Surrender to the Will of the Night - By Glen Cook Page 0,238

Unless they flood them. They could always do that.”

Hecht kept after them but could not get no more sense out of either. He said, “First chance we get we need to let Princess Helspeth know what happened so she can be ready when the news gets to Alten Weinberg.”

Heris and Februaren both groaned and glared.

Lila said, “I can do that.”

“No. You can’t,” Hecht told her. “You’ve taken enough risks.”

The Ninth Unknown said, “I’ll do it. In the morning. I’ll need tokens from you and the Empress to be convincing, though.”

“I’ll write you a letter. That should do. She’ll recognize my hand.”

43. Alten Weinberg: Bad News, Bad News

A short man in dirty brown stepped out of the shadows in the Princess Apparent’s private bedchamber. She had just risen. Her women shrieked and fled.

“You.”

“Me. I have news. Listen closely. It’s critical. You’ll only get to hear it once before the guards arrive.” He told her what had happened to Katrin. He handed her a letter from Piper Hecht, now her Commander of the Righteous. He vanished seconds before Algres Drear burst in.

“He’s gone, Captain.”

“Who?”

“A sorcerer. The same one who took Ferris Renfrow. He brought a message. Get these people out and close the door. With you on this side of it.” That done, she said, “Katrin is dead. She fell into the Teragi and drowned. There were twenty witnesses, half of them her own lifeguards. There’s more to the story, I’m sure. The sorcerer brought a letter from the Commander of the Righteous. I haven’t read it yet. Right now, this very minute, I want you to start getting ready for whatever happens when that news gets back here.”

“You believe this sorcerer?”

“I do.” She gripped the letter from the Commander tightly, already willing Drear to leave so she could read.

“Then you’re right. I’d better get started. And stop talking. It won’t be long before someone or something moves in to spy.”

“Yes.”

Helspeth held on barely long enough to let Drear get out of the room. Then, in her haste to get to read it she fumbled the letter twice. And a moment after that she spit like an angry cat to get her women to leave her alone long enough to find out what the Commander had to say.

44. Great Sky Fortress: Heris’s Game

Operations in Brothe turned anticlimactic. First came word that Pinkus Ghort, literally outside the gates and getting set to storm them while, at the same time, preparing to tame the Grand Duke, had, suddenly and inexplicably, ordered the levies to go home and his own men to stand down. He did not disarm but said he would not fight unless he was attacked.

Meantime, the Righteous captured Krois. And did not profit after making history. Never in its twelve hundred years had that island fortress been taken.

“They’re gone!” Vircondelet complained. “We went over every inch of the place. They’re just plain not there.”

Some staff remained, people who were, in essence, part of the physical plant. People whose families had been part of Krois for centuries. They reported that Serenity and his associates had slipped away during the night, aboard three boats. They had fled to a ship waiting downriver. The servants did not know where that ship was headed.

Hecht cursed softly. Doneto’s boats would have sailed right past the Castella. Brotherhood sentries would have seen them. Would have ignored them. All night traffic on the Teragi was ignored.

* * *

Heris and the Ninth Unknown got into some sort of squabble. They did not explain. Hecht thought the old man wanted to go find ships and sink them while Heris wanted to get on with her own project in the realm of legend, myth, and devil gods.

Heris said, “Piper, I need all those eggs you collected after you killed those Instrumentalities.”

“Why?”

“Instrumentalities have two souls. One they bring into the world with them and one they leave hidden in the Night. The eggs are their middle-world souls. If an egg and a hidden soul got together your success could be undone.”

“How about the thing in the catacombs?” The egg from that had not been collected.

“Double Great is sure it’s still down there, under the rubble.”

“I don’t know how much good I can do, Heris. I never kept those eggs myself. Rhuk and Prosek collected them. They sealed them up in metal boxes but I don’t know what they did with them after that.”

“Find out. I’ll make arrangements to collect and transport them.”

“What’re you going to do with them?”

“Get rid of them.”

But she had