“IF THAT FIRE IS SORCEROUS,” KING AMBROSE muttered, “then the Blades’ bindings will resist it. We must play for time until they find a way through. Meanwhile, there is no need for suicidal heroics.” Backing into a crenel, he grasped Emerald’s arm and effortlessly moved her past him, then emerged between her and the assassin. She did not resist, for he was right—she would do no good being a human shield. Besides, even cats would not try wrestling on this catwalk.
Although she was trying not to look down, she knew that the courtyard was full of spectators, with more spilling out of every doorway. Horrified faces were staring up at the spectacle so brightly lit by the inferno.
“Good evening, King!” the assassin called cheerfully. He was still sauntering slowly toward them, as if he were enjoying himself too much to hurry. “Or morning in exactitude. Chilly for the time of year, I comprehend.”
“Commander Bandit warned me you were a show-off.” Ambrose was quietly backing away, keeping the distance between them constant and forcing Emerald to retreat toward the bath house.
“The wise physician trumpets his cures and buries his mistakes in silence. I bury my successes, but not without public demonstration.”
“Then you did not arrange this meeting for the purpose of negotiation?”
“Whatever to negotiate?” Silvercloak conveyed surprise, although his face was shadowed and indistinct against the fire.
“Release of your fellow conspirators, perhaps?”
He laughed. His voice was high-pitched for a man, yet Emerald had trouble imagining any woman displaying that sort of uncaring homicidal arrogance. Although he had no accent, he used an odd choice of words, which was typical of persons who had been conjured to speak a foreign tongue.
“After your inquisitors have completed with them? What purpose are they for, then? Likewise, they were unvalued to me anyway. They paid. I kill. I collect.”
Something bounced off his cloak. He ignored it. Men and boys in the courtyard were throwing things at him—books, pots, bottles, tools—with no apparent effect except a few yells of pain from below, as the debris bounced back on the crowd. Younger boys were racing back and forth to the buildings, fetching ammunition. Pliers struck a merlon and clattered down on the walkway, joining a candlestick and a hairbrush. Unfortunately Ironhall taught no courses in archery.
“You must survive to collect,” the King growled, continuing to ease back. “You really think you can get away from here alive?”
“Oh, yes! Did you ever appraise I could get in?”
“No. I’m very impressed. Shall we talk about a king’s ransom? Would you like to be my Grand Inquisitor? A peerage, plus ten times what the Skuldigger gang paid you.”
Silvercloak chuckled and shook his head. “I must contemplate my professional reputation. An honest crook stays bought. Kings rarely do.”
Ambrose stopped moving and folded his arms. He had reached roughly the middle of the curtain wall and seemingly decided to retreat no farther. “I compliment you on your ethics. You will allow my companion to leave in peace, though?”
“Alas! My condolences to the boy, but he may seek to interfere with my departure.”
“But this is no boy—”
“Excuse me,” said a voice near Emerald’s ankle. “Move the King back a pace or two, will you?”
She did not quite leap to her death in shock, but obviously the stress had driven her insane. That could not really be that familiar face down there peering up at her.
“Of course,” she mumbled, and poked a well-upholstered royal loin. “Move back three steps, sire. Right away.”
Ambrose did not stop lecturing the assassin on the moral depravity of killing innocent women, but he did resume his deliberate backing up. As soon as he had cleared the crenel, Wart scrambled up on the catwalk, rose to his feet facing Silvercloak, and drew his rapier.
The spectators’ cheers echoed off the buildings and from the distant hills. From knights to sopranos, they screamed with joy. He was recognized, and shouts of “Wart! Wart!” spread through the crowd. Perhaps sharp eyes even made out the gleam of the cat’s-eye on Sleight’s pommel.
They were seeing the King’s salvation. Emerald saw a friend about to die. They did not know about Chefney and Demise. Even the great Durendal had admitted he had never fenced like Silvercloak.
Of course he could not swarm up stone walls like a human ant, either. How had Wart managed this miraculous arrival?
“Bless my celebrated eyebrows!” the assassin said. “What have we here? Last week you were a carrot boy. Yesterday you collected animal excretion. And today you’re a swordsman. What are you really?”
