Bal-Simba frowned. “Little. Surprisingly little for such an effort.”
Arianne looked up tiredly. “We were too strong for them,” she said.
“Or they did not push too strongly,” the High Lord said half to himself. He turned quickly to his talker.
“Get reports from all the land. I want to know what else has happened.”
“Isn’t this enough Lord?” asked Arianne.
“No,” Bal-Simba told his apprentice grimly. “It is not nearly enough. I would learn the rest of the price we paid this night.”
“Sparrow? Sparrow.” Dimly and faintly Wiz heard Moira’s voice calling from a great distance. He stirred, but his head hurt terribly and he just wanted to sleep.
“Sparrow, wake up, please.” Moira’s voice? No. Shiara’s. He was laying on the floor and there was smoke in the air. He pushed himself to his hands and knees. His head spun from the effort.
Shiara helped him stand. “Quickly,” she said. “We must leave.”
“Moira?” Wiz asked weakly.
“Outside! Hurry.”
“I won’t leave Moira.”
“She’s not here. Now outside.” Wiz clasped her hand in his and started for the door.
As he led the way down the stairs he stumbled on a small limp form in front of the stairway.
“It’s Ugo,” he said, bending down. He gasped as he saw the horrible gaping wound that nearly severed the goblin’s head from his shoulders.
Shiara knelt and moved between him and the body. She gently cradled it in her arms and the ends of her long silver hair turned dark and sodden where they touched the goblin’s breast.
“Oh Ugo, Ugo,” she crooned. “I brought you so far and for so little.” By the flickering orange light Wiz could see the tears streak her face.
“He’s dead, Lady.” A fierce, hot gust brought choking gray strawsmoke and the pungent odor of burning pine up the stairwell. “Come, Lady,” Wiz tugged at her sleeve. “Come on. We’ve got to get out of here.”
Shiara raised her head. “Yes,” she said. “Yes we must.” She picked up Ugo’s body, supporting the nearly severed head with one hand, cradling him as if he were a baby. For the first time Wiz realized how small the goblin had been.
With Wiz leading, they groped down the stairs, gasping in the heat and blinking from the thick smoke. Wiz guided Shiara through the blazing Great Hall, past the overturned furniture and patches where the floor burned fiercely. As they skirted along one wall, they passed the window seat. Wiz saw that the chair he had moved so long ago lay on its side roughly where he had dragged it.
They picked their way over the shattered remains of the door and out into the courtyard. The cold night air was like balm on their faces and they sucked great, gasping lungfuls, coughing and hacking up dark mucus that reeked of smoke.
Behind them the flames consumed Heart’s Ease and shot high into the sky, grasping for the pitiless stars.
Eleven
Hacking Back
Heart’s Ease burned the whole night through. Far into the bleak winter morning sudden tongues of flame leapt from the ruins as the rubble shifted and the embers found fresh fuel. The walls stood, black and grim, but a little before dawn the roof crashed in, carrying with it what was left of the floors. There was nothing to do but stand aside and watch the flames. There was no help for Heart’s Ease.
Shiara buried Ugo, refusing Wiz’s offer of aid. Wiz didn’t press. He sat alone, wrapped in Shiara’s smoke-stained blue velvet cloak, utterly filled with pain and misery. Not even the chill of the stone beneath him penetrated.
It was mid-morning when Bal-Simba arrived. He came upon the Wizard’s Way, accompanied by a party of armed and armored guardsmen who quickly spread out to search for any of the League’s servants who might remain. The wizard closeted himself with Shiara for the rest of the day.
Wiz barely noticed. About noon he got up from his rock and returned to the tiny stable workroom in the clearing outside the palisade. It was almost evening when Bal-Simba found him there.
“You will be leaving Heart’s Ease,” he told Wiz gently. “There is nothing left worth staying for. The Lady Shiara has agreed to accept accommodation closer to the Capital and you will live in the Wizard’s Keep itself. There is no longer any point in trying to hide you, it seems.”