Кейт Новак - The Wyvern's Spur

The memory of how nice Gaylyn had been to her earlier in the morning sprang to Cat’s mind. She felt an urge to say hello to the woman. Thinking Frefford’s lady might be sitting in the parlor, the mage turned from the staircases and headed down the northwest corridor.

Cat had just reached the parlor door when a shout came from the entrance hall below. Curious, she ran back to the nearest staircase and looked down. Giogi stood in the hallway, calling out for Frefford. From some room below, a tall, burly man with dark but graying hair ran into the hallway in answer to the noble’s cries.

“Sudacar!” Giogi gasped, grasping the man’s shoulders excitedly. “Thank Waukeen! It’s the baby. He’s after Amber Leona. Where is she?”

“She should be in the nursery,” Sudacar replied.

Giogi and Sudacar dashed up the staircase opposite the one Cat stood over. Neither man noticed the mage standing on the shadowy balcony. Sudacar led Giogi down a corridor at the other end of the building. With an uneasy, disturbed feeling, Cat hurried after them.

Sudacar opened the door to the baby’s nursery with his heart pounding wildly. He sighed with relief. Dorath kept watch over her great-grandniece like a she-dragon over her treasure. Amber lay sleeping in the cradle. Dorath sat in the rocking chair, darning socks. She looked up at the lord of Immersea with disdain, hastily pocketing her wooden darning sock and sweeping her mending into a basket on the floor.

“Is there something I can do for you, Lord Samtavan?” she asked haughtily.

Giogi pushed past Sudacar and strode over to the cradle. He swept the baby up in his arms.

“Giogioni Wyvernspur, just what do you think you’re doing, you fool?” Dorath demanded. “You’ll wake her up.”

As if on cue, Amber began to cry.

Cat peeked into the room from behind Sudacar’s broad back.

“Hand me that baby this instant,” Dorath insisted, rising to her feet and closing in on Giogi.

Giogi cracked Dorath across the face with the back of his hand, sending her sprawling across the room. Cat gasped. Giogi looked to the door and spotted the mage. “Catling,” he said. “How convenient. Come hold this brat, and I’ll take us all home.”

Amber began bawling louder, and her face turned bright red.

“No,” Cat whispered in horror. “That’s not Giogi,” she said to Sudacar. “It’s Flattery. You must stop him.”

Sudacar gave a sharp glance at the woman now standing beside him. Her face was familiar somehow. That wasn’t a sufficient reason to believe her—he didn’t even know who this Flattery was supposed to be—but when it was combined with the display of violence he’d just witnessed, the Lord of Immersea was inclined to take the woman’s word for it. “Put the baby down,” Sudacar ordered, drawing his sword, “whoever you are.”

The would-be Giogi snorted. He dropped the baby in the cradle. Then he whirled on Sudacar with his hands extended, saying, “Flame spears.” Cat dodged out of the doorway just before jets of fire shot out from the wizard’s fingertips. Caught unprepared, Sudacar took the full brunt of the magic, his face and hands turned red from the heat, and his shirt and hair burst into flame. He collapsed in the doorway with a groan.

Cat threw her cape over his back and head to extinguish the flames. Then she drew the fur back from his head so he could breathe.

“Catling, get in here!” Flattery shouted with Giogi’s voice.

Cat dodged out of the doorway again and cowered in the corridor, not wanting to obey, too frightened to run.

“Now, Catling, or I’ll hurt the brat,” the wizard threatened. Amber gave an especially loud shriek, as if she’d been pinched or worse.

Cat fought back her terror. It’s Gaylyn’s baby, she told herself. You can’t let him hurt Gaylyn’s baby.

When Cat appeared in the doorway, Flattery held the baby again. Amber was sobbing and hiccuping at the same time. Flattery sneered at her. It was awful seeing Giogi’s face twisted in such a look of hatred, but Cat stepped over Sudacar’s body and walked toward her master, holding out her arms to take Gaylyn’s screaming infant.

Flattery gave the mage a suspicious glance. “No. Maybe I’d better hold onto her,” he said, pulling the baby closer to his chest. “Take that scroll of paper out from my belt and put it in the cradle.”

“What is it?” Cat asked, pulling out the scroll.

“My terms, you witch. This is all your fault. If you’d brought me the spur, I wouldn’t need to be wasting my time here.”

In the corner of the room, Dorath was struggling to her feet. “Give me my Amber!” she screamed.

With a huff of annoyance, Flattery turned toward the old Wyvernspur dame. Cat pointed a finger at the wizard’s back and muttered the words, “Soul daggers.”

Three shimmering daggers of light shot from her hand and buried themselves in Flattery’s back.

The wizard cried out in pain and surprise. He whirled around, his eyes burning with fury. “You want combat, woman? I’ll show you combat,” he screamed, pulling out a crystal cone. “Death ice!” he growled.

A freezing blast of cold covered the female mage from head to toe. Her skin felt as if it were on fire and her lungs and heart ached as if she’d been stabbed. Unable to breathe, she collapsed to the floor.

Flattery stepped up to her and slammed his foot into her stomach. “I should kill you,” he snarled. He kicked her again.

“Stop that!” Dorath screamed, slamming a porcelain water pitcher over the wizard’s head.

Flattery spun to face his new challenger. The quarters were too close to cast one of his offensive spells at her. Besides, he was forced to clench his hands tightly around the baby to keep the old woman from pulling her away from him.

Frefford appeared in the doorway. “What in nine hells is going on here?” he asked. “Giogi! What are you doing with Amber?”

“Frefford, stop him!” Dorath hollered.

Flattery released one hand from the baby and grabbed Dorath’s wrist. “Silver path, castle keep,” he whispered.

Before Lord Frefford’s astonished eyes, his cousin, his grandaunt and his daughter vanished.

Giogi stepped back from the parlor window of his townhouse. “I’ve got to get to Redstone fast!” he said.

“If we’re not too late already,” Drone muttered. “Thomas, notify the watch,” he ordered. “Giogi, take my hand, boy. You, too, Mistress Ruskettle.”

This may not be one of the smarter things I’ve ever done, Olive thought, taking the wizard’s left hand while Giogi grasped the right.

“Silver path, home tower,” Drone intoned.

Something buzzed in Olive’s ear, and her flesh tingled. She involuntarily blinked, and when she opened her eyes, she, the wizard, and Giogi were standing in Drone’s lab in Redstone Castle. From a room downstairs came the shriek of an anguished woman.

“Gaylyn!” Giogi cried. He rushed to the door to the outer stair and dashed down. Olive followed closely on his heels.

Three stories down, the door to the nursery stood open. Sudacar lay slumped in the doorway, unconscious. His face and chest were horribly burned, and his hair was scorched to the scalp. Julia knelt over him, pouring a healing potion very carefully down his throat. Her eyes were streaming with tears.

Inside the room, Gaylyn was seated on the rocker, sobbing hysterically. Frefford knelt beside her with his arms around her waist, but he was pale and silent, without the strength to console his wife.

Cat lay in a heap beside the baby’s cradle. Her flesh was a deathly white, and her lips and eyelashes were covered with rime. She clutched a cloth sack to her chest.

Giogi stepped over Sudacar’s body and rushed to the mage’s side. He took up her hand and shuddered at the cold. He pulled the platinum band from his forehead and held its smooth inner surface near her lips. Still cold from the nobleman’s flight, the metal dimmed with the tiniest bit of moisture.