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Marvene's Side

Chapter 52

Marvene had resigned herself to just bleeding out. She was too miserable to care. Too miserable to move. And she didn't know how she'd ever look Estica in the eye again after what she had done. This time, she hadn't just been unfaithful with some bint in a tavern. She had been unfaithful with a fox, one of the enemy, one of the creatures who had confessed to participating in violent raids on the duchy. The foxes were coming anyway. They were going to die anyway. She would rather die alone with her shame than have to face Estica's angry eyes. Estica's beautiful angry eyes.

The bells started ringing at the gates, servants screamed, and Marvene could hear feet thundering back and forth in the hall. Someone poked their head in and saw her, and she was lying so still that they ran away screaming that someone had "stabbed Porter dead in Mastuh Jonathan's bedroom!!!"

Marvene's eyes drifted lazily to the window, and she could see the sky churning red with black smoke. So this was the end? She had never imagined dying this way, bleeding out on some rich lord's floor with no one there to hold her paw. She thought of her father and what he would say. Malcolm Porter would be ashamed. No daughter of his would just lay down and die - and from a flesh wound? The vixen hadn't even hit any organs. Marvene could hear her father as if he was standing over her. "Get up, Marvi! What the hell's the matter with you? Got your monthly? Gonna cry?" Such things he would say to provoke her while he was training her, and she would take the bait, lunging at him in a sudden fury with her wooden sword. "Never attack in anger," he'd say and parry her wild swing easily. He hadn't been able to afford a real sword for her. They hadn't been able to afford many things for so long. But somehow . . . there was always money for ale. "Run down to the corner and buy me a bottle, boy," he would say to Marvene. Malcolm had always wanted a son. So he made do with Marvene instead.

"Marvi? Marvi!" Estica ran straight past the open door, backtracked, and lunged into the room. Marvene groaned as the black and white Bernese fell to her knees beside her. Estica was wearing her usual guard attire: a silver breastplate and jacket, a sword on her hip, a dagger on her back, and her mass of wavy black tresses were pulled back in the usual thick cloud of a ponytail. Her sharp eyes darted over Marvene's bloody jacket, as cool and calculating as ever, though Marvene looked in her eyes and thought she saw a trembling fear there as well.

"What happened?" Estica demanded and touched the tips of her fingers to Marvene's arm, as if she were afraid to touch her for hurting her. "No, no - no time for that - get up! Come on, Marvi --"

"Leave me here," Marvene groaned as her lover hauled her to her feet. She leaned heavily against Estica, clutching her side. "Just leave me h-here . . . we're under attack. You have to rally everyone --"

"Shut up," Estica hissed. She helped Marvene limp out the door, and they started down the stairs as servants and guards ran past them.

Marvene scowled to see that some servants were toting bags of things they'd looted from the manor. "Ungrateful bint!" she shouted at a maid who ran past wearing Evelyn Kingsley's full set of diamonds. "How did Mr. Charlie miss those? He . . . a-ah . . . was going to t-take his valuables . . ."

"Stop shouting," Estica scolded. "And stop talking. You're making it bleed more . . ."

"Well . . ." Marvene wheezed, " . . . I can't . . . make it bleed less . . . Look, baby . . . leave me here, alright? I can take care of meself --"

"Shut up. You'll come with me. The duke will have gone out the secret passage in the library. He could still be near. He has bandages. He'll take care of you, and you could go with him --"

"No, I said!" Marvene burst angrily. She shoved Estica off and lost her balance, staggering back into the wall. They had come to the first floor, and outside, the bells were ringing frantically at the gates. A group of guards would be gathering there, waiting for the foxes to come with fire and arrows. Marvene was damned if she turned her back on her brothers now. Her father would want her to stand. So she was going to stand. "Give me a weapon," she said to Estica, who was looking at her with tight lips. "Come on, love. That dagger on your back will do."

"You stubborn . . ." Estica shook her head. "I'm trying to save you --!"

"Maybe I don't need saving," Marvene said through her fangs - even as more blood slipped past her fingers. She clutched her wound tighter and moaned. "Shit!"

Estica shook her head. "Look at you. I'm taking you to the library. Come on!"

