[11] The Mountains Played Catch

Jay, Makepeace, Sansaime, and Olliebollen Pandelirium exited the forest.

Mountains rose before them, craggy, barren. Slabs of rock and gravel, a few leafless trees jutting from crevices. A sky grown bleak. Rain soon, Sansaime spat between clenched teeth while they rested at the base of the zigzag path that led up the foremost slope to the monastery.

The monastery. Atop the sheer summit, as though an organic outgrowth of the mountain, a wall of gray brick culminated in a pair of structures, one short and one tall, both with peaked roofs and Christian crosses. Backdropped by the stormy skies it hardly seemed real, in some ways more fantastical than even the most absurd sights of Flanz-le-Flore's forest, a Disney castle, where a wicked witch boiled her brew of frogs and apples. No sign of life stirring, but a sense that someone somewhere watched.

As they dined on supplies despite Olliebollen's protest that her magic made eating unneeded, Makepeace leaned back on a rock and stretched his arms as though yawning. "See that, my good man?"

"I see the monastery."

"Not that. Over there—Look."

Makepeace pointed at a smaller peak, more like a foothill, not far from them. Atop it, the giant white cross visible from the Door. It really was about fifty feet tall.

"Seen that before too."

"Not the cross itself. At the base."

At first it looked like part of the mountaintop, a gray mound of stony outcroppings, but Jay scrutinized and it became clear that curled around the base of the cross was the body of what could only be described as a dragon, with hard ridges for scales, wings fallen flat against its body, and eyes sealed shut. Even after seeing it, Jay couldn't tell if it was a real dragon or an artistic facsimile carved out of stone.

"That, my good man," said Makepeace, "is the dread lizard Devereux."

"Dead lizard Devereux more like," said Sansaime, unsmilingly, as she focused all energy on her pipe.

"Slain by none other than my forebear, John Coke. Now Devereux—"

"Devereux used to rule over these mountains!" Olliebollen poked her head out of Jay's pocket. "He acquired an unfathomably gigantic treasure horde by making the people of Whitecrosse and the faeries of Flanz-le-Flore pay fealty to him. Or else he'd burn them all with his fiery breath! But the hero John Coke worked with Queen Flanz-le-Flore to trick and then defeat him in a huge battle. Afterward John Coke ordered the construction of the monastery and the cross. As a token of gratitude, Flanz-le-Flore allowed him to also build the road through her forest."

She spoke quickly and shrilly, making sure Makepeace didn't interject. When she finished Makepeace finally got a word edgewise: "I'd have told the tale with a touch more grandeur."

"It'd be bones if it died four hundred years ago," said Jay.

"Not even worms would feast on the corpse of a dragon," said Makepeace. Which made no sense. Jay looked to Olliebollen for a more accurate explanation but Olliebollen only beamed proudly in wake of her successfully-delivered exposition.

By the time Jay decided it didn't matter Sansaime dashed the ashes out of her pipe and tucked it into her cloak, motioning the others to rise. "Best we finished before dark or rain, whichever's first."

With a huff Makepeace climbed upright and started on the road toward the monastery. Jay followed. Thanks to Olliebollen's magic no trace of the previous battle remained, inside or out. Only one fight left in these waning moments of the second day: the monastery Perfidia and all her witting and unwitting minions hyped up since he set foot in this world. Here he was, despite his best efforts, dogging the heels of others to assist them in their goals, tempted to it by the promise of some Staff of Lazarus that felt more and more unreal, something that couldn't really exist, something that everyone was collectively lying to him about because they all wanted him at the monastery and didn't know how else to make him go there. The idea of reviving Pluxie, Lalum, or Flanz-le-Flore felt impossible, undoable, although on a rational level he understood this self-erected roadblock to be a byproduct of something akin to guilt, something he'd be better off ignoring altogether. He needed only to remember his goals. Nothing more.

Nothing more. Thinking it made it real again, both the staff and his goals, and that fleeting flicker of guilt transformed into pride. Why not? Pluxie, Lalum, Flanz-le-Flore—those were challenges he overcame. They were necessary sacrifices on his road to becoming what they kept calling him, a hero. They were the conquered.

"As for our plan once we get inside," Makepeace said, "I believe our best course of action—"

"I make the plan," said Jay.

Makepeace and Sansaime glanced back at him; Sansaime quickly returned her gaze to the front, while Makepeace kept looking. "What was that, my good man? Believe I didn't quite catch it."

