Darkspell - Katharine Kerr [138]
“He doesn’t have it,” Sarcyn thought to him.
“I was afraid of that.” Even Alastyr’s thoughts sounded weary. “Well, I’ll have to force the spirits to scry it out. If the lass has it, you’ll have to go back into town.”
“Just so. I won’t be able to reach it tonight.”
“Of course not. Tomorrow will do.”
Alastyr’s image vanished. Sarcyn started to rise, then saw, just for the briefest of moments, another face staring out of the flames—a dark face, narrow-eyed. With an oath he scrambled up, dodging away from the fire before the eyes could see where he was sheltering.
Jill and Ogwern stayed at the Red Dragon through the evening meal. While he worked his way through a huge bowl of stew, Jill picked at her food and considered contacting the town wardens. Yet what could she do? Go running to the gwerbret with chatter about cursed gems and evil dweomermen? Blaen would probably have her arrested for public drunkenness if she tried. After they ate, Jill and Bocc fetched her gear from the Running Fox, then went to Ogwern’s lodgings, a pair of small rooms above the inn. In one was a bed; in the other, a wooden chest, a small table, and two benches. Jill dropped her bedroll on the floor and sat upon it, but Ogwern paced about, lighting tin candle lanterns, waddling over to the window to peer out the crack between the shutters, then waddling back to the hearth with a heavy sigh.
“Oh, come now,” Jill said at last. “Do you think our nasty friend is going to drop out of thin air into the middle of your bed?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me in the least.” Ogwern lowered his bulk to a bench with one last sigh. “I’m very upset. If I liked this sort of thing, I’d have been a silver dagger myself.”
“It might have kept you leaner.”
“Kindly don’t be rude. A man can only take so many insults. Sausages, indeed! The gall of—” He paused, listening.
Someone was coming up the stairs with a heavy tread. Jill loosened her sword in her scabbard as she got up. The someone pounded on the door, paused, then pounded again.
“I know you’re in there.” It was a different voice from what they’d been expecting. “Come along, my good man. Open it. It could profit you.”
Jill and Ogwern exchanged a puzzled glance.
“Who are you?” Ogwern snapped. “What do you want?”
“Just to talk with you—on a matter of business.”
With a shrug Ogwern unbarred the door and opened it a bare crack. Jill heard a grunt as their visitor smashed into it and shoved the enormous innkeep out of his way, then slipped in and slammed the door behind him. He was a tall man but slender, and his dark eyes seemed strangely merry. He smiled, too, a flick of full lips in his swarthy face. He wore an ordinary sort of shirt over his brigga, and it seemed he carried no weapons—but something about the way he stood, his hands half-raised to either side of his waist, made Jill suspect he was well-enough armed under the cloth. She stepped back, half-hidden by shadow, to keep a better watch on his hands.
“You’re a long way from Bardek, my good sir,” Ogwern said.
“I am, at that. I’m looking for a particular gem.”
Ogwern groaned and waved both hands in the air.
“You and half the men in the kingdom, or so it seems. That beastly opal, I suppose you mean.”
“Just that. So you’ve been approached?”
“What’s it to you, good sir?”
The fellow laughed—more of a giggle, really—and flicked one hand. All at once he was holding a long knife with a thin blade, fashioned with a pair of curves in it, so that pulling it out of a wound would cause more damage than the original stick. Ogwern gulped and took a step back.
“There’s been no sign of the opal, none.”
“I don’t believe you.”
Ogwern squeaked and glanced Jill’s way. The stranger looked right at her, then shrugged, utterly ignoring the fact that she was armed. For a moment Jill stood frozen by sheer disbelief, but the stranger took a step toward Ogwern and grabbed for his shirt, his knife at the ready. Jill drew, dropping to a fighting crouch.
“Ogwern! Call the town watch!”
Jill swung up, a flick of her wrist meant to slap