Rob Scott - Lessek_s Key

‘Don’t make eye contact with anyone, but don’t be too obvious in looking away, either.’

Hannah felt her stomach flopping over and she was already damp with nervous sweat. ‘Where do we go if they come after us?’

Alen shook his head. ‘If we’re caught, there will be no place to go, certainly not down to the foyer. If that does happen, I’ll try to create enough disturbance for the rest of you to melt into the crowd. Let’s hope we’re lucky enough that there are no guards at the main gate.’

‘Who would be insane enough to attack this palace?’ Hoyt asked rhetorically.

‘Right. Are we ready?’

‘Let’s go,’ Churn signed for all of them.

Alen leaned over and reached out for Milla. ‘Are you ready to go find your Mama? You’ll have to let Hoyt carry you; is that all right?’

The little girl squealed. ‘Will we be there soon?’

‘It will take a few days; we have to cross the Ravenian Sea, remember?’

‘How do we do that?’

‘In a boat.’

‘A big boat?’

‘Yes, a big boat,’ Alen said, and nodded to the others. ‘It will have a kitchen and a place to sleep and maybe even a puppy that lives on the boat all the time.’

‘I bet his name is Resta.’

‘I bet it is, too, Pepperweed, but for now, we have to be quiet. Can you do that for me?’

‘A being quiet game?’

‘Yes, a being quiet game.’

‘All right, but later I want to play grambles.’

They had just started down the first stairs when their plan began to unravel. Churn, in front, gave a hurried salute to a sergeant who was rushing up the stairs so quickly that he barely acknowledged the gesture, but as he passed Alen, he stumbled. ‘Sergeant Willis!’ Alen exclaimed, ‘Where are you going?’

The other man frowned. ‘Where the rutters have you been? We’ve got squad members looking all over for you – Tandrek’s down there by himself. You’ve had a break, three prisoners – can you rutting believe it?’ He stopped and looked over the curious group. ‘Who is this child?’

‘Colonel Strellek’s daughter; that’s where I’ve been. He got called out to the docks, something he was expecting from Treven. He asked me to bring her after she’d eaten.’

‘Strellek? Who’s that?’ Sergeant Willis sounded bemused.

Hoyt interrupted, ‘Sorry, Sergeant, we are assigned to Colonel Strellek, but he didn’t want us bringing the girl out through the gates and then the encampment without at least a sergeant with us. He wanted to find the lieutenant, but none of us knew where he was at the time.’ Hoyt could lie like a professional; given half a chance he would have stood on the stairs the rest of the aven, spinning a wrinkle-free tale that would have had all of them believing they had been ordered to bring Milla out to her father on the wharf.

‘The lieutenant?’ Willis was confused. ‘He’s down in the prison wing cursing your name all the way to the Northern Forest. If I were you, I’d let these three take the girl out while you get yourself-’ His gaze fell to Hoyt’s hands, which were still a grim testament to his efforts to break out of his cell. ‘Soldier,’ he interrupted himself. ‘How did you get-?’

Hoyt nonchalantly clasped his hands behind his back. ‘Sorry, Sergeant?’

‘They’re here!’ Sergeant Willis screamed, ‘I have them up-’

Churn’s punch took Sergeant Willis beneath the chin, lifting him clear off the stairs. He rolled into a heap, eight or nine steps below, and Hannah wondered if he was dead – until a commotion erupted from the main floor two levels down. ‘They’re coming,’ she said, the words feeling strange in her dry mouth. ‘What do we do?’

‘Up this way,’ Alen ordered, ‘quickly.’

Hannah felt the world crash into the sun. ‘Not up, no, we can’t go up. There’s no way out up there.’

‘You have to trust me.’ Alen was trying to remain as calm as possible.

‘Where are we going?’ Hoyt asked.

‘There’s an atrium at the end of the hall. Across the way is a courtyard.’

‘Alen, we’re three levels up,’ Hoyt said.

‘No, no, no,’ Churn was signing furiously, ‘I won’t go out there, I won’t.’

‘We’ve no choice,’ Alen said. ‘The courtyard is off a banquet hall or a meeting hall on the second level of the other wing. It’s a short fall. I’m sure we can jump it. It’s that or them.’ Alen pointed down the stairs.

Hoyt tweaked Milla’s nose. ‘Can you fly?’

Milla nodded, grinning. ‘A little bit. Can you?’

‘I’d better be able to.’

Alen had already started up the stairs and down the upper hall. Hoyt followed. Churn waited with Hannah.

‘I can’t do it,’ he signed.

‘Jump down to a courtyard? I can’t imagine why not.’

‘Maybe they’ll think of something before we get there.’

Whatever – we can’t stay here.’ She reached for his hand and the two of them hurried after the others.

‘What do you suppose happened to them?’

‘He might have thrown them away.’

‘Garec?’ Steven was incredulous. ‘You’ve seen the pride he takes in them – he made them himself; if he truly planned never to fire another shot, he would have given them to you.’

‘He hasn’t said anything.’ Mark checked to be sure Garec was still out of earshot. They were riding south along the river through Meyers’ Vale into the Blackstone foothills. ‘Ever since he got back, he’s been staring into space. Something happened to him, Steven.’

‘Of course it did,’ Steven retorted. ‘He failed to raise a finger to help you and Brand; he knows you’re disappointed with him. We’re within inches of wrapping this whole wretched business up, and he feels like he’s fumbled the ball inside the five – of course he’s embarrassed. But you and Brand aren’t making it any easier for him. Let’s face it: this has been the worst nightmare any of us could ever imagine, and you’re holding an outbreak of honest-to-goodness compassionate conscientious objectorness – or whatever you call it – against Garec. He chose to die rather than to kill; I don’t know if I could have been that brave given the circumstances.’

Mark grimaced. ‘Okay, you’re right. I’ve been a bastard – but I don’t think that’s it. Something happened between there and here.’

‘Ask him,’ Steven said. For a few seconds they were back in Idaho Springs, in a place where things made sense. ‘He’s your friend,’ Steven went on, ‘whether you’re disappointed in him or not. If you think something happened on the way down here that caused him to fire-’

‘Twenty. He had about twenty in his quiver.’

‘Okay, so about twenty arrows… I bet he’ll tell you. Give up the grudge; ask him what’s wrong.’ Steven guided his horse around a tree partially blocking the trail. Mark ducked and rode under it, wondering if there was some Eldarni superstition – seven hundred Twinmoons of bad luck, boils, locusts and flatulence, maybe – that was all he needed to cap a terrifically abysmal few days. He smiled at Steven, then slowed to allow Garec to catch up with him.

‘Hey,’ he said as Garec came alongside.

‘Is that a greeting in Colorado, Mark?’

‘Yep.’

‘A good greeting or a bad greeting?’ Garec looked grim; he slouched in the saddle as if he were carrying the world on his shoulders.

‘One of the best,’ Mark said.

‘Well, hey then.’

In the ensuing uncomfortable silence, Mark thought about dropping it, but finally he said, ‘I’m sorry about the other day. It was wrong of me to expect you to kill if you choose not to.’

‘You had the best interests of the Resistance at heart, Mark. I was the one at fault.’ Garec’s voice was flatly matter-of-fact.