Sword of the Gods - Bruce R. Cordell [13]
Chant turned to lock the the shop door, and for a moment, the splash of the water falling into the plaza fountain catchment was drowned out by the jangle of keys. They walked across the plaza, but Demascus paid no attention. He was utterly absorbed in what he held. The weave seemed finer than silk, but not slippery. It shimmered in the lamplight of the plaza, as if words might be hidden just beneath the surface.
A flicker of movement overhead was all the warning Demascus had. The next thing he knew, the scarf was torn from his grip.
“Thief!” yelled Chant, pointing.
A silver-skinned woman in a black mask spun up through the air, light as a cloud, receding. Demascus’s scarf made the pattern of the whirlwind as it swirled in her wake.
CHAPTER FOUR
AIRSPUR
THE YEAR OF THE AGELESS ONE (1479 DR)
RILTANA BOUNDED FROM WALL TO ROOFTOP, FROM FLOATING mote to suspension bridge, and from stone spire to empty air itself. The gossamer breeze swept her upward, all the way to her favorite look-over point on the northern cliff wall. The tempest in her soul called to the wind, and wind answered.
She laughed, and clutched her prize to her chest.
Finally, she had the damn scarf.
Her mark had looked as strange as he’d been described, with his skin nearly the color of chalk. His narrow face had looked at her with surprise so complete she laughed again.
She had not been told the man named Demascus was a member of the Firestorm Cabal. Usually the Cabal didn’t accept humans into their ranks, but her mark’s white hair showed that at the very least he wasn’t genasi. Cabal members had gulled most of Airspur with their crap about being noble vigilante defenders of the city. What a joke. She, at least, was wise to their lies.
And now one liar was light one scarf. She studied the length of fabric, wondering at its significance.
Riltana’s client, a hooded fellow with carrion breath, had specified to the hour when she could expect to see the white-haired man leave the pawnshop. Quite a prediction to make, considering it had been made about four years ago.
She’d sniggered when her client had first laid out the timeline for the job, thinking it was a joke. In response, the hooded man hissed. Apparently he wasn’t someone who made jokes.
Riltana had asked why, if Demascus was to pick up the scarf in the pawnshop, she couldn’t just go into the shop right then and steal it; why wait? Her client hissed again, louder and with more resonance than before. Not really the best explanation, but she’d decided not to press the issue.
Four years was a long time for even the best divination to go awry, but she’d been happy to accept the generous retainer. It provided a sum of coins large enough to ensure the lease on her loft for three full years plus change.
And today she’d shown up several hours before the specified time, crouching over the shop to await the appointed hour. The promised payoff had been too sweet to not see the commission through to the end.
Excitement tingled through her when she’d recognized her mark in the dingy courtyard. She’d had a moment of worry when drunks from the pub had intruded. She’d almost intervened then, but in the end she hadn’t had to. She watched him enter the shop following the fat human.
When he’d exited, he’d produced an appropriately shocked expression when she’d plucked the pale length from his hands. Shocked, and a little sad.
She smiled down on the wrap in her hands, then sniffed it; it smelled like parchment and library glue. Its knit was fine, but pliable. Probably woven with enchantment. Of what sort? She twisted the scarf and gently pulled at its length. Probably it contained a minor glamor that protected its wearer from cold, as was fashionable among the well-to-do. Whatever its nature, the thing was valuable to her client, which made it valuable to her.
To claim her payoff, she was to rendezvous with the hooded man just after midnight at the Sepulcher.
Once the Sepulcher had been the lair of goblins and orcs, before they were driven out by genasi settlers.