Nothing to it, really 16
In which a battle happens and matters are resolved.
EDIT: tying up a last loose end and correcting a couple of minor inconsistencies and errors.
ברוך אתה ה' אלהינו, מלך העולם...
"That reads as Barukh ata Adonai Eloheinu, melekh ha'olam" Rivka said, tracing the words on the page from right-to-left with her finger. Ponder nodded comprehension.
"It's one of our oldest prayers. I'm only guessing, but I expect the author started with this prayer to sanctify the work and make it holy unto …"
She didn't voice any names, but pointed upward with a finger. She read on. Ponder, who could read Old Cenotian up to a point, had reasoned that having a native speaker available might add some extra information to the text of the old grimoire, a fifth-hand copy of the original book that he felt he could safely open to a non-wizard.
"It appears to be a set of instructions for writing the chem. The text that goes into the head of a golem and animates it. This is interesting!" the girl said.
"That's what I thought." Ponder Stibbons said, equally interested. He considered the implications. HEX could possibly take this and create golems. HEX was un-nervingly capable of many things. But he also understood Lord Vetinari would not be too pleased at any renewal of the ancient craft skills that made golems. Vetinari, with several thousand Umnian golems in his keeping, would take the view that the City had a sufficiency already. And the last time people had made a brand-new golem had been something of a disaster…. (1)
They read on together. Ponder decided to recommend to Ridcully that this newly discovered grimoire be safely lost again. The Librarian was good at creatively losing things. But just to be on the safe side, he decided to spend the time until Johanna returned reading and assimilating the book. Claude the butler discreetly announced that it was approaching eleven o'clock, sir. Perhaps the young ladies might care to consider retiring to bed? Madam may not be pleased to return and see them still up.
Ponder wished the others a very good night, and retired to his study to critique the Cenotian grimoire-cum-holy-book. On the surface, it seemed to deal with the adventures of a Prophet called Enoch.(2) But as a wizard, he recognised another magic-user had coded his learning into the pages. Enthralled, he read on, scribbling notes now and again, and completely failing to look out of the window.
Rivka and Mariella were sharing a big double bed in a guest room. They appreciated this. It meant a sort of cosy comfortable togetherness, a long way away from the noise and clamour of their dorm. After the attack at the sports field, neither girl had removed her throwing knives and the loaned pistol crossbows were close at hand.
"I really hope the dogs are alright." Rivka said. "Johanna's been gone for ages now."
Mariella agreed. Something was nagging at her head. It didn't feel right. She felt guilty she hadn't gone out with the dogs when they'd been let out into the garden. If her leg had not been injured, she would have done.
"It's strange that sickness should have come on so quickly. I'm sure it wasn't something they ate here. Johanna gets her dogfood from Grace Speaker's. The best."
"One of those weird plants in the garden, do you think?" Rivka asked. Mariella shook her head.
"No. Doctor Bellamy specifically chose plents thet do not poison or harm dogs. She knows whet she is doing with plents."
They turned over the possibilities together. Then the same appalling thought struck both girls almost at once.
"Do you remember the lesson in dealing with guard dogs? When were were told a good way to deal with big attack dogs is to poison them? You do it at the last possible moment before you make the approach to the target so as not to alert them. Give it long enough for the poison to take affect…."
Mariella sat upright, in horror.
"Johanna may not have realised this! She loves those dogs! Her first thought would be to heal them!"
Mariella was already out of bed and hobbling painfully towards the disused and blocked fireplace at one end of the room. Heating was now done by radiators fed from a boiler in the cellar. She knew the redundant chimney flues were used by the goblins to get to and from the clacks tower on the roof; every fireplace now had a goblin-sized door in the side. She opened this one and called, urgently.
"Wimowe! Wimowe! We need you!"
She heard a distant scuttling. Then the smell of goblin heralded his arrival.
"What so important, Red Vixen Cub?" the goblin demanded, tetchily. Mariella reflected that goblins needed sleep too.
"Wimowe. We're going to be ettecked here. Tonight. You must clecks the Guild. End the Watch. The dogs were poisoned to get them out of the way. Thet means en etteck is on the way. Here, tonight!"
