Read Online The Brazen Gambit by Lynn Abbey - Free Book Online

to Metica?
    Throw himself before King Hamanu's mercy? King Hamanu's infinitesimal mercy?
    Fear tightened his chest and he stumbled to a halt in the near-darkness. Gasping for air, he swore he wouldn't
worry about the future until he reached the street. His ribs relaxed. He spared a heartbeat to listen for Dovanne's
footsteps. There was only silence, and he started off at a fast, quiet, walk.
    There was method in the catacombs. Corridors crossed at predictable places. Pavek approached each one with
caution, working his way across the man-made cavern, far below the room where the zarneeka powder was stored. He
allowed himself to believe that he'd gotten behind Dovanne and to hope mat her hunger for revenge would lead her
back to the places they had explored years ago while he headed for a stairway that hadn't been built until after the
Tyrian raid.
    Pavek climbed the steps soundlessly on the balls of his feet. The street door was bolted from the inside, which
he judged a good omen. With his weight against the wood, he withdrew the bolt from its slot. It squeaked loud enough
to wake the dead. He hid in the shadows, counted to fifty, then pushed the door outward. A band of moonlight
widened into a rectangle through which he discerned no movement.
    The door bumped once against the outer wall, then was still and silent Pavek counted to fifty again and crossed
the threshold.
    Arms as thick as a man's thighs dropped around his shoulders before he'd taken his third step. Half-giants were
massive and strong, but their bodies were put together the same as any human's. Pavek crashed a boot-heel into his
captor's knee and dug his fingertips into sensitive gaps in the half-giant's huge wrists. A pained bellow shattered the
night as the brute's muscles spasmed. A second good crack into the half-giant's kneecap might have produced both
freedom and a head start down the alley, but a well-thrown punch hit his jaw before he got his foot up.
    "Damn you. Damn you to life everlasting," Dovanne hissed as she clouted him again.
    Pavek's neck snapped against the half-giant's hard chest. He was stunned: unable to feel anything, but
clear-headed enough to wonder what she had concealed in her fist. Then the pain started, and he was grateful for the
next weighted blow.
Thought you'd sneak away again, didn't you?"
    "Get up," Dovanne demanded, jabbing her boot into his flank. "He wants to talk to you."
    Groaning and retching, Pavek hauled himself to his knees. His last-ditch defiance, which had broken his nose so
many times, sent disastrous words to his mouth: Elabon Escrissar can wait until I'm dead. But fortunately, his mouth
was full of blood and he couldn't say anything. Dovanne yanked her one-time lover to his feet.
    "Carry him," she told the half-giant.
    That was more indignity than a living man could endure. Pavek spat blood. "I... can... walk."
    "Then start walking." Dovanne pointed a slender sap at the open door.
    Pavek took one unsteady step after another. He clung to the handrail and pretty much fell down the first flight of
stairs. It got easier after that. Dovanne delivered a solid wallop, but she and her sap hadn't broken any bones. He
wondered if that was an accident or the lingering scar of affection.
    The pain was down to dull aches and he was moving fairly well by the time they got to the zarneeka corridor. The
locked door was open. Dovanne gave him a shove between the shoulder blades.
    A trestle table had been set up in the center of the storeroom. Rokka stood behind it, busily mixing tiny scoops
of zarneeka powder with much larger dollops of plain flour from the half-giant's barrels. He dumped the combination
onto scraps of crude paper. Escrissar himself folded the scraps into self-sealing Ral's Breath packets with elegant
movements of his taloned fingers.
    The mask tilted upward. Their arrival had been noticed. Sharp eyes appraised him coldly from the depths of the
mask. He turned away.
    There was a halfling in