“Of course,” I lied.
“You could tell me anything.”
The cloud shaped like a sausage dissipated. “Perish the thought. What’s keeping those
greenshanks? Can you see what they’re doing?”
The sorcerer rolled his eyes and cozied up to the hole in the wall. “The sergeant with the oiled
beard is talking to the big breasted wench by the gates. Her brat’s a lucky cove. I wouldn’t mind
suckling on those big, leaky tits. The greenshanks are dismounting. The sergeant has a perky arse.”
“Keep your mind on the job, sorcerer.”
“I always do, dearie but it don’t hurt to admire the local talent now does it? The stable lad is holding
the horses at the gate, so it doesn’t look like they’re planning on spending too long scouring the
scene of the crime.”
“Good. Is that thing ready?”
“Almost.” The sorcerer put his back to the wall and breathed on the dust in his hand. The bloody
sigil glowed, and the pile of coffin dust swirled in his palm. Animated by his magic and the magic in
the sigil, the powder coalesced into the shape of a lizard made of shifting sand and the sorcerer’s
breath. Sweaty raised his hand, and the homunculus scuttled through the hole in the parapet. I
couldn’t see it, but I could hear its tiny claws scraping on the stone as it worked its way down the
wall to the window, where my rope dangled from the hook I’d embedded in the sill. Stefan let his
head rest against the wall. His eyes were now shallow pits of swirling sand. Down below, the
guards’ voices and iron-shod boots echoed in the marble atrium.
“Rublis is back,” Sweaty whispered, his senses now augmented by those of the homunculus
confirmed what I’d heard a few seconds earlier. “The servants are talking to him.”
“Probably telling him that some dastardly curs have tried to rob him while he was enjoying a spot
of hunting.”
Sweaty nodded. “Aye, probably. Hedon’t look happy that’s for sure. Well, I didn’t know that.” He sat
up.
“What? What didn’t you know?” I asked and tapped him on the head to remind him to keep down.
“He’s got a bald spot. He must wear a hairpiece when he’s in Valen. Fancy that. Right, he’s riding to
the door, jumping off his horse. He looks really fucking angry.”
I nodded. “That’s good. We want him off balance.”
We waited in silence for about half an hour while the Senator roundly berated his staff. After
venting his spleen, he stormed into his study which was directly below us and right where we
wanted him to be. A trickle of sand ran from the corner of Sweaty’s eye as he stifled a treacherous
sneeze. His skin was dusty, and his lips were cracked as though he hadn’t had a drink in a month.
I couldn’t bear the wait,but I didn’t want to stick my head above the parapet, so I poked the
sorcerer who started at my touch. “What’s he doing?”
“He’s taking his cloak off. Now he’s picking his nose. Urgh. That’s disgusting.”
“What?”
“He ate it.”
“That’s humans for you. Come on Sweaty, keep talking.”
“He’s pacing, scratching his arse. Aha. I knew it.”
“He’s gone for the safe?”
“No, he’s putting on a wig.”
“For fuck’s sake. Why hasn’t he gone to the safe? You’d think he’d want to check his most valuable
possessions.” Patience was not a virtue I possessed. All the pieces were in place. All he had to do
was show us where his fucking safe was, so I could rob it and go home.
“Hey, what if it isn’t in his study?”
“It has to be.” It bloody had to be. I couldn’t bear the thought that we’d done all this for nothing, or that I’d have to go back and tell Mother we’d failed. “That sellspell was very specific.” I
remembered the day the pale-haired, black-eyed sorcerer had come to Mother, bartering her
information for a bag of powdered dragon bone. She’d told her that Rublis mentioned that the safe
was in the study, the room upon which he’d hired her to cast some wards. According to the
sellspell he was a tight-fisted cuss and had told her that he didn’t want a glamour casting on the
safe itself because it was well hidden. Mother had seemed satisfied and handed over the bag of
powdered bone, but not before explaining in explicit detail what she would do to the sel spell if her
information proved false or inaccurate. “Trust me, Stefan, it’s in the study.” Sweet Salvation, please
let it be in the study.
“If you say so. I wouldn't trust Gizla Milkmane as far as I could throw her. Anyway, shh. I can hear
footsteps.”
“I know, below us, I can hear them too.”
A door creaked open. “Ah. At last.” Someone said. My money was on it being the senator. “Did you
find anything?”
“No, Senator, the thief is long gone.”
Sweaty Stefan and I grinned at each other as we crouched a few feet above their heads.
“Wel , what are you going to do about it…?”
“Malpus, my lord. Sergeant Malpus.”
“Sergeant?”
“Aye, sir. Sergeant Regnal Malpus.” There was the sharp crack of a heel click.
“I don’t care what your fucking name is,” the senator snapped. “I don’t want to speak to some
provincial greenshanks. Where’s your commanding officer? I need someone here with rank.”
“He had to go to Valen, sir on important Imperial Guard business. However, this woman says she
was a witness to the failed robbery.”
“That’s right. I saw it, Senator,” said a woman in a trembling voice.
