The Man Behind the Mask

The shot hit an armoire over in the corner, splitting the gorgeous dark wood. The guy in leather dived for the guy with the gun. The shooter toppled, his second shot going into the ceiling, sending plaster trickling down. The fall broke his grip and the second gun went spinning under a bureau.

Ski mask number one was rallying, crouched now on hands and knees in a corner, shaking his head, moaning a little. I looked at the gun by my feet.

Better get that, I thought.

In the meantime, the one in leather and the second guy were up again and trading blows. The guy in leather delivered a right hook that sent ski mask number two lurching back. He hit the wall and steadied himself, then leapt on the guy in leather, who reeled back and bumped a chair, which hit a side table. A china lamp tottered and hit the rug, not shattering, but cracking neatly in half with a sound like a big eggshell splitting.

I whimpered some more and reached out my foot toward the gun.

The guy in leather slithered free of the one who’d just jumped him. He landed a punch—a good one, hard in the belly.

“Whoof,” said the guy in the ski mask, a sound halfway between a hard grunt and a big dog’s low bark. The one in the leather mask hit him again, a lightning fast karate-type chop to the back of the neck.

The guy crumpled to the fabulous antique rug and lay still beside the split-open lamp. Ski mask number two was down for good, it looked like to me.

I had my pink toes curled over the gun. Wincing, sure any second I would shoot myself in the foot, I inched the gun toward me over the crimson velvet. When it was close enough to grab by just reaching down, I got it in my shaking hands and aimed it, my quivering index finger on the trigger.

“Stop,” I said in a terrified croak. “Freeze.”

As if anybody cared. Ski mask number one was through shaking his head. He lurched upright and launched himself at the one in leather, taking them both to the floor. They rolled, punching at each other, grunting as each blow connected.

“No,” I said, in a tiny squeak. “Uh, ooh, ah, ga.…” I held the gun out at them with both trembling hands and jerked and twitched in terror and sympathetic pain as each blow landed.

No, I was not particularly helpful.

But think about it.

Whose side should I have been on, anyway? Who should I be shooting? Like I had a clue. Like I had any idea why this was even happening—and then, all of a sudden, before I could even begin to make up my mind what to do next…

It was over.

The guy in leather was still standing, the other two sprawled at his feet, neither one moving. The expressionless black mask turned my way. “Are you injured?”

I held the quivering gun on him and slowly shook my head.

He extended a hand. “Bring the gun to me.” He said each word with great care—as if addressing a total hysteric. And you know what? At that moment, that’s pretty much what I was.

“No,” I managed to get out in a wimpy little whisper. “I don’t think so.”

That gave him pause. For about a half a second.

And then he simply ignored me. I braced against the headboard, the gun still pointed—and still quivering—in his general direction. He went about tying up the guys in the ski masks.

He did it with lamp cords. Just ripped them from the wall and the bases of the lamps and crouched over the men he’d beaten, yanking their lax hands together at their backs and whipping the cords around their pressed-together wrists.

It was all very smooth, accomplished in maybe sixty seconds, tops. Once he’d tied them both, he tore off their masks, one and then the other, grabbing each by the hair to get a good look at his face, then letting go with a shove, so their heads thudded hard against the rug.

Did he recognize them? I didn’t ask.

As he stood from unmasking the second guy, it came to me very clearly that now he would be dealing with me. I didn’t think I wanted that.

“Stop,” I croaked. “Stop, or I’ll shoot.”

He took a step toward me.

“I mean it. I am going to shoot.”

Another step.

About then, I realized…

I couldn’t do it. I could not pull that trigger. Not for the life of me—and it seemed at the time that the life of me was precisely the issue. He took another step.

The guards!

The words exploded in my brain. Why the hell hadn’t I thought of the guards before? Maybe they were too far off—beyond at least two sets of doors, who knew how many hallways between—to have heard the fight. But by golly they were close enough to hear me scream.

I did scream. “Guards! Help!” And then I just shut my eyes, threw back my head and let the pure sound rip.

It was amazing, the earsplitting perfection of that scream. Jamie Lee in Halloween could not hold a candle, you hear what I’m saying? I screamed again, piercing as the first time.

I heard doors flung back somewhere in the suite, booted feet pounding my way.

I stopped screaming and opened my eyes.

