Night guild 3, p.34
Night Guild 3, page 34
Diana, Eric, Ronan called, sending his thoughts out toward the crowd. Can you hear me?
A wave of acknowledgment flowed back to him from his friends.
I’ve found Janus and Tanya and the other rebel leaders, Diana replied. They are well; there is no problem.
Excellent, Ronan replied.
But there is something else, Eric added. The King of Ghennet is here, and the High Vizier of the Malachites. They heard about the trouble in the Twelve Isles and have allied to bring troops and try to keep the peace. Bringing a non-violent resolution to the conflict is their priority. They have a proposal for us.
What is that? Ronan asked.
It will avoid further bloodshed, Eric explained. The King of Ghennet proposes to buy the mercenaries off. If we can find their leader, he will pay them double whatever they’re being paid by the Guild Council.
Tell him I will find the leader of the parthayeen and bring him to parlay, by the statue of Peldor with the raised spear.
Ronan felt Eric’s acknowledgment, and he broke the connection.
“Naxos,” Ronan said. “Wait here. I have something I must do. There is a door at the other end of this corridor. Block it so no one can get through, and wait here with the prisoners until I return.”
“Very well,” Naxos agreed, and with a group of the freed guildsmen, he hurried to the other end of the corridor to bar the entry.
Ronan took a deep breath and stepped out into the plaza again, closing the door carefully behind him. He looked around, scanning the line of parthayeen mercenaries and looking for the command point.
After a moment, he saw it. Conveniently, it was not far from the meeting spot he had named — a tall statue of a famous Twelve Isles warrior with a raised spear that lay a little behind the parthayeen lines. There, a banner had been raised, a fire burned in a brazier, and a group of men stood together, huddled around a table.
Ronan kept his stealth field off. He pushed his hood back and lowered his mask. This was a situation that called for brazening it out, not for stealth.
As he approached, one of the men around the command post leaped forward with a drawn blade. “Hold there,” he barked. “Who are you?”
Ronan held his hands up to show that he carried no weapon. “I come with a proposal for a parlay,” he called. “Where is the commander?”
A tall, grizzled man with a scar down one side of his face stepped forward toward Ronan, then stopped. He eyed Ronan with an unfriendly gaze, then spoke. “I’m Commander Praxes. I’m in charge,” he said. “Who are you, and what do you want?”
“I’m Ronan Renzo, and I have a proposal for you to stop the bloodshed.”
“And that is?”
“You are mercenaries, are you not? Have you been paid yet?”
“What is this?” The commander sneered. “I will not answer such a question as that. Name your proposal.”
“Very well,” Ronan said. “My proposal is this. Whatever you are being paid by the High Guild Council, we will double it.”
“You would hire us?” the commander said with a harsh laugh. “And what would you have me do, turn upon my clients? I fear you know little of mercenaries. We cannot be paid to turn on those who have already paid us.”
“No,” Ronan said. “You will be paid to go into the service of the King of Ghennet. He will not ask you to fight the Twelve Isles council but just to help him in a separate endeavor.”
Ronan was improvising.
He had no idea if the Ghennetian king actually had any extra work for the mercenaries, but he felt that he would be well advised to present as if he were certain. The commander and all his bodyguards were now glaring at Ronan with a very unfriendly eye, and Ronan had no doubt they were seriously considering whether he might not make a good prisoner.
“What guarantees can you give me that what you say is true?” the commander demanded. “For all I know, this could be some trick to make us withdraw. The King of Ghennet, you say? How do I know that you have any authority to speak for him?”
For a moment, Ronan was stumped. Then a happy thought came to him. He grinned and reached to his belt pouch. “Actually,” he said, “I have here a signed letter of credit from the king, sealed with his seal and signed with his own hand.”
He pulled out the letter, given to him by the king when they had passed through Ghennet on their way back through the lands and almost forgotten up to now. Ronan unfurled the document and held it out toward the commander.
