Джеффри Лорд: Champions Of The Gods

Eventually Blade forced himself to sit down. It was his plan, and he ought to at least look as if he had complete confidence in it! Otherwise, he would end up making all the men following him nervous, from Mirdon on down. He mentally ran over the trap they were setting for Jormin again. He couldn't think of anything he'd left out, or anything the Raufi could do he didn't have some way to meet. Now if they could only go into action at the right time-

Footsteps sounded on the spiral stairs in one corner of the tower. A helmeted head popped up into the room. «Just got the word. They're inside and coming this way.»

«Good,» said Blade. «How many?»

«Oh, sixty, they guess, lord.»

Blade nodded and the head disappeared. Men began tightening sword belts, loading muskets and pistols, tying extra knots in their climbing ropes.

Sixty men. That would be Jormin's crew, plus the Raufi. There were forty men in the top room of each of the gate towers. That should be enough.

Dahrad Bin Saffar had a high reputation for courtliness and poetic skill with words. These were gifts the Raufi valued, and they honored him more highly because of them.

Tonight, though, he was neither courtly nor poetic. He sharply gestured the kneeling Jormin to rise.

«Are your men all here?»

«Yes, Noble B-«

«Any sign of extra guards?»

«None.»

«Good. We will do what we have planned. Take the lead, Jormin.»

They headed toward the Eighth Gate at a swift, silent trot. Jormin kept wanting to break into a run, but each time his feet quickened, he heard a voice behind him.

«Slower, man, slower. Hurry, hurry has no blessing from Jannah, and the noise hurry causes still less.» They covered the two hundred yards to the Eighth Gate in only a few minutes, although to Jormin it seemed more like a few hours.

The Raufi went swiftly into action. Dahrad must have rehearsed each man over and over again until he could do his part blindfolded. Some fanned out into the Gardens of Stam, to lie in wait with pistols and swords for anyone who might come to interrupt the party. Others began climbing the vines that grew up the inside of the wall, knives in their teeth, to deal with the men mounting guard on top. Still others waited under cover, ready to storm into the towers themselves as soon as the alarm was given. Then they would open the gates, and that would be the signal for the waiting Raufi to come thundering in.

Jormin hoped everything would go well. He badly wanted those two thousand Raufi around him, between him and the vengeance of the Kanoans. He looked at Katerina. She was nervously trying to look in all directions at once and fingering the hilt of her sword. She had even more reason than he did for wanting protection. She was not only betraying Kano, she was betraying the Champion of the Gods. The penalty for that would be horrible.

A faint, choked cry sounded high above. Then something sailed through the air and landed with a thud almost at Jormin's feet. It was the body of a soldier from the walls, throat slit from ear to ear. Jormin noticed, with an uneasiness in his stomach, that the man had also been castrated. He looked upward and saw the heads of three Raufi appearing over the railing on top of the wall.

Then from the very top of the western tower, orange flame stabbed out as a light cannon went off. Two of the Raufi on the wall flew high into the air, shredded into bloody rags by a blast of grapeshot. The third lurched, toppled over the railing, and struck the ground almost beside Jormin. His head wasn't human any more, it was a smashed mess of bone and brains.

Jormin went on looking upward because he couldn't do anything else. Sheer terror was freezing every one of his muscles and joints. So he saw clearly the shutters in the windows high in the two towers of the Eighth Gate fly open. He saw ropes and ladders snake out of those windows and men come scrambling down those ropes and ladders. Finally he saw the Champion of the Gods himself come sliding down one of those ropes. It seemed to him that the Champion's eyes glowed fiercely red in the darkness, and that a golden light played about his hair. That was the sight that unfroze Jormin's joints and muscles. With a scream of terror he turned to run.

Blade hit the ground as lightly as a cat, then dropped flat, rolling to confuse anybody aiming at him. A bullet whistled over his head and spannnnggged off the wall. The Rauf who'd fired dashed in, throwing his useless pistol aside and raising his sword for a slash at Blade.

Blade leaped to his feet, parried the slash with his own sword, then thrust up under the Rauf's jaw with his dagger. The Rauf stiffened as the dagger's point drove upward into his brain. He collapsed.

As Blade jerked his dagger free more cannon shots roared out from the top of the towers. The soldiers left up there were firing light swivel guns at the Raufi lurking in the bushes farther inside the Gardens of Stam.

Grapeshot whistling about their ears would keep those Raufi busy.

In the glare from the cannon fire Blade saw Katerina clearly. She stood alone in her white robe, a startling contrast to all the dark-clad figures dashing madly about. Her sword was drawn. As Blade watched, one of the Jade Masters' guards passed too close to her. She shifted to the right and reached out, fingers closing in the man's long hair to drag him to a stop. Before he could move or shout, Katerina's sword sank into his back. One, two, three quick thrusts, then she was pulling the sword free as the man collapsed and lay twitching.

Blade plunged toward Katerina, sheathing his dagger and drawing a pistol as he ran. He dashed up to her and had a moment to throw an arm around her. Then she turned, pulled away from him, and broke into a run, pulling up the skirts of her robe as she ran. Blade saw that she was heading off after Jormin, raised his pistol, and sighted in on the Second Consecrated.

Katerina saw him aiming and screamed out, «No-don't kill him for me! He's mine!»

Katerina's cry made Blade hesitate for a second. That gave Jormin time to stop, snatch a pistol from under his robe, and fire at the white-robed figure rapidly catching up with him.

Blade saw Katerina reel as the bullet struck her. His own pistol crashed out. The Second Consecrated threw up his arms and fell backward onto the ground, a gaping dark hole in his forehead and another in the back of his bald skull.

Blade wouldn't have noticed or cared if the Second Consecrated had turned into a dragon and flown away into the night. All his attention was for Katerina. He ran to her as she sagged forward onto her knees, one hand clamped to the wound under her right breast. As he reached her, she collapsed, rolling onto her side and then onto her back as her strength faded.

«Kat.» His throat was suddenly too tight to say anything more.

Katerina tried to speak but could only cough. Blood bubbled up on her lips and trickled out of the corner of her mouth onto the ground. The white robe was stained dark now, from breast on down. Her sword was still in her hand, also dark from point to hilt with the guard's blood.

At least she'd put down one enemy, Blade thought. Then he realized that she was trying to speak again. More blood came out, but this time so did words. Blade strained to hear them.

«I-wanted-to-love you,» she said. «I-«

«I wanted to love you too,» said Blade. He bent down to kiss her as her lips curved into a smile. The smile slowly froze as he kissed her. By the time Blade stood up, it was frozen forever.

Someone screamed shrilly, seemingly almost in his ear. «Behind you, Champion! It-«The words ended in another scream and the chug of a Raufii sword hacking flesh.

Blade whirled, in time to see a tall bareheaded Rauf charging at him whirling a blood-dripping sword around his head. Blade had heard enough descriptions of Dahrad Bin Saffar to recognize the man he faced. He gave a terrible shout. Here was a miracle indeed! Dahrad Bin Saffar, chief and guiding genius of all the Raufi, delivered into the hands of his enemies for the slaughter!