Mickey Zucker Reichert Read online

  The number of killings sounded high, the robberies low, and Nightfall doubted he had assaulted anyone without finishing the deed. Yet, otherwise, the charges seemed appropriate. He continued the conversation to keep the guards watching his face so they would not notice the missing fetters. "That’s impossible. I’ve never been to Alyndar in my life. You’re mistaking me for someone else . . . . "

  The blond exchanged his key for another, working on the last lock. He snorted. "First time I ever heard that defense. How about you, Rylinat?"

  Rylinat laughed merrily, as if his companion had actually said something funny.

  "Ready?" The blond hooked the key clip over his belt.

  Rylinat nodded. Sheathing his sword, he back-stepped, leaving room for the door. It swung open with a squeal of rusted hinges, and the two guards scissored toward Nightfall, alert to his every movement. "It’ll go easier if you cooperate.” A slight quaver in the smaller guard’s voice revealed apprehension. Apparently, the legends had affected even him. "Come here."

  Nightfall remained in the shadows, pleased that the guards’ discomfort kept them focused on his face and arms. He kept his features slack, trying to appear innocent and scared. Hesitantly, feigning the awkward shuffle of shackles, he edged toward the guards.

  Rylinat caught Nightfall’s right arm, the companion his left. Nightfall kept his fingers laced together to prevent the guards from pulling his unmanacled hands apart. Docilely, he allowed them to lead him, in small steps, from the cage and into a dark tunnel of hallway.

  Nightfall’s mind kicked into memory, retracing his route to the cage. To the right, the long corridor led to a moss-slicked stairway which spiraled upward to a wooden door. Once through it, he would be free. Only one other barrier stood in his way, a gate that spanned from hallway floor to ceiling like a cold, steel web. His gaze strayed to the key clip at the guard’s belt, the answer to the door locks.

  Rylinat traced Nightfall’s attention. Too late, the thief realized his mistake. The guard’s stare slid past his companion’s waist to the floor and the shackles missing from Nightfall’s ankles. He opened his mouth to speak.

  Instantly, Nightfall jerked, trebling his weight.

  The blond stumbled. Thrown askew, Rylinat loosed a startled cry in place of the warning he had planned. He scrambled for balance, losing his hold on Nightfall’s arm, nails raking his prisoner’s naked shoulder. The sword on his left hip bumped Nightfall’s thigh.

  Nightfall seized Rylinat’s hilt. He drew, twisting for momentum. As the blade rattled free, he spun, slashing open the blonds’ neck.

  Impact quivered through Nightfall’s hands and flung the blond guard to the floor. Blood splashed Nightfall’s cheek. He whirled back to Rylinat, whipping the blade in a blind strike at the place the guard had stood.

  Rylinat leapt back, pawing at his empty sheath, the sword nicking his tunic and sending the links into a rattling dance. "Here!" he screamed. "Nightfall’s free!”

  Shouts of encouragement rose from scraggly prisoners in the other cages.

  Nightfall swore, knowing the noise would draw the attention of any sentry who had not already responded to Rylinat’s shout. He let the sword sag, leaving space for the unarmed guard to retreat.He’s already alerted the others. Speed is more important than silencing him now.

  But Rylinat rushed Nightfall, apparently trusting his superior size and training, unable to know Nightfall now weighed as much as a boulder.

  As the guard bore down on him, Nightfall sprang backward, flicking up the sword.

  Too late, Rylinat tried to swerve. His own momentum carried him onto the sword, impaling him to the hilt. He crashed into Nightfall, meeting resistance as solid as the granite wall. Shock crossed his features. Then his mouth gaped open, emitting agonized screams. He slid to the floor, smearing blood across Nightfall’s torso.

  Nightfall cursed his own incompetence. Now that he had killed the guards, escape was no longer a matter of timing; it had become instant necessity. And Rylinat’s shrieks had turned a difficult evasion into an impossible one. Ignoring the writhing guard, Nightfall shifted his attention to the motionless blond. Grabbing the keys and the boot knife, he dodged around Rylinat and ran for the exit.

