They came down and spread to the left and right, four on each side. Then two Sylvan females descended down to the bottom step. The first was tall and slender in an elegant, dark maroon gown, chased in gold and cut low across her ample bosom. Long dark hair framed her face in what Melville thought of as a Cleopatra style. The elegant, long-barrelled pistol in her hand coordinated perfectly with her ensemble. She was ravishingly beautiful, but it was the kind of deliberate, calculated beauty that came from a team of expert hair stylists, make-up artists, and dressmakers. And religious attention to vigorous daily workouts. You knew immediately that she took her beauty, and herself, very seriously.

Beside her was a dour, gray-haired old Sylvan lady dressed in layers of black and dark gray clothing, with slim maroon piping around the hems. Her plain, modest dress fit her matronly appearance perfectly.

When Fielder saw them his eyes grew wide and began to dart around like trapped animals.

"They always remind me of ballerinas," whispered Melville as he watched them come down the moonlit steps. "So elegant and graceful."

"Yeah," muttered Fielder, "the nutcracker suite."

The two customers in the door to the banquet room turned to watch what was happening, and several of the goons pointed their guns at them and motioned them into the middle of the room. The revelers in the banquet room couldn't see the stairs and had no indication that there was trouble.

"Baronet Daniello Sans-Fielder. The n.o.bleman without a 'field.' " said the elegant Sylvan lady with a nod and a pleasant smile. "And Captain Thomas Melville," she continued with a nod in his direction. "You must come with us. You are in great danger."

"Why?" said Melville, leaving the revelation of Fielder's full name and t.i.tle to be considered later.

"Because we will kill you if you don't," she said, her smile suddenly turning feral. "Actually, you will die anyway, but this way you will live just a little while longer. In fact," she continued, licking her lips and picking up momentum, "I intend to kill you myself, and I intend to enjoy it. Perhaps I will toy with the boy a little first, but you are all, already, dead men. You should resign yourselves to that fact." You could tell that she was getting pleasure from this. Her eyes were sparkling and her lips began to glisten.

Fielder smiled. Threats made him feel at home. Appeals to his better nature, his duty, and his country always made him uncomfortable. But threats now, threats he could handle. She had arrogantly and foolishly stated her intent and blocked off his escape route, leaving no option but to fight and kill them. First he needed to buy time. He could hear that lunatic Broadax up to something in the cloakroom to his left, and time would only work in their favor. If he were in Broadax's position, odds were good he'd never come back out, but that demented dwarf would never run from a battle.

"Lady Madelia," Fielder replied with something between a grimace and a smile.

"You know her?" Melville asked.

"Oh, yes sir. Careful! Don't look her in the eyes. She'll steal your soul. How very good to see you again, Maddy. But, you know, that gown just isn't you. Last time I saw you, you were wearing considerably less, and you were blindfolded and tied to the bed with an a.s.sortment of vegetables to keep you company. I liked you a lot better that way. Too bad you have adult supervision now," he added with a waggle of his eyebrows. "Lose them and we could still have a lot of fun, just like last time."

Her face went slightly red and the elderly Sylvan's face went beet red. The huge guard to her right began to raise his pistol with a growl, but Fielder was betting that she couldn't let an insult go unanswered. The Sylvans' one besetting weakness was their arrogance, and he intended to work it for all he could.

She reached out and put a restraining hand on her goon's arm and replied in a syrupy voice, "Why Daniel, is that the way to talk to the only woman who ever slept with you sober? s.e.x is only for revenge or making babies. In your case I was getting exquisite revenge on my father by having an affair with a hairy, under-evolved human. It was delightfully wicked. For me you were a pet, like a dog or a horse, only you could be publicly flaunted. But then," she went on with a pout, "my point was made and it was time to put the beast down, and you were nowhere to be found. But you couldn't stay out at sea forever, could you? Now I have you and the dog who is panting after my niece."

The matron beside her was clearly stunned by these revelations. Her face went from red to bloodless white. You could tell that she was the kind of woman who might be aware that, somewhere beneath the complex strata of her petticoats and undergarments, there was some flesh and other female accouterments, but that didn't necessarily mean she approved of it. Madelia's last comment had ensured that, whatever the old lady might have contributed to the coming battle, it wasn't going to happen now.

"Maddy," said Fielder, dragging out the "y" with an infuriating grin and a knowing cant to his head. Infuriating grins were his specialty and this was a prize winner. " 's.e.x is only for babies or revenge?' You'd only eat your babies, and everyone knows all about your penchant for revenge, so how do you ever have fun? Have you considered the advantages of autocopulation?"

