"Have ye done, ladies?" asked the taller of the sentries.

"Yeah."

"Then let us escort ye both back to your quarters, if we may?"

He made a mocking half bow, echoed by his short companion.

"Thank thee," Krysty replied, locking her fingers together and clubbing the man on the back of the neck, a ferocious, chopping blow that laid him out, instantly unconscious, on the damp stones of the yard.

Lori took a half step in closer to the other sec man, driving her knee into his groin with all her strength. The air exploded from his lungs, followed by most of the contents of his stomach, splattering noisily on the stones. He fell to his knees, mouth open, both hands clutching his genitals. Though he was crippled and out of the action, Krysty knew that it wouldn't be good enough. Half measures meant half failures.

"Put him down," she whispered.

Her own victim lay on his face, arms outstretched. He was breathing slowly but regularly. He could recover any time in the next half hour.

Krysty judged her aim carefully in the dim half-light. If she miscalculated she could cripple herself. She dropped with all her force on her right knee, all her weight striking the unconscious sentry on the exposed neck, snapping it like a dry branch. His body convulsed and he gave a very small cry. And died.

The other guard's mind was tucked away, trying to cope with the sickening pain that paralyzed his legs and stomach. Lori slapped him contemptuously across the face, sending him sliding into the cold dirt. He moaned, and threads of vomit straggled from his pale lips.

"You fuck!" the girl gritted, putting all her seething resentment into the vicious kick to the base of his skull, just below and behind the right ear.

Krysty heard a sound like a large orange being violently squeezed. Soft and wet. The sec man's legs kicked out like a brain-hit rabbit, then he, too, lay still in the swirling mist.

"Walk the road alone." Krysty stopped by the nearer corpse, taking the weapons from the belt.

Lori hadn't finished. She swung her leg back and kicked at the man's head again, the toe of her boot splitting open the skin of his cheek.

"Leave him! He's chilled. Can't feel anymore, Lori. Get his blaster and knife and let's go. Time's sliding."

"Sure," the girl muttered. "Why can't we stopping running some day? I'm tired, Krysty. Real tired, tired, tired."

"We all are. Gaia! This isn't the time or the place for this, Lori. Get his weapons and let's move."

The taller of the dead sec men was carrying a chromium-plated Smith &Wesson .38, which had a rare Wichita winged rib sight assembly on top of the barrel. The man wasn't carrying any kind of knife in his belt. Krysty rolled the dead corpse deeper into the shadows near the rear wall of the yard and straightened up. She could see that Lori had plucked a pair of small pistols from the other body. The light was poor and Krysty wasn't any kind of expert on blasters, but she guessed that the little guns were Beretta .22s. Lori also hefted a long knife. More like a small sword, broad bladed with an ornate brass hilt.

"There." The girl grinned, her blond hair gleaming like spun golden wire, condensation from the drifting fog glistening in the long strands like thousands of tiny diamonds. Now that they'd successfully achieved the first part of the plan, the teenager's good humor had been restored.

The back stairs of the tavern were quiet and deserted. It was late enough for most of the inn's drinking customers to have already gone home to their own beds. And the crew of the Phoenixwould be busy down on the docks, readying the whaler for her voyage. From the kitchens of the Rising Flukes they could hear the melodious voice of one of the serving girls, singing as she finished the evening's washing up.

"Up to the attic," Krysty whispered, waving for Lori to go ahead of her. The pair of sec men had been alone on the top floor, but there were at least three more men, generally lounging around in the taproom or kitchens.

Then someone entered the kitchen through the far door and the singing stopped.

Lori, halfway up the first flight of stairs, hesitated and looked behind her.

"Someone's..."

"Get the others. I'll deal... go on, Lori. Go, now!"

The blonde picked her way up the stairs, vanishing just as the door into the hallway opened. And Jedediah Hernando Rodriguez walked out.

He was wearing the same purple shirt as when they'd first met, jewelry chinking on his hands. The little pistol was in his belt with the pretty stiletto. His limpid brown eyes clicked wide as he saw Krysty standing there alone.

"What art thou?.. Where's the sec men? Thou wilt find trouble if thou dost rock the boat by..."

The big .38 filled the woman's hand, the chrome gleaming in the soft light of the oil lamps lining the wall.

"How did?.. Where?.." His face went white as linen, and for a moment Krysty thought he was going to fall over in a faint. But he recovered, leaning one hand on the closed door to steady himself. The girl began to sing again, a different, older song.

Krysty raised the gun toward the landlord's throat. If she pulled the trigger he'd be blown apart. But the chilling would bring the other sec men rushing in on them.

"A word, and you're dead. Like the two double-stiffs out there." She gestured to the yard.

"What dost thou want, mistress?" Rodriguez whispered, his mouth working like a man stricken with an ague.

"Your toy blaster and the knife." She held out her hand, taking the derringer and slipping it in a pocket of her coat, feeling the cold metal of the dagger's hilt in her left palm. She beckoned the man closer, keeping the blaster under his chin to force his head back.

"Sec men? How many and where?"

"Three in the snug. Sleeping, two of 'em. Two at the front and one by the back gate. But the roads out of the ville swarm with 'em, mistress. Best give up now and take the judgment. Or be cut down as thou runnest."

Krysty nodded. The landlord could taste the scent of excitement on her skin, like a feral musk. The scarlet hair seemed to his terrified eyes to be moving gently around her shoulders, as if it had a life of its own. But that wasn't possible. Her closeness aroused him, and he could feel the tentative beginnings of an erection nudging at his breeches.

"Art thou breaking out? I'll help thee. I can show thee paths out of the ville. Secret. Nobody knows."

Krysty's preternaturally sharp hearing picked up the sound of steps moving cautiously down the creaking stairs from the high attic. Time was slipping by perilously fast. She took the knife and delicately placed the point an inch within Rodriguez's right nostril.

His head jerked back farther, neck sinews straining, trying to get away from the sharp steel. A tiny, frail worm of blood inched from his nose over the broad, sensuous lips.

"Please, please," he whispered. "Spare me, mistress. I had to do it. She'd have killed me."

It was time.

"So will I," Krysty said quietly.

She drove the long-bladed stiletto deep into the innkeeper's head, through the top of his nose, tearing the web of cartilage apart, the thin point sliding into the forepart of the brain. Krysty angled the knife, twisting her wrist to make the wound more devastatingly final.

The man's weight slid off his feet, almost tearing the dagger from her hand. The blade cut through the side of his nose as he fell to the floor, hands reaching up and clutching her knees. A dark patch of damp spread across his trousers as death loosed his bladder.

Blood frothed over his mouth and he struggled to speak. To her right, Krysty saw J.B. leading the others, pausing on the steps, watching the tableau of death and life.

"I never sold the ring my... mother gave me," Rodriguez mumbled. "She died thinking I had, but I never wanted. Wanted her..." He coughed and more blood came from the cavern of his throat. "Didn't want to rock... rock..."