Fey 02 - Changeling (86 page)

"Trust me," Wind said.

"We'll have to," Burden said.
 
"I don't want to go through that building if we can help it.
 
We have a lot more chances of running into that poison inside than we do outside."

"I actually think our greatest difficulty will come crossing that courtyard," said Llan.
 
He was one of the oldest Foot Soldiers, old enough that Rugar even treated him with the respect due the aging.
 
But he had the same restlessness that Owrie had, and he too hid his hands in his armpits.

"We'll have to be silent," VeHeter, the remaining Foot Soldier.
 
She had a deep voice, almost masculine.
 
She was the only one of the Foot Soldiers who was perfectly still.
 
But her hands rested, palm up, on her knees and the tips of her fingers glinted in the moonlight.

"Shouldn't be too difficult," Nightshade said.

"For some," said Fants.
 
He spoke softly but Burden listened.
 
Fants had been a Leader in Nye, but a scandal that no one discussed forced him back into the Infantry.
 
Most of the time, he said nothing.
 
He had only come with Burden because they had spent so much time commiserating over Rugar's poor leadership.
 
Fants thought anyone could do better --even a Charmer.

"Come on, Fants, we can do it," said March.
 
She was the only member of this troop that Burden was uncertain about.
 
Her only battles had been on Blue Isle.
 
She had done well, but she was young.
 
She had strength, and little cunning. Amar had asked that she remain, but Burden couldn't find anyone else to round out the troop, and he felt comfortable only in a contingent of ten.

"One should never assume one's ability to succeed in anything," Fants said.

"If we believed that," Llan said, "then we would never get up in the morning.
 
Don't let one bad experience color everything, Fants."

"Leave him alone," Amar said.

"Quiet," Burden said.
 
"I don't care about your disagreements.
 
We have to do everything right here, or we might not return to Shadowlands."

"Wouldn't that be a shame?" VeHeter asked.

"For some of us it would be," Wind said.
 
His wings were wrapped so tightly around his body that he looked as if he were swaddled.

"Yes, I forgot," VeHeter said.
 
"Some of us are raising Islander children."

"This isn't going to work," Burden said.
 
"We can't fight."

"We can fight," Fants said.
 
"The energy is here.
 
We just have to turn against an enemy instead of ourselves."
 
He glanced at Burden as if asking for permission.
 
Burden nodded once.
 
"The enemy is inside that building.
 
You need to think of two things.
 
The first is that he, in cold blood and with complete duplicity, slaughtered the Black King's daughter when she stood before him in good faith."

"Her mistake," VeHeter muttered.

"Shut up," Condi snapped.

"The second," Fants said as if he hadn't heard the women's interchange, "is that if we succeed, we'll light a spark under our people again.
 
We'll be able to leave Shadowlands for good and get off this horrible Island."

"Dreamer," Owrie said, but she said it with fondness.
 
They all knew the truth of his words.
 
If they succeeded in killing this man, the one with the secret to the poison, they would return to Shadowlands heroes. The moral victory would be worth any price.

Burden squeezed Fants' arm in thanks.
 
"We cross to the rope and climb," Burden said.
 
"Wind goes ahead of us as a diversion, and Nightshade follows Wind to prepare our victim.
  
Are we ready?"

"As ready as we're going to be," Llan said.

"Good."
 
Burden stood, keeping to the shadows.
 
Nightshade disappeared along the dark rim of the bridge.
 
Burden wouldn't be able to watch him.
 
Dream Riders always traveled at their own pace.
 

Wind shrank until he was the size of a blade of grass.
 
Then he turned into a spark and swirled through the air ahead of them.
 
Fants moved ahead of Burden, leading the troop.
 
He kept them low in the tall grass, pushing it down as he moved, somehow doing so silently.
 
Burden thanked the Mysteries that Fants had agreed to come.
 
Burden wouldn't have been able to move that quietly without him.

The Foot Soldiers slinked off to one side, moving as a unit, almost looking like a creature themselves.
 
The grass continued to the wall, and then there were hedges along the side.
 
But when they reached the wall, Fants slid along the side, moving to the road.
 
It wasn't until Burden followed that he saw the open gate.

So trusting, these Islanders, even in the middle of a war.

Or perhaps they didn't think it was war yet, not with only two casualties.
 
It was the importance of those casualties that escalated this conflict.

A dark shape slithered over the wall.
 
Nightshade was inside.

Fants worked his way around the gate, keeping to the shadows.
 
Burden and the remaining infantry followed.
 
The Foot Soldiers climbed over the spot that Nightshade had used.
 

Burden could no longer see Wind.
 
