CHAPTER TWELVE

They passed back through the treasure room, Gunther and his remaining men collecting more gold and gems as they went, and from there out into the pits.

They would have run at that point. Alaric certainly wanted to and he was sure the others felt the same. The urge to abandon all reason and flee full-speed for the entranceway and the calm, rational world outside was almost overwhelming. Fortunately cooler heads prevailed. One guard started to bolt once they’d climbed from the pits but Gunther and Hammlich caught him before he could take a single step.

“Don’t be a fool,” Hammlich hissed. “The floor is trapped, remember?” The guard froze, eyes wide. “Now,” the scout said, “follow me.”

He retraced the route Thorgrek had plotted exactly, an impressive feat, but stopped halfway across, staring at something atop one of the latticeworks. Alaric looked as well and saw a mummified cat. It had not been there earlier. As he watched, it turned glowing eyes towards them and uttered a series of sharp meows, the sounds strangely like words.

“Kill it!” Therese said behind him, gasping. Her efforts in the crypt had exhausted her. “Quickly!”

One of the guards obediently raised his crossbow but the creature had leapt across the grille work and was upon him before he could pull the trigger. The man screamed, the cloth-wrapped feline’s jagged claws having sliced open his face, but the screams turned to shrieks as the wounds burst into flames. The others backed away as the man fell to the ground, convulsing, and half-rolled, half-jerked off the path, the lattice snapping open to drop him into the nearest pit. After a moment he stopped moving. The cat, meanwhile, sat daintily in front of them and began licking its claws with a desiccated tongue.

“Now what do we do?” Gunther demanded, raising his hand to stop another guard from trying the same tactic. Most of the others looked equally confused but Alaric glanced at Dietz, who grinned.

“You need to be the right size,” he said. Then he whistled. Alaric bit back a laugh as he saw some of the guards start at the small, furry head that popped up out of his friend’s jacket. Apparently some of them hadn’t noticed Glouste until now.

He’d never been sure just how smart the tree-fox was but fortunately this situation didn’t require any explanation. Glouste glanced around, spotted the strange mummy-cat, and hissed. The cat hissed back, spine arching, tail pointing straight up. Then the tree-fox leapt from Dietz’s jacket to the ground and the fight was on.

Glouste was hampered slightly by a chain she had clutched in her mouth, but the cat’s bandages hampered it in turn, and of the two, the tree-fox proved to be the faster. They exchanged blows, claws raking fur and wraps respectively. Then Glouste ducked beneath an attack and, faster than Alaric could follow, somehow wrapped herself around her undead foe. All four paws fastened securely, claws deep in the bandages across the cat’s chest and then Glouste gave a fierce tug and the cat was torn open, what was left of its innards spilling out onto the walkway. Two of the guards and Therese were sick over the side, but the cat slumped, the glow in its eyes fading away. Glouste preened for a moment before returning to Dietz’s shoulder and he scratched it affectionately.

“Shall we?” Alaric asked Hammlich, who had been staring with some admiration at the tree-fox. His words made the scout start but the little man nodded and continued along his path. The others trailed him across the room, doing their best to ignore the feline remains off to one side, and to the antechamber beyond. Alaric was wondering how they would escape the small room, since the chute they had used ended well above their heads and was far too slick to climb, but Gunther had obviously thought of that. He nodded to Hammlich, who fired an arrow up the shaft. A moment later a rope appeared.

“Smart,” Alaric admitted. The lieutenant had left one or more of his men up above for just such an eventuality.

“I plan ahead,” Gunther replied, and something about the way he said it made Alaric uneasy. There wasn’t much he could do about it now, so he followed Hammlich up the rope with Dietz right behind him.

It was a relief to see the sky again, and Alaric allowed himself to breathe deeply as one of the guards gave him a hand out. He sprawled to one side of the tunnel entrance, staring up at the night sky, thankful their journey through the amazing, awful tomb was finally over.

They numbered eleven and all but the guards who had pulled them up were wounded to some degree. Therese had suffered a minor scratch from one of the statues and Dietz had taken a grazing blow to the temple from a skeletal guard. Alaric had a few small cuts and scrapes from the various encounters, and Gunther and Hammlich looked to be in the same shape. Woldred had a cut to one arm and was limping from a blow to the leg and Goran’s left arm was all but useless. Both of the guards who had been below had taken blows from skeletons and statues, and were bruised and bloodied. They were all a mess, but they had survived.

Gunther and his men had all the treasure they had taken from the treasure room, and Alaric had the gauntlet. He wasn’t sure why he’d taken it, but he had a feeling it was important.

Everyone was out, and Gunther was speaking to the two guards who had remained above. Alaric turned to say something to Therese, who was sitting up next to him, sipping from a water skin Woldred had handed her. As he watched she jerked, the skin falling from her hands, her eyes grown wide as she stared down at the crossbow bolt blossoming from her chest.

“No!” Alaric reached for her and caught her as she fell, her blood drenching his hands where the bolt emerged from her back. Even as he held her, the mage’s eyes glazed and dimmed, and her face slackened. Her body shuddered one last time and went limp. Alaric stared down at her. He hadn’t known Therese long but he had liked the quiet woman with her sparkling eyes and shy, lovely smile. For her to die now, after surviving the horrors of the tomb, was more than he could stand.

He turned to Gunther, to demand an explanation, just in time to see the lieutenant draw a long knife and slash Woldred’s throat from behind.

“Damn you!” Alaric shouted, dropping Therese’s body and scrambling to his feet, his hand reaching for his rapier. He had lost the bronze hook-sword somewhere in the tomb. The lieutenant just laughed as he and his men arrayed themselves against Alaric, Dietz, and Goran.

