Stormlight - Ed Greenwood [23]
Storm raised her goblet to Pheirauze in salute, added a merry smile and a nod. Then she glanced toward the war wizards. They seemed to have forgotten their guest for the moment. With heat and scornful disputation, they discussed the legendary and recent hauntings of Firefall Keep.
"Any fool-save perhaps yourself, Hundarr-knows phantoms can't carry or disturb swords and coins and such! If things were stolen or shifted about, we're talking some other sort of undead!"
"Well Sir Exalted Expert, what sort?"
"Gods take you, Hund-"
"Goodsirs!" Erlandar said firmly. "Entertaining though this may be-and I'm not one to miss a chance to hear a mage make a fool of himself-I've heard about enough nonsense for one night! I doubt our guest appreciates knowing what fearsome thing lurks in the Haunted Tower! It's enough to know that something fell and sinister is there-something that slew young Athlan, pride of the Summerstars. Keeping out of the Haunted Tower is the best policy for us all to follow. He swung his head to deliver a cold, heavy glare across the table, and added, "Even clever and beautiful Harpers."
Storm laughed lightly."Another of your challenges, Lord Summerstar? They come so thick and fast-almost like the courting comments of an ardent man!"
Erlandar Summerstar grinned slowly. "Aye so they do… strange the similarities, eh?"
Storm smiled back at him, but let her eyes show true feelings. If she'd thought to leave just a little of that soup, she could have kissed the man and passed the poison on to him…
Erlandar winked at her, and then leered again. No, Storm thought, poison was too gentle. It had to be a sword-deftly wielded, to make his end slow and painful…
Erlandar winked again. Well, Storm thought, painful at any rate…
*****
Renglar Baerest, seneschal of Firefall Keep, stood in the courtyard of the fortress he had come to love, facing a silently floating strongchest. It belonged to a woman who might well be able to shatter the keep and hurl it down stone by stone until only windblown dust was left. Seneschal or not, he might well be making a terrible mistake-but he had to be sure.
Swallowing, Renglar took a step forward and laid a firm hand on the side of the chest. It promptly and silently sank to a gentle grounding on the cobbles, and opened itself. The seneschal stared down at the satchels, coffers, duffels, and trunks crammed into it He sighed and began carefully lifting them out and placing them on the blanket-padded service carts brought. It was a long way to the quarters he'd chosen for the most distinguished-and dangerous-guest to visit the keep during his tenure, but this was one job he was going to do alone.
He'd have insisted on that even if any of the servants had dared to help him.
*****
"We call it brittle tart," Lady Margort Summerstar said stiffly. "And serve it with dry wine at the end of most high meals." She pause for a moment, and then asked coldly, "You have dessert in-oh, wherever is it again, dear?"
"Shadowdale." her sister said with a sneer, rubies glittering as she leaned sideways to speak by Margort's ear.
"Ah, yes, thank you, Nalanna," Margort continued. "You do have desserts in Shadowdale, don't you?"
"Once or twice a year," Storm said solemnly, "when dragging the plows around all day and whipping ourselves to go faster leaves us enough energy to eat an extra course. Then we enjoy crushed apples, or sometimes just handfuls of sugar. We're too poor and backward to have oxen, you see."
"Ah," the Lady Nalanna Summerstar said in tones of satisfaction. "I thought so."
"Lady Silverhand," the Dowager Lady Pheirauze said coldly, "stop toying with my kinswomen. I expect better behavior from my guests."
Storm raised her brows as she set the last bones of her roast boar aside. It had been delicious-poisoned again, but delicious. "They do