Miri woke feeling sore, yet drowsily contented. Judging from the warm covers and medicinal smells, her comrades had carried her to the healers' tent, and she was going to be all right. She could feel it, and in any case, the important thing was that she hadn't disgraced herself.
Standing behind the bramble barricades with the senior rangers and their allies, waiting for her first battle to begin, she'd been frightened she wouldn't be able to bear it, that she'd throw down her bow and run away. And when the enemy—orcs, ogres, and huge, shapeless, crawling masses of mold—appeared among the trees, it was as terrifying as she'd imagined. But somehow she'd stood her ground, loosing arrow after arrow until the foe overran her position, then frantically hacking with her broadsword. She cut down two orcs, turned, and saw an ogre swinging its club at her. The world went dark.
Evidently her side had won the fight. Otherwise, she wouldn't be lying in a clean, soft bed. She realized her throat was dry, opened her eyes fully, and looked about to see if one of the priests had left her some water.
She wasn't in a tent but a small, sparsely furnished candlelit room with bare whitewashed walls. A thin young man with a red beard sat watching her. The sight of him made her snatch for the sword that no longer hung at her side, even as it pierced her confusion.
It wasn't an ogre that had wounded her—that had happened years ago, in the Winterwood—it was a collapsing balcony in Oeble, after which, what? Had Aeron sar Randal found her and decided to make her his prisoner?
As if by magic, a long, heavy fighting knife appeared in the thief's hand.
"Calm down!" he said. "I don't mean to hurt you. If I had, I wouldn't have carried you to Ilmater's house for healing."
She sneered and replied, "Yet you pull a dagger on me, even though I'm injured and unarmed."
"According to the healer who attended you, you're only a little bit hurt at this point." He smiled crookedly and added, "Besides, this afternoon I found out just how tough an unarmed outlander woman could be."
"You met Sefris."
"I did if she shaves her head and moves like... I don't know what. A cat? lightning? Flowing water? Whatever you liken it to, it was scary."
"That's her."
"Who in the Nine Hells is she? How do you know her?"
"How do you? What happened?"
"I'm the one with the knife," said Aeron, "so I'm going to ask the questions."
She glanced surreptitiously around. Her weapons were nowhere in evidence, nor was there anything much she could grab and use for self-defense. Even the pewter candlestick was out of reach. Still, perhaps her plight wasn't all that desperate.
"If this truly is a house of healing," she said, "all I need do is shout, and someone will rush to my aid."
"Faster than I can stick an Arthyn fang between your ribs?" he countered. "Don't count on it."
"Are you ruthless enough? I don't see it in your eyes."
He sighed like a man with a headache and said, "I already said I don't want to do it. I'm just hoping you can tell me something to help me get my father back."
She felt a reluctant twinge of sympathy for him. She remembered how it had felt to lose her own parents, when the white fever took them both within a tenday of one another.
"I saw a gang of ruffians march him away with a sack over his head," she said. "One of them was a tanarukk."
"Right, the Red Axes. I know who kidnapped him, but did you overhear them say anything about exactly where in the house they're holding him, or how he's restrained, or guarded? Anything like that?"
"No. I'm sorry."
"Curse it. Really, I don't even know what I thought you might be able to tell me, but I prayed there'd be something. What were you doing in my garret?"
"Looking for you and the strongbox."
"You can say 'The Black Bouquet.' I know what I've got. Sort of. Were you up there questioning my father when the Red Axes showed up?"
"No," Miri replied. "Sefris and I were just approaching the tower when the Red Axes and your father came out."
His eyes narrowed.
"Then you," he said, "this Sefris woman, and Kesk are all working together?"
"No. I mean, Sefris and I aren't on the same side anymore. It's complicated," Miri answered. She blinked when she absorbed the implications of what he'd just said. "Are you telling me Sefris has joined forces with the Red Axes?"
He frowned, considering, then said, "I assumed so at the time, but now that you ask, I guess I can't be absolutely sure. Anyway, I told you I'll ask the questions, and I think we're going to have to start at the beginning and go step by step for me to make sense of the answers. What is The Black Bouquet? A perfume maker's cookbook, I know that much, but what makes it so valuable? A secret message hidden somewhere inside?"
She hesitated, then decided that, since he knew so much already, it wouldn't hurt to tell him. In the course of interrogating her, he was likely to reveal things that she wished to know as well.
"No," she said, "it's just a formulary, but the formulary of Courynn Dulsaer."
Aeron looked blank.
"Until I got involved in this affair," Miri admitted, "I'd never heard of him, either, but evidently he's famous if you care about perfume. In fact, he was the most famous perfumer who ever lived. His concoctions weren't magical, but they might as well have been, for they delighted anyone who got a whiff. These days, when some lucky soul discovers an unopened bottle, it sells for thousands of gold pieces."
"Because nobody knows how to make any more."
"Right Courynn never took on an apprentice, or taught anybody else his secrets, and The Black Bouquet disappeared mysteriously at the time of his death. That was three hundred years ago, and everyone thought the book lost forever. Recently, however, in Ormath on the Shining Plains, Lord Quwen's agents uncovered and destroyed a temple of Shar. They found The Black Bouquet with the rest of the cult's treasure."
"And it's truly valuable," Aeron said.
Plainly, the thief was still trying to wrap his head around the idea that anyone cared so much about perfume. Miri had had the same reaction when she'd first heard the story.
"I'm no merchant—thank the Forest Queen!—but I'm told that if the right person used the book to set up a perfume manufactory, he'd probably wind up as rich as a prince," the ranger continued. "Anyway, Ormath has had its problems recently. It's had to cope with three bad harvests in a row, fend off raiders, and fight an actual war or two with its neighbors. For that reason and others, Lord Quwen was more interested in selling the book and turning a profit quickly than going into the perfume trade himself. He put out the word that he had it..."
"And a rich merchant here in Oeble arranged to buy it," Aeron finished for her. "Which one?"
"That, I can't tell you."
He scowled and said, "Ranger..."
"Threats won't move me. Come at me if you want, and we'll find out if an unarmed scout of the Red Hart Guild can defeat a common cutpurse waving a knife."
"Oh, calm down," said Aeron. "Maybe it doesn't matter who wanted it, or maybe we'll come back to that point later. For now, go on with your story."
"At the buyer's insistence," she continued with a nod, "the negotiations were conducted in secret, Lord Quwen dickering with the merchant's factor in Ormath. Finally they struck a deal. The buyer made a down payment, the balance due when he took delivery of the book. Quwen undertook to get the volume to Oeble. Since that too was supposed to happen secretly, he didn't want to use his own troops to move it. Instead, he applied to my guild for an experienced guide—me—and I in turn hired a company of mercenaries. In addition, Quwen's court wizard cast spells of warding on the strongbox and saddlebag intended to hold the Bouquet."
Miri sighed and added, "You know the rest of the story better than I do. The sellswords and I carried the formulary all the way here, and you stole it mere minutes before I could hand it over. Because, plainly, the expedition wasn't a secret. How did you know we were coming?"
"Only because Kesk hired me to steal the coffer. My guess is, he knew because somebody asked him to get it. Kesk's a power to be reckoned with here in Oeble, but I doubt he has spies in faraway cities. Though he might have one in a rich man's household here in town."
"I take it he's the most dangerous scoundrel hereabouts."
Aeron shrugged and said, "One of them."
"I'm surprised you dared defy him."
"He held back information that might have kept my friends alive," Aeron replied. "It made me angry. Though why I turned on him, then saved you who actually killed Dal and Gavath with your own hands, is a puzzle."
"I killed them in a fair fight you outlaws started."
"Does that make them any less dead?"
"No, and if you feel the need to avenge them, come ahead."
"Maybe we'll get to that," Aeron said. "Tell me about Sefris."
"What do you know about the followers of Shar?"
Aeron frowned and replied, "Just what everybody knows. They're vicious, mad, and worship an evil goddess."
"I don't know a great deal more myself, but I have heard of a cult within the cult. Or that watches over the main cult. Something like that. They're called the Monks of the Dark Moon, and they learn a special, highly effective style of fighting. Sefris claims to be one of them, and I believe her. Evidently her order sent her here to recover the treasure Quwen plundered from their goddess."
Aeron cocked his head and asked, "So what were you doing wandering around with her?"
Miri felt her face grow warm.
"At first," she said, "I didn't know who she was. She tricked me into accepting her as my comrade. For some reason, she must have thought she'd have better luck getting her hands on the Bouquet if we hunted it together. In the end, she turned on me, because I wouldn't agree to help her take your father from the Red Axes and hold him hostage ourselves, and that was when she told me who she really is. We fought until your balcony collapsed beneath us. She managed to scramble off, but I didn't. It's a miracle I'm not dead."
"You didn't fall all the way to the ground," said Aeron. "You landed on a Rainspan partway down. If Sefris wants to take the book back to the cult, and Kesk wants it for some other reason, how could they work together?"
"I don't know. You're fairly certain they are?"
"I palavered with Kesk today. Sefris stalked me when I left and tried to capture me. How did she know to find me there unless that pig-faced bastard told her?"
"If she tried to catch you, you were lucky to get away. As lucky as I am to still be alive."
"I realize that. The first time she threw a spell at me, it didn't take, but I felt a kind of tickle in my head. I glanced around and spotted a woman standing in a wriggling blot of shadow, or twilight, in the middle of the sunshine. It only lasted a second. If I'd looked a heartbeat later, I wouldn't have seen anything funny. I might have decided the tickle was just my imagination, and not known I was in danger until it was too late."
Miri stared at him and asked, "Sefris threw a spell?"
"Yes. You didn't even know she was a sorceress? Shadows of Mask, you are thick."
"She didn't cast any spells when we were together. Magic must be the secret weapon she likes to hold in reserve."
"Maybe."
"I assume Kesk offered to ransom your father for the formulary?" Miri asked.
"Yes."
"Are you going to do it?"
"I don't see how I can. I figured that if I tried, he'd play me false. Seize the book, take me prisoner, and kill both my father and me. He's like that mean, treacherous, and vengeful. But I wasn't sure of it, so I arranged a meeting in Slarvyn's Sword to feel him out. After what happened, I'm positive I can't trust him. Though maybe if I'm clever enough, I can set up the exchange in such a way that he has no choice but to keep his word."
"You sound doubtful," Miri said, "as well you should."
She decided she was tired of sitting up in bed like an invalid, so she pushed back the covers, and swung her bare feet to the floor. Someone had dressed her in a white linen shift sufficient for modesty.
"Why don't we do the sensible thing?" she asked.
He arched an eyebrow.
"Go to the authorities," she continued, "and report that the Red Axes abducted your father. If you have the kind of reputation I suspect, they might not take your word for it, but the Red Hart Guild is known far and wide as an honorable fraternity, and I'll back you up. I won't even tell them you're the thief who committed the outrage in the Paeraddyn and escaped to tell the tale, and in exchange for my help and forbearance, you'll return The Black Bouquet."
Aeron chuckled grimly and said, "I don't think so."
"Why not?"
"First off, I'd have to trust you, and all I know about you is that you killed my friends, and stood and watched as the Red Axes kidnapped a sick old man. I didn't think 'honorable' rangers were supposed to behave like that."
The barb evoked a rush of shame in Miri, which she did her best to hide.
"I've seen a hundred cruel and depraved acts since I came to this cesspool of a city," the ranger said. "I couldn't interfere with all of them. Anyway, who are you, a miserable thief, to lecture me on my duty?"
He shrugged and said, "Nobody, obviously, in your eyes. Anyway, there are other reasons I don't want to go to the Gray Blades. I wouldn't be surprised if some of them are in Kesk's pay, or beholden to the person who hired him to get the book. Even if they're not, they're as leery of the Red Axes as the gang is of them. They wouldn't want to break into Kesk's stronghold just on our say-so. They do know I'm an outlaw even if they've never been able to hang anything on me, and while your guild may be known the world over as honest and true, you're still an outlander, which means you don't count for much."
"The rightful owner of the book does. If I can convince him to speak up...."
"It's still not a sure thing. Look, my father was a notable robber in his time. The law hasn't forgotten, and it doesn't love him, either. But let's say we could convince the Gray Blades to raid Kesk's mansion. Do you think they'd find my father alive? The house surely has secret rooms, and sits on the river to boot."
"So the only answer is to out-trick Kesk?" Miri asked. "And his henchmen? And Sefris?"
"I imagine."
"In that case, let me help you, and when your father is safe, you'll return The Black Bouquet to me."
"Right," Aeron said with a snort, "and as soon as I turn my back, you knock me over the head, tie me up, and torture the location of the book out of me. Or hand me over to the law and let them do it."
"I swear by the Hornblade that I won't."
"Oh, well, that changes everything."
Miri felt a surge of anger, and quashed it as best she could. In his world, perhaps it wasn't a deadly insult to doubt the sanctity of another person's oath.
"Look," she said, "neither you nor I are a match for Sefris and the Red Axes by ourselves. But if we work together, we might have a chance."
Frowning, he thought it over for a moment.
"At the end," he said, "when I turn over the book, I want a reward."
"We're talking about your father's life."
"Even so," the thief replied. "Think of it as wergild for my friends."
"All right I can arrange it. Where are my clothes and weapons?"
"Your clothes and armor are in the chest at the foot of the bed. We'll have to buy you a new sword and bow."

CHAPTER 11
The night was overcast and dark. Still, peering down from the Rainspan, Aeron could make out some detail inside the shadowy enclosure off Dead King's Walk. From the looks of her, Miri could, too. In fact, from the way she fingered her new longbow, he could tell she was thinking she could hit the guard who periodically emerged from his sentry box to amble around checking on the merchandise, and never mind that she'd complained of the poor quality of the weapon compared to the one she'd lost.
She was a dangerous woman for certain, one who'd already killed some of Aeron's friends, and he was trusting her simply because, when she'd promised to deal fairly with him, she'd seemed to be speaking honestly, and even if not, so long as she didn't know where he'd stashed The Black Bouquet, she might well hesitate to attack him. For what if matters went awry, and he either escaped her or wound up dead?
In any case, he had to run the risk of working with her, because she was right. For the time being, he did need her. His truest friends were dead, and Kesk had demonstrated his ability to turn the rest of Oeble against him.
"What do you think?" he asked.
"I can make the shot," Miri replied. A cool breeze, moist with the promise of rain before morning, shifted a lock of her close-cropped hair. "And I don't like slavers. But the trade is legal in Oeble, isn't it?"
"Thank Mask I'm just a 'miserable thief,' " he said. "Such concerns don't matter to me. Yes, a slave emporium is legal in and of itself, even if an outlaw like Kesk owns it. But if it makes you feel any better, I'd wager a wagon full of gold that he didn't come by all his stock in a lawful manner."
"That does make it better. Still, I'd rather not murder a man unnecessarily." She glowered and added, "If that makes me a squeamish fool in your eyes, so be it."
"It doesn't," he admitted. "If you remember, I tried to steal The Black Bouquet without anybody getting hurt. We'll use the other plan."
Keeping an eye out for those who were scouring the city hunting him, they stalked to the end of the bridge, entered a squat octagonal tower, and descended to ground level via the stairs inside. Aeron cracked open the match-boarded external door, peeked out, and frowned. Dead King's Walk was one of Oeble's primary thoroughfares, and despite the lateness of the hour, that particular section was both better lit and busier than he would have liked. He and Miri would just have to cope.
They sauntered to the slave market entrance. Aeron figured he had just a moment or two to make an assessment. If he took any longer, someone might conclude that he and his companion were loitering suspiciously.
The gate had a sturdy, well-made lock. Burgell could have opened it with a perfunctory mystical whisper, but it was likely to take Aeron a while. The high fence had long nails driven all the way through to catch and pierce a climber's flesh. He thought he could swarm over unscathed, but had no idea whether Miri could do as well.
All things considered, he felt the third option was the best. He positioned himself against the fence, where someone opening the gate wouldn't see him, then Miri took hold of the rope hanging from the brass bell and rang.
She had to clang it twice more before a surly voice replied from the other side, "We're closed. Come back tomorrow."
"I'm traveling at first light," she said, "and I need thralls to tend the pack animals. I'll pay well."
The guard opened the gate a notch to peer out at what appeared to be a lone woman in a non-threatening stance, no blade in her hand or arrow on her bowstring. Squeaking a little, the hinges in need of oil, the portal swung wider.
Aeron threw his shoulder against it and slammed it all the way open, staggering the half-orc watchman in the process. He lunged onward and hammered his new cudgel against the guard's temple. The half-breed collapsed, and Miri closed the gate. The whole thing had only taken a second, and with luck, no one outside the fence had observed it.
Miri gave Aeron a nod of approval, and a second attendant, a human, stepped onto the stoop of the shack at the rear of the fenced-in yard. He'd plainly heard the bell, too, and come to see what was going on. He goggled, then whirled to run back inside.
Aeron grabbed an Arthyn fang and threw it. The blade plunged into the target's back at the same instant as Miri's arrow. The man stumbled, made a ghastly little gargling sound, and fell on his face, the top half of him over the threshold and the rest still stretched across the little porch.
Aeron sighed. They'd hoped to do their job without killing, but it simply hadn't worked out that way. They couldn't let the wretch raise an alarm. Anyway, the dead man was a Red Axe, wasn't he, or as good as. Aeron shoved the matter out of his mind.
The slaves slept in what amounted to lean-tos in the middle of the yard, with buckets provided for sanitation. Evidently no one had emptied them in a while, and the stink made Aeron's eyes water. The thralls stared at him and Miri apprehensively.
"It's all right," the ranger said. "We're here to free you. Where do the overseers keep the tools?"
An underfed, half-naked hobgoblin, its back and shoulders striped with whip marks, pointed at the shack. Miri stepped over the corpse in the doorway, then reappeared with mallets and chisels. Some of the slaves clamored for them.