The man nodded to one of his subordinates, who stepped forward, taking the letter and bringing it back. The commander looked it over, then rolled it up and laughed heartily. “Well, well,” he boomed, his whole attitude changing in a moment. “This is indeed a stroke of luck. This letter names you, specifically, and gives a fair physical description of you so that the letter cannot be stolen and used by someone else. I know the Ghennetian king’s seal well, and I can testify to the authenticity of this letter.”
He strode forward and held a hand out to Ronan, who shook with him a little reluctantly while taking his letter back.
“Yes, it’s true what you suggest,” the commander continued, beaming at Ronan. “The High Guild Council has not paid us yet. The Bank of Gold engaged us initially, and they paid well enough, but now this Guild Council have hired us and given us the orders to defend this building.” He jerked his head in the direction of the council hall. “They have not been out to speak to us, though, and we suspect they may be hoping to give us the slip. We’re a mercenary force, and we work for pay, but many of us were trained in the Twelve Isles fighter guilds, and we have no desire to turn our blades against those very same guilds where we got our start in life. I have been worried that my men would not obey the command to attack if I gave it, and I was reluctant to do so anyway.”
“Now you won’t have to,” Ronan said. He made a decision. “I am the one who had given you that letter of credit, and so I’m the one who is hiring you for the moment. In due course, that command will pass to the king himself, but for now, I’m the client, all right?”
“Seems fair to me.” The commander grinned. “So long as you don’t ask us to kill the guild council. It’s against our code to turn on the last client that hired us, for any money. People have to be able to rely on mercenaries that even if they are bought off by another force, they can’t be turned that easily.”
“I understand. I don’t ask that of you. I simply ask that you call your men together and line up in the plaza here, ready for further orders.”
“We’ll defend ourselves if attacked by these citizens,” the commander warned, glancing darkly at the angry crowd that pressed in upon the parthayeen lines.
“I’ll see to it that doesn’t happen,” Ronan promised. “In a moment, I’m going to release the prisoners who were in those holding cells. Your men must do nothing to hinder that.”
“Not a problem,” the commander agreed. “Between ourselves, we’d heard we were going to be given orders to execute them — several hundred men and women to be hanged in the public plaza. None of my men were too keen on that duty, me least of all. I’m glad we won’t be obliged to do that.”
“And I,” Ronan said. “I’ll wait here with you for the moment.”
Eric, he called, sending his thoughts out seeking for his friend. The parthayeen have accepted the proposal and are about to back off. Have the fighter guilds hold their people in place. I don’t want a crowd rushing the council hall, understand? This needs to be handled carefully.
Don’t worry, Eric replied. Since Valandrus has come among them, the fighter guilds are ready to do anything we ask them.
Good, Ronan said. Have the leaders of the fighters guilds, and the King of Ghennet, come to the statue of Peldor in the main plaza. The High Vizier should come as well.
He broke the connection, then reached out to Naxos. Bring the prisoners out, Naxos, he said.
Touching minds with the Night God was a strange sensation. For all Naxos had said that in the human realm, he was just a human, his mind felt strange and entirely unequal to Ronan’s. It was a disconcerting feeling like the vertigo one gets looking up at an immensely tall building, and Ronan pulled back quickly as soon as he felt the Night God’s acknowledgment.
The door opened, and the prisoners all flooded out. At the same time, the runners sent by the commander of the parthayeen delivered their message to the encircling ring of soldiers, who all lowered their spears and marched in good order back to the center of the plaza.
Ronan was pleased to see that, as per his orders, there was no great surge forward from the Twelve Isles citizens. The fighter guild soldiers did not rush forward, and they carefully kept the press of angry citizens back. There were too many people to effectively communicate with, but the orders had gone to the fighter guild leaders, at least, and they were being carried out.
Behind him, Ronan heard a cheer and looked around. The imprisoned guild leaders were flooding out into the central plaza, running forward to be greeted by their guildsfolk.
