The Broken Eye(293)

The Nuqaba began shrieking, and Orholam forgive them, many in the audience laughed.

Karris didn’t care. She moved to Gavin quickly and cut him free as the Tafok Amagez stood around, baffled.

Oh, Orholam. Gavin’s face. His face!

“Gavin,” she said, “we have to run. Can you—”

“I won’t let you down,” he said, but when he stood, he almost collapsed. He put his left hand up to his face, and two of his fingers were gone. Those fucking animals.

But what mattered now was that Gavin was in no shape to fight.

Karris steadied him. Around her, the Tafok Amagez looked uncertain as to what they should be doing. She had won a trial that their Nuqaba had established, so they should let her go, but then, she’d also thrown the head of one of their leaders into the Nuqaba’s lap, so, should they arrest her? Could they, after what she’d just done?

There was no point in waiting to find out what they decided.

But just then, one of the hippodrome guards ran to the steps of the spina. “It is Gavin Guile!” he shouted. “I recognize him from the old days! They dyed his hair and dirtied his face, but he is Gavin Guile!”

Karris veritably pulled Gavin down the steps, and the soldier fell in with them, desperately signaling to other Guile family troops to join them.

“Kill them!” the Nuqaba shrieked suddenly. “Kill them both!” Karris shot a look over at her. She was covered with blood. More blood than you’d think would leak out of a man’s severed head. She’d smeared it somehow on her face.

“No! Ignore that order!” Eirene Malargos shouted. “You’re not in your right mind, Haruru!”

“Kill them!” the Nuqaba shouted. “Block the exits! That’s an order!”

“That’s an act of war! I forbid it!” Eirene Malargos shouted.

Chaos.

“This way!” the Guile soldier said.

He unlocked a door set at the level of the sand. They stepped through and he closed it behind them, locking it.

“Captain Eutheos, you son of a bitch,” Gavin said. “I thought I ordered you out of here.”

“Wasn’t much good at orders at Blood Ridge either, my lord.”

Gavin laughed briefly at some shared memory, then cut off abruptly, as if anything that made his face move spawned such pain that it nearly felled him.

“I can get us to an exit, but they’ll get there faster,” the soldier said.

“There has to be some kind of service exit,” Karris said.

“First thing they’ll think of,” Gavin said. And he was right. Dammit.

“Can you get us to the top tier, west side?” Karris asked.

“Absolutely.”

And he did. They dodged through corridors where only servants and slaves went, and crossed halls clogged with spectators eager to get out—the sight of men drawing swords and pistols and drafting and ready to kill anyone who opposed them did crazy things to people. Other people, who’d been outside the hippodrome and heard that amazing things were happening within were pushing to get in, creating vast snarls. One musket shot and this was going to turn into a stampede.

The Guile soldiers manning the exits were shouting, trying to bring order, but they were confused themselves. Were the Tafok Amagez now the enemy? Or were they still friends who should be helped? What had happened inside?

Gavin collapsed several times, apologizing each time. Karris and Eutheos ended up each taking a shoulder—another thing that being short made her ill-suited for. He was shockingly light.

But in minutes they made it to the arch where Karris had entered. She poked her head out over the drop.

Oh my.

But there was Ironfist. At the sight of her, he grinned big.

When Gavin poked his own head out, Ironfist’s grin slipped. Gavin’s eye was still bleeding. But Gavin smiled, delighted to see the big man.

“Are you going to make your own way down, Lord Prism?” Ironfist asked.

Gavin jerked back and turned. “Company coming,” he said.

Karris saw five Tafok Amagez running up the stairs she’d run down not fifteen minutes ago. These upper decks had cleared out. They definitely saw them.

“Afraid not,” Gavin said, quickly poking his head back out. “What’s the plan? Quickly.” He looked out at the river. It was a long way away, and a long way down. “Oh no, tell me that’s not the plan.”

“That’s it,” Karris said. “Captain, thank you. Now get the hell out of here. Five count, Gavin. Commander, I’ll come five after Gavin.”

Gavin had already backed up. He wobbled, but gathered himself. Eutheos steadied him. “Go, Captain, and bless you.”

Karris stood at the edge so both of them could see her. “One, two, three, four, five.” And Gavin leapt, right in front of her.