Elminster_ The Making of a Mage - Ed Greenwood [63]
This sudden movement sent him skidding on a fragment broken off the statue, and he sat down hard, jarring a portrait down off the wall. Roaruld Trumpettower, Scourge of Stirges-depicted holding a glass of blood aloft in one hand and a wrung-out, limp-winged stirge in the other-landed with a crash that shook the room, hopped forward as the frame shivered, and smashed down atop the thief. The stag spun away again, still growing smaller.
Nanue sobbed at the overpowering smell as she wallowed in glass shards and spilled perfume; she was drenched with half a hundred secret oils and glowing daubs, and the tiles were so slippery she couldn't find footing. At length, weeping with frustration-and at the smell-she started to crawl toward the nearest rug. It was the one Elminster had recently decorated. Nanue recoiled from it, selected another as her goal, and crawled in that direction, weeping with fresh energy.
Elminster shook his head in disbelief at the scene of devastation in the room, caught hold of the rope, and was gone into the night. Behind him there was a sharp tearing sound as a gloved hand holding a dagger punched up through the heart of Roaruld Trumpettower, cutting a hole in the massive portrait so that its masked Moonclaws owner could emerge and look wildly around the room for-there!
The stag lay in a serene pool of moonlight near the bed, starred now with many cracks. The thief hastened to scoop it up. "Mine at last!"
"Nay," responded a cold voice from the window. " 'Tis mine!"
A dagger was flung, but missed, coming to quivering rest in a wooden wall-carving with a solid thunk.
The first thief sneered as he scooped up the stag-then, realizing the other Moonclaws man couldn't see his expression through the mask, made a rude gesture with the statue. The second thief snarled in rage and threw another dagger. It flashed across the room and passed just in front of Nanue's nose. The crawling bride hastily changed course again, scuttling back across the tiles toward safety behind the lounge.
The thief with the statue strode toward the window. "Keep back!" he warned, waving his dagger.
The second thief scooped up one of the fallen gem-coffers and calmly flung it at the head of the first thief. It hit home and burst open, spilling a glistening rain of gems to the floor. The first thief joined them in the general cascade, the stag flying up from his hand.
End over end it spun through the air-toward the window.
"No!" The second thief lunged desperately after it, slipping and sliding on the bouncing gems. His gloved hands stretched, reaching, reaching-and into the very tips of his straining fingers the proud stag fell.
He clung to it in gloating triumph, skidding across the floor with the momentum of his desperate run. "Hah! I have it! My precious! Oh, my precious stag!"
And then the gems under his boots slid him hard into the low windowsill, and he kicked helplessly, toppled, and with a shriek fell out into the night, wailing, and was gone.
Nanue saw the thief disappear, shivered, and came carefully to her feet, turning again toward the door. She must get out-
Another pair of thieves in black leathers swung in through the windows. "Oh, dungheaps!" Nanue wailed, and started yet another desperate dash for the door.
The thieves looked around at the wreckage and carnage and swore horribly. One bounded forward into the room, swept up the masked woman from the bed, threw her over his shoulder, and made straight for the window again. The other sprinted down the room after Nanue to snatch her for a ransom.
She screamed, and was slipping on rugs, trying not to crash into the door in her haste and fall on the crumpled Peeryst, when something heavy hit the door from the other