As if reading her thoughts, Lady Mantilla's head snapped up. With a bony finger she traced a contour in the air. The quartet of knights began to spin and move with such grace and agility that Kitiara was astonished. The only noise they made was the clanking of their equipment. They did not go toward her, but instead, in some choreographed maneuver, moved toward the perimeter and took up prearranged positions at four equidistant points around the room. Kit noted uncomfortably that she was the focus of their pattern.

Holding both her knife and sword in front of her, Kitiara did her best to look threatening.

Lady Mantilla's face shone. Her rotting yellow teeth were bared in a smile. "You are wondering about my Iron Guard," she said with almost a wink. "They are more alive than my mage. Well, only half-alive, or half-dead to be sure, but I like them better that way. I only have four left, more's the pity. I think I've been rather hasty with the rest of them. But the important thing is-" she made a clucking sound and put a finger to her head "-the important thing is they are created so that they will do anything for me-even die at my bidding. They are exceedingly loyal about that, dying I mean. Shall I demonstrate? Zierold!"

One of the armored men took a step forward, his armor creaking. Kit braced for a challenge, but Lady Mantilla said airily, "Jump out a window for me, will you, Zierold?"

The heavily armored Zierold went to one of the windows curtained with velvet. With ballet-like moves he hoisted himself up to the ledge, turned to salute the Lady, then, without an utterance, hurled himself out the opening. There was a long moment of silence, followed by a muffled crash. Lady Mantilla positively squealed with glee.

Good, Kit thought, one less. She shifted her position slightly so that none of the remaining three Iron Guard stood directly behind her.

"Yes," continued the Lady, "it was easy to catch up with Radisson and El-Navar, but a little harder to find that sneaky Ursa. He seemed to disappear, be swallowed up. He separated from Cleverdon for a while. We followed Clever-don, but then he managed to lose us as well. They donned disguises, camped in the outlands, traveled hundreds of miles outside of my purview.

"I found out all I could about Ursa. I had spies and agents everywhere. He never visited the same place twice and always managed to stay one step ahead of us. But in the end I came to know more about him and his habits than his own mother did, and I knew I would eventually track him down."

She shifted tone, velvety now, like her curtains. "To find out who you were proved harder than locating Ursa, my dear," the Lady cooed. "Radisson didn't have a chance to tell me before he died, and El-Navar does not converse very well as a panther. I know from the eyewitnesses that five people were involved, but I never considered that one of them might be a woman. Not until, purely by chance, one of my operatives was traveling on a boat and spotted my beloved's sword. But even then, we thought it was this fellow, Patric. Of course he claimed to know nothing. But he had to be killed anyway. Just to be on the safe side."

While the Lady was preoccupied with her tale, Kitiara had edged closer, until she was only a few dozen paces away. With her next step, Kit entered the cone of pale light that enveloped Luz so that, for the first time, the wretched woman could get a clear look at her. And as she did, Lady Mantilla gave a gasp.

She shrank in her chair from horror. Kit was so startled by her reaction that she froze, then took a step backward, retreating into the shadows. Then Kit realized that to the deranged Lady, she, with her short hair and fighting garb, must still resemble Beck Gwathmey.

Kitiara stepped back into the glare, Beck's sword glinting in the light.

"It is you, then?" whispered the Lady. "It is you! You have the sword."

Behind her Kitiara could hear the clanking of the armored men as they began to move again. She took another step closer.

'The sword I gave to my beloved…" the Lady moaned plaintively. "His betrothal gift. He was carrying it with him when he was… assassinated."

"I had nothing to do with that," Kit said truthfully.

The expression on the Lady's face changed. She bent over and gave a shiver, then straightened up. Her face contorted with fury. "You will die for your part in it," Lady Mantilla screeched. "You will die! Die! I have sworn!"

Kit could hear the armored men clanking behind her. She lunged toward the Lady, holding out her sword so that the crazy woman was trapped against her chair.

Close up, Kitiara could see that Lady Mantilla's face was deeply creased with lines and garishly made up with white powder and rouge. "Call them off," Kit said tersely.

"You can't kill me," the Lady countered. "I've been dead for a long, long time. Ever since that day."

"Call them off," Kit repeated, bringing the tip of the sword up to the Lady's neck, glancing nervously over her shoulder. The three remaining guards were gliding closer to her, moving to a different rhythm, slower, more cautiously. Yet they still came forward with that peculiar grace that, despite their heavy armor, they were able to muster. They had formed a tighter triangle now, with Kit in the center, and were gradually closing in.

"Tell me your name!" the lady hissed.

"Kitiara Uth Matar!" Kit proclaimed.

All of a sudden, she heard a low sliding noise that she could not account for, then a high-pitched cry; from behind her, out of a door hidden behind a tapestry, charged someone she had almost forgotten-Colo.

The tracker was clumping on one foot, but made the short distance before anyone could react. She leaped gamely onto the back of one of the Iron Guard, wrapping herself around his neck and trying in vain to find a spot without leaden protection to plunge in her knife or sword.

Kit's attention was diverted for all of three seconds, yet by the time she had turned back to Lady Mantilla, the woman had gone from the throne. She stood in another part of the room, cackling. Kitiara didn't have time to ponder this failure, however, because she heard more clanking and wheeled just in time to see the danger, ducking beneath the swing of one of the Iron Guard.

Twirling like a dancer, this Iron Guard leaped behind Kit and aimed another blow at her head. She raised Beck's sword up in time, and their weapons smote each other with tremendous force. The superior strength of the armored guard drove Kit back and smashed her up against a wall. Reeling, she stabbed upward with her knife, striking only metal.

Colo was faring no better. She was riding the broad back of the Iron Guard who careened around the room, knocking into furniture and walls in an attempt to dislodge her. She hung on stoically, her weapons futile, screaming curses at her enemy.

The third Iron Guard seemed momentarily unsure as to what he should do. He stood closer to Kit and her struggle, but Colo and her opponent covered a lot of ground, swooping and stumbling around the room. This third opponent took tentative steps toward Kit, then whirled and took a few steps toward Colo.

From one side of the hall, Lady Mantilla watched the melee with relish, shouting derision at Kit.

As if in reply, Kitiara feinted with her sword, then suddenly went limp. The Iron Guard, thrusting forward, was not able to break his heavy momentum. He crashed his helmeted head into the wall, and by the time he was able to turn around, Kit had slithered out from under him and was back near the center of the room.

Although somewhat dazed, Colo finally had figured out that her sword was of no use. She let it drop to the floor. Then, with her legs still wrapped around the guard's chest, she reached around with two hands and stabbed her knife upward into the exposed eye-slots of the Iron Guard. An unearthly wail of anguish filled the room. He dropped to his knees, clawing at his eye-slots, as Colo held on and drove the knife home repeatedly.