and she sank beneath the surface and began to pull off her
tunic.
‘What’s she doing?’ Talen asked, peering down through the
clear water.
‘She’s taking off her clothes,’ Aphrael replied, ‘and she doesn’t
need any help from you. Keep your eyes where they belong.’
‘You run around naked all the time,’ he protested. ‘Why
should you care if we watch Mirtai get undressed?’
‘It’s entirely different,’ she replied in a lofty tone. ‘Now do as
you’re told.’
Talen thrust himself around in the water until he had his back
to Mirtai. ‘i’m never going to understand her,’ he grumbled.
‘Oh, yes you will, Talen,’ she told him in a mysterious little
voice. cBut not quite yet. I’ll explain it all to you in a few more
years.’
Then Mirtai rose to the surface coiling the coil of rope that
had been slung over her shoulder under her tunic. ‘i’ll need
something to stand on, Aphrael,’ she said, hefting the grappling
hook attached to one end of the rope. ‘I won’t be able to throw
this while I’m treading water.’
‘All right, gentlemen,’ Aphrael said primly, ‘eyes front.’
Sparhawk’s smile was concealed in the dimness. Talen was
right. Aphrael seemed almost unaware of her own nakedness,
but Mirtai’s was an entirely different matter. He heard the sound
of water trickling off the sleek limbs of the golden giantess as
she rose to stand, he surmised, on its very surface.
Then he heard the whistling sound of the grappling hook as
Mirtai swung it in wider and wider circles. Then the whistling
stopped for an interminable, breathless moment. There was the
clink of steel on stone high above, followed by a grating sound
as the points dug in.
‘Good cast,’ Aphrael said.
‘Lucky,’ Mirtai replied. ‘It usually takes two or three throws.’
Sparhawk felt a touch on his shoulder. ‘Here,’ Mirtai said,
handing him the rope. ‘Hold this while I get dressed. Then we’
climb up and go find your wife.
‘What on earth are you doing, Bergsten?’
The Patriarch of Emsat started violently and jerked his head
around to stare at the God who had just walked up behind him.
‘You’re supposed to be hurrying, you know,’ Setras chided
him. ‘Aphrael wants everybody to be in place by morning.’
‘We came across some of Klael’s soldiers, Divine One,’ Sir
Heldin rumbled. ‘They’re inSide that cave.’ He pointed at a
barely visible opening in the hillside across the shallow gully.
‘Why didn’t you deal with them? I told you how to do it.’
‘We put a lantern in there, but there’s a door inside the cave,
Setras-God,’ Atana Mans advised him.
‘Well, open it, dear lady,’ Setras said. ‘We really must reach
Cyrga by morning. Aphrael will be terribly vexed with me if
we’re late.’
‘We’d gladly open it if we knew how, Divine One,’ Bergsten
told him, ‘but late or not, I won’t ride away from here and leave
those monsters behind me, and if that vexes Aphrael, that’s just
too bad.’ The handsome, stupid God irritated Bergsten for some
reason.
‘Why do I have to do everything myself?’ Setras sighed. ‘Wait
here. I’ll deal with this, and then we’ll be able to move on. We’re
terribly behind schedule, you know. We’ll have to get cracking
if we’re going to make it by morning.’ He strolled on across the
rocky gully and entered the cave.
‘That young fellow’s really trying my patience,’ Bergsten muttered.
‘Trying to explain something to him is like talking to a
brick. How can he be so -‘ Bergsten pulled up short just this
side of heresy.
‘He’s coming back out,’ Atana Mans said.
‘I thought he might,’ Bergsten said with some satisfaction.
‘Apparently he didn’t have any better luck with that door than
we did.’
Setras was strolling toward them humming a Styric melody
when the entire hill vanished in a great, fiery explosion that
shook the very earth. The fire billowed out with a dreadful,
seething roar, hurling Bergsten and the others to the ground
and engulfing Aphrael’s cousin.
‘Dear God!’ Bergsten gasped, staring at the boiling fire.
Then Setras, with not so much as a hair out of place, came
sauntering out of the fire. ‘There now,’ he said mildly, ‘that
wasn’t so difficult, was it?’
‘How did you get the door open, Divine One?’ Heldin asked
curiously.
‘I didn’t, old boy,’ Setras smiled. ‘Actually, they opened it for
me.’
‘Why would they do that?’
‘I knocked, dear boy. I knocked. Even creatures like that have
some manners. Shall we be going, thenP’
They are much feared by the other Cyrgai,’ Xanetia reported,
‘and all do give way to them.’
