The Alabaster Staff Read online

  “Well, thank you,” said Kehrsyn as she started to back away.

  “Oh, don’t be scootin’ off now, hon. No, that wouldn’t be the best snap of your nut today. We need someone the likes of you.”

  Kehrsyn paused. The guard, one hand pressed against his bleeding leg, started to try to pull himself back up into a sitting position.

  “What do you mean?” asked Kehrsyn, only partially focused on the conversation. Most of her mind was filled with watching the guard she’d had to discommode, while also unobtrusively searching for the best escape.

  “Heard that question already, missy, so let me put it to you simply. We’ve been watching you back there in the plaza. You got real good hands. Long, slim, and agile. Your body’s about the same way, for that matter. And you can use them like nobody’s business, too. Your hands, that is. You make stuff appear and disappear like you were a regular fire-slinging scroll-thumper. And I should know.”

  The woman’s silhouette leaned precariously over the edge of the rooftop. Just as Kehrsyn was sure she’d fall, the woman began to crawl headfirst down the side of the building, using her hands and bare feet. As she descended, Kehrsyn could see ghostly wisps of blue energy curling away from her extremities and rapidly fading to nothing in the steady rain.

  “You’re a magician,” said Kehrsyn.

  The woman paused in her descent and said, “Well, maybe I gave you too many chops for smarts, but we can work around that. Yes, some of the time I’m a sorceress, if you must know.”

  Working her hands to the sides, the stranger levered her torso up until she sat on her heels. It looked much like she was kneeling on the floor—except that her feet were flat against a wet, vertical wall ten feet in the air. She pulled at her collar and tried to clear her throat, but to no particular avail.

  Since the sorceress had come closer, removing herself from the backlighting of the clouds, Kehrsyn could see her more clearly. She had a squarish face, tanned, with Untheri features and the leathery wrinkles of too many seasons in the sun. Her red-rimmed eyes drooped at the outside corners, and her nose was very small. She wore several layers of nondescript traveling clothes, mostly in sun-faded browns and grays. Kehrsyn noted that the layers and loose, wrapped cut to her clothes gave her a number of great places to conceal small items. She looked a few pounds toward the heavy side, but the clothes made it impossible to tell if the extra weight was muscle or fat. Finally, Kehrsyn noticed that, while her hands and feet were bare, she had soft leather boots with thick stockings tucked carefully into her belt. It seemed only reasonable that she wouldn’t habitually go barefoot in that kind of weather.

  The woman sat on her heels, elbows resting easily on her lap and hands dangling between her knees. Her left thumb fiddled with a bright silver ring she wore on her left middle finger. She cocked her head to the right and studied Kehrsyn, eyes roving carefully over her body from feet to hair. The sorceress spent a fair amount of time looking right at Kehrsyn’s eyes, but Kehrsyn steadfastly refused to drop her gaze. For the rest, Kehrsyn chose not to move. It was best not to upset a magician too much until one had a better idea of how capable her magic was. Novice magicians could cause someone a bit of trouble; an experienced one could leave her victim as a pile of ash in the blink of an eye.

  While the two women appraised each other, the wounded man at Kehrsyn’s feet managed to push himself up into a sitting position and lean against one wall. The shield on his back grated on the rough, gritty stone. With a sigh that was one part pleasure and one part pain, he set his legs straight out in front of him and put pressure on his wound with his balled-up fist. With his other hand, he tried unsuccessfully to wipe the blood from his wincing eyes, then he began to pull his healing potion from his belt.

  The mysterious woman gestured to the man with a casual motion of her thumb. Without taking her eyes off the mage, Kehrsyn flicked her rapier to her right and tapped the man’s cuirass twice, just as he drew forth the vial.

  He sagged, and gasped, “Oh, damn. I thought you two had left.”

  The woman flipped her hands over, revealing her blue-haloed palms as if doing so might convince Kehrsyn of her sincerity.

  “All right,” the sorceress said, wheezing, “let me sing your dance for you. There’s something in this town that we need, and your talents can get it for us.”

  “We?” said Kehrsyn, her eyes narrowing.

  The woman pursed her lips. and replied, “Why, the guild, if you must know.” She cocked her head to the other side.