Ignoring Marvene's protests, Estica grabbed her around the waist and helped her hobble up the corridor as more servants flew by. They were almost there when someone screamed and they stopped short. A maid came staggering out of one of the rooms. She was bleeding from her arm and clutching the wound as she ran, screaming, tears in her eyes. She looked no more than thirteen, with a round face and plump body. A female burst out of the room behind her, a sword in one paw and a dagger in the other. Marvene stiffened: it was the damned vixen.

The maid glanced back in horror to see the white vixen behind her. She staggered into the wall, caught herself, and kept running, wildly and unsteadily, her eyes large with fear. Her mane was tousled and she was bleeding from her temple. It looked as if the vixen had knocked her around. She fled past Estica and Marvene without even looking at them, her eyes unseeing for her horror. The vixen pursued, her blue eyes glinting viciously, her tongue in her teeth. But she stopped short when she saw Estica and Marvene.

Estica's breasts heaved with silent fury and she ripped her sword from its sheath, nudging Marvene aside as she stepped in front of her and fell into fight stance. The fox slowly smiled and approached. They sized each other up, and Marvene hobbled to the wall and held herself up, watching with a small smile. Estica had been trained by experts in the field of swordplay and moved with an elegance and grace that was unmatched by any swordfighter Marvene had ever seen. The vixen, meanwhile, moved as if she were holding two butcher knives. There was a mad glint in her blue eye and a hunger that unnerved Marvene.

"Come to me, savage," Estica said in a voice that was barely a whisper. "I will send you to your gods this day." She held her sword horizontally just near her cheek and peered over the glinting blade at the vixen.

Marvene smirked. Estica was highborn. And highborns always spoke as if they were onstage, wringing every word for dramatic effect. Estica was no different.

"Well, come at her!" Marvene suddenly shouted. "Ya pissin' bint!" Yeah. That's how it was done.

The vixen's nostrils flared and she lunged at Estica, pirouetting to bring the dagger and sword down on her one after the other. And Marvene had to admit: the fox was graceful in her own way. She moved as if it were a dance, a tribal dance, where she snapped her back and her neck to avoid Estica's sharp slices, where she bent her knees and stamped her feet, until the lavender feathers dangling from her ankles fluttered.

Estica was more like a ballerina - a vicious ballerina. In two fluid strikes, she disarmed the fox of her dagger and caught it deftly as it spun through the air. The fox was beyond fury that she had been disarmed, and it was clear that she had never been disarmed in combat before. But she still had her sword. Screaming a war cry, she spun about and made a slash at Estica's side. Estica blocked her with the dagger and sword and glared at her through their locked blades before shoving her off with a growling heave. The fox lost her footing and staggered.

_Never attack in anger,_Marvene could hear her father say.

Estica took the opportunity to strike, quickly and precisely, her eyes flashing as she cut the fox across her arm with the dagger and across her side with the sword, one after the other in rapid succession. The fox's injured arm was her sword arm, and she dropped her weapon, screaming as her own blood splattered her cheek. She backed away, her white fur slick with blood, clutching the side that gushed with a trembling paw.

Estica didn't advance and Marvene sighed wearily: Estica was giving the fox a chance to pick up her sword and die with dignity. It was always a sad thing when a swordfighter died without their sword in their paw, and Estica wished to acknowledge the vixen's skill by letting her die holding her weapon. Stupid highborns and their stupid honor. Marvene couldn't believe Estica.

The fox couldn't believe Estica either. She glanced at her dropped weapons, glanced at Estica, then dove for them, rolling to her feet in an immediate pirouette, a vicious attack that Estica barely parried. "Rrraaaa!" The fox pushed herself away from Estica, roughly and wildly, fangs and eyes flashing. She pretended to dive one way - then feinted to the right and slashed Estica's arm. Estica gritted her fangs but didn't cry out as blood squirted through her ripped sleeve. The fox struck again, coming down hard on her injured arm, and she dropped the dagger, her arm with shaking with blood as she backed away, holding her sword before her. The vixen moved in.

Marvene's face twisted and she swore. "Oh, no you don't!" She made a hobbling lunge at the vixen, shouting, "Back off, you savage whore!"

The vixen skidded to an immediate halt and looked at Marvene with a quivering smile. Her side was still gushing, the dark blood trickling down her deerskin dress, and her ears flattened in her wild white mane as if against the pain. She limped back slowly, holding the dagger and sword before her, as if she expected Marvene and Estica to attack. But they simply watched as she limped to the end of the hall. Then she turned and fled, disappearing around the corner with a flash of her puffy white tail.