The light from four torches burning over the arched doorways made sparks of their own. Wind probably played in those sparks, waiting for his companions.
  
The courtyard seemed unusually light.
 
The tiles depicted scenes of some sort, religious scenes.
 
Burden's heart began to pound hard.
 
He didn't know if he could safely touch those tiles.
 
If the Islanders were smart, they would have poured poison on every surface in this place.

Nightshade slithered along the tiles, heading toward the flower pots lining the building's wall.
 
He was a giant black shape that remained unchanged.
 
No poison here.
 
He apparently didn't even have any fear of it.

Fants signaled with his hand and the entire troop moved as one unit to the pots near Nightshade.
 
The edge of the rope was tied to a tree.
 
The Islanders probably forgot about it in the excitement from that night.
 

A spark floated past Burden, swirling up and up and up.
 
Nightshade wrapped his body around the rope and parts of it disappeared under his darkness.
 
Burden climbed up next.
 
It had been a long time since he climbed a rope.
 
Fortunately it was sturdy.
 
It curled around his hands.
 
He pulled himself up slowly so that he wouldn't touch any of Nightshade's darkness.
 

The rest of the troop would follow, two on the rope at all times, in rank order.
 
The Foot Soldiers would climb next, followed by the Infantry.
 
Fants would bring up the rear, partly because he had lost all of his rank, and partly because it would work better to have a competent pair of eyes at the bottom.

When Nightshade reached the edge of the balcony, he got off the rope and slithered along the stone, hiding in the shadows.
 
Wind was floating over the rope, waiting for the others.
 

Burden pulled level with the stone floor of the balcony.
 
The guard had torches around him.
 
His feet were bare and black with dirt.
 
He couldn't have been more than sixteen.
 
His angular face didn't even have the trace of a beard.
 
The pockets of his light robe bulged with poison, and a vial of it sat on the table beside him.
 
Behind him, the double doors leading into the room were closed, and the room was dark.
 

Nightshade had reached the edge of the doors.
 
Burden clung to the rope, his arms aching from supporting his weight.
 
He looked down.
 
Owrie was behind him, several feet lower on the rope.

Wind floated past him, a tiny light in the darkness, as if checking the position of the others, then floated up.
 
He was a spark the size of Burden's fingernail — almost big enough to see the little man in the center of the light — and he looked vaguely threatening, more as something that would start a fire than as something that would become human.

He floated toward the Islander and Burden held his breath.
 
He moved one hand higher so that he could see better.
 
The Islander didn't notice.

Wind floated around the Islander's face.
 
Burden's heart was pounding.
 
If Wind did this wrong, he would die.
 

Suddenly Wind shot up four sizes until he was the size of the Islander's head.
 
He slammed his small body into the Islander's nose.
 
The boy screamed and clawed at his face.

Nightshade rose to his full height and pulled open the doors.

Burden climbed on the balcony.

The boy grabbed at Wind, but Wind shrank to spark size.
 
The boy's shaking hand found the vial and tried to uncork it.
 
Wind landed in his hair and pulled.
 
The boy got the cork off.

The rope below Burden shook as another Fey climbed on it.

The Islander boy had enough poison to kill them all.

The Islander grabbed at Wind with his other hand.
 
The poison was shaking out of the vial, drops landing on the stone.
 
Burden grabbed his knife as Nightshade slipped inside.

Wind raised his small head, saw Burden, and placed his hands over the Islander's eyes.
 
It was a dangerous move, because the boy was very likely to pour poison on Wind.
 
The boy splashed the poison toward his own face as Burden let his knife fly.

It caught the boy in the chest.
 
He grunted and toppled backwards.
 
Wind floated up with the air, becoming small again, and floated inside the open doors.

The poison spilled all over the stone.
 
Burden grabbed the railing around the balcony and sat on it, raising his feet above the liquid.
 
He hadn't counted on this.
 
Other vials smashed as the boy fell.

The sound was deafening.

Burden waved at Owrie, indicating that she should stop.
 
She rested halfway up the rope, with Llan behind her.
 
The rest of his troop were huddled near the wall, open and vulnerable to anything that appeared on the courtyard below.

Wind landed on Burden's shoulder, sending a warmth down his arm.
 
"Warn them about the poison," he whispered.

The boy wasn't dead yet.
 
He raised his head and pulled at the knife, making whimpering sounds as he tried to free it.
 
Burden would have to finish him off, but he couldn't get near.
 
The boy was soaked in poison.

Wind floated down the rope, pausing beside Owrie and then beside Llan on his way.
 

Burden crawled along the railing toward the boy.
 
It shook beneath his weight.
 
It wasn't made for more than decoration.
 
If an Islander had hit it at full speed, the railing would shatter.