  “The guild? Which guild?”

  The woman shook her head in disbelief. “Why, what guild do you think, hon?” she asked.

  “I—I don’t know,” stammered Kehrsyn.

  The woman snorted, “The thieves’ guild, of course.”

  She pulled a small, soiled kerchief from an inner pocket and blew her nose.

  “But there’s no thieves’ guild in Messemprar,” objected Kehrsyn. “They wouldn’t dare make one.”

  “If only your mind were as nimble as your vixen hands, hon,” said the sorceress with a rattling sigh of exasperation. She returned the kerchief and clasped her hands together. “You got to keep up with the times, especially here. The Northern Wizards don’t have the control everyone thinks they do. The ex-Gilgeamite priests don’t have the control they wish they had. And no one trusts the church of Tiamat, or the army, or the Banites, or—or the followers of Furifax, or anyone. So when the Mulhorandi army starts looking like a good option, well, that’s when there’s cracks large enough for a guild to move in, and with this many people packed into the streets, we got ourselves a good set of targets.”

  “Move in?” asked Kehrsyn

  “Yeah, we’ve been operating elsewhere for a while, so it’s nice to be home again.”

  Kehrsyn paused and considered what she knew. If the sorceress was powerful, she could have laid a geas upon her to do whatsoever work she had in mind. If, as the sorceress had implied, the guild was new in town, its members might not know their way around too well.

  Kehrsyn studied the gloating eyes of the sorceress for another breath and said, “Well, welcome back to Messemprar. Sorry to disappoint you, but I don’t steal. Olaré.” She tapped the guard on the shoulder with her rapier to get his attention and added, “I’m leaving now, but you’re still not alone. Good luck.”

  So saying, she started to back away. The sorceress cleared her throat again, snuffled, and spat.

  “Don’t do something you might regret, hon,” she said, waggling her fingers.

  “Life is full of regrets,” said Kehrsyn, “and mine has been full of threats far more intimidating than yours.”

  “Why, I’m not threatening you, hon,” said the woman, as more wisps of bluish energy coalesced around her hands. “I’m offering you protection. Assistance. Help, you know.”

  “Help? Sounds to me like you’re trying to bully me into doing your dirty work. Pretend I’m in danger, then offer me an imaginary way out.”

  “Imaginary? Far from it. Seems a fair trade to me: you do us a favor and we help you avoid your due punishment for killing this here guard,” said the woman, rubbing her nose with the back of her hand.

  “What?” asked Kehrsyn. “What are you talking about?”

  “I tell ya, hon,” said the woman, a catch in her throat adding gravel to her tone, “you got to keep up with the times. If you don’t keep up, it’ll do you in.” She paused to hack a few times, then spit a large wad at the ground at the guard’s feet. “That there guard, he’s a member of the Zhentarim. You heard him say that, didn’t you? Or weren’t you paying attention? Anyway, those Zhents, they look after their own. They don’t take kindly to sleek little thieves like you killing one of them.”

  “But I didn’t,” said Kehrsyn.

  “Your nut might be a little slow, but your eyes are fast enough,” the sorceress said, pointing her finger at Kehrsyn’s bag.

  Kehrsyn looked down just in time to see her dagger slide from its hiding place, a sli
ght blue aura shining around it. She gasped in surprise and started to reach for it, but as it flew away she stayed her hand, lest she slice her own fingers off trying to grab the wicked blade. Kehrsyn glanced up at the sorceress, who was gazing at the guard with a cold, passive stare. The woman swept her finger with an efficient gesture. Kehrsyn looked back down just in time to see the dagger plunge itself into the guard’s throat, lodging just between the collarbones. The mortally wounded guard coughed in pain and surprise. Even as he reached for his throat, the dagger flew back to the sorceress’s hands. She caught it by the pommel and held the blade down. Blood dripped into the alley, where it feathered itself apart in the cold puddles.

  Gurgling and choking, blood welling from his neck, the guard tried to unseal his healing potion with his right hand. The left he kept pressed to his leg, until his cold, desperate fingers fumbled the precious blue vial. Feeling the vial slip from his fingers, he scrabbled for it with both hands, letting more blood flow from his leg wound.

