Masquerades - Kate Novak [132]
Kimbel stood waiting at the first landing, with a double-loaded drow crossbow aimed at the paladin. Dragonbait could smell as well as see the resinous putty smeared on the bolts' tips, but he wasn't quick enough to dodge the missiles. The first caught the saurial in the shoulder, the second in the chest. Dragonbait hissed and lunged in an attempt to skewer the assassin, but he fell short and crumpled into a heap on the stairs.
"Looking for your mistress?" Kimbel taunted, lowering the crossbow. "I'm sorry, but she's occupied right now." He motioned for two men in guardsmen uniforms to collect the saurial's body.
On the main floor, a tight knot of halflings surrounded Lady Nettel as Olive Ruskettle tried with limited success to keep any approaching golems from turning their attention on the matriarch. Lady Nettel was leaning heavily on a spear, which she had plucked from a fallen guardsmen. Just when it seemed as if Olive had managed to send one golem off to seek easier prey, Lady Nettel shrieked, "Thistle!"
Olive spotted the young noblewoman collapsed on the floor with a golem hovering uncertainly over her.
Olive dashed forward, but Lady Nettel was faster. The head of House Thalavar barged through her ring of bodyguards and stepped right between the iron colossus and her granddaughter. The old lady swung her spear to ward off the monster, but the shaft snapped like a twig against the creature's iron arms. As Olive dragged Thistle back to the uncertain safety of the ring of halfling bodyguards, the golem lifted Lady Nettel in both arms and squeezed. Even above the din, Olive swore she could hear the sound of the old woman's back breaking. Then the monster, disinterested in the dead, dropped Nettel Thalavar's crushed, mangled body and wandered off.
Olive dashed over to Lady Nettel's broken form; Thistle followed directly behind her, ignoring the bodyguards who tried to hold her back by tugging on the skirt of her gown. Astonishingly, the old woman still breathed, but she was twisted in an odd, inhuman fashion, and Olive could tell she was fading before their eyes. The dying woman called for Thistle.
Thistle bent close to her grandmother's face. "You are… my heir," Nettel Thalavar w0heezed. "Take… the feather pin."
Thistle began to cry, but Lady Nettel pushed her aside and grabbed Olive by the tabard. She gasped once, then whispered vehemently, "Protect… my… granddaughter!" The noblewoman never drew another breath. Her face spasmed into a contortion that looked anything but peaceful and froze.
Thistle Thalavar, new leader of House Thalavar, gently unpinned her grandmother's copper brooch. As her tears splashed on her grandmother's corpse, she fastened the brooch to her own gown. Then she and Olive fled to the halflings' last defensive position, under a buffet table.
Nineteen
The Unmasking
Ultimately it was a mild-mannered gate crasher who managed to turn the tide. Yielding to Dragonbait's request, | Mintassan had been keeping an eye on the proceedings at the ball. Cloaked in an invisibility spell, he had slipped past the seneschal and stood quietly in the corner, wearing the mask of a bearded, graying wizard with pipe clenched between his teeth. The paladin had not been able to even guess what might go wrong at the ball, but once the golems had arrived, the sage knew exactly how to bring the situation under control.
Magic being nearly useless against such monsters, Mintassan teleported back to his home. There, on his desk, tucked in box full of straw, was the remedy for iron golems. He had prepared it this morning after realizing the Faceless still controlled a troop of the creatures. Arriving in the back of his workroom, the sage dashed to his desk, prepared to scoop up his secret weapons and teleport back immediately. He halted before the desk and nearly froze in panic. The objects he sought