It took Marvene a moment to realize she was shaking with rage. She took a shuddering breath and tried to calm down.

Estica ripped off her sleeve and tied it off over her wound. Marvene limped to her and touched her face. "Baby, did she hurt you . . .?"

Estica's eyes flashed and she jerked away. "Don't," she said stiffly and quietly.

"Essie . . ."

Estica darted her a glare, then dropped her eyes to her injured arm again. "Your breath smelled like . . . At the time I didn't think . . . You were hurt. That was all I could think about. Then I smelled her. It was_her_ on your breath. On your jacket. All over you."

Marvene's ears flattened. "Baby . . ." She didn't know what to say. She clutched her side and thought nothing could hurt worse than Estica's anger, not even a stab wound.

Estica tore off her other sleeve, and reaching under Marvene's breastplate, she tied it tight around her wound, to stop the bleeding in her side. "I don't want to hear," she said as she worked, "how you were seduced into it. How you had a few. Or how you did it to get back at me because you're common and I'm highborn --"

"You know damn well that's not why --!"

"For god's sake, Marvene," Estica said angrily and shook her head, her bushy ponytail flowing behind her shoulders. "It's all you ever _talk_about. Especially when you're drunk. Which is how I know you're sober now."

Marvene swallowed tightly and was silent as Estica finished tying the makeshift bandage in place.

"Now let's just go," Estica said quietly. "We should join the others. I wanted to take you to the library, but I can't risk running into that . . . creature again. She went the same way we were going . . . _damn_it all," she swore under her breath.

"Yes, love," Marvene said docilely.

Estica took Marvene by the arm and led her on.

They arrived at the gates as the sky boiled red, and Marvene breathed the harsh, stifling scent of smoke and fire with a twisted face. Her heart burned to think of all the villagers down in the duchy, lying in pools of their own blood, children and females and farmers who'd probably never done a fox any real harm. It amazed her that she had once pitied the creatures, that she had secretly hated the Hunt, that she would secretly burn with anger every time she heard of some farmer who'd caught a fox in a trap, bent on making a bit of extra money. But as she and Estica approached the other guards, she had to ask herself: what would she do were she a fox? Sit out in the forest and be hunted forever? Or take back what was hers? Howlester Duchy had once been fox land, forests as far as the eye could see. Then King Antony put his flag down, and somehow, that made it okay to slaughter the creatures and drive them away. But Marvene looked at the sky and asked herself . . . was this okay? Was any of this okay? Foxes and dogs fighting? Maybe everyone was wrong.

"Shackley!" shouted one of the guards. He broke from the throng of gathering guardsmen and approached with his paw on the sword at his hip. "And about bloody time," he complained. "Where the hell have you been?" He nodded at Marvene. "Trimmin' the verge?"

The other guards chuckled.

Marvene glared at him. His name was Floyd Crawley and he loved to make jokes about Marvene and Estica's relationship, as much as the other guards loved to laugh at their relationship. Crawley was a big auburn mastiff who had failed his training at the academy to become an elite royal guard. Somehow, he wound up working at Howlester Manor instead, and because he had trained at the academy, he automatically fancied himself captain of the duchy's guard - despite the fact that he had failed said training. Charles had appointed Marvene and Estica in charge in his stead, and it was more than obvious that the fact ate away at Crawley, who considered himself a better candidate to lead than any highborn female who had "run away from Daddy" or any "drunken bint off the street," as he often referred to Marvene.

Another guard came forward, frowning with concern to see Marvene hurt. His name was Charlie Pin, but everyone called him Pin to avoid confusion with the duke. He was a young Airdale terrier, who had joined the duke's army to feed his pregnant wife. She died in childbirth, and he had spent the last six years raising his daughter with his sister while serving at the manor. He was so young. And nice. And brave and good. Marvene looked at him and thought it was a pity he was probably about to die.

"They're coming," Pin said breathlessly to Estica. "Captain Shackley, what should we --?" He took a step toward Estica, but Crawley stuck out his arm to stop him.

"She's not your captain, boy," Crawley said darkly. "We aren't charging to our deaths under the lead of some weepy bitch." His glaring eyes were fixed on Estica, silently challenging.

