30

Echo swept past Hylas and he nearly fell off the ladder, which angered the wasps, who buzzed furiously around his head. One stung his ear and another his thumb. Clenching his jaw, he tied the cord around the wasps’ nest, then slid down the ladder, looped the cord at ankle height around the pillars on either side of the passage, and raced off. There. Another trap set.

As yet, he’d seen no sign of the Crows, but he knew it wouldn’t be long. Earlier, he’d peered out of a window and glimpsed a black swarm of them at the north gates. He’d counted twenty-two, including Telamon and Kreon. Twenty-two against one. He didn’t want to think about that.

If he’d been out in the wild, he would have made boulders into deadfalls and saplings into spring-loaded spikes. In here, his only plan was to frighten them off. In a workshop he’d thrown together a couple of lumpy wax figures, and sloshed water in powdered lime to make runny white paint; then he’d raced about, leaving the pus-eaters where they’d look most menacing, and marking doors with the white handprints of Plague.

If that didn’t work and it came to a fight, he was finished. All he had were axe, knife, and slingshot—with not enough shot, just a pouchful of big carnelian beads from a necklace of Pirra’s.

As he ran, he felt a stab of worry at leaving her alone. She was somewhere in the east of Kunisu, while he was in the west, with the Great Court between them. Although no one knew better how to hide in here than Pirra, if the Crows caught her, he wouldn’t even hear her scream.

Turning a corner, he started down a shadowy passage flanked by workshops. No handprints on the doors; he hadn’t set any traps here. He bumped into a brazier and sent it clattering, then tripped over a coil of rope. That’d come in handy; he slung it over his shoulder.

At the end of the passage, torchlight glimmered. Hylas crouched behind the brazier. Any moment now and Crow warriors would appear around the corner.

Torchlight glimmered at the other end too. The Crows were approaching the passage from both ends.

In panic, Hylas threw himself into the nearest workshop. Please please don’t let it be a dead end.

It was. No windows, no ceiling hatch, not even a drain to crawl into. Just a dim chamber cluttered with tools.

“Search every room!” shouted a man from one end of the passage. The crash of breaking pottery: The two parties of Crows were working their way toward each other, ransacking every workshop as they went. The one where Hylas hid was in the middle. It wouldn’t be long before they found him.

In panic, he cast about him. On a workbench he saw three of those weird giant eggs; no use to him.

The din was getting nearer.

He backed deeper into the gloom, and something jabbed his shoulder blade. It was one of those giant tusks; in fact, a whole wobbly stack of them.

The Crows were almost upon him.

In feverish haste, he tied a loop in one end of his rope and slung it over a tusk jutting from the middle of the stack; then, placing a giant egg on the floor to distract the Crows, he darted behind the workbench, gripping the other end of the rope in both hands.

An instant later, the room filled with the stench of sweat and the creak of rawhide armor. Torchlight slid across the floor toward him.

“Told you there’s no one here,” growled a man, shockingly close. “I say we get out before we catch Plague.”

“Those handprints were fresh, you idiot!” snapped another. “Who d’you think made them?”

“I don’t care! This whole place feels cursed, I’m getting out!”

Mutters of agreement from the others, but the one who’d noticed the paint didn’t back down. “You heard the orders,” he insisted, “check every cubit!”

The torchlight slid closer to Hylas’ foot. He fought the urge to recoil, knowing that the slightest move would betray him.

“What’s that?”

He froze.

“Looks like—a giant egg.”

“Don’t touch it, it’s cursed.”

“What’s that over there?”

The torchlight moved even closer. With a desperate prayer to the Lady of the Wild Things, Hylas yanked the rope as hard as he could. The pile of tusks tottered—and fell with a crash.

Torches went flying, men shouted and swore in the dark. Seizing his chance, Hylas scrambled past them and out the door.

The Crows recovered terrifyingly fast. As he sped down the passage, shouts rang out. “There he is!”

