings—”
His eyes finally took note of who stood at his door.
He threw his hands in the air.
“Off with you…no time for gapers…’nough problems of mine own.” He waved them off.
“Good ser,” Brant said loudly, “I’ve come to inquire about two loam-giants, represented by Oldenbrook.”
His words only deepened the scowl on the keeper’s face, but he tromped over to them and swung open the door. “So you heard then, have you?”
Brant walked through with a frown. “Heard what?”
The answer came from down the passage. “Ock! Master Brant!”
A broad form pushed out of a side passage, hunkered from the low ceiling into an awkward crouch. It
was one of the loam-giants Dart had spotted with Brant earlier. He approached, almost knuckling on the hay-strewn floor. A few hounds howled at him as he passed, unaccustomed to such giants down here.
“I just sent word up a mite ago. Did you jump from a window to get down here so fast?”
Dart didn’t know the giant, but she still read the deep unease in the man’s manner.
“Malthumalbaen,” Brant said, “what’s happened? I’ve heard no word. I’ve only chanced to come down here to see how the whelpings are settled for the night. One of Tashijan’s pages was kind enough to escort me.” He nodded to Dart.
The giant shook his thick-necked head. “Disaster, ser. Bad as they come.”
“The wolf cubbies?”
Malthumalbaen lowered his head and his voice. “Gone, ser.”
“Dead?” Worry etched his words, but anger narrowed his eyes.
“No, ser. Thank the gods for that good bit of Grace. You’d best come see. Dral is still trying to salvage the matter.”
“And it weren’t no fault of mine,” the keeper groused and called after them as they headed down the passage. “Just so it’s clear to one and all! If’n you had let me know you had wild whelpings, I could have better prepared.”
Malthumalbaen let out a long sigh and grumbled under his breath. Still it had to be loud enough to reach the keeper’s ears. “Gave us a place near the back. Ill-kept, it was, with nary a torch to see much by.”
The loam-giant turned the corner and led them down the cross passage.
Dart glanced to the small cells on either side, where tawny-furred forms lay curled at the back, two to a cage, piled almost atop each other for warmth. She noted an eye or two peek open as they passed, wary and watchful. A few others, younger and more exuberant, stalked back and forth in the front of their cages, hackles half-raised in warning. In the dimness, their eyes shown with a bit of Grace. Air and loam, she had been told. It gave the hounds especially keen noses and ears.
Then down near the end of the hall, a form lay splayed on the floor, as if dead or brought low by a blow. But the figure stirred at their approach, struggling, it seemed, with something out of sight. A growl of curses accompanied the effort.
“Dral!” the first giant called out. “Look what I found! Master Brant himself!”