Ronan spoke to the commander. “There was a special prisoner, a man called Tarquin,” he said. “Do you know anything about him?”
“I’m sorry, no,” he said. “We don’t know much about the internal goings-on of this business. We’ve just done what we could to obey our orders, but we’re pretty well in the dark about the identities of the prospers.”
“I heard something,” another parthayeen volunteered. He was a younger man, pale-haired but with skin much darker than any Twelve Islander. He looked like he was from Afrik.
“What did you hear?” Ronan said.
The man shrugged. “Just what you said. There was a special prisoner, a guildmaster who was at the heart of all the trouble. They wanted to execute him, but they couldn’t risk bringing him out into the open. If he had any freedom at all, they thought he would get away. We don’t know where he is, but there was some talk of a special prison for him.”
Ronan thanked the man. He didn’t like the sound of this at all. Quickly, he communicated with Diana, Eric, and Naxos, and they all agreed that they must enter the council building immediately.
We’ve staved off the immediate danger, Eric said, and there will be no fight between the citizens and the parthayeen, but we have to go into the building and find what we can.
Come and meet me at the statue, Ronan urged. Once we’ve set the others to their debates, we can go in. Bring Daeron — the fighter guild leader — and Tanya.
We’re on our way, Eric replied.
Ronan was in a fever of impatience, but he knew that there was no point in rushing off ahead. He waited until he saw the welcome forms of Eric and Diana, accompanied by Tanya of the fighter guild and Emelia of the Red Dawn. They were all very glad to see him.
With them came several fighter guild leaders, and the King of Ghennet himself, along with the High Vizier of the Malachites of Oretum.
“We have no time for catching up, I’m afraid. Daeron, get me twenty of your best men and follow me. We must search the guild council from top to bottom.”
The King of Ghennet called to one of his lieutenants and put a detachment of Ghennetian soldiers under Ronan’s command. Quickly, Ronan had nearly fifty soldiers at his call, and he was pleased to have Tanya and Daeron at his side as well. Together, they mapped out a plan for the searching of the council building, and at the same time, they assigned men to guard the entrances and exits from the building to stop anyone from escaping.
“Though that might not be enough,” Daeron added. He knew what he was talking about since he had been inside the building before. “There are tunnels and secret ways under the building through which the traitors may have escaped. If so, they could be halfway to the mainland by now.”
“I understand you both have ships in the bay?” Ronan said to the King of Ghennet and the High Vizier. “Set up a patrol, if you will, and stop any ships that are heading out of the Twelve Isles. Detain any who seem to be trying to flee.”
Both dignitaries nodded and gave orders to their underlings to set the patrols in place.
But it turned out to be too late.
When Ronan entered the High Guild council with the men who had been put under his command, he organized a thorough search of the building. There was nobody there. They scoured the High Guild Council building from the top floor to the lowest basement, and the only person they found was Tarquin.
He was in a room in the very base of the lowest dungeon, a small cell, pitch black and lined on the walls with layers of lead and silver. Ronan had never seen such a thing before, but he discovered what its purpose was when he tried to use his magic spells to open the lock.
“No good, I’m afraid,” Naxos said. “This door is built to stop the powers of the gods from having any effect. This whole cell is custom-made to contain a powerful magic user. The alternate layers of lead and silver stop any magic power from getting in or out.”
It didn’t stop more traditional methods, however. Valandrus might have just been a person here in the human realm, but he was still mightily strong. He took a great battle axe and struck the door as hard as he could with it, just above the lock. One strike, two strikes, three, and then the door burst asunder.
“Guildmaster!” Ronan cried in great delight as he saw the old, wizened figure of his dear mentor and old friend, sitting very patiently at the back of the cell. Old Tarquin blinked in the light, and he looked much the worse for his long imprisonment.
