I don’t have a chance to take it in, even to catch my breath, before I’m scooped up in a pair of strong arms. A little squeak of either protest or terror escapes my lips, but I can do nothing more than cling to Valtar’s neck, staring over his shoulder at the roiling mass of monster on the floor. He carries me as though I weigh no more than a twig, bounding to a set of nearly hidden stairs and scaling them in a few great leaps. By the time I realize what’s happening, he’s deposited me in a chair beside anabandoned lute. The gallery—he’s carried me to the musicians’ gallery.
Valtar tries the door in the back wall, which should, theoretically, offer an escape. “Locked,” he snarls, teeth flashing. Down below, shouts echo to the ceiling, joining in hideous chorus with the grating screams of the votyr. He whirls to me. Light filters through the gallery screen, dotting his face in a diamond pattern. “Stay here,” he says. “Stay quiet. Let me deal with this.”
“Wait!” I demand, holding out my hand. “Give me one of your knives.”
He hesitates, brow tightening.
“Don’t you dare leave me up here like a sitting duck!” I beckon with my fingers. “Give me means to defend myself at least.”
Wordless, he bends and slips a dagger from his boot. Because of course he has a dagger in his boot. He probably has another in his knickers and a third tucked behind one ear. “Here,” he says, flipping it round to offer me the hilt. “Try not to cut yourself, Princess.”
I start to snarl a response, but he has already pushed aside part of the screen and leapt out from the balcony into midair. Open-mouthed, I stare through the opening at the horrible scene below. One of the demons has Prince Taigan pinned to the ground under its heavy hand and is just opening wide its mouth to bite his face clean off. Valtar lands squarely on its back, wrapping his arms around its neck. It rears back, allowing Taigan a chance to scramble free. Another flash of steel, and I see Valtar go for the creature’s throat. But this beast is both stronger and wilier than Prince Joro. It twists its muscular torso viciously, wing-arms flapping, and manages to loosen Valtar’s grip. I watch him struggle to regain his hold, but the votyr wrenches to theopposite side so abruptly, his balance is completely broken. He falls, hits the stone floor, stunned.
“Valtar!” I scream. I don’t mean to—a shock of pure terror ripples through my senses and erupts from my lips in that cry. Too late to take it back.
The demon bat, its attention caught, lifts its awful face from Valtar to me in the balcony above. Its eyes are practically useless, but its enormous ears vibrate delicately, aware of my every movement and breath. That awful mouth opens wide in a hungry cry as it leaps from the floor and begins to climb the wall straight up to where I stand, trapped in this small space.
I have moments in which to act.
First, I yank the screen shut once more. It’s not much of a barrier, but it might give me an extra breath or two. Then, still gripping Valtar’s dagger in one hand, I reach for the nearestscintilglobe, a small glass orb meant to illuminate sheet music. Ignoring the blistering heat in the palm of my hand, I catch it up, draw it back, and in the same instant the votyr rips the screen barrier away, send it hurtling, a shining missile of magicked light.
My aim is good. I always did have a strong arm. Back at Gartsworth, I was known for my skills at the apple shy, a Harvest Feast tradition in which competitors sought to take out scarecrow targets dressed up to look like dracori warriors. One year, my apple took a scarecrow’s head clean off, and I won myself a barrel of apple ale to carry home as a prize.
This shot is probably not as true. But it’s close. It strikes the demon square in its pushed-in, slitted nose and bursts in a shattering cascade of glass and splintering beams of light. The bat beast rears back, screaming, and nearly loses its grip on the balcony rail.
I take the opportunity to dart for the stairs. I can’t stay here, trapped in this confined space; I’ve a better chance out among the champions. So, gathering up armfuls of skirts, I rush for the little doorway and all but fall down the flight of stairs to the floor below before the votyr has realized I’ve gone. Head spinning, vision blurring, I stare out across the floor to where Valtar lies, unmoving. Oh gods, did he crack his skull open on the floor? I fling myself across the open space, his name quavering on my lips as I drop to my knees beside him. “Valtar! Valtar, please!” I cry, grabbing the front of his tunic.
