Masquerades - Kate Novak [64]
Alias swallowed back a return of last night's grief. The audience reacted with an angry mutter, but their anger was not with the serious turn the troupe had suddenly taken; it was aimed at the Night Masks. Although human-halfling relationships were sometimes strained in Westgate, the general consensus was that only a coward would kill a halfling.
In the play, Alias's reaction was swift and sure. She yanked the Urdo puppet away from the remaining Night Mask and kicked the thief off the stage. The Night Mask lay still at the audience's feet. Dragonbait pulled out a miniature prison stocks, and Alias locked the Urdo puppet in it. The audience participated immediately, throwing scraps of food and rocks at the puppet and booing loudly.
The halfling rose from the stage and called out, "This collection's for the family of Maxwell Berrybuck. He's left behind a wife, a stout son, and two fine little girls." As the musicians played a dirge, the Night Mask actors yanked off their masks. All the actors took up the small kegs and plowed their way through the audience, collecting far more coin than Alias had ever seen any of Jamal's shows earn.
There was the trill of a watch whistle in the distance, and the entire acting troupe looked up. While Jamal might go toe-to-toe with the local authorities, her people obviously recognized the better part of valor. Wrapping themselves and their kegs of coin in their cloaks, they disappeared down one alley, the musicians down another. Although the actors had plenty of time, they made no effort to retrieve the food-spattered Urdo puppet, but left it sitting in the stocks.
Discretely, Alias stepped into the shadow of a building and looked down the street in the direction of the whistle. A phalanx of guards, headed not by Sergeant Rodney, but by the humorless, freckle-faced officer, bore down on the cafe. Of course, by the time they arrived, there was no one but innocent cafe customers picking at their chowder-soaked bread bowls and a puppet. The freckle-faced officer's reaction to the puppet locked in the stocks surprised the swordswoman. He pulled the puppet out and ordered one of his men to hide it beneath his cloak. The patrol then turned and marched back toward the Tower.
Alias gave them a friendly nod as they went marching past her, but they all kept their eyes locked forward and did not acknowledge her presence. She shook her head with disdain at their rigid attitude. Not wanting to arrive at the Tower on the heels of the patrol, Alias strolled more casually through the market.
The market was a rainbow of tents and stalls erected each dawn and removed, by order of the watch, before sunset. Here all the merchants of Westgate were out in full force, extolling the virtues of their wares and pressing them into view of all potential customers. Even merchants who had a shop in town kept a stall in the market to hawk their best items.
A bolt of shining yellow fabric caught Alias's eye, and she paused for a moment to finger the shimmering cloth.
A moment was all the stall's salesman needed to notice her interest and descend on her. He was a short young man in saffron robes and a long, long plait of hennaed hair. He had the most ridiculous patter about how silk from Kara-Tur was harvested from great purple worms herded by giants and spun into cloth with the aid of magic.
Alias had fought purple worms before and knew that the beast's tail was armed with a scorpionlike stinger, not spinnerets, but she knew better than to reply. She'd learned from Akabar that such fanciful tales were a common merchant's trick along the southern coast. If the potential buyer believed the tale, the product was enhanced. If not, any time spent arguing about the tale kept the buyer looking at the product, and, hopefully, increasing her desire to own it. Alias smiled wordlessly at the merchant and passed on. She could hear him tell another passerby how Mulhorand