The goblin looked thoughtful for a second, then nodded and disappeared.
There was a lot of chattering in the goblin language. She heard the vibrations of feet going up a ladder. She smelt passing goblins. That was unmistakeable. Behind her, Rivka was putting on her boots and buckling a belt over her nightdress, tucking the pistol crossbows through it. She passed Mariella her slippers and a belt and urged her to hurry.
"If we can get downstairs, we can get swords. Weapons. A belt is useful." she urged. Mariella nodded agreement. The Guild taught that if necessary, if surprised and needing to dress quickly, grab boots to protect your feet, and weapons. Clothes were not as important.
They heard the distant clattering of the clacks tower. And then goblins were screaming in fright and alarm. There were the sounds of running feet, a distant scream, quickly cut off, and the noise of a door crashing open. Then the world changed.
Julian and Ruth had also settled down into bed. Appreciating each other and enjoying a place where they could be together, he was in a happy semi-doze. But Ruth was restless.
"Something isn't right." she said. "I can feel it."
Julian felt her disentangle from him and get out of bed.
"Hmmmph?" he asked, half-asleep.
"One of my half-brothers described a time out patrolling the border. He said he thought things weren't right and the night felt wrong. Then your bloody lot pulled a night ambush." she said. "I felt this myself, on a night when a pack of hyenas were on the other side of the kraal wall. You know. Sizing up the buffalo pens. Sense of menace. Oppression..."
She opened the window slightly. Julian heard a distant noise, as if somebody was trying to move heavy things silently but hadn't quite managed it. It sounded like a double thump, of something dropping into vegetation, a very soft muted slam. He sat up.
Ruth gasped. Then she ran to where she'd left her weapons and picked up two pistol crossbows. Julian distractedly took in the sight of a naked dark-skinned girl focusing on selecting her target. It was, he thought, a distraction. Then he realised the significance of what was going on and leapt out of bed, groping for his britches.
Ruth took a shot. There was a scream from below, which became a sudden strangled gurgle. She aimed and fired with the other crossbow.
"Missed. Damn." she said, laconically, and stepped out of line of sight to reload. A single crossbow bolt thudded into the window jamb inches from where she had been. A second and third followed.
"At least get some boots on." she said to Julian. "And for goodness sake, grab your bloody sword!"
Ruth dropped to all fours as more crossbow bolts came back at her. One shattered the glass of the window and embedded itself in the ceiling. Coming up on the opposite side of the window, Ruth snapped off two more shots. There was another scream. She ducked out of sight again.
"I counted at least fifteen men. Maybe more. Attacking this house." Ruth said, calmly.
In the distance, voices were shrieking "Alarm! Alarm! Under attack!"
She recognised Rivka bin-Divorah.
Got to get those girls out." she muttered, pulling her boots on.
"Err, Ruth. Clothes?" Julian prompted her. She smiled, slightly. Ruth dragged on the long baggy-legged knickers she'd been wearing, pulling them on over her boots, he noticed. They were incongruously frilly.
"Thanks, Julian. Can't go into battle completely naked. It's taboo. Bad muti." she said. She buckled her Assassin weapons belt around her and they went to the door. They heard the crash of the front door being smashed down, and feet clattering in, and the shouts and roars.
"Ready?" she said at the door. "One, two, three…"
And then she ululated a Zulu battle cry. Once again, Julian was grateful this Zulu was fighting on the same side as him. Ruth waited as rushing feet crashed by. Then as somebody tried the door, she nodded at Julian, and opened it…
Claude the butler had supervised clearing up after dinner. Finally everything had been cleared up and Dorothea had supervised washing-up and cleaning the kitchen to her satisfaction. The servants had retired to their beds, but Claude was aware the Professor was working late in his study, which had a door that backed onto the living room. Besides, Madam was not yet home after the emergency with the dogs. He would need to be up to welcome her on her return and to ensure any comforts she required would be provided. He also knew that with Madam away, the Professor tended to gravitate to working into the small hours of the morning, as he understood the Professor had been accustomed to do at the University. Madam tended to strongly discourage this, if she were there. But tonight she was not here to remind her husband that it was getting late.