"I make the plan. Not you."

An affable smile. A good-natured shake of the head. Condescension. "That's a fine enough sentiment, my man, but—"

"I'm the hero. I'm the one who beat the archbishop's women and I'm the one who beat Flanz-le-Flore." He remembered the brittle feeling of her fingers snapping in his grasp and shoved his hands into his pockets. "You two were knocked out or tied up or dropped down a pit each time. Sometimes you even got in the way. So I'm in charge now."

Makepeace's smile dwindled. Jay thought, yeah, that's right. That's right asshole. Jay was onto him, it took some time because Jay underestimated him but he knew now, Makepeace wanted to use Jay the same way Flanz-le-Flore and the archbishop did. Faux friendliness, reverse psychology, telling him wistful stories about a dream to roam the world as a knight errant, all simply strings that sought to make Jay dance one way or another. No more. Jay was in charge now. Anyone who wanted to help him was welcome to, but they were going to answer to him.

"What's your plan then, hm," Sansaime said. "Of all of us, even the faerie I figure, only I know what the monastery looks like on the inside."

"It'll be dangerous," said Makepeace. "The archbishop has at least thirty more twisted women waiting for us. Sansy certainly knows a side gate somewhere or a weak patch of wall we can sneak through to give them a great big surprise. Let her take the lead."

Jay shook his head. "The archbishop has foresight."

"He does?" Sansaime looked at Makepeace.

"Jay, how do you know that?" Makepeace's eye fell on the pocket that contained Olliebollen.

He knew because the twins told him. A long time ago, in the cemetery. Charisma mentioned it casually, offhand, and at the time Jay placed zero importance on the detail. Now, in sudden clarity of mind, Jay remembered it.

"Well, only limited foresight anyway," Makepeace said. "Quite limited. Not as though he's omniscient."

Limited was right. Limited by Perfidia. She wanted Jay to fight someone right away, so she told Astrophicus he was coming. But only a day before Jay actually showed up—because Perfidia herself only knew that far ahead of time. If the archbishop needed the hero so badly, why'd he only send the twins to the Door? Because it was more than a day's trek on foot. Only the twins, who could fly, were quick enough to make it in time.

So how come, with an extra day of preparation and even less distance to cover, he only sent Pluxie and Lalum to reinforce the twins in the forest?

He tapped his pocket to make Olliebollen surface. "Question for you."

"Really?!"

"When we fought the fairies in Flanz-le-Flore's court, none used magic except Flanz-le-Flore herself. Why?"

"Easy! There's two reasons. First, faeries aren't a bloodthirsty and wicked race like humans or especially elves, so very few of them have magic that's for fighting. Most faeries have powers that help flowers bloom or birds sing prettily or turtles flip over after they fall on their backs or—"

"And the archbishop's women, who eat fairies to use magic, are the same, aren't they," said Jay. "Of the four we've fought so far, only half of them used magic at all."

"Wait, I didn't get to say the second reason—"

"So it's like this. The archbishop has known we're coming the whole time. If he has thirty of these nuns at his disposal, why has he only sent four to stop us?"

A rhetorical pause. Nobody answered within two seconds, so he answered himself:

"Because most of those nuns aren't any good at fighting. They're poor orphans turned into monsters with magic powers that don't matter even if they can use them. Maybe there are some more like the twins who have sharp claws or teeth, but it's nothing I need to worry about as long as I have my healer."

Huffing now from the steep climb, Jay's speech came more fragmented than he wanted, punctuated by ragged exhalations. As a group, they rounded the last zigzag and the ground evened out. There was the monastery, no longer above, only straight ahead. Upon a distant peak lightning flashed; the roar of thunder split the silence seconds later. Precarious barely began to describe the monastery. It seemed if a single boulder stirred the entire structure would collapse.

"You don't need to be good at fighting to set a trap," said Sansaime, as they stopped to regard the endpoint of their journey. "Front gate's the best place to set one."

But she said without certainty, because she knew what Jay knew. "If the archbishop has foresight it doesn't matter which way we go in." And the front gate was on relatively solid ground. Jay didn't want to imagine what treacherous path of jagged rocks suspended above a thousand-foot fall led to the "side gate."

Besides, Sansaime was Jay's enemy here as much as the archbishop. That's right, Sansy. Don't think Jay forgot. She wanted the Staff of Lazarus too and she had the advantage of knowing the monastery's layout. Jay needed to throw her off her plan as much as possible, keep her close, not give her the chance to slip away and get a head start.