The man in the leather mask had vanished—escaped, no doubt, through the empty mirror frame into the secret passageway. There were only the split-open lamp and a couple of overturned chairs, the bound, unconscious men on the floor, and me—in my SpongeBob pajamas with a big black gun in my hand.

Chapter 5

The two guards kicked open the bedroom door at almost the precise second that Brit and Eric burst through the mirror frame.

All four had weapons drawn, though Brit wore her Wile E. Coyotes and Eric had on soft drawstring flannel pants, his chest bare. They all froze at the sight of the two men on the floor. They took in the overturned furniture, the broken lamps and shattered knickknacks—and me. On the bed. With the gun.

All four gaped. Seriously. They went slack-jawed at the sight.

Which struck me as hilarious, just hysterically funny. A wild trill of laughter escaped me.

“Dulce?” Brit said my name as if she wasn’t really sure it was me sitting there.

And I was instantly appalled at myself. What was I laughing at? This was not funny. Not funny at all. I shut my mouth on a dry sob.

There was an extended moment of bleak silence.

Then Brit tried again. “Dulce.” She spoke softly, with great care. “Dulcie, honey…”

My fingers stopped working. The gun slid from my hands. Suddenly I was freezing cold. I drew my legs up, wrapped my arms around my knees and hunched into myself, shivering convulsively.

“Dulce…” I felt the bed shift and looked up with a startled cry. “Hey.” Brit was on the bed beside me. “It’s just me.” She set her gun and her lantern on the nightstand and gave me a questioning smile. When I didn’t object to her nearness, she took the gun I’d dropped, flipped a little notch on the handle, and set it on the nightstand, too. Then she held out her arms. “Come on, come here…”

With a small, strangled cry, I grabbed for her. Her arms went around me. I buried my head against her neck, breathing in deeply, instantly reassured by the warm, healthy scent of her skin, by the perfumy smell of the styling gel I’d used on her hair.

“It’s okay,” she whispered, “you’re all right, you’re not hurt…”

Slowly I grew calmer. Brit patted my back and made more soothing noises. Meanwhile, Eric ordered the guys in uniforms to guard the men on the floor. He walked around the room, checking things out, dropping to a crouch now and then to peer under the furniture.

When he dropped low near a certain bureau, I pointed a shaking hand. “Gun,” I said. “There’s a gun under there.…” He reached way in back and found it. Holding it by the trigger guard, he carried it over and set it on the dais at the foot of the bed.

Near the entrance to the passageway, he bent and picked up something else. He sniffed at it—and jerked back at whatever he smelled. Then he mounted the dais and stood beside Brit and me. He held out what he’d found: a folded square of white cloth.

Brit frowned at it. “Chloroform?”

He nodded. They shared a bleak look.

“What?” I demanded. “Someone tell me. What does it mean?”

Brit said, “It looks like an attempted kidnapping.”

“A kidnapping…” I turned the ugly word over in my mind—and knew it couldn’t have been me they were after. It was Brit’s room. Given that she’d brought me here through the secret passageways, how many people could have known I was here—let alone that Brit wasn’t? I met her eyes. “Those men came for you.”

She pressed her lips together and nodded. “That’s how it looks.”

“But then…what about the other guy?” I glanced from Brit to Eric and back to Brit. When I got no reaction from either of them, I realized I’d yet to mention the man in the black mask. “There was another guy. He wore a black leather mask. He was the one who fought those two and tied them up. Didn’t you see him? In the passageway?”

Brit started to speak, but Eric caught her eye and shook his head. She pressed her lips together and kept silent.

“Okay,” I said. “What’s going on?”

Nobody answered me. One of the men on the floor let out a low groan. Eric turned to the guards. “Remove these two from Her Highness’s rooms. Wait in the main hallway, by the doors to the suite. Hauk Wyborn has been notified. Guard the prisoners well until Hauk relieves you or gives you further instructions.”

Elli’s husband, Hauk, was some kind of high-level soldier. I wasn’t really clear on it. They called him the king’s warrior—and wait a minute. Who’d had time to notify Hauk? Come to think of it, how had Brit and Eric known I needed help?

The guards saluted, fists to chests. “As Your Highness commands.” They rolled the intruders onto their backs, grabbed them beneath the arms and hauled them out.