  Rylinat’s screams dropped to sobbing moans, revealing `the echoing slap of running footsteps and the pleading promises of convicts begging freedom. Nightfall measured the confusion released criminals might cause against the time it would take to free them and found the need for haste more driving. In the same situation, he knew Dyfrin would have loosed every one, expecting no reward, though he would receive it. One might assist him in a barroom brawl. Another might later supply information he needed for a heist. Still another would warn him when an enemy threatened his life or well-being.

  Dropping his weight to normal, Nightfall continued his sprint down the hallway. Prisoners called to him from the cells, marking his passage. Ahead, the guards’ footfalls rang louder, mixed with shouted commands. Nightfall whisked around a corner, probing the keys for the one that felt most correct from his momentary assessment of the lock.

  The gateway flashed into sight. Six guards aimed loaded crossbows between the bars, three kneeling and the others standing. More guards in mail and Alyndarian uniforms huddled behind the bowmen.

  Nightfall skidded to a stop.

  "There he is!" one shouted. An overeager crossbowman released. The quarrel sailed toward Nightfall who sprang aside. Its point struck the wall. The shaft shattered, plunging a splinter deep into Nightfall’s arm.

  "Fire!"

  Nightfall hurled himself to the floor, tucked and rolling. The bolts rained around him, just beyond accurate range. Retreating as he floundered to his feet, he darted off the way he had come.

  Vulgarities chased him down the hallway. A sword struck the metal wall, the sound ringing deafeningly down the corridor.

  Nightfall ran, weaving through puddled shadows, skirting the semicircles of torchlight. He kept his run sinuous, avoiding jerky movements that might attract attention, hoping to become lost to sight in the pervading darkness. Never having gone in this direction, he had no idea what to expect or where to go, so he trusted his instincts to lead him toward an exit. Behind him, the sound of the opening gate jostled and creaked through the hallway. Ahead, boot falls hammered the granite, accompanied by a chorus of clinking chain links.

  Mercifully, the prisoners seemed to have lost track of him, their shouts muddled into a wild chaos that no longer gave away his location. Directly before his own cell, Nightfall stepped over Rylinat’s now still form, reassessing his strategy in the moments before the guard contingents sandwiched him. To remain in place was folly. Enraged by his escape and their companions’ deaths, Alyndar’s prison guards would surely beat him to oblivion or beyond. Yet to run in either direction meant colliding with a rushing herd of sentries. From the noises, he guessed the guards from the unexplored direction would reach him well before the other group. Already, he could see the leader’s mail reflecting a beam of sunlight from a slit in the roof.

  Nightfall seized the bars to his cage. Rust bit his fingers, flaking into his palms. He lowered his head, dropping his weight as low as possible, and scrambled like a squirrel to the top. He took a deep breath that jabbed the rib into his lung with enough force to make him dizzy with pain. He clung, not daring to exhale.

  Within seconds, fifteen guardsmen dashed beneath him. Their four ranks swept the corridor from side to side leaving no space for an escaping convict to slip past. The ones in the lead jerked to an abrupt halt before the body of the blond, and the others pulled up as suddenly. One in the back veered, stumbling to his knees. "What the hell?"

  ` "Holy Father," one of the leaders said.

  Spots filled Nightfall’s vision. His lungs ached.

  Another guard crept forward, checking first Rylinat, then his companion. "They’re dead." His tone went ugly, though welling tears softened the curse. “The ruthless bastard. I’ll rip him apart with my own hands."<
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  Nightfall’s lungs gasped spasmodically for fresh breath. He fought the urge for an explosive exhalation, letting spent air trickle silently between his lips.

  Several guards glanced into the empty cell, but not a single one looked up.

  "There’s nothing we can do here," another guard said. “We’ve got to keep moving or he’ll get away.” Skirting the corpses reverently, they continued down the hallway.

  Nightfall waited only until they passed, then slithered down the bars and dropped lightly to the ground. Gasping in a quiet breath, he ran in the direction from which the guards had come. Behind him, he heard the shouted exchange as the two contingents met.

  "Where is he?"

  "He’s not this way!"

  "Well, he’s certainly not that way!"

  "You idiots!"

  The footfalls resumed behind him, growing louder as they spun back in his direction. They paused briefly as the new group found the corpses, gaining Nightfall several paces of lead.