So without another word, Jay took the lead toward the front gate. Two tall and arched wooden doors rose before him, fortified by metal strips that ran horizontal to bind the long planks into a cohesive whole. Lightning flashed again and the monastery in a single instant became a black surface exuding a bright halo of light; the instant passed, the thunder rumbled. Jay cupped a hand around his pocket and pushed Olliebollen's head down with his thumb. If they sprung a trap, he needed to ensure it didn't catch her too.

One push and the giant doors creaked open on half-rusted hinges. No lock. But then again, the archbishop wanted him to come here anyway. Jay readied his bat in case something lunged but nothing was there and the doors opened onto a courtyard of dead grass. A cobblestone path split to lead to the monastery's two buildings: One, a chapel, and the other—larger—a building-block mass of geometric shapes arranged around a central cylindrical tower. If Jay needed to guess, he'd guess the staff (and Princess Mayfair) were in the room at the top of that tower, where a single small window set deep in the bricks exuded an orange glow crisscrossed by decorative bars. The most dramatic and easily-defended location.

Lightning once more. As the thunder subsided the sound of a solemn hymn emerged from the chapel. Its doors opened; two rows of figures exited in meticulous procession, their darkened figures rendered a semblance of uniform by hoods and habits. Under their clothing, though, they possessed all varieties of warped and animalistic elements: claws, extra limbs, scuttling legs, long snouts, ragged fur. They sang, brusque but concordant:

How wondrous is

The prescience of the divine Heart

That foreknew every creature!

For when God gazed

Into the face of Humanity whom He formed,

He beheld all His works,

In that same human-form, entire.

How wondrous is the informing breath

That awoke mankind in this way!

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A single figure led the procession, stopping at the fork where the path split, and the two rows behind her stopped as well. Lightning; for an instant their faces lit up, and the foremost one had the face of an insect, green and triangular with bulbous eyes. Out of the habit sleeves emerged two scythe-like arms, pressed in the form of prayer. A mantis. As far as Jay could tell in the brief flash, the rest of her body was humanoid.

"Well now, leader?" Makepeace gave Jay a good-natured nudge Jay would've returned with a glare if he was willing to look away from the nuns. "What's the plan? Shall we ready for battle?"

"If they intended to fight they'd try a different approach." Although Jay wasn't sure what to expect. The neat orderliness in which they came seemed incompatible with a trap, but the lack of seeming subterfuge only made Jay suspect subterfuge the more.

It started to rain. A drizzle—for now.

The mantis woman stepped forward. She retained the same meticulous pace until she stopped fifteen feet away, distant enough that nobody could suspect her of aggression. No cages around her waist, no sign she recently devoured a fairy.

"Welcome." Her voice high-pitched, but otherwise human, despite the sound emerging from twitching mandibles. "At long last you have reached the Monastery of King John. Archbishop Astrophicus has anticipated your arrival. I am Theovora. I shall act as the archbishop's voice."

"He doesn't want to talk to us himself?" said Jay.

"He does. Please follow me."

Theovora bowed her head and, maintaining her prayerful stance, walked down the path to the main building of the monastery. The other women remained where they stood.

Jay shook his head as raindrops pattered his hat and shoulders. "I don't care what the archbishop has to say. Why don't you tell us where the princess is. And the relic."

Theovora stopped and turned where she stood, or rather rotated her body to face them, because her legs seemed capable of moving only with rigid forward steps.

"Princess Mayfair and the Staff of Lazarus are where you expect: the main tower. The archbishop is on the way."

That was all the explanation she deigned to give. She rotated back and continued walking as robotically as she spoke.

Jay shifted his gaze between Theovora and the two rows of women still standing in the same place. He almost glanced over his shoulder to exchange a glance with Makepeace, something he understood the instant he stopped himself as a need for approval. Unnecessary. Worse than unnecessary, and he felt Makepeace's gaze on the nape of his neck as though Makepeace was waiting with a broad grin for Jay to give him that glance and relinquish his newfound authority. A paranoid thought seized Jay that Makepeace was only humoring him, letting him pretend to be the hero, that this was part of his plan. His manipulation. Somehow. Jay trashed those thoughts, every time he had them it only ceded his own agency.

It wasn't like Jay planned to stand outside in the rain all night anyway. Without another moment of contemplation he set off after Theovora. The other two followed.

