David Chandler - A thief in the night

Then he saw the sphere itself, dull and empty, fall to smash upon the side of the central shaft. It collided with the wall at high speed, and shattered into a million shards of crystal.

Directly overhead.

“In Sadu’s name,” Prestwicke said, “I shed this blood, for-”

Malden jumped. He had no choice but to leap right toward the priest’s knife-there was no time for anything else. He twisted in midair and the blade passed his jugular by a hairbreadth. He hit the flagstones hard, his own blood flecking the air all around him as he rolled and jumped to his feet. He didn’t stop running.

“Malden,” Prestwicke called, “you cannot escape me.”

The priest didn’t move to follow. He stood still by the railing of the gallery, as if he could simply wait there and Malden would have to return to him.

When a thousand spears of broken crystal fell on him, his eyes went wide. When they pierced his flesh and thudded into the flagstones like frozen lightning bolts, he opened his mouth as if to speak. But then a shard of crystal sliced off the front of his head, obliterating his face, and he moved no more.

Elves were screaming. Cythera called Malden’s name. He heard Croy groaning under a pile of struggling elves, and Slag shouting for him to get away from the gallery, that it wasn’t over.

“No,” Malden said. No, not yet-not like this-not before he could demand to know who’d sent Prestwicke after him. “No. No!”

Prestwicke was dead. There could be no doubt about that. He was impaled in place, still standing on his feet, his arms and his chest transfixed by long shards of crystal. Malden rushed forward and grabbed the priest’s woolen robe. It was wet with blood.

“Who sent you after me?” Malden demanded, frenzied by being cheated this way. “Who was your employer?”

Prestwicke could not answer, of course. But as Malden pulled at the priest’s garment he heard a rattling little sound, like a tiny snare drum. He tore open Prestwicke’s habit and saw a piece of parchment folded neatly against the dead man’s breast. He plucked it free.

Then he ran like every demon in the pit was after him, for he could hear the entire Vincularium shaking itself to pieces above him.

When Malden was halfway to Cythera and Slag, the entire hall felt like it had fallen away under his feet. He tottered and fell, slamming onto the flagstones, his hands over his head as if that would do any good, and prayed for the world to stop moving. Eventually the shaking stopped-but when he looked down and saw his own blood on the flags, the drops were rolling to the left as if the floor had been tilted a few degrees out of true.

The elves didn’t stop screaming. The soldiers were running about as if looking for something to attack. The nobles in their finery were shouting for their servants, while the servants in their patchwork clothes were huddled together, crouching on the floor and staring up at the ceiling with wild eyes.

For good reason. A fine drift of powdered stone was raining down from the vaults high overhead.

Malden got back up and kept running. As he passed the cart where Morget and Croy had been bound, he heard high-pitched laughter and stopped to see Balint lying in the cart, staring up at him. Her whole body was trembling with mirth. “He did it,” she said. “He blew the fucking thing up. It’s all over now! We’re all going to die!”

Malden ignored the crazed dwarf and ran to Cythera’s side. She and Slag were clutching each other. They looked confused and very frightened. He grabbed Cythera’s shoulders and tried to force her to look at him. “I think,” he said, when she finally met his gaze, “that we should get out of here.”

Cythera nodded and pushed her hair out of her eyes. “Good plan,” she said. “But how will we-”

“We’ll figure it out. Come on,” Malden said, and grabbed at her arm.

“Help me get the elves moving,” Cythera said.

He could only stare at her. Even as parts of the hall above began falling down to the floor with thunderous crashes, he couldn’t think of the words he needed to respond.

“We can’t leave them here to die,” she said, as if it was obvious.

“Really? I believe we can,” Malden tried.

“Malden-please. You’re not that callous. I know you,” Cythera said.

It was Slag who made the best point, however. “Lad,” he said, “do you remember what you told me, once? That the elves were evil and deserved to be entombed? You still think that?”

“They’ve done nothing but imprison us and try to kill us since we got here,” Malden pointed out. “I’d call that evil.”

“All of them? You’d call ’em all evil, then? Even Aethil? After all she fucking did for us?”

“Well… no,” Malden said. “She treated us well enough. But-”

A chain of explosions far off in the Vincularium made it impossible to speak for a moment. When it was over, Cythera grasped Malden by the arms. “Remember what Aethil said. There was a time when elves and men were brothers-we share the same language, Malden. Don’t you understand? Help me save them.”

Malden thought back to when he had grabbed Aethil, intending to hold her prisoner so they could escape. Was that really so different from what the elves had done to him? Cythera had a point. He needed time to think this through, to make a rational decision.

Unfortunately at that moment giant stones started falling from the ceiling, and all rational thought became superfluous.

He nodded and raced over to where Aethil stood, staring upward at her collapsing kingdom. Before he could reach her, she saw him and came storming toward him, her eyes sparkling with anger. “What have you done?” she demanded of him.

“I survived your little sport, that’s all,” the thief told her.

The elf queen raised one hand and made claws of her fingers. She started to speak in low, ugly syllables, and Malden realized she was about to cast a curse on him.

“Wait,” Cythera said, from behind him. “Your highness, please-listen to me.”

Aethil let the curse dissipate and stared at Cythera.

“Please, Aethil, I know you have no reason to love us anymore. But we must make common cause. If we don’t leave here now, we will all be killed.”

“Leave? Yes, I suppose we must withdraw to the tunnels our ancestors made. It seems the dwarven halls are no longer safe.”

Cythera shook her head. “No, your majesty. I mean we must leave the Vincularium altogether.”

Aethil’s brow furrowed. She didn’t seem to understand. “But we can’t do that. This is where we live.”

“It will be your tomb,” Malden told the queen, “if you like.”

“I must consult with the Hieromagus,” Aethil said. “Surely this cataclysm was enough to bring him back to the present.” She stood up on her tiptoes and looked around the hall. “Where is he?”

Malden searched the crowd of milling elves for the priest-wizard but could find him nowhere. “Aethil,” he said, “he’s gone.”

“Impossible. He wouldn’t desert us at a time like this.”

Malden might have argued with her further, but just then the floor of the hall split open. Cracks ran crazily between the flagstones, and an elf fell into the gap between two stones. His screams filled the air for a moment, then ended abruptly.

Cythera exhaled in frustration and grabbed the elf queen’s forearm. She twisted it, hard. When Aethil turned to face her with a look of rage, Cythera said, “You can save your people. Right now. Or you can wait for his approval. Are you a queen, or not? Do you lead the elves?”

“I-” Aethil stopped in mid-thought. “There was a time when my forebears, the ancient queens of the elves, had that power, but-”