The Jaguar Knights Read online

  Long ago they had agreed to rotate the leadership, just to ease the appalling tedium, and this was Fell’s month to wear the sash. Mandeville was off patrolling the rest of the fortress. No one could remember a winter so bleak, even on Whinmoor. Sheep had been freezing to death on the hills and cottagers in their beds. Even Celeste, who normally flaunted a king’s ransom of jewels on large areas of bare skin, was muffled to the eyebrows.

  She was chatting with Sir Alden, Dupend’s knight banneret, the one genuine warrior in the castle, a boiled-leather veteran of the Wylderland campaigns. He took his duties seriously. Even in that weather he posted sentries on the battlements, but they would certainly have headed indoors to find a brazier as soon as his back was turned, so Fell had warned Mandeville to be especially vigilant and make doubly sure the gates were locked and barred. Nowadays it seemed insane to raise a drawbridge and drop a portcullis, but they did so every night without fail; that was the one thing on which Baron Dupend and his wife’s Blades agreed.

  As the remains of the mock boar were being carried out to feed the kitchen staff, Lynx drew Ratter and deftly detached a slice of pork. He chewed happily, unnoticed by the Baron, provoking sly grins from the servants. The harpist was coughing his lungs out, up there in his smoke cloud.

  Sir Mandeville came running in by the pantry door, yelling, “To arms! The castle is under attack!”

  The drunks howled jeers and catcalls. Lynx hurled the meat in the fire and wiped grease from his hands, while exchanging shocked glances with Fell. Blades did not make jokes about danger to their wards! The deaf old Baron was yelling hysterically, wanting to know what all the commotion was about.

  Mandeville arrived at the fireplace, panting. “Men coming in the gates,” he said. “They’ve killed Dogget and Treb.”

  Then the hounds sprang up, growling. Thunder, the leader, started her terrible baying and charged out the door Mandeville had left open, vanishing with the rest of the pack on her tail. Men who would not believe a Blade would trust a dog, and in the sudden silence everyone heard what they had heard, a drum beating. Sir Alden had a voice like a harbor seal—not beautiful, but audible for miles—and he began roaring at everyone to start stripping weapons from the wall displays. In moments crashes of crockery announced that the tables were being tipped up and dragged over to the corner he had designated for the redoubt.

  Lynx and Mandeville waited for Fell to issue orders. Normally a Blade guard prepared plans to deal with any conceivable emergency, but an armed invasion of Quondam was unthinkable. Even a lifelong worrywart like Wolf would not take that idea seriously. The keep was the Great Tower, but it was not provisioned for siege, so they would freeze to death in there before dawn, and to reach it, they would have to cross the bailey, which the enemy already held. Fell had no choice—although the hall had four entrances and was therefore not truly defensible, the Blades must remain there with the others and defend their ward as best they could.

  “The corner!” Fell shouted. Lynx and Mandeville grabbed their ward’s arm and rushed her, almost carried her, across to Alden’s makeshift fortress.

  Other women might have screamed, but Celeste was a tough gosling. Her only protest was a calm “Put me down, you bullocks! I’m perfectly capable of walking.”

  Now servants were pouring in from the buttery, yelling about raiders. The main door flew wide and intruders appeared en masse, bringing an icy gale with them. Half the rushlights blew out and the smoke billowed worse than ever. At first Lynx did not believe what he was seeing. Apparently Quondam was being assaulted by the grand parade from one of those masquerade balls King Athelgar fancied. The newcomers wore bizarre headdresses and swirling cloaks, some had elaborate masks, and some bore strange basket structures on their shoulders. Others were close to naked. Their eyes glinted in the rushlight, but their faces did not show up well enough for them to be fair-skinned Baels.

  And he saw no glint of metal, neither weapons nor armor. He relaxed, convinced that this was some absurd joke. Then he remembered the dogs. What had happened to the hounds? With even some of the women armed, they were about fifty defenders facing at least six times that number.

  Drums boomed out a signal and the enemy charged. Lynx drew Ratter and barely had time to raise her in mocking salute before the nightmare army was pouring over the barricade. About six of the illusions came straight for him.

