Luck Of The Wheels

'Perhaps.' It was the older man's voice conceding that, placatingly. 'But in any case, it's too late to worry about it. It's done. We have to go on with whatever tools we have. It's too late to change the whole plan.'

'It's never too late for caution. I think we should try a whole different approach. An ambush of the Duke's party ...'

'No.' The older man again. 'It's too late for a sudden change like that. We'll never get an opportunity like this again. Everything is in place. In two days the Duke will be here for the festival. The plans of Masterhold have fallen to us. When he goes down, our friends move on Masterhold. It falls to the Duchess.' The man paused. His voice became graver. 'But only if the Duke falls. We have two days to re-establish contact with our inside friend. Two days to get this man on his feet and convince him of the justice of our cause. Two days to show him there is only one way to redeem his honor.'

'Redeem his honor?' A youth's voice, angry and incredulous. 'He has none. You won't reach him that way, Lacey, with talk of honor and right. Say rather that we have two days to convince him that he can do what we say and depart with coins, or die.'

The older voice again. 'He doesn't look like a man who greatly fears death. I do not think he will be swayed by threats. I think we must appeal to his sense of justice ...'

'It would be a further waste of time to do so, and we have little enough as it is,' a woman broke in. 'No, Lacey. I've another way, one I've already set in motion, one that ...'

'Willow,' Vandien gasped, finally placing the voice.

He watched the heads turn to him. Willow's eyes were flat, and she was dressed in a severe robe that was the color of parched grasslands. Hatred burned in her, but did not illuminate her. She cloaked it from all but him, and he felt it strike and burn into him like a pitch arrow. His eyes met Willow's and he knew he was looking at his death. The coldness of that death washed over him suddenly, and he gave himself up to it.

'Get up.'

Vandien opened his eyes. 'Me?' His voice was thick; his tongue wanted to stick to the roof of his mouth.

'Who else?' The speaker was a young man with a tangle of blond hair and grey, almost colorless eyes. His sullen frown looked vaguely familiar. Vandien thought perhaps he had been one of the onlookers when he fought Kellich. Kellich. He winced from the memory and started to close his eyes. The youth kicked the edge of his bed, sending a painful jolt from the back of his skull throughout his whole body. 'Don't close your eyes when I'm talking to you, damn you! Get up!'

He got up, moving faster than either he or the startled youth had believed he could. He paid for it in acid pain that exploded from his skull and drenched his body, but it fueled his sudden anger, and he found his hands about the boy's throat, heard the back of the boy's head bounce off the rough wall. 'Please!' theboy gasped, scrabbling at Vandien's wrists.

'Please what?' he asked savagely. He found himself fully awake, totally confused but angry. He cha

'Please ... let me ... go! Please!'

Vandien was still deciding when he felt the knife prod his lower back. 'Let him down,' a voice suggested pleasantly. An older, mature voice. The leader. The conversation he had dreamed suddenly came back to him. But there were still gaps in his recent memory and they angered him. Other people were entering the room.

'I could break his neck before you killed me,' he observed.

'Then there would be two of you dead, and nothing achieved by it. Why not let him down and hear what I have to say before you kill anyone?'

Vandien stared into the boy's face. Terror stared back at him. The unfocused anger he felt was like a fog around him, driving him to violence. He wanted to hurt someone, to make someone pay for the pain and confusion he was experiencing.

'Come now.' The warmth of the man's voice was like a friendly hand on his shoulder. 'You're overwrought, man. Don't do a foolish thing on an impulse. You've done too many foolish things lately.' He felt the pressure of the knife ease.

'I want to know what's going on,' Vandien said harshly. 'I want to know how I got here. I want to know ...' He stopped himself before he mentioned Ki and his need to know where and how she was. If they did not know of her, he wouldn't drag her into his trouble.

'And you will. If you let us tell you. Come. Let the boy go, sit down, have something to eat. We're willing to answer all your questions. Just give us a chance.'

An instant longer he held the boy; then he slowly took his hands away, let him slide gasping to the floor. He turned slowly, trying not to jar himself. The pain from his skull had not abated, and the slightest movement sent out waves of agony. But he hid it as he turned to face his captors and assess his prison.

It was a fairly large place, with walls of mud brick and dirt floors. No windows, and only one door. It was poorly lit and shadows haunted it. Sacks of something were piled in one corner. In addition to the cot he had rested on, there was a worn chair, a plank table, an old saddle frame, and a tangle of leather harness straps dangling from pegs. A storage place of some kind? His attention went quickly to the folk that filled the place. About a dozen of them, he guessed, and all dressed in brown robes. A few had their hoods thrown back, but most gazed at him from deep within shadowy cowls. Willow did, but he spotted her anyway, almost instantly. She returned his gaze with a flat look of dislike unsettling in its intensity. He shifted his eyes away, appraised the others. Farmers and tradesmen, he thought to himself, studying the sturdy muddy boots that peeped out from under the robes, the muscled hands that clutched at the fronts of their garments. None of them had the bearing of soldiers. Nor the discipline, he observed, as one man demanded, 'Who put you in charge, Lacey?'

'Who said I wasn't? This is my place, and I'm the one taking all the chances. So we run it my way.' Lacey looked slowly around the assemblage. Few met his gaze, but Willow did, staring her cold defiance. Vandien noted that Lacey's eyes moved away from hers, breaking free of that challenge. Noone else disputed his authority, so Lacey cleared his throat and said, 'One of you bring him some food. The rest of you ... if you must stay, sit down instead of milling around like sheep.'

As the others moved slowly to his suggestion, Lacey turned to Vandien. 'Come, man, sit down. Over here.' He gestured toward the rickety table and old chair. Vandien followed him slowly, carefully aware of the way the folk parted to let him pass. Lacey indicated he should sit, while he himself leaned up against the wall. Vandien sat, and as he did so he became aware of what an effort it had been to stand. He pressed his feet against the floor to still the shaking of his legs. Damn poor time to be feeling this weak.

Lacey appeared to be studying him. Vandien stared back. Dark eyes, jutting nose ... Lacey suddenly became the man from his dream, and the dream suddenly became an earlier awakening. The realization further disoriented him. He sat, staring silently at the man. Someone clomped a tureen of soup down before him; the greyish gravy slopped over the lip and puddled on the table. A slab of bread and a wooden spoon were tossed down beside it. Vandien made no sign of noticing it or the server.

'Go ahead and eat,' Lacey said gently. 'It's been a day and a half. You must be hungry.'

The displacement in time made him feel suddenly shaky, or perhaps it was the greasy aroma of the soup. His hunger suddenly superceded all things, and he tore a piece off the slab of bread, sopped it in the soup and filled his mouth. It was not the flavor of the soup, which was greasy and strongly spiced, which swamped his senses, but rather the physical act of eating. The jarring headache that had become a part of him lessened in intensity, and he suddenly felt more inclined to be rational. He glanced up at Lacey, found him watching him closely. For that matter, every eye in the place seemed to be fixed on him as he ate. He swallowed. 'So?' he asked Lacey.