“I’m a swordsman,” Wart said. “But you aren’t.”
“Back,” Ambrose grunted. “Must give him room.” He renewed his retreat, driving Emerald behind him.
Wart said quietly, “No. Stay there for now, please.”
“I manage in humble fashion.” Silvercloak swished his rapier up and down a few times. He was left-handed after all, although Emerald thought he had been carrying the sword in his right hand earlier. Perhaps he was ambidextrous. He resumed his slow approach.
“No.” Wart did some swishing of his own. He stepped forward two paces and halted. “You killed Chefney and Demise. They were friends of mine, so I dedicate your death to their memory.” He raised his sword in a brief salute and went back to guard. “That made us all think of you as a swordsman, but we were wrong. You’re not. You are only a sorcerer.”
“Only? I never saw a sorcerer kneel in the dung of a stable yard.”
“Nor yet a Blade. It was a regrettable expedient.” Pompous talk was not Wart’s style, so what was he up to? Was he playing Ambrose’s game, dragging it out until the Blades could come? Even if the duel was a foregone conclusion, he could reasonably hope to delay Silvercloak a few seconds. That might be long enough to save his King if the Guard was on its way. The illusory fire in the tower was faltering, shooting green and even purple flames at times. It had stopped making any sound at all.
Silvercloak halted his approach when he was close enough to launch an attack. The barrage of missiles had stopped.
Wart had his left side to the merlons and his sword arm clear. That should be the better position on this parapet, but the advantage canceled out because Silvercloak was left-handed. Being left-handed was itself an advantage, Emerald knew. Right-handed swordsmen found few chances to practice against southpaws, while southpaws could always find right-handers.
“I worked it out on the ride here,” Wart said. “It’s pretty obvious now. The door in Quirk Row was the first clue, of course. And at Holmgarth I had a score of men in that yard looking for you. I had described you exactly. I gave them the signal that you were there, and some of them were watching the gate. Yet you rode right past them.”
For the first time Emerald thought the assassin hesitated, as if re-appraising his opponent. “I have a very unremarkable face.”
“Very. And the dog tonight—that was the clincher. You fence as a southpaw—usually. Tell you what, messer Argènteo,” Wart said brightly, “why don’t you drop that cloak of yours and we’ll make an honest fight of this?”
The assassin’s laugh sounded a trifle forced. “I think not. If you have gotten that far, young man, then you are smarter than you look, but you also know that your case is hopeless. Why die so young?”
“I won’t die. I will avenge my friends. Come on, then, killer! Two hundred thousand ducats await if you can get past me: Stalwart of the Blades. I say you can’t.”
Silvercloak did not move.
This time it was Wart who laughed. He raised his voice in a shout to the audience below—and certainly no one in the Guard could play to a gallery better than he could, with his minstrel background. “Brothers! There’s a horse down in the Quarry. It’s in some sort of trance and there may be warding spells on it, but that’s how this Blade-killer intends to escape. If you hurry—”
Silvercloak leaped and lunged, a fast appel. Wart parried without riposting. He parried the next stroke, too, not moving his feet. And the next. The swords flickered and clinked with no apparent result. Then stillness. The contestants stood frozen in place, the tips of their rapiers just touching, eyes locked.
No blood had been shed, but the spectators whooped and cheered. The experts clearly thought Wart had shown the better form. The juniors were almost hysterical with excitement.
“That the best you can do, messer? That wasn’t how you treated Sir Demise and Sir Chefney! The fire behind you is turning a most sickly color. I think the Blades will be here soon.”
When the killer made no answer, Wart raised his voice again, never taking his eyes off Silvercloak.
“Your Majesty! If I may presume, sire. There is a cord tied around the merlon behind me. It holds up a rope ladder, which this man expects to be his escape route. If you would be so gracious as to—”
Silvercloak lunged again, his rapier a blur of firelight. Steel rattled against steel.
Someone—it must have been Wart, although it did not sound like him—screamed piercingly. It was certainly Wart who pitched headlong through the crenel and went hurtling down to the jagged rocks of the Quarry, far below.