“I’ll send up Mennos to take my place,” she said. “After you, Sir Hereward.”
“I will be able to collect my weapons?” asked Sir Hereward. He had surrendered them when they first arrived at the citadel, but he didn’t want to go wandering about the city without being fully armed. Or that was the impression he wanted to give.
He had a dagger in each boot, of course, another up his left sleeve, and the locket he wore around his neck did not contain a portrait of a loved one, but rather opened to reveal a very small moon-shaped blade, sharp as a razor.
Then there were also the curious gold earrings he wore, shaped like long bones. They were hollow, with little holes drilled through them. Charming little pipes the length of his little finger, a solid weight of near pure gold. Not exactly weapons, but they had a purpose.
“Your baggage is held at the main gate,” said Aryadny. “Of course, if going into the city, you may take up sword and pistols. Though you will not need them, provided you stay out of the worst parts of the Levels.”
Still Hereward did not move. Aryadny shrugged and went ahead, sweeping down the stair with the ease of a native Nikandrosite, for whom steps were more natural than a level floor. Hereward did not immediately follow, taking a surprisingly large silver flask from the pouch at his belt to indulge in what appeared to be a long swig.
“You cannot wait for the wine, Sir Hereward?” asked Aryadny politely, looking back up the steps.
“This is a medicine,” replied Hereward, wiping his mouth. The smell of powerful brandy rolled off his breath. “A nasty concoction for an old wound in . . . in my hip . . . that niggles at me betimes.”
“I trust it will not grow worse,” said Aryadny. “You are not troubled by all our steps?”
“Not at all!” declared Hereward, bounding down after her. He immediately stumbled, recovering himself just in time to avoid cannoning into Aryadny, though she had stepped aside in any case. She was very light on her feet, further confirming Hereward’s assessment of her as an assassin.
“Or perhaps a little,” confessed Hereward. He belched brandy fumes and started off again, more slowly. “It is true I have never been confronted with such an array of stairs and ramps and steep changes of altitude.”
“Nikandros is unique in many ways,” said Aryadny. “But then you are also a novelty to us, a visitor from so far away. Do you really think there is a dragon here?”
Hereward pretended surprise, stumbled again, and clutched at the wall to save himself.
“What . . . why . . .”
“We are the Archon’s Chosen,” replied Aryadny. She paused to open the door at the base of the stairs, admitting welcome sunlight. “Naturally we have been informed of your purpose here.”
“I see,” said Sir Hereward, following her out into the narrow courtyard that led from the isolated tower to the palace proper. “I had wondered if you’d been told. I am not personally convinced there is a dragon, but Mister Fitz has found old documents that purport otherwise, and I have to confess that clerkly old puppet is very good with documents. And he has found dragons before.”
This caused Aryadny to almost stumble herself, on perfectly flat paving stones.
“He did?”
“Without profit to us,” grumbled Sir Hereward. “I had to kill it before it could lead us to its hoard.”
“You killed a dragon?” asked Aryadny. “Might I ask how this was done?”
Her tone did not so much suggest curiosity as disbelief, but not in an offensive manner.
“It’s easy enough when they’re in mortal form,” said Sir Hereward, puffing out his chest and assuming a rather pompous manner. “Though ’tis true they cannot be slain with any ordinary weapon.”
“How then?”
“Fitz is a clever fellow, for all his other defects,” said Hereward. He stopped to take out another, smaller flask from his pouch and drank from that as Aryadny waited patiently. “He found me something that would do the job.”
“Some particular weapon?” asked Aryadny. “I confess I did wonder about one of the items in the small arsenal you brought ashore.”
“Ah, noticed it, did you?” asked Hereward, tapping his finger with his nose, apparently forgetting he held the small metal flask. He flinched as its stopper almost went up one nostril.
“I would say it is unusual for an artillerist and exponent of gunpowder weapons to entertain the use of something so outmoded as a crossbow,” said Aryadny. “I think anyone would have noticed that.”
“Well spotted, well spotted,” said Sir Hereward. He took another drink as Aryadny opened the door at the other end of the courtyard. “But it—hic—isn’t the crossbow, as such. No, the secret lies in the quarrels!”
“The quarrels?” asked Aryadny. She frowned. “I do not recall seeing any.”
“They’re in a case,” said Hereward. “A case, made special, lined with lead to keep them quiet.”
“Keep . . . the quarrels quiet?”
“They’ve got imps in them,” confided Hereward.
“Imps!”
“That’s what I call them,” said Hereward. He returned the small flask to his pouch and fished around for the larger one, removing it with an air of triumph. “Fitz found them—the bolts, I mean. Dug ’em up somewhere. They talk. Mutter. High-pitched little voices. Imps. Apparently that’s what it takes to kill a dragon. Worked on the other one, anyway. Oh gods, more stairs.”
“There are always more stairs in Nikandros, Sir Hereward,” said Aryadny. “This is something of a secret way to the main gatehouse. I would like to look at these imp-haunted bolts, if you don’t mind.”
“Didn’t think we came up this way,” said Sir Hereward. He tripped, fell against the wall and rebounded with the air of a man who thought the wall was at fault for being there. Somehow he didn’t drop his flask.
This stairwell was very narrow, the ceiling was low, and unlike the fine stonework everywhere else in the citadel, the passage that stretched down and down and down, lit only by the occasional torch in a bracket, was the original rock of the mountain, rough-worked, as attested by the many chisel marks.
“No, this is a direct passage. We generally prefer our visitors to take more pleasant paths,” said Aryadny. “But I fear this is a long stair, and dull, without windows or outlooks. Perhaps you would tell me how you came to slay your . . . ah . . . first dragon. Where was this dragon, as it happens?”
“Oh, far off,” said Hereward. “Can’t tell you. The puppet, he swore me to secrecy. Might go back and search for its gold someday. Only when he found out about the dragon here, that had to come first. He says it will have a much bigger hoard!”
“Why is that?”
“Oh, the one we got was youngish, or so Fitz told me. Only a hundred or so. The one here is much older. Least that’s what the puppet says. Busy old fool.”
“You think the puppet is wrong?”
“Oh, probably not, but his ways are tiresome,” complained Hereward. He paused on a step to vigorously shake his flask, sighing as he heard no answering gurgle. “Won’t let me drink. He found the other dragon without all this fussing about with musty old tax rolls. Shepter’s Blood! How many more steps are there?”