"Keep quiet!" she hissed.
Once they obeyed, she passed out the tools, and they started striking off their leg irons.
"Kesk will puke blood when he finds out all this coin has grown wings and flown away," Aeron said with a grin.
"Coin?" Miri repeated. "Is that all they are to you? I suppose if it was practical, you wouldn't free them, but simply steal them to sell yourself."
"You're wrong," Aeron said. He didn't know why he should care about her opinion of him, but her scorn was starting to rankle. "In my time I've stolen copper ingots, bales of silk, pots of jam, and as it turns out, a formulary. Why not? They're just things. What difference does it make whose pocket they wind up in? But I've never tried my hand at slaving—or kidnapping, or killing for hire. I don't have the stomach for any of that."
"But you do hurt people, in the course of committing your outrages. You and your accomplices killed some of my mercenaries."
"At least killing isn't the very heart of our trade. Unlike yours. A ranger's a warrior and manhunter, right? I don't suppose you would have joined your Red Hart Guild unless you liked shooting people."
"I like defending the innocent. Sometimes that re—"
"This is madness!" one of the thralls, a rather pretty blond woman with an upturned nose, suddenly wailed. "We can't escape! They'll only punish us, maybe kill us, if we try."
"Not if you're smart," Aeron said. "If you were enslaved illegally and can prove it, run to your families or the Gray Blades. The rest of you, sneak out of town before dawn, stay off the roads, and head for the Barony of the Great Oak. It's not far, and they don't traffic in slaves there. They won't send you back." He opened his belt pouch and handed one of the slaves a few coins. Miri probably suspected the funds he was spending were the same coins she'd been carrying before her fall, but so far, she hadn't made an issue of it. "This will buy food, or pay a bribe if need be."
"It won't help," the blond thrall said.
"You gutless bitch," snarled the hobgoblin with all the lash scars. "Always whining, or tattling on the rest of us."
The hobgoblin had already freed itself, and it lunged at her, swinging a length of broken chain like a morning star.
Aeron and Miri sprang forward and grabbed the goblin-kin, which, biting and thrashing, struggled madly to break free. It was surprisingly strong despite the mistreatment it had endured.
"Easy!" Aeron said. "Take it easy!"
So intent was he on restraining the creature that when the other thralls cried out, it took a split second for the warning to register.
When it did, Aeron looked over his shoulder, just in time to see the Red Axes pull the triggers of their crossbows. The weapons clacked, and he dived forward with all his strength, bulling Miri and the hobgoblin down to the ground.
The goblin-kin grunted as one of the bolts pierced its body. Aeron was unscathed. He hoped Miri was, too, but didn't have time to check on her. It was more important to assess the threat. He scrambled around to orient on the marksmen.
He saw five Red Axes, three human, one long-legged, hyena-faced gnoll, and an orc. Perhaps they'd been prowling around the city hunting him, or else some other business had called them forth from the mansion on the river. Either way, they must have heard the clank of the thralls breaking their fetters and come to investigate, entering through the gate Miri had closed but neglected to relock.
A couple ruffians reached for their quivers.
A big man with a boil on his neck shouted, "Don't shoot! That's him, Aeron sar Randal. Take him alive."
His companions obediently dropped the crossbows and readied their cudgels.
Aeron was glad of that, at least. Their reluctance to kill the one person who could lead them to The Black Bouquet was the only advantage he had. As he scrambled up, he plucked a throwing knife from his boot. He faked a cast at the gnoll, whose eyes widened in alarm, then he pivoted and flung the dagger at a human wearing a foppish slashed doublet and fancy sash instead. The knife plunged into the bravo's chest, and he reeled backward.
At the same moment, however, the orc lifted a tiny metal bottle, threw back its head, and gulped the contents. The man with the boil tossed what looked like a little brass toy to the ground. It scuttled forward under its own power, and as it advanced, it grew larger, swelling into a clattering metal preying mantis two heads taller than Aeron himself.
The slaves kept on screaming. He didn't blame them.
Aeron couldn't imagine a throwing blade damaging the enchanted apparatus, so retreating, he reached for his heavy fighting knife instead. That wasn't likely to do much good either, but if was the best weapon he had.
Miri shot the mantis twice. The first arrow glanced off its long, thin body. The second stuck for a second, then drooped and fell away, leaving a shallow pock mark in the brass. She nocked a third shaft, registered the foes of flesh and blood rushing in at her, pivoted, and let fly at them instead. The arrow plunged so deeply into the torso of a human Red Axe that half of it popped out of his back. The outlaw dropped.
Her next arrow flew at the orc, whose flesh emitted a sickly greenish light—a product, no doubt, of the potion it had consumed. The shaft hit the creature squarely in the neck, but simply snapped in two without even slowing its target.
The orc had figured out that the Red Axes didn't need to take anyone but Aeron alive. It still carried a long club in its left hand, but had drawn its scimitar with its right, and as it scrambled into the distance, it slashed at Miri's knee. She retreated, avoiding the cut, tossed the longbow away, and snatched for the hilt of her new broadsword.
Aeron watched it all from the corner of his eye, directing most of his attention to the metal insect mincing toward him, graceful despite its size and the clanking that attended its every move.
The mantis leaped, its long hind legs straightening explosively and hurling it through the air.
Even though Aeron had his eye on it, the move caught him by surprise. If the mechanism landed on him, the shock would break bone, and the sheer weight of it would pin him to the ground even if it didn't crush him outright. He sprang desperately backward.
Even so, the mantis crashed down right in front of him, the impact jolting the ground. Up close, it smelled of oil. Long serrated pincers opened to snatch him up.
He dodged one set of claws and riposted with a stab. The Arthyn fang grated along brass, merely scratching it. The other forelimb leaped at him, and a hand shoved him out of the way. The pincers snapped shut on empty air.
He glanced at his rescuer. It was the gaunt hobgoblin with the whip marks. The creature had a crossbow quarrel sticking in its left shoulder, but apparently wasn't too badly wounded to fight. It lashed the mantis with its chain. The construct twisted its head, evidently considering the thrall through its bulbous faceted eyes, then it returned its attention to Aeron.
It chased him across the yard, snatching for him relentlessly, occasionally dipping its head lower in an effort to seize him in its mandibles. The other slaves scurried to stay clear. Aeron thrust and hacked with the knife when he could, which wasn't often. It was hard enough just to stay out of the constructs clutches and keep it from cornering him against the fence. He supposed the lack of offense didn't much matter. As predicted, the blade wasn't doing the device any real damage, any more than was the hobgoblin still gamely flailing away at its flank.
When Aeron was facing in the right direction, he caught glimpses of Miri and her opponents, who'd spread out to attack her from two sides. The orc pressed her hard, trusting the magical elixir it had consumed to keep her blade from penetrating its flesh. For the most part, the gnoll fought more defensively, hanging back a little until it judged that its comrade had her distracted, then attacking furiously. So far, neither of them had succeeded in penetrating her guard, but her manifest skill notwithstanding, Aeron was sure she was in trouble.
She was in no more trouble than he was in himself, but the hobgoblin's attempts to save him weren't helping. It was possible the slave could aid Miri, however, so he gasped in the air to shout and tell it to go to her.
But before he could get the words out, the goblin-kin left off battering the mantis and grabbed one of its middle legs. The thrall was either trying to tear it off, use it to heave the mechanism onto its side, or simply immobilize the thing. Aeron couldn't tell which.
Whatever the hobgoblin intended, the maneuver finally served to distract the mantis. Pausing in its pursuit of Aeron, it jerked its leg, shook the slave loose, pivoted, and snatched it up in its pincers. It gave the thrall a shake, then flipped it across the yard to slam into the front of the shack, after which the hobgoblin sprawled motionless.
Though the goblin-kin's effort had failed, perhaps it had given Aeron a chance. While the mantis was concentrating on its other foe, he dashed around to the back of it, the end it typically carried so low it nearly brushed the ground. Without hesitation, he clambered straight up its narrow body, the years he'd spent scaling sheer walls and traversing treacherous ledges and rooftops allowing him to maintain balance and traction on the slippery, rounded surface.
He straddled its neck like a rider sitting a horse. While he stayed there, he hoped, it couldn't reach him with either its claws or mandibles. Looking down, he saw a gap where the head connected to the body. He jammed his knife into the crack, and when that had no appreciable effect, he threw his weight against the blade, prying as if it were a lever.
The mantis pitched sideways, and he realized that if he remained where he was, it was going to roll on him. He leaped clear, and landed hard. Metal crashed. Numb, half stunned, he forced himself to his feet, and the apparatus did, too.
Flinging itself to the ground had damaged it. One side was dented, and its left forelimb protruded at an angle. Still, it pounced at Aeron as agilely as before.
As once again he fled before it, he struggled not to give way to outright panic and despair. There had to be a way to stop it. Once Nicos had resigned himself to the fact that his son meant to follow in his footsteps, he'd taught him that if only a thief kept his head, he could think his way around any danger.
And so, dodging, panting, gasping for breath, his heart pounding, Aeron strained to think, and eventually something struck him. Two Red Axes were dead. The orc and gnoll were fighting Miri.
Where is the fifth one, Aeron thought, the heavyset man with the boil? Why isn't he battling alongside his comrades and the mantis?
Once Aeron looked, it was easy enough to spot the fellow, even though he was standing well back from the action. The ruffian was simply gazing fixedly at his quarry's struggle with the metal insect. . . because he was controlling the contraption with his mind? Aeron had spent enough time with Dal and Burgell to know it was possible.
It was a long dagger cast to the Red Axe, but he doubted the mantis would let him get much closer. He dodged its next attack and snatched out a throwing knife. The brass insect pivoted, cutting off Aeron's view of his target, so he sprinted to bring the man with the boil back into sight.
Thanks to the delay, the Red Axe had plainly spotted the new weapon, for he stood poised to duck or dodge. Aeron cocked his arm and flicked his wrist, faking a cast to make Kesk's henchman move. The bravo jumped to the left, and Aeron truly threw the blade, leading the target slightly. The man with the boil was committed to his useless evasive action. He couldn't arrest or change it, and the flat, leaf-shaped Arthyn fang plunged into his chest right up to the handle.
Aeron sensed motion above him. He looked up at a pair of grasping claws and jumped back just in time to avoid them. Pincers clashing and gnashing, the mantis lunged after him, and sick with terror and hopelessness, Aeron thought he'd guessed wrong. It didn't matter that he'd killed the outlaw with the blemish. The apparatus would keep attacking on its own.
Then, however, he saw that it was hesitating between advances and attacks—slowing down—until, after a few more seconds, it froze into immobility with a final metallic groan.
Aeron would have liked nothing better than to stand still and catch his breath, but when he glanced around, he saw that Miri's plight was as difficult as before. Accordingly, he transferred the big Arthyn fang back into his primary hand and charged across the yard. He bellowed to draw the attention of the orc and gnoll. Or rather, he tried. The sound came out as more of a bleat.
Still, it worked. The Red Axes faltered in their attack and glanced around. Miri tried to take advantage of the opportunity that afforded her. She lunged, her arm straight, the broadsword extended to pierce the towering gnoll's guts. She almost scored, too, but the canine-headed creature must have glimpsed the motion from the corner of its eye. It wrenched itself back around just in time to parry with the sturdy brass-headed cane in its off hand, then it chopped at her head with a falchion. She turned the stroke with her steel buckler. Metal rang.
Foam flying from its muzzle, the gnoll snarled something in its own yipping language. Aeron couldn't understand it, but the orc must have, because it immediately turned to face him. The sheen of its warty flesh made his eyes ache and his stomach queasy. It reminded him of the way he felt on those rare occasions when he drank enough to make the world spin around.
The orc feinted a cudgel jab at his face, and when he lifted his arm to block, it swung its scimitar at his leg. Evidently it trusted that it could cripple him without killing him outright Caught by surprise, Aeron still managed to recoil in time. Then, before the Red Axe could come back on guard, he sprang in close and thrust the Arthyn fang at its ribs.
The blade screeched and glanced away, tearing the orc's tunic and shirt, but not the skin underneath. The Red Axe threw its arms around him and clasped him in a bear hug, meanwhile gouging at his throat and face with the tusks jutting upward from its lower jaw. For some reason, it trusted that wouldn't kill him, either, or else in its excitement, it had forgotten the object was to take him alive.
Whatever it had in mind, Aeron was sure he had only seconds to break free before it blinded him or flensed the flesh off his skull. He wrestled frantically, holding its boar-like teeth away, trying to loosen its grip, grimly certain that most of the tricks he might ordinarily have tried in such a predicament—a head butt, biting, a knee to the groin—wouldn't deter the magically armored orc. It strained to fling him down beneath it onto the ground. Aeron could feel his balance going, and with a last frenzied effort, he tore himself away from it.
They both came back on guard at the same time. The orc whipped the club at his head. He ducked, stabbed the underside of its wrist, and failed to break the skin. As before, by committing to an attack, he'd merely opened himself up for the Red Axe's riposte. He had to snatch his foot back to keep the scimitar from chopping it in two.
Aeron groped for another idea. He wasn't confident of the one that came to him, but it was all he had. He ducked, dodged, parried, and gave ground while he waited for the chance to try it. He knew a few obscene taunts in the orc tongue, and gasped them out in hopes of further angering his adversary and so undermining the creature's judgment.
The Red Axe charged and swung the cudgel. Aeron lunged in close, avoiding the stroke in the process. He didn't bother to thrust out the knife in another futile attack. Instead, he dropped it to free up his hands. He shifted behind the orc and kicked it in the knee.
The assault likely would have lamed an ordinary foe. He was sure it hadn't hurt the Red Axe, but it did cost the creature its balance. The orc stumbled, and Aeron threw himself on its back and bore it to the ground.
Using his weight, Aeron fought to hold the orc down. He grabbed its neck and squeezed. It heaved and thrashed, trying to buck him off.
Once or twice, it nearly succeeded, but then its struggles grew weaker. As he'd hoped, though the potion's magic kept its flesh from being pierced or pulped, it couldn't stop Aeron from pressing its windpipe closed and cutting off its air.
Eventually the Red Axe stopped squirming. Aeron choked the orc for a few more seconds, just to be sure, then he let go. His hands ached.
"Are you all right?" Miri asked.
He turned. At some point in the last minute or so, she'd disposed of the gnoll, which lay on the ground behind her with a deep cut on the left side of its chest.
"Yes," Aeron replied, panting, "and from the looks of it, you are, too."
He rose and hurried to the fallen hobgoblin. Miri followed.
To Aeron's relief, the slave was still breathing, and though he was no healer, speaking to it and patting its hairy, big-nosed faced sufficed to restore it to consciousness.
"How are you?" Aeron asked.
The hobgoblin sat up and rubbed its head.
"I've had worse," it said. "My people are hard to kill."
"I reckon so," Aeron replied. He took out some gold and pressed it into the goblin-kin's hand. "Plainly, you have more grit than these others. Can you make sure they get to the Barony of the Great Oak before you strike out on your own?"
"I can if you get this crossbow bolt out of my shoulder."
"I'm no chirurgeon," Miri said, kneeling down beside it and drawing her knife, "but I've done this a time or two, when none was available. Let me."
It made Aeron wince to watch her cut the quarrel out. The hobgoblin, however, bore it stoically. Only its clenched jaw revealed how much it was hurting. Once Miri bandaged the puncture as best she could with strips of cloth, the former slave gave the two humans a nod, then hauled itself to its feet and appropriated the strangled orc's scimitar.
It glared at its fellow thralls and said, "What are you all standing around for? Loot the bodies and the shack. We want weapons, coin, and any clothes that aren't bloodstained. You've got three minutes. Move!"
Aeron turned to Miri and asked, "Do you feel up to wrecking another of Kesk's operations?"
"Why not?" She sniffed the breeze and said, "We've still got a while before it rains. Let's salvage my arrows, leave your mark on the wall, and move on."

Sometimes the Red Axes struck or spat on Nicos as they passed by the chair to which he was tied, but no one had made a serious, sustained effort to torture him since they'd decided he really didn't know where Aeron was hiding or where he'd stashed the strongbox. Still, it hardly mattered. His body screamed with the memory of the agony Sefris Uuthrakt had inflicted on him.
He'd thought he understood pain. It had, after all, been his constant companion since the night the master of a caravan from Innarlith caught him trying to steal a cartload of valuable rugs. Instead of turning him over to the Gray Blades, the merchant decided to mete out his own form of justice. His guards beat Nicos, then hanged him.
Miraculously, the noose didn't kill him. He dangled for hours, slowly strangling yet enduring, until friends found him and cut him down, to suffer, hobble, and silently curse his infirmities forever after. Or rather, until just then. Nicos thought that after the torment Sefris had inflicted on him, if he somehow managed to escape Kesk's mansion alive, he'd never, even in the privacy of his own thoughts, complain of his everyday afflictions again.
He must have passed out for a while, because suddenly, or so it seemed to him, the long row of windows shone with the soft silver light of a rainy morning. Despite the grime on the panes, to say nothing of his own distress, the cloudy sky and rippling river were lovely, and lifted his spirits for just a moment.
Then, her garments wet and dripping, Sefris stalked into the solar, and any semblance of peace or ease in Nicos's soul died in a spasm of terror. He hated himself for feeling so afraid, but after what she'd put him through, he couldn't help it. Toward the end, had it been possible, he might even have betrayed Aeron to make it stop.
To his relief, the monastic ignored him to focus on Kesk, slouched in his golden chair with his battle-axe across his knees and a half-eaten sausage in his fist.
"Well?" the tanarukk snapped through a mouthful of meat.
"I haven't found him yet," Sefris replied.
