Vaticine City, Castille - 1666

"I shall, your Eminence. Arciniega will pay…"

La Ciencia, Castille - 1666

"They're coming."

The voice came from the rear of Alvara Arciniega's hidden laboratory, where the shadows pooled together. It belonged to Gruenhild, his groundskeeper, and a friend of the family since her father retired from the same position some fifty years before.

"How many?" Arciniega's words were firm, practiced.

"I'm not sure," Gruenhild answered, "But they're led by someone new."

Arciniega turned from the stone block resting upon his work bench. A fragment of it had recently been chipped away, revealing a sliver of thin inhuman bone.

"New?" Alvara's eyes narrowed. This was no time for surprises. "An Inquisitor?"

"I think, but I can't know. He looks… dangerous."

"Curious…" he mused, then sprang into action. Lifting a thick leather case from beneath the bench, he removed its contents - a small but heavy telescope - and replaced it with the chipped block of stone. Strapping the bag shut, he handed it to Gruenhild and ushered her toward the door from which she had emerged.

"Make sure this arrives safely in Aldana, and take Stefan with you. He knows his way around a sword."

Gruenhild had worked for Arciniega long enough to recognize the urgency in his voice. Without responding, she ducked back into the dark rear corner of the room and vanished. The only sound of her escape was a brief gust of air followed by the click as the secret door locked behind her. The stairwell beyond was all but sound-proofed.

Now then, Alvara noted, drawing his fencing blade free of its thin sheath, on to more pressing matters.

The center of the heavy wooden door suddenly burst inward, showering splinters across the floor and revealing a heavy arm wrapped in smoke-black armor. The arm whipped about until it found the thick plank barring the portal, and ripped it up and away.

The door swung open slowly, revealing a tall swordsman dressed all in black and red, his tabard clearly displaying the Prophet's Cross and his face hidden behind an impressive helmet. Behind him stood a pair of red-clad Inquisitors carrying weapons of varying lethalness.

"Welcome, gentlemen," Alvara quipped at the intruders. "Do step in and make yourselves at home." He considered simply felling all of them now, and making away as the College had planned. But he fancied a bit of fun first.

Besides, he thought as the armor-clad Inquisitor stepped into the laboratory, this one deserves a closer look…

The foot soldiers moved to flank Arciniega, lining the walls on either side as their leader approached.

Alvara took two steps back, placing himself between his workbench and a long low table lined with his latest chemistry experiments. The armored man continued his brisk walk toward the scholar, never pausing, confident that his men would fall in where he expected them to be. When he finally drew his sword, it groaned with the death-cries of a hundred fallen heretics.

No speeches. Alvara braced for the man's first lunge. Thank Theus for small favors.

When the attack finally came, Alvara ducked and kicked outward to the left, upending the chemistry table toward the Inquisitors. Remembering the reaction time of the vials' contents, he swept the knight's lunge aside and rolled to the right, out of range…

The explosion rocked the room and knocked the telescope from its perch upon the work bench, but as it sailed toward the ground Alvara shifted direction and rolled beneath it, snatching it from the air and coming up into a crouching position. His eyes darted to both sides in time to make out two figures nearing him from the right and one - the knight - from the left.

One direction or the other…

Leaping up onto the work bench, Alvara gauged his distance from the beams above, then leapt upward, depositing the telescope safely between two support pillars and crashing down into two of the three figures. Switching sword hands, he lunged outward at the nearest, catching him along the temple, and then kneed him away. The man's screams confirmed his accuracy; he would be blind in one eye when this was done.

A sudden burst of pain erupted from Alvara's right shoulder as the knight's blade cut through cloth and muscle, and the scholar tumbled forward, through a second work bench and onto the cool stone floor. Righting himself as quickly as he could, he rolled quickly to the left and came up on one knee. Behind them, the knight's swing fell heavily through the air, narrowly missing his neck.

No time. His shoulder throbbed but he still had his rapier. More Inquisitors coming. Many more…

Alvara closed his eyes and focused for a moment, working the arrangement out in his head, visualizing the room and the remaining enemies, the surrounding furniture, the scattered devices, the debris…

Without looking, he reached out and yanked a lever to his left. A gush of hot wind behind him was followed by the knight's screams as an arm of fire leapt from the nearby burner to engulf him. The screams only intensified as the flames leapt about him, creeping into the tiny slits between plates, scalding flesh and bone. Within moments, the screaming was over, however, and only the sizzling within the knight's armor was heard, followed by a thundering crash as it fell sideways and came to rest.

Alvara opened his eyes, and caught sight of the remaining Inquisitor. His face was little more than a pale sheet as he observed the smoldering ruin of his former commander. He eyed the exit as he dragged his near-blind companion to his feet, but Alvara stepped in front of them.

"Lost your nerve?" Alvara chided them. "Come now, gentlemen. I'm sure you're responsible for worse…"

Both Inquisitors moved at once, as Alvara dove toward them. One fell before he could make it three steps, the scholar's rapier catching him along the neck. The second took up an awkward defensive position and moved out to Alvara's side, hoping to divide his attention.

Crafty devil, Alvara thought as he scanned the floor and surrounding tables. When his eye caught the fallen knight's blade, he grabbed for it and both arms whipped out toward the Inquisitor, stabbing through his torso in both directions.

But I invented the craft.

Freeing the blades, he wiped his own clean, leaving the second beside its former owner. Then he climbed up onto the work bench and retrieved his telescope, wrapped it in fine cloth, and made his way out to the stables.

The College would be retreating all over Théah by now, and he had to be at the rallying point by dawn.