  Next thing he knew, he was down on the floor in a jumble of bodies and shattered furniture. His head rang carillons of pain and when he touched it, his hand came away bloody. He was lying on the corpse of a hefty, dark-skinned youngster wearing a loincloth and sandals. This was madness. It was colder than death out there!

  Even in that hubbub, he could hear his ward’s screams. She needed him. Fell was shouting his name, too. He struggled to his feet and headed in their direction, stumbling over the confusion of dead and wounded. The invaders were leaving by the same door they had come in, carrying their wounded, abandoning their dead. Fell was hobbling after them, carrying Widowmaker in his right hand. His left arm hung limp and he was a southpaw, almost useless that way. Beside him went one of the farmers, a solid yokel armed with sword and shield. Lynx managed a wobbly sprint and the three of them were almost together when they reached the hearth and caught up with the rearmost invader.

  He had to be important because he was screeching incomprehensible orders in a discordant, inhuman voice. He loomed so grotesquely tall, at least seven feet, that he must be on stilts, and his streaming cloak swirled in iridescence—an impressive masquerade costume, but not warrior garb by any stretch of the mind. His head was hidden inside a bizarre furry helmet and Lynx saw no indication of a weapon under the cloak.

  Somehow the giant sensed the threat behind him, for he spun around only just too late to avoid a wild haymaker overarm stroke by Fell. Widowmaker slammed down on his right shoulder. Had Fell been fighting southpaw he would have slashed the freak’s head off, helmet and all, slick as cutting berries. As it was, he almost severed the man’s arm. The giant yowled in rage, struck the farmer’s matching stroke aside with his left hand, and kicked the man like a mule, sending him sprawling. Then Lynx was there, thrusting Ratter into his heart.

  That’s what he meant to do. He underestimated his opponent. Despite his size, that tree-high monstrosity was so incredibly nimble that he dodged Lynx’s thrust at zero range. Ratter sliced along his chest and tangled briefly in his cloak. His left hand smashed down on Lynx’s arm.

  Lynx registered the clang of his sword hitting the flags and stooped to snatch her up. His fingers refused to obey him. He stared in bewilderment at his forearm, which had been macerated into raspberry puree and slivers of bone. The lower half hung at right angles, as if he had grown a new wrist. One blow had done that?

  So Fell and the raider and he were all one-handed. Fell was now behind the giant, though, and this time he slashed at kidney level, cutting through the cloak. Blood burst out. The giant should have dropped to the floor and died, but he didn’t. He rounded on Fell with a massive, deadly blow to the face. He was wearing gloves armed with knives, and one blow did to Fell’s face what he had done to Lynx’s arm.

  The farmer closed again, with even less success. He was game, but he was nothing compared to the Blade-killing monster. The thing parried the man’s sword aside like a straw and kicked again, but this time up, under the older man’s shield. Its boots were toothed, too. The farmer screamed. The thing finished him off with another punch.

  By then Lynx had retrieved Ratter. He was not quite as inept with his offside hand as Fell was, and this time he made certain of the freak with a cut on its good shoulder, severing the tendons it needed to raise that arm. One-arm was now no-arms.

  “That fixed you, swine!” he roared.

  No. It was spilling blood in rivers, but it leaped on Lynx, crunching his shoulder in its jaws. He heard bones crack as they hit the floor together, with the invader on top. Lynx tried to grab the thing’s throat to choke it, but he had only on
e useful hand. The monster had no usable hands anymore, but it had knives on its feet, and it proceeded to rip Lynx apart with those.

  8

  Hogwood said, “Do you, Lynx, warrant that what you dictated to Candidate Tancred is the truth as you know it?”

  “Wait!” Wolf barked. “He’s not himself.” Naked savages in midwinter, superhuman warriors, unknown conjurations, insurrection for unknown purposes?

  Lynx tried to laugh and grimaced in agony. “I know it sounds mad, Wolfie, but the others will back me up.”

  “It agrees with Grand Master’s report,” the inquisitor snapped.