She ought to have been feeling a chill, but if so, Nicos saw no sign of it in her manner.
"Well, he found us," Kesk said. "He stole some of my slaves, and killed the Red Axes who tried to stop him. Hurt and robbed two more whose job it was to collect protection coin along the docks. Burned a wine shop I operated onboard a barge. Didn't even try to steal the till, just destroyed the place."
"He's sending you a message," Sefris said.
Kesk trembled, and his eyes shone red.
"That I have his father, but he can hurt me, too, by interfering with my business," said the tanarukk. "I understand. I'm not a fool. The question is what to do about it."
"The same thing we have been doing. Hunt."
"We've already seen how pitiful you are at that."
If the taunt nettled Sefris, Nicos couldn't tell that, either. She remained as calm as ever, as composed as she'd been throughout the torture and the amputation of his finger.
"Aeron only escaped me by a fluke," she said. "It won't happen again."
"So you say. I never should have trusted an outsider."
"I'm better able to handle this chore than are your underlings. You may recall that I proved that by defeating three of them at once. In any case, you still want the jewels, don't you? If so, let me break my fast and sleep for an hour or two, then I'll return to the search. I imagine we'll have Aeron in hand before we see another sunrise."
"I don't want you relaxing just yet. Have another go at the old man."
Nicos cringed, straining against his bonds. His chair rocked and bumped against the floor.
"If he had anything to tell us," Sefris said, "we would have heard it already. His only use is as bait."
Nicos prayed Kesk would believe her and relent. But everything he'd seen or heard about the outlaw chieftain suggested otherwise.
And sure enough: "I don't care if he's got nothing to say. I want to hear him squeal. I promised Aeron we'd make the father pay for the son's treachery, and so we will."
The monastic inclined her head.
"As you wish," she said as she advanced on Nicos.
Nicos fought the urge to squinch his eyes shut or twist his head away. Her fingertips wandered about his body, pressing here and there. She didn't seem to be straining or exerting any extraordinary force, yet the sensation was excruciating. Nicos prayed for her to ask some questions. That would stop the pain for at least a moment. When she didn't bother, he still cried out the lies he hoped would satisfy her. They didn't, though, and before long, he was screaming wordlessly instead.
He didn't know how long the torture continued. Long enough for him to shriek his throat raw and reduce his already ruined voice to the thinnest of whispers. In his disorientation, he didn't know precisely when it stopped, just eventually realized that at some point, for some reason, it had. He sucked in a ragged breath, blinked the tears from his eyes, and peered about Sefris was backing away from him. By the looks of it, she meant to take up a position with a couple of the Red Axes who were loitering around.
Nicos didn't understand it. Kesk didn't, either. He glowered at the slender monastic in her robe and hood, his stare demanding an explanation.
Sefris provided one, in an ambiguous sort of way. She touched a finger to her lips, then pointed at the door.
Kesk looked where she'd bade him. For a moment, there was nothing to see, and he almost seemed to swell with impatience, then a small figure sauntered into view. The newcomer wore a dark green camlet mantle, lightweight but voluminous, and a hood like the one Sefris used to shadow her features and cover her shaved scalp. He'd wrapped a knit lemister scarf around the lower part of his face.
A law-abiding person might have thought the stranger a menacing figure, but Nicos had spent his life among folk who wore masks of one sort or another. To his eye, the newcomer, who didn't carry himself like a warrior or bravo, was, except for himself, the least fearsome person in the room. But Kesk and Sefris eyed the stranger as if they knew something their prisoner didn't, as if leery of the gold-knobbed blackwood stick in his clean, soft-looking hand. Maybe it was just a long cane, but it might also be a magician's staff. Indeed, as Nicos peered closer, the fact that the small man was entirely dry argued for the latter.
"Shall I show my face," the newcomer said, "or do you know me?"
He spoke like an educated man. Nicos didn't recognize the voice.
"I know you," Kesk growled, "and I told you to stay away. I'll handle this."
"As I recall," the stranger said, "you didn't want me to look for your rebellious hireling all by myself, for fear I'd find him, then decide to cut you out of the profits. It occurred to me, however, that if we locate him together, you won't have cause for concern. So here I am."
"What if somebody saw you come?"
"I'm wearing a disguise, and I left home stealthily, through the exercise of my Art. The same way I entered here, without the bother of persuading your guards to admit me. It will all be fine, and even if it's not, it's my worry more than yours."
"If something happens to you," said Kesk, "you won't be able to pay me."
"Nor will I should we fail to recover the prize. In that case, there won't be anything to pay for."
Nicos was still in so much pain that it was difficult to follow the conversation. Yet even so, he gradually figured out that the stranger with the cane was the rich man who'd hired Kesk to steal the coffer.
"I told you," said Kesk, "I'll find it."
"Will you? My sources inform me you can't lay hands on our quarry even when he's robbing one of your own enterprises."
Having figured out who the small man was, Nicos could think of one reason why Kesk wanted to get rid of him, and why Sefris had concealed herself among the common ruffians: The two of them had conspired against the stranger, and didn't want to give him the chance to find out.
The tanarukk looked as if the newcomer's last observation had so irked him that he scarcely cared any longer. He shuddered, and chucked away the remains of the sausage to grip his axe with both fists.
"Are you mocking me?" he demanded.
"Of course not," the stranger said, his mild, cultured voice steady. He seemed almost as unflappable as Sefris. "I'm simply pointing out that now, even more than before, it's in your best interests to let me assist you. I can think of several reasons why you'd be reluctant, but..."
As the man with the cane nattered on, Nicos had a sudden horrifying inspiration. He could ruin Kesk and Sefris's deception simply by speaking up.
The idea terrified him. After what he'd already suffered at their hands, the last thing he wanted to do was attract their renewed attention, let alone infuriate them.
Yet he despised himself for his dread. He yearned to defy it.
Would it do any good, though? He didn't understand enough to foresee the consequences of such an action.
He did, however, have good reason to fear that if matters continued as they were, Aeron was doomed. Apparently his son had enjoyed remarkable success in evading the Red Axes, then taking the fight to them, but it wouldn't last. A lone thief, no matter how cunning or deft with a knife, couldn't oppose Oeble's most powerful gang for long. But maybe, if Nicos sabotaged relations among the boy's enemies, his chances would somehow improve.
If so, he had to try, not only because he loved Aeron, but because it was his fault the lad was in danger. Oh, conceivably, Aeron might have become an outlaw anyway. He'd always had a taste for excitement and the tawdry life of the gutter and the Underways. Still, Nicos thought he'd sealed his son's fate by getting himself crippled. From that point onward, Aeron had become his family's sole support, and there had been no honest way for a boy so young to earn as much coin as was required.
Nicos screwed up his courage, then cried out to the man with the cane. Or rather, he tried. His throat was still so dry and raw, his voice so feeble, that it was inaudible even to him.
He swallowed and tried again. This time, he heard the frail little croak, but no one else paid any attention. In desperation, he thrashed, and the legs of his chair, bumping and squeaking against the floor, finally made some significant noise.
The other people in the room regarded him with some surprise. He understood why. Once ruffians bound, tortured, and seemingly broke a man down, they didn't expect him to do anything to assert himself thereafter. Such mistreatment typically left a victim as cowed and passive as a piece of furniture.
"Who's this?" asked the small man.
"Just someone who crossed me," Kesk said.
He didn't seem too upset that Nicos had stirred. He must not have any notion of what his hostage intended to do.
"Wizard," Nicos rasped, "if that's what you are, you have to listen to me."
"Do I?" The small man shrugged and said, "Then I'd better move closer. As it is, I can barely hear you."
Kesk's smoldering eyes narrowed. Perhaps he felt a sudden uneasiness, an inkling that Nicos could cause him some actual inconvenience.
"Surely," the tanarukk growled, "you don't need to hear the wretch grovel for his life. I'll have somebody shut him up so we can palaver in peace."
"Don't be hasty," the stranger replied. The ferule of his walking stick clicked on the floor as he ambled in Nicos's direction. "Perhaps it would be worthwhile to hear what he has to say."
"It will be for you," Nicos said. "Kesk has sold you out I overheard the whole thing."
The tanarukk sprang up from his seat and brandished his battle-axe at his captive.
"By the War Maker," he said, "hold your lying tongue, or I'll split your skull here and now!"
"Is it a lie?" said the man with the cane.
"Of course it is!" Kesk snarled. "Who would I sell you out to? Your rival? Why? He couldn't afford to give me as much as you promised. He definitely wouldn't pledge to make the Red Axes supreme over all other gangs in Oeble and keep the Gray Blades from troubling us ever again."
Sefris shifted just inside Nicos's field of vision, stepping so stealthily that the small man probably hadn't even noticed. Her change of expression was just as subtle. Her calm, inscrutable expression was essentially just the same as ever, yet something in her steady gaze conveyed the promise of hideous retribution if he continued on his present course.
It nearly intimidated him, but not quite. It felt too good to strike back at his tormentors, no matter what the eventual cost.
"Kesk is conspiring with that woman there." Nicos indicated Sefris with a nod and continued, "She's a Shar worshiper, a monk... or nun... whatever you call the women ... of the Dark Moon. I imagine you know your treasure was plunder taken from one of the cult's hidden temples. They sent her to get it back."
"Liar," said Kesk. "She's just another Red Axe."
"Fair enough," said the man in the green cloak. "I suppose, then, that she wears your brand?"
"She just joined," the tanarukk said. "We haven't gotten around to it."
The stranger reached into one of the pockets of his mantle, produced a copper piece, and made it vanish and reappear like a mountebank performing on a street corner. He murmured an incantation behind his scarf, and magic sighed through the air.
"Well, now," the wizard muttered.
"What?" Kesk asked.
"I'm listening to other people's thoughts. The prisoner's. Hers. Yours."
The tanarukk jerked, as did his axe, and he said, "How dare you..."
"Oh, calm down. I'm the one with a legitimate grievance, because it's all true. Dark Sister Sefris is an agent of the Dark Moon, and you and she have been plotting behind my back. The only reason I'm not more upset is that you haven't yet decided which of us you truly mean to betray. I'm afraid the time has come to choose. I can't continue our arrangement until I'm sure I can trust you."
"If I decide against you, merchant, you won't leave this house alive."
"I assumed as much. You could have killed me back in my study, and you were alone then. I'm certain you, your henchmen, and the Dark Sister working together can manage the job. But I'm still willing to press the issue to see it resolved."
"So be it," Sefris said. "Kesk, I've told you what I offer. A fortune in gems, and the guarantee of future aid from a secret society feared the world over for its power and guile."
"Show me the jewels," the tanarukk said. "Show me just one of them."
"I don't have any of them on my person," Sefris said, "but they're real enough, I assure you."
"She's lying," the wizard said. "I can see it in her mind."
Kesk snorted, a nasty, porcine sound. Slobber, brown from the sausage, dripped down his chin.
"What else would you say," the tanarukk challenged, "when you're trying to turn me against her?"
"Well," said the mage, "consider this, then. I may be a scoundrel by some people's standards, but I'm not lunatic enough to worship the Dark Goddess. She is. Which of us is likely to prove more dependable?"
"I sought power," Sefris said to Kesk, "and took it where I found it. I don't believe we're so different in that regard."
"Maybe not," the tanarukk admitted.
"You differ in at least one way," said the man with the cane. "She's an outlander. She came to Oeble for The Black Bouquet, and when she has it, she'll leave. At that point, what becomes of any promises she made you? Why should she keep them, or spare you another thought? I, on the other hand, am like you. I live in this city. I've built something here, and will bide here the rest of my days to enjoy and protect it. That means it's in my best interests to deal fairly with you. If I don't, you can always find me to retaliate."
"That makes sense," said Kesk. "But this is twice you've tried to muck around inside my head with magic. I didn't like it either time, and I do like emeralds and ghost stones."
Leering, he lifted his axe, then suddenly pivoted and struck at Sefris.
She skipped back out of range, and the weapon whizzed harmlessly passed her. Her foot snapped out and caught Kesk in the chest. Despite the squat massiveness of him, the attack slammed him staggering backward.
"Get her!" the tanarukk roared.
The Red Axes snatched out their knives and swords and rushed in.
Nicos wouldn't have imagined that anyone could survive such an onslaught, but Sefris dodged and sidestepped unpredictably. When the Red Axes veered to compensate, they stumbled into one another's way. Somehow her hands and forearms deflected sharp steel without being cut, while her punches, elbow strikes, and kicks thudded home to stun or injure one orc, bugbear, or human assailant after another. As she fought, she gradually retreated toward the row of windows. In her place, Nicos would have done the same. It was the best escape route available.
She was nearly there when the small man reached inside his mantle, produced a silver dirk, brandished it, and chanted words of power. Another knife, this one made of blue light, shimmered into existence, floating in the air before him. At first it was so vague and ghostly that Nicos could hardly make out what it was supposed to be, but it became more clearly defined, somehow more real, by the second. Nicos surmised that in another instant, when it was substantial enough, it would fly at Sefris and attack her.
The monastic simultaneously ducked the swing of a scimitar, rattled off a rhyme, and swirled her hand through a mystic pass. The floating knife blinked out of existence like a puffed-out candle flame.
She then shifted in close to the Red Axe with the scimitar, grabbed him by the sword arm, pivoted, and flung him at the row of windows. The outlaw crashed through one of the panes and plummeted out of sight
Kesk had been maneuvering frantically, trying to bull his way past his own men and get at Sefris. When she tossed the swordsman through the glass, she finally cleared a path. The tanarukk charged in and swung his axe. Nicos was sure that if the weapon connected, it would kill her, her sorcerous and combat skills notwithstanding. Even a warrior in plate armor couldn't have withstood that mighty chop.
Her expression as calm as ever, Sefris swayed backward like a reed in a breeze, and the stroke missed. She hooked Kesk's ankle with her foot and jerked his leg out from under him, staggering him for a moment. She used the time to scurry to the broken window, where a few triangular shards of glass still hung around the frame. She dived through the opening headfirst. Nicos assumed that, agile as she was, she managed a safe plunge into the river below.
For a second, the Red Axes and the wizard in green simply stared at the shattered window as if unable to believe Sefris had truly succeeded in escaping.
Kesk roared, "Useless! Useless, the lot of you!"
Spit flew from his mouth. His men quailed before his anger—or rather, most of them did. Sefris had kicked one skinny fellow in the head early on, after which he'd lain insensible on the floor. That one lifted himself up on one elbow and rubbed his temple.
"What?" he mumbled, drooling a little. "What happened?"
"You let her get away!" Kesk replied. "Just like Aeron! Just like everybody!”
He charged. The battle-axe hurtled down and split the human's pinched, petulant-looking face from scalp to chin.
The tanarukk wrenched the weapon free, spattering blood and brains in the process.
"Find them!" the tanarukk commanded. "Aeron sar Randal and that monk-bitch, too!"
Most of the Red Axes, even those still dazed or in pain from Sefris's attacks, hastily exited the room.
"It's unfortunate the monastic escaped," said the man in green, "but the important thing is that we kept our partnership from foundering."
Kesk spun around to face him and grumbled, "You miserable . . . You're supposed to be a wizard, but you were just as worthless as the rest of them."
"I'm sorry about that, but I'm not a battle mage. Just a dilettante, when you get right down to it I don't have any experience fighting other spellcasters, whereas Sefris manifestly does. She dispelled my sending before I could, ah, send it. If need be, I'll do better next time. Meanwhile, we mustn't lose sight of the fact that our objective is still to lay hands on the Bouquet, not chase a Shar worshiper around town."
"I wish I'd never heard of the cursed book. Or you."
"You won't say that when it makes you the richest, most powerful outlaw in the Border Kingdoms. Sefris's gems were just a fantasy, but the joyous tomorrow you and I are going to share is quite real."
"It had better be." Short and burly as he was, the tanarukk only had to stoop a little to stick his wild-boar face close to Nicos's. "Now, old man, you're going to learn a lesson about speaking out of turn. What Sefris put you through is nothing compared to what I'm going to do."
Nicos was pleasantly surprised to discover that, for whatever reason, he wasn't frightened.
He sneered back at his captor, "Go ahead. It's like the Shar cultist told you. I won't have to endure it for long. My heart will give out under the strain."
Kesk backhanded Nicos across the face. But only once, then he wrenched himself away.

CHAPTER 12
"I keep worrying about the hobgoblin," Miri said.
Aeron asked, "How's that?"
He scanned the crowd in the street ahead. Many folk had covered up their heads against the drizzle, which made the task of spotting Kesk's henchmen more difficult. Still, it appeared that all the people in the immediate vicinity were law-abiding sorts scurrying off to their jobs, and that made sense. Most of Oeble's outlaws slept in the morning. In fact, Aeron looked forward to doing the same, but he and Miri had one more stop to make first.
"Will the creature really help the other slaves run away," she said, "or will it betray them? It is goblin-kin, after all. I'm sure it has no love for the civilized races."
Miri had stayed awake as long and worked as hard as Aeron, but she still seemed relatively fresh. It was as if the rising of the sun, which generally made him yawn, had infused her with fresh vitality.
He snorted and said, "Goblin-kin. Of course. I bet your fingers were just itching to shoot the creature, and never mind that it risked its neck to help me fight the mantis."
"I didn't say it was inconceivable that it would keep its word. Nor do I relish killing, whatever you think. I certainly took no joy in shooting your friends."
"I'm sure you didn't," he said sardonically.
They swung around a mule-drawn wagon heaped with bags of flour, the product of one of the mills upriver.
"I didn't," she insisted, "and... I'm sorry I didn't try to rescue your father when the Red Axes were kidnapping him. I shouldn't have let Sefris talk me out of it. It's this place. It makes me doubt my instincts. It even makes it hard to know right from wrong."
