Stormlight - Ed Greenwood [60]
"There's a man on the stairs back there," Storm told him, "a servant, by his livery, who has his head-just his head-burnt away. He was carrying water buckets when it happened."
Their eyes met. Two mouths tightened into identical thin lines.
"Our murderer, it seems," Ergluth said softly, "has s-_"
"My lords!" The breathless shout came down the passage from a servant who coughed out smoke, "Lord Boldshield?"
"In here," Ergluth said sharply, turning to the door A man in the livery of the house ducked in through the door, a torch in his hand. "Sir," he panted. went to Storm and then darted away again. "There's something you must see. Pray come quickly!"
Ergluth wasted no time on questions, but gestured for the man to lead them; the folk in the room emptied out into the passage after him. They had shouldered through a doorway and started down the stairs when the Purple Dragon commander asked his first question
"Will we need our swords out?"
The man shook his head, and then turned on the landing below them to do it again. His face was grim. "Nay-too late for that."
He stopped at an open door where two Purple Dragons were standing guard, and gestured within. Storm and Ergluth looked at each other.
"The steward," the warrior told her. "Ilgreth Drimmer."
Something hard came into Storm's face, and she laid a hand on his arm. "I'd like to look at this alone for a breath or two, if you don't mind," she said quietly.
Ergluth shrugged. "It won't make any difference to him," he said wearily. "Go ahead." Then he laid a hand on her arm, and murmured in her ear, "Was he a Harper? Is that it?"
Storm whispered back, "No. I just… have to say farewell to this one."
Ergluth waved his hand at her to go forth and do so, and muttered to the armsmen coming up behind him, "This is getting as bloody as a battle."
Storm took the torch from the servant who'd fetched them, and stepped cautiously inside. Nothing seemed disturbed in the room but a wicker laundry-basket, fallen by the foot of the bed that Ilgreth Drimmer lay upon. A door at the back of the rooms was ajar, opening onto a narrow passage where the dim blue light of false dawn was just beginning to show at the windows.
The steward lay sprawled on his back on the bed, a dagger in his breast. His face was slack in death, but nowhere could Storm see the burns left by the consuming powers of the shapeshifter. Had someone else slain the man to settle old scores, trusting to the tumult of the other deaths to quell all hue and cry?
Storm looked at the steward's hands, and took on a single strand of hair from under his nails. A long hair-too long for most men. She bent over Ilgreth's face and wiped at his hp with a finger. The tip of her finger came away red. Lip-rouge.
A woman, then-or a shapechanger posing as a woman, to gain entry here unopposed, and get close to the man. She frowned-and then gasped in astonishment.
Where the steward's red robes had been pulled away from his throat and pinned thus by the dagger, his neck was exposed-and there, glinting up at her, was a silver harp.
Storm reached for it There was a sudden shout from the door. She looked up to see one of the guards staring past her at the other doorway. She whirled to lock there-but saw only empty passage.
Vaulting the bed, the pin in her fist, she sprinted to the door and looked both ways, silver hair swirling. The dark, narrow hall was empty.
She turned back into the bedchamber. "What was it?" she demanded. "Who was there?"
The armsman looked at Ergluth. who'd come into the room at the head of a crowd of Purple Dragons. The commander gave him a grim nod.
"A man in a cowled robe, Lady," he said, "with a staff in his hands and eyes like red flame."
"Anyone seen such a person hereabouts before?" Ergluth demanded. There was a general shaking of heads and negative mutterings. "Our shapechanger," he concluded.