off as he watched the men reach the lip of the pool.
Nakor said, ‘Odd place for a bolt-hole, over a hundred feet above ground, isn’t it?’
‘I imagine the Nighthawks did some work around here some years back. My men report tool marks on the rockface. There was probably a path down to the floor of the run that was demolished.’ He sighed. ‘It’s time. Where’s your man?’
Nakor nodded behind them. ‘Sleeping, under the wagon.’
‘Get him, then,’ said Erik von Darkmoor.
Nakor hurried back to the luggage wagon, where the two boys responsible for looking after the stores from the town waited. They spoke in hushed tones, understanding how dangerous this mission was; even so, they were only boys and the waiting was making them restless. Underneath the wagon lay a solitary figure, who roused quickly when Nakor kicked lightly at his boots.
Ralan Bek wiggled out from under the wagon, then unfolded himself to tower over Nakor. The youth was six inches over six feet in height, and he loomed over the diminutive gambler. Nakor knew he was possessed by some aspect of the God of Evil, a tiny ‘sliver’ as Nakor thought of it; an infinitesimal portion of the god himself, and that made Bek extraordinarily dangerous. The only advantage Nakor possessed was years of experience and what he thought of as his ‘tricks’.
‘Time?’
Nakor nodded. ‘They’ll be up there in a moment. You know what to do.’
Bek nodded. He reached down and picked up his hat, a hat he had claimed as a prize from a man he had killed before Nakor’s eyes, and he wore it like a badge of honour. The broad-brimmed black felt hat, with its single long eagle’s feather hanging down from the hatband, gave the youth an almost rakish air, but Nakor knew that beneath the young man’s convivial exterior seethed a potential for harm, as well as preternatural strength and speed.
Bek trotted over to the face of the cliff, and waited. A coil of line was dropped quietly from above, followed a moment later by another. Soldiers quickly tied heavier rope to the lines, and this was pulled up. When the first rope was made secure, Ralan Bek unbuckled his scabbard belt and tied it over one shoulder, so that his sword now rested on his back. With powerful ease he pulled himself up the rope, feet firmly on the rockface, as if he had been climbing this way all his life. Other soldiers followed, but Bek’s speed up the rope was unmatchable.
Erik watched him ascend into the darkness. ‘Why are you so insistent he goes first, Nakor?’
‘He may not be invulnerable, Erik, but he’s a lot harder to kill than any of your men. Magnus will look out for those guarding the main entrance to the keep, but if there’s magic on this back door, Bek has the best chance of survival.’
‘Time was I would be the first one up the rope.’
Nakor gripped his friend’s arm. ‘I’m glad to see you’ve got smarter over the years, Erik.’
‘I notice you’re not volunteering to be up there, either.’
Nakor just grinned.
Bek waited, running his fingers over the door’s outline. It was a rock, like the others, and in the darkness he couldn’t see the crack his fingertips told him marked the edge of the entrance to the bolt-hole. He let his senses drift, for he had discovered early in life that sometimes he could anticipate things – an attack, an unexpected turn of the trail, the mood of a horse, or the fall of the dice. He thought of it as his ‘lucky feeling’.
Yes, he thought. There was something just beyond this door, something very interesting. Ralan Bek did not know what fear was. As Nakor had suggested to him, there was something very different, even alien, about the young man from Novindus. Glancing down to where the little man waited with the old soldier, he found he could barely make them out in the dark. ‘Lantern,’ he whispered, and a soldier behind him handed him a specially constructed, small, shuttered lantern. He pointed it at Nakor and Erik and opened it and shut it again quickly. That was the agreed-upon signal to proceed cautiously.
Not that Ralan truly understand caution. It was as alien to his thoughts as fear. He tried to understand a lot of things Nakor talked to him about, but sometimes he just nodded and pretended to understand the strange little man in order to keep him from repeating himself endlessly.
Ralan continued to run his fingers along the seam until he determined that the door was designed to be opened only from the inside. He shrugged. ‘Bar,’ he demanded, and a soldier stepped past him and inserted the crowbar where he pointed. The soldier struggled for a moment, until Bek said, ‘Let me.’
With preternatural power, he forced open a crack, and the door swung suddenly wide with a protesting sound of twisting metal as an iron bar was ripped from its restraining mechanism. With a loud clank it hit the stones and instantly Bek had his sword out and was through the opening. Unconcerned about the noise, Bek turned towards the soldiers and held up a restraining hand. ‘Wait!’ he said in low tones, and then he entered.
The soldiers knew their orders. Bek would enter first and they would only follow when he gave the order or ten minutes after, whichever came first. One soldier turned over an hourglass bearing markings, red lines drawn to indicate demarcations of ten minutes. Erik’s hand-picked men hunkered down before the entrance, along the edge of the pool, listening to the sound of the waterfall in the darkness.
Bek moved cautiously, ignoring his lack of sight. He stepped lightly as he progressed, not putting his full weight down until he knew he wasn’t stepping into a pit, or triggering some sort of trap. He knew he could take a lot of damage – he’d been wounded several times in his short life – but he had no more appetite for injury than the next man. Besides, if what Nakor said was true, there should be some fun ahead.
Thinking of the little man caused Bek to pause a moment. Bek didn’t like him; but then again Bek didn’t like anyone; he didn’t dislike anyone either. His feelings towards other people were fairly predictable: they were either allies or opponents – or they were inconsequential, like a horse or some other animal, sometimes useful, but mostly not worth the attention. But the little man stirred some strange feelings in Bek, feelings he couldn’t put a name to. He didn’t know if it was familiarity, or enjoyment or what. His pleasures tended to the intense: watching men bleed and scream, or rough coupling with women. He knew he liked fighting. The crashing of steel, the clamour of voices, blood and … death. He liked watching things die, he had decided some time before. It fascinated him to see that one moment an animal or a man might be alive, aware, moving, and the next it was lying there, just so much meat. Not even useful meat if it was a man.
Bek expected to kill some very dangerous men, and looked forward to it.
A faint sound from ahead caused him to forget Nakor and his confusion over things the odd gambler said all the time. Someone was moving at the far end of a tunnel and Bek’s entire body quivered with anticipation.
He was supposed to go back, but he had lost track of time – how long was ten minutes, anyway? The other soldiers would come in after him, and besides, Bek was anxious to be about some slaughter. It had been a very long time since he’d enjoyed a good fight. Nakor had done something to him, and often his head hurt when he tried to think about things. But Nakor had said it was all right for him to kill anyone who was hiding up in this old keep, except for more of the old soldier’s fighters who might be coming in from the other side.
Ralan Bek found his head swimming, so with a grunt he shoved aside all thoughts except finding the author of the noise he had
