279
ay confidently, "Cooperate with me and it will go easier on you. Or do you really want to be handed over to that old madman?"
"If you've taken him as your master, you're far madder than he is."
Dontane snarled, "That's your last--" and Grandier's mild voice interrupted, "That's enough."
Grandier stepped into the circle of lamplight, appearing suddenly out of the dim cold twilight outside. From his tone he might have been encountering the younger man at a promenade or a market square, but Dontane whipped around to face him.
Grandier regarded him imperturbably. Dontane started to speak, thought better of it, and stepped back.
Moving forward, Grandier said, "An unexpected pleasure, Captain." He still wore the baggy black scholar's cope, still wore Galen Dubell's face.
That was the hardest part. Now that I know who he is, he should look like a monster, not like... Not like an old friend. Thomas tried to pull free of the troopers and was surprised when they allowed it. He stood on his own, swaying a little. "Are you getting what you want out of all this?" he asked Grandier. About ten of the Alsene troopers were grouped around him; he thought about fighting but his bad leg was trembling, threatening to give way, and the room kept swaying. He thought about attempting it anyway.
Grandier regarded him silently for a long moment, his gray eyes calm as ever. "Not yet. But soon."
At that moment it occurred to Thomas just why Grandier might want him alive.
Grandier turned away, and while the troopers' eyes were on him, Thomas dove sideways and slammed into one of the men, ripping the sword out of his surprised grip and slashing upward at him. But a hilt cracked down on Thomas's head from behind, and in the end they took him alive.
* * *
Roland walked along a colonnaded porch open to the interior court of Bel Garde, his knights surrounding him, feeling as if his mind were a rusty clockwork that hadn't been wound in far too long. Everything fe