  Kehrsyn glanced once more at the sorceress, who watched the proceedings with a thin, lopsided smirk. Kehrsyn dropped her rapier with a clatter and dived for the elusive vial.

  “Got it!” she said as she broke the seal.

  Holding the back of the guard’s head with one hand, she pressed the healing potion to his lip, but as she did so, he coughed up the blood that was trickling into his lungs, spraying the precious liquid and spattering Kehrsyn’s face and hands with crimson and cobalt.

  She flinched, pulled back, and wiped her eyes. She opened them again and saw the guard slump to the side, the shield on his back grinding slowly along the stone wall. He hacked and gasped, his face twisting in agony and going pale with shock. His breathing, what there was of it, was forced and noisy.

  Trembling, Kehrsyn tried to force the remaining fluid into his throat, but he flailed his arms, desperately clawing for air. She was able to get the vial to his mouth as his movements faded, but the blue liquid pooled in his cheek and dribbled out onto the grimy alley floor. A moment more, and Kehrsyn heard his dying breath rattle its burbling way out of his lungs, giving up its last shred of warmth to the cold winter’s air.

  “Great gods!” gasped Kehrsyn, appalled at the turn of events. She glared at the sorceress on the wall. “You—you killed him!”

  The woman had pulled her kerchief back out with her free hand and was rigorously trying to clean her nose some more.

  “No, hon,” she said as she explored her nostril, still gently dangling the dagger between the fingers of her other hand, “you killed him. You took him down. You stopped him from drinking his healing potion. Your dagger slit his throat. Your face wears his blood. Any divination spell will show all that. If the Zhents here don’t have a wizard at their immediate disposal—” she shrugged, helpless, and returned the kerchief to its hiding place—“why, I’m sure they can locate a freelance mage somewhere around here.”

  She paused to clear her throat, then coughed a few times to get something clear of her lungs.

  “But I tell you what, hon,” the sorceress added with a conspiratorial wink, once she’d gotten control of her cough again, “we of the guild got to stick together against the cold, cruel world.” She gestured vaguely around, at once taking in the vast city that surrounded them as well as the chill, gray weather. “I can personally guarantee you that no one will hear of this, no one will find your dagger, and no diviner will offer their services to the Zhentarim. All you have to do is provide us with what we need.”

  Kehrsyn looked at the blood and liquid on her hands, and, cringing, used the dead man’s cloak to clean them and her face. When she was done, she picked up her rapier and looked up at the sorceress again.

  “Why don’t you just get it yourself?” she asked. “You can walk on walls and stuff. I can’t do that.”

  “It don’t work quite like that, hon,” the woman replied with a grimace. “I use magic to augment my skills, but, you see, magic is not the best tool for slipping into a manse.” She waggled her fingers, sending the blue strands of energy spiraling around. “Little lights, little flashes, little noises of spells or incantations, they all attract attention, and good merchants have wards and other traps to snare those who try to magic their way into a valuable area. No, far better to go tippy-toe like a little mouse, all small and quiet and twitchy whiskers. And that, hon, is something I wager you’re darned good at. So confident, in fact, that I’m choosing you for the task.”

  Since the sorceress had shown spells—wall-walking and a little telekinesis—Kehrsyn was growing bolder. Not only was the woman staying out of easy reach, but Kehrsyn knew that the spells she’d used were little more than minor cantrips. She’d seen magic—real magic—several times in her life, and the sorceress’s offerings were a far cry from those spells. She believed she could parry or dodge whatever telekinetic assault the woman might launch with her dagger, and the studded leather vest Kehrsyn wore beneath her blouse offered her vitals some protection.

  She paused as if considering, and studied the woman some more, letting time pass. The sorceress was clearly suffering from some kind of contagious catarrh or grippe. Kehrsyn sucked in her lips and nodded, as if she was indeed deciding to go along with the woman’s demands.

  She waited until the sorceress cleared her throat again—Kehrsyn well knew how the grippe sapped people’s willpower—and coughed to see how suggestible the woman might be.

  Very, as it turned out.

