The Pyramid Waltz by Barbara Ann Wright Page B

man, followed by another clothed and masked in leather. “Hold her down!” the old man cried.
    Starbride tried to cry out, fearful that these people were like the others, but she could do nothing. The big man and the young woman leapt on Katya and pinned her to the ground. It must’ve been the pyramid that allowed them to do so with her strength. Even though the large man was twice Katya’s size, he grunted as he struggled with her.
    The masked man began cutting Starbride’s bonds, and she yanked the gag from her mouth. “Who are you?” He finished cutting her loose without answering. She pushed off the table and wrapped the rag that had been in her mouth over her bleeding finger. The masked man ran back through the curtained door into the shop.
    On the floor, the old man opened Katya’s coat and shirt enough to press the pyramid to her chest, just above her heart. “Hold on, Katya.”
    Veins stood out in the large man’s neck as he strained to hold Katya down. She screamed nonsense as her horns receded into her forehead, where there couldn’t be room for them, and her features returned to normal. She breathed hard and sweated, her eyes rolling wildly. Two bloody drops rolled down her forehead where her horns used to be, and she wept tears of blood that smeared her cheeks with red.
    At last, her eyes rolled back one more time, and she lay still. Her chest moved steadily up and down. The old man jammed the pyramid back in his pocket and took a deep breath. He wiped his sweaty forehead, slicked his thin white hair back, and said to Starbride, “You’d better come with us, miss. You must have questions.”
    He was wrong. At the moment, she didn’t even have speech. The large man lifted Katya’s unconscious body and started for the curtain. When he waved for Starbride to join his party, she hesitated, not feeling very trusting as things were.
    Katya’s body was going out the door, though, and she had to make a decision. Katya had transformed into something—Starbride’s mind whispered, Fiend —but she had done it to save Starbride, and now she looked so helpless. These people seemed to care about Katya, but Starbride couldn’t be certain of their intentions, not unless she watched them. “Yes…yes.”
    The old man inclined his head deeply, an expression that spoke of respect. Outside, the masked man drove up to the front of the shop in a horse-drawn cart. The others bundled Katya’s body in cloaks and loaded her inside.
    “Clean up,” the old man said. “Don’t forget their horses.” The other two men walked back into the shop, and the old man helped Starbride into the cart while the young woman took the reins. They drove through the city streets for a few moments without speaking.
    “Cimerion Crowe is my name,” he said at last. “Everyone calls me Crowe.” He gestured to the young woman’s back. “She is Maia.”
    Starbride shut her mouth on the questions he had just answered. “Starbride.”
    “Yes, I know.”
    “From Katya?” Starbride swallowed. “From Princess Katyarianna Nar Umbriel?”
    “I am King Einrich’s pyradisté, and sometimes, I am hers.”
    “A bodyguard?”
    “Unofficially.”
    Starbride nodded, but anger burned in her. She welcomed it. It chased away the terror that wanted her to run for Dawnmother’s embrace. “Why did you take so long to come?” She tied the rag tighter around her finger. How much of her flesh would this man and his friends have allowed her to lose? Enough so that she could never write again? Never feed herself? Never speak?
    “We didn’t know anything was wrong until Katya’s necklace…” He trailed away. “Never mind about that now.”
    “Thank you for rescuing…us.” She’d nearly said, “Thank you for rescuing me,” but Katya had done that. Or had she also been rescued from Katya?
    “You’re welcome.” He said no more until they entered the royal stables. When the doors of a barn closed behind the wagon, Crowe and Maia surprised