When they were near enough, she parted the cloak. As loudly as she dared, Zala called her father’s name.

“Shut up,” said a voice from the mass of unmoving captives.

“I must find Kaeph the Scrivener!”

“He’s here. Keep talking so loudly, and you’ll be in here with him.”

Helbin whispered, “Is that Miya?”

One of the shapeless mounds stirred. It was indeed Miya. Moving slowly, as though languid with sleep, she sat up. Although she acted sleepy, her voice was clear and her ears sharp.

“There are two of you,” she said.

“Yes. We’re here to get you out.”

“Just two of you?”

“No, there are forty kender here, ready to help.”

Miya stiffened. “Forty kender? May the gods have mercy.”

She leaned forward and prodded the figure in front of her. He snorted and woke, grumbling noisily. Miya clapped a hand over his mouth, and hissed, “Quiet, all! Guards!”

A pair of foot soldiers approached. Their hobnailed boots struck in unison as they marched along the length of the cage. Zala drew the edges of the cloak together again. She and Helbin stood motionless.

“…out of beef, they said,” one guard was saying. “So I put my knife to the innkeeper’s throat and told him if he didn’t have beef, he could give us his daughter!” His partner joined him in rough laughter.

The men’s voices drew closer. Zala held her breath and wondered if they would bump right into her.

As the men passed, one brushed lightly against Helbin’s back.

“What was that?” he asked, stopping abruptly.

“What was what?” said his comrade.

“Something touched me.”

Zala flexed her fingers around the grip of her short sword. At close range, she could take both men down, if they weren’t wearing heavy armor.

“There’s nothing here but stinking prisoners. Come on. We’re off duty.”

In spite of his comrade’s urging, the first guard drew his saber and swept the air around him. The flat of the blade struck Helbin in the back. The wizard stumbled forward, throwing Zala against the bars of the cage and out of the cloak’s protection. Instantly she was revealed, and out came her sword.

Both guards shouted, tearing the cloak from Helbin’s back. More soldiers came running in response to their yells.

“So much for being rescued,” said Miya sharply.

“Wait,” Zala hissed. “We’re not done yet.”

The Ergothians quickly ringed the wizard and huntress in a wall of swords and halberds. An officer on horseback demanded Zala lay down her weapon. Instead, she cut the air with her blade. The soldiers started to close in.

Miya and the Dom-shu rushed toward the bars, shouting. The sudden movement distracted the guards. Zala thrust the pommel of her sword through the bars to Miya. “Free yourselves!” she said. “Run, wizard!”

Helbin tried. He got about ten steps before soldiers tackled him, knocking him down on the grimy pavement. Zala proved more elusive. When she felt fingers snag the back of her undershirt, she spun, gripped her pursuer’s arm, and used his own momentum to send him flying. Then she took off in a new direction.

The houses along the eastern side of Luin’s Field had been turned into barracks for hundreds of soldiers. As Zala raced down the street, she heard shouting from within the barracks, followed by a furious pounding. Sparing a glance in that direction, she saw that every door was blocked with timbers, piles of masonry, casks, or barrels. Further on, she passed a solitary figure leaning against the columns of one of the fine houses now home to part of Caergoth’s garrison.

Queen Casberry. She and her kender troop had been busy. They had blocked the barracks’ doors.

The commotion near the prisoners’ cages had become an uproar. Zala’s sword had been passed back among the ragged Dom-shu and vanished. The guards who hadn’t chased Zala demanded it back. Miya’s reply was brief but pungent.

The sergeant of the guard summoned a squad of archers. Soon, ten bows were leveled at the foresters, standing shoulder to shoulder just inside the bars. Other prisoners scampered out of the line of fire.

“Give up the blade!” shouted the sergeant..

“Come and take it, grasslander!” Voyarunta bellowed back.

The Ergothian raised his hand. Ten bowstrings creaked as they were drawn back.

“Will you murder us all?” said Miya. “I am the wife of Lord Tolandruth!”

The archers glanced at their commander. “You are all condemned prisoners of the empire!” said the sergeant. “Yield the blade or die!”

Uncle Corpse pushed his daughter behind him. “Enough talk! Dom-shu, time to go!”

The tribesmen rushed the bars, smashing into them with all their weight. Bows twanged, and arrows flashed in a short flight to meet the oncoming wall of flesh.

Governor Lord Wornoth’s factotum was a plump, fussy man named Tello. He arrived at his master’s bedchamber to find the doors already closed. Squaring his shoulders, Tello lifted his baton of office and rapped on the portal. A loud voice beyond the door yelled at him to enter. He did so, and the servant behind him scurried in to light the room’s lamps.

Wornoth sat up in bed. Although he was not an old man, the strain of ruling the second city of the empire in Ackal V’s name showed in his hollow eyes, sallow complexion, and thinning brown hair. Tello pretended not to notice the young woman lying next to Lord Wornoth, her face buried in the bedclothes. She was not, he knew, one of the governor’s wives.

“Tello, if the bakali aren’t at the gates, I’ll have you flogged for this interruption!”

“My gracious lord,” Tello said, putting his soft hands together and bowing. “The prisoners in Luin’s Field are rioting!”

“Sweet Mishas, you woke me to tell me that? Tell the guards to quell any disturbance. When they’re done, tell the captain to give you forty lashes!”

Tello bowed again in acknowledgment of his master’s judgment, but added, “There is more, Lord Governor. We have captured one of those who was trying to free the prisoners. It’s the Red Robe Helbin, my lord.”

Wornoth’s annoyance vanished. “Helbin! Where is he?”

“In your audience hall, my lord, under heavy guard.”

The governor slid out of bed. A lackey hurried forward to hold his robe. As Wornoth tied the sash around his waist, he told Tello to rouse the garrison.

“Have them clear the streets,” he commanded. “Anyone caught helping the prisoners escape is to be killed on sight. I will see Master Helbin at once.”

“Very good, my lord.”

Factotum and servants departed, and Wornoth’s bedmate exited through a door concealed in one of the room’s walls. Wornoth donned his rings of office and hung the heavy governor’s medallion around his neck. The golden emblem of the House of Ackal felt cold against his skin.

So, the Red Robe deserter had been caught. The emperor’s pleasure at this news would be great-as would his gratitude.

He went to the small gong by his bed, intending to summon a scribe to take down an immediate dispatch, but he paused. Perhaps it would be better to find out exactly what Helbin knew first. Great discretion had to be exercised in dealing with any important person from Daltigoth, especially Ackal V. Although the emperor had issued a death warrant for the wayward wizard, it was entirely possible Helbin was acting on the emperor’s behalf, and the warrant was only a ruse to confuse Ackal V’s enemies.

Wornoth rubbed his forehead. Countless possibilities chased themselves around in his brain. He could feel a major headache beginning, just behind his eyes.

Dirty and exhausted, Tol and a twenty-man escort rode into Tylocost’s dark, fireless camp. They had covered the distance between the Isle of Elms and Caergoth in less than two days. The Army of the East, moving more slowly, was strung out behind them. Its full strength would not arrive for another day, possibly two.