Realms of the Underdark - J. Robert King [55]
It was the turn for Durnan's eyebrows to rise. "Slave-trading, Mirt?"
The fat moneylender gave him a disgusted look, and turned to start the long trudge back up the alley. "Ye know me better than that," he rumbled. "Slaving's work for those who've no scruples, less sense, and too much wealth. Nobles, for instance."
Durnan groaned. "Let's not start that one again. We rooted out all we could find, and Khel set spy spells… there'll always be a few dabblers, no doubt, but nothing we can't handle-"
Lightning roared across the ruins to split the stones at his feet.
"Oh? Care to try to handle me, tavernmaster?" The voice echoed and rolled around them, made louder by magic: the taunting voice of an arrogant young woman of culture and breeding.
The three lords looked up whence the lightning had come and saw a lone figure standing on the catwalk where Asper had inspected a line of washing not so long ago: a slim, haughty figure in a dark green cloak whose folds showed the shape of a long sword beneath it. The uppermost part of the figure was all flashing eyes and curling auburn hair, piled high around graceful shoulders.
"Young Nythyx," Mirt roared, "Come down from there!"
In reply, two gloved hands parted the cloak from within to reveal the glowing, deadly things they bore: Netherese blast scepters, crackling with simmering lightning. "Come up and get me, 'fat man," Nythyx Thunderstaff sneered. "I don't take orders from drunken old commoners."
Durnan looked up at her, eyes narrowed. "You're a slaver, then?" He strode calmly toward the mouth of the alley, and after a moment Mirt and Asper followed.
The scepters were leveled at them, and the young woman who held them shrugged and said almost defiantly, "Yes."
Durnan kept on walking, but shook his head in smiling disbelief. "You've never shackled men, or dragged ores out of carry cages. If you tried, they'd toss you around like a child's ball!"
Lighting stabbed at him, in wordless, deadly reply.
An unclad woman whose hair and eyes shared the color of leaping flame leaned out of a window at the mouth of the alley and stiffened. "Blast scepters!" she hissed.
As her eyes blazed even brighter, she flowed forward out of the window. Her lower body was human to the hips, but from there down it was the scaled, sinuous bulk of a serpent. She slithered along the wall, drawing herself upright, and raised her hands to weave a spell.
A dark, chill hand caught at her shoulder.
She spun about, hands growing talons with lightning speed. "Who-?"
"I am sometimes called Halaster Blackcloak," the wall told her. A cowled face melted out of its stones to join the arm that held her. Flame-red eyes met dark ones, and after a moment Transtra shivered and looked away. The hand released its hold on her, and Halaster's voice was almost kindly as he added, "They'll be fine. Watch. Just watch."
Lightning spat down at the tavernmaster, slashing aside lanterns and washing. Durnan calmly leapt aside, rolled to his feet, and resumed his steady walk a dozen paces ahead and to the left of where he'd been walking.
He looked up through smoking rags and swaying ropes and remarked, "Ah. You cook every slave who says something you don't like, eh? This may be one reason why we've never heard of your stellar slaving career."
Lighting cracked again. In its wake the young noblewoman shrieked, "Don't you dare mock me, tavern-master! My master would have killed you, all of you, if it hadn't been for that-that snake-thing! You're very lucky to be alive to toss smart words my way right now!"
"Ye really should practice with that toy," Mirt growled, waggling one large and hairy finger her way, "if ye harbor any fond hopes of ever hitting someone with it."
At his shoulder, Asper frowned. "You served… the beholder?" she asked the woman aloft.
They were close enough now to clearly see Nythyx Thunderstaff's slim lips draw into a tight line. The young noblewoman stared down at them, pale and trembling with rage, and said, "Yes. With Xuzoun, I wielded power and influence. Great lords