Sean Dalton - Time trap

Completely bewildered, Noel felt his anger fade. He placed his hand upon her bowed head and realized she was trembling.

“Stand up,” he said softly. “Face me, and tell me the truth.”

She rose to her feet, keeping her head down. He slipped his knuckle beneath her chin and forced her to look at him.

“What the devil are you up to?” he asked.

She glanced at the door as though she expected the guard to burst in at any moment. Then she drew a tiny, much-folded slip of paper from an inside fold of her headdress and pressed it into his hand.

“My name is Cleope, and I serve the Lady Sophia,” she whispered. “She sent me here tonight in Katrina’s place. Now all our lives are in your hands.”

Noel unfolded the scrap of parchment that crackled stiffly against his fingers. A single line of laboriously printed Latin was all it contained. He frowned, struggling to decipher the message. His universal translator worked on audio mode, not visual.

… help you in any way I can…

At least he thought that was pretty much the gist of it. It was signed with the flourishing initial S.

“I guess she couldn’t give me a signal when we met in town tonight.”

“Met you?” said Cleope in bewilderment. “When, pray?”

Noel explained that he had watched her retinue pass by. Cleope shook her head. “My lady mentioned it not. Word was just brought to her that a man impersonating Lord Theodore had been brought to the palace. Then she sent me here to you.”

He frowned.

“I am to ask you what has become of Lord Theodore. Does he live? Is he well? If he has been injured my lady will die of grief.”

“He’s fine,” said Noel shortly. “It was his idea for me to take his place and distract Sir Magnin while a way is found to rescue Lady Sophia. But I’ve been caught by Sir Magnin already.”

“It is not a wonder,” said the girl, “since you are the very image of-”

A pounding on the door startled both of them. She clung to him, her face as white as linen. Noel’s own courage sank. Options were running out.

“Time!” said the guard loudly through the door.

The girl snatched the piece of paper from Noel’s hand and threw it on the fire, where it charred and disintegrated at once in a shower of sparks. She had time only to dash back to Noel’s side and give him one last beseeching look before the door crashed open and a pair of burly guards peered inside.

“Out,” said one to the girl. “Get yourself presentable and help with the serving belowstairs.” He pointed at Noel. “You, come forth.”

Noel’s heart was thudding. There had to be a way out, had to be a way to escape. Sophia would help him, but he didn’t know how he could reach her. The palace complex was an unfamiliar maze. He could remember the way he’d come in, but that was all. There were too many people, too many knights, servants, pages, squires, and God knew what else hanging around. He’d already tried one desperate getaway today and it failed spectacularly. He thought he needed a better plan in mind before he made another attempt.

The stairs themselves were narrow, winding, treacherous things, offering no chance for him to dodge free of his guards and run for it. He had a guard ahead of him and a guard in back. They were armed to the teeth and dressed in a formidable combination of mail and plate armor that protected vulnerable places like throats and kidneys. Even if he managed to take out the man ahead of him, the one behind him remained.

He sighed, his gaze darting everywhere in search of inspiration or a chance, however slim. There wasn’t even a pike hanging on the wall. All the windows in the stairwell were little more than arrow slits, far too narrow to squeeze through. He had no options.

The sound of talk and laughter and a hideous kind of twanging music rose up the stairwell as he neared the bottom. He emerged into a dim, shadow-filled colonnade bordering the long, high-vaulted hall. Bright light and a scene of merriment filled the hall itself. Long trestle tables had been set up for all the knights to dine. Merchants, an abbot in travel clothes and his retinue, and others of unidentifiable trade or occupation sat at the foot of the tables, with the boisterous knights filling the center. They were laughing and jesting, hacking at platters of meat with their daggers, eating with their fingers, hurling morsels at dogs roaming behind the benches, slopping wine from their cups, belching, and in general ignoring the group of three acrobats in motley performing a series of tumbles and cartwheels for the evening’s entertainment.

At the head table, facing the rest of the room, Sir Magnin sat with his own retinue of advisers and favorites. He was too far away for Noel to see him clearly. Just a glimpse of the huge, broad-shouldered man with the long black hair and cruel face was enough to send a shiver through him.

He noticed that Lady Sophia had not joined the company. Before he could decide whether that was a blessing or a hindrance, the guards shoved him on.

“Move! Don’t gander all day.”

They walked behind the columns supporting the vaulted ceiling high above. The torchlight flared bright in the hall but did not quite reach them along this colonnade. Noel was glad of the shadows, glad those eating took little notice of his passing behind them. A gaunt dog blocked his path, snarling and growling, but one of the guards swore at it and kicked it in the ribs.

Yelping, it slunk off with its tail between its legs. Sir Magnin noticed. He turned his head, and for a moment he and Noel stared at each other. The hairs on the back of Noel’s neck stood up. Sir Magnin merely smiled and swung his attention back to Sir Geoffrey, who was speaking to him with many earnest gestures. Sir Magnin yawned widely, making no effort to mask his boredom.

On his other side, however, Lord Harlan lifted his head slightly from between his hunched shoulders and followed Noel with his gaze. He looked like a scrawny vulture, his white skeletal fingers tearing a joint of chicken apart, his cap clamped tightly to his narrow skull. For a moment he smiled at Noel, half toothless and malevolent, then dispatched a page boy on an errand.

Past the colonnade stood a door flanked by guards in livery. They let Noel and his escort pass through into what proved to be a narrow corridor. It ended at another guarded door, beyond which stood a short flight of about four steps leading through an open archway into a sizable chamber furnished with benches and massive chairs covered with carving. Byzantine frescoes and French tapestries decorated the walls. Tall, arched windows lined one side of the chamber. Noel stared at them, wondering what they overlooked, wondering how high off the ground this room was.

Queer, heavily swirled glass in tiny panes mirrored the chamber back at him. He could not see through them into the night. The guards released him and left him alone there. As soon as the door closed and was bolted, Noel hurried about the chamber in a quick circumference, peeking behind the tapestries for a hidden door.

He found it, but it was locked.

“Damn!” he said aloud.

A fire crackled upon the stone hearth, fragrant with burning apple wood and cedar. The benches lining the walls and the very sparseness of the other furnishings told Noel that this must be an antechamber, where suppliants waited for an audience with the governor.

The eyes in the faces of the frescoes seemed to watch him. He warmed his hands at the fire, then told himself to get on with it. Striding across the room, he picked up one of the two chairs, finding it heavy enough to wrench his side. He lifted it high with a grunt and swung it against the center window.

Glass shattered into a thousand shards, the brittle noise of its breakage crashing over him. Cold air rushed in, and the fire blazed up the chimney with a roar.