The Iron Ring Read Online Free PDF Page A

man! “ Monsieur! How dare you?”
    Rameaux’s face blanched. “I . . . I meant no offense . . .”
    â€œI regret to inform you, then, that I am offended!” Tyvian stiffened his back and flared his nostrils, affecting his best impersonation of an angry fop. He even flapped his hands loosely at his sides. “Your crudity toward my person since our meeting has been most uncalled for!”
    Rameaux exchanged a troubled look with his guards. “My lord DuGarre, if you would only listen—­”
    â€œ Non! You listen to me, you insolent half-­blooded toad! To preserve the honor of my fathers before me, I challenge you to a duel!”
    The look on the false Marquis’s face was priceless. Tyvian knew he would cherish it for years to come, though he hid his glee well behind a quivering facade of rage. He watched Rameaux and his two guards shift uncomfortably from foot to foot.
    â€œBut,” Rameaux sputtered, “you do not have a sword!”
    â€œYour guards do,” Tyvian countered. “Let them give up their blades—­one to each of us—­and I shall have satisfaction.”
    Again Tyvian’s opponents stood flabbergasted. Go on, he thought, go ahead and give me one of your weapons.
    Rameaux, eyes wide as his plot—­whatever it had been—­was rapidly unraveling, tried once more. “Really, if we could finish business first . . . could we see the items you promised and then—­”
    â€œSir,” Tyvian growled, “we do not go anywhere until my honor is satisfied.”
    Rameaux’s face fell, and his guards looked worried. If Tyvian could read thoughts, he was certain Rameaux’s mind was chaining together a number of colorful vulgarities. That’s right, Tyvian told himself. You can’t arrest me if you don’t see the goods, can you?
    T he demons moaned in their piston prisons, and Artus stumbled as the spirit engine lurched forward. It picked up speed quickly, leaving Galaspin behind in the dark, and with it any chance of leaping off into the relative safety of the city’s winding streets. Cursing Tyvian Reldamar for the hundredth time since meeting him, Artus pushed his way forward to the cargo cars.
    Like the dining car, the cargo containers on this spirit engine were Astrally modified. Artus found the effect disconcerting; the magical alteration made it difficult to judge distances properly, and he constantly felt he might run into the wall or strike his head on the ceiling. Unlike the dining car, however, the extra space was the only amenity afforded the cargo section. It was a dark box with thin wooden slats forming a thin barrier between the sawdust-­scented interior and the crisp, cold air of the Galaspin night. The wind and the cries of the engine-­demons howled through the cracks in the wide-­mouthed cargo doors on both sides of the compartment, and light was limited to a single feylamp swaying from a beam over the door. Large crates and heavy trunks stenciled in a variety of foreign languages were stacked in precise rows along the walls, throwing long shadows wherever the lamplight struck.
    Artus reached up and took the lamp down. He took only a moment admiring its craftsmanship—­a feylamp, they said, could burn for months without need for replenishment—­and then turned his eyes to the dusty gloom. “Hello?”
    There was no answer. He stood still, listening and scanning the shadows for movement. Then, from the other side of the car, he heard a low-­pitched growl followed by a sudden thump, as though something heavy but soft had been thrown against a door. Moving slowly to keep his balance as the engine bucked and shuddered over the hilly landscape, Artus held the lamp in front of him as some kind of ward and called again. “Is anybody there?”
    Silence for a moment, and then another growl, this one even lower pitched and more sinister