Ticastasy grabbed his arm and pointed towards the illuminated windows of the governor’s palace, rising up in the fog’s gloom like candles. Thealos had the uncanny feeling that the structure was watching them. The smell of garbage wafted up to his nose, reminding him of the sour flavors in Sol.
His gaze followed the line of her arm and he saw it—a park to the north of the manor house. It was only a few streets over.
Two of the quaere hustled with them down the chipped and broken steps and into a tiny courtyard ringed with two-story buildings. In the shadows of one of the buildings they waited for the other Wolfsmen to arrive.
Xenon bounded down the steps and glanced at them all. He grasped the pommel of his weapon, apparently thinking his orders to the quaeres and then motioned for the two of them to follow him. One of the quaeres remained behind in the courtyard.
It was strange being in the streets of Landmoor again. As they hurried down the main street, Thealos watched two cats furrowing in one of the cross alleys and glance up at them, their eyes glowing like a Shae’s.
Xenon fell back and grasped Ticastasy’s shoulder when they reached the first intersection of streets. “Which way?”
She motioned to the left and pointed to the governor’s palace looming before them.
Nervousness burned inside Thealos. This was too easy.
They took the left-side street and traveled along in the shadows before cutting deeper into the city. The unlit houses had the feeling of a graveyard. Or was it simply the potency of the warding?
“There it is,” Stasy whispered.
Down a side alley stood a spiked iron gate set in a stone embrasure. Gardens and trees filled the courtyard beyond, awash in the fog. A stone footpath went from the gate into the depths, flanked by lush lawns and hedges. The chill of a shudder went down his spine. Was she leading them to a trap? He wanted to trust her, to believe that the Sorian did not have a hold on her. He patted the pouch of stones at his waist.
The manor house itself was an entrance into the tunnels. But it would be the most heavily guarded position in the city. The gardens behind it was a safer choice.
Xenon motioned for the gate and the first quaere stormed it, bounding up and over it without it groaning or rattling. The four of them stood tensed, hands on their blade hilts, staring into the fog-shrouded park on their side.
Thealos touched the cold iron bar, wondering if he was making a mistake. No prompting from the wellspring. No whisper in his ear from Jaerod. He glanced at Xenon, nodded once, and then climbed up the ironwork and jumped down the other side.
The others joined and together they entered the park full of its turret-like redwoods. Ticastasy gripped his elbow, her face strained with anxiety. She guided them through the park to a small stone well in the center.
Crickets chirped suddenly, startling him.
He approached the mouth of the well and stared into its depths, seeing not a glimmer of water but a chain descending down to a passageway beneath. She was right after all.
Xenon circled his hand and pointed to the well shaft. The other quaere members started down, using the chain as a rope to descend into the gloom of the tunnels.
A silvery wind blew through the grove of trees and tickled Thealos. The Wolfsmen down in the tunnel below disappeared, two going one way, two going the other. Xenon planted one hand on the rim of the well, seeming to watch through their eyes, his hand never losing touch with the pommel of his leaf-blade.
“The girl next,” Xenon said when it happened.
The well crank started turning, bringing a circular wheel of stone up from the floor of the shaft, spinning slowly to cut off the Wolfsmen from below. The crank turned by itself, looping the chain around its shaft.
Xenon threw himself against the handle to stop it, but it shoved him back, twisting and grinding as the flooring of the well rose up the well’s throat.
Blackness deepened within the park, a presence as ancient as the world. A reddish light shone through the dark, its color like blood.
The Sorian known as Mage stood illuminated in its garish light.
“Thank you, my dear, for leading them here.”
Four Crimson Wolfsmen blades rang from their scabbards.
Chapter XXVII
The smells from the bread ovens struck Exeres with a raving hunger as soldiers shoved him down the hall past the kitchens. He glanced into the cook area and saw one of the bakers bringing out two loaves on a single paddle. A little butter teased with garlic—it was enough to drive someone mad just thinking about it.
The lead soldier, a lanky man with spiky sideburns, opened the doorway leading down and waved the group through.
The smells from the cells below overpowered the pleasant kitchen aromas and Exeres’ stomach soured. Another stay in the dungeons—this time as a prisoner instead of a healer. What a mess his life had become since leaving the Isherwood.
Mage stood at the bottom of steps, partly concealed by the shadows cast by wavering wall torches.
The lanky soldier stopped in his tracks. “Sir?”