  The hallway branched into winding byways. Nightfall chose his course at random, guessing he ran toward the palace, yet finding no place to reverse direction. The pursuit grew more sparse as the guards broke into groups, but still they followed him consistently, never losing distance, yet never gaining.

  The run taxed Nightfall. Deep breaths shot agony through his chest so he reverted to rapid, shallow patterns that lapsed into a doglike pant. The pain radiated into a nearly crippling side cramp.

  Nightfall massaged the ache as he ran. Suddenly, the left wall fell away, revealing the black mouth of a stairwell. The guards had hauled him down steps to enter the dungeon, so it seemed only natural to ascend. Whipping around the corner, he started up the steps.

  Nightfall’s toes met slime-covered granite, interrupted by the passage of metal and leather. Encouraged by obvious signs of use, he sprinted upward, probing each slippery step briefly before trusting his weight upon it. From behind, the sounds of pursuit continued, the guards’ boots slamming solidly on each stair.

  On entering, Nightfall had been too busy trying to catch each of the guards’ words and intentions to count steps. Now, the stairway seemed endless, and he wondered whether to blame the sensation on a poor choice of direction or his own impatient desperation. Just as he considered turning and trying to sneak past the guards, he came to a landing and a twisting hallway. He ran on, the sentries closing the gap behind him.

  Shortly, he came upon another gloomy funnel of steps. Now committed, he took the stairs two at a time. Within a dozen paces, he came to a dead end, discovering the bottom of a trap door above him. Two keyholes admitted light in parallel bands.

  Damn. Nightfall studied the locks, separating the correct keys by touch. He had no way of Knowing where he would find himself once through the trapdoor, presumably in some well-traveled chamber of King Rikard’s castle. Below him, the clink of armor grew louder. He flicked the first key into the lock and spun, then inserted the second.

  "He’s up there! I hear him." A voice floated up the stairway, closer than Nightfall expected. He could hear winded inhalations beneath his own and counted at least six sentries.

  Nightfall cursed his gasping breaths and the injured rib that made them necessary. Exchanging the keys for the dagger, he slammed his shoulder against the trapdoor, prepared for a fight.

  The panel swung open. Chilled air washed over Nightfall, startling him. Outside. How? Catching the sides of the opening, he hauled himself through, studying his surroundings. The moss-stained wall of Alyndar’s castle rose beyond him, and a nearby pair of sentries whirled, alerted by the sound of the swinging door. To his left and right, a stone ledge adorned with gargoyles jutted to the height of his waist. The sun beamed through a cloudless expanse of sky.

  As Nightfall swung to the pathway, a hand enwrapped his ankle. Thrown off—balance, he staggered, twisting. The gash from the shackles reopened, slicking his skin with blood. The fingers slipped off, but their tug sent Nightfall crashing to the ground.

  The sentries near the castle ran toward him. From the trapdoor, a grim face appeared.

  Nightfall rolled, scrambled to his feet, and leapt to one of the low walls. Behind him, guards sprang through the trapdoor opening. Ahead lay a vast void of air. Nightfall grabbed a gargoyle’s head for support. Far below, easily three times the length of Raven’s main mast, the leaf-covered tops of oaks and hickories waved in the breeze. Not outside! We’re on the parapets! Realizing his mistake, Nightfall whirled.

  The guards advanced with the same predatory look as Raven’s crew, clutching swords and crossbows. "Get him," one shouted.

  Cornered and prepared to fight, Nightfall brandished his knife, dropping his center of gravity. Several guards charged. Nightfall dodged. His ankle cracked against a gargoyle. Stone gave beneath his foot, pitching him backward. For an instant, he seemed to hover in midair. Then he plummeted from the parapets.

  Nightfall screamed. Wind sliced through his loincloth, spinning him like flotsam beneath errant waves. Desperation scattered his wits. Helplessly, he clawed air. Within seconds, tree branches scratched his face and hands. Limbs shattered, knocking him sideways. Then, logic returned. He channeled all thought in one direction, driving his weight downward until his loincloth became heavier than his body.

  Air resistance slowed Nightfall’s descent. Branches brushed aside harmlessly, and he floated toward the forest floor little faster than the leaves his fall had dislodged. He hit the ground, breath driven from his lungs, staring through intertwined branches at a distant line of loaded crossbows.