  No sooner had Kehrsyn cleared her throat than the woman stretched her neck and tried to clear hers. Kehrsyn put the pear to her mouth as if to take a bite and forced a sudden cough around the fruit. That brought a coughing fit upon the unhealthy woman as well. Kehrsyn watched for just a moment while the rasping cough gathered momentum, and just as the woman’s eyes started to close with the force of her hacking, Kehrsyn made her move. Pear held in her teeth, Kehrsyn leaped forward, jumped up the wall with one boot clawing for just a bit of traction and stability, and neatly flicked her rapier at the woman’s hand. The tip of her rapier caught her dagger just below the hilt and spun it out of the sorceress’s helpless fingers. Deftly Kehrsyn caught the dagger by the handle as she landed on the uneven alleyway ground.

  “You w—cough!” spluttered the woman, pointing with her newly emptied hand while the other futilely clawed at her collar.

  Kehrsyn sheathed her rapier and took the pear from her teeth.

  “The only protection I need,” said Kehrsyn, “is for you to cover your mouth, so I don’t catch my death.”

  She slung the blood from her dagger, sheathed it, and withdrew.

  Kehrsyn hazarded one last glance over her shoulder before she turned a corner in the alleyway to leave the sight of the coughing woman. She caught a glimpse of the woman making mystical passes with her hand once more. Blue motes sparkled around her fingers, and something small and shiny zipped through the air to the woman’s hand. Kehrsyn had just an instant to wonder what it might be.

  The woman moved her hand to her mouth, and a high-pitched two-tone whistle filled the alley. Kehrsyn recognized it instantly: a constabulary whistle. One long, shrill blow was the signal for riot or assault upon a guard.

  The response was immediate. Like feral dogs echoing the baying of the pack, other whistles began calling in the surrounding streets. Kehrsyn staggered, frozen by the abrupt flare of mortal fear, the return of the all-too-familiar feeling of being human prey.

  The sorceress fixed Kehrsyn with a look of disgust as she slung the whistle back at the guard’s corpse.

  “Guess we’ll see how good you really are now, won’t we, hon?” she called out. Then, at the top of her lungs, she screamed and yelled, “Thief! She killed him!”

  Kehrsyn turned and fled as the false witness broke into another fit of coughing. She ran down the twisting back alleys, dodging barrels of refuse and ducking under laundry lines, puffs of steamy breath peeling from the sides of her panicked face. When she’d been pursued as a child, she’d used her small siz
e, fast feet, and knowledge of the terrain to evade pursuit, but she had none of these left to her. She was an adult, somewhat the weaker for chronic hunger, and had only been in Messemprar a few months. Worst of all, she was outnumbered far worse than she’d ever been as a kid. An entire city’s worth of guards and deputized mercenaries had become her foes. Her only hope was that they couldn’t identify her.

  Kehrsyn ran down the haphazard scattering of alleyways, trying to find a way out into the main city streets. The whistles petered out, but she knew they’d sound again if she were spotted. In the meantime, she was certain the sorceress had given the city watch a good description and that the information would leap like sparks from guard to guard.

  The thought struck her that carrying a half-eaten pear in her hand was not a wise idea. She almost tossed it away, but her gnawing stomach overcame her fear, so instead she slipped it in into the rear portion of her sash, where her cloak concealed it. The meager camouflage wouldn’t pass a close inspection, but she hoped to avoid that possibility.

  With her left hand she held her bag against her body, while her right gripped the hem of her cloak and wrapped it around her rapier’s scabbard, both securing the blade and thinly concealing its deadly purpose.

  Kehrsyn slowed to a jog. Moving adroitly through three thousand years’ worth of urban growth proved more than she could handle. She didn’t want to run pell-mell into a dead end, or worse, a whip of city constables, but though she slowed her feet, Kehrsyn’s heart continued to race. She had never exited the Jackal’s Courtyard in that direction before, and she knew neither where she was nor where she should go. On top of that, she wasn’t sure whom she should fear more, the Messemprar constabulary, who would obey the law, harsh as it was; or the Zhentarim, of whom the sorceress had spoken in such dark tones. It didn’t help that Kehrsyn knew next to nothing about the Zhentarim, and thus her fears had fertile fields in which to grow in the darker recesses of her mind.