Karzil Li had proven to be somewhat of a disappointment, his resilience not at all what his impressive physical stature suggested it might have been. Nonetheless, Vardun's session with the warlord had been sufficient to remove the edge from his temper, and in his calmer state he had become aware of a niggling sensation, an awareness that he now realised had been growing in his mind, for some time. Back in his chambers, he paused in the act of changing his clothing, frowning as he focused on the sensation. His eyes widened momentarily, and as he reached for his robe, his features formed into a slow, satisfied smile. The Blade was near.

"'Ere, who's that messin' about up on the roof?" Gnomes generally had excellent eyesight, and despite his advanced age, Bup was no exception.

All Korbus could see was an indistinct group of figures, but he wasn't about to admit it. "Probably just some guards."

"Nah, I don't reckon. None of 'em are in black, and a couple of 'em are wenches. There's a big bugger, and there's somethin' little flittin' about, as well. Could be a fairy. Or maybe a really big cockroach."

Korbus shuddered. "Can't stand those bloody things. Or cockroaches." Despite himself, he was sufficiently intrigued to grudgingly reveal that he couldn't see quite as much as his friend. "What are they up to, then?"

"Runnin' about like idiots, for the most part."

In the mad dash to evade their pursuers, Laya had led her little group onto any staircase leading upwards, working on the assumption that if the dungeons were below ground, then increasing their elevation had to be a good thing, in terms of finding a way out. Unfortunately, it now seemed as though they may have overshot the mark.

"Ah, to feel the invigorating warmth and rejuvenating glow of the magnificent Volandan sun, and to glory in the vivid blue of the endless sky, stretching—"

"Roderund, if you don't shut your mouth, it's going to wind up full of my fist."

"Ha-ha, what a jester you are, my dear. Quite clearly your unwieldy, human-sized fist would never fit in my perfectly-formed fairy mouth."

"Maybe not, but I'm going to give it a try, if you don't put a cork in it, right now. Help Marie find something to barricade the door, while Danus and I hold it shut."

Backed up against the door which had admitted them to the rooftop, Danus grimaced with effort, as the guards on the other side battled to push it open. "There ain't no room for you, Laya, but I reckon I can hold on for a bit longer. You help the others."

Laya hesitated, but it was clear that what Danus had said was true, so she joined the other two in a frantic search for something to secure the door. Only moments later, she was interrupted by a cry from Marie, out of sight on the opposite side of the rooftop.

"I found something!"

"Great!" Laya called back. "What is it?"

"A spear!"

She smiled in relief. "That'll be perfect. Bring it to the door!"

"I can't!"

Her smile faded. "Why not?"

"Because the guard who's holding it won't give it to me!"

Clutching a piece of paper, on which the linguist had grudgingly scrawled his first approximation of a translation, Kowolski stood and stared up at the runes adorning the otherwise featureless rock face. Despite the occasional recognisable word, the translation was largely gibberish to him.

According to the director's interrogation of Ergan Pu, this cave, this wall and these runes, were somehow a passageway to somewhere. Somewhere other. It sounded utterly preposterous, but then so did most of the stuff that had happened over the last twelve hours or so, and Kowolksi had actually witnessed a decent proportion of those events with his own eyes. His preposterous-ness threshold had been raised significantly.

He frowned down at the piece of paper, in the forlorn and illogical hope that his eighth reading might somehow magically make more sense than the first seven.  Just to mix things up a little, he decided to read it aloud.

Stumbling over the unfamiliar sounds and awkward phrasing, he paused after a couple of lines. It may have simply been caffeine withdrawal, but he could have sworn he was picking up a vague sense of something. He couldn't define exactly what, but something felt different. The very air felt charged, as if about to deliver a jolt of static electricity. He began to read again.

The feeling grew in intensity, his heart-rate increasing along with it and as he read on, the hairs on his arms slowly stood up.  Approaching the end of the text, his voice growing louder, the rock itself seemed to grow taut with suspense, as if the slightest touch would break it into a million pieces.

He launched into the final line, the tension rising to an almost unbearable pitch, and reaching a crescendo as he bellowed the final word at the rock face, arms held akimbo, head thrown back and eyes tightly closed.

Breathing deeply, he lowered his head, and—slowly, warily, hopefully—opened his eyes.

Nothing. The rock face, the runes, the whole damn cave, were all utterly unchanged. Clearly, whatever had been going on while he was reading the text had been entirely inside his sleep-deprived and over-medicated head. Cursing himself for a fool, Koslowski turned away in disgust, crumpled up and threw away the translation, thrust his hands in his pockets, and slumped back against the rock face.

