The Kingless Land - Ed Greenwood [95]
The man in leathers calmly picked his way among the fallen, plucking up daggers here and swords there. Wherever he found buckles he could wrest away from their belts, he took them too-men whose breeches won't stay up are seldom eager to swagger into a fight When his steely armfuls grew too heavy, the man in leathers tossed them, in their own series of small clangs and crashings, down the laundry chute, whose door opened onto a landing. When every weapon he could see was stripped from the senseless warriors, he applied the toes of his boots to their limp bodies, rolling them into boneless journeys down the next flight of stairs. Then he sprang back up the steps in a few uncannily quiet bounds and slipped back into his room.
In the brief instant before his door closed again, anyone who'd stood on the empty landing would have seen the two silver spheres brighten and begin to rise from the floor again.
On the other side of the closed and barred door across that landing, a sleepy-eyed Embra was pulling herself up to a sitting position against her pillows as Craer enthusiastically finished his tale: "… so it seems the Three have practically handed us one of the Dwaerindim-on the heels of meeting Sarasper, look you! Can there be any doubt what we must do next?"
There had been a time-as recently as four days ago-when Hawkril would unhesitatingly have followed Craer wherever the procurer's quick wits and slick tongue led them. Now, however, his eyes flickered in the midst of enthusiastically agreeing, with one bite gone from the gravy-dripping roast kleggard in his hand… and he looked to the wan-eyed, tangle-haired woman on the bed.
Embra licked dry lips, and the room fell suddenly silent. She looked around at the three men awaiting her words, and a smile flickered for a moment about her lips. "I had forty servants," she said in a voice raw from disuse, "but now I have three friends. Much better."
She sat up and seemed to gain both strength and excitement together. "I can spelljump us all to about a mile distant from Indraevyn."
Sarasper lifted one busy eyebrow. "You can? How is it that you know any locale deep in the Loaurimm Forest?"
The Lady of Jewels gave him a weak smile. "You're a nasty, suspicious old man, Sarasper. One of my tutors liked to go swimming in waters more warm and placid than the Coiling, and in years gone by we often practiced spelljumping to Lake Lassabra, called by some-"
"'The Sheet of Mists,'" Hawkril interrupted, causing three heads to turn his way in surprise. The armaragor looked back at them and shrugged. "There's a ballad," he explained rather apologetically.
"Lady Embra," Sarasper said then, "are you sure you should try such a thing? Every spell you work seems to bring you a stride closer to death."
"Aye," Craer agreed. "Shouldn't y-"
Embra held up one hand in an imperious "heed me" gesture and followed it with a long look and the words, "Think, friends, how many spells I might have to cast if we trudge and fight all the long and winding way up-river, through Silvertree-only to find that one of the countless other mages who's heard Yezund's tale by now jumped to the ruin long since, found the Stone of Life, and is off raising an army of loyal walking dead or suchlike with it."
"Sargh, yes!" Craer burst out, at about the same time as Hawkril muttered, "Graul," under his breath. The three men looked at each other, and with the next moment, the room erupted into a whirlwind of repacking and slinging packs and crowding together, punctuated by Hawkril's loud complaint that he'd had just one swallow of what looked to be a gods'-blessed good hot meal, and he'll neverA raw, feminine scream of pain echoed through the middle floor of the Wavefyre Inn-a scream that abruptly cut off, leaving empty silence behind. There came a soft footfall outside the room whence that cry had erupted, a discreet knock, an attempt to quietly open