"Oh, Daniel, that is so low. Next you'll be making scatological culinary recommendations. How tiresome." She was back to the pout. This was a bad sign and Broadax was finished making noise to his left. That meant the demented dwarf was up to something, and Fielder had to buy her time. At least Broadax had sense enough to spit out that d.a.m.ned cigar first.

"A quick death is the best you could have expected, Daniel, but now perhaps something more is called for. After all, my lover, only the brave deserve the fair, and we know that you are not brave. Now don't we? You put up such a good front now, but oh my how you will whimper and beg under my knife."

At one level his guts were turning to water and a whimper was striving to escape from his lips, but his finely tuned survival instinct knew that groveling would lead straight to death. The good news was that he'd p.i.s.sed her off so bad that she wasn't going to kill them out of hand. The old, "Let's torture them in some creative way," really meant "Let's be stupid and not kill them right now while we have the chance." Truly dangerous people didn't threaten, they just killed. Quickly and efficiently. Melville, Broadax and Fielder were as different as three people could be from each other, but they had this in common: they were profoundly dangerous people.

Melville chimed in at just the right time, naive as a puppy but a master of tactics once the situation was clear to him. Now he was playing the same game as Fielder, maneuvering to give Broadax time. "Madam," he said calmly, "do I understand that Princess Glaive Newra is your niece, and that the family disapproves of my attentions? I a.s.sure you that we've been quite honorable in our relations, and thus far none of her relatives have communicated any disapproval."

Now she was back to angry. "You pathetic little man. Your superiors most certainly do not approve. Your own amba.s.sador has turned you over to us."

She gestured with her left hand to the elderly lady standing beside her. "Furthermore, this is my aunt Ondelesa, Princess Glaive's great-aunt. She is the family matriarch and she most a.s.suredly does not approve."

"Actually, sir," said Fielder, "she controls the money in the family, and money and morals are rarely on speaking terms. Are they, Maddy?"

"Daniel," asked Melville with mock innocence as Aunt Madelia's knuckles grew white from gripping the pistol in her right hand, "Whatever did you do to make this lady so angry?"

Angry is good, thought Fielder. Keep her talking. "You know how it is, sir. Put me next to a beautiful woman and one of two things happens. She either surrenders or screams. Sometimes both. You did a lot of surrendering and then screaming, didn't you, my little Maddy? My back still has the scars. But in the end, it didn't work out." c.o.c.king his head slightly toward Melville, he confided, "I dumped her when she started to get mean and fat."

"Fat!" she screamed. Then she took control of herself and went icy cold. "Why Daniel," she said, "don't you find me attractive any more? Your discipline might have to take a very special form. Perhaps I will make you beg for me when I'm done. But when I'm done no woman will want you, and you will beg for death." It was obvious that her pleasure was becoming intense now. The moonlight was beginning to highlight two shadows emerging across the front of her sheer maroon gown, like two thumbs protruding, as she licked her lips.

"Captain," she said, licking her lips and turning the full power of her megawatt gaze upon Melville, "Daniel finds me unattractive. What do you think?"

Sylvan females seemed to have some kind of physical impact that was incredibly powerful. Perhaps a kind of pheromonal control. Melville found his knees growing weak. His stomach and regions further south seemed to ignite and twist into knots. Then he found his salvation, and a tactical diversion, in poetry. He gestured up at the moonlight flowing in from the skylights, intentionally pointing them away from where Broadax seemed to be moving, and said, "You meaner beauties of the night,

That poorly satisfy our eyes

More by your number than your light,

You common people of the skies;

What are you, when the Moon shall rise?"

Their tormentor's eyes crossed slightly as she absorbed this. It was like a fuse being lit as they waited for the reaction when she finally comprehended what Melville had said.

At the top of their peripheral vision, up in the high, vaulted, smoky dark ceiling, Fielder and Melville both saw movement in the shadows of the rafters, and they had to concentrate to avoid looking. "Captain," continued Fielder, maintaining the momentum, "I think we should both forget about women, and stick to handguns. Handguns are infinitely superior to women. For example, a handgun won't ask, 'Do these new grips make me look fat?' " There, that was a good hint to get ready for a gunfight!

"You monkey sc.u.m! I've had about all the 'fat' I'm going to take off of you!"

"You know another way that a pistol is better than a woman?" Fielder continued relentlessly. "You can buy a silencer for a pistol."