By the time Theovora opened the doors of the main building, Jay and his party were only a few feet behind. The two rows of women started marching again, slow as before, following, and Jay told himself that if this was a trap it was a particularly stupid one, that if they wanted to fight they should've just fought already. Theovora led them inside. Jay came out of the rain taking off his hat and flicking the loose beads off it; he looked up and stopped because in the tall, octagonal, dome-topped chamber before him was a giant plant.

Its roots, which drilled into the elaborate tiled flooring, coalesced into seven and then three and then one columnar stalk that—almost unnatural in its greenness, a tropical green, lighter than lime—curved and angled until it erupted into a huge pink flower that butted against the ceiling. It lacked soil, lacked even light other than whatever filtered through the stained-glass scenes of Christ performing various miracles that covered each wall of the chamber; walking on water, water into wine, resurrection of Lazarus, resurrection of himself. Altogether it looked like a cheap Photoshop, a copy-paste of a plant from some Amazonian rainforest into the ruminative, ceremonious interior of a medieval cathedral. Beside the roots, one scowling and one sobbing, were the twins, who at this point Jay wasn't surprised to see, given slinking away alive seemed to be the only thing they were good at. They said nothing and made no attempt at movement and by this point proved no threat whatsoever even if they did intend to attack. Currently attack seemed unlikely. Although their ability to display only one emotion apiece made them surprisingly unreadable.

Theovora's shoes clacked along the tile until she reached the plant and rotated to face the party. Jay stopped when she did, as did the two rows of nuns, some of them still in the intensifying rain which set a constant tattoo across the roof.

"Please," said Theovora, "pay your respects to Archbishop Astrophicus."

Jay's eyes traveled from one end of the room to the other. Nobody present except them and the monster nuns.

He pressed his hand over his eyes, clenched tight the bridge of his nose, and expelled a balloon-deflating amount of air.

"Don't tell me he's the fucking plant."

Nobody said anything.

"Don't tell me this whole time you've been coming after me because of a fucking plant."

"Astro... ficus," Olliebollen whispered.

Jay strode forward, holding his arms out, letting his baseball bat dangle by the knob between two fingers, gazing skyward at the dome over the archbishop's big flowery head, drawn onto which were starry constellations that Jay's limited astronomical knowhow could only guess belonged to which world. "This is the stupidest thing yet you know," he said to that fake sky, the fake "Master" maybe watching beyond it, "this is the stupidest thing yet and two hours ago I was a rat. Are you even trying? What is it? Writer's block? You've resorted to ad libs?"

If Perfidia heard, she gave no sign. Dark stars, untwinkling, matched his gaze and that was all; the stained glass Jesuses turned phantasmic white for a split second, outlines enveloping utter lacks of color, and that was all. The thunder groaned. The rain pattered.

"Whatever." He let his arms fall. "I'm taking the princess and the staff now. You nuns go home. It's a plant. You're getting yourselves killed over a plant."

"Please wait, hero," said Theovora. "The archbishop wishes to speak to you."

Husks. Husks, husks, husks. Jay started walking again, eyes set on the doorway behind the "archbishop," where a stairway curved upward. He stopped only when one of the giant plant's roots detached from the ground and burrowed into the back of Theovora's mantid head.

Her bulbous eyes went blank. The pupils rolled in random directions, came to transfixion. The rest of her body slumped, supported only by the root, and then the twins who came to her sides to hold her up by each of her scythe-like arms. Her mandibles twitched, a voice emerged:

"Jay... Waringcrane."

"No," said Jay Waringcrane. "No."

"At long last... you arrive. I am... Archbishop Astrophicus... or so they say."

"No."

"Long have I... foretold your arrival... to our Godless world."

Jay turned on his heel. "Fuck it. I'm leaving. It's too stupid."

"What do you mean, leaving?" Makepeace attempted a chuckle but moved forward sternly. "Need I remind you, we're here to rescue Mayfair, my good man."

"It is your body, hero... your soul... that is the only way... to our salvation."

"Rescue Mayfair yourself. Look at this place. Look at these things." Jay's hand indicated Theovora and the twins, indicated the rows of onlookers in the doorway. "They're nothing. There's no threat. I don't care. It's not worth it. Go get your sister yourself and take her back to your castle."

Olliebollen flew out of his pocket and into his face. "Heyeyey wait! Wait just one second hero! You can't go back. We need you. I need you, hero! You can't even open the Door by yourself anyway!"