Claude sighed, resignedly. He might be called upon to summon the duty goblin and clacks an order for delivery of fast food, perhaps the white person's strange delicacy called pizza. None of the servants understood why a rich white master should even contemplate this, a mess of poor meats and bad cheese on soggy dough, with so many better foods to choose from.
He reached for the wine bottle he had secreted away when clearing up. It was a shame the Master and his guests had left it half-empty. But no matter. It was a recognised butlerian perk, his mentor Mr Willikins had said. Claude poured himself a glass. A Barossa valley spatzendreck, a good vintage. Madam had once said her father was from the Barossa river country and had moved Hubwards.
He frowned as the Professor's wizarding staff began, of its own accord, to shift and rattle in its mountings. He was not unduly perturbed by this. He understood it to be a larger version of the pointing-bone, used by witch-doctors in his own society.
"You. Behave!" he said to the staff, and took an end-of-day drink.
And then he heard the shouting and the screams. He went to the door and looked into the corridor. To see the front door beginning to explode inwards under the impact of heavy blows.
Claude thought quickly, and retreated into the room. He selected the right key and locked the corridor door. Then he wedged a heavy chair under the door handle and swiftly set about arming himself. Better the intruders not have access to Madam's weapon collection in this room.
Without haste, he unlocked the armoury chest, selecting crossbow bolts, looking for something else he knew Madam kept in there. With a grim smile, he threw a handful of caltrops down in front of the door. If they broke this door down, they'd have a surprise underfoot. He reasoned that Captain Smith-Rhodes and Her Royal Highness would not be caught by surprise and would defend the young ladies upstairs. Her Royal Highness. Hah. Claude, who was not a Zulu and came from a tribe that had differences going back centuries with the Zulu Empire, shook his head. The Princess could fend for herself. She was trained to. He could focus on defending the Professor, who by marriage was a Smith-Rhodes, as well as his employer.
Claude heard a window smash behind him. He heard scrambling and indistinct shouting. He turned, realising they must also have broken in through the Professor's study window. Attacked on two sides. This would not do. He knew the heavy door on this side was securely barred. His duty was now clearly to the Professor. Holding the bayonetted crossbow in the crook of his arm and a jungle machete in the other hand, he grinned and took a step towards the study. Mr Willikins had hinted this sort of thing would happen occasionally, and he had missed this since leaving the Army.
And then the wizarding staff rose vertically off its mounting, the knob on the end moved as if sniffing out a direction to move in, and it turned in the air before pointing towards the study door.
Realising, Claude opened the door, took in the scene, coughed discreetly, and said "Your Staff, sir." Then as the staff zoomed to its Wizard, he selected a target and fired.
Johanna accepted a cup of tea from Igorina. Something was telling her she ought to be home. She felt very tired, and her thought processes were glacially slow compared to usual.
Igorina looked at her sympathetically. She'd taken blood samples from both dogs and had very carefully purged their stomachs, a procedure that necessarily had to be done slowly and carefully on an unconscious subject. She had performed tests, consulted reference books, and at one point had given Johanna a long suspicious look as she tried to hide a new set of belly cramps.
"You're starting to have contractions, aren't you?" Igorina said, outright. Johanna nodded.
"Thought so." Igorina said. Waters not broken? No? Probably just precursors. You know, false alarms. But when the waters break, hospital. No. Arguing!"
Igorina went back to checking and testing samples. Then she whistled.
"Well, not poison or venom. You need to know this is a strong sedative drug. They'll both wake up in a day or so, as healthy as old, with muzzy heads. I've got semi-digested meat in the expelled stomach contents here, which seems to have been the means of entry into their systems."
Johanna sat up. The horrible implications belatedly registered with her.
Drugged meat.
"Somebody gave drugged meat to my dogs." She said. Igorina nodded.
"No other way."
And I was so anxious for my dogs that I didn't think…
"I need to get home." Johanna decided. "Fest. Igorina, cen you look efter them for me? Explain to eny of the girls who esk, thet they're going to be fine."
Reflexively, she checked her weapons. Igorina looked more disapproving than ever.
"If you think you're going out fighting…"
"In my condition. Yes. I know. But if I read this correctly, they're ettecking my home, Igorina!"