Marvene saw Estica's back tighten with anger and tried not to show her worry. Estica had just come from a fight, was tired, and had been injured by the vixen. Marvene knew Estica was strong, that she could probably fight Crawley if it came to that. She still didn't want her to. She hated seeing Estica hurt. By anyone. And the fact that she had no weapon with which to defend Estica was suddenly infuriating.

"I am his captain," Estica said stiffly to Crawley. "And I am your captain too. And if you don't shut up and get in line --"

"What?" laughed Crawley. "You'll throw your monthly rags at me?"

The others laughed but for Pin, who looked away darkly.

Estica remained calm and cold. "You'd only be so lucky. It'd probably be the only whiff you ever got from a bitch."

"Oooo," chorused the guards, impressed.

"Now get --"

Crawley tensed. He took a halting step and punched Estica. Blood flew, and Marvene's eyes widened as Estica's head snapped back and she reeled from the blow. "Son of a bitch!" Marvene shouted. She could see her father, drunk and roaring, as he punched her mother to the floor. Could hear her mother's screams as Malcolm dragged her up by the mane and beat her some more. And the sounds . . the choking . . . the snap of flesh bursting and bleeding from every blow. Marvene's breasts heaved and she staggered toward Estica and reached for her but missed.

Crawley cracked his knuckles and laughed, watching as Estica bowed her head and spit blood. "Now whadda you say to that, bitch?" The other guards were laughing when Estica took a halting step - and gave Crawley an upper cut that sent his boots in the air. He collapsed in a dazed heap, and with blood staining her mouth, Estica lifted her eyes to the other guards. The distant fires reflected in her furious gaze, and without a word, they fell into line before her.

"Pin!" Estica barked.

Pin stepped forward. "Ma'am?"

"Get Porter a weapon," Estica ordered.

"Right away, ma'am," Pin said at once and ran off.

Estica paced before the guards, casually stepping on Crawley's paw as she turned. There was a nasty crack, Crawley screamed, and Marvene smiled to think Estica had casually broken a few fingers.

"I am your captain," Estica said, loudly, face hard, breasts heaving behind her breastplate, "and I will stand at your side this day, as I have always stood at your side, your sister in arms. We know Owen's soldiers are coming, that they will arrive late, and that we will probably die defending our own. But we will die with honor, standing shoulder to shoulder to stop those creatures passing the gates. The earth will tremble with our steps and the sky will shatter from our roar! If I have to die today, I'm taking all those sons of bitches with me!" She lifted her sword. "Are you with me!"

The guards drew their swords and roared - and Marvene felt a chill sweep through her fur. They looked at Estica, waiting for her order, and even if they resented her, they respected her leadership. Now. In these last moments. When the male they thought was worthy of their respect was crawling through the dirt with a broken paw.

The guards turned to face the gates, standing stiff and solemn as they listened to the foxes approaching. Marvene limped to Estica's side and peered with her down the road. The approaching horde grew louder, and Marvene could swear the ground was shaking. Behind her, she could feel the guards' fear, like a poisonous fume curling on the air. All of them had families, wives, children living down in the village who they had been forced to abandon in order to defend the manor's gates. The duke's army was down in the village, fighting and losing. Howlester Manor was the last stand. The foxes thought they were coming for the prince, but the prince was long gone. They would capture soldiers, torture and interrogate them, but none of the soldiers knew where the prince had gone. And Marvene would slit the other guards' throats before she let a fox torture any one of them.

"Ma'am," Pin said breathlessly.

Marvene glanced over. Pin had returned with a sword for her. She took it with an unsteady paw and cursed under her breath at the agony in her side. Pin watched her anxiously a moment, but she nodded him away. The boy had always been like a little brother to her, and now he was going to die - either by the paw of a fox or by her paw. She couldn't let them take him alive, and he had asked her earlier that evening. "Don't let them take me," he'd said to Marvene, "swear! If they break the gate, cut my throat! I don't want my daughter knowing her father was mutilated when he failed to protect her."

The foxes continued to approach, their fire growing brighter as it blazed up the road, and the tremble in the ground became very real. Marvene swallowed hard and glanced at Estica, who was standing cold and solemn, sword ready as she peered through the gates.

"Es-Estica . . ." Marvene whispered.

