Cormyr_ a novel - Ed Greenwood [192]
Azoun broke the locked gazes first. "We should take care of our 'ghosts.'"
The woman managed a small smile. "Indeed. It would not do for your scholar to return here to find us mooning about with brigands in the house."
Side by side, the pair ascended the porch steps of the old manor house. The front door was unlocked, and Azoun went in first.
The interior was fairly typical of a country house. A slender hall ran from front to back, dividing the ground floor in two. All the doors along the hallway were closed.
On the right would be the dining room, and behind that, a kitchen overlooking cooking pits behind the house. On the left would be a sitting room, parlor, or library. The bedchambers would be upstairs, reached by a narrow wooden flight of stairs. Azoun tried to imagine brigands getting the goat up the stairs. He shook his head. They must be hiding the livestock somewhere else.
The building was too quiet. Even if the livestock had been shoved in the basement, they would make some noise. There would be the soft sounds of their calls, or at least the slight shifting of floorboards as they moved about.
Kamara hung close behind him as he entered, and he could feel her soft, warm breath on the back of his neck.
Had the brigands taken the chickens and left? Mentally he figured the time it would take Vangerdahast to return to the main trail and bring the old couple back. More than enough time to get comfortable with a fellow seeker of adventure. And perhaps enough time to "let slip" one's true identity and reap the benefits of that admission.
Kamara shut the front door behind her as Azoun opened the door on the right. As he thought, it was the dining room, with another door beyond leading to the kitchen. The furnishings were sparse but of high quality, probably the salvageable remains of the original Goldfeather stock. A great table dominated the room, and the walls were covered with cabinets, all open, their contents spilled on the floor. In the center of the table, a box of silver flatware, another legacy of the Goldfeathers, was rudely overturned, the knives and forks carving fresh scratches in the deep polish.
The thieves came after chickens but did not stop for the more valuable silver, thought Azoun. Perhaps they were still in the building. He held his breath and looked at Kamara. She hung back from the dining room and was scanning along the hallway. Her muscles were tense, as if she expected an attack at any moment.
Azoun brushed past her and tried the door opposite, which should lead to a parlor or sitting room. The door was stuck, and the young prince had to shoulder it open. Something heavy and wet slid along the floor, pushed out of the way of the door, leaving a crimson streak on the floor behind it.
It was a goat. A dead goat in the sitting room, propped against the door. Azoun had found the missing livestock.
The sitting room had been turned into an abattoir, its old furnishings covered with blood, fur, and feathers. There were a trio of old goats, including the billy goat that partially blocked the door. Their throats had been torn out by crude daggers or teeth. The chickens, great black hens with crimson bellies, had their necks snapped and were strewn about the room. Some had been half eaten, but most had been slain and discarded in an orgy of slaughter. Feathers blotted the sticky pools of blood.
Azoun began to say something to Kamara, something about these invaders being more than mere brigands or even ghosts, when he heard her growl behind him.
He turned and realized what the supposed ghost had truly been. Brigands had never been inside the house. Someone else-something else-had created the bloody carnage in the sitting room.
Kamara growled as her shoulders slumped and narrowed, her jaw elongating into a fang-toothed muzzle. Her eyes went from jade coins to cat's eyes, as bright