Part 20 (1/2)
Oliver, still in his maiden's garb, remarked that midday was almost upon them and the Dwelf would soon be open, but Luthien gave no indication that he heard.
”There was not a thing you could do!” Oliver finally shouted, hopping up to stand on a chair in Luthien's pacing path so that he could shout in the man's face. ”Not a thing!”
”They took him to the mines,” the burdened young man remarked, turning back on his heels and ignoring the ranting halfling. ”Well, if they took Shuglin to the mines, then I go to the mines.”
”By all the virgins of Avon,” Oliver muttered under his breath, and he sat forcefully down in the chair and pulled the long black hair of his wig over his eyes.
Chapter 20.
THE VALUE OF A KISS.
Oliver and Luthien waited for more than an hour, crouched among a tumble of boulders in the rocky foothills just a quarter of a mile outside Montfort's southern wall, overlooking the narrow trail which led to the mines. Riverdancer and Threadbare, glad to be out of the city, grazed in a small meadow not far away. Oliver had explained that the slaver wagon would not leave the city until the tax calls were completed-in case Morkney found some other ”volunteers” who preferred to work in the mines rather than pay their heavy t.i.thes.
Luthien had planned to hit the wagon here, long before it got to the mine; Oliver knew better.
The young Bedwyr's expression fell considerably when the wagon came bouncing along, escorted by a score of cyclopians riding fierce ponypigs.
”Now can we go to the Dwelf?” the weary halfling asked, but from the determined way angry Luthien stormed off to retrieve his mount, Oliver guessed the answer.
They trotted along the road a good distance behind the wagon, but sometimes catching sight of it far ahead on the rocky trail as it came out along an open ledge.
”This is not so smart a thing,” Oliver said many times, but Luthien didn't reply. Finally, with more than three miles of trail behind them, the halfling stopped Threadbare. Luthien went on for about twenty yards, then turned Riverdancer about and looked back accusingly at his friend.
”The dwarf-” he began, but stopped immediately as Oliver threw his hand up. The halfling sat with his eyes closed, his head tilted back, and it seemed to Luthien that he was sniffing the air.
Threadbare leaped at Oliver's command, crashed through the brush at the side of the road and disappeared. Luthien eyed Oliver incredulously for just a moment, then heard the rumble of rus.h.i.+ng ponypigs not so far up the road.
He had no time to escape to where Oliver had gone! Head down over the horse's thick mane, Luthien kicked Riverdancer into a dead run, back toward Montfort. A mile pa.s.sed before he found a place where he could get off the road, and he and his horse skidded into a shallow gully and banged roughly off a stone wall. Luthien dropped from the saddle and grabbed Riverdancer's bridle, trying to soothe and quiet the nervous beast.
He needn't have worried, for the cyclopian band pa.s.sed by at a full gallop, the thunder of their heavy mounts and the empty wagon bouncing behind them burying any other sounds.
After a few deep breaths, Luthien walked Riverdancer back to the road, waited a moment to make sure that all the one-eyes had pa.s.sed, then galloped back the other way. He found Oliver right where he had left him.
”Is about time,” the halfling complained. ”We must get to the dwarf before they bring him to the lower mines. Once he is down there ...” Oliver didn't bother finis.h.i.+ng the thought, since Luthien was long past him by then.
The mine entrance was little more than an unremarkable hole in the side of a mountain, its sides propped with heavy timbers. The friends tethered their horses far to the side of the trail and crept to a vantage point behind some brush. They saw no cyclopians milling about; saw no movement at all.
”It is not well guarded,” Luthien remarked.
”Why would it be?” Oliver asked him.
Luthien shrugged and started out from their hiding place. Oliver grabbed his arm, and when he looked back, the halfling directed his gaze along the mountain wall to another opening at the right of the mine entrance.
”It could be the barracks,” the halfling whispered. ”Or it could be where they keep the prisoners before they send them down.”
Luthien looked from one entrance to the other. ”Which one?” he finally asked, turning back to Oliver.
Oliver held his hands out wide and finally pointed to the main mine. ”Even if this dwarf, Shuglin, is not in there, that is the way they must get him down.”
Luthien moved up to the wall, Oliver right behind. He put the cowl of his crimson cape low and inched along, pausing at the entrance. The tunnel was dark, very dark, and Luthien had to pause until his eyes adjusted to the gloom. Even then, he could hardly make out the shapes within.