"Shut up, Marvi," Estica said without looking at her. "I don't believe in goodbyes."

Marvene looked at the road again and snorted. Were goodbyes something to believe in? She wanted a bloody kiss. She was about to snatch Estica into her arms and to hell with it when the foxes appeared on the road. The guards tensed, and Marvene heard some of them cursing and gasping. The foxes were not carrying torches - they were on fire. They stomped as one, a marching wall, bloody, screaming, a wild and savage glint in their bright eyes. Some of them had cut ears, ones tail had been cut clean off, and they marched on bloody feet, on legs that trembled with wounds that should have stopped them altogether. But they kept coming, as if they couldn't feel the pain. They kept coming, as if the gates weren't even there. They only had eyes for the line of guards who stood waiting for them. And their eyes were hungry.

"Bloody nutters," Marvene whispered in amazement and shook her head. It had to be magic. Magic, fire, and madness.

The fox in the lead was a tall white vixen, and Marvene thought she looked a great deal like the one loose in the manor. Except her eyes were red. She wore a long deerskin thong that trailed the ground between her legs and a thin wrap of deerskin around her great breasts. Her long white mane trailed behind her, blowing in the wind, and on her head was a crown of lavender feathers. The feathers were wreathed in flame, as were her shoulders and arms. And yet, she marched with wild-eyed euphoria, her paws open wide and licking with flame.

"The fire," Estica shouted, "is coming from the one in the lead! When they break the gate, she's fucking dead!"

The guards roared in response, and Marvene could hear their determination. She glanced back to see them in fight stance, shields lifted, grim-faced and filthy as sudden dust clouds blew in their faces. The rising dust was swirling from the feet of the marching foxes, and it grew thicker as they reached the gate.

The white fox in the lead lifted her paw, there was a terrible bang, and Marvene screamed as sky, trees, and fire swirled across her vision. She was so dazed, it took her a moment to realize she was tumbling and tumbling through the dirt. Another guard rolled to a stop beside her, eyes staring blank at the sky, fur singed. She closed his eyes with a trembling paw and whispered, "Good bye, sweet Pin." At least she wouldn't have to kill him now.

The foxes came, stomping dust and screaming wild war cries as they marched through the gate. Marvene's heart leapt with every shudder that tore through the ground, and she could see tiny pebbles leaping in rhythm. Coughing and sputtering dust, she ignored the searing pain her side and fumbled for her sword. Not far away, she could see other guards scrambling up, grabbing shields and dropped weapons. Many grabbed their shields too late and were failed by fire, spears, the sudden zip of arrows riddling them like pincushions. Their screams of agony tore to the red sky as they fell in clouds of dust.

"NA TUAR TU DEEN!" screamed the white fox in the lead, and the other foxes replied with an earth shattering roar, running and leaping as they tore into the guards.

"A booga booga to you, too," Marvene snarled, dragging herself to her feet. She lifted her sword and had almost come up on the white fox when the vixen spun around. Marvene choked as she took the back of her paw. She staggered but regained her footing and swung her sword in a flashing arc, bringing it down hard. "Rrraaa!" The vixen parried, conjuring a sword of fire that reflected orange in her red eyes. They struggled, blade to blade, and Marvene gritted her fangs, ignoring the wound that screamed in her side. She could feel the blood seeping from Estica's makeshift bandage. The vixen noticed the blood as well. She slowly smiled . . . then kicked Marvene in her wound, flipping back from the kick and landing deftly in a cloud of dust.

Marvene roared with pain and staggered back - then roared again when the vixen followed up with a vicious backslap. And another. And another. Marvene took the blows with a burning heart and staggered to one knee. She was surprised when another blow didn't come. She looked up to find the vixen simply standing over her, waiting. And in that moment, Marvene was reminded of Estica standing over the other white vixen back in the manor. Waiting.

"Alright," Marvene said, dragging herself to her feet again. Her golden curls tumbled, bloody and filthy across her eyes in the wind. "You wanna fight dirty? Let's fight dirty." She lunged.