“Don’t just stand there sniveling. What did you see Decima? Come on girl, spit it out.” I had no love
for any mark, but this Rublis fellow sounded like a prick of the highest order.
“Well, sir, I’d just told Nuni to prepare your bath because I know they didn’t have it ready for you
when you got back yesterday and—”
“Sweet Salvation!” Rublis was growing angrier by the minute. “Get on with it woman. The thieving
bastard will be halfway to Shen by now.”
“I was passing the study door when I heard the sound of something scraping against the
window—”
“The windows aren’t warded?” Malpus jumped upon the possible clue like a dog on a rat.
“Of course they’re warded. Do you think me a country squire who must rely upon locks and bars?
My wards are very specific, very expensive. They don’t go off at a tap from a nosy crow, they don’t
go off if my staff or I open them.”
“I was just asking.” The greenshanks sounded deflated.
“Don’t. Go on Decima and hurry up. I want that bastard caught and skinned.”
Stefan leaned close to me. “They say lizard skin makes excellent scroll cases.”
“Whereas your ballbag will make a wonderful coin purse if you don’t stop calling me ‘lizard’.”
“I didn’t call you ‘lizard’, I merely commented on the quality of lizard skin.”
I gave him the side-eye.
Below, Decima blew her nose and continued. “I unlocked the door, and there it was, staring in at
me.”
“What did it look like?” the sergeant asked.
“Its eyes were a sulfurous yellow, it had scales, wicked fangs, long, spiky hair, and huge claws. Oh,
those eyes. I’ll never forget them.” She began to sob.
I held up my hands. As claws went, minewere quite modest.
Sweaty
chuckled, shedding a fine mist of dust from his clouded eyes. “She’s had to sit down. The
poor thing’s gone faint at the recollection of your ugly mug.”
“So, it was a warspawn?” The sergeant asked. “A thoasa maybe?”
“I don’t think so. It didn’t have a tail.”
“You sure? Only it sounds like a thoasa.” Malpus was growing impatient, andRublis muttered in the
background. There was the clink of glass, and the smel of brandy blossomed in the air.
Decima was not to be cowed. “I’ll never forget what that thing looked like so long as I live. It did
not have a tail. It wasn’t a thoasa.”
“Right, got it, not a thoasa. No tail.” It sounded like he was taking notes. “How tall was this mystery
creature? What, if anything, was it wearing?” Malpus couldn’t keep his bored contempt for the
witness and her evidence from his voice, his ire no doubt exacerbated by Rublis’ disparaging
comments about provincial greenshanks.
“Pale peach?” The sergeant echoed.
“Yes. Pale, sort of pinky peach.”
“Like skin color?”
“Like your skin color perhaps. I would say that I’m more olive than pink.”
“Olives are green but have it your way. What did it do when it saw you?”
“I shouted at it, told it to get off or else. It fel to the ground and ran across the gardens.”
“Which way did it go?”
“North, into the trees.”
In point of fact, I’d had to knock on the window until the deaf cull noticed me, whereupon she
didn’t shout, she screamed. I then dropped to the ground and loped slowly across the garden so
that she could see which way I’d gone and report it. I’d then raced through the trees, looped
around behind the manor, and climbed onto the roof where Sweaty was waiting, quietly laughing
as the housekeeper raised the alarm. Unlike me, the sorcerer had it easy. He didn’t have to run or
climb, he just cast an apportation spell and transported his carcass onto the roof.
“North, forest. Right then. We’ll go and take a look.” The sergeant sounded far from overjoyed at
the prospect. I guessed that as soon as they were out of sight, they’d do what I would have done
and head to the nearest inn for the afternoon. Senator Rublis had other ideas.
“Take a look?” The Senator’s tone was frosty.
“As in, we shall not rest until we find the thief, Senator.” The sergeant made more of an effort to
sound enthusiastic, but it was too little too late.
“Damn right you won’t. I have the ear of Imperial Consul Soldus. You will take the road to Alselm
through the forest. I’ll take my retinue east to Brogundel. You will meet me there inthree hours.
And if you know what’s good for you, Sergeant you will have apprehended the miscreant who
tried to break into my home.”
“He’s pacing, hands behind his back.”Sweaty’s voice was a dry rasp now as the homunculus spell
took its toll. “He must think he’s back in the Senate, orating.” The hand gesture Sweaty made had
nothing to do with public speaking.
“This is why we need legislation.” The Senator continued. “Warspawndon’t belong in civilized
society. Their place is on the battlefield, not roaming amongst decent people.”
“No indeed, Senator.” The sergeant’s words were followed by the ring of steel on steel that marked
a chest-beating salute. It was followed by the sound of footsteps retreating into the bel y of the
manor.
“Stop crying,Decima,” Rublis commanded. “Tell Breck to saddle fresh horses. We’l ride at once
before the trail gets cold. I don’t trust those green-clad imbeciles to do anything more productive
than get lost in the woods.”
He would find a trail, albeit one which was as cold as a week-old corpse having been laid by me on
the way to the Senator’s retreat earlier that day. It would keep him and his retinue busy and out of
the house long enough for us to get the job done. Of course, if he didn’t show us where his fucking
safe was located the job might not get done at all.