"That's right." Makepeace's good nature bled dry, his face went pale, he shook his head and moved into Jay's path. "That's right. The Door cannot be opened. You're not leaving this world. Jay. This is simply—impulsiveness—simply an imbalance of your humors, my good man, a momentary lapse in judgment, temporary madness. You're not seriously considering what you're saying."

Was he seriously considering it? The momentary irritation that gripped him weakened. His logical mind thought: Why turn back now? When he was so close? Was the talking plant really worse than what he saw in Flanz-le-Flore's court? Something compounding maybe. He left the forest gritting his teeth darkly, and now Perfidia hit him with this farce... Or was it self-sabotage. The way he had to suppress the urge to look back after he wrested leadership from Makepeace. Something inherently repulsing, like an inverted magnet, about his goals. The Staff of Lazarus was here. He wanted it, didn't he? What else would he want?

"We can... use your soul..." said the Archbishop via Theovora. "We can... use it to craft a key... a key to open the Door... You can go home, hero. You can take us with you..."

"Don't listen to that!" Olliebollen screamed. "Don't listen to that, they can't do that, that's impossible, that Door won't open! It won't! Only the Master can open it! I know. I know for certain!" By the end she was screaming less at Jay and more at the blank face of the mantis.

"Aha! Temporary madness. I wager it's one of these twisted women. Their animus, yes. A nasty power to inflict temporary madness. They seek to lower your judgment, my good man, until you agree to their absurd demand to trade your soul for a key home. Only explanation. Apologies Jay, but I'll have to prevent you from acting under such manipulation. You must rescue my sister—no other solution."

Makepeace kept darting into Jay's path and Jay laughed a single laugh at him. He knew he wouldn't actually leave, especially wouldn't go home. That'd be stupid. Stupider than the plant was stupid. He just—he didn't know what he wanted to do, every option was stupid, an inertia caused by a perfect balance of forces pushing against him from every direction, paralysis, he deactivated like a robot and slumped his shoulders. Was he putting on these dramatics because of Perfidia's braindead creative decisions, or was he conjuring a Perfidia in his own head perpetually?

Besides. If he thought about it, he could think Perfidia even into his potential decision to leave. Flanz-le-Flore and the archbishop both wanted his Humanity. Why would Perfidia make them want that, or even let them know what that was? Because Perfidia's contract prevented her from taking his Humanity, but if he gave it willingly to her husk-like puppets, well—an easy win for her. Nobody wanted him dead, they just wanted him drained. So unless he decided to kill himself after all, he had no choice but to move forward, to keep himself intact, to give her the middle finger.

Not having a choice was what really killed him.

He never should've agreed to come to the monastery, he should've stuck to the castle, he should've forced Perfidia to design a story around his desires instead of following her pre-laid path no matter what treasures she promised. Fine. She tricked him, used Makepeace to play on his emotions and got a victory. Alright, fine, he admitted defeat on this point, but it was only a point.

He cut short his impetuous temper tantrum. He'd see this monastery subplot to the end no matter how loudly she laughed in his face, sure. Then, once he had the staff, it was back to doing what he wanted, when he wanted, a simple "no" to whoever told him otherwise. Can we do that, Jay? Can we follow this rudimentary plan?

Breathing under control, body under control, he sent a dismissive wave at Makepeace as though to say "Whatever" and turned back toward the plant. He wanted to be the protagonist, he told himself. He wanted to conquer this world and make it paradise. He wanted the Staff of Lazarus. They were his wants, not hers, not anyone else's. He led the way.

He remembered the feeling of brittle finger bones snapping and curled his hands into tight fists.

"Please... young hero," said the plant's parasitic host. "It would not only... benefit yourself. It would help... all the people of this world. They are separated from God. None of us feel His warmth. You must allow us... passage to your world, your God-made world. Only there can our souls be made whole..."

"I'm not going back," Jay said.

Olliebollen squealed a sigh of relief and sank back into his pocket. Makepeace tried to play things cool, but gave Jay a too-friendly jostle of the shoulder.

Theovora spoke again in her strained and pause-laden voice, but Jay stopped listening. He looked around, at Olliebollen and Makepeace, at the nuns behind him, and then back at Theovora and the twins. Something was wrong.

A pit formed in his stomach.

Sansaime was gone.

