A dozen riders on horseback galloped toward Krysty and Jak’s position, circling slightly to get through the tangled brush. Ryan lifted the SIG-Sauer and banged out a handful of rounds. At that distance the rounds weren’t effective against the riders, but they did warn Jak and Krysty. Two rifle rounds struck fragments from the brickwork near Ryan’s head, driving him to cover.
Spotting the riders, Jak and Krysty turned suddenly and headed for the pond. Bullets ripped into the ground where they’d been. Tracer rounds scattered sparks in their wake. In seconds they were gone from view.
“Go,” Ryan told J.B.
The Armorer didn’t wait to be told again, hoisting himself up immediately through the window and launching himself outward. Mildred followed, trailed by Moosh Wandell and Thompson.
Ryan wheeled in the direction of the approaching monkeys and started to fire. His bullets had little effect on the phalanx of hairy and winged bodies, as the beasts’ anger kept them moving.
While the monkeys were still ten feet short of the final intersection that would bring them less than thirty feet from Ryan’s position at the window, two men stepped out forward wearing some sort of sec uniform. Both men carried what appeared to be homemade flamethrowers.
Huge gouts of roiling black-and-orange liquid fire jetted from elongated tubes and flowed over the front line of monkeys. Gurgling hisses filled the corridor, followed immediately by the agonized dying cries of the animals. The smell of burned fur and feathers became an overpowering stench.
Ryan held his fire, hoping they’d escape unnoticed while the sec men were involved with the monkeys. Owen was now clambering through the broken window.
“There!” an armed sec man shouted, pointing at Ryan and Owen. A green armband marked him as belonging to one of the barons. Evidently someone was going to use the confusion to whittle down the odds on Hardcoe’s team of warriors. Ryan grinned to himself, already in motion, knowing if it had been him, he’d have done the same thing. Why chance it when a victory can be made certain?
Instantly the men with the flamethrowers came around, both of them firing.
Ryan shouted a warning to Owen, then threw himself farther down the side corridor the companions hadn’t traveled.
Orange-and-black fire coursed along the wall, blistering paint and peeling paper, which started to burn a heartbeat later when it reached flashpoint.
Owen was caught in the window by both flaming streams. He screamed the last few seconds of his life away as his body caught on fire. He fell from the window with flames wrapped around him, finally becoming mercifully silent.
With a last look at the fire-filled window, Ryan pushed himself to his feet and raced down the corridor. There was no way he could make it through the swirling inferno. Behind him he heard the shouts of the men who’d taken up the chase. He ran, searching for a way out of the maze, knowing there was little chance that Jak and Krysty could escape from the situation they’d been in unless J.B. and Mildred were able to get into position to help. Even at that, all of their lives might still become forfeit.
“CALL THEM OFF, dammit!” LeMarck yelled at Connrad. Through the binoculars he’d seen the men with flamethrowers attacking Hardcoe’s champions. He knew he was stepping way past the boundaries that had been established regarding how underlings spoke to barons.
“Shut up, boy!” Connrad snarled. “Your team lost its immunity when they fired upon my sec guards!”
Atop the tall wall overlooking the pit, LeMarck turned to face Connrad. His hand dropped down to his pistol. Immediately two of Connrad’s sec men lifted their own weapons. At least if he laid his life down taking out Connrad, maybe the blame wouldn’t fall on Hardcoe.
“No,” Hardcoe said, stepping in front of LeMarck, “not this way.” He reached out and stilled his sec boss’s hand.
His eyes remained locked on LeMarck’s, he raised his voice. “Vinge.”
“Yeah.”
“Saying I agree with your view on that team of mine down in the pit,” Hardcoe said, “and saying that I sit by and don’t raise a hand while your sec men mow them down, let’s also say that if your team joins mine and tries to win free of the pit, they’re also forfeit and will be executed accordingly.”