  Nightfall lay still, his consciousness wavering, aware any sudden movement would hurl him into blackness. Despite his dangerous occupation and his gift of weight shifting, he possessed a normal man’s fear of heights. Never before had he tested his talent so abruptly nor relied upon it so completely. Have to run. Gotta get out of here quickly.

  Something struck the ground near his head. Painfully, methodically, he swiveled his neck toward it, staring down the shaft of a bolt to its purple and silver feathers.

  "Don’t move, Nightfall." A red-haired commander spoke. He knelt on the ledge of the parapet, a crossbow leveled at Nightfall’s head. "I don’t know what demon blessed you. I don’t know how you survived that fall, and I don’t want to know. The king wants you questioned. He’ll take your wicked, ugly, disgusting, murdering soul, I’m going to see that his will is done. But if you so much as quiver if you give me the slightest excuse, I’ll shoot you dead and revel in it."

  Though he had landed relatively lightly, Nightfall felt bruised all over. A double stab of pain told him he had broken another rib, and his back ached badly enough to warn of a possibly serious injury. Vertigo gripped him. Closing his eyes, he surrendered to oblivion.

  Chapter 2

  Eyes darker than the midnight shade,

  Teeth sharper than the headsman’s blade.

  When he smiles, a cold wind blows-

  Darkness comes where Nightfall goes.

  —"The Legend of Nightfall"

  Nursery rhyme, st. 2

  Prince Edward Nargol wove through the garden pathways of Alyndar’s courtyard, too preoccupied to notice the buds of the first spring flowers poking through the dirt or the ever-present steward who chased him, huffing in his wake. Slavery. The evil inspired by the thought sent a shiver through him. His chest clenched in sympathy for the men and women forced to toil for moldy scraps unfit for hounds, driven to work beneath the broiling summer sun or shivering as frigid winds cut beneath their ragged clothing. Owned like animals. Beaten and cowed like wild asses broken to plow. No one deserves that. The last plot disappeared behind Edward’s ground—eating stride. He kept to the trail, headed for the main gate and its hovering, attentive retinue of guardsmen.

  "My lord, wait. Please." The steward pleaded, his voice a wheeze.

  Edward paused, giving the steward sufficient time to draw to his side. "Elfrit, it’s not necessary to follow me everywhere I go."

  T
he slighter man stopped half a pace behind his prince. Sweat trickled from his gray-flecked, brown hair. "It’s my job, lord."

  "Not for long, if you kill yourself doing it." Edward smiled. Elfrit had endured as prince’s steward for four months, longer than any other attendant since Edward had turned thirteen. "Here, I’ll give you the day free."

  Elfrit adjusted his tabard, his breathing falling to a less painful-sounding pant. "And I thank you for your generosity. But, with all respect due, lord, I work for your father, not you.”

  The prince laughed. "I hardly think my father would object to my giving my own steward some time to himself."

  Elfrit’s cheek twitched as he suppressed an exclamation that Edward would never hear. He avoided the prince’s stare, hunched and concentrating on each slowing gasp.

  Impatiently, Prince Edward smoothed his red satin shirt and tugged his patterned breeks into a more comfortable position. "Well?”

  Elfrit straightened, his breaths normalizing. Pulling a handkerchief from his pocket, he wiped his brow, leaving spirals of hair plastered to his forehead. "Where are we going, lord?"

  Resigned to Elfrit’s presence, Edward resumed his walk. "Out to do the king’s bidding?

  “And that is, lord‘?" Elfrit broke into a trot so as not to fall behind again.

  The gate loomed closer. The six guardsmen before it snapped to attention as the prince approached. On the wall above, the other two sentries crossed their halberds.

  “To do something constructive outside his court, of course." Edward waved the guardsmen to an “at ease" position, "Open the gate."

  Elfrit groaned almost inaudibly.

  The nearest sentries seized the iron portals, pulling them open. A third crossed his wrists in a gesture of respect. "Prince Ned, we will escort you." He inclined his head toward the guardsman directly across from him who imitated the deferential motion.

  "That won’t be necessary? Edward stepped past them and through the gates before the panels came fully open, Elfrit bundling after him.