The Vacant Throne - Ed Greenwood [98]
There was suddenly a door opening in front of him, and flickering light from behind it. Weldrin was running too hard to stop even if he'd wanted to. "Three above," he gasped, "let there be no sword to the fore!"
Boots thundering on the floorboards, he wondered if the gods would even have time to hear that prayer.
"Roldrick," the husky voice by his ear said urgently, "wake up."
That seemed an odd thing for his old swordsorn to say, now that Roldrick had run him through with six swords and was strangling the furious old man for all he was worth. Old Deldroun was refusing to die, snarling defiance through his white moustache and growing ever larger, no matter how hard Roldrick throttled him…
"Roldrick!" The voice was insistent, and-female!
Roldrick whirled around, there on the purple plain with the red sandstorms blowing and the huge skeletons of things that had perished ages agone rising over him like the burned timbers of ruined houses, and found himself gazing into the golden eyes of a dragon, impossibly close…
He blinked. He was gazing into golden eyes! He was in his bed, in the dark, and Jelenna of the kitchens was bending over him, lamp in hand and wearing nothing but a shawl that had slipped to lay bare one breast and shoulder. He stared at a tiny brass ring in her nipple until something crashed across his face and she said crisply, "Enough drooling, man-up!"
Roldrick blinked at her, and then grinned sleepily and put a hand around her shoulders to drag her down. "Don't lasses believe in kissing first and suchlike, anymore?"
She slapped him again, her blow turning his head over his left shoulder and leaving his eyes watering. "Harrr!" he snarled angrily. "What's th-?"
"Get up and bring your sword," she snapped, stepping quickly back out of reach of his angry grab. "There's fighting going on by the main stair."
"Why me?" he protested. "There's a duty guard, look you!" Putting a hand over his eyes to shut out the lamplight, he turned over and hauled the blanket she'd pulled aside back over his shoulders. Gods, no wonder he felt cold-she must have laid him bare to take a look, the wench! Well, well…
The slaps fell like the blows of the last man he'd fought in a tavern, jolting him rudely into full wakefulness in a hard, rocking rain.
"Listen-well-you-hind-end-of-an-ugly-mule," Jelenna panted, snarling at him between the blows she was dealing, "The-master-orders-you-up-to-fight!"
Abruptly he was cold again, the blanket whipped away to leave him blinking at her in his leather breeches. The lamp flickered mockingly as he stared up at the furious kitchen lass, scratched himself a little dazedly, and growled, "All right, lass, I-"
There was a heavy crash in Holdyn's room, next door. Roldrick peered at her as if she was a swordsorn over him, and not a gasping and still-angry woman whose shawl had deserted her for the floor, and snapped, "What's that, yon?"
"Mistress Margathe," Jelenna replied, "rousing Holdyn. Shall I bring her in here?"
Roldrick scrambled. "Gods, no! Where's the battle?"
"Out there," she said in a voice of doom, extending one shapely arm to point at the door. Snatching up his scabbarded sword, Roldrick found himself trotting unsteadily to fumble open the latch, the echoes of her slaps still ringing around his ears.
Boots, he thought, as he got the door open. I've forgotten my boots…
18
Not in My Inn
The gods were smiling this night on Weldrin Hathenbruck.
The man stumbling into the corridor had his head down, hair tousled and sleepy face slack. He was hairy and much-scarred, wore leather breeches that trailed half-undone laces, and held a scabbarded sword in his hand. He was turning to face Weldrin and lifting his head as the running reaver skidded a little-and kicked the man as hard as he'd ever kicked anyone before, with all the fury of his rage and racing haste behind his boot.
The man's eyes bulged in amazed pain as his body lofted helplessly into the air, arms flailing and sword spinning away-and Weldrin crashed into the passage wall, regained his balance, and was past,