The Emerald Storm (41 page)

She was alone with Modina. They had not said a word to each other for hours. Something was troubling the empress—something more than usual. Modina was stubborn, and no force could move her once she decided on a course. Apparently, the course she decided on was not to talk.

The gate opened and the hay cart entered.

Arista watched intently. Nothing seemed amiss, no guards, no shouting, just a thick pile of hay and a slow walking donkey pulling it. The farmer, an elderly man, parked the cart by the stables, unhitched his donkey, hitched it to a new cart, and led the animal out again. Staring at the cart, she could not help herself. The plan had been to wait until just before dawn, but she could not leave Hilfred lying there. She managed to restrain herself only until she saw the harvest moon begin to rise, then she stood.

“It’s time,” she said.

Modina lifted her head.

Arista walked to the middle of the room and knelt.

“Arista I…” Modina began hesitantly.

“What is it?”

“Nothing…Good luck.”

Arista got up and crossed the room to hug her tightly. “Good luck to you too.”

The empress shook her head. “You keep all of it—I’m not going to be needing any.”

Arista traveled down the stairs, disguised as Regent Saldur, wondering what Modina had almost said. The excitement of the night, however, kept her thoughts jumping from one thing to the next. She discovered she could remain in her disguise for a long time. It broke when she slept, but it would last beyond what she would need that night. This gave her greater confidence. Although she was still concerned about bumping into the real Saldur, the thought of seeing Hilfred again was overwhelming.

Her heart leapt just thinking about traveling home to Melengar with Hilfred once more at her side. It had been a long and tiring road and she wanted to be home. She wanted to see Alric and Julian, and to sleep in her own bed. She vowed she would treat Melissa better and planned to give her maid a new dfor Wintertide. Arista was occupied in a long list of Wintertide presents for everyone when she stepped outside. The broad face of the harvest moon illuminated the inner ward, allowing her to see as clear as if it were a cloudy day. The courtyard was empty as she crept to the wagon.

“Hilfred!” she whispered. There was no response, no movement in the hay. “Hilfred.” She shook the wagon. “It’s me, Arista.”

She waited.

Her heart skipped a beat when the hay moved. “Princess?” it said hesitantly.

“Yes, it’s me. Just follow.” She led him into the stables and to the last stall, which was vacant. “We need to wait here until it is nearly dawn.”

Hilfred stared at her dubiously, keeping a distance.

“How…?” he began but faltered.

“I thought Nimbus explained I would appear like this?”

“He did.”

Hilfred’s eyes traveled up and down her figure, a look on his face as if he had just tasted something awful.

“The rumors are true,” she admitted, “at least the ones about using magic.”

“I’ve known that, but your hair, your face, your voice.” He shook his head. “It’s perfect. How do I know you’re not the real Saldur?”

Arista closed her eyes, and in an instant Saldur disappeared and the Princess of Melengar returned.

Hilfred stumbled backward until he hit the wall of the stall. His eyes wide and his mouth open.

“It
is
me,” she assured him. Arista took a step forward and watched him flinch. It hurt her to see this, more than she would have expected. “You need to trust me,” she told him.

“How can I? How can I be certain it’s really you, when you trade skins so easily?”

“Ask me a question that will satisfy you.”

Hilfred hesitated.

“Ask me, Hilfred.”

“I have been with you daily since I was a very young man. Give me the names of the first three women I fell in love with and the name of the one I lost because of the scars on my face.”

She smiled and felt her face blush. “Arista, Arista, Arista, and no one.”

He smiled. She did not wait for him. She knew he would never presume upon her to take such a step on his own. She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. She could feel the sudden shock in the tightening of his muscles, but he did not pull away. His body relaxed slowly and his arms surrounded her. He squeezed so that her cheek pressed against his, her chin resting on his shoulder.

“Maribor help me if you really are Saldur,” Hilfred whispered in her ear.

She laughed softly and wondered if it was the first time she had done so since Emery died.