The vixen smiled and leapt back, easily dodging and parrying Marvene's every strike. But Marvene hadn't only learned to fight from an expert swordsman. Marvene had also learned to fight on the streets. She brought the heel of her boot down on the vixen's bare foot with a nasty crack and the creature roared. Marvene didn't give it time to think. She stepped in and punched its face. Hard. Its flaming sword dissolved as it tripped back from the blow, and Marvene was proud to see the blood that sprayed from its mouth. It was apparent it had never been punched before. But it seemed to like where their battle was going. It wiped the blood away, staining its white wrist as it did so, and slowly smiled its mad, gleaming smile.

Marvene sniffed and wiggled her fingers in a beckoning gesture. "Well, come on, ya bint!" She took her sword in both paws and fell into fight stance, wishing she had a shield. If the thing conjured fire again . . .

But the vixen didn't conjure fire. She rolled through the dirt, snatched up a sword, and in one fluid motion, brought it down on Marvene. Marvene parried. And they struggled. And for every slice of the vixen's flesh, Marvene noticed her weakening, slowing down. And she realized why the creature wasn't conjuring more fire. She was losing energy: she couldn't.

But the vixen could still fight. And for all the injuries Marvene had given her, Marvene was still the more badly injured. It wasn't long before Marvene found herself on her knees before the vixen, her sword lost in the dirt as she clutched her bleeding side and gasped. The vixen stood over her and placed the tip of her sword under Marvene's chin, lifting her gasping face so she could appraise it.

"You fight well," the vixen said, startling Marvene into staring.

"Yeah . . . well . . ." Marvene panted. "You do, too . . . don't tell anyone . . . I said that . . ."

The vixen smiled. "I will make it quick, dog."

Marvene tensed as the vixen raised her sword, and she thought of her father, who would be mortified that she had lost to a "savage." Her father hadn't thought much of foxes. And he wouldn't care that Marvene had already been bleeding for an hour. The old dog had never given her a break.

The vixen was bringing the sword down when a blade suddenly blossomed in her chest. The sword tumbled from her grasp to the dirt, and she and Marvene watched in astonishment as the blood spread over her deerskin dress. The blade was ripped free with a nasty squelch, and the vixen whispered, "Great Yfel . . . I come to the warmth of your wings . . ." before collapsing limp in the dirt to reveal Estica.

Estica stood breathless over Marvene. Her black mane had torn loose of its tail, and it streamed around her in a wild mass. Marvene looked up at her and thought she looked like some hero who had stepped out legend to save her, standing tall as she was against the blazing red sky. She leaned down and grabbed Marvene and hurled her to her feet. Marvene saw her panicked eyes dart over the battlefield. The guards were losing. More and more foxes kept coming, a never ending throng.

"PULL BACK!" Estica screamed as yet another dog took a spear to the belly and fell. "GOD DAMN IT!" she roared when a guard tried to charge by her. She grabbed him by the shoulder, whirled him around, and shook him with a strength that horrified him. "I said pull back!" she snarled. "I will not lose another soldier to a battle we can't win!" He nodded and she shoved him toward the manor, screaming, "PULL BACK!"

Marvene didn't protest when Estica dragged her up the drive to the manor doors. The other guards ran with them, and it was depressing, the small number that had survived. They charged inside to the mess of toppled furniture and fallen vases the servants had left in their mad dash into the secret passages. Crawley was in the foyer, sitting on a couch with old Matson and sobbing as the gatekeeper bandaged his broken paw.

Milly was there as well. She came to Marvene, firmly took her by the arm, and helped her sit on the couch. Marvene watched as the old maid pulled bandages from her apron pocket, pushed aside Estica's makeshift bandage, and started patching her up.

"What are you doing here, old lady?" Marvene said to the maid. She leaned back, trying to ignore the pain as Milly's rough paws tended her wound.

Milly sniffed. "Who else is going to care for you brave fools? You be nice or I'll let you bleed out."

Marvene laughed softly.

Estica whirled, shouting for the guards to help her barricade the doors. Bloody and ragged, they scrambled to obey.

"And the windows!" Estica shouted. She grabbed a guard who was moving too slow and shoved him. "I said move! I want the most injured of you to head for the library. There's a secret passage out of the duchy there. The rest of us will stay here, hold them off as long as we can --"

Marvene's heart about stopped. Shoving Milly's paws off, she ignored the old dog's indignant cry as she lurched up from the couch, grabbed Estica by the arms, and peered into her eyes. "I'm not leaving you!" she declared in a voice that trembled.