Igorina was about to say "So leave it to the other people who are guarding you…" and then the Duty Assassin was running down the stairs to find her. With a clacks flimsy. It was the message Mariella had shouted up the chimney to the goblins, more or less.
"My sister is not inclined to jump at shedows." she said. "Get a coach. A fest one. Does Lord Downey know this?"
"Fortunately, Doctor Smith-Rhodes, I do." Downey appeared, in dressing gown over pyjamas. "A coach is being made ready."
They rushed out of the Infirmary to the yard. Igorina shrugged. The dogs were sleeping and would wake with no ill-effects. Maybe not for twelve hours yet. She could safely leave them. She grabbed the ready black bag she took when she was called on to support field operations, and followed. Igors know when they will be needed.
The Duty Sergeant brought the clacks to Commander Vimes. He read it, frowned, and called for Angua. She read it too.
"Signed MSR." Vimes said. "The SR bit is Smith-Rhodes, yes. But the M?"
"Mariella, sir. The younger sister. I've met her. She's a steady kid. Not one to cry wolf or raise false alarms." Angua said.
Vimes grunted. He thought one Smith-Rhodes might be enough for any city. Having to get to grips with three, at the last count, was a new phenomenon.
"Alert the detail in Hope Square." he said. "Have them get round there and check. And Gods help the kid if this is a false alarm."
He considered. "Get a good coach. I'll go myself. You too, Angua."
The evening at the Bellamys, just down the road, had been a relaxed one. Not too far away from her own due date, Davinia Bellamy had been happy at Peter's suggestion that he order in a Ghatian takeaway dinner for everyone. Everyone included the detail of four Assassins, a rotating squad who used her address as a base to keep covert watch on Number Eighteen and to act as a rapid-response team if they were needed. They were a pleasant bunch, three fairly recent graduates led by a Senior Assassin with experience. All three recent graduates had been taught by Davinia and Johanna, and were pleased to be doing a service for old teachers they'd liked and respected.
Emmanuelle de Lapoignard had dropped by, flush with pleasure that her intermediaries had finally concluded the purchase of Four Spa Lane. She had brought fine sparkling wine to celebrate with her new neighbours.
As Tim and Martin were listening to tales of the Final Run from their guests, Emmanuelle did the courteous thing to her non-smoking hosts and went for a cigarette in the back garden. Here she spoke to the fourth member of the team, who was the duty sentry, watching and listening.
"Hard to tell with these high hedges." she said, apologetically. "But you can see the upstairs of Number Eighteen. Lights on. Looks like people are going to bed. No signs of alarm, perfectly normal. But listen."
They listened together. The sounds of the City filtered back to them, distant and muted. But something else was there too. It suggested people trying hard not to make a noise. Something expectant.
"Something's wrong." the sentry said. "But I can't figure out what."
Emmanuelle pinched out her cigarette. A lighted cigarette was highly visible at night. She sensed this might be wise.
They waited together, listening, using their senses, tasting the night.
And then the clacks tower on the top of Number Eighteen leapt into life, using the coloured lights the clacks employed by night. Emmanuelle was no expert, but she'd tried to learn some of the patterns. You never knew when the knowledge might be useful.
"Is it normal for them to send and receive at this time?" she asked.
The sentry-Assassin shook her head. Ninety percent of their traffic is to and from the University." She said. "But Arch-chancellor Ridcully sends most of that, and he tends to go to bed fairly early at nights."
She suddenly jerked her head up, startled. "I'm reading… Emergency. And that's Guild code for Alert!"
And then they heard the soft muted thuds and the sounds of a lot of men moving who were trying to stay quiet. Metal chinked. Then there were two screams in the night and the distant unmistakeable sound of crossbow bolts hitting wood…
"Turn out the guard!" Emmanuelle called. "Alert!"
Rivka could not lock the bedroom door. But she dragged a chair across the room and wedged it under the handle. She turned to Mariella.
"That is the best we can do. I'd need two of us to drag that chest of drawers over and, no offence, with your leg you're at most one-and-a-half."
"None taken." Mariella assured her.