Jay rushed forward. The twins twitched as though they expected him to attack but since they were busy holding Theovora they didn't fully react until he was past them, past the plant, running into the stairwell and stomping up the steps three, four steps at a time. His boots echoed in the drafty spiral upward as he placed a hand on the rough-hewn stone to balance himself on his precarious ascent, only vaguely aware of the metal tromp of Makepeace behind him yelling some affable but semi-concerned exclamation because it apparently took him longer to realize his girlfriend made a run for the money than it took Jay.

Finally the stairs ended and he spilled into a corridor lined by elaborate carved arches onto the pillars of which were sculpted stocky figures reminiscent of the ones that infested the cemetery, these ostensibly with a more religious bent although Jay wasted no time deciphering their parables. At the end of the corridor he saw her, a wisp of her, a greenish cloak flittering around a corner, and propelling himself from his half-crouched position with hands and legs alike he rose into a sprint.

Ten seconds of sheer sprinting and he reached the bend and skidded into it, slowing just enough to hit the wall softly so he could rebound and tear along a stretch spanned by a tapestry upon which John Coke manifested exuding a halo and vanquishing foes that were mostly human but also included the dragon Devereux. The intermittent windows stared out onto the dark and rain-drenched courtyard, and at a slant he saw the tower, the apex of the monastery, ahead. A small staircase, so narrow it seemed impossible to fit through without turning sideways, led from the end of the hall to an unseen above but he heard wood splintering above and metal creaking and finally by the time he reached them a large shattering crack.

"Don't bother Sansaime," Jay shouted, halfway out of breath, as he ascended at a more plodding pace than before. "There's no other way back down from the tower." He realized he didn't know that for sure. He realized Sansaime might be able to rappel out a window, nimble as she was, and abscond with the staff in a way Jay truly couldn't follow. He wheezed, Olliebollen finally made herself useful and spurted dust that eased the ache of his lungs and legs, and with Makepeace rounding behind him sputtering a series of "what's going on?" Jay rushed up the stairs and through the broken door and into a study choked with stacks of tomes and papers.

Choked because many of the stacks had fallen over or were in the process of falling over, cascading in torrents of crinkling parchment, spewing dust undisturbed for decades and blasting Jay with a whiff of decay he turned to cough out. Sansaime was mired in the papers, trudging through them as they rose to her waist as though wading through a river. Her hood fell off exposing a blotched and discolored face, her cheek even gashed open by what Jay could only imagine was a paper cut as another stalagmite of learning came down upon her. Beyond the wreckage, at the end of the cramped room, stood a girl who could not have been older than fourteen.

She was remarkably "pretty," the kind of perfect prettiness of an actress or a painting, a prettiness that matched that of her brother. Short blonde hair and blue eyes, a flawless and intelligently-lined face, but everything else about her a cataclysm of Puritanical modesty, a skin-devouring black dress strewn with ruffles of fabric culminating in a chokingly tight collar that clasped tight to her thin neck. She clutched to her chest a staff, white as bone, with a blue orb at its top—what could only be the Staff of Lazarus.

"Mayfair!" said Makepeace as he waded into the room behind Jay, caring significantly less about what pages he trampled. "Come now, Sansy, back off, there's no point to this is there?"

Jay was of Makepeace's mind, it seemed impossible that anything of relevance could happen here. Sansaime took her shot to sneak off and steal the staff—she blew it. But the faces of the women in front of him made him pause. Utter terror on Princess Mayfair, terror almost hidden within her preternatural prettiness. And Sansaime, digging forward desperate, was streaming tears from her eyes.

Hadn't Sansaime been hiding something else?

"I'm sorry," Sansaime said. "I'm sorry Mack. I am. I hoped you wouldn't have to see it."

"Sansy, what are you saying?"

Nothing happened. Everyone in the room stood suspended in waves of paper. Jay lifted one leg with elephantine slowness and brought it down equally carefully. Makepeace dredged a line in his wake.

The one who spoke next was Princess Mayfair. Her voice was, despite her terrified features, calm. Serene even, a voice in a dream. She said: "Do you not already know, Makepeace? Do you not know what this woman was sent to do?"

Makepeace stopped. His eyes went wide as the words sunk in. A rabid yell escaped him as he plunged forward with a hand extended toward Sansaime.

Sansaime watched him tumble toward her. Her ugly face glistened in the dim brown light of the candelabra above. Lightning flashed, the chamber went white, and when the white subsided her arm was extended toward Mayfair, the gloved hand at the end quivering. In Mayfair's throat, a thrown dagger was embedded.