  Small wonder the Council was confused and the King so worried! When the Thencaster Rebellion exploded, Athelgar had followed age-old tradition and fled to the safety of Grandon Bastion. The Bastion would be no haven if conjury could now take even a major fortress like Quondam so easily.

  Wolf parried and riposted. “Pray note, Inquisitor, that the bite marks on my brother’s shoulder were made by jaws larger than those of any hound I ever saw. The King speculated that he might have been injured while fighting for the wrong team, so for the record, Lynx, did you fight to prevent the abduction of the Baroness?”

  “I did.”

  Had there been a fleabite of hesitation there?

  “You were wounded by the invaders?”

  “I was.”

  “While fighting alongside the Baron’s men, the defenders?”

  “Yes.”

  If dear King Athelgar had been hoping Wolf would have to arrest his own brother and charge him with murder, he would be disappointed. Relieved, he turned to Hogwood. “Is the witness telling the truth?”

  She regarded Lynx glassily. “He has not lied yet. Pray do not interrupt while I am questioning the witness, Sir Wolf. Sir Lynx, you describe the intruders as dark-skinned. Black or dark brown skin is found in southern lands, where the sun is closer to the earth. Were these such men, or had they dyed themselves to be less visible at night?”

  Lynx tried to shrug and winced again. “I don’t know. They seemed about the color of ripe chestnuts, but the light was very poor.”

  “Describe the helmet your assailant was wearing.”

  This time his pause was longer. “I’m not sure now that it was a helmet. A sort of spotted mask covering his whole head…but it bit me…” He peered down at his ravaged shoulder.

  “You described the Baroness as wearing ‘rags and jewels.’ What did you mean by that?”

  “What I said,” Lynx retorted grumpily. “She had no decent clothes and if she hadn’t worn her jewelry all the time, it would have been stolen.”

  “By whom?”

  “The Baron.”

  “Who is her current lover?”

  “Mind your own business.” Lynx set his teeth. For all his amiability, he could be stubborn as moorland granite.

  But so could an inquisitor, and this one was very eager to prove her competence in an investigation of historic importance. “You are required by law to answer my question. Did she have a lover?”

  “Baroness Celeste is my ward and I will not—”

  “Wait!” Wolf was willing to keep Hogwood on a slack rein, but browbeating his invalid brother went too far. “Lynx, we’re trying to find her. You want her found, don’t you? We need your help. The only reason to kidnap Celeste is to free her from captivity and only a lover would care enough to risk this. Were you or Fell or Mandeville swiving Celeste?” Seeing another refusal coming, he tried to forestall it. “Specifically—within the last year, did you or Fell or Mandeville have carnal relations with Baroness Celeste?”

  Lynx glowered. “No. None of us.”

  “She had no lovers?”

  “If by lovers you mean admirers, then everyone who pees standing up. If you mean who slept with her, then nobody.”

  Knowing Celeste, Wolf found this statement as incredible as the assault itself. He sighed and returned the witness to Hogwood.

  “The Baron is a very old man,” she prompted.

  “And smelly.” Lynx bared his teeth. “Celeste would not have him in her chamber. She slept alone and we stood guard outside the door. Dupend loathes her. He has grandsons older than she is and she will inherit everything he has left, through dower rights. He wanted nothing more in the world than to catch her with a man so he could divorce her and spit in the King’s eye. That would be dangerous for her, and we made certain no other man got near her!” Anger had raised pink roses on his ashen pallor. His voice was as taut as a bowstring. “To the best of my knowledge, Celeste has balled no man or boy since the day she left Greymere. I don’t pretend she enjoyed chastity, but we weren’t bound to keep her happy, only safe, so we saw to it.”

  “Not easy?”

  Lynx conceded, “Like herding wasps!” with a shamefaced grin.

  Hogwood took off after another scent. She was literally steaming, standing there before the fire. “So you have no idea who might have plotted to rescue Celeste from her captivity?”

  “Not like that,” Lynx muttered.

  Flames! Wolf bit back another interruption. He was growing very uneasy.

  She pounced. “Like what?”

  “Not killing and violence.”

  “Who was plotting to free her, and how?”