“Did you really think I would let you live?” Gunther asked quietly, his sword raised as he approached Alaric, “After you knew the way in, and to the treasure room? I can’t risk your coming back here to take what’s left, or telling anyone else about it. I’m sorry.” He didn’t sound very apologetic but he didn’t seem to be enjoying the betrayal either. Alaric suspected that it wasn’t personal.

That didn’t make it any easier for him, Dietz, and Goran. The big fighter, enraged at Woldred and Therese’s murders, smashed one of the guards aside with his shield, despite his own injuries. He swung his sword at another, blocking the guard’s own blow and bringing his blade back around to stab the man through the stomach. Then he stabbed downwards, his blade driving deep into the chest of the guard he’d knocked aside. Hammlich slid up behind the big man and stabbed Goran in the side while his sword was still caught in the guard’s torso. Goran dropped to his knees, trying to retrieve his blade and defend himself even as the life drained from his body. Then he collapsed and did not move again.

Gunther advanced on Alaric and made the first move, lunging forwards, his longsword sweeping across to carve Alaric’s chest open. He blocked the blow and took a step back, giving himself more space to manoeuvre, and parried the next blow before assaying a strike of his own. The tip of his blade licked past Gunther’s defence and caught him on the cheek, leaving a line of blood there.

“We would have left,” Alaric said quietly, trying to force back the rage building within him. The lieutenant was a good enough warrior for him to need a cool head to beat him. “We would have stayed away.”

“I couldn’t take that risk,” Gunther replied, trying another attack. This time he pulled a long knife from his belt and used it to block Alaric’s sword, stabbing with his own at Alaric’s head. Alaric managed to twist and avoid the blow, but he left his side open as a result. Gunther did not miss the opening and stabbed him in the gut with his knife, sending a spike of pain through Alaric’s stomach and leaving him weak in the legs.

Alaric caught a brief glimpse of Dietz as he went down, his friend fending off one of the remaining guards while Glouste clawed at the face of the other. Then he was on his knees, peering up as Gunther raised his blade for the killing blow.

A shot rang out.

Gunther looked down in surprise, and Alaric stared up, both of them fixated on the gaping hole that had suddenly appeared in the lieutenant’s chest. Gunther managed to turn before he fell, staring at the face of his attacker.

It was Hammlich.

The scout stood there, pistol still smoking, his face utterly blank of emotion. Alaric idly wondered where he had found the firearm, and then realised it had been Gunther’s own. His assistant must have taken it from him at some point during their flight.

Dietz had clubbed his opponent with his plundered mace and stood a few feet from Hammlich, staring at the gun. Alaric knew his friend was wondering if he could reach the scout before he could reload or draw a new weapon.

“Don’t,” Hammlich warned, stepping back a few paces. He dropped the pistol and crouched, and when he stood again he had a shortbow in his hands, an arrow already nocked. It was his own bow, Alaric realised, he’d seen it on Hammlich back when Levrellian’s troops had first arrived, what seemed like ages ago now. The scout must have left it here when they entered the tomb, and now he was armed again, and could shoot one or both of them before they could get close enough to harm him.

“Kick that over here,” Hammlich said, jerking his chin towards something in front of Alaric. With a start he realised it was the gauntlet, lying on the sand where he must have dropped it. Alaric did as he was told, nudging it with his foot, and Hammlich nodded.

“I’m taking this,” he said, taking a step forwards and kicking the gauntlet behind him a few paces. Then he backed up so it was in front of him again. It was a smart move, Alaric thought. Even if they rushed Hammlich he might still have time to grab the gauntlet, stand, and fire at least one arrow. “I leave, you live, everyone’s happy.”

Dietz glanced pointedly at Gunther’s body, and the scout laughed.

“Fine, everyone left is happy,” he corrected. He looked at both of them. “Agreed?”

Alaric nodded. There was little else he could do. With the wound to his stomach he couldn’t even stand, let alone fight, and he could see that Dietz knew it.

They both watched as the scout reached down, grabbed the gauntlet, and stuffed it in the sack at his side with the rest of the treasure he’d taken. Then Hammlich was backing up, his bow still sighted on them. The scout scooped up the other three sacks where Gunther and the two guards had dropped them, slinging each one over his shoulder in turn. Once that was done he continued backing up to the valley’s far wall. He reached the path Alaric and Dietz had taken to get down into the valley and started up it. After a few paces he turned, un-nocked his arrow, shouldered his bow, and ran. Within minutes Hammlich had vanished over the rise.

Dietz had run over to Alaric the minute Hammlich had started his escape. The older man sank to his own knees, helping Alaric lay back on the cool sand. “How bad?” he asked, his fingers already gently probing the wound.

“Bad,” Alaric admitted. He was feeling light-headed and alternately burning hot and freezing cold. Dietz offered him a water skin and he drank a little, even though it hurt to swallow.

“We’ll get you patched up,” Dietz assured him. “I’ll bandage this and then we’ll get out of here. We’ll go slowly.”

He was reaching for his backpack and the meagre supplies there when a voice stopped him.

“Slow is good,” it said. “So lift your hands, real slow, and keep ’em there.”

Alaric looked up. A man stood nearby. Apparently he had come over the cliff while they were watching Hammlich. He was short and stocky, with sandy, greying hair, but what Alaric noticed most was the crossbow aimed at him, and the short sword pointed at Dietz.

“Nasty wound,” the man said, glancing down at Alaric. “Good thing the price on your head is the same dead or alive.”