Which, as if it were made of nothing more substantial than smoke, absorbed him without a trace.

Arnutz Go liked guarding the roof.  He was fully aware that the primary reason he'd been given the job was the extreme unlikeliness of the roof ever actually needing any guarding, but to him that was just part of the appeal.  Generally, he found guarding to be the bit of being a guard that he liked the least.  This was one of the few things upon which he and his superiors agreed.  They found his guarding to be the thing they liked least about him as well.

Which is not to say that they were crazy about the rest of the package, either.  From the tips of his turned-in toes, to the top of his slightly egg-shaped head, Arnutz was perhaps one of the least guardly guards to have ever graced the guarding game.  Although, if you asked his squad captain, he would quite likely have objected to the use of the word 'graced', and in fact may well have advocated for the addition of a judicious 'dis'.

If the captain had had his way, Arnutz would have long since been relegated to latrine duty.  However, while being the youngest nephew of a minor baron didn't carry much in the way of privileges, it did exempt him from being required to mess about with the business end of a plunger.  So, unable to rid of himself of his weakest link, the captain had settled for allocating Arnutz to the post where he was least likely to inadvertently stab anybody, set fire to anything, or just generally bring the guarding profession into disrepute.

Which, given that he was effectively being paid to lounge about in the sun, read the occasional book, and daydream, suited Arnutz just fine.  Particularly on days like today, when there seemed to be an unusual amount of annoying hustle and bustle in the castle.  Having already had his peace and quiet disturbed once, when Karzil Li himself had made an unexpected appearance, he'd just relaxed sufficiently to be considering a nap, when the strange woman had appeared and inexplicably started asking him to hand over his spear.

Now, as has already been stated, Arnutz was to guarding as badgers were to brain-surgery, but he was enough of a guard to realise that handing your spear over to random strangers was probably wrong.  Even if they asked nicely.

"Look, lady, I'm not giving you my spear.  So just you move along, before I..."—Arnutz racked his brain for a suitable threat—"...um, get really cross."  He smiled in relief at having thought of something appropriately intimidating, but then, realising that smiling may lessen the effect somewhat, half-heartedly waved his spear in the general direction of the woman.  Which proved to be a mistake, as she simply smiled back, and took it off him.

"Thank-you, young man.  You're such a help."

Arnutz's jaw dropped.  He tried to remember the last time that somebody had said something complimentary to him.  Or thanked him.  He found that he couldn't.  Half in a daze, he barely noticed the arrival of another, younger woman.

"Right, where's this guard?  I'll soon sort him—" Laya pulled up short, at the sight of Marie clutching the spear, with Arnutz staring at her, slack-jawed.  "Oh.  It looks like you've already sorted him out."  Coming closer, she stared in puzzlement at the immobile guard's vacant features.  "Um, what exactly did you do to him?"

"Oh, nothing at all.  This lovely young man just seems to have changed his mind, and given me his spear.  He's a real sweetie."

And, just like that, for the first time in his life, Arnutz Go found that he was in love.

Slowly, George lowered the Blade—his arm was getting tired.  "Um, right.  I guess I better get to it.  So, I suppose I'll just go and hack my way through the guards, rescue Mum, and maybe give Vardun the chop.  Or, you know, something like that.  Um."  He looked around hopefully at the other occupants of the carriage.  "Of course, I'm open to other suggestions."

Grandpa blew a raspberry.  "You want a suggestion, boy?  How about using that brain of yours?  Your mother tells me you're not completely unintelligent, and although I've got my doubts, now might be a good time to prove it.  With another ten years' experience as the Blade, that plan of yours might actually have a snowball's chance in hell of working, but as a noob, it's suicide.  The Blade can do a lot, Georgie, more than you can imagine, but it can't turn a novice into a world-beater, overnight.  You're gonna need to come up with a better plan.  A smarter plan."

George slumped back into his seat, and glared at the ranks of dark-clad soldiers barring the entrance to the castle.  How the hell were they going to get through them?  They formed a seemingly impenetrable barrier, solid and daunting, each helmeted figure virtually indistinguishable from the next.  Hmm...

"Hey, Wuck?"

"Yes, your Bladeness?"

"Er, George is fine."

"Sorry, your Georgeness."

"No, just Geor...never mind.  Listen, Lob tells me you're pretty handy at nicking stuff."

George cursed himself under his breath, as the usually meek gnome bristled.  "I find stuff.  I acquire objects.  I liberate items.  I obtain—"

"Fine, fine," interrupted George.  "Whatever.  The point is, do you think you could find some stuff for me?"