On that note, Broadax dropped like a red bolt of lightning from the sky. Or from the ceiling, as the case may be. She'd crawled from the alcove up into the rafters, creeping slowly, avoiding the moonlight flowing through the skylights, and moving quietly through the shadows. As soon as she was in position she dropped onto the shoulders of the big goon. She held a very short, sawed-off, double-barreled, 10-gauge shotgun pistol in her left hand, and a short hand-ax in her right. She must have kept them concealed on her body, which was ample in width and depth, if not height, and had plenty of concealment s.p.a.ce.

Melville mentally numbered the goons, from his left to right, as one through four. Huge-goon was number four. Then came the two hags, first Aunt Madelia and then Great Aunt Ondelesa, back and up on the step, followed by goons five through eight.

As she dropped down to goon four's shoulders, Broadax fired both barrels in the direction of goon five. For the unsuspecting Sylvans it was a deafening "BLA-BLOOM!" from out of nowhere. As always, she was a terrible shot, and even with a sawed-off shotgun, with barrels little longer than the sh.e.l.ls, she only succeeded in spraying a few buckshot rounds into goon five's feet. The really amazing thing was that goon four was not knocked to the floor by the impact of 250-plus pounds of compact marine. At least his knees buckled. Meanwhile Broadax swung her ax to the right, cleanly cutting a cleft halfway through goon three's skull, her ax coming out in a vivid arc of blood and brains that sprayed across Aunt Madelia's dcolletage.

Melville and Fielder took completely different approaches to life, but there was one rule they both could firmly agree upon: "Be polite. Be professional. And have a plan to kill everyone you meet." Thus they were both completely, mentally and physically prepared for Broadax's signal. They saw the feet emerge before her body fell, giving them a split second's warning, and they began to move as soon as her body began to drop. Already the effects of auditory exclusion had kicked in, so they barely heard Broadax's shotgun blast.

Melville crouched and cut to his left, since the right was blocked by the two dumbfounded innocent bystanders. He drew his .45 with his right hand as he pulled young Hayl along with his left. He raised the pistol up before his eyes. Thousands of practice reps made it smooth, like a martial art. Weapon up, thumb safety down with a comforting "snick."

He brought the front sight into focus, pressing the trigger as the sight covered goon six's face and . . . "_____!" You never "pull" a trigger. There are many things in life that are good to pull, but not triggers, not if you want to hit your target. The recoil pulled his pistol up. He forced it rapidly down and to the right, covering goon seven's face with the front sight and, "_____!" A very satisfying fountain of blood and brains erupted from the backs of both goons' skulls, spewing an interesting pattern of red and gray across Great Aunt Ondelesa's ashen face.

Fielder also cut to his left and drew his weapon. He didn't try for fancy head shots. Not bothering to get a good sight picture, he simply shot goons three, two and one as quickly as he could in the gut, turning the weapon sideways and letting the recoil carry the pistol to the left, covering each target in turn, "_____!, _____!, _____!"

He wanted very badly to shoot Madelia. She scared him profoundly and he derived great personal satisfaction from shooting people who frightened him, but she cut back behind the ma.s.sive bulk of goon four and there was no clear shot at her.

The Sylvan goons foolishly subscribed to the belief that just pointing guns at your enemy rendered them helpless. After all, that's the way it worked in countless plays and stories, and in every movie and video on the high-tech worlds they'd visited. In reality, a good opponent can almost always draw a weapon and fire before a man with a gun pointed at him could shoot. The process was first outlined by Colonel John Boyd, an early warrior science pioneer in the mid-twentieth century. He called it the OODA loop: Observe, Orient, Decide, Act.

Thus, the OODA loop for the early stage of this battle went something like this: Melville and Fielder "Observed" and "Oriented" when Broadax began to lower herself. They "Decided" to draw and shoot, and began to "Act" when she dropped.

The goons began their OODA loop when their opponents began to draw their weapons.

a"Observe: "Dey's doin' sumfin. Watar dey doin? Dey's drawin' guns!"

a"Orient: "Dat's dangerous! Sumbuddy could get hurt!"

a"Decide: "I'm gonna hafta shoot 'em!"

Then, just as they got this far, before they could Act, a new data point came into play when Broadax fired her shotgun and landed on goon four's shoulders, and the goons began a new OODA loop.

a"Observe: " . . ." (Pause a beat here to be stunned by the sensory overload caused by the noise, concussion, smell, and flash of the shotgun blast.) "Wot da hale wus thaat!"

a"Orient: "It came from ober ter!"

a"Decide: "Bedda look!"

a"Act: "Looky der!"

