The Alabaster Staff (8 page)

Kehrsyn hit hard, trying to tumble to ease the impact, but she felt a ripping, popping sensation tear through her right leg and ankle. She felt no pain, but her foot felt loose, almost unhinged. She pushed herself up, keeping her right foot off the ground, and shifted herself to a sitting position. She scrunched up her eyes and brought her ankle around to take a look at it. A limp foot, dangling from her shin like a dead fish, was what she expected to see. Instead, she saw her boot flayed open, laces burst asunder from ankle to knee. A bright scar of cut leather ran from the outside of her ankle upward, then reappeared near the inside of the top.

It struck Kehrsyn what had happened: Pupface’s khopesh
had grazed her leather boot, slicing along the laces, cutting into them, but not quite all the way through. The added stress of her last jump had burst them. The surprise and relief was so great that a giggle bubbled up from her throat.

She heard a sudden scuffing step up the alley, then silence. Kehrsyn’s cold fear returned. She froze, trapped in the dead end of a narrow alley. She opened her mouth to aid her hearing—could she hear someone coming closer? It was hard to tell … until she heard the splash of a puddle being disturbed. She quietly picked up her rapier and bag and tried to scoot into an inset doorway to hide. As quiet as her movements were, she heard the footsteps pause.

For untold pounding heartbeats, she dared not move, dared not even to breathe lest the mist of her breath give her away.

The footsteps turned and scooted away. Kehrsyn held her breath until she heard them no longer, then let the air out in a heart-pounding, trembling heave. She tried to breathe deeply and quietly in hopes of stilling her heart and frazzled nerves. Whichever guard or bounty hunter that had been, her hunters were still out there, so she couldn’t leave just yet. Instead, she pulled out the longest scrap of leather thong she had left in her boot and used it to tie her boot tight across the ankle and again across the top. It was serviceable, if uncomfortable.

She hid for a while longer, then began to creep out, wondering if she could make an escape. She found that the alley she’d jumped into was a short branch off a minor paved street. Not good. She inched closer to the mouth of the alley, listening intently.

She heard boots pacing slowly along and voices quietly speaking a foreign tongue. She quickly moved back down the narrow passage to her scant hiding place, but as she pulled her rapier in beside her, the tip of her scabbard scraped on the stone doorframe.

She heard the voices pause. They spoke again, some sort of interrogative. She heard the whispering sound of steel being drawn, then the scuff of feet moving into the alley.

Kehrsyn pulled a tiny mirror from a secret pocket at her waist and used it to peer around the side of the doorway. Two black-tabarded swordsmen moved slowly down the alley, peering into windows, doorways, and barrels, as well as scanning the walls and ledges above them.

There was no way out. Kehrsyn hadn’t a clue what to do. She fingered her rapier … If I’m going to suffer for killing one of these bullies, she thought, I might as well actually do it. Deep inside, however, she wasn’t certain she could.

She watched them draw closer and saw that they were too cautious for her to be able to ambush one of them. Just as that realization crossed her mind, she saw something move at the open end of the alley. The guards turned just in time to see a cloaked figure vanish from sight behind them. They looked at each other, startled and confused, then somewhere nearby the keening cry of the guards’ whistle started again. The two sprinted from the alley to pursue, blowing their whistles in response.

Kehrsyn sagged against the wall and let herself drop to the ground. She didn’t care that the cold rain soaked its way through the seat of her skirt and into her leggings. Kehrsyn could hear the guards’ whistles moving farther and farther away through the city. She didn’t know who or what those Zhents had chased, but in all likelihood it had saved her virtue and her life. Not knowing what else to do, she reached around, found her pear still in her sash, and took it out. For some reason, it no longer looked appetizing, so she let her hand droop over her knee.

She hung her head and let silent tears of relief trickle off her nose and join the cold rain that slicked the grimy street.

R
uzzara stalked the rooftops, cursing the luck that had her chasing a reluctant recruit through near-freezing rain. The throbbing chill in her feet had not abated when she’d put her boots back on. In fact, the dampness of her feet had balled up the lint in her stockings, making them even less comfortable.