When they were gone, Eric turned to me again. “Dulcie, we need you to tell us exactly what happened here.”

I pushed my hair out of my eyes. Why wasn’t I getting through? “Did you guys see the man in black, or not?”

Eric said, “Just tell us what you know.”

Brit stroked my hair, smoothing it over my shoulder. “Please, Dulce. Just…tell it like it happened. Everything you can remember.”

“But it seems to me that you two should have seen the—”

“Shh. Listen.” She took my face between her hands and made me look at her. “Start from the beginning. Were you asleep when they entered?”

I jerked my chin from her grip. “What is up with you two?”

They shared another speaking look. Then Brit said, so gently, “We’re just trying to find out what happened, that’s all.”

It wasn’t all. I might have been traumatized, but I was not yet brain-dead. There was something up with them.

But would they tell me what? Looking at their grim mouths and set jaws, I seriously doubted it.

I gave in and did it their way. “Okay. I was sleeping. I didn’t see them come in. It was the noise of the fight that woke me up. I thought at first I was having some kind of nightmare.…”

I told the rest as I remembered it. It was pretty disjointed. Really, what did I know? I woke up to find three men fighting at the foot of the bed. One of them beat up the other two, tied them up and ripped off their masks. I added, “I was so freaked at first, I forgot there were guards I could call. But then the guy in the leather mask finished with the other two. I figured I had to be next on his to-do list and I knew I wasn’t up for that. About then, I remembered the guards. I threw back my head and screamed. A lot. When I looked again, he was gone. Maybe five seconds later, you and the guards rushed in.”

Brit asked, “Did the intruders say anything—to you or to each other?”

“Well, the guy in the leather mask asked me if I was injured. When I shook my head, he told me to give him the gun. That was after he’d won the fight, but before he tied up the other two.”

“Concentrate on the other two,” Eric said patiently. “Did they say anything?”

By then I was wondering if they even believed me about the guy in the leather mask—but they had to know there was someone else. It was pretty obvious I hadn’t handled the two thugs in ski masks all by my lonesome.

I frowned at Brit and then at Eric. “So okay. You don’t care what the guy in the leather mask said?”

Eric let out a long breath. “Certainly we do.”

“We care very much,” Brit chimed in. “But the truth is…” She shot a pleading glance at Eric. He frowned, but said nothing. So she went on. “The man in the mask is…known to us. He’s an ally, you might say.”

“So…he was trying to protect me?” They nodded in unison. “But how did he know to—”

Brit cut me off. “Dulce. Can we get back to what happened please? What did the man in the leather mask say?”

“I told you. He asked if I was hurt and said to give him the gun. Which I didn’t.” I was way proud of that. Hey. My performance had not been stellar, you know? I was clutching at straws.

And I might be useless in a fight, but that didn’t mean I was stupid. Slowly I was putting two and two together. The two in the ski masks had to be the bad guys and the other one had come to my rescue. So it was a good thing I hadn’t been able to make myself shoot him…right?

Good a guess as any, I thought.

“And the others?” Brit prompted. “Did they speak?”

I tried to remember. “Someone said something when I first woke up, before I sat up and saw what was going on. The voice was…different. Rougher than the voice of the one in leather.”

“Not the one in leather, then?” asked Eric.

“I don’t think so.”

“What did the other man say? What were his words?”

I thought about it a minute, trying to get it right. “‘I’ll…cut off your balls, fitz-something,’ I think.”

A wry smile curved Brit’s mouth. “Fitzhead?”

I beamed. “That’s it. That’s what he said.” Then I frowned. “What does it mean?”

“Let me put it this way, you don’t call a Gullandrian a fitzhead unless you’re in a fight or planning on starting one.”

“Big-time insult, huh?”

She nodded. “And that’s all? All any of them said?” “Yeah, I think so…” I was feeling sheepish, wishing there was more to tell.

Brit grabbed me close again and hugged me some more. “I’m so sorry you had to deal with this,” she whispered against my hair.

I hugged her back. “I’m okay, really.” And then I pulled back so I could look at her. “But why?” I demanded. “Why would someone want to kidnap you? For ransom, you think?”