Then a new OODA loop began as they processed this new data.

a"Observe: "They's a giant red monkey on 'is back!

a"Orient: "Where da hale did dat come frum! Now we's got two problims! Do I kill da one up der, or the ones out der? Wottel I dew? Wottel I dew?!" (Note that the more options you have to consider, the longer it will take to complete the Orient and Decide phases.) a"Decide: "Bedda kill da ones out der!"

Again, just as they were getting about this far, and before they could Act, several of the goons' OODA loops were interrupted by .45 caliber chunks of lead going into their brains or guts. Even those who weren't hit were distracted, and they had to begin a new OODA loop, initiated by the gunshots. "Dey's shootin' us! Dey can't dodat!" And, if they happened to be looking in the direction of their falling comrades, there was a further distraction and yet another OODA loop, "Oops, der goes Og. An' he owed me money!"

Sometimes this whole process was referred to as an "action-reaction drill" and the person on the "reaction" side of the equation almost always lost. Additionally, the effects of tunnel vision meant the goons were figuratively "looking through a toilet-paper tube." A target making a rapid lateral movement, as Melville and Fielder were doing, could quickly cut out of the field of view and literally disappear off their narrow "radar screen."

Goons one and two were busy cogitating upon the bullets in their guts. However, much to Fielder's disgust, they had body armor on. Even with good body armor, a .45 will still knock the wind out of a man, but they were only temporarily distracted and even managed to get off a few wild shots.

Goon three was suffering from a ma.s.sive, ax-induced, prefrontal lobotomy.

Broadax was sitting on goon four's shoulders. She'd punched the hot, empty shotgun barrel in her left hand through his lips and teeth ("Crunch!") and ground it deeply into his mouth, muttering, "Suk on dis, big boy!" Then she yanked the shotgun to the side and was having a fair degree of success at uns.c.r.e.w.i.n.g his head with it, while flailing unsuccessfully at Aunt Madelia with the ax in her right hand.

Great Aunt Ondelesa was in deep shock, and she didn't have a weapon anyway. Goon five was understandably distracted by a spray of buckshot going into his feet, but he managed to get off a few wild shots. Goons six and seven thought whatever final thoughts a brain thinks as a bullet goes through it. Then they died without getting off a shot.

Goon eight was the only one capable of accurate fire, since he was the only one without any major distractions. Unfortunately for the goon team, he chose to fire at the two bystanders, since they were the targets directly in front of him. In an ideal world, all of the goons would have killed the targets directly in front of them. This was their "a.s.signed sector of fire." But the sudden, violent action taken by the Westerness officers threw an eight-legged monkey wrench into their plans.

The feeble fire from the stunned Sylvans failed to hit the two Westerness officers as they dodged into the alcove to their left. Melville pulled Hayl with him, while the profoundly frightened Hayl left a trail of unnecessary body ma.s.s behind him. Both Melville and Fielder fired a few more wild shots as they ducked around the corner, and like all wild shots they accomplished little. The monkeys on their shoulders didn't have to deflect a single bullet, satisfying themselves with a defiant "Eeek!"

The two innocent customers to their right, fellow humans whose only crime was to witness what was occurring, were both hit. One took a bullet through the heart and the other received a blast to the gonads that made the officers' eyes water in sympathy. Both of these individuals tried to stagger mindlessly after them into the alcove. The man shot in the groin didn't make it far before he was debilitated by the pain of his wound and fell to the ground, coiled around his private pain. But the luckless customer shot through the heart had five to seven seconds before his body would lose hydraulics. He used that time to stumble into the alcove. Crouching on the floor beside the dying human, Melville and Fielder edged around the corner of the alcove to cover Broadax's retreat.

Goons one and two, shot in the gut but saved by their bulletproof vests, were ready for them. "They're wearing body armor," grunted Fielder in disgust. Melville and Fielder each picked one off with a bullet in the head, their monkeys blocking incoming bullets with an "Eeek!" of protest and terror. Meanwhile Broadax used her legs, one apelike arm, and the leverage from the shotgun shoved in goon four's mouth to finish uns.c.r.e.w.i.n.g his head with one vicious jerk, "snAAP!crack-krunch." Then with a kick of her legs she spun to his front and dropped to the floor as her victim toppled backwards. She broke her fall by plunging her ax into her victim, ripping him open from sternum to crotch as she fell, spilling his innards out onto his feet as he fell back.

