Twilight Falling by Kemp Paul S Page A

from her shoulders. But he held on.
    From back in the parlor, Cale could hear house guards rushing toward them. They’d be too late, he knew.
    Halthor picked up his sword and stumbled through the doorway. Derg kicked one of the dead guards and followed. Still holding the boy to keep Cale at bay, Almor backed through the doorway.
    To Cale, Ren mouthed the words, Kill them. Cale made no reply. He would kill them, but not there, not then.
    He followed them through the door onto the large porch overlooking the lawn and courtyard. In one hand he held his sword, in the other, his last throwing dagger.
    “More coming,” Derg said to Almor. He didn’t sound alarmed.
    From across the courtyard, another patrol was rushing toward them. Cale couldn’t see numbers in the darkness, only torches. Shouted voices rang out. More shouts answered from within the manse. House guards were closing from both sides.
    “Halt! Halt!”
    Cale figured maybe six or seven men. He looked to Almor.
    “You’re out,” he said. “Let him go.”
    She grinned at him, winked, and said, “Goodbye, Mister Cale. Don’t forget your promise to me, now. I’ll look forward to seeing you again.”
    With a free hand, she removed a small bronze rod from her belt. Gold runes swirled around it, and parts of it rotated. She began to manipulate it, with difficulty though because she could use but one hand.
    To her men, she said, “Go.”
    In Cale’s head, a woman’s voice said, Nice to have met you, Erevis.
    Hearing her “speak” his name made him feel soiled.
    “You won’t think it’s so nice, next time,” he said.
    He’d never killed a woman before, though he had come close once. She would be his first.
    Each of her men removed a similar device from a pocket and began to turn its parts.
    Cale could do nothing but grit his teeth and stand there. She still had Ren.
    Almor winked at him and said, “I’ll keep him, Cale. Just to make sure.”
    Without any sound, without even a flash of magical light, Almor simply disappeared. And took Ren with her. One instant they were there, the next they were gone.
    “Godsdamnit!”
    In the next breath, Derg was gone.
    Cale raised his dagger to throw. Halthor, his thick fingers slicked with blood, fumbled with the teleportation rod. Cale hurled the dagger and charged.
    The sliver of steel took Halthor in the stomach and nearly doubled him over. Cale charged forward. Halthor pulled the dagger from his flesh and tried to parry with his sword. Cale would have none of it.
    Using the force of his momentum, he swept Halthor’s blade out wide, then suddenly reversed his motion and slammed the hilt of his sword into the man’s face. Squarely. Bone crunched, and blood sprayed. The big man’s head snapped back and he groaned in agony, a sound lost in the gurgle of blood pouring into his mouth. He dropped his teleportation rod and staggered back, reeling.
    “Still seem tame, you bastard?”
    Halthor muttered something, but a mouthful of blood, a split lip, and several dislodged teeth made it unintelligible. He still gripped Thamalon’s sphere in his hand. Cale knew that if he could stop Halthor, the Almor lookalike would come back for it.
    From behind, he could hear the guards charging into the reception hall. Behind Halthor, the grounds patrol closed in. They had him surrounded. They could take him alive if they wished.
    No.
    Cale decided that Halthor would be dead before the guards arrived. If they needed to speak with his corpse, the Uskevren could hire a priest. If he’d had time, Cale would have killed the man painfully for what he’d done.
    He advanced, blade held low.
    Though bleary-eyed and wounded, Halthor did not back away. Instead, he stood his ground and began to laugh. To Laugh. Not at Cale, it seemed, but as though he found being wounded and about to die exhilarating. His illusionary fat stomach bounced with his mirth. Blood frothed in the mess of his mouth.
    Cale was disgusted, but lunged forward anyway and