A voice demanded they come out. Something large and heavy began hammering on the door.
"Crossbows first, I think." Mariella said. "Then throwing knives."
Rivka nodded assent.
"I counsel we each keep one knife back. For stabbing. Conceal it so they think they only see a frightened little girl. Sob. Say "don't hurt me!" Then when he's near enough, stab."
"A terrified little girlie." Mariella said. Rivka nodded.
"Me too. But what choice do we have?"
They stood back from the door, ready to shoot the first person to come through. They heard a distant ululating battle-cry. It sent a shiver through Mariella's ancestral memory.
"Miss N'Kweze." Rivka said, laconically. "She says silence is all well and good, but a good war-cry that says "I'm a Zulu and I've got a big spear!" really scares the other fellow."
"It scares me." Mariella agreed. Rivka smiled slightly.
"Well, yes. From a Zulu point of view, you're the sort of fellow she wants to scare. The bad neighbour over the river."
There was as noise from the goblin-door in the chimney stack. They turned. Wimowe was urgently beckoning them.
"Red Vixen-Cub! Girl-Prickly-As-Desert-Cactus!(3) This way! Hurry!"
"Girl-Prickly-As-Desert-Cactus?" Rivka demanded.
"You've got a Goblin name now." Mariella said, squeezing through the goblin door. It was a tight fit, but she made it. Rivka heard "It's a compliment!" in the muffled distance. She shrugged, and followed. A goblin closed the door behind them as men tried to smash down the door to an empty room.
Two goblins made it to the roof tower and began transmitting emergency messages. The rest of the house goblins conferred and ran to the kitchen. Looking out through the dark night, their night-adapted eyes saw part of the back garden hedge collapse downwards as large heavy planks of wood were dropped into place, crushing Davinia Bellamy's carefully selected inimical border plants beneath them. Men ran across the makeshift drawbridges, thus bypassing the first line of defence. They were armed.
The goblins looked at each other, then one opened a certain drawer and started passing out Dorothea's kitchen knives. The cook had flatly forbidden the goblins from even entering her domain. What she'd do if she found them stealing her knives and meat cleavers was potentially frightening.
But the oldest goblins, the ones who'd endured slavery in Howondaland, smelt Howondalandian in the cocktail of human smells drifting in from out there. Not just any Howondalandian. At least one of their former slave masters was out there. That was more frightening than an enraged Dorothea.
Several goblins slipped quickly out of the kitchen door to hide and await a moment. Others vanished, now armed, into the network of chimney flues.
Ponder Stibbons realised he was no hero. He cheerfully admitted this. Even though his courtship and marriage to Johanna had led him, often unwillingly, into several bowel-clenchingly frightening places at her side.
As the study window exploded inwards in a shower of wood and glass shards, he returned to the everyday world from his rapt study of the Old Cenotian grimoire. Watching first two heavy-set thugs, and then the man he recognised from the iconographs as Benckel, climbing in through the window, he sat, frozen with terror.
Benckel whistled with surprise as he recognised Ponder. His henchmen sniggered with malice.
"You, wizard-boy? I thought we hed killed you thet night et the fectory."
Ponder realised now he was no hero. He'd never wanted to be one. Otherwise he'd have said something laconic like "I'm hard to kill." and fired a ready spell. But he had no ready spells. Even though a part of his mind was racing and trying to think of one.
"You got an innocent man who just happened to look like me." he said. Then anger surged. He remembered Anthony Theopracticus. "You bastards."
Benckel grinned.
"Exectly correct." he said. "besterd by birth, besterd by inclination."
He raised his crossbow. Then decided to be sadistic, and pretended to contemplate the machete in his other hand.
"Crossbow bolt or blade, wizard-boy? You decide which kills you."
Then Ponder spoke a spell. There was an octarine flash. The hench-thugs dived for cover. Benckel looked down at the bouquet of roses in his right hand and scowled.
"Thet wes a good crossbow, wizard-boy! You'd better bleddy change it beck!"
Ponder winced. Why did all spells, when you wanted one in a hurry, seem to default to Eryngeas' Surprising Bouquet?
Then he heard Claude cough discreetly.
"Your Staff, sir."