“Ah, Ronan,” he said in a quavering voice. “I knew you would come at last. It is so good to see you and to feel my Night God powers expanding outward into the world again from this accursed cell. Come, give me your arm. Let us go out of here and never return.”
Ronan looked up as Eric and Diana smiled broadly and clapped each other on the back. Ronan took the guildmaster’s arm, but Valandrus stepped forward and took more direct action. He crouched and picked the old guildmaster up bodily, carrying him swiftly out of the dungeon and into the fresh air.
As Ronan and his friends came up out of the High Guild Council building and stepped outside, a cheer went up from the assembled crowd. He looked around, seeing all the folk of the Twelve Isles in their many colored guild robes gathered there in the great plaza.
The news had spread quickly. The traitors who had taken over the High Guild Council were gone, vanished, escaped. They had fled the city, never to return. The rebel guild heads had been freed, and even old Guildmaster Tarquin, the first rebel guildmaster to be imprisoned, was free at last.
Ronan stood at the top step of the council hall steps, looking out on the crowd and bathing in the cheers and applause. There were the gathered fighter guilds, and as he looked at them, he saw his old friend and mentor Guildsman Janus standing with them. Their eyes met, and Janus tipped him a sly wink.
Not far off, the other members of the Night Guild had arrived. They stood in a block of dark-robed figures, looking a little uncomfortable at their exposed position. There were many familiar faces among that crowd — and some noticeable absences as well. Ronan guessed that many of the Night Guild had gone off with the traitors when the time came, and now their ranks were thinner than they had been in the past.
Closer by, he saw the kindly face of the King of Ghennet, standing with the High Vizier of the Malachites. With them, he saw the chastened figure of Mala himself, looking humble and contrite — though now dressed in better clothing than he had been when he’d been taken from the dungeons. Decius, native of Trentum City, stood next to Mala, supporting him with one arm.
Valandrus, god of the fighter guilds, stood with them, as well as many other major and minor gods who had come through from their realm to reestablish contact with their guilds. And beside this group, in the very center of the gathered crowd, stood the huge forms of the two dragons, leaning against each other and looking very satisfied with life.
Ronan looked from side to side. Here with him on the steps was Tarquin, his old mentor, who insisted on standing on his own two feet to come out into the open. He leaned on the broad arm of Eric the Norskander on one side and Tanya of Daeron’s Guild on the other. Next to Eric stood Diana of Ghennet, his fellow assassin and pupil of the Night Guild. With them was Emelia, who had been the leader of the Red Dawn. No longer would the Red Dawn and the Night Guild be enemies. They had united to make sure the dragons would return to the world, and they had succeeded in that task.
As they stood there, taking in the acclaim of the crowd, Ronan felt a slight pressure on his hand. He looked down and realized that Diana had slipped her black-gloved hand into his and given it a quick, confidential squeeze.
She glanced at him and winked briefly, and he knew the meaning in that look. They had done it. They had taken complete revenge on those who had destroyed their families. Dragons had returned to the world. The Red Dawn were reconciled, and the corruption had been driven out of the Twelve Isles and the kingdom of Ghennet.
In fulfilling their own quests, they had succeeded in uncovering an even darker plot, and in the end, they had saved the realm of the gods as well as their own world.
Ronan looked out at the crowd. Smoke still rose from the buildings beyond the plaza, and the numbers of the Night Guild were sadly depleted. He thought of the cleanup operation that would be required to bring Trentum City back to the state it had been before all this had happened. He thought of the traitorous High Guild Council members that were at large in the world still. And overall, he thought of the map that he held, the brightly colored map that was covered in little multicolored dots, each denoting the hiding place of a dragon egg.
There would be work to do.
“The fates indeed weave strange paths for us,” Tarquin said, leaning over to speak to Ronan. “And now your journey has ended in coming home.”
“You know, guildmaster,” Ronan said, “I don’t think it’s the end of the journey. In a way, I think it’s just the beginning.”