He hurtled around the bend, slipped on a rug, and staggered past a doorway flanked by two painted lions with wings. He’d seen them before: He’d set another trap somewhere close.

This time, he let the Crows catch a glimpse of him.

“That way!” one yelled.

They were so intent on catching him that they didn’t see the rope at ankle height. He heard the lead warriors go down in a clatter of weapons, then men howling in rage and pain as the wasps’ nest burst.

A swarm of furious wasps wouldn’t delay them for long. Hylas found a stairway that he recognized and sped up it, past a lumpy little pus-eater that glared at him from the bottom step with red carnelian eyes.

He’d scarcely reached the dark at the top when warriors appeared at the foot. They saw the pus-eater and lurched to a halt.

“Told you this place is cursed,” panted one.

“Whatever you saw, it can’t have been human,” whispered another. “I’m getting out!”

This time, no one argued.

Shaking with relief, Hylas listened to them go. From a window on an upper gallery, he saw them streaming out of the gates. He counted nine, far better than he’d dared hope. Now the odds were only thirteen against one.

It was getting hotter. Yanking his jerkin over his head, he stuffed it behind a brazier and headed off.

Downstairs, he found himself in another endless passage, with giant earthenware jars standing sentinel between workshops along one side. All the doors except one bore his white handprints.

More torchlight and creaking armor. He darted into the one room that bore no handprint. This time, he wanted the Crows to give the Plague-marked workshops only a cursory look, and concentrate on his hiding place: It was his final trap. Either that, or it would be his tomb.

The room was dark, and full of an eye-watering stink. Dung crunched underfoot and he fought the urge to gag as he slipped behind the column by the door and climbed onto its base, so that his face was near the roof beams. They were thick with sleeping bats, hanging motionless. Across the room, he made out the pale rectangle of the opposite door, which earlier he’d left ajar, with a basket balanced on top.

“He went in there, I saw him,” a warrior said hoarsely.

Light glimmered in the workshop, but the bats slept on. Hylas watched in horrified fascination as warriors passed within touching distance of the column behind which he hid. He heard the hiss of their pine-pitch torches. He saw the sweat beading their muscles and the vicious gleam of spears. If they found him, he’d be skewered like a pike.

It was time to put his plan to the test. The surest way to waken bats is to mimic their worst enemy. Putting his mouth close to the cluster near his face, Hylas hissed.

Snakes invaded the bats’ dark dreams, and the colony exploded in twittering panic. Shouting in disgust and clawing at bats, the warriors fled for the opposite door, bringing down the basket with its load of whipsnakes. Torches went flying, men roared and trampled each other.

“Told you this place is cursed,” yelled one. “I’m getting out!”

“Orders is orders, you can’t run away, you coward!”

A torrent of oaths—and now bronze was clashing with bronze, the Crows were fighting each other. In the lurching light, Hylas saw a man fall, clutching his belly. Another crumpled with blood bubbling from his mouth. The coppery tang caught at Hylas’ throat, and he smelled the stink of burst bowels. The bats and snakes had fled: He followed their lead and slipped unnoticed into the passage. If he was lucky, the Crows would slaughter each other, and those who survived would flee.

Which still left a handful unaccounted for, including Kreon and Telamon. Somehow, he had to get back to the staircase where he’d left Pirra.

But now he found himself running down a passage he’d never seen before. It was painted a burning yellow, and its floor was set with red river pebbles, knobbly and painful under his bare feet.

He stumbled into an enormous hall that was also unfamiliar. He saw black ivy painted on the walls and oxblood hangings stirring in a breeze. Benches and three-legged tables lay overturned on moldering rushes—as if the hall had only just been deserted by a gathering of ghosts.

Hylas cast about him. Which way? All the arches and doorways looked the same.

An arrow whined past his ear. He flung himself sideways, and cried out as another grazed his calf.

Grabbing a bench, he held it against him as a shield.

Above him on a balcony, he glimpsed a shadowy figure crouch to nock another arrow to its bow.