Ponder, amazed, watched his staff shoot into the room. It appeared to somehow be aware, diverting its course in mid-air to wallop one of the grinning thugs across the head. Then it flew to Ponder's hand as the henchthug grunted and dropped. At the same time, there was the snap of a discharging crossbow and the second henchthug staggered, a look of surprise on his face and a crossbow bolt in his heart. Red started to blossom on his chest.
A wizard's staff will always seek to defend its owner…
Ponder stood.
"Riggght!" he said, angry. He was now in touch with the reservoir of spells represented by his staff. Primal wizard-thoughts surged through him. Now he could zap! A little part of his brain realised that the old-time Wizards must have thought like this all the time. He grinned and tipped the metaphorical pointy hat to them. Henry Dean and Ridcully would have expressed pride.
Benckel looked from angry wizard to resolute armed butler. He dropped the flowers, grabbed a crossbow from the dead henchman, and leapt back out of the window just as Claude finished reloading.
"This is not over, wizard-boy!" he called from the dark.
Claude coughed again.
"I earnestly recommend that Sir retreats to the living room." he said. "That is a defensible position. I have made it so."
Ponder fired a stream of zapping energy out into the night through the shattered window. There was a regrettable lack of agonised screaming. But he grinned and followed. He was a wizard defending his version of the high tower. His home, his wife, her sister, his unborn child. That gave him a right to zap things.
DuPlessis noted, without undue surprise, that two of the meat-shields hadn't even made it to the house. But that was what they were there for. To be expendable. Two less to pay fifty dollars each to, afterwards. As the front door caved in, he stood to one side and bellowed to the meat-shields to move on. They'd take the first shots back, and leave the four important members of the party unscathed. He was aware the target kept weapons in her main room, some sort of display. They'd be useful if they could get to them. Deny anyone in the house the chance to arm up. He was annoyed to find the door locked and barred, and left deKoenig in charge of some of the meat-shields to try to knock it down. Reasoning the target would be upstairs in bed, he urged more of the meat-shields upstairs, he and Ouistrehaam following on behind. They kicked on doors, ignoring empty rooms. One door gave slightly, indicating it was occupied and had been barricaded. He shouted for the occupants to give themselves up and lied that they would not be harmed.
"We've got to hurry!" a meat-shield said, agitated. "Didn't you see their clacks tower was working? Sending messages?"
The clacks did not exist in Rimwards Howondaland. But duPlessis saw the point. He took two of the meat-shields and ran on, looking for the upper stairway, a way to the roof. As they found a stair to the upper floor, the servants' quarters, he heard the one sound that made his bowels knot in fear. A Zulu battle cry. He'd fought those fierce evil bastards. They terrified him, though he would not admit it. A door burst open and a terrible apparition emerged, a Zulu woman naked except for long frilly white bloomers. The absurdity of it didn't register as much as the sword in one hand and a crossbow in the other. Behind her, a well-built red haired man, naked to the waist, but also sword-armed. He scowled. The Smith-Rhodes bastard. So he's porking the kaffir girl.
They met the meat-shields head-on. DuPlessis did not stop to watch the fight, nor did he intervene. He urged his meat-shields on up the stairs. That tower had to be destroyed. And those verdammte goblins who operated it. Wherever they were hiding, cowardly little filth.
DuPlessis completely failed to see that two more meat-shields, the last two, never made it to the house. As they ran to the door, goblins armed with Dorothea's kitchen-implements got them, without fuss and with little chatter, from behind. It was fairly quick.
At first, Julian made to chase duPlessis and his two thugs. Ruth grabbed his arm.
"If the servants have any sense, they'll lock themselves in their rooms." she said, urgently. "Concentrate on these."
She fired both crossbows into the first of the thugs rushing up the stairs. Both bolts hit, slowing the rush. Then she screamed a war-song and leapt forward, dropping the spent bows and raising her sword. Julian leapt after her, exploiting the confusion of men whose brains were fused by the mixed signals sent out by a near-naked woman carrying a long sharp sword. Only two men at a time could come after them. Julian made things more confused for them by punching an attacker in the face with the hilt of his sword, sending him staggering back down the stairs, sending other men flying with him. He ducked a random crossbow bolt, hearing an angry Howondalandian-accented voice urging them on. He scowled. He had the dead men at the Embassy to avenge. They waited for the attackers to come again, dodging a random and badly aimed crossbow bolt. Ruth tossed him a pistol crossbow. She had reloaded both weapons quickly.