Her feet slid out from under her on the slanting rooftop, dropping her hard onto her left hip. Despite the fact that her legs slid most of the way off the rooftop, dangling over empty space, she appeared merely inconvenienced. She stood back up, muttering an inventive string of rural invectives and rubbing her hip.

Ruzzara had seen the confusion in Hooper’s Alley, seen how a premature whistle had sent the city guard, the deputized brute squad, and a hopeful bounty hunter all running in the wrong direction, chasing their own alarm like a stampede of maddened bulls.

She wasn’t sure how the young lass had done it, but it was very clever. In fact, Ruzzara hadn’t expected the young girl to do that well at all. She’d thought the guards would have long since taken care of the “murdering thief,” forever concealing Ruzzara’s role in the killing. Instead, she searched in the rain, trying to find the thief again.

Ruzzara wasn’t sure where the thief had holed up, but she figured circumnavigating the block on the rooftops would flush her out eventually. Ruzzara peered down into the alleys as she sauntered along, looking for motion or likely hiding places. She hoped she’d be able to find the vagrant, whose fear of Ruzzara’s power made her a useful tool and whose evident skill made her an effective weapon.

She found her, sitting on a stoop. Ruzzara smiled with relief, then her face darkened into a frown. The young lady was down on the ground, while Ruzzara was on top of the roof, three stories above.

She contemplated using her magic to spider climb down the wall, but her digits were only just starting to tingle with returning sensation. She had no desire to pull off her gloves and boots and press her numb hands and feet to the cold, wet stones yet again.

She had a better idea, more comfortable … and more dramatic, besides. She had long before purchased a ring—a magical circle of silver—that protected her from dangerous falls by floating her slowly to earth. She’d bought it for protection, a magical safety net, but it occurred to her to use it aggressively. She rocked it back and forth on her middle finger with her thumb. It was an unconscious habit. So much wealth tied up in one little object made her check its presence almost continually.

Ruzzara moved as quietly as possible along the rooftop until she was opposite the young thief who cried quietly in the alley. Fidgeting with the ring to reassure herself, she crouched down and let herself lean forward. As she felt herself start to fall, she pushed off the rooftop gently,
quietly. Just as her heart started to thrill with instinctive panic, her senses realized that she wasn’t accelerating; she was descending at the speed of a brisk walk. It was an unnerving sensation.

As she drifted downward, Ruzzara pinwheeled her arms once to right herself, then put her hands on her hips and assumed a cocky and arrogant stance. She landed with a light sound of crunching dirt not three feet in front of her quarry.

The young woman jerked her head up in fear, staring wide-eyed at the sorceress through a veil of haggard, damp hair. She gasped in recognition, and her mouth flapped in silent amazement.

“Well, at least I know you can stay silent,” said Ruzzara. The young woman glanced down the alley and back at her. “Oh, come on, hon, don’t look so shocked,” added Ruzzara. “You think the guild lets anyone in if they can’t sneak around?”

The young woman held up her hands placatingly, one hand spread wide and the other still ridiculously clutching her half-eaten pear. When the thief noticed that she still held the pear, she quickly hid that hand behind her.

She stammered a few faltering words, saying, “Please, I—please don’t—I mean, I’ll … just don’t call the guards, please …?”

“Give it a rest, will ya, hon?” said Ruzzara. “You think I want to call them guards back here to barge in on our little private time? No thanks. You know, you got a friend out there, hon, I’d say you do.”

“A friend?”

“I saw what happened. You done good, hon, moved like a regular alley cat, but I’d say Mask, God of Thieves, has a soft spot in his larcenous heart for little ol’ you.”

“What do you mean?”

“I sure wish I knew how you done did it, hon, I really do. I swear you were stewed like a rabbit, when all of a sudden
you got the whole gaggle of guards galloping off in the whole wrong direction. Showed up just a bit too late to see your trick, but that was slick, hon, real slick.”