He shook his head in puzzlement and asked, "Is Oeble truly so much fouler than other towns?"
"You've never visited another?"
"Not a big one, just little villages hereabouts."
Miri took a long stride to avoid stepping in a puddle.
"Well," she said, "Oeble is the worst I've seen. I'll admit, though, I've never visited a city that didn't make my skin crawl. They all have their dirt, crowds, and stenches. That's why I'm a scout."
"Because cities spook you?"
"Because as a ranger, you spend most of your time in the parts of the world that are worth living in: forests, mountains, rivers, the prairies, and the sea."
He grinned and said, "Without a soft bed or a mug of beer to be had for leagues in any direction."
She smiled back.
"You don't miss easy living once you lose the habit," she said. "Not that I ever had it much, growing up on a little farm on the edge of the wilderness. Haven't you ever wanted to roam, and see wonders you could never even have imagined?"
"Everything I want is right here in Oeble."
It was true, but just for a moment, Aeron wondered whether he might discover something more to desire if only he opened up his eyes.
Ombert Blackdale's thick-built brownstone drum of a tower came into view around the next bend, and the sight banished the peculiar, wistful thought from his mind.
"That's it," he said, pointing.
Miri peered at it and said, "I don't see any sentries."
"I don't either, yet, but Ombert will have somebody keeping an eye out. He always does. Not that it matters."
"True, considering that we're proposing to serve ourselves up to him on a platter."
"You know," Aeron said, "you don't need to come inside. I can do this by myself."
"I'll stick with you."
"To help me fight my way out again if necessary?"
"That, and to keep you from deciding our alliance is a mistake, and skipping out the back door."
He chuckled and said, "You're finally learning to think like somebody who belongs in Oeble."
"That's an insult, but I'll let it pass."
They headed for the tower and climbed the three steps to the entrance, a high, arched oaken panel with a smaller door, scarcely taller than waist high, inset in the larger one. Aeron clanked the wrought iron knocker up and down, and they waited.
After a time, Miri said, "Maybe they decided they don't want any part of our problems."
"Or maybe," Aeron replied, "they need a couple minutes to ready their trap."
She scowled and said, "If you actually think th—"
The full door swung open, and a stocky man with waxed, upturned mustachios frowned out.
"Get inside," he grunted
Aeron stepped through, and Miri followed. Beyond the threshold was a gloomy, windowless anteroom.
"Now give me your weapons," the stocky man said.
"I'm here to see Ombert Blackdale," Aeron replied. "He knows me. We've pulled jobs together."
"He knows who's come calling," said the tough, "and he told me either to collect your blades or send you on your way."
Aeron sighed. He hadn't expected to win that particular argument, but it had been worth a try. He handed over all his Arthyn fangs except for one throwing knife he was currently carrying strapped to his forearm beneath his sleeve. By itself, it was a slim defense, but better than nothing.
Glowering, plainly not liking it one little bit, Miri surrendered her sword, bow, quiver, and dirk. The ruffian hung everything on a pegboard, then led the visitors deeper into the tower. His heart pounding, Aeron waited for other outlaws to rush out at them.
They didn't.
The inhabitants of the well-kept, lavishly furnished spire eyed the newcomers speculatively, but made no effort to interfere with them. Most of the folk who were still awake were smaller even than gnomes like Burgell, smaller than many human children, and that was as Aeron expected. The Lynxes were notorious for being Oeble's preeminent halfling gang, though they did occasionally recruit a representative of another race. Like Kesk, they'd invited Aeron once upon a time, but unlike the tanarukk, hadn't taken offense when he declined.
The stocky ruffian led the visitors up a flight of stairs. The climb felt awkward, because the risers were too low and shallow for long human legs and feet Still, Aeron managed the ascent without stumbling. At the top, they found the leader of the Lynxes seated at a halfling-sized table tucking into a breakfast substantial enough for a giant.
Ombert Blackdale had the straight, shiny raven hair, luxuriant sideburns, and pleasant features characteristic of his kind. In his case, a round face and a sprinkle of freckles contributed to the general appearance of amiability. Despite the short sword lying ready to hand among his silverware and fine porcelain crockery, he scarcely looked the part of an outlaw chieftain, but anyone familiar with Oeble's criminal element could attest to the fact that he was almost as dangerous a felon as Kesk, though he lacked the latter's instinct for sheer viciousness.
"Good morning, Aeron!" the halfling called. "Who's your friend?"
"Miri Buckman of the Red Hart Guild," the ranger replied.
Ombert frowned and asked, "The same guide who killed Kerridi and the others?"
"Yes," Aeron said, "but I can't afford to care about that right now."
"If you say so," Ombert said with a shrug. "They were your friends. Welcome to the both of you, then. Will you join me? I like a good breakfast before I turn in, and I think Cook made enough for a couple more plates."
The twinkle in his blue eyes said he understood very well that the kitchen had prepared enough eggs, toast, ham, bacon, and slices of apple and melon to feed a dozen.
Aeron hadn't eaten since the start of the previous night, and the steaming food both looked and smelled appetizing. He opened his mouth to accept the invitation, and it occurred to him: What if something was drugged? That would explain why the Lynxes hadn't tried to overwhelm him and Miri by force of arms. They knew an easier way to take them prisoner.
Yet he'd decided to gamble on Ombert. Otherwise, he and Miri wouldn't be there at all. It made no sense to go that far, then risk offending the halfling by declining his hospitality.
Accordingly, Aeron said, "Thanks, we could use a meal. I'm afraid these cloaks are wet..."
"Toss them anywhere," Ombert said. "Someone will come around to clean up after us."
The little chairs were hopeless for full-grown humans. Aeron realized that he and Miri would do better sitting or kneeling on the floor. She looked entirely comfortable in that attitude. He supposed scouts were used to taking their meals without the benefit of any sort of furniture.
The food was delicious, and nourishment seemed to push back his weariness a little. That was good. He wanted his wits sharp for the conversation to come.
Ombert let his guests eat in peace for a while, with only the clink of their forks on their plates to break the silence.
Eventually he said, "Well, my friend, it seems you're the most popular man in Oeble. Everyone is looking for you."
"Including the Lynxes?" Aeron asked
"Of course," Ombert said, his voice as serious as could be. "When I clap my hands, a net will fall from the ceiling." Miri glanced upward, and the halfling grinned. "I'm joking. The tanarukk is offering a considerable bounty, enough to tempt most anyone, but I'm inclined to let the Red Axes do their own dirty work."
Aeron said, "I was hoping you still hated him."
Ombert smiled, but his eyes were cold.
"Hate's such an ugly word," said the halfling. "Let's just say that he and I have been trying to pick many of the same plums for quite a while now."
"As I recall, he made a couple attempts to kill you."
"I survived, and sent a warning. It's old news now. Let's talk about your adventures. What was in the lock-box you stole?"
Aeron saw no point in giving that particular piece of information away.
"I don't know," he said. "It's warded, and I haven't been able to crack it."
"If you don't even know what it is, then why didn't you hand it over to Kesk as agreed? It's not like you to break a deal."
"Kesk knew the box would be well protected. He didn't warn me, and Kerridi, Dal, and Gavath died. What's more, the Red Axes were planning to murder whichever of us survived the job."
"So no one could trace the coffer to them. Fair enough, that certainly relieves you of any obligation. Though it doesn't explain why you're running around with the same guard you robbed in the Paeraddyn."
"Kesk took my father hostage," Aeron said.
Ombert frowned and said, "That's a breach of the code, as I see it. Nicos was one of us in his time, and always dealt fairly with his fellow thieves. He earned the right to live safely in his retirement."
"When has Kesk ever truly cared about the code?"
"You have a point."
"Anyway, Miri offered to help me rescue my father. In return, I'll give the strongbox back to her."
Shifting his gaze to the scout, Ombert arched an eyebrow.
"Wouldn't it be easier just to knock this rascal over the head when he isn't looking," the halfling asked Miri, "tie him up, then torture the location of the coffer out of him?"
Miri glared at him and said, "I gave my oath."
"Of course," Ombert said. "Forgive me, I meant no offense. So, it's the two of you against the Red Axes and all the lesser gangs who truckle to them. I'm afraid you're still facing some long odds."
"You Lynxes could improve them," Miri said, "by joining forces with us."
"Why," said the halfling, "would we do that?"
"If you hate Kesk," she replied, "this is a chance to spite or maybe even kill him."
"Outlaws don't prosper by indulging such passions," said the halfling. "The successful ones concentrate on gold and silver."
"If that's the case," Miri said, "the man to whom the lockbox rightfully belongs will reward you."
"How much will he pay?" Ombert asked. "Enough to warrant risking my entire operation in another blood feud with the strongest gang in Oeble? It seems unlikely."
Miri drew a deep breath, evidently to calm herself, then said, "Look. You spoke of following a code. Well, if the coffer doesn't reach its proper destination, a good many innocent folk will suffer. Lord Quwen and the people of Ormath need the gold the sale of it will bring."
Ombert poured himself some tea from a silver pot.
"I've never been to Ormath," he said, "but I've heard tell of the place. The proudest, most warlike city on the Shining Plains, ready to attack its neighbors at the twitch of a cat's tail. If they're currently enduring hardship, perhaps they brought it on themselves."
Miri blinked. Plainly, Ombert's knowledge of faraway lands had taken her by surprise.
She pressed on: "Let's talk about Oeble, then. I can't tell you what's in the strongbox. It's not my secret to give away. I will say that in the right hands, it can bring prosperity to a good many folk."
Ombert waved his hand in a vague gesture that took in the spacious room, the gleaming table setting with its bounty of food, the thick carpets adorning the hardwood floor, and the vivid tapestries on the walls.
"Oeble's prosperous already," he said.
"For you reavers," Miri answered. "But how many other folk suffer as a result of your killing, stealing, and slaving? How many rot in poverty because they're too honest to join one of the gangs? It doesn't have to be that way. Given the proper opportunity, Oeble could make its gold lawfully."
"Which doesn't sound like nearly as much fun," Ombert said, and he shot Aeron a wink.
"It would be healthier," Miri said. "The rest of the Border Kingdoms scorn Oeble for the nest of robbers it is. Someday, one of your neighbors is going to clean it up. In other words, conquer, rule, and exploit you to suit themselves. Unless you mend your ways."
Ombert added milk and sugar to his tea.
"Mistress ranger," he said, "you have some interesting notions. But I must tell you, I don't aspire to be a god or even the Faceless Master, and I'm not prepared to take responsibility for the welfare of every wretch in Oeble. I have enough to do just looking after my own followers. And as for the threat of someone marching into town and taking over, well, I'll deal with it when and if it happens. The Gray Blades have never managed to stamp out the Lynxes, and I doubt that an outlander garrison would fare any better."
Miri scowled and said, "Then you won't fight alongside us."
"No," Ombert said, "certainly not. Aeron should have known better, even if you didn't."
"I did," Aeron said.
The halfling eyed him quizzically and asked, "Then why did you come to see me? Surely this isn't just a social visit."
"Naturally," Aeron said, "you aren't going to wage open war against Kesk simply for my sake, or my father's. It's not in your interest." To his surprise, Aeron felt angry at Ombert, as if Miri's extravagant fancies about duty and honor had infected his own practical thinking. He strained to quash the irrational feeling. "But there is a way you can help us and yourself, too."
"I'm listening."
"Miri and I have been raiding Kesk's various operations," said Aeron. "You can do the same. Steal his profits and destroy ventures that compete with your own. Kill the Red Axes responsible for controlling particular pieces of territory, then move in yourself. You won't ruin Kesk, but you'll weaken him, and improve your own position."
"How does that differ from declaring all-out war?"
"It's different if you make it seem like I'm the one doing all the damage," Aeron replied. "That way, it doesn't come back on you."
"No, but rather on you," said the halfling. "However this business with the coffer turns out, Kesk will never forgive you."
"It's already too late to worry about that. I just need him driven crazy, and all the Red Axes running around town hunting me even more frantically than they already are."
Ombert shrugged and said, "In that case, I agree to your proposal, and I pray the Master of All Thieves will receive your spirit kindly when the half-demon sends it into Shadow."

By midday, the rain had stopped, and the sun had broken through the clouds. As she prowled the streets, Sefris rather wished it were otherwise. A good many people were wandering around enjoying the warm golden light, and it would be inconvenient if someone recognized her as the same woman who'd killed two Gray Blades and worked dark magic in the vicinity of Slarvyn's Sword.
She suspected she might have done as well to stay in her hideout until dusk, for after all, her quarry had likely gone to ground. Yet once she'd slept for a couple hours, she found it impossible to linger. She was too impatient to take up her errand once again. Her seeming lack of progress evoked an unaccustomed feeling of frustration.
As the arcanaloth had promised, Miri had led her to Kesk, who had in turn brought her into contact with Aeron. Then, however, everything had gone wrong. The thief had eluded her, the wizard in green had subsequently turned the Red Axes against her, and as a result, she was more or less right back where she'd started.
But obviously she couldn't let it rest there, couldn't fail the Lady of Loss and the Dark Moon. Born a slave in Mulhorand, Sefris had suffered the abuses of a master and mistress who used her cruelly. Finally she escaped their household, only to discover a life in the streets—picking through rotting garbage in search of edible scraps, freezing on cold nights, selling herself for coppers—that was equally terrifying and degrading. It was then that she truly learned to hate the world, to recognize all its bright promises of freedom and happiness for the lies they were.
When the order of the Dark Moon recruited her, it rescued her from want and squalor, and cured her of fear by teaching her to kill. But even more importantly, the Lady of Loss gave her disciples the assurance that the vileness of creation would one day dissolve into the purity of oblivion, and it was that knowledge that truly sustained Sefris. She thought that without it, she might have lost her mind.
She knew that every errand she completed brought universal obliteration a small step closer, albeit generally in a way no mere mortal could comprehend. Such being the case, she'd never allowed herself to fail, and never would.
But how was she to proceed? She'd considered summoning the arcanaloth again, but experience had taught her it was generally pointless to seek a second such consultation on the same problem. The spirit likely wouldn't have anything new to tell her.
She could stand watch over one of the markets full of smuggled and stolen goods, brothels, gambling halls, mordayn dens, counterfeiter's lairs, or other enterprises the Red Axes still had running. Kesk had given her a list.
But the odds of intercepting Aeron at any given one of them were slim. He simply had too many to choose from, and wasn't likely to strike before nightfall anyway. In the meantime, one of the Red Axe sentries might spot her lurking about. Ordinarily, she would have pitted her trained aptitude for stealth against their vigilance without hesitation, but she didn't know what magical devices the wizard might have supplied to heighten their natural abilities.
After some consideration, a vague instinct prompted her to visit those locations Aeron had already raided. She didn't know what she might discover there, but thought it would be easy enough to find out. Spread thin, the Red Axes were unlikely to mount much of a guard over a place the red-bearded thief had already attacked.
She hadn't learned anything at the blackened ruin of the floating wine shop. The place had burned down to the waterline. She could only hope the slave market off Dead King's Walk would prove more instructive. As she made her approach, she scanned the busy street for signs that someone was keeping an eye on the place. If so, she couldn't tell it from outside the high fence all a-bristle with nails.
She marched up to the entrance as if she had every right in the world to do so, and no one paid her any mind. The gate was locked, so she whispered a charm of opening. For a split second, she stood in cool shadow, as if a cloud has passed before the sun. The latch clacked, yielding to the magic.
She slipped through the gate and pushed it shut behind her. The hinges squeaked a little. Before her, the enclosure was deserted. Peaceful. At first glance, only the splashes of dried blood and discharged crossbow bolts on the muddy ground gave evidence of the violence that had erupted there the night before.
Well, those and the taunting "A" chalked in bold white strokes on the roof of one of the low, unwalled slave kennels. Sefris surmised that Aeron sar Randal didn't know how to write his name, but could manage his initial.
Once satisfied that none of Kesk's minions was going to leap out and attack her, Sefris prowled around examining the ground. She found the broken fetters and the hammers and chisels the thralls had used to strike them off. On the ground nearby were the distinctive tracks the brass mantis had made as it hopped and scuttled about. The rest of the scene was a muddled confusion that only a ranger might have deciphered.
Sefris felt irritated with herself for even trying. Suppose she could read the tracks. Suppose she could follow the course of the battle from the first flight of quarrels to the final knife thrust. What difference would it make? This was all just a waste of time.
She started to turn to go, and a pang of intuition spun her back around, just in time to glimpse movement inside the window of the tumbledown shack at the back of the yard. Somebody had peeked out at her, then ducked back down under cover, but not quite quickly enough.
Probably just a Red Axe with the good sense to be leery of tackling Sefris by himself. That meant he was no threat at present, but since she and the gang were overt enemies, she saw no point in leaving him alive to get in the way later on. Sefris extracted a chakram from its pocket, charged the shed, and sprang through the doorway, hands poised to deflect a missile or blade.
But it wasn't a weapon that assailed her. Rather, a shrill scream pierced her ears. Huddled on the floor in the far corner, a young woman with an upturned nose and straw-colored hair squinched her eyes shut and shrieked again and again.
The blonde seemed to be rather comely, though it was hard to tell with her features contorted, tears streaming down her cheeks, and snot glistening on her upper lip. She had shackle galls on her ankles, but otherwise appeared relatively free of bruises, scars, or other signs of abuse. She looked well fed, too. Sefris knew what tender young female slaves had to do to earn soft treatment, and felt a surge of contempt directed in equal measure at the wretch before her and the child she herself had been.
The feeling was a distraction, and she stifled it with practiced ease. Viewed properly, the blonde was despicable, but no more so than any other created thing. Which was to say, she was of no importance except as a potential resource to further Sefris's mission.