Royce and Hadrian began investigating the spouts, the giant tunnels bored out of the rock through which molten lava would blast on its way to the sea. There were dozens, ea
ch one aiming in different directions, their access to the mountain’s core sealed off by gear controlled portals. They climbed the interior until they reached the opening and the sky.

The sun was up and the sight below forced Hadrian’s stomach into his mouth. They were well above the bridge level. The world looked very small and very far away. Tur Del Fur was a small cluster of petite buildings crouched in the elbow of a little cove. Beyond it rose mountains that looked like little hills. Directly below, the sea appeared like a puddle with tiny flashes of white that took Hadrian a moment to realize were the crests of waves. What he thought might be insects were gulls circling far below.

None of the spouts were blocked, none of the portals tampered with.

“Maybe it’s in the other tower?” Hadrian asked after they climbed out of the last tunnel.

Royce shook his head. “Even if that one is blocked, the pressure will vent here. Both have to be closed. It’s not the spouts or the portals, it’s something else—something we’ve oerlooked—something that can seal all the exits at once to make the mountain boil over. It has to be another master switch, one that locks all the portals closed.”

“How are we going to find that? Do you see how many gears are in here? And it could be any one. We should have brought Magnus.”

“Sure, with him it would be easy to find—in a year or two. Look at this place!” Royce gestured at the breadth of the tower, where the sun’s light pierced through skylights spraying the tangled riddle of a million stone gears. Some spun, some whirled, some barely moved, and everywhere were levers. Like arrows peppering a battlefield, stone arms protruded. Just as the gears came in various sizes, so too did the levers—some tiny and others the size of tree trunks. “It’s a wonder they ever learned how to vent the core.”

“Exactly,” Hadrian said. “No one knows what most of this stuff does anymore. The Port Authority leaves it alone for fear they might destroy the world or something, right? So, whatever Merrick did, it’s a sure bet the folks in charge here don’t know anything about it. It has to be a lever that hasn’t been moved in centuries, maybe even thousands of years. It might show signs of recent movement, right?”

“Maybe.”

“So, we just need to find it.”

Royce stared at him.

“What?”

“We only have a few hours left, and you’re talking about looking for a displaced grain of sand on a beach.”

“I know, and when you come up with something better we’ll try it. Until then, let’s at least look.”

Hours passed and still they found nothing. Adding to the dilemma was the interior of Drumindor itself, which was a maze of corridors, archways, and bridges. Often they could see where they wanted to go but did not know how to get there. When they arrived, they discovered it was not what they expected and had to backtrack. Luck remained on their side, however, as they saw precious few people. They spotted only a handful of workers and even fewer guards, all of them were easily avoided. The sunshine passing through the skylights shone with the brilliance of midday, then passed to evening, and they still had not found their goal.

Finally, they headed for the bottom of the tower.

It was their last resort as the Drumindor defensive garrison fortified the first three floors. Approximately forty soldiers guarded the base, and they had a reputation for their harsh treatment of intruders. Still, whatever Merrick did, he most likely did to the mechanism that controlled the lava’s release. Descending yet another winding staircase, they paused in a sheltered alcove just outside a large chamber. Peering in, they saw it was similar to an interior courtyard, or a theater, with four gallery balconies ringing it with pillared archways stacked one upon another.

“There.” Royce pointed to an opening in the room below that radiated a yellow glow. “It has to be in there.”

They crept down the stairs to the bottom. Elaborate square-cut designs of inlaid bronze and quartz lined the tiled floor. It picked up the glow coming from the open doorway on the far side. The air warmed dramatically as hot gusts of sulfur-laced air blew in their faces.

“This has to be it,” Royce whispered.

They looked up at the stacked galleries of arched openings circling the walls above them and slowly, carefully, stepped forward together, crossing the shimmering tile, heading for the glowing doorway.

“Halt!” The command echoed through the chamber the moment they reached the center of the room. “Lie face down, arms and legs spread.”

They hesitated.

Twenty archers appeared, moving out from behind the pillars of the galleries, with stretched bows aimed down on Royce and Hadrian from three sides. Pikemen entered the hall in an orderly march, boot heels clicking on the tile. They spread out forming two lines. A dozen more armored men issued down the side corridor from the second stry gallery and proceeded in two-by-two formation to the bottom of the stairs fanning out to block any retreat back the way they had come.