Eric spoke then. “We’ll question the intruders as soon as they regain consciousness.” It was a brush-off, no matter how gently he said it. “We’ll get some answers, never fear.” Uh-huh. Answers no one would be sharing with me. He added, “And now, I think it’s best if you wait in another room of the suite. There’ll be a few more questions for you when Hauk arrives.”

Brit grabbed my hand. “Come on, Dulce. Let’s see if we can find your robe and slippers in this mess.…”

Brit led me down the hall to a small sitting room and waited with me for Hauk to come. It took a while. We sat on a velvet settee and listened to the sounds of booted feet going in and out of the suite. I tried two or three times to talk to her about what had happened back there in her room. But she was evasive. She’d say, “Let’s just wait till Hauk comes,” or, “Dulce, we don’t really know much of anything yet.” When I asked her about the man in the leather mask, she only shook her head and said she couldn’t say more about him.

Finally, about half an hour after we entered the sitting room, Hauk Wyborn came to talk to me.

He filled the doorway. Literally. Elli’s husband was about six-eight. I swear to you, he looked like a Marvel comics superhero come to life. Massively muscular, with shoulder-length blond hair. And when I say muscular, I mean as in Hulk Hogan, as in Schwarzenegger during his bodybuilding days.

Brit left us. I told Hauk what I knew. Gravely he thanked me. “There may be more questions later,” he warned. “And may I take this opportunity to tender His Majesty’s deepest regrets for what has happened here tonight?”

“Well, sure,” I said, feeling there was probably some proper response to that. But not being Gullandrian, I didn’t know what it was. “And, uh, thank you for…everything.”

He bowed his big blond head. “I am more than gratified to be of service.” He looked at me again, piercingly, without the slightest trace of a smile. “And may the wise eye of Odin be upon you.”

Was that a good thing, to have the wise eye of Odin “upon you”? I supposed it must be. He didn’t say it as if it was a threat or anything. And what should I say now? He just didn’t come across as a small-talk kind of guy.

A tap on the door saved me from having to figure out my next conversational gambit. It was Brit, fully dressed in gray slacks, black shoes and a funnel-neck sweater. “Finished?”

Hauk saluted, fist to chest. “Yes, Your Highness. The interview is concluded.”

He left us. Once I knew he was out of earshot, I remarked, “He’s your sister’s husband, and he calls you Your Highness?”

She shrugged. “It’s a matter of form, that’s all.”

“But is he always so…”

She knew the word I wanted. “Reserved? Well, sometimes, when Elli’s around, he’ll lighten up a little.”

“Fun guy to have at a party, huh?”

“Hauk’s a soldier, through and through. He’d never have become the king’s warrior if he weren’t. The training is killing. And I mean literally. Men have died trying to prove themselves worthy of the job. And Hauk’s not only good at his job, he’s…spectacular. A great warrior. The people adore him—and you should see him fight.”

“Uh. No, thanks.”

“Come on. I don’t mean a real fight.”

“Oh. There’s another kind?”

She nodded. “In the warm months, my father puts on a series of fairs down in the parkland below the palace. At the fairs, Gullandrian men come from all over the country to fight staged battles in the old, wild Viking manner. Hauk inevitably wins the day—and I can see by the look in those big eyes of yours. You’ve got a thousand questions.”

“At least.”

“Sorry, but right now I need to get you back to your own rooms.”

I was not thrilled to hear that; I had the feeling she was going to drop me off there. After what I’d been through that night I didn’t relish the thought of being alone—at least not while it was still dark outside.

However, my friend was not my baby-sitter. “Good idea.” I tried valiantly to appear more enthusiastic than I felt.

“I’m afraid we can’t go back the way we came. Hauk’s men have taken over the secret passageways.” She was frowning at my yellow chenille robe, at all the hugely smiling SpongeBobs peeking out from under it. “Do you want to change before we hit the main hallways?”

“Into what? Something of yours?” Brit was about three inches taller than I was—and thinner, too. How much thinner? Hah. Like I’d tell you that. “And really,” I added, pouring on the perky, “you don’t have to go with me. I can find my own way back.”

She waved a hand. “I’m not leaving you to stumble around the hallways by yourself.”

“Stumble? Who says I would stumble?”

She sighed. “It’s a figure of speech.”

“Choose another one.”