Assuming the thrall knew something of significance, how best to extract it? Ordinarily, Sefris would have opted for threats and torture, but the blonde was already frightened beyond the point of hysteria. It seemed unlikely that heightening her terror would render her any more coherent. So, distasteful though it was, the monastic rearranged her features into the same sympathetic simper she'd worn while drifting about with Miri.
She tucked the chakram away, crossed the grubby one-room shack with its few sticks of rickety furniture, and kneeled beside the slave. The blonde cringed away from her gentle touch.
"Easy," Sefris said, "I'm not going to hurt you."
The thrall sobbed.
"Really," Sefris added. She took the blonde's chin between her thumb and forefinger and turned her averted face until they were eye to eye, compelling the other woman to take note of her own compassionate expression. "I'd never hurt a slave. I was a slave myself, once upon a time."
"I'm not a runaway!" wailed the thrall.
"It's all right I'm not a slave catcher, and I'm not interested in returning you to your master."
The blonde said, "I have to go back. What else can I do? But they'll blame me. They'll whip me to death."
She was afraid to seize the opportunity Aeron had given her and even try to be free. The realization gave Sefris another twinge of disdain, even though she knew that, ultimately, liberty was as foul as bondage or any other condition or thing to which one could put a name.
In any case, if all the thrall cared about was escaping punishment, then that was the lever Sefris would use to pry some sense out of her.
"If you mean to return to your master," the monastic said, "then maybe I can put in a good word for you. Help you convince him it wasn't your fault."
The blonde snuffled, "You'd do that?"
"I follow the Broken God, and he teaches us to help those in need. The only thing is, I won't be able to persuade another of your innocence until I myself understand exactly what happened. I mean, you say you didn't want to run away, but you did strike off your leg irons."
"All the other slaves were doing it. I was afraid they'd hurt me if I didn't let them break my chains, too. I went off with them for the same reason, but sneaked away as soon as I could. By the time I got back, though, some more of the masters were already here, loading the dead bodies into a wagon. They'd seen everyone was gone, me included, so I was scared to approach them. I hid until they drove away, then came into the shed to try and figure out what to do."
"Well, that explains it to some extent," said Sefris, "but you'd better tell me the whole story from the beginning. How did the red-bearded man get inside?"
"He rang the bell. Or she did, the woman who was with him. When Master Durth went to answer, the man shoved through and clubbed him."
Sefris nodded. Durth, the half-orc Aeron had knocked unconscious but left alive, had only a cloudy memory of the attack, but thought he recalled a woman. The ruffians the thief had ambushed along the docks likewise had a vague impression that Aeron hadn't acted alone, and it certainly seemed unlikely that he'd defeated five Red Axes and an enchanted construct unaided. Sefris had already concluded that he'd found an accomplice foolhardy enough to stand with him against the gang.
"Master Evendur came out to see what was going on," the thrall continued, "and the man and woman killed him. Afterward, they fetched the tools to strike the chains off, and told us to run away. I said it was madness, but nobody would listen to me."
"Then the other Red Axes—the masters with the big metal insect—came to investigate the noise?"
"Yes. I thought that then, everything would be all right I didn't have my shackles off yet, so they wouldn't punish me. But the man, the woman, and Yagan—a hobgoblin, one of us thralls—killed the masters. The man threw knives. The woman shot arrows, then fought with a broadsword and buckler. Yag—"
"Hold on," Sefris interrupted. A sudden suspicion took hold of her. It was ridiculous, of course. The world was full of archers, and even if it wasn't, no one but a magician or highly trained monk could have survived the fall from the top story of Aeron's tower. Still, she had to ask. "This woman. Was she a good shot?"
The blonde cocked her head as if puzzled by the question, but answered willingly enough, "She never missed."
"Describe her."
"Tall and slim, with curly brown hair chopped off short. She had on leather armor, and when she went into the shed, and the lamplight caught her, I saw it was dyed green."
Sefris felt astonished. She'd never been more certain of a kill, yet she had no doubt it was Miri the thrall had seen. Somehow, the guide was still alive and had joined forces with Aeron. If Sefris had examined the Red Axe corpses and recognized the arrow punctures for what they were, she might have suspected sooner.
Yet what sense did it make? She assumed Aeron's goal was to put so much pressure on Kesk that the tanarukk would be willing to undertake a fair exchange of Nicos for The Black Bouquet in order to put an end to the harassment. Miri presumably still wanted to deliver the formulary to whoever had bought it from Lord Quwen. How, then, could they possibly work together?
When the answer came to Sefris, she couldn't help smiling a fleeting but genuine smile, because it solved her problem. She didn't need to scour the city looking for Aeron. She knew where he'd turn up sooner or later.
Her companion cringed from the momentary change in her expression.
"What is it?" whimpered the thrall.
"It's fine." Sefris rose. "You told me what I needed to hear."
"Are you leaving?" asked the blonde. "You said you'd help me. Please, take pity on me."
"No," Sefris said. "Shar teaches that nothing in the world deserves our pity, neither others nor ourselves."
Still, what she was about to do would be mercy, the only true mercy any being ever received. It was the thrall's good fortune that her deliverer didn't want her repeating their conversation to the Red Axes.
All it took was a simple front snap kick. The ball of Sefris's foot slammed into the blonde's delicate chin, breaking her neck. She was dead before her yellow-haired head touched the floor.
Despite the ease with which she'd managed it, Sefris found the kill particularly satisfying. She wasn't sure why.

CHAPTER 13
Aeron peered at the crack between the wide double doors, then lightly pressed one of them with his palm.
"Can you open it?" Miri whispered.
She looked odd, and it wasn't the olive pigment they'd both smeared on their skin to make themselves resemble half-orcs. He couldn't see the color amid the darkness of the narrow cul-de-sac. Rather, it was the absence of a bow, quiver, and her distinctively dyed armor, which had seemed as much a part of her as her hands and feet.
"No," he said. "It doesn't have a lock for me to pick, just a bar on the other side. However, the place does have a skylight."
He prowled along the warehouse wall, looking at a spot where the brick was cracked and pitted enough to provide some decent handholds. When he found it, he swarmed upward onto the slanted roof, where a night breeze wafted. The cool air felt strange on his newly shaved chin.
It was easy to work a knife between the skylight and frame and pop the latch. The hard part would come after he slipped through. It was a thirty-foot drop to the floor. He'd had good luck lately surviving long falls relatively unscathed—it was about the only good fortune he'd enjoyed—but it would be mad to risk another unnecessarily.
In other circumstances, he would have lowered a rope, but even if he'd had one, he wouldn't have been able to leave it hanging down for someone to discover. So he gripped the protruding underside of a rafter. Clinging by the sheer strength of his fingers, Aeron inched along it until he could swing himself over the railing onto the loft that ran around the walls.
He found the long hooked pole used to manipulate the skylight and swung it closed then skulked down the stairs. The warehouse was more empty than otherwise, a testimony to Imrys Skaltahar's ability to move stolen goods quickly, but stacks of crates sat here and there, providing places to hide.
Aeron unbarred the door, and re-secured it once Miri slipped inside.
"How in Fury's Heart does this Skaltahar scoundrel get in and out?" she asked, peering warily around the interior of the building.
"I imagine he has a private tunnel connecting the warehouse to the Hungry Haunting."
She considered a pile of boxes shrouded with a drop cloth, then gave him an inquiring glance. He nodded, and they crouched down behind it. After that, they had nothing to do but wait.
It wore on his nerves, and maybe on hers as well, because eventually she whispered, "Nothing's happening."
"It will. Here in Oeble, thieves move loot through the Underways whenever possible, but some things are just too big and heavy to drag around below ground. They have to go through the streets, and the Red Axes make a delivery to Imrys around this time every fifth day."
"How do you know?"
Aeron just grinned.
"All right," she said, "but are you certain they won't postpone it? After all, they're looking for you, and trying to protect all their various enterprises, too. If the halflings are raiding them as promised, they should be feeling all the more inclined to pull in and stay safe."
"You'd think. But a gang chieftain like Kesk has to keep his operation running and the coin flowing, if only because otherwise it would make him look weak. He can't afford that. He's got rival organizations, the Gray Blades, and ambitious underlings all eager to strike at him if they think they see an opening."
"That makes sense, I suppose." She was silent for a time then said, "Was I completely foolish, hoping Ombert would help us just because it's the right thing to do? He said you rogues have a code."
"It's not the same kind your guild evidently holds to. It doesn't say you have to put your own hand on the chopping block to help out somebody else. It just says outlaws are supposed to deal fairly with one another." He smiled ruefully and added, "Even so, we break the rules when it suits us."
"I'd be ashamed to tell people my name if I were content to live like that."
He wasn't sure she'd aimed the barb specifically at him, but even so, it stung.
"You're so sure you know right from wrong," he said, "but you work for this Lord Quwen, and according to Ombert, the bastard loves war. Maybe he's going to use the gold he makes off the Bouquet to launch another campaign against his neighbors."
"He's not! He told me himself, it's to provide food and shelter for folk in need, just as, here in Oeble, the book will give a good many laborers a chance to live both comfortably and honestly."
He grinned and asked, "Do you believe everything people tell you?"
She glared, but before she could retort, a hitherto concealed trapdoor in the plank floor swung upward, and she had the good sense to fall absolutely silent.
A lantern in one hand and a scimitar hanging at his hip, Imrys Skaltahar climbed into view and closed the hatch. Oeble's preeminent receiver of stolen goods was a square-built man with dark, watchful eyes. Time had stolen much of his hair, etched lines in his face, and begun to tug the flesh under his jaw into dewlaps, but he still had the lithe tread of the young bravo he'd started out as. He was simply but well dressed in an indigo buffin tunic and leather breeches.
Imrys started drifting about, idly contemplating this heap of plunder or that, pulling the lid off a crate to look at the ivory tusks inside. Aeron's mouth went dry. Somehow, when he'd conceived the plan, it hadn't occurred to him that the fence might simply wander through the warehouse until he inevitably stumbled upon the intruders.
Aeron assumed that together, he and Miri could overpower Imrys, but that wasn't the point. Any confrontation would ruin the plan, and even if matters were otherwise, he had no desire to raise his hand to a man who'd always treated him relatively well.
Fortunately, before it could come to that, someone rapped on the door. Imrys unbarred it, and a wagon, drawn by a white horse and a black one, rolled inside. Tharag the bugbear held the reins, and an orc cradling a crossbow served as guard.
Imrys shut the door behind them. After the three exchanged a few words, the Red Axes hopped down and unloaded some barrels from the back of the cart. From the ease with which they accomplished the task, it was plain the kegs were empty.
They had to shift them, however, to more easily raise a hidden hatch of their own. The wagon bed was hollow, deeper than it looked, and held the actual shipment cloth bundles that clanked or clattered when they lifted them out and set them on the floor.
Imrys crouched to unwrap one, and a pungent scent of oil filled the air. Inside were gleaming sword blades. Evidently nobody had sharpened them yet, for he had no difficulty flexing one without cutting his hand. Poking with his index finger and muttering under his breath, he counted them, then turned his attention to the next bale, which proved to contain spear shafts.
Tharag and the orc looked on as Imrys conducted his inspection, responding, as best they were able, to the fence's shrewd observations regarding short counts and deficiencies in workmanship. Aeron was grateful to the older man for keeping the Red Axes occupied. It was the only reason his plan, which, since the moment had come to try it, looked harebrained even to Aeron, had even the slightest chance of working.
He gave Miri a nod, and they glided forward, keeping low, using every available bit of cover. He was glad she moved as silently as any burglar he'd ever known. He supposed rangers had to master stealth to stalk game and goblin-kin through the woods.
Imrys liked to cook for the patrons of his tavern, and was renowned for his tangy stews. Aeron's path led him nearly within arm's reach of the fence, so close that the scent of spice clinging to Imrys's hands and clothes tickled his nose, and for a moment, he was afraid he was going to sneeze. He didn't, though, and he and Miri reached the wagon without anyone looking up. Nor did the draught horses, stolid beasts of burden that they were, do anything to give them away.
Aeron managed to crawl into the cramped interior of the wagon bed without making noise. Miri did almost as well, though once, when she'd squirmed most of the way in, the tip of her scabbard softly thumped the wood. Aeron winced, but Imrys and the Axes didn't react.
Aeron and Miri lay in the claustrophobic space like corpses in a coffin built for two, and he wondered how they could defend themselves if discovered. He'd just about concluded it would be impossible when Imrys completed his inventory and declared exactly how much he was willing to pay.
Tharag objected in a desultory fashion, even invoked the threat of Kesk's displeasure, but then accepted the offer. The fact was, even the Red Axes found Imrys too useful to risk alienating him over an everyday sort of transaction.
And to a thief operating outside the gangs, the fence's good will was all but indispensable. If Imrys ever found out Aeron had used him as an unwitting tool in a quarrel with Kesk, the consequences could be severe. Yet with his father's life in jeopardy, and schemes for rescuing him in short supply, he hadn't seen another choice.
Tharag laboriously counted Imrys's coin, and the orc slammed the hatch shut without looking inside. The boards above Aeron's face groaned a little as the Red Axes reloaded the empty casks. Then, axles creaking, the wagon began to roll. The wood was hard against the thief's back, and felt harder still when the cart's progress bounced him up and down.
Miri's voice murmured from the darkness, softly enough that the Red Axes wouldn't hear it over the noise made by their horses and conveyance, "Suppose they don't bother to unload the barrels when they get back to the mansion. How are we supposed to climb out of here without jostling them around and making a lot of noise?"
"I don't know," Aeron answered. "I knew about the trick wagon, but I kind of forgot about the kegs."
"How clever of you."
'We'll manage, all right? If you don't like this idea, what was your cunning plan?"
She was quiet for a moment, then said, "I'm sorry. You're right. Barrels or no, this is a better scheme than any I was able to devise, and I shouldn't find fault."
"Well, I'm glad I didn't have to attempt it alone, and glad you know how to creep. You have the makings of an able cutpurse or housebreaker."
She snorted and said, "Thanks so much. I imagine someone could make a passable woodsman of you. If you were willing to stop depending on all those little knives and invest the time and effort to learn to use real weapons."
"I guess if I learned to draw a bow, I could kill people from a long way off, when they had no way of fighting back."
"I told you, I took no joy in shooting your friends."
"I know," he said with a sigh. "You were only doing your job, and they knew the risks. I just miss them, is all."
"I understand. I've lost my share of comrades."
"Who knows, maybe I've already lost my father, too. He's frail. If Kesk tortured him the way he said, he may have killed him without even meaning to."
Groping in the blackness, Miri found his shoulder and gave it a squeeze.
"Don't dwell on such thoughts," she said. "Focus on practical matters: how to accomplish the task at hand, and what to do after."
"Right. Once we get him out, he'll probably need a healer. We can take him to Ilmater's house, but I don't think he or I should spend another night there. When someone's after you, it's often safer to keep moving around. I have one more person I trust. Her name is Naneetha Dalaeve, and—"
"And she owns the Talondance," finished Miri, in the tone of one reluctantly delivering bad news. "She gave up your name to Sefris. It was how we traced you to your garret."
"Shadows of Mask, why would she do that?"
"It's not important. What matters is that your friendship is no great secret, and if someone could make her betray you once, the same thing could happen again. If I were you, I'd find somewhere else to hide, or another way to be safe. Let me help you with that, too."
"You mean, you'll ask the same rich bastard I robbed in the first place to protect me?"
"By all accounts, he's an honorable per—"
" 'By all accounts,' " Aeron broke in. "You've never even met him, have you?"
"Well, no, only his representatives, but..."
"Thanks, anyway, but Father and I will take our chances on our own. You just keep your mouth shut about exactly who stole the Bouquet, or helped you recover it, for that matter."
After that, the conversation lagged, and Aeron felt a black mood coming on. Even sweet, unworldly Naneetha, who doted on tales of chivalrous heroes and pure damsels faithful unto death, had sold him out. It was even more of a shock than Burgell's treachery.
But Miri was right, it was not the time to brood about it. He struggled to shake off the hurt and concentrate on his immediate concerns, on how he and the scout would locate Nicos, then escape Kesk's stronghold alive.
The wagon accelerated and slowed, turned periodically. Aeron found it impossible to judge how much time had passed or how far the conveyance had traveled since the Red Axes drove it out of the warehouse. His discomfort and trepidation made it feel like hours. Finally, though, the cart rumbled to a stop. He listened as, judging from what he could hear, Tharag and the orc climbed down from their seat and unhitched the horses. After that, everything was quiet.
"Now?" Miri breathed.
"A little longer," he replied.
He counted off twenty heartbeats, then squirmed around until he could reach the catch that held the hidden panel down.
Even working blind, it was child's play to pop it open. When he raised the hatch, however, the barrels on top slid, toppled, and clunked hollowly together. He'd expected it, but scowled at the noise even so.
He'd only raised the panel a few inches. Plainly, if he shoved it all the way back, the casks would fall and bang around even more.
"Hold this," he said.
Aeron dragged himself out through the narrow gap. When he got his feet under him and looked around, he discovered he was in Kesk's stable. Horses and mules eyed him from their stalls, but no Red Axes were in view. Evidently the kegs hadn't made enough of a racket to attract attention.
He held the hatch for Miri while she wriggled free. She pointed to a door that apparently led to the main body of the mansion. He gave her a nod.

The interior of the sprawling house was gloomy. Only a few of the lamps were burning, and due to the mild autumn weather, most of the hearths were cold. Still, enough light shone for even human eyes to make out the dirt and other signs of neglect, and naturally, the dimness did nothing to cover up the smell of mildew.