"Save it for anyone you spot with a crossbow." she said.
And then there was a massive explosion downstairs.
Mariella remembered little of the mad scramble down the chimney flues, guided by the goblin Wimowe. Soot and scabs of old fires rubbed and flaked off onto her skin. She tried to move down ladders designed for goblins with only her good foot, trying to ease her damaged leg. For a moment she felt concerned about the rapidly blackening nightgown rucking immodestly up about her waist, then shrugged. Who was there to see, other than goblins? She reflected that the Guild of Chimney Sweeps used children of her own age and less to manually clean chimneys. These old stacks and flues had been designed for them. Therefore she had no fear of being trapped in there. She swore luridly (4) as one of the pistol crossbows fell from her belt and rattled off somewhere, bouncing away in the dark, lost to her. how am I going to explain that to Johanna? she asked herself. It's her weapon. On loan. (5)
And then there was light and another goblin door was opening. Wimowe made an ironic bow and ushered her out. Claude the butler turned and regarded her with mild surprise. He and Ponder had overturned the big table, tipping it on its side to act as a makeshift palisade. Goblins were loading crossbows for them. Mariella noticed the panels of the door creaking and splitting under heavy battering.
"Ah, Young Madam." he said. "And Miss bin-Divorah. May I suggest the young ladies arm themselves with weapons of their choice?"
His free arm took in the walls. There were lots of weapons to choose from. Mariella patted down her now grimy nightdress for modesty's sake and appraised the selection.
Women were screaming in the servants' quarters. DuPlessis decided the kaffirs could wait. There were two younger women the surviving meatshields could have, as a perk. But not yet. He let them lead the way. Then an impossibly tiny door opened. What looked like a sharp butcher's knife tied to a mop handle stabbed out. It took the leading meatshield in the leg. He screamed in pain and surprise and fell.
DuPlessis leapt over his body and chopped down at the mop handle in passing. It split halfway through and was quickly withdrawn. He kicked the door shut. But at the end of the corridor, a ladder bolted to the wall led to a skylight. He made the other meatshield climb it first. Then when nothing happened to the hired help, he followed, feeling night air on his face.
As the living room door crumbled under the battering, holes began appearing in the panels. Rivka bin-Divorah stepped carefully forward, avoiding the caltrops underfoot. She fired through one of the holes. There was a scream of surprise and the battering briefly stopped. She fired again. She heard the thump of bolt hitting flesh. Then she stood back to reload.
A voice was heard to shout "Where the Hell is Benckel? We could use one of his little toys here!" It had a Howondalandian accent.
Mariella remembered Benckel was the one who did bombs. If he was here and had explosive devices, this was not good. A bomb thrown in the room could kill them all.
"A bomb?" Ponder growled. She reflected he was being uncharacteristically pugnacious. A wizard, angry and holding a fizzing staff. Her Assassin teaching said this was not a good thing, whichever side you were on. She urgently gestured for Rivka to find cover and ducked behind the sturdy oak table.
"I'll show them a bloody explosion!"
Rivka, realising, leapt behind the table. She, Claude and Mariella ducked as low as they could get. Dry, old, words were spoken. Then there was a massive, octarine-tinged explosion. Bits of door, door frame and wall went everywhere.
She heard Ponder say, in a cold angry voice,
"This house is mine. Well, half-mine. If anyone's blowing a bloody door off in my house, it's going to be me!"
"Well done, sir." Claude said. "But I fear if you were only going to blow the bloody door off, you over-did it somewhat." (6)
In the corridor, de Koenig was bullying and pushing his dazed henchmen forward to enter the room through what was now an overly large hole in the wall. Part of the ceiling sagged. Plaster dust filled the air.
The first meatshields through the door were hit by a volley of crossbow bolts. The caltrops were a courtesy detail. Then it was hand-to-hand fighting. Claude diligently tried to put his body between the attackers and the girls. But the biggest and most brutal looking went for Mariella.
