“Vahrohnos Myros, you rutting rebel, you perverted traitorous swine, come out and meet the death you’ve so long cheated! Or-do you lack the courage, you forsworn, buggering bastard?”
But once the echoes had ceased to carom off the muraled walls and high, carved ceiling, only silence answered his challenge. Turning to the group which had followed him, he grounded his heavy axe and shrugged.
“Of course, we’ll search, but my fargathering senses no menace within these walls. Where could all the dogs be hiding?”
“It is possible,” commented the High Lord slowly, “that there really is no one left in the city.”
Master Ahlee carefully sheathed his double-curved saber. “The High Lord supposes then that the rebel lords drove out the inhabitants, barred the gates and then went down the walls?”
High Lord Milo nodded. “Either that or … these old Ehleen cities often are honeycombed with subterranean passages, both connecting important buildings and giving a hidden means of entering or leaving their confines.”
Spiros Morguhn shook his head briskly. “There’re no records of any such thing in Morguhnpolis, my lord, nor even any legends of such.”
“Since they generally were used for secret or clandestine purposes, by the old Ehleenee,” Milo said, “there were probably never any records to begin with. And since, as I recall, Morguhnpolis fell by storm, the Ehleen governor or lord could have taken many secrets to his grave. But this is all supposition, gentlemen-we’ll not truly know until we search.”
He turned to Staisee. “Prehsvootehros, mindcall your other troop and bid them ride straight to the palace. I’d feel better with more force behind me, ere I start probing this place.”
Drehkos and his party had not progressed far when they chanced upon a small detachment of Vawnee cavalry, who had halted to bury their former commander, freshly deceased of wounds sustained the night before. Fortunately this band had lost some third of its original numbers in the firelit debacle below Morguhn Hall but had retained most of the now-riderless horses; consequently, all members of the allied party were able to ride when they left the nobleman’s grave and turned their faces west.
The only remaining Vawnee gentleman was a sixteen-year-old nephew of the dead commander, one Kleetos of Mahrto-spolis, who was overjoyed to confer his unwanted responsibilities upon the middle-aged Drehkos. The Vawnee seemed much relieved at this transference of authority. And, sensing their immediate trust in him, Drehkos had not the heart to tell them the cold truth.
Although reared to the sword and the horse, as were all Kindred and most Ehleen noblemen, Drehkos Daiviz had never acquired any formal military training or experience. When, thirty-odd years before, his brother, Hari, and the bulk of the other young Kindred of Morguhn and Daiviz had ridden to the Middle Kingdoms to seek fortune and adventure as members of the Freefighter condotta formed by Djeen Morguhn, Drehkos had flatly rejected all blandishments and remained in the duchy of his birth.
At his father’s death-which many attested had been much hastened by Drehkos’ almost continual misconduct and profligacy-Hari, the elder by eighteen months, had returned to Morguhn to be confirmed in his komeesteheea. For his part, Drehkos had then been well content to accept the baronetcy which was the patrimony of a second son of his sept of Clan Daiviz and the very munificent maintenance income which the new komees generously and most unexpectedly offered to furnish his brother until he was well married or had otherwise made his fortune.
And Vahrohneeskos Drehkos had married well, financially speaking, though many had frowned upon his choice of a girl who was neither Kindred nor Ehleen. But there were few who said aught of their feelings in Drehkos’ hearing, for the sloe-eyed Rehbehkah had been the only living child of the most successful goldsmith-moneylender of the archducal city of Prahseenospolis-two hundred kaiee southeast of Morguhn-and the heiress-bride had brought to her new husband a vast fortune, so much in fact that not even twenty-five years of Drehkos’ debaucheries, harebrained business ventures and large contributions to the Ehleen Church or other questionable causes had forced him to lower his standard of living.
Rehbehkah Daiviz of Szohbuh had never presented Drehkos with a child, but he could not fault her for that lack, for neither (to the best of his knowledge) had any other of his multitudinous women. Though he never tried to conceal the fact that he had married her solely for her wealth, as she proved gentle, companionable, forgiving of his frequent excesses and an admirable chatelaine of his palatial Mor-guhnpolis townhouse, with the passing years, Drehkos came to truly love her . . . and, in the three years since her death from summer fever, he could not recall ever being really happy.