The young woman’s lip trembled. “I—I don’t know what to say,” she said.

“Well, I’d say you passed the test, hon,” Ruzzara said with a smile. “You kept your head in a tough situation, moved nimbly and quickly, and managed to evade a fine ol’ dragnet of constables and Zhents alike.” She pulled the dead guard’s whistle from a pocket. “So are you gonna do our job for us, or shall I give this a little toot?”

“Please!” said the fugitive in a panic. She sagged visibly. “No, please don’t. I’ll … I’ll do it.”

“Aw, now don’t look so sad, hon,” Ruzzara continued. “Life is full of adventure, and every adventure begins with a single step!”

“I have found more often that what the bards call an ‘adventure’ begins with a single mistake.”

“Wow, hon, your outlook is as bleak as an eighty-year-old prostitute.”

“It’s not bleak,” said the young woman. “It’s realistic. The trick is knowing when to stop so you don’t make that mistake.”

“Whatever you say,” said Ruzzara. She paused and raised one eyebrow. “Are you trying to sneak your hand to that dagger you keep under your bag, hon? My associates wouldn’t take that very well,” she added, waving a hand vaguely in the direction of the street, or maybe the rooftops.

“Uh … no,” said the young woman, avoiding Ruzzara’s eyes.

“Excellent!” said Ruzzara, though her eyes were as cold as steel. “I’d hate to think you looked at me as a mistake to be unmade.” She studied her quarry and smiled. That was the best time to interrogate, when the last shred of hope had been taken away. “What’s your name, hon?”

“Kehrsyn.”

“Well, olaré, Kehrsyn. So where do you live?”

“I … don’t really have a … a place to stay. Anymore.” Kehrsyn’s voice was very soft.

“Well, Kehrsyn, I’d say maybe your luck is changing,” said Ruzzara. Once someone had no hope, it was best to be the first one who offered it.

Kehrsyn looked up, and Ruzzara saw a desperate sparkle return to the waif’s eyes. Kehrsyn stood, ending up a little taller than Ruzzara, which annoyed her. It was harder to be intimidating when looking up.

“You mean I can sleep in the guild house?” asked Kehrsyn, with just a shade of fear and hope.

Ruzzara laughed. She liked the hint of desperation in Kehrsyn’s voice. It was best to cultivate that by keeping the ray of hope to a glimmer.

“Aren’t you getting ahead of the horse there, hon? We gotta talk about the assignment.”

“Right,” said Kehrsyn, and Ruzzara was pleased to see that she was focusing her attention so she’d remember what she was about to be told.

Ruzzara turned so that she faced Kehrsyn squarely. She folded her arms to add gravity to her words.

“This merchant has somehow laid his grubby paws on an important item of great magical power,” she began.

“You want me to steal a magic item,” interrupted Kehrsyn, her lower eyelids trembling.

“No hook in your blade, is there? That’s right. It’s apparently pretty potent. Some daredevil grave robber done said that he dug up this magic staff while under hire from this here merchant. It must be right important if a merchant sends folks after it while the city is under siege, don’t you think? We think we can use that staff to protect our city against the pharaoh’s army, or mayhap even drive them back.”

“Drive them back?” asked Kehrsyn. “What does it do?”

“That’s not your concern,” said Ruzzara. “Leave that to those what can handle it. You just need to know what it looks like. It’s a wand one span shy of a cubit, the color of dried bone, and carved all over with those pictoglyph thingies. And there’s a wavy band of bronze all wrapped ’round the top, with a big piece of black amber in the top. We think this here merchant intends to sell it to the Zhentarim. They’ll take it up away to the north, for their own plans. Needless to say, that makes us as mad as a constipated goat, selling out our whole darn future for a few lousy shekae.”

“Sounds to me like it must be worth a mountain of gold,” said Kehrsyn.

“That’s beside the point, hon,” groaned Ruzzara. “Keep the big picture here. We’re talking saving Unther’s collective hide from the Mulhorandi army.”