The Dream Spheres - Elaine Cunningham [104]
When the women had changed places, Isabeau slipped down the stairs to the alley, and the carriage waiting beyond.
The cot sank dangerously low as the young Harper sat on the edge. She hummed idly to herself to pass the time until the tavern closed and the streets grew dark enough for her to hold her guise as she slipped off.
Again the stairs creaked, this time with more protest. Cynthia rose and crept to the door. She stood with feet braced as the portal began to swing slowly open.
Lilly saw the creature first, and she knew it from the enormous clawed feet. She threw her will and strength into a futile effort at screaming a warning.
The silence was broken, not by her voice, but by the sudden scuttle of tren footsteps. The creature darted forward, pivoted, then grunted with the effort of a single, massive blow.
There was no time to scream, even if Lilly had been able to. The Harper hit the floor hard. Lilly's eyes widened in horror as Cynthia's lifeblood spilled out into a spreading pool. The red stain reached out toward her in wide rivulets. To the terrified girl, it looked like tattling fingers pointing the way to her hiding place.
Even so, she was startled when a large green hand thrust under the cot and seized a handful of her skirts. The creature dragged her out with a single tug, then jerked her onto her feet.
In some mist-veiled corner of her mind, Lilly realized that she could stand on her own. The poison Isabeau had administered was beginning to wear off. Her terrible fear, however, was nearly as immobilizing. She stood frozen like a mouse facing a raptor, staring with a wide, dry, unblinking gaze into the fanged smile of a tren.
"You have some very interesting dreams," observed the creature in a musical voice. "It is almost a shame to end them. However, it is necessary, you see. A step toward an end I highly desire. As is this."
The tren held up a bit of parchment. It was the note Isabeau had stolen from the bearded man. On it was written the details of the air caravan's route. A signature had been added to the page. The name was that of her secret love. "They will find you, and they will know what you did. Of course, they will blame your gallant lover. He will pay for every loss, every death. And your family, of course. Oh, yes, the Thann family will pay as well."
Lilly shook her head, a tiny movement of anguished denial. Her secret love had had nothing to do with this! She was the thief, not he! Never, never had she intended anyone to die!
Even as she tried to shape air into protest, the creature before her began to change. The thick body became longer and more slender, the features sharp.
Lilly remembered what she knew of Isabeau Thione, and she thought she understood what manner of foe the woman had fled. Isabeau had stolen her escape, though, and had left her to face this handsome monster.
The deadly visitor smiled, as if somehow pleased that she understood his true nature and his intention. Then his smile widened horribly and his face elongated into a reptilian snout. Scales erupted on his face, and an anticipatory string of drool dripped from the false tren's fangs. He lifted claws already stained with Cynthia's blood, and hooked them with slow, tantalizing deliberation. There was malicious pleasure in his eyes. He intended to feed on her terror as surely as a real tren would have fed upon her flesh.
Lilly would not close her eyes. A noble's life might have been denied her, but the manner of her death she could choose.
She fought the immobilizing poison with all the strength and heart and will she