Neither Aeron nor his father was much of a housekeeper. That had been his mother's province until she passed away unexpectedly in her sleep, worn out, perhaps, by worrying over her son's embrace of the outlaw life and her husband's infirmities. But then again, he'd never lived anywhere fancy, and his own slovenly habits notwithstanding, he still felt a twinge of disgust at Kesk for letting such a palace gradually crumble into ruin.
But what mattered was that the mansion was quiet. Aeron knew it wasn't deserted. The tanarukk wouldn't have left his coffers of gold and stores of loot and contraband entirely unguarded. But from the sound of it, most of the Red Axes were off hunting Aeron, or standing watch over their various interests throughout the city, and that meant his scheme might actually work.
"Which way?" Miri whispered.
He shook his head and replied, "I've never been inside here before. They could be keeping my father anywhere. We'll just have to look."
They skulked on, keeping to the shadows, cracking open doors to check the rooms on the other side. The damp river air had warped some of them, making them stick in their frames, and the intruders had to force them open. The resulting squeaks and rasps jangled Aeron's nerves.
They didn't raise an alarm, however, and as the minutes passed without calamity, Aeron started to feel the old familiar thrill. He was still frightened for Nicos, and for himself, come to that, but it was nonetheless a delight to outwit his opponents in the game a burglar played, to trespass where he wasn't allowed and do what wasn't permitted.
In time, he and Miri found a staircase leading down to the cellars.
"Maybe the Red Axes have their own little dungeon," the scout suggested.
Aeron thought about it for a second, listening to the same instincts that had led him to many a hidden cubbyhole or closet filled with valuables.
"It's possible," he said, "but they wouldn't need to lock my father in a cell to keep him under control. Feeble as he is, a bit of rope would do the job, and I reckon Kesk would prefer to keep him close by. That way, he could hurt him whenever he felt the urge, without the bother of tramping up and down stairs."
"So we need to find where Kesk spends the majority of his time."
"Which will be the most lavish part of the house."
They prowled on, and in time caught sight of a wide marble staircase sweeping upward. Partway up, a bravo sat on one of the steps picking something out of his shaggy, tangled beard. At the top, tall double doors, inlaid with a stylized scene of a river, boats, leaping fish, and spindly-legged wading birds, stood open.
Aeron and Miri retreated back into the shadows before the Red Axe could spot them.
"That looks like it could be it," the ranger said. "If you'd let me keep my bow...."
Perhaps he should have, but it was too uncommon a weapon in Oeble. It had marked her almost as well as her green leather armor.
"You still couldn't count on picking that fellow off without him making some noise," Aeron said. "Maybe we can find a back way in. A big room in a rich man's house is likely to have at least two doors, one for the masters and one for the flunkies."
She gave him a nod and said, "Lead on."
It didn't take long to find the servants' stairs, spiraling up and down in a claustrophobic shaft. The risers were narrow, the way all but lightless, and the trapped air was stale. Aeron wondered how many maids and valets had taken a nasty tumble back when the house was young. He caught his first glimpse of the chamber at the top, and it drove such casual speculations from his mind.
The long hall was a solar, one wall a continuous row of windows intended to admit sunlight and provide a panoramic view of the Scelptar. Nicos sat tied in a chair, his eyes closed and his head lolling. His chest rose and fell, reassuring proof that he was only unconscious, not dead. In fact, apart from the mutilation of his hand, he didn't look as badly injured as Aeron had expected.
Unfortunately, the prisoner wasn't alone. The big gilded chair in which Kesk no doubt liked to sit was currently vacant, but Tharag, the orc who'd accompanied the bugbear to Imrys's warehouse, and a human outlaw were hanging around. Moreover, one of the glass panes had shattered, and a small man with a wool scarf masking the lower portion of his face stood before the breach, evidently because it afforded a clearer view than the cracked, filthy windows that remained intact. Gazing through a brass astrolabe, he alternately scrutinized the night sky and scratched his observations on a slate. A green mantle and gold-knobbed blackwood cane rested on a little table beside him.
Aeron wondered if the astrologer was also a magician, and had supplied the Red Axes with the metal mantis and potion of invulnerability that had nearly cost him and Miri their lives. If so, he was likely to prove more clever and dangerous than the common ruffians.
Miri tugged on Aeron's arm, and they sneaked back down the steps a little way, where they could whisper without fear of being overheard.
"How fast can you throw your knives?" she asked.
"Not fast enough to kill four men before one of them yells for help. I think it's time to test these disguises."
She stared at him as if he'd gone mad. Maybe he had.
"I figured that at best, they'd only work at a distance," the ranger said. "I mean, I've seen half-orcs. We don't look right."
"Close enough, maybe, if no one peers too closely," Aeron replied. "A disguise is half attitude and the way you carry yourself. We have the advantage that the Red Axes never expected us to sneak in here. I'm sure of that much. Besides, if they recognize us, and we wind up having to fight, it won't be any worse than if we started out that way."
"Yes, it will. We'll have lost the advantage of surprise." She frowned and continued, "Still, Nicos is your father, and it was your tactics that got us this far. If you're sure you want to try it this way, I'll follow your lead."
"Thanks. Let me do the talking."
They climbed back up the stairs, making no particular effort to do so quietly. The risers creaked.
When the Red Axes glanced in his direction, Aeron felt a split second of panic, of certainty that the greenish pigment on his skin, the black dye in his hair, and the absence of his goatee wouldn't fool anyone. He slouched on into the room anyway, praying that his cowl cast his features into shadow. Kesk's operation was large and varied enough to make it unlikely that all his minions knew one another well, but it was possible they'd all laid eyes on one another at least a time or two.
Aeron grunted one of the orc greetings he'd picked up over the years then ambled to Nicos with Miri following along behind. He crouched beside his father's chair and started untying him. The old man came awake with a start.
"Hey!" Tharag said. "What are you doing?"
"What's it look like?" Aeron replied in his best imitation of a surly goblin-kin voice.
He kept his head bowed over his work.
"It looks like you're undoing the rope," Tharag said.
"I knew you could figure it out if you strained hard enough," Aeron replied. "Look, Kesk's sick of having the old man up here all the time. He wants us to stick him somewhere else. You don't think we're going to carry him and the chair, too, do you? Not as long as he can walk."
The hulking bugbear blinked its green, red-pupiled eyes and asked, "Kesk's back?"
"He couldn't give orders if he wasn't, now could be? He said he'll be up here in a minute, soon as he checks something that came in through the Underways."
The last knot yielded, and Aeron jerked Nicos to his feet. Miri grabbed hold of the hostage's forearm, and they wrenched him around toward the servants' door.
For a couple of steps, no one protested, and Aeron felt a surge of exultation that he and Miri were actually getting away with it.
Then a mild baritone voice said, "Please, hold on for just a moment."
It had to be the astrologer. No one else in the room would speak in that educated accent. For want of a better idea, Aeron and Miri ignored him and kept on moving.
"Excuse me," said the man in the scarf, raising his voice a little.
Brilliant white light blazed through the room. Startled, the Red Axes shouted and cursed. The intruders spun around, only to discover they didn't need to defend themselves. The flare of light had been simply that, not a sign they were under mystical assault. Not yet. It had been a warning the wizard could attack them if they refused to heed him.
"What?" Aeron growled.
"Do any of you fellows know these two?" the small man asked. "Look closely."
At some point over the course of the past couple minutes, he'd tossed his cloak over his shoulders and picked up his cane.
"We rob travelers along the river," Miri said, making her voice coarse. "We don't get into town much."
"That may be," said the magician, "but I'm going to ask the same thing of you that I did of Dark Sister Sefris. Show me your brands."
Aeron pulled back his sleeve to display the false scar he'd shaped from crimson candle wax.
"Nice," the wizard chuckled through his lemister scarf, "but not quite convincing enough. You're the man himself, aren't you? Aeron sar Randal, even bolder than your reputation led me to believe. I thi—"
Aeron whipped an Arthyn fang from its sheath and hurled it at the arcanist's chest. The knife hit the target, but clanked and rebounded. The small man had some magical protection in place that kept it from penetrating.
A crossbow bolt streaked at Miri. She shielded herself with her buckler, then turned to face the human Red Axe, who was charging her with a dagger in either hand. She drew her broadsword and cut in a single motion, ripping open the outlaw's belly. His knees buckled, and he dropped.
"If you Red Axes have any of my talismans or elixirs,'' the astrologer shouted, "use them!"
He backed away, putting distance between himself and the intruders.
It was evidence the whoreson wasn't entirely impervious to harm, but Aeron was more interested in getting away than in trying to hurt him. He considered a leap out the broken window, but feared Nicos wouldn't survive the fall into the river, and that even if he did, he couldn't manage the frantic swim for safety afterward.
He shouted, "Down the stairs, Father! We'll follow."
Nicos spat an obscenity. Plainly, frail as he was, it still irked him to flee while other folk risked their lives to cover his retreat. But he tottered backward as quickly as his weakness allowed.
No doubt drawn by the commotion, the Red Axe with the long, matted beard appeared in the doorway at the far end of the hall. Half concealed behind Tharag, the wizard chanted, and swept whatever it was he held between thumb and forefinger through a mystic pass. Standing closest to Aeron, Miri, and Nicos, the bugbear and orc gulped the contents of tiny bottles.
Aeron threw a knife at Tharag. The creature wrenched himself sideways, and the blade pierced his forearm instead of his chest. A painful wound, perhaps, but it wouldn't stop the creature. An instant later, Tharag's body swelled, becoming bigger and likely stronger than an ogre's. His clothing and gear grew with him, though for some reason, Aeron's dagger didn't. The process of enlargement shoved it out of the wound to fall and clank on the floor. Tharag raised his cudgel, bellowed a battle cry, and rushed the human who'd hurt him.
Huge as the bugbear was, his head nearly brushing the high ceiling, he seemed as terrible an opponent as the brass mantis. Aeron was sure he lacked the strength to parry a blow from the heavy club, so he dodged the first vicious stroke instead. He told himself it was just possible that, by drinking the potion, Tharag had outsmarted himself. At his present size, the Red Axe wouldn't be able to pursue his foes down the servants' stairs.
Nicos cried out in dismay. Hard-pressed though he was, Aeron risked a glance over his shoulder. A mesh of slimy gray cables, sticky enough to adhere to the walls, floor, and ceiling, sealed the entrance to the narrow steps, as if a gigantic spider had spun a web there. Obviously, the man with the blackwood cane had conjured the strands to cut off the intruders' retreat.
Miri and the orc circled one another near Kesk's throne. The Red Axe opened its mouth wide and seemingly spat out its own tongue. The pink flesh flew through the air, meanwhile stretching into a cord a dozen feet long. It slapped and whirled around the startled ranger's legs, yanking her off balance and binding her to the heavy chair. The orc sprang at her with its short sword leveled to pierce her belly.
Aeron wanted to rush to her aid, but it was impossible. He didn't dare ignore his own opponent. He hastily faced forward, and Tharag swung the cudgel down like a man splitting wood. Aeron dodged. The weapon clashed against the floor.
Maybe Aeron could hamstring the goblin-kin before he could lift the stick for another stroke. He sprang in close, only to find that Tharag had anticipated the move. The bugbear's boot lashed out at him.
Aeron tried to dodge, but the brutal kick still struck him a glancing blow. That was enough to smash the breath from his lungs and send him staggering. As he did, he caught a glimpse of Miri, still alive but still bound as well. The orc was trying to stab her from behind, and she was only barely able to twist around far enough to fend him off.
Snowballs pelted her. Plainly, it was another conjuration, one that looked almost comical, though it was evident from the way she jerked that the white barrage inflicted actual pain. The orc lunged, and once again she managed to turn its blade with her buckler. Her riposte, however, was a feeble, fumbling action easily avoided. In fact, it looked like she almost lost her grip on her broadsword.
Nicos had picked up a bronze cuspidor to use as a makeshift bludgeon, then limped to intercept the Red Axe with the unkempt whiskers. The old man had been a formidable brawler in his day, but it was obvious from the way Nicos moved that, without sufficient strength or agility to back them up, his rusty skills no longer posed a threat. The Red Axe thought so, too. Leering, he advanced with his guard lowered, daring Nicos to strike at him.
Two more ruffians appeared in the far doorway.
Tharag rushed in. Aeron flailed his arms and recovered his balance just in time to dodge the next sweep of the bugbear's cudgel. It was hard to imagine it mattered. He, his father, and Miri might last a little while longer, but the Red Axes were inevitably going to prevail.

CHAPTER 14
Perched atop a gabled slate roof overlooking Kesk's mansion, Sefris peered down, watching for Aeron and Miri while munching on a cold toasted roll with a greasy sausage-and-apple filling. She'd brought food and a canteen because she'd known she might have to remain at her post for hours before the red-bearded thief made his play. Indeed, it was possible that Aeron wouldn't try to rescue Nicos at all, but Sefris considered that unlikely. He'd be eager to retrieve the old man before the Red Axes snipped off any more pieces.
She was certain that, after confusing the gang with raids throughout the city, Aeron meant to invade their stronghold. No other plan would give Miri a reason to work with him. The difficulty was predicting how the pair would try to enter a building theoretically accessible from the Scelptar, at ground level, and via the Underways.
After some thought, Sefris had ruled out the river. Kesk had found and patched the breach in the portcullis defending the water gate, and anyway, it was unlikely that Aeron would attempt the same approach twice. The Underways also seemed an implausible choice. She'd seen that the passage connecting the cellars to the lawless tunnels was well fortified, and Aeron surely had some inkling of that. That left advancing up the street and across the yard. Kesk undoubtedly had a sentry on watch, and kept his doors and windows locked. But Aeron would trust in his ability to avoid detection by the former and tease open the latter, for after all, it was his trade.
The lawns and gardens surrounding the mansion were overgrown and weed infested. Slinking about just after sunset, Sefris had cast spells of warning on the best hiding places. If a second intruder used those choice bits of cover to sneak up on the house, she'd sense it. Then she climbed up on top of a neighboring building to wait.
In time, another watcher's attention might have wandered, but her teachers had trained her to suppress boredom as efficiently as any other emotion. She gazed down at Kesk's residence as patiently as a python hanging in a tree waiting for prey to happen along beneath.
Yet even so, she almost missed the light, for it was just a momentary flicker at the periphery of her vision. By the time her head snapped around toward the north and the river, it was already gone.
She wondered what the pale radiance had been. The moon, peeking momentarily from behind a cloud? No. The sky was clear that night, and Selune, her Tears, and the stars had shone brightly right along. It must have been magical, then. Firelight wouldn't be so white, nor could it blaze and die so quickly.
Maybe a priest or sorcerer out sailing, or on the far shore, had cast a spell that kindled a momentary glow. But she wondered about Kesk's employer. The last time she'd seen the wretch, it had been in the solar on the opposite side of the house. Suppose he lingered there still, and his magic had produced the flare. The light could have pulsed out the long row of windows and reflected off the surface of the river.
Maybe, but even if the masked wizard had used his art, it didn't have to be because he was engaged in a confrontation with Aeron sar Randal. Sefris strained, listening for shouting, the clash of blades against shields, or some other sign of strife. All she heard was the constant murmur of the city around her.
Still, over the course of the next minute or so, she felt a growing certainty that somehow Aeron and Miri had slipped past her and into the house. Either they'd free Nicos and make their escape, or more likely, the Red Axes would kill the scout and take their fellow outlaw prisoner. However it worked out, it could result in The Black Bouquet passing beyond Sefris's grasp forever.
That was unacceptable. She'd hoped to capture Aeron before he had a chance to enter the mansion, not make another foray into a place she'd fled with some difficulty the night before, but she saw no alternative. She sprang off the edge of the roof, snatching and releasing the irregularities in the wall to slow her plummeting descent.
When she hit the ground, the impact jolted her but did no real harm. She rolled to her feet and charged the house. Given a choice, she would once again have skulked up in hopes of remaining undetected, but she felt speed was more important.
Nobody shouted or sent a quarrel or sling stone flying in her direction. She was certain Kesk routinely posted a sentry, but if she was right, if something was happening inside the house, perhaps it had already diverted the guard's attention.
The primary entrance was a pair of massive double doors. Neither their solid weight nor the intricacy of the lock would have hindered her spell of opening, but she begrudged even the moment it would take to stop and recite the incantation. She raced up the wide steps, leaped into the air, and thrust-kicked at the juncture of the panels, attacking it as if her entire body was a battering ram.
The doors bucked in the frame, and something crunched. Sefris rebounded and fell onto the porch. She scrambled to her feet and kicked a second time. The two leaves flew apart.
As she sprinted on, she heard the clamor that had been inaudible from outside. Sure enough, it was coming from upstairs. She smiled slightly to know she'd guessed correctly, and two ruffians scrambled out of a doorway up ahead. Evidently they were rushing toward the noise as well, but faltered when they spotted her.
While a tolerated guest, Sefris had taken the trouble to learn the floor plan of the mansion. Thus, she knew the bravos were blocking the shortest route to the solar, and likewise knew she needed to clear them from her path. Considering that they were still several yards away, magic might have been the safest way to go about it, but she'd already wasted a measure of her power creating the alarms her quarry had somehow bypassed, and she wanted to save the rest to address more serious threats. So she simply charged.
One Red Axe threw a dagger at her. He had a good eye, and it would have plunged into her heart if she hadn't slapped it spinning off course. She responded in kind with a backhand flip of a chakram. The razor-edged ring sheared into his neck, and he fell. Blood spurted from the wound to spatter his companion.
The second outlaw winced but stood his ground, a slim needle of a thrusting sword cocked back in one hand and a parrying dagger extended in the other. Maybe he fancied himself a duelist, for his stance, spine straight and knees flexed, bespoke some formal training in the fencer's science. Sefris kept on charging, one cestus-wrapped fist raised and threatening a punch. Confident that proper timing and the length of his blade would protect him, he'd almost certainly respond to her seemingly reckless advance with a stop hit.
