Troy Denning - The Sentinel

Yder.

Arietta started to move into a flanking position, but Joelle put a hand out to stop her. The heartwarder uttered a quick prayer to her goddess, and her long red hair began to emit a faint aura of fiery light. She pointed her sword in Yder’s direction, then started to race toward him.

“Help me!” Joelle called. “Kill that one!”

Sune’s magic carried Joelle’s voice into the ears of their fellow travelers. All at once, dozens of fighters broke from their battle with the orcs and whirled on Yder, assailing him with everything from golden missiles of magic to spiked clubs. The prince vanished behind a wall of attackers, leaving Arietta and Joelle with a clear path to … what? A courtyard filled with angry orcs?

Joelle breathed a sigh of relief, then said, “Let’s take the high ground.”

She pointed to their left, where the moonlit face of the citadel wall loomed above a handful of bustling campsites. Ascending the interior of the wall was the jagged line of a stairway-and the battle with the orcs had not yet spilled into that part of the courtyard.

Arietta nodded and started toward the stairway, which lay about thirty paces ahead. It made her stomach ache to let Kleef bring up the rear alone, but the first priority was protecting the Eye-and that meant she had to get away from the shades.

Before they had taken five steps, a tremendous hiss sounded from Yder’s direction, and his attackers began to shriek and wail. Arietta glanced over to discover that the prince had surrounded himself with a whirling sphere of shadow. A dozen stunned men stood at its perimeter, staring at wisps of shadow where their sword arms used to be, watching in horror as their shoulders melted into shadow and drained into the hissing orb.

Arietta felt Joelle’s hand on the small of her back, urging her to move faster. She raced around a campsite with three tents and a horse line that must have had thirty animals. And then the hiss ended as suddenly as it had begun. When she glanced over, Yder was standing alone in a ten-foot circle of emptiness, his gaze fixed on the last place he had seen his quarry. It did not take long for his eyes to turn in their direction again.

Kleef was still behind Arietta and Joelle, about even with the large campsite, pivoting and spinning as he held four shades at bay. But even he could not be in all places at once, and there were four more shadow warriors circling around the other side of the campsite, racing to catch Arietta and Joelle before they reached the stairwell. Judging by their speed, the shades were likely to succeed.

“We’re not going to make it,” Arietta said. “What now?”

“You return what was stolen from me.” The reply came not from Joelle but from a nasal voice on Arietta’s opposite shoulder. “That is what.”

“Malik?” Arietta turned to find the little man running alongside her, his far hand holding his sword. “Where have you been?”

“Hiding from the thieving oaf who tried to kill me,” Malik snarled. “Where else would I be?”

The three companions were less than ten paces from the stairs-about the same distance as the four Shadovar rushing to cut them off. Malik reached up with his free hand and tried to pull his drab robe off Arietta’s shoulder, but it remained trapped beneath Arietta’s bowstring and would not move. Before she could raise a hand to help, he brought his sword around and slipped the tip beneath the bowstring, clearly intending to cut it.

“No!” Arietta pushed an elbow into the side of his head and sent him stumbling, then pulled the robe from beneath her bowstring. “And don’t you ever turn a sword my way again.”

Arietta tossed the robe to him, then instantly lost sight of him as he dived to the ground and rolled into the shadows at the base of the wall. Seeing that Joelle had already taken a position about three paces from the stairwell, Arietta stopped next to her and turned to face their pursuers-only to discover the shades had changed directions and were already sinking into the shadows behind the nearest horse line.

Kleef, down to just two foes, was standing his ground no more than five paces from Arietta and Joelle. Beyond him, the battle against the orcs seemed to have stabilized, with wizards and mounted caravan guards working the perimeter of the fight, slowly forcing the enemy back toward the well.

Malik was nowhere in sight.

Realizing that the shades did not necessarily need to go through her and Joelle to reach the top of the citadel wall, Arietta spun around and looked up the stairs. Near the top, she saw a line of dark silhouettes emerging from the shadows, then continuing upward toward the top of the wall.

“Joelle, above us!”

Without waiting for a reply, Arietta charged up the stairs. Set into the wall itself, they were steep and narrow, with no handrail to offer support. Still, she managed to climb quickly and was more than halfway up when the fifth shade emerged from the shadows near the top and turned to face her.

A trio of Joelle’s white darts came flashing up from the courtyard below. The shade managed to dodge one and catch two on a shield of shadow. By then, Arietta was on him, hacking at his knees, then driving her sword up into his torso. She angled the tip of her blade toward the citadel interior and sent him plunging into the courtyard below.

“Go!” Joelle called. A wet crunch sounded as she brought her blade down across his neck. “They’re after Malik!”

Arietta nodded, then traded her sword for her bow. She nocked an arrow and, expecting to see a shadow disk flying toward her at any moment, crept the rest of the way up the stairs.

The attack never came, and when she reached the top, it was to find herself alone. The last four shades were moving along the wall in both directions, their glassy swords probing shadows and crannies as they searched for Malik in every conceivable hiding place.

Arietta stepped onto the top of the wall, then crouched in the shadows of the parapet. She heard Joelle’s voice down at the base of the stairs, calling out to Kleef.

When Malik did not reveal himself, Arietta whispered, “Malik?”

Her only reply was the sound of Joelle’s boots pounding up the stairs behind her, and the faint rustle of leaves, coming up from the trees on the other side of the parapet.

Or were they leaves?

Arietta rose high enough to peer over the parapet and found herself looking down on the vast Chondalwood forest. The canopy was perhaps twenty feet below, a billowing blanket of moonlit leaves that came up tight against the base of citadel walls. She saw no sign of niches or crannies in which the little man might hide, but the walls were rough enough that he could have climbed down to conceal himself among the trees.

Arietta leaned over the parapet, then called again, “Malik?”

This time, a soft scoff sounded behind her. Arietta turned to see a gray blur charging toward her, two outstretched hands leading the way.

“Malik!” Arietta let go of her bow and raised an arm to defend herself. “What are you-”

Then he hit her, and Arietta felt herself going over the parapet. She grabbed a handful of coarse wool, then realized it was too late to save herself, that she would only pull her attacker down with her. She tried to open her hand, but her feet were already in the air, Malik already coming down atop her.

“Thief!” he cried. “Harlot!”

They tumbled apart and crashed into the forest canopy, and the last thing Arietta saw before sinking into the leaves was Joelle’s stunned face, peering over the parapet after her.

Kleef plunged into the forest canopy with his feet together and his arms held wide, snatching at branches and boughs as he dropped through the tangled darkness. He managed to grab hold of only twigs and leaves and began to realize just how reckless he had been to jump. But what choice had there been? He could not be sure that Arietta and Malik had survived their fall, and in the confusion of his dream, Kleef had revealed the Eye’s hiding place. If Malik was dead and Yder located the body before Kleef did, Malik’s robe would be lost.