‘That would be useful – if it weren’t for the racial differences,’
Bevier noted.
‘Such differences do not pose an insurmountable obstacle,
Sir Knight,’ Xanetia assured him. ‘Should it prove needful, thy
features and those of thy companions may once more be altered.
Divine Aphrael can doubtless serve in her sister’s stead in the
combining of the two spells which disguised ye previously.’
‘We ‘can talk about that in a moment,’ Flute said. ‘First,
though, I think we should all get some idea of how this part of
the city’s laid out.’ The Goddess had asumed her more familiar
form, and Bevier for one seemed much relieved.
‘Methinks this mount is not of natural origin, Divine One,’
Xanetia told her. ‘The sides are of uniform steepness, and the
avenues which do ascend to the top are more stairways than
streets. Cross-streets, however, do encircle the hill at regular
intervals.’
‘Unimaginative, aren’t they?’ Mirtai observed. ‘Are there
many of them wandering around out there?’
‘Nay, Atana. ‘Tis late, and most have long since sought their
beds.’
‘We could chance it,’ Kalten mused. ‘if Flute and Xanetia can
make us louR like Cyrgai, we could just march right up the hill.’
‘Not in these clothes we can’t,’ Sparhawk disagreed.
Talen slipped out of the shadows to re-enter the passageway
leading back to the central shaft of the well. In many ways the
agile young thief could be nearly as invisible as Xanetia. ‘More
soldiers coming,’ he whispered.
‘Those patrols could get to be a nuisance,’ Kalten said.
‘These aren’t like those others,’ Talen told him. ‘They aren’t
patrolling the side-streets. They’re just climbing the stairs toward
the top of the city. They aren’t wearing the same kind of armor
either.’
‘Describe them, young master Talen,’ Xanetia said intently.
‘They’re wearing cloaks, for one thing,’ Talen replied, ‘and
they’ve got a sort of emblem on their breastplates. Their helmets
are different, too.’
‘Temple Guards then,’ Xanetia said, ‘the ones of which I spake
earlier. I did glean from the thought of such few as I encountered
that other Cyrgai do avoid them insofar as they might, and that
all are obliged to bow down when they pass.’
Sparhawk and Bevier exchanged a long look. ‘There are the
clothes you wanted, Sparhawk,’ Bevier said.
‘How many are there?’ Sparhawk asked Talen.
‘I counted ten.’
Sparhawk considered it. ‘Let’s do it,’ he decided, ‘but try to
keep the noise down.’ And he led them out of the passageway
into the street.
‘Good God, Ulath.’ Itagne exclaimed, ‘don’t do that! My heart
almost stopped!’
‘Sorry, Itagne,’ the big Thalesian apologized. ‘There’s no really
graceful way to come out of No-Time. Let’s go talk with Betuana
and Engessa.’
They rode back to join the Queen and her general.
‘Sir Ulath just arrived with news, your Majesty,’ Itagne said
politely. ‘Ah,’ she said. ‘Good news or bad news, Ulath-Knight?’
‘A little of each, your Majesty,’ he replied. ‘The Trolls are a
couple of miles east of here.’
‘And what’s the good news?’
He smiled slightly. ‘That is the good news. The bad news is
that there’s another large force of Klael’s soldiers waiting in
ambush just south of here. They’ll probably hit you within the
hour. They’re in our way, and we have to hurry. Sparhawk and
the others are going to rescue Ehlana and her maid tonight, and
he wants us all to converge on the city by morning.’
‘We must fight the klael-beasts then,’ she said.
‘That could be troublesome,’ Itagne murmured.
‘Tynian and I have worked out a solution of sorts,’ Ulath
‘continued, ‘but we don’t want to offend you, your Majesty, so
we thought I should stop by and talk it over first. klael’s troops
are preparing to ambush you. I know you’d prefer to deal with
that yourself, but in the interests of expediency, would you be
willing to forgo the pleasure?’
‘i’d be willing to listen, Ulath-Knight,’ she said.
‘There are ways we could just slip around that ambush, but
klael can probably do the same kinds of things to time and distance
that Aphrael and her cousins can, and I don’t think we
want those brutes coming up behind us.’
‘What’s your solution then, Ulath-Knight?’
‘i’ve got a sizeable force at my disposal, your Majesty,’ he
replied, ‘and they’re hungry. Since we’re too busy right now for