“Now, lay on your bellies, or we will cut you down where you stand.”

“We’re not here to cause trouble, we’re here—” Hadrian’s words were cut short as an arrow hissed through the air and glinted off the stone less than a foot from them.

“Now!” the voice shouted.

They laid down.

The moment they did, troops from in front and behind entered, pinning them and stripping them of their weapons.

“You have to listen to us. There’s an invasion coming—”

“We’ve heard all about your phantom armada, Mister Blackwater, and you can give up that charade.”

“It’s real! They will be here tonight, and if you don’t fix the tower, all of Delgos will be taken!”

“Bind them!”

They brought forth chains, tongs, and a brazier. Smiths arrived and went to work hammering manacles onto their wrists and legs.

“Listen to me!” Hadrian shouted. “At least check the pressure release controls, see if something is wrong.”

There was no reply except the smith’s hammer pounding the manacles closed.

“What is the harm in checking?” Hadrian went on. “If I am wrong, what does it matter? If I am right and you don’t even look, you’re sealing the fate of the Delgos Republic. Just humor me, if nothing else it will shut me up.”

“Slitting your throat will do that too,” the voice said. “But I will send a worker if you two come quietly without resistance.”

Hadrian was not certain what kind of resistance he expected them to give as the smith finished attaching another chain to his legs, but nodded anyway.

He gave the order, and the guards pulled them to their feet. It was hard navigating stairs with hobbled legs and Hadrian nearly fell more than once, but soon they reached the bottom of the fortress and the main gate.

The gigantic doors of stone soundlessly swept open. Outside the late afternoon sun revealed a contingent of port soldiers waiting. The commander of the fortress guard stepped forward and spoke quietly with the Port Authority Captain for some time.

“You don’t think these guys are always waiting out here, do you?” Hadrian whispered to Royce. “We’ve been set up, haven’t we?”

“It didn’t tip you off when they called you by name?”

“Merrick?”

“Who else.”

“That’s a bit farfetched. How could he possibly expect us to be here. We didn’t even know we would be here. He can’t be that smart.”

“He is.”

A runner appeared trotting up from the bottom of the tower and reported to the commander with a sharp salute.

“Well?” the fortress commander asked.

The runner shook his head. “There is no problem with the pressure release control—everything checked out fine.”

“Take them away,” the commander ordered.

The Tur Del Fur City Prison and Workhouse sat back, hidden on a hillside away from the dock, the shops, and the trades. It appeared as little more than a large, stone box at the end of Avan Boulevard with few windows and a spiked iron fence. Hadrian and Royce both knew it by reputation. Most offenders typically died within the first week due to execution, suicide, or brutality. The magistrate’s role was merely to determine the manner of execution. Parole was not an option. Only those known to be serious threats came here. Petty thieves, drunks, and malcontents went to the more popular and lenient Portside Jail. For those in Tur Del Fur Prison, this was the end of the road, literally as well as figuratively.

Royce and Hadrian hung by their wrists with their ankles chained to the wall of cell number three, where they had spent the last few hours. The room was smaller than those in Calis. There was no window, stool, nor pot—not even straw. It was a sml, stone closet with a single metal door. The only light came from the gap between the door and the frame.

“You’re awfully quiet,” Hadrian said to the darkness.

“I’m trying to figure this out,” Royce replied.

“Figure it out?” Hadrian laughed even though his arms and wrists burned like fire from the metal cutting into his skin. “We’re hanging chained to a wall waiting execution, Royce. There’s not that much to it.”

“Not
that
. I want to know why we didn’t find anything wrong with the spouts.”

“Because there’s a million levers and switches in there and we were looking for just one?”

“I don’t think so. When we got to the bridge what was it you said? You said you didn’t think anyone except I could scale that fortress. I think you’re right. I know Merrick couldn’t. He’s a genius, not an elf. I always outdid him when it came to anything physical.”