Temple Hill - Drew Karpyshyn [35]
Lhasha preferred to freelance, but on occasion she would do work for hire, if the price was right, and this price was very, very right. An unsigned note left at the front desk of the Wyvern's Pipe had been forwarded to Fendel by the proprietor. Knowing she needed money, Fendel had passed the message on to her. Very short, very mysterious-just a number, a time and a place. Lhasha didn't like mysteries, but the number on the page was too high to ignore.
If she'd told Corin what was going on, he'd have no doubt objected to the meeting. He objected to everything, even her clothes. "They attract too much attention. They make you stick out in the crowd." But of course, that was the whole point.
She told him she was going out on a job. It wasn't really like lying to him… it was for his own good. Corin took his job seriously. A little too seriously, sometimes. He wasn't even drinking anymore-not a drop since she'd hired him. These past few tendays he spent all his free time mastering the few thieves' tricks she'd taught him, or practicing with his sword, honing and refining his already impressive skill with the blade. His dedication bordered on mania. That was why she hadn't mentioned this rendezvous. No sense getting him worked up. Besides, she didn't need her hired muscle looking over her shoulder all the time; she had enough sense of her own to avoid walking into a trap.
Lhasha gave a quick scan of the rest of the bar before deciding it was safe to meet her prospective employer. She slipped out of her chair in the shadows-almost seeming to materialize from the darkness-and approached the fat man sitting at the table across the room.
The man glanced up, and wiped the sweat from his shiny forehead with a silk handkerchief. Now that she was closer, Lhasha could see that his entire wardrobe was silk… bright red, gold, and yellow, with a splash of orange for effect; plus some permanent sweat stains under his armpits and around his collar. He looked like some kind of bloated butterfly.
Lhasha herself had a similar outfit, and she briefly wondered if she looked as ridiculous in her silks as he did in his. No, she quickly decided. She didn't. On her it looked good.
Most of all, she noticed his rings, if that was even an applicable term. Little more than huge hunks of gold, encrusted with a variety of oversized, ill cut gemstones. Calling them gaudy would have been a compliment. Haifa dozen bands of gleaming yellow, each completely devoid of any sense of style or taste, despite the obvious wealth that had been spent on the materials. Lhasha felt a brief touch of regret that so many beautiful gems had been condemned to an eternity encased in such ugly prisons of gold.
"Finally!" he said in an a voice as loud and overbearing as his dress and adornments. "I've been waiting a dragon's age."
A little taken aback by his lack of discretion, Lhasha apologized.
"I'm sorry… I didn't mean to keep you waiting."
The man waved his chubby hand in an imperial gesture of forgiveness, making the rings actually clunk against each other with a dull, heavy sound.
"No matter, you are here now. Fetch me some wine… if you have any that won't make a man of my station ill."
Lhasha couldn't help but smile a little at the mix-up as she took a seat.
"What are you doing?" the man protested, half rising from his chair. "How dare you presume to seat yourself at my table!"
Suddenly Lhasha wasn't smiling anymore. "Sit down and shut up, you blathering fool," she hissed. "I'm not the serving wench, I'm the person you're meeting!"
The man froze, half in his seat, half standing. "You? You're the best thief in Elversult?"
"I don't know if I'd go that far," Lhasha said modestly, "but I'm good. Very, very good. You were expecting someone else? A man perhaps?"
"No…" the man said slowly, lowering himself back into his seat. "Not a man, necessarily. Just someone more… imposing.