"Still not dead, girlie?" he demanded. "I'll fix thet!"
Mariella hardly had time for a contemptuous "Voetsaak!" before he was on her. And all she had to fight back with was a throwing knife. She ducked and dodged as best as her wounded leg would allow. But the traitorous leg collapsed under her. She could feel new pain and the wound breaking open into fresh blood. She fell on her back and rolled and dodged the wildly swinging machete. Her arm groped for something she could use to pull herself upright. She found it: it felt like a pole of some sort. Grabbing it to raise herself, it came away from the wall and sent her sprawling again. Desperately, she rolled to evade the blade and for want of anything better, pushed the pole at the big man to ward him off. There was a light of vicious triumph in his eyes as he raided his blade. And then it died and faded into surprised agony as the cavalry lance she was holding hit him in the chest. Mariella thrust it upwards with desperate last-resort strength.
And de Koenig, the man who had a stated preference for young pale redheads, slid down the length of the lance that was now sticking right through his chest. Mariella closed her eyes. She really didn't need to see the pennant on the end had also gone right through his body. It might have been yellow-over-blue. But now it flopped a damp red. It dripped.
And then the full weight of the man's body landed on her. It hurt. Mariella's last thought before sinking into unconsciousness was It could be worse. He could still have been alive before getting on top of me. To do… ag!
The dwindling band of men on the stairs retreated backwards as Ruth and Julian fought them down. They could see now the hole in the wall where the living room door had been. Dust and grit filled the air. A man backed out of the living room, his nerve evidently gone, and ran out of the front door. Several of the men on the stairs joined the rout. But an agonised scream from outside brought them up short. Then they paled, as a round football sized object was contemptuously thrown into the hall. It was the head of the man who had tried to run. Julian winced. He knew goblins did not mess about when they were angry.
He heard running feet in the corridor beneath. One of them was evidently trying a different escape route. He did not recognise any of the men he saw as being from the core Howondalandian gang. But it was almost over. Without the Howondalandians to drive them on and no means of escape, the hired thugs were throwing down their weapons and surrendering. Which only left….
(1) See, of course, Feet of Clay by Sir Terry Pratchett.
(2) I know. The lost book of the Bible again. Can't leave it alone. Maybe this is where Aziraphile sent the only extant copy for safekeeping, hiding it in a magical library on a completely different planet. If confused, see my Good Omens fic I Shall Endure to The End. I have an origin story for the Cenotines. Their legend says that G-D turned his back on them and allowed a rapacious enemy to conquer their lost land of Israel. The Twelve Tribes were deported to a place called Babylon, where there was much lamentation at the water's edge. The King of Babylon finally relented and allowed them to return. But ten of the Twelve Tribes drop out of the story at this point. The Bible does not refer to them again. Much speculation has been made and much theological ink spilt concerning where they went to. Whole religions have been born out of the legend of Ten Lost Tribes. What if… a relative of the Witch of Endor, a Naomi Ogg, perhaps, led at least one of those tribes to a new world entirely, a place with a nice familiar Israel-like country called Cenotia… if any Jewish readers want to advise me on the good taste or otherwise of this idea, please PM me.
(3) The literal meaning of the Hebrew word "sabra", connoting fierce fighter. A "sabra" is apparently a sort of edible cactus found in the Negev. Israelis joke that it's hard and spiky on the outside but deceptively soft and sweet on the inside. It's getting past the pineapple again.
(4) Another characteristic of Smith-Rhodes women when irritated, stressed out or needing to vent. Vondalaans/Afrikaans is a most expressive language for cussing in.
(5) Later, Mariella steeled herself to confess to her sister that she'd negligiently mislaid an expensive precision weapon. Then Wimowe the goblin presented it back to her with the words "You're welcome, Red Vixen-Cub, Red-Of-Hair-and-Spear". Mariella realised it had fallen into the goblins' lair in the cellar and been retrieved there. And that she now had the extra honorific part of her goblin name to go with the physical description. She felt honoured. and relieved.
(6) I know. Michael Caine in "The Italian Job". Couldn't resist.