He did. He stepped backward, and his point leaped at her breast. She dropped underneath it, smacked down on the floor, and still carried along by her momentum, slid at him feet first. She kicked at the proper moment, bone cracked, and the duelist went down with a shattered ankle.
It was unlikely he'd give her any more trouble, but Sefris saw no reason to chance it, not when it would take only a split second to finish him off. She scrambled onto his chest, crushed his windpipe with a jab of her stiffened fingers, leaped up, retrieved her chakram, and ran onward.
Nobody was on the marble staircase. Judging from the muddled racket issuing from the top, all the other Red Axes who'd remained in the house had already reached the solar. When she charged up the steps and peered into the hall, she saw that the situation was just about as inconvenient as it could be.
Along with Miri and Nicos, Aeron was at the far end of the room, up by Kesk's chair. The only way to keep him out of the Red Axes' hands and wring the location of The Black Bouquet out of him herself was to kill her way through a dozen or so gang members and the wizard in the green cloak, too.
So be it, then. At least Kesk's henchmen were all facing away from the door. That would give her a brief initial advantage. She sprang into the solar and punched, breaking a hobgoblin's spine. The tall, hairy creature needed to fall first to give her a clear toss at the small man. She'd already concluded he was no seasoned combat wizard—he was too hesitant and miserly with his magic in a fight—but he was still the most dangerous opponent in the room.
She was just about to fling a chakram when she glimpsed movement at the edge of her vision. She pivoted. Sewer Rat rushed her, clawed hands extended to rake. After the trouncing she'd already given it, the stunted, green-skinned savage should have known better, but maybe it ached to avenge its earlier humiliation.
She sidestepped out of the meazel's way, cracked its skull with an elbow strike as it blundered past, and returned her attention to the wizard. He'd spotted her and was jabbering a spell at her. Futilely. He wouldn't finish in time.
She hurled the chakram. It hit the mage in the forehead and bounced away. He bore an enchantment to shield him from missiles.
Even so, the mere fact of a blow to the face would have startled many a spellcaster into botching his conjuration. The small man, however, maintained his focus. He spoke the final word, and a ragged fan-shaped distortion, like hot air rippling over pavement on a torrid summer day, shot from the head of his cane.
Sefris tried to dodge, and nearly made it. The edge of the magic grazed her, however.
It didn't make her feel any different, and for a second imagined it hadn't affected her at all. Then she perceived that the wizard was backing away with an implausible quickness. In fact, everything—Aeron's battle with a gigantic bugbear, Miri's clash with an orc, the other Red Axes maneuvering to close with one foe or another—was scuttling and jerking around more rapidly than before.
Sefris realized that wasn't actually so. It just looked that way to her. The man with the cane hadn't sped the rest of the world up. He'd slowed her down.
Had the enemy allowed her a moment, she probably could have dissolved the enchantment with a counter-spell, but suddenly, or so it seemed to her, other Red Axes were rushing her. A dagger slashed at her eyes. From her perspective, the blade came in as fast as if one of her teachers was wielding it, and she nearly failed to duck. She riposted with a punch to the jaw, and the outlaw jerked out of the way.
She flowed into one of the combinations her instructors had drilled into her, following up with a blow to the ribs. The Red Axe didn't dodge that one. Her knuckles smashed bone. He stumbled backward and fell on his rump.
But already two more Red Axes, one human, the other a slavering, hyena-headed gnoll, were spreading out to flank her. She realized that, in her present condition, she could no longer count on simple trained reflex to snatch her out of harm's way. She had to read their stances and predict how and where each attack would come.
It looked like the gnoll would cut to the head and the human would try a low-line thrust, and when they pounced at her, it was so. She evaded both attacks and retaliated with a snap kick to the knee that crippled the goblin-kin. Unfortunately, that gave the remaining cutthroat time for a second stab, and she couldn't pivot fast enough for a clean, fully effective block. She kept the dagger out of her lung, but it pierced her forearm, grating on bone before ripping free.
It didn't hurt, not yet, and wouldn't until she allowed it to. Mere force of will, however, wouldn't stop the bleeding or the weakness it would eventually produce. She realized she was genuinely in trouble.
Aeron crouched before Tharag, and when the enormous bugbear swung its club, the rogue lunged forward, safely inside the arc of the blow, and swept his Arthyn fang in an overhand stab at the creature's stomach. The point plunged through magically thickened layers of tanned horsehide armor and clothing to pierce the Red Axe's flesh.
Tharag roared in rage and snatched at Aeron with his offhand. Aeron ducked and stabbed a second time. The bugbear lunged forward, trying, apparently, to knock his foe down and trample him. Aeron sprang aside, and Tharag lurched past.
In the instant it took the Red Axe to spin back around, Aeron had his first chance to survey the entire room in... he realized he had no idea how long. He'd lost all track of time trying to contend with Tharag.
Miri was still alive. Indeed, she was faring better than the last time he'd taken note of her situation. She looked as if she'd shaken off the shock of the snowballs, and at some point had managed to chop through the coil of pink flesh that had bound her legs to the chair. She stood facing both the orc and the bravo with the matted beard, who'd already finished with Nicos. Aeron felt a pang of fear and rage to see his father sprawled motionless on the floor.
A second tongue-rope lay twitching on the floor. Evidently the wizard's elixir enabled the orc to spit more than one. But the second such attack had failed to take its target by surprise, and Miri managed to dodge.
Aeron was surprised to see that Sefris Uuthrakt had appeared at the far end of the room. Something was wrong with the way she was moving, though he couldn't make out precisely what. Still, the wizard and the rest of the Red Axes had turned to engage her. Apparently they weren't all on the same side anymore.
Aeron realized that could be his salvation. It was possible that he, Nicos, and Miri could make their escape while the gang was busy battling the agent of the Dark Moon. First, however, they'd have to dispose of their current opponents, and that wouldn't be easy. It was plain from the way Tharag turned, quick and surefooted as before, that the Arthyn fang might have jabbed his skin, but hadn't reached his guts. Aeron felt as if he might as well have pricked the towering brute with a pin.
Then he thought of a ploy that might enable him to do some actual damage. Another idiot idea, perhaps, but the only one he had. He retreated toward Miri, and Tharag lumbered after him.
The problem was that he couldn't simply tell the scout what he had in mind, or Tharag would hear, too. He could only hint at it, praying she'd understand and the bugbear wouldn't.
Aeron said, "If we could trip him...."
"Right," Miri panted.
A few heartbeats later, the man with the tangled whiskers feinted a cut to the leg, then lunged at Miri in earnest. She caught the true attack—a head cut—on her buckler, but to all appearances, the impact staggered her.
Aeron could only assume she was faking. He hopped backward, and Tharag compensated by taking a stride forward, into what ought to be the proper position.
Hoping to take advantage of Miri's seeming incapacity, the orc spat a third extending tendril of flesh. The guide wrenched herself out of the way. The wet, meaty strand flew past her and lashed itself around Tharag's ankles. The bugbear pitched off balance, but didn't fall.
Aeron threw his shoulder against Tharag's leg. That brought the giant crashing to the floor, and he scrambled toward its neck, where no armor protected it, and a major artery throbbed just beneath the skin.
Tharag flailed at him but missed, then was in position. He slashed, a torrent of blood sprayed, and the bugbear thrashed in its death throes.
Aeron jumped up and rushed in on the orc's flank. The pig-faced creature pivoted and parried his knife with its short sword, but in the instant it was distracted, Miri cut into its chest. It whimpered, and its legs gave way.
That left Aeron and Miri confronting the man with the beard. Aeron just had time for an instant of savage satisfaction that for once, it was the foe who found himself outnumbered.
Miri said, "Deal with him."
She turned, and dashed away.
Aeron and the Red Axe shifted in and out of the distance, feinting, striking, and parrying, neither, in those first moments, able to score. Something shattered, then warmth and a wavering yellow light flowered at Aeron's back. He surmised that Miri had smashed an oil lamp to set something on fire. The blaze alarmed his opponent, who started shouting for help.
If the Red Axe kept on yelling, some of his comrades just might heed him, too, even though, so far, Sefris was holding her own against them. Desperate to shut him up, Aeron lunged forward, inviting a stop cut. When it came, he blocked with the knife in his off hand and simultaneously drove his largest Arthyn fang into the Red Axe's chest.
It took the ruffian a moment to drop, and by that time, Aeron could feel the hot pain burning in his shoulder. His knife had been too light a weapon, or his defense not deft enough, to stop the heavy sword entirely. His parry had robbed the stroke of some of its force, but the blade still gashed his flesh.
Aeron knew he had no time to stop and examine the wound. Instead, he pivoted toward Miri and the fire. She'd set the mesh sealing off the servants' stairs alight, and the gluey cables were burning away.
"I learned to clear spider web in the Thornwood," she said, flashing him a grin. "Help me with your father."
As they dashed toward Nicos, a couple more Red Axes started in their direction.
Fine, Aeron thought. If it was a race, he and Miri would just have to win it.
He caught sight of the wizard. Standing by the windows at a reasonably safe distance from any of the intruders, the mage had also oriented on the thief and the ranger. Holding a spell focus—Aeron couldn't make out precisely what the small object was—high above his head, he recited a rhyme.
A dark blue vapor billowed up around Aeron's feet, so thickly that he could no longer see any farther than his hand could reach. Even worse, the fumes had a vile, rotten smell that instantly turned his stomach. Stricken with a nausea as intense as any he'd ever experienced, Aeron swallowed to keep from puking.
"Run!" cried Miri from somewhere in the mist.
The strain in her tone made it obvious that she too was struggling not to be sick.
"My father!" Aeron called back.
"We can't.. . find him ... in this murk," Miri replied between coughs, "and we're too ill... to carry him off... if we could. It's over... for tonight."
He hated her for it, but she was right. Silently vowing that he'd come back for Nicos somehow, he tried to turn around toward the servants' stairs, only to realize he no longer knew where they were. He was so sick it made him dizzy.
He nearly panicked, then spotted a smudge of brightness that could only be the firelight. He staggered forward into the center of it. Curling wisps of burning web seared him as he brushed by.
At the moment, it didn't matter. The fog hadn't penetrated far beyond the doorway, and as soon as he clambered down out of it, his nausea abated. The relief of that rendered the sting of his blisters insignificant.
Miri stood below him on the steps. She beckoned impatiently, and they ran on down to the first floor, then onward through the house. When they reached the stairs leading down to the cellars, he swiped some blood from his shoulder wound and smeared it on the banister.

CHAPTER 15
Sefris had suffered a second wound, a gash just above the knee, by the time the fire started and the ruffian at the far end of the hall started bawling for help. A couple of the other Red Axes left off attacking her to answer the call.
She dodged a dagger thrust, grabbed her assailant, and spun him at a goblin armed with a spiky-headed mace. The outlaws fell in a tangle, and finally, for the first time since the man with the cane had snared her in his enchantment, she had time to rattle off a spell of her own.
She snatched a handful of black ribbons from one of her pockets, recited the words of power, and snapped the lengths of silk as if they were a cat-o-nine-tails. Tatters of shadow exploded from a point on the floor to engulf the nearest Red Axes, who cried out at the insubstantial but somehow repulsive contact. They stood dazed and shaken for a few moments, and their incapacity bought Sefris even more time.
Time to dissolve the unnatural sluggishness with which the wizard had afflicted her. Crooking her fingers through the proper signs, she began the counterspell. Gloom crawled around her, the Shadow Weave responding to her call.
At the same time, she took note of the blue fog filling the opposite end of the room. Thanks to her own magical expertise, she knew what the conjured mist was. No doubt it was intended to drop Aeron and Miri in their tracks, make them too nauseated to do anything but retch, but it evidently hadn't. Sefris could hear them calling to one another inside the cloud. If they could resist the vapor long enough, they were going to flee through the far doorway.
Sefris wouldn't be able to follow without fighting her way past more Red Axes and subjecting herself to the debilitating queasiness engendered by the fog. She thought she'd be better off trying something else instead.
She spoke the final word of power. The air around her sizzled like meat frying in a pan as her own magic burned the small man's hindering spell away. She whirled, dashed out the door, and bounded down the wide marble steps.
As she ran, her wounded leg throbbed, the pain begging her to favor it. She blocked the discomfort from her mind. If she allowed herself to limp, she might not be fast enough to intercept Aeron on the ground floor.
It turned out that she wasn't anyway. When she saw the bloody mark on the banister of the cellar stairs, she realized he and Miri had scurried down them to escape through the Underways. She continued the chase through the labyrinth of storerooms and piled crates until she found her way to the exit.
It was still locked. And bolted. Even if Aeron knew a burglar's trick that would allow him to secure it fully from the other side, it was unlikely he would have taken the time. He and Miri had actually fled the house at ground level.
Which was to say the handprint had been a trick to make a pursuer believe the fugitives had gone that way. It had worked well, too. It would be futile to race back upstairs and try to pick up Aeron's trail. Even if it didn't result in another useless encounter with the Red Axes, and further delay, he'd gained too long a lead.
Sefris simply opened the inner door, then the outer one, and departed via the tunnels herself. She felt herself seething with anger, and worked to quash the feeling. Her frustration and injured pride in her own competence didn't matter, nor the pain of her wounds—only patience, resolution, and the success they would bring did.
Yet deep down, she hoped with a bitter fervor that, in the course of accomplishing her mission, she'd have the chance to slaughter Aeron, Miri, Kesk, the wizard with the blackwood cane, and everyone else who'd gotten in her way. Perhaps it was a prayer that even a deity as cold and unyielding as the Lady of Loss would grant.

A couple blocks from Kesk's mansion, Miri and Aeron climbed a rusty wrought iron ladder, the rungs tangled in ivy, that ran up a tower wall. At the top was a Rainspan. From there, they could watch for signs of pursuit. Thus far, she hadn't seen any.
She and the outlaw leaned on the railing and panted for a time, catching their breaths and waiting for their stomachs to settle. The night breeze was mild, but her clothes were so sweat-soaked that it chilled her even so.
When Miri felt able, she said, "Better let me take a look at that shoulder."
"All right."
For once, Aeron's voice was dull, not the energetic, sometimes humorous tone to which she'd become accustomed.
She ripped the rent in his bloodstained sleeve wider to get a better look at the gash.
"You're lucky," said the ranger. "It's shallow. If you think it's unsafe to go back to Ilmater's house, some salve from an apothecary and a bandage will probably take care of it. If need be, I can put a couple stitches in."
"Lucky...."
From the bitterness in his voice, Miri realized he wasn't talking about the cut.
"I'm sorry the plan didn't work," she said. "It nearly did. If the wizard hadn't been there ..."
"Even though he was," Aeron said, "we almost saved my father. Another couple paces, and I would have picked him up in my arms. Then the fog came, and it panicked us. We turned tail and left him lying there."
"We didn't have a choice."
"You can't be sure of that. Maybe we still could have gotten him out. We'll never know, because you said we had to run, and I listened."
She stared at him, then said, "So it's all the fault of my cowardice that things didn't work out."
"I didn't say that."
"Not in so many words, but... Listen, when we fight your fellow cutthroats, all they do is try to club you unconscious, or cut a leg out from under you. They're out to kill me. So I'll be damned if I understand where you find the gall to question my courage."
"I said we both panicked. I didn't mean to put it all off on you."
"I'm a scout of the Red Hart Guild," Miri replied. "I have honor. You're a common sneak thief. You don't. Be thankful I'm willing to dirty my ..."
She felt the clench in her muscles and heard the shrillness in her voice. She took a long breath.
"Never mind," Miri continued. "I shouldn't have said that I'm frustrated, too."
For a few heartbeats, Aeron just stared out at the night as if struggling to swallow his own anger.
Eventually he said, "For all we know, he could be dead now."
"I don't think the mist would kill him," Miri replied, "and I didn't see any fresh blood on him when he was lying on the floor. I think the one Red Axe just knocked him out with the flat of his blade, or his fist."
"That could have been enough to kill him, sickly as he is. Or maybe, after what happened, the Axes decided I'm never going to trade the book, and they stuck a knife in him."
"I doubt the wizard would let them do anything rash," said the ranger. "He strikes me as too canny."
She reached out to give Aeron a reassuring pat on the shoulder, but he irritably twisted away from her touch.
"You don't know that, either," he said. "All we do know is that we wasted our one chance to sneak into Kesk's house. We'll never get inside a second time."
"Then it's time to try it my way, isn't it? Seek help from the Bouquet’s rightful owner, and the authorities."
Aeron scowled and said, "I explained to you why that wouldn't work."
Despite herself, Miri felt her own hostility welling up anew.
"While painting our faces green like clowns in a pageant works brilliantly," she said. "I think you won't turn to the law just because it is the law. It would tarnish this notion you have of yourself as some sort of master rogue, and you couldn't bear that. You'd rather let your father die."
"That isn't true. It just wouldn't help."
"What is the answer, then?"
"I don't know," he said. "Shut your mouth for a while, and maybe something will come to me."

Kesk's mood was already sour from several fruitless hours of hunting Aeron through the Underways, and it curdled into cold fury as soon as he tramped into the solar and saw his henchmen. It was obvious from the way they quailed from his gaze, as much as their fresh splints and bandages and the sooty fire damage around the far doorway, that some new fiasco had occurred in his absence.
Ambling closer, his cane tapping the floor, the wizard took it upon himself to explain how Aeron and a female accomplice had entered the house in disguise to spirit Nicos away.
"We would have captured them," the wizard added, "except that Dark Sister Sefris burst in to snatch them away. Evidently she'd been tracking them or something. While we all fought over Master sar Randal and his ally, they escaped. It's rather ironic when you think about it."
