CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN

‘What did you do that for?’ said Gibor.

His voice started quiet but crept up into a booming resonance of anger and shock. ‘You have put us into incredible danger.’

‘I know,’ said Trinket.

‘Why? You must know that the Empire soldiers have special protection, and that killing them is treated as an act of war?’

‘So now you are in danger which means you have to change course. The option of appeasement has been taken away.’

‘I could hand you to the Emperor, as the villain.’

‘You aren’t going to do that,’ Trinket purred through a twitching mouth.

‘Of course I’m not going to do that,’ Gibor growled. ‘I hope you have killed the soldier with a plan going forward. My men are already mutinous and if I don’t present them with a solid plan I am afraid they will rebel against me.’

‘I have a plan,’ said Trinket.

Gibor looked from Trinket to Jane, as though she might have something to add.

Jane shrugged, and said, ‘I don’t know what is happening.’

Gibor said, ‘Let us all go into the chancery and talk. There is no immediate reason for the Empire soldiers to come looking for their fallen comrade, so we have some time to discuss this plan.’

‘Okay,’ said Trinket. ‘But just you and me.’ Trinket whipped a hand out in Jane’s direction. ‘For your protection, Jane, it is best that you do not know the plan?’

‘How does this protect me?’

‘If you get captured you can’t be compelled to tell the details of a plan you don’t know.’

‘That protects the plan … it doesn’t protect me.’

Trinket raised her shoulders and eyed Jane with suspicion. Then she nodded and said to Gibor, ‘Let’s go.’

Up the stone stairs from where the Empire soldier lay with blood still trickling from his throat, was an iron door through which Trinket and Gibor disappeared, leaving Jane alone with the dead soldier. There was a mineral smell, and a dank biological smell.

A rat came nosing down the stairs and sniffed its way up to the soldier. The rat tiptoed around the soldier until it came to the large pool of blood where it stopped and sniffed, then dipped its nose in for a drink.

Jane sat on the bottom step, which was hard and cold, like blue, under her bottom. The stone vault that soared overhead was filled with troubling echoes, like whispers. Then thunder crashed and the storm exploded. Rain smashed against the roof with a deafening sound.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

After a long wait the door above opened and Gibor came out, followed by Trinket. Gibor pounded down the stairs past the fallen soldier, and Trinket followed, her body moving like fluid.

‘Follow,’ said Trinket to Jane.

The length of the corridor was filled with the roar of the rain. Hurrying behind Trinket, Jane wondered how difficult it would be to ride a horse in this weather, if indeed it was still part of Trinket’s plan to take two horses to intercept the ship.

As the group approached the door into the dining room, Trinket unslung the bow she had taken from the armoury and strung an arrow.

‘There will only be two,’ said Gibor quietly as Trinket came alongside.

‘I have two arrows,’ said Trinket.

Gibor leaned on the door that fed into the great dining room, pushed it open and stood aside for Trinket to pounce through, the bow up, her eye behind an arrow, and the arrow flying.

Through the door Jane could see a soldier with his eyes just turned to the door. She watched an arrow splash into his right temple. She watched his eyes widen and his mouth fall open.

With the whip speed of a cat Trinket strung a second arrow, and this arrow flew toward the second soldier who was turning with a sword in his hands. The arrow punctured his shoulder, and he cried out and immediately rose to his feet.

Trinket’s quiver was empty, so no more arrows.

The first soldier crumpled to the floor, and Jane could tell by the glassy look in his eyes that he wasn’t going to get up again.

With one huge arm, Gibor shoved Trinket aside. He strode past the first soldier and approached the second soldier with the arrow in his shoulder. Although the soldier was obviously in pain, he was still in the fight. He held a heavy sword in his right hand. He dragged the sword into a slashing arc, aiming to get Gibor in the neck.

The soldier’s face was a distorted elongated grimace of exertion and fear. The sword was starting low and coming up, with momentum in the swing, momentum that took it in a direction that couldn’t be changed in any sudden way.

Gibor lowered his body, and threw his head back so that the blade that should have struck the top of his shoulder before sweeping into his throat whistled an inch past his nose.

The sword was heavy with momentum and it yanked the soldier off balance. He let go of the sword and it flew through the air and slammed, metal on stone, into the corner.

The soldier stumbled. Gibor threw himself at the soldier and both of them fell. The soldier bellowed in a voice that alternated between a guttural roar and a shrill cry.

Suddenly the soldier went silent.

Gibor had an elbow pressed across the soldier’s windpipe.

A look of utter panic in the soldier's eyes slowly subsided into a marble nothingness.

Everything became silent. The men surrounding the dining table were watching with shock - the death of an Empire soldier representing the summoning of peril.

The men at the far end of the table murmured to each other, but the men closest to Gibor remained silent.

Gibor turned to the table and a flash of lightning threw shadows across his face. The landscape of scars flashed white like distant ridges catching the last light of a sunset.

‘We have gone past a point where we cannot return,’ Gibor said.

This was met with more murmuring. There was something dangerous in the tone of the men. Something mutinous.

‘Now we must fight,’ said Gibor quietly.

The grumbling grew louder. Gibor was losing his men. He looked to his left where Trinket stared back with her green eyes narrow and hungry for action. Jane had weary eyes and a downturned mouth.

A hint of a smile creased Gibor’s lips and pushed up a fat scar that wriggled down his cheeks. He turned back to his men.

One of the men, an old battle scarred warrior, rose. A flare of lightning ran demonic shadows over his old warrior’s face. He put a fist in the air and Jane heard the words, ‘Gibor is weak …’

Only a drum roll of thunder smothered the remainder of his sentence.

When the thunder rolled away it was Gibor’s voice that roared over the men.

‘It is time to fight … Elion is back in Paris.’