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Strick was right there outside, seated on the front steps of the carefully
elevated house, apparently awaiting Lone's arrival. Moreover and far more
awesomely, beside him sat a black-clad figure. That one threw up a hand as the
other man in black approached on weary legs that he had pushed close to the
limit of their endurance.
"Lone!" Chance called jubilantly. "Good to see you at last, lad!"
"Shit!" Lone muttered. Then, reprovingly as a schoolmaster: "You cheated!"
"True! I used my brain instead of my legs!"
While Lone ground his teeth, Strick spoke. "Not to mention a horse. Promise
never to enter this house again unless invited, Lone, and we will go in for
some refreshment."
"I promise," Lone said. "I even& uh& I had something to prove."
"Still have," Chance said, rising with the apparent aid of his cane.
Lone heaved a sigh and nodded. He had aborted, saying, "I even apologize,"
because it was hard, so hard for him to say such words. They went inside, and
Lone learned what it was like to have the wherewithal to have a fast runner
fetch ice from the mountains down to Sanctuary.
Or, in this case, for a certain old master cat burglar to find a way to
relieve Arizak's runner of his burden and make a gift of such rich bounty to a
friend&
Ice weakened good ale a bit, but how good to a sweatily exercised man it was
with a bit of coolth added!
And then a bit more without the ice, as the three men talked. The woman
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present talked but little, as was her habit, but she gazed much on the cocky
youngster working so hard to control his natural cockiness and truculence.
What a fascinating boy! How strangely&
akin to him she felt!
Linnana knew already the story of Strick's nonpayment by Lord Arizak, even to
the amount. Now she heard Chance lay out his desire to steal into Arizak's
less than modest dwelling and relieve him of that exact amount.
"Not a quarter-ounce of copper more," Chance said, one finger upraised, "and
not a quarter-ounce less."
"Yet," Linnana put in, "there is or should be the matter of interest& "
Strick smiled. "I have little doubt that opportunity will one day arise for me
to extract that from the great
Arizak."
She chuckled.
Chance did not. Meeting the eyes of no one, he said, "How I long to do it! But
my age and leg make me unable to undertake that exciting piece of night work& "
"Your age and arm, you mean, Master," Lone said, lest Chance think the youth
still believed that he was crippled in the leg, that the walking stick was
necessary. "But the work will be done. I need only bethink myself of what I
will need, and make a little list& "
"You need make no list," Chance assured him. "I know exactly what you need,
for in past I completed an almost identical mission."
"Hmp," the Spellmaster said, without the hint of a smile. "Mission? Not on my
behalf. Must have kept the swag to yourself!"
His friend also did not smile. "Nah, nah. Gave it all to the poor and the
Temple of Him Whose Name We
Do Not Pronounce, I did!"
Strick laughed with him, and continued to keep his peace about what he knew:
his friend was indeed spawn of the shadows& or rather of the shadow god,
Shalpa, usually referred to namelessly, as Chance just had.
"By four nights hence," Linnana suggested into the laughter, "we will have
full dark of the moon, surely the perfect time for such a wicked venture& "
"But too easy," Chance said firmly. "By night after next the moon will be a
mere tiny sliver a fine working night for an excellent roach anxious to prove
his talent and ability!"
Lone shrugged and endeavored to look relaxed and, above all, casually
confident. Whatever the
Shadowspawn said. At last he had achieved his goal, and here he sat, in the
company of the man he most respected and admired. Naturally a youth with such
a goal considered himself lucky to be in the service of Shadowspawn, no matter
how much in his shadow! The only aspiration of the orphan Lone was to be as
exactly like his idol as he could make himself which meant doing things
Shadowspawn's way, however dangerous.
"For one thing," Chance said, "you will need an archer."
Lone cocked his head. "An archer?"
"Someone good with a bow," Strick said, as if it were the meaning of the word
that Lone did not grasp.
"And arrows."
Without taking his gaze off Chance, Lone said, "Oh."
"An archer who can loft an arrow upward, trailing a rope," Chance explained.
"That gets you over the
Lord Arizak's wall, and maybe farther, as in higher."
"Ah!" Lone bobbed his head, acknowledging something he had not thought of.
"I, ah, know a girl who is expert with bow and arrow," Linnana said, and
received strange looks from the men, all thinking:
a girl
?!
Strick said, "Would that be that teen daughter of Churga and Filixia?"
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She nodded. "Jinsy, aye. She practices every day behind their house, and the
girl is good.'"
Chance was looking uncomfortable, and wishing he were having this meeting with
his apprentice elsewhere, and just the two of them. "Uh& you sound like you're
talking about a neighbor& "
"Right," Linnana said, smiling brightly. "And very good friends. Jinsy will be
thirteen next month." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]