  “Me.” Lynx spoke unhappily to his own toes. “Us. Least, we’d talked some about it. We worried about her sanity. Lately she’d taken to weeping and moaning for days on end. She’d stand on the high battlements, staring down at the surf, brooding. We stayed very close to her when she did that. We searched her room every day for knives or rope. That sort of thing.”

  “She was always a wonderful actress,” Wolf said, earning another brotherly glare.

  “A few months after Baroness Dupend was sent to Quondam,” Hogwood said, “she bore a child.”

  “Athelgar’s, not Dupend’s!” Lynx shouted. “Everyone knew that.”

  “It died within a few days?”

  “Everyone celebrated! The Baron celebrated. Celeste was the only one who mourned.”

  “Did you not mourn it?”

  That was an unfair question, but Lynx answered before Wolf could object.

  “No. No, we celebrated, too, thinking she might be released then, that the King might let her go and live somewhere better.” He stared down at his thick, scarred arms on the cover. “Even her Blades!”

  “If the death of her child did not make her suicidal, then why this sudden concern for her sanity now?”

  “How much cruelty can a woman take? Four years in jail? Four years of that awful climate? Four years of that awful husband? No ladies-in-waiting for company, no lady’s maids to dress her hair? All her gowns—remember, Wolf, she had three wagons with her when she left Grandon? All that stuff disappeared. She wore her jewels all day long and probably in bed, too, for all I knew. Everything else got pilfered—clothes, silverware, even furniture. All gone.”

  “What did the Baron do about that?”

  “He was behind it. He stole whatever he could and sold it. It was part of the deal, I think.”

  “What deal?”

  Lynx sighed. “We thought Athelgar threw in her jewels when he gave her to Dupend. Dupend seemed to think he had a right to them.”

  That was reasonable, because if Athelgar felt an unwanted mistress was his to dispose of as he pleased, he would not scruple to deal off the finery he had given her.

  The snoop said, “So what were you Blades planning?”

  “We talked,” Lynx said grumpily, “just talked, about one of us riding into Lomouth to pawn a bracelet or something and hire a ship. Then the other two would bring her. We hadn’t gotten very far.”

  And never would have, if the Baron had sent his men after them. But he might just have shouted, “Good riddance!” Wolf made a mental note to ask Hogwood about dower rights.

  “So,” she said, “her Blades were plotting rescue but had not taken action?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And you know of n
o other plots?”

  “None.”

  “Could the Baron have faked this attack himself?”

  Lynx snorted. “Never.”

  This had gone far enough. “Can’t my brother be allowed to rest now? It would seem that he has cleared himself of any complicity in this affair.”

  “Not necessarily.” Hogwood continued to stare snakily at her victim. “Sir Lynx, have you deceived me or tried to deceive me in any way, by omission or equivocation, misdirection or evasion?”

  That catchall invitation to self-incrimination was a hoary inquisitorial trick, repeatedly denounced by the courts and repeatedly resurrected. Fortunately Lynx was aware of it. “I refuse to answer that.”

  Intrepid walked in, ending the interrogation. If Wolf was not satisfied with Lynx’s story, he could not expect Hogwood to be.

  9

  The statements you wanted, Dolores,” Master of Rituals proclaimed breezily, handing her a sheaf of paper. “Also some evidence for your, um, weapons expert. Sir Alden brought this along when he ferried over the wounded.”

  Intrepid enjoyed annoying people, especially people with any trace of authority. He handed Wolf a club as long as a man’s arm, carved from some dark wood. It was not too heavy to swing with one hand, although the leather-bound grip had space for two. The shaft was an intricate tangle of fanciful birds, beasts, and vegetation, flaring out like a paddle at the working end, which was inset with teeth of black stone. Three of the original four had broken off, no doubt when that part acquired its ominous bloodstains.

  “It impresses me more as a work of art than a weapon,” Wolf said, “but it could obviously damage people.” He tried it for size against the wounds on Lynx’s scalp. “I’ve never seen its like. Have you any idea where it came from?”

  “No,” Intrepid said, “but Grand Master thought he did. We did not have time to discuss it before he left for Quondam.”

  “No metal? Black stone, sharp as razors.”