Calzon’s eyes narrowed, as if he sensed more in her words than she intended, and he was about to say more when a slight tremble shivered through the ground and quivered up their feet and ankles. Both agents looked down, startled, and felt it again. All at once three or four dogs bounded out into the street and began barking. A flock of birds burst out of a nearby tree. Varia hooted a warbling cry. A deeper tremor rattled the buildings and shook up a cloud of dust. People shouted in alarm.

“The volcano. Look!” Calzon cried out.

Far in the distance, against the brightening sky, the red cone of Mount Thunderhorn belched out a billowing cloud of smoke, and a low, continuous thunder shook the morning air. Suddenly a bright orange light trailed up from the distant fortifications, and it shot up into the sky like a shooting star and exploded in a brilliant burst of orange and gold light.

“The signal from the tower,” Linsha exclaimed. “The dome has already started to collapse. I’ve got to go!”

Calzon grasped her arm and gave it a squeeze. “Thank you, Lynn. The Legion will be ready.” He dumped his cart beside the road and dashed back the way he had come, his long hair flying behind him.

Varia waited until he was out of earshot, then sprang aloft. “I will get Windcatcher,” she called, and she flew, swift as a hawk, for the city gate.

Linsha broke into a run.

At the West Gate, the City Guards on duty stood looking east, worriedly watching the volcano. The pounding of Linsha’s footsteps drew their attention back to the gate, and they raised their spears, wary of her precipitous approach.

“Do not look to the east for danger,” she shouted to them. “Keep your eyes to the west. We have had word the Knights of Takhisis are massing ships for an attack.”

The Officer of the Watch stood in the middle of the gateway and eyed her scarlet uniform. “We received no word of this. Who are you?”

Linsha skidded to a stop. “Governor’s Guard, Lynn of Gateway. Late of the City Guards. We just learned this news.

They may attack the harbor this morning.”

“How do you know this?”

“Mica, the healer. Didn’t he come through here earlier this night?” The guards glanced at each other and nodded. “He told me,” she said.

“Why didn’t he tell us?”

“I don’t know. I think he was in a hurry to reach Lord Bight. But he didn’t make it. A Dark Knight murdered him. I reached him just before he died.”

Gasps of surprise and outrage met her news. The guard officer slapped the signal horn hanging at his side. “I will put the City Guard on alert,” he said, his face filled with anger.

“And warn the harbormaster. He can post watchers at Pilot’s Point,” she added, then she turned on her heel and ran hack the way she had come, east on Shipmaker’s Road.

Chapter

Linsha passed by the bazaar again and was hurrying through a small suburb of walled houses and well-trimmed gardens when she heard hoofbeats behind her coming at a fast pace. She moved to the side of the road and saw Windcatcher cantering toward her. The bay mare wore only a halter and trailed a broken lead rope. Her eyes rolled in excitement; her coat was damp with sweat. Varia flew above her head, warbling a wild song.

A nearby watering trough provided a. convenient mounting block. Linsha climbed swiftly on Windcatcher’s bare back, snatched the rope, and urged her into a canter toward the East Gate and the guard camp. She didn’t stop at the gate but pounded through, past the astonished guards and on toward the camp.

The volcano was clearly visible now. A loud rumbling issued from its throat as smoke, steam, and ash poured forth, swelling into the air in shapeless gray and white masses. The dome could not be seen behind its cloak of smoke, but every now and again flashes of red and orange gleamed upward in the gloom.

The camp was in an uproar when Linsha arrived. Horns blared from every corner. Men hurried back and forth. Officers shouted orders as the guards pulled back from the northeast fortifications and hurried to strengthen the southeast walls, facing the East Pass and the camp of the Dark Knights. Mounted men rode by in squads toward the northern defenses.

Linsha slowed Windcatcher to a walk and moved out of the way. “Where is Lord Bight?” she shouted to the sentries at the main entrance.

“On the volcano,” came the reply.

“Was anyone with him?”

“He had a few guards, but he sent most of his company to help man the siege works in case the Dark Knights try to attack from the passes.”

“Only a few,” Linsha repeated worriedly. “Was Commander Durne with him?”

The sentries traded questioning looks. “He came by here, but we don’t know where he is now,” a sergeant answered.

The hope that Ian was not responsible for leaving her bound and gagged in the apartment diminished. If the sentries saw him here, he was certainly still alive and moving under his own free will. She swallowed hard against a sudden hard lump in her throat. She was about to urge Windcatcher forward when she thought of one more question. “Did the woman guard, Shanron, accompany Lord Bight?”

“No,” the sergeant answered again. “She arrived later and followed him toward the mountain. In a great rush, she was.”

Linsha’s call of thanks flew behind her as she pushed the bay mare into a canter again. They followed the edge of the camp toward the northeast observation tower and the great earthen ramparts of the siege works. Linsha didn’t see Varia, but she knew the secretive owl was close by and would fly to her aid if the need arose.

The horse flew over the paths, past rows of tents and the crowded infirmary, past the open practice fields and the empty horse corrals, Linsha clinging to her hare hack like a burr. A few guards called out to her, hut Linsha ignored them and concentrated on finding the quickest path to the mountain.

They came at last to the tower, and Linsha saw several Governor’s Guards still manning it in spite of the grit, ash, and smoke that drifted down on the wind. The men leaned on the crenellated wall and gazed toward the burning mountain.

The possibility occurred to Linsha that if one Dark Knight could hide as a Governor’s Guard, so could others. What if these were henchmen of the Skull Knight, positioned there to protect his rear? Without a word, she sped by the tower and, ignoring the guards’ shouts, guided Windcatcher over the rim of the wall.

Thirty feet down plunged the mare, her haunches tucked under her, her forelegs driving into the dry, grassy incline. At the bottom, she lunged forward across the open moat. The next fortified wall stood about a hundred feet away, rising like a huge brown ridge before the horse and rider. A set of stone steps had been set in the wall for the aid of the defenders, and Windcatcher clattered up them two at a time.

At the top of the second wall, the mare had to stop, for there was no apparent road for a horse. The defenses had been arranged to thwart not only siege engines and ground forces but mounted cavalry as well. Rows of sharpened spikes had been planted on the far side of this wall like a tilted forest of spears. Only a narrow footpath wound down between the spears toward the heavily fortified trenches, the moat of lava, and the volcano.

Reluctantly Linsha slid off and left her mare on the berm. She paused for a minute or two to study the lay of the land. Every moment she delayed could risk Lord Bight’s life, yet she couldn’t rush out there alone and unprepared. She could get lost on the wrong path or stumble into an ambush. As far as she could see, this section of the fortifications was deserted because of the risk of pyroclastic flow from the collapsing dome. Beyond the line of trenches lay a wide strip of no-man’s-land and the sullen, reddish yellow flow of the lava in the wide moat. A slender stone bridge arched over the slowly moving river of molten rock to the stony ground beyond.