the place where the brief action had occurred. There was no movement there now.
“They’re gone,” Wilf said in mild surprise.
“That’s good. Your shooting may bring more soldiers.” Gonji leaned over Wilf’s shoulder and scanned the road ahead. Seeing nothing threatening, he continued: “Quickly now, tell me what’s happened since yesterday.”
Wilf recounted the busy hours: the surreptitious movement of armament and supplies from the now unsalutary catacombs; the securing of Vedun by Klann’s troops; the beefing up of the city garrison; the restriction of movement to and from the city—Klann’s paranoia ran rampant now, as well it might; the systematic search throughout the city for Gonji (which amused the samurai no end; Julian’s discomfiture was a balm to his anguished spirit); and the surrender of the location of a weapons cache in the foothills by the now penitent and cooperative craft guildsmen.
Gonji received the news of the unblocking of the catacombs access tunnels with enthusiasm. The catacombs were yet of strategic usefulness. The southern valley tunnel had been unblocked to permit Gonji to journey to Simon’s cave. It had been reshaped to admit one horse and rider at a time. In addition, the northern foothill tunnel and the passage to the vestibule chamber that led up into the city had now been opened to allow humans through; however, creatures of unnatural size from Mord’s mystic arsenal would find it difficult to pass the formidable spiked redoubts constructed in some of the tunnel’s arches and adits.
“That’s good,” Gonji agreed. “I should have thought of it. Whose idea was it?”
“Michael’s.”
“Mmm. Encouraging to see that he’s in a military state of mind. We’ll need that. How is his leg?”
“Better, but he’ll limp, there’s no doubt. Lydia’s with child,” Wilf added matter-of-factly, forgetting it almost at once.
Gonji was struck by this news; the reality of the Benedettos’ marriage and its stumbling block to his desires was abruptly driven home with the unrelenting finality of a death sentence. He smiled crookedly, had to backtrack swiftly to catch up with Wilf’s train of thought.
“—pole-arms were dismantled and hafts were brought up separately from the weapon heads.”
“Eh? Oh—good idea, for ease of movement. Very clever.”
“Ja, that was Roric Amsgard’s. Then the armor, and the big weapons, and the really dangerous materiel—pistols, shot, powder, bows—those were a problem until....” Wilf shook his head, wincing at some indelicacy.
“Well?” Gonji pressed.
“God forgive us. Poor Master Flavio would have—”
Wilf peered back over his shoulder, knowing the pain of the memory he had evoked. “Sorry, Gonji.”
The samurai stared down at the racing, rain-stippled track, making no reply.
“But anyway,” Wilf continued, “there were so many dead after the craftsmen’s rebellion. The chapel—the city—filled with coffins until the funerals. A lot of those coffins...don’t contain bodies....”
Gonji’s face brightened. He chuckled dryly. “And whose ghoulish idea was that?”
Wilf snorted. “Your braying chum Paille’s.”
“Hah! I might’ve known.”
“Gonji—” Wilf grew deadly serious. “Have you given any more thought to the traitor? To whom it might be?”
Gonji was slow to respond. “Hai.”
“You don’t think it’s my father, do you?”
The odd frankness of Wilf’s question surprised him. “Iye—why do you ask?”
“Oh, nothing. I’ve just...overheard talk. Well, not talk, exactly, but...you know, the way people look at someone they don’t trust. And Papa sure hasn’t done much to inspire trust lately, what with all these secrets of his. He hasn’t made a move to appeal to Klann for peace or to tell him about Mord’s treachery—what we suspect, you know? He wants to take my head off when I bring it up. He’s become unapproachable.”
Gonji thought awhile before answering. “I wouldn’t worry about it, Wilf,” he said, scratching an itch beside his sore belly. “Words of caution against Mord are going to be hard to form without tipping the militia’s hand. And I certainly don’t suspect your father of being traitorous. No spy would behave as mysteriously as he has.
“Nein....” His gaze lofted to a distant vision. “I don’t think it’s anyone in the council. Only the council members knew that there was no hope of Rorka raising outside assistance. So eliminating him was a futile action. It must be someone in the rank and file, I suppose, who reports to Mord. But who?” His fists balled up on his thighs.
“Do you have a plan now?” Wilf asked. “Do you know what we’ll be doing next?”
“Hai, sort of a plan,” Gonji allowed, exhaling wearily. “I doubt that it will be very popular among your countrymen.”
They reached the area where the fight had transpired. Quiet now, but for the falling rain. Dark blood-streaks whirled and eddied in puddles under soft moonglow. Drag marks and myriad hoof prints filled in rapidly with water.
“Who did you leave in charge?”
Wilf blinked, embarrassed. “I—Nagy, I guess.”
“Come on,” Gonji said. “If they were smart, they took the horses back down into the valley.”
They cut a virgin path through tangled congeries of shedding larches that left them soaking by the time they reached the valley floor. Turning eastward for about a hundred yards, they found the party of four with the shuddering horses in tow, awaiting Wilf’s return with short-tempered uncertainty.
“Gonji!” several voices whispered in relief. Happy wet faces glowed aboard prancing steeds. Only Vlad seemed sullen and unimpressed.
“I see they’re delighted to see me back,” Wilf said sarcastically.
Gonji snickered. “So how do you like the mantle of leadership?” They could make out the swathed body lashed to Tadeusz’s saddle. “Who’s that?” Gonji asked. Wilf told him who it must be, and he nodded grimly, but then the others were shushing them and waving them closer.
“Helmets,” Nick Nagy grated harshly when they had closed the distance. “Across the ravine to the south. Jiri saw them.”
“Klann’s troops?” Gonji inquired.
“I don’t think so. The helms were sort of...spired.” Jiri described a pointed effect in the air above his sallet.
Gonji mounted a dead mercenary’s horse and, waving off accompaniment, trotted to the ravine some small distance to the south, swords at the ready.
The trees parted at the northern end, and the samurai immediately espied the mounted party at the farther end.
Turks. Three of them. An armed military scouting