“Oh, stop. You know what I mean. And as far as something for you to wear, I’ll just—”

I was shaking my head. “Look. It’s so late, it’s early. I doubt we’ll run into anyone. And who’s gonna care what I’m wearing, anyway?”

Well, I was half-right. Nobody seemed to care that I was not properly dressed. But we did run into people. A number of them.

When we left the suite, I expected to see the men the soldiers had dragged out, sitting propped against the wall on the floor, their hands behind them, still tied with lamp cord. I was picturing sullen, threatening glances and muttered Gullandrian obscenities.

But the prisoners were nowhere in sight. There were, however, soldiers all up and down the hallway. We saw a bunch more every time we turned a corner.

And some of the guests were stirring, poking sleep-rumpled heads through slits in doorways, squinting against the light from the ornate wall sconces, asking, “What’s going on? Has something happened?”

Brit gave them regal smiles and a few reassuring words and we moved on by. We saw more soldiers, and several housemaids and an old prince who, for some unknown reason, was up and about, all gotten up in a tweed suit, complete with vest curving over his considerable paunch and a weighty veil of gold chains looping extravagantly from his watch pocket.

“Your Highness.” He bowed in the Gullandrian way. “Schemes of the Trickster, what goes? All this commotion has ruined my sleep.”

Brit told him there was nothing to worry about. “Please, Prince Sigurd. Back to your rooms. All is safe now, I promise you.”

Muttering under his breath, the old prince did as she instructed.

Around the next turn, another prince was waiting, this one young and slim, with pale hair combed back from a high forehead. He was also fully dressed, but not in tweeds. Armani, maybe? Or Dolce and Gabbana? He frowned when he saw us coming, then quickly bowed.

“Prince Onund,” Brit said when we reached him. “What are you doing up?”

“Your Highness, I heard all the noise. What’s afoot?”

“Nothing to worry about,” she coolly lied. “As of now, we have everything completely under control.”

“Ah,” he said, as if she’d actually told him something. “Then I’ll return to my chamber.”

“Good idea.” Brit pulled me on down the hall.

A minute or two later, we reached our destination. She led me inside, helped me out of my robe as if I couldn’t manage it myself and tenderly tucked me into bed.

“I’ll stay right here,” she whispered, standing over me. “Don’t worry. I won’t leave you.”

I did like the sound of that. I wanted her to stay right there beside me until daylight, at least.

But I just couldn’t do that to her. She kept biting her lower lip and fidgeting—and as much as she talked about staying, she wasn’t showing any signs of making herself comfortable. It was painfully obvious that she longed to get back where the action was. Also, it did occur to me that I was going to have to get past being treated like the shell-shocked victim of some terrible tragedy.

I looked up from my nest of pillows into her distracted face and I groaned. “Oh, puh-lease. I know you have things to do. Get outta here.”

To her credit, she actually put up a little resistance. “No, Dulce. I’m going nowhere. You’ve had a brutal scare, one that wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t—”

I sat up, which made her back off a few inches. “It’s not your fault. You know it. I know it. And I’m fine. Honestly. We both know damn well I’m in zero danger, now that I’m back in my own room where no one is going to mistake me for you. You don’t need to be here holding my hand and you don’t want to be here holding my hand.”

“I never said that.”

“Like you had to say it. We both know how you are. You want to be with Eric and Hauk Wyborn and whoever else they’ve called in by now. You want to be on the case, rousting the bad guys.”

She looked at me sideways. “Well. If you’re certain…”

“What? You’re still here?”

She smiled. Fondly. “Thank you.”

“Go.”

She started backing toward the door. “One more thing…”

“What now?”

“I know this all has to be really confusing to you, but I have to ask you not to talk about what happened tonight, not to mention it to anyone. At least not until we’ve been able to decide what to do about it.”

Did I have questions? Oh yes, I did. It was plain as her eagerness to go that she knew a lot more than I did and she was not telling me any of it. But I didn’t really have the heart to keep her with me another minute—let alone to try to get her to talk to me right then. “My lips are sealed. Good night.”

“If you need me—”

“I won’t. Get lost.”

She vanished into the shadows of the short hallway that led to my door—and I instantly wanted to call her back. I heard the door open and shut behind her and I longed to leap from the bed and chase her down the main hallway until I caught her. I would tell her it was all a big mistake to have let her go. I really needed her with me, after all.