“Decima Leaky Tits has left,” said the sorcerer. “Shit. The Senator’s leaving too.”
I bit down on a curse when Sweaty sighed with relief. “Ah. Forget that, he’s just closed the door and
locked it.”
I waited for Stefan to continue but he didn’t so I poked him in the ribs. “What’s he doing? Come on
Sweaty, what’s he up to?”
“He’s tugging his old man, all right? And stop calling me Sweaty.”
“Really?”
“Yes. I don’t like it. I can’t help having a perspiration problem. There was this duel you see. I was
forced beyond the Paradox of Power and have had this problem ever since. I just can’t seem to get
rid of it.”
“No. Not that. I mean is he polishing his staff?”
“Of course not. He’s just standing in the middle of the room, drinking brandy and grimacing. Now
he’s going over to the desk.” It was odd watching Sweaty staring into space with his dust-filled eyes.
“There looks to be a catch on the front. I think it's in the center of the second flower in the carved
claws of the homunculus as it attempted to get a better look. “Aha. Got you, you lovely bastard. The
safe’s in the desk, under the blotter. Don’t know why it's not in a wall. What if there’s a fire?
Anyway, we’ve got it.” He grinned. “I told you I was worth the gold.”
“All you’ve done is sit on your arse.”
“Come on, admit it. You’d never have looked there.”
“Yes, I would.” He was right, I would have torn every brick out of the wall and ripped up every
floorboard, before searching the desk. I wasn’t going to admit that though. Sweaty summoned the
beast back to his hand where it curled up and once again became a pile of dust. Exhausted, he lay
back against the roof and closed his clouded eyes.
***
While I waited for Sweaty to recover his strength, Rublis and his grooms rode out. The household
quietened. The suns began to set, and shadows lengthened. Wood smoke mingled with the smell of
bread and meat as evening meals were prepared. Lights pearled in windows, shutters were closed,
and I got ready to do what I do best.
I cracked my knuckles and prepared to lift the first tile from the roof. This was the moment that I’d
find out if Mother’s information was worth a bag of powdered dragon bone. Sweaty watched
anxiously, his eyes had returned to their usual, bloodshot brown.
“Go on,” he urged. I wedged my claws under the tile, half expecting an alarm to ring out and shatter
the bucolic peace. According to the disgruntled sorcerer,Rublis had only paid for the door and the
window of his study to be warded,and even then, he’d withheld a portion of the sorcerer’s fee on
some apparently unjustified pretext.
I lifted the tile. Nothing happened. Sweaty exhaled as relieved as I was. I drew my knife, reached
down through the rafters, and began to saw through the plaster-covered ceiling board. It rained
paintwork onto the patterned carpet, but no alarms sounded. After I’d finished cutting a me-sized
piece out of the ceiling, I carefully removed the board and handed it to Sweaty. “Don’t say I never
give you anything.”
“You’re too generous.”
I sheathed my blade, squeezed between the rafters, and dropped onto the carpet. Many lovely
shiny things caught my eye, andI was momentarily blinded by glitter and greed. As I was fond of
my head being attached to my shoulders, I ignored the chink and found the catch in the flower and
pressed it. There was a satisfying click, and then unexpectedly, the button yielded a fraction more.
Being half thoasa my body has a mind of its own when it comes to self-preservation, and I was
already twisting sideways as the dart flew past my thigh and embedded itself in the door with a
solid thunk. “Who puts a poison dart in a desk?”
Sweaty’s leering face appeared through the hole in the roof. “It’s irresponsible if you ask me.”
“I agree, Stefan. Very irresponsible.” While we talked, I traced the seam of the secret compartment
under the blotter with the tip of a claw. I found the catch and levered it open. Inside was a pile of
official-looking documents and the bone scroll case that Mother had described in exacting detail. I
tucked the case into my doublet and replaced the blotter. In my extensive experience on the rob, I’d
learned that if you tidied up after a job, it could take a while for a cull to even notice they’d been
done over.
With that in mind, I swept the plaster flakes under the carpet and pulled the dart out of the door before hauling myself back onto the roof with no one in the house any the wiser. The evening was
settling in now, beginning to layer the land in shades of soft purple and dusky blue. My capricious
friend the moon was doing us a kindness and remained discretely hidden behind a bank of cloud.
“Gimme that.” I pointed at the neat rectangle of plaster ceiling. Sweaty handed it back. I set it at a
slight angle in the hole from which it had been cut. There were gaps, and the pattern would be off,
but only if you looked up, and very few people ever look up. I’d wager that the Senator wouldn’t
even know he’d been burgled until he opened the secret compartment again, by which time we’d
be back at the Guild’s headquarters enjoying a frothy mug or two of ale. I re-laid the tile. “Sweet as.”
“Let me see the case.” Sweaty asked. I handed it over. He turned it in his hand, checked the seal and
smiled his amber smile. “Nice work. I’ll see you back at The Mouse’s Nest.”