He stirs. His eyelids flutter.
Then something heavy shudders the ground. A gray-and-brown form looms before me, dragging my gaze up from Valtar into the leering jaws of a roaring demon. Still scattering bits of broken glass, it bellows a rotten blast of air straight into my face, then lunges, awful teeth snapping with bloodlust. I scream and fling up my hand, which still grips the dagger, trying to put that narrow slip of blade between us.
A heavy blow thuds, and the votyr staggers to one side. Another figure appears before my addled vision. He grips a metal stake in both hands, a chain and ascintilglobe dangling from the far end. He must have ripped it straight from the wall! The light from thatscintililluminates the fixed stare and rigid features of Learned Majestic Rune.
The demon lunges, and he strikes it across the face with the stake. But though his blow lands, the demon does not stop rushing him. Rune is obliged to drop his weapon and dart to one side. A graceful, nimble maneuver that I don’t quite follow, and he gets behind the monster and wraps his arms around its neck in a choke hold. The votyr screeches and flails its enormouswing-arms, struggling to shake him off, but Rune’s grip is strong. He won’t be shaken free; he’ll strangle the beast, and—
A second demon grabs Rune in its jaws and yanks him off the back of its fellow beast. A cry of shock, of pain, bursts from Rune’s lips, then cuts off abruptly with a sickening crunch.
The votyr drops him to the floor, a limp bundle of bones, flesh, and blood. So much blood.
“No!” I cry, and try to go to him. An enormous hand closes around my back, clawed fingers pinching into my rib cage. Were it not for the boned corset wrapping my torso, those claws would pierce straight through me. The votyr lifts me off my feet, turning me to look at it, to stare into those blind, beady eyes. Its mouth opens, jaw dropping far wider than I ever would have believed possible.
Moving on impulse rather than thought, I throw up one hand, the same hand which grips the knife Valtar gave me. The blade pierces the top of the demon’s palate. Blood spurts down my wrist and arm. Shrieking with surprise, the monster drops me like a velvet sack of potatoes. I roll, desperate to put whatever distance I can between me and it, but my enormous skirts wrap around my legs. Trapped, I push up onto my elbows and stare at the demon. It spits the dagger out of its mouth, then rounds on me. Muscles rippling, it crawls toward me, jointed and awful and inescapable. I scream again, flinging an arm up in defense.
Suddenly, Valtar is there. He appears like magic between me and the demon. Blood oozes in a stream through his black hair, but he braces himself, and, when the votyr swipes at him with its claws, he lashes back, cutting the beast across the arm. The demon roars and goes for him again, but Valtar lunges, plunging his blade deep into its shoulder.
Staggering back, the monster shakes its hideous muzzle, lips curled to reveal every jutting tooth. Then it throws back its head, a roar erupting from its chest, too enraged in that instant to do anything but give voice to its madness. A mistake—the last mistake it will ever make.
A whistle of steel. A sick crunch of breaking bone.
The demon’s head falls from its shoulders and rolls across the floor.
The body stands a moment longer before crumpling in on itself in a bursting cloud of black miasma, disintegrating back to the realm of its origin. When the debris clears, Elis stands before me, King Alderin’s sword gripped in his hands.
Blood thuds in my temples, drowning out the sounds around me. I turn to stare about the hall in time to see Taigan skewering one bat monster with what looks like a carving knife taken from the banquet table. It shrieks and flees the hall, escaping into the dark passage beyond the open doors. Warrick has another votyr wrestled to the ground. He holds it in place while Elis strides forward and plunges the sword into its chest. Like the first, it too disintegrates in a cloud of darkness. The other two demons are gone as well; whether escaped or slain, I do not know.
The hall is empty of all save us—me, my four living champions, and the broken body of Rune lying close by.
I look up at Valtar, who stands nearest to me. He is panting hard and does not meet my gaze. So I turn to Elis. He shakes his head, spinning slowly in place. “Where the gods-rutting helliseveryone?” he demands.