He lifted a fold in his cloak and Oliver scooted under, then Luthien inched his way around the corner and into the mine. They went around one bend-a side pa.s.sage broke off to the right, possibly leading to tunnels within the other mine opening. Further down the pa.s.sageway they were traveling, though, they saw the flicker of a torch and heard the footsteps of approaching cyclopians.
Into the side pa.s.sage the friends skittered, taking up a position so they could continue to watch down the tunnel.
Luthien had his bow out and a.s.sembled in an instant, while Oliver, flat on the floor, peeked around the corner.
The torchlight grew; two cyclopians rounded the next bend, talking lightly. Oliver held two fingers up in the air for Luthien to see, then kept his hand up high, ready to signal the attack.
Luthien drew back his bowstring. The light intensified, as did the sound of heavy cyclopian footsteps. Oliver's hand snapped down and Luthien leaped by the p.r.o.ne halfling into the tunnel, bow bent and arrow ready to fly.
The cyclopians were barely a dozen feet away, leaping wildly in surprise.
Luthien missed.
He could hardly believe it, but as one of the cyclopians jumped and twisted in fright, its arm waving high, his arrow sliced in below the creature's armpit, grazing it but doing no real damage.
Luthien stood staring blankly, holding his bow as if it had deceived him. On came the growling cyclopians, and if Oliver hadn't slid out to intercept, Luthien would have surely been cut down.
Rapier and main gauche whipped in a wild dance, Oliver scoring a wicked hit in the ribs of the closest brute and nicking the second before they even realized he was there.
The wounded cyclopian, weapon arm tight against its side, clubbed at the halfling with its torch. Its companion fell back a step, then came on, throwing curses and waving a heavy club.
Oliver rolled left, back toward the tunnel. Luthien, sword drawn, dove ahead behind the halfling. The club wielder, its bulbous eye following Oliver's movement, gawked in surprise as the young man's sword exploded into its chest.
Oliver came up short, halfway through the roll, and fell forward instead, inside the arc of the down-swinging torch. The halfling's rapier plunged ahead once, and then again, and the cyclopian staggered backward, eyeing little Oliver with sheer disbelief.
Then it fell dead.
Taking only the moment to put out the torch (and for Oliver to ask, ”How did you miss?”), the two friends moved on more urgently now. Soon more torchlight loomed up ahead.
The tunnel ended at a ledge forty feet above the floor of a large, roughly oval chamber. Five cyclopians were in here and, to the friends' relief, two dwarves, including one with a bushy, blue-black beard and a sleeveless leather tunic. Both were shackled at the wrists and ankles, surrounded by their cyclopian captors. The group stood near the opposite end of the chamber in front of a large hole cut into the floor. Suspended above the hole was a block and tackle, with one thick rope going to a cranking mechanism on the chamber's floor at the side of the hole and two other ropes disappearing beneath the floor.
One cyclopian leaned over the hole, loosely holding the side rope and looking down, while another worked the crank.
Luthien crouched and nocked another arrow, but Oliver looked at him doubtfully, pointing to one side and then the other of the well-lit room. At least three tunnels came into this chamber at the floor level.
Luthien understood the halfling's concerns. This higher region of the complex was likely for the guards, and those three tunnels, and the one Luthien and Oliver had just come down, might quickly fill with cyclopians at the first sounds of battle.
But Luthien did not miss the significance of the crank. Those two ropes supported a platform, he figured, and once Shuglin and the other dwarf went down, they would be lost to him forever.
The cyclopian leaning over the hole nodded stupidly and called down. The brute was answered by another cyclopian, and then another, not far below the rim.
The first cyclopian jerked suddenly, then fell headlong into the hole. Four other cyclopians, seeing the arrow in their companion's back, looked across the room and up to the ledge, to see Luthien fire off another arrow, then take a rope from Oliver. The arrow skipped harmlessly off the cranking mechanism, but the cyclopian working it fell back and shrieked.
Oliver, his adhering grapnel set against the ceiling far out from the ledge, jumped onto Luthien's back and as soon as Luthien packed his folding bow away, the two swung down, crimson and purple capes billowing behind them. Luthien angled the jump toward the crank: the most important target, he figured.