Estica looked at her wearily. "Marvi --"

"I'm. Not," Marvene said over her, "Leaving. You."

They stared at each other. Then Estica slowly nodded. She turned away. "That's good enough," she said to the guards, who were pushing two tables against the door and a dresser over a window. "We'll all head to the library. Come on, Matson. Can you walk? Take my arm!"

Marvene glanced over and realized for the first time that old Matson was bleeding down his leg. His face was pained as he nodded and allowed Estica to help him ease up from the couch. The old male had been stabbed near his abdomen and thigh. There was too much blood: he wasn't going to make it. Crawley sobbed as he also rose from the couch, and Marvene smirked: cranky old Matson was braver than Crawley, who was still blubbering over a few broken fingers.

They ran for the library as the first foxes crashed through the windows. Marvene heard them screaming as they tumbled across the floor, now covered in shattered glass. Two guards fell back to protect the group from the rear, ignoring when Estica told them to keep running. They could hear the screaming and fighting as they rounded the corner and flew into the library.

Blood was on the floor. And Marvene recognized her sword and dagger on the carpet. So the vixen had been here. She picked her weapons up and was relieved to see Duke Charles had left the ladder against the bookshelf with the secret switch. He'd told them he would in case they needed to escape the manor and that the secret switch would be the green book left of the ladder. The other secret passages in the manor led to hidden panic rooms, but the one in the library was an escape route. Charles had entrusted the knowledge to Estica and Marvene, in the event that they needed to escape should Owen's soldiers come too late.

Estica scurried up the ladder and pulled the secret switch. The panel was opening when one of the guards who'd dropped back to protect them staggered into the room. His comrade had fallen protecting the rear, but he was not alone. He dragged an angry male fox with him.

The fox was young and scowling and blood was seeping from his temple. He wore a thin deerskin thong that barely hid his flapping penis and testicles. He was bright red, and the white "socks" on his bare feet and paws were caked in blood. Blood was also oozing from his lip. He glowered at them all as his capture dragged him into the room by his red mane, holding his sword to his throat.

"What'd you bring one of 'em for!" one of the guards complained.

"No time," breathed Estica, sliding down the ladder with her mane flying. "Into the passage!"

They hurried inside. Marvene hung back to allow Estica to help old Matson inside. The other guards followed, and Marvene could hear the sound of feet in the hall: foxes were coming. She grabbed Milly by the arm, ignoring the old maid's pained cry as she pulled her into the darkness of the tunnel. The sound of a switch. And then the panel was closing behind Marvene. She saw a fox appear in the library doorway, just as the panel closed.

They stood in the darkness, panting, tired. Marvene could hear breastplates jingling, the ragged, tired breathing of dying battle-weary soldiers. Someone cursed and something scraped across the floor.

"What in blazes?" complained Crawley.

"What? What is it, for god's sake?" begged one of the guards, who sounded paranoid and frightened.

Light slowly blossomed in the darkness, and Marvene blinked as the faces pressing around her came into view. Crawley held an oil lamp aloft and peered at it in surprise. "It was just . . . sitting there," he said with a shrug. "Kicked it with me boot."

"Mayhaps the Creator smiles on us after all," said another guard.

Matson sniffed and shook his head. "It's low on oil. Let's stop standing around here letting it burn away. . . . let's . . . get going," he panted.

"He's right," Estica said. "Let's go." She nodded at Crawley. "Lead the way."

Crawley nodded obediently, and holding the oil lamp aloft, he started down the passage. The others followed, Milly taking old Matson's arm and helping him along. The guard with the fox roughly dragged his prisoner along by the mane and was still holding his sword to his throat. Marvene and Estica brought up the rear, walking side by side in the pressing darkness.

"You're looking better," Estica commented, though Marvene could tell she was trying to hide the worry in her voice.

"Are ya lookin' at me then?" Marvene teased in her thick brogue. "Like the way me tail swings? That's sexual harassment, m'lady."

Estica laughed softly. "Don't joke about it," she said, and Marvene could see the crease of her frown in the dim light of the oil lamp. Marvene's lashes fluttered when she felt Estica caress her lips, and the tall beauty whispered, "You wouldn't be bleeding out your side if you didn't think with your clit."

Marvene caught Estica's paw and kissed it. "At my side's where you belong, love."