Melville noticed that the big goon didn't look any better on the inside than on the outside. Yep, he hated his guts.

Aunt Madelia and goons five and eight fired at Broadax as she made her exit. Her monkey stood backwards on her shoulders, shaking its fists and screaming its outrage as it blocked the shots. Then it mooned the goons as the marine officer scampered into the alcove.

Hayl lay looking at the face of the dead bystander. "He's awful still," the boy said cautiously. "Is something bad happening to him?"

"Could be," answered Fielder distractedly. "He's dead."

By this time Broadax had joined them, her monkey still sitting backwards to cover the retreat.

"Gosh," said Hayl, still fixated on his first dead man. "I'm sorry that happened."

"Now that is a view which I'm sure he shares," said Fielder. "It could be worse," he added. "It could be me."

"But this is all wrong," whimpered Hayl. "We were taught that the Sylvans were a n.o.ble race. Wise and fair, with fluid laughter and a wonderful, subtle sense of humor."

Broadax and Fielder's belt buckle exchanged quick glances. "I think ye must be thinkin' about diff'r'nt Sylvans," Broadax said slowly. "We jist seem ta have the udder sort here," she added, as she broke open the shotgun, ejecting two smoking 12-gauge sh.e.l.ls ("Click, tiiing!, thum-thump"), and inserted two more and slammed the breech shut ("thuun-thuung, Chung!").

These sound effects made Hayl jump and twitch, as his recently expelled body fluids continued to stain the leg of his trousers. Then he apologized with an abject, embarra.s.sed, " . . . sorry."

" 'S okay, lad," said Broadax kindly. "We're all a bit jumpy."

"Except him," added Fielder, nodding at their dead, unknown companion. He used the momentary lull to conduct a tactical reload, ejecting and saving a mostly empty magazine while slamming home a full one, all with his left hand in a smooth, fluid motion, while keeping the gun up and ready in his right hand.

"Mr. Hayl," began Melville, conducting his own tac reload. "You need to know that the Sylvans engage in some very dirty dynastic infighting. Knives, subtle poisons, and arranged accidents are common. You're correct about the laughter and subtle sense of humor though. They have been known to use quite hilarious b.o.o.by traps involving numerous needle-sharp spears in the nether regions. Direct confrontations like this are rare, but not unheard of."

"Aye," muttered Fielder. "A very 'pointed' sense of humor, generally applied to family feuds. Heir today, gone tomorrow."

Then they heard someone outside the entrance to the inn. It had been braced shut behind them after they entered it. "Madam!" shouted a voice. "Is everything all right? Do you need us?"

Madelia screamed, "Yes you idiots, come in and kill them!"

"Okay," Melville continued quickly. "We're going across this room, into the dining room, across the table, and out the back door. Broadax and Hayl go low, we'll go high." Glancing down at the reproachful eyes of the dead customer, and then at his still-writhing a.s.sociate, Melville added, "Shoot to kill as we go. It's only fair."

Hayl nodded. Broadax growled, hand-ax held ready in one hand and shotgun in the other. Fielder pulled a two-shot derringer from an ankle holster and said with a nod, holding a weapon in each hand, "Here's another reason why a handgun is better than a woman. Your primary handgun doesn't mind if you have a backup."

With a flurry of accurate .45 rounds Melville led, "_____!-_____!-_____!-_____!," followed a split second later by Fielder's deadly pistol fire, "_____!-_____!-_____!" and the "_____!!-_____!!" of Broadax's blind, double-barreled fusillade of double-ought buckshot. The Sylvans responded with a satisfying spray of blood and groans, and a feeble rattle of return fire punctuated by Aunt Madelia's curses. Fielder took several shots at her, but she was retreating quickly up the stairs and her vitals were above the field of view and unavailable. As she turned to the left at the top of the landing, Fielder got a side view of her most ma.s.sy visible target centered in his front sight and pressed off a round. He got a brief and very satisfying glimpse of the bullet creasing both cheeks as she screamed and ran out of view with a b.l.o.o.d.y line etched across her hams.

The four officers raced across the room, their monkeys again blocking bullets with a feeble, futile, half-hearted "eek," of protest. Then they moved into the long, narrow banquet hall, dominated by the fully laden banquet table, whose occupants were arching their necks to observe the dinner show next door.

"Where are we running to?" asked young Hayl.