Kesk trembled. At that moment, he would dearly have loved to split the rich man's masked face with his axe.
"You think it's funny, do you?" the tanarukk asked.
"Mildly," the wizard replied. "Now, don't glare at me like that. Aeron didn't rescue his father, which means that except for a few casualties, which you, with your horde of underlings, can readily afford, we're no worse off than before."
"And no better."
What truly infuriated Kesk wasn't the wear and tear on his henchmen. Those too weak to defend themselves deserved whatever they got. What nettled him was that, by arranging the raids on his various enterprises, Aeron had successfully concealed his true intentions. In other words, made a fool of him. Kesk wondered which of his other foes or rivals were actually responsible for the harassment his operation had suffered earlier in the evening, at the same time the redheaded thief was invading his home. He vowed to find out, and pay them back triple, but supposed it would have to wait until he settled the maddening business with the black book.
"If," the wizard said, "Aeron could be convinced we'll make a fair trade, give him Nicos and a reasonable amount of coin, too, and not come after either of them later, don't you think he'd agree to it?"
Across the room, bound to his chair, Nicos laughed feebly until an orc silenced him with a slap.
"I suppose that is the proper response to my suggestion," sighed the small man. "Aeron would have to be mad to trust us at this point. Your malice and bungling saw to that."
Kesk glared.
"Get it straight once and for all," the tanarukk grumbled. "I'm not your lackey, and I don't take orders from you. I did what I thought best."
"And look how far it got us."
"As far as your nimble-fingered wizardry and magical toys."
" 'Toys' you extorted from me after I spent years collecting them," the mage countered. "I wouldn't care if it had done some good. But even equipped with enchanted gear, your Red Axes can't lay their hands on one lone-wolf cutpurse. Instead, he's made you look like a dunce in front of the entire city."
Kesk had been thinking something similar himself, which only made the magician's taunt rankle all the more. For a second, he was so angry that it choked off the words in his throat, and the merchant saw something in his face that made the eyes above the lemister scarf widen in alarm.
"Well," gritted Kesk when he was able, "I'm not going to look foolish for much longer. Tomorrow I'm going to put an end to this business."
"How?"
"My people will spread the word that if Aeron doesn't hand over what I want by midnight, I'll chop his father's head off and dump the sundered pieces in Laskalar's Square."
The wizard shrugged and said, "You've been threatening Nicos's welfare right along. How will this be any different?"
"Because of the deadline, my promise to display the corpse to the whole city, and the fact that my men will repeat it to every robber, slaver, and whore they can find. Aeron will know I have to follow through. Otherwise, I'll lose respect."
The magician cocked his head and asked, "You mean, if things don't work out as planned, you actually mean to do it?"
"Yes."
"Then we lose our hold on Aeron, don't we? With Nicos slain, what's to stop him from fleeing Oeble with The Black Bouquet still in his possession?"
"Nothing, I guess. At least I'll be rid of him," Kesk replied, "and you."
"Without me for a partner, you'll never rise any higher than you have already."
Kesk sneered and said, "Maybe it doesn't look like it to you, but since the day I first came to Oeble, with nothing but this axe to help me carve out a life, I've climbed pretty high already. If I never go any farther, that will be all right."
"You don't mean that."
"Oh, yes, I do, and you can't talk me out of it. So why don't you turn that twisty mind to yours to the task of laying a trap that Aeron can't possibly escape?"

Aeron kept quickening his pace despite the fact that even under normal circumstances, it could be dangerous to race headlong through the Underways. You could blunder into a strong-arm robber lying in wait for easy prey or intrude on plotters willing to kill to keep their palavering a secret.
Thus, whenever he caught himself, he forced himself to slow down, but it was hard. After fleeing Kesk's mansion, he and Miri had slept aboard an unattended skiff moored at one of the docks. Restless, anguished over their failure to rescue Nicos, he woke first and rose to prowl the streets. It was then that he overheard a team of thieves, two pickpockets, a bag man, and a lookout, discussing Kesk's well-publicized threat to murder his hostage at midnight unless Aeron gave him what he wanted. Since then, he'd felt a seething urgency that made him want to hurry every instant, whether it was sensible or not.
"Do you really think," said Miri, striding along beside him with her bow slung over her shoulder, "our allies are likely to do more than they have already?"
"We won't know until we ask."
"Actually," said the scout, "I already did ask, when we talked to Om—their chief the first time. If you recall, he said he'd snipe at the Red Axes on the sly, but not risk open war."
Squinting against the darkness, Aeron peered down the passage. Three people stood murmuring to one another at the next intersection. He recognized one of them, and once more had to quash the impulse to rush.
"Then I'll just have to change his mind," the thief said.
"I tell you, visiting him again is just a waste of precious time. Let's go to my employer."
"We had this talk already."
The trio ahead were good at their trade. They didn't even glance up as Aeron and Miri drew nearer.
"We had it hours ago," said the scout, "and you promised to come up with a new strategy. This desperate notion won't do, and if it's all you can think of, then we need to try things my way. Fury's Heart, try behaving like a decent, law-abiding person for once in your life. You might like it."
"I might like it all the way up the gallows steps."
The loiterers were just a couple paces away. Aeron's heartbeat quickened.
"I swear by the Forest Queen," said Miri, "I'll make sure you aren't punished. My employer doesn't care about you. He only wants his property retur—"
Aeron pivoted and threw a punch.
Miri must have seen him swing, for she reacted with the quickness of a trained warrior. She dodged, and he only struck her a glancing blow.
She sprang back and reached for the hilt of her broadsword. The problem was that, by retreating from Aeron, she'd merely shifted closer to his three confederates. The largest of them, a half-orc with a broken nose, lashed its cudgel against her back. The blow slapped her leather armor, and she lurched forward.
The other two ruffians lunged at her, bludgeons flailing. She swept her buckler in a backhand stroke that held them off long enough for her sword to clear the scabbard. She cut, the half-orc recoiled, and her blade missed its torso by a finger-length. A passerby who'd stopped to watch the show cried out in excitement.
Aeron edged in on her flank, then faked a leap into the distance. She turned and thrust, and that gave the half-orc a chance to give her another blow from behind. It knocked her to one knee, and the creature's human partners swarmed over her. Her sword was useless at such close quarters. After a few moments of frantic struggling, they pummeled her into submission, then lashed her hands behind her back with rawhide.
"When I said you were learning to think like an Oeblaun native," Aeron said to her, "I gave you too much credit. You told me how one fellow led you into a trap here in the tunnels, and now you've let exactly the same thing happen again. I don't think Sefris will save you this time around."
Miri glared up at him. Blood trickled from her split lip.
"Why are you doing this?" she asked.
"You can't help me rescue my father. Maybe if you had the rest of your precious guild behind you, but not by yourself. I gave you your chance, but you aren't skilled or brave enough."
"Shall we get her moving?" asked the half-orc.
"Yes," Aeron said.
His confederates hauled Miri to her feet and relieved her of her belt pouch and remaining weapons. The half-orc shoved her to set her stumbling in the right direction.
"I'm a better fighter than you," she said, still focused on Aeron. "I still don't see the point of this."
"It's simple enough. I can't trust Kesk to hold to any deal we make. You and I alone can't fight all the Red Axes, or sneak into their lair a second time. So I've decided to save my father with gold. I'll bribe one of the gang to smuggle him out."
"Maybe that would work," she said, "but..."
The half-orc gave her another push.
"Unfortunately," Aeron said, "the Axes are all afraid of their chief, and they live pretty well already. That means it's going to take a lot of coin to tempt one of them. More than I've got, and more than I can steal in the time remaining. I wouldn't be able to sell The Black Bouquet quickly enough, either, or use the book itself as a bribe. Kesk's cutthroats wouldn't understand what it is or why it's valuable any more than I did until you explained it to me."
"But you decided what you could do," Miri said, "is sell me."
Aeron grinned and replied, "I found out who wanted all those yuan-ti to capture you, then asked him if he was still interested. It turned out he is, so we arranged the details."
"Listen to me," she said. "You don't have to do this. If you want to try bribery, I can get the gold from my employer. I won't even have to mention your name."
He shook his head and told her, "I feel safer dealing with my own kind."
"Curse you for a liar and a traitor! You have rat's blood in your veins!"
"What did you expect?" Aeron asked. "You're the one who said I'm just a common thief, with no notion what honor means."
"I didn't truly want to believe that."
"Well, believe this," he said. "Folk like you and me are natural enemies, you killed my friends, and even if none of that was true, I'd sell out you and a hundred like you to save my father. Look, it's your new home."
They marched her onward, through the entrance to Melder's Door.
Even at that hour, when so many of Oeble's rogues were snoring in their beds, the stone-walled common room held a motley assortment of travelers and waiters, and as usual, tiny dragons flitted everywhere. Most everyone, whether human, goblin-kin, or reptile, eyed Miri with curiosity, some with malicious amusement, and none, so far as Aeron could judge, with sympathy.
Smiling, handsomely clad in a red silk shirt and a black suede jerkin laced with scarlet cord, Melder sauntered up to inspect his prize. Miri spat at him, and a dozen of the little wyrms hurtled at her like bees defending a violated hive.
Melder raised a swarthy hand, and the dragons veered off.
"Please," he said to Miri. "It can all be quite pleasant, if you'll only allow it to be."
"I'll kill you for this," she said, "and even if I fail, the Red Hart Guild will avenge me."
"As your own experience demonstrates," Melder said, "your friends had better stick to their forests and mountains. Oeble will eat them alive." He looked at the half-orc. "Why don't you lock her away, then I'll pay you?"
The creature and its fellow kidnappers manhandled Miri across the common room. She struggled every step of the way, but with her hands bound, to no avail. She and her captors disappeared through a doorway.
"I'd like to get paid, too," Aeron said.
"Surely," Melder said. "Vlint?"
A hobgoblin appeared at his elbow with a clinking pigskin purse in hand.
Aeron untied the laces, lifted the flap, and stirred the coins inside with his fingertip, which afforded him a glimpse of the ones at the bottom.
"Thanks," Aeron breathed.
"I realize," Melder said, "that these days you have to be careful about lingering too long in any one place. But will you have a glass of something before you go?"
Aeron smiled a crooked smile and said, "I suppose I might as well celebrate. This was the first plan that's gone off without a hitch since before I robbed the Paer."

Sefris heard voices echoing down the tunnel, and though she couldn't make out the muttered words, instinct warned her she had cause for caution. She cast about and spotted a notch in the wall, containing a steep flight of steps that probably linked that section of the Underways to somebody's cellar. She silently hurried partway up the steps, above the eye level of anyone likely to pass below then crouched motionless in the narrow, unlit space.
Sure enough, two Red Axes tramped by. She recognized them from the time she'd spent among the gang, and assumed they were scouting the tunnels near Melder's Door for the same reason she was. They'd heard the gossip that Aeron sar Randal had visited the inn to sell his former ally to the proprietor.
It seemed unlikely that Aeron was still lingering in the area, but it also seemed inexplicable that he'd made such a conspicuous display of himself in Melder's establishment in the first place. In any case, Sefris didn't know where else to look for him, so there she was.
She crept down the stairs and onward through the darkness, in the opposite direction from Kesk's henchmen. She encountered other ruffians, some of whom eyed her speculatively. But when she returned their stares, making it clear she registered their interest without the slightest flicker of alarm, they allowed her to continue on her way unmolested.
It was difficult to keep track of time underground. Eventually, though, she became convinced she'd been searching for quite a while. Certainly she was retracing her steps through sections of tunnel she'd traversed before. Maybe, she thought, she should return to her sanctuary and consult the arcanaloth after all. Then, some distance ahead, a lanky figure stepped from a doorway. He froze for a moment as if startled to see her, which gave her a decent look at his face. Though the gloom dulled the bright copper of his hair to a nondescript gray, Sefris recognized the man she'd come to find.
She sprinted toward him. She'd tended the wounds she'd received the night before, and though her thigh ached, she was able to run as fast as ever. She snatched a chakram from her pocket and broke stride for the split second required to fling it spinning ahead of her, skimming low to maim Aeron's leg.
The ring flew as true as any cast she'd ever made. Unfortunately, however, it was a long throw, which gave Aeron time to dodge. He scrambled onto the first riser of a staircase and on up out of sight.
When she followed him onto the steps, she realized from the wan trace of sunlight leaking down from overhead that they connected the tunnel with the outdoors. If Aeron reached the top, it might give him the chance to flee in more than one direction, or lose himself in a crowd. Resolved to catch him while he was still inside the stairwell, she ran even harder.
From above her came a sudden clatter. She was still peering, trying to figure out what the sound meant, when her sandal landed on something small, hard, and round. The objects rolled, and despite all her training, threw her off balance. She fell, caught herself, and at the same time realized that Aeron had tossed a quantity of marbles bouncing down the steps.
A good trick, but the fall hadn't injured her, nor delayed her for more than an instant. She could still catch him. She raced on.
As she neared the top of the steps, the daylight dazzled her. She squinted against it, but still missed seeing the cord her quarry had stretched at ankle level. She tripped and fell a second time.
Her wounded leg throbbed, and she suspected she'd torn open the cut. He still hadn't stopped her, though, nor saved himself. He'd simply annoyed her, which meant it was going to be even more satisfying to hurt him.
She scrambled up into a little unpaved cul-de-sac. Towers rose around her, with Rainspans linking the upper stories. To her right, a door slammed. She dashed to it and grabbed the black wrought iron handle. It turned, the latch disengaged, but the panel wouldn't push open. She had to kick it twice to dislodge the wooden wedge her quarry had used to jam it shut.
Judging by the look and stink of the interior, the spire was another of Oeble's squalid tenements, with hordes of paupers living, breeding, and dying in its tiny rooms. Aeron's footsteps thudded on the stairs zigzagging away into shadow overhead. Sefris raced after him.
She thought he'd bolt out onto one of the elevated bridges, but he surprised her. He ran all the way to the top floor, then scrambled up a ladder and through a trapdoor.
She expected him to lie in wait by the hatch, poised to knife her, and when she swarmed up the ladder, she was ready to defend herself. It wasn't necessary. What he'd actually done was retreat to the very edge of the square, flat roof, then hop up on the low parapet that ran along it.
It had to be another trick, didn't it? She looked at him and all around, but couldn't spot the hidden threat.
"You're fine," he panted. "I'm the one who's in danger. If I lose my balance, if anything jostles me, I'll fall to my death."
"What does this mean?" she asked.
"You don't think I just happened to be carrying a bag of marbles, a trip cord, and a wedge around with me, do you?" he replied with a grin. "I wanted to talk to you, so I let people see me in the Door. I figured you'd hear about it and come sniffing around. I spotted you, let you do the same to me, then used my tricks to slow you down while you chased me. I couldn't let you catch up until I led you here. You won't throw a spell or one of those rings at me now, will you?"
"What I will do is take hold of you and pull you down," she said, then started forward.
"Don't try!" Aeron called. "I'll jump, and you'll never find out where I hid The Black Bouquet."
She didn't believe him, but she wasn't absolutely sure she was right, and thus she hesitated. Maybe it would be safer to hear him out first, and call his bluff later if need be. It wasn't as if he could evade her. He'd backed himself into a corner.
"I don't think you want to die and leave your father in the tanarukk's hands," said Sefris.
"You're right, but I know I can't save him by myself—or working with Miri, for that matter. That's why I sold her to Melder."
Sefris frowned, trying to follow his train of thought.
"What do you mean?" she asked. "What did betraying Miri accomplish?"
"Well, I told people it was to raise the coin to bribe one of the Red Axes, but that's not practical, considering that none of them is any more trustworthy than Kesk himself. I just wanted folk to think it was the reason, so they wouldn't figure out I was getting rid of her to clear the way for you."
"Clear the way for me?"
"Yes. I can't very well work with you and Miri both, considering that you'd both demand the black book in payment, and you're the one I need. You fight better than anyone I've ever seen, and you're a sorceress on top of it. Her talents are nothing compared to yours."
"So you're offering me the Bouquet in exchange for my help in rescuing your father."
"And peace between you and me afterward."
"I agree."
Aeron smiled and said, "Good, except that I don't believe you yet. Maybe it's because I'm such a faithless liar myself, but it strikes me that you might promise anything to lure me into your clutches, with no intention of keeping your word."
"I swear by Shar that I will."
Some deities might object to their worshipers making false vows in their names, but the Lady of Loss wasn't one of them. She wanted her work done by any means necessary. Indeed, she relished treachery and oath-breaking to the extent that she could be said to savor anything in the vile stew that was creation.
"That's wonderful," Aeron said, an ironic edge in his voice, "but even so, I want to ask you something. How did my father hold up under torture?"
"Fairly well," she admitted.
In truth, Nicos had borne up remarkably well. After what he'd suffered, he should have been too cowed to utter a word unbidden, yet instead he'd exposed her identity to the mage with the blackwood cane.
"Remember," Aeron said, "he's old and sick. I'm young, healthy, and my father's son. I could hold out even longer. I could sit on the location of the book until it's too late. Until the cursed thing's destroyed."
She felt a thrill of dismay, and asked, "Destroyed ... how?"
"If I told you, it might help you figure out where it is. Just take my word for it. If I don't fetch it from its current hiding place by sunrise tomorrow, that will be the end of it. Your only hope of getting it is for me to hand it over voluntarily."
"I understand," she said, and it was so.
Evidently she did have to play along for the time being, and that was all right. Eventually a moment would come when he no longer held the formulary hostage, and at that moment, she'd repay him in full for all the trouble he'd caused her.
"Good."
Aeron stepped down off the parapet. He was trying to appear confident, and it would have fooled most people, but she could read the tension in his lean frame, the fear that she was going to lunge at him. It made her wish she could.
He said, "Here's what I think we should do ..."