Rogue Powers by Phil Stern Read Free Book Online

constricted passage created by the presence of two wide stone walls to either side. This was a deliberate bottleneck, created so that any invaders who’d crashed the outer gates into the courtyard would then be forced into the small space before assailing the actual castle door. This would allow attack from the top of the bottleneck walls themselves, as well as boiling oil and other nasty stuff to be poured down on them from the upper levels of the castle itself.
    But this would also be the most likely location for a Demon ambush. Pressed into the enclosed run, surrounded by his mates, there wouldn’t be much opportunity for escape.
    Girding himself as best he could, Anson stoically pressed forward toward the wide-open doorway and the golden sunshine beyond, fellow recruits to either side.
     
    ***
     
    The Demon made a point of swiping her dirty cleaning rags at some iron plating on the guard platform. Here she was just another lowly servant, trying to stay out of the way.
    But set on top of one of the bottleneck walls running out from the castle door, the platform was a perfect place to first detect, and then incapacitate, the Unknown passing some ten feet below.
    All she had to do now was wait for him to come out of the castle.
     
    ***
     
    Bursting out into the mid-morning sunshine, Lydia was again on the same veranda from which she’d soothed the horse an hour before. Two long stories below was the stone bottleneck, a few soldiers standing guard on the wall platforms.
    But wait! That cleaning woman there on the wall! Staring almost straight downward, Lydia was nearly overwhelmed by a surge of malevolent energy emanating from her. Though pretending to be a lowly drudge, this was obviously a Demon, her attention focused on the castle entranceway on the very ground level.
    Clearly, she was waiting for someone to emerge. With a sense of dread, Lydia knew who it must be.
     
    ***
     
    Just before crossing the threshold of the massive stone fortress, Anson’s inner warning clarion sang out.
    Passing out into the bright daylight, Anson abandoned all caution, letting his own sensitivity extend outward. He immediately detected the same Demon from before, standing on the platform above.
    Without even having to look up, he firmly swept the Demon’s legs out from underneath her, causing the woman to first crash down on the platform above his head, then tumble down to the ground within the constricted area between the two walls itself.
     
    ***
     
    The entire contingent stopped, mid-bottleneck, to stare at the Demon now lying on the grass by the base of a stone wall.
    “What the hell?” one of the recruits exclaimed. “She must have fallen!”
    “Drunk, more likely,” said another. “You know how these washer-women are.”
    “Hey, isn’t that the same drudge from before?” a third added. “The one that Prince Tenen warmed up?”
    A few of the recruits laughed, kneeling down to examine the groggy Demon. Anson deliberately took a step back, maintaining his distance.
    The first uniformed boy to touch the woman immediately passed out, crunching down beside her. Surprised, a second recruit bent down, also falling into a deep sleep.
    “Get away from me!” Obviously disoriented, one hand gingerly gripping an obviously injured shoulder, the drudge now struggled to her feet. “I’m warning you!”
    “Hey, what did you do to them?” Conger now drew his sword. “Those are the King’s men there!”
    “Peasant!” snarled the Demon, unsteadily rocking back and forth. “You have no idea...”
    With the merest mental flick, Anson flung the Demon back against the wall. Her head connecting with a protruding stone, she collapsed once more, unconscious. To everyone else it merely appeared the drunk washer woman had again tripped and fallen of her own accord.
    Determining the two downed recruits were merely asleep, a bucket full of cold water jolted each back into full wakefulness. Five agonizing minutes later, during which