by Tanya Huff
Grinning, Terizan waved a hand at the bottle, jars, and brushes. "Arcane ritual?"
"Don't be ridiculous; this is skill, not magic." A touch of oil on his lower lip and he turned to face her, looking stylized and beautiful.
"Looks like magic to me," she told him fondly. Poli in cosmetics looked more like himself. If she'd tried to apply an equivalent amount of paint and powder, she'd have looked like one of the priests of Busoo, the God of Laughter. "So if you have no first-hand knowledge..." She handed him his robe as he stood. "...have you heard anything?"
Eventually, the whores heard everything.
"Sweetling, you're not listening – wizards don't use the services of my guild."
"People who work for wizards do. Don't they?"
"No." He narrowed kohled eyes and sighed. "Terizan, have you agreed to steal something from the wizard's tower?"
"You know I can't answer that."
"Wonderful. So, sharing your bed with an insane mercenary captain isn't enough to satisfy this sudden death wish of yours? Now, you want to be turned into cat food?"
"One." Terizan flicked a calloused finger into the air. "Swan isn't insane, she's just really, really good at what she does which happens, incidentally, to be mayhem. Two." A second finger followed the first. "I don't have a death wish, I have a reputation as the best thief in the city and that brings with it certain unavoidable responsibilities that I have every intention of surviving. And three." She folded the first finger down.
"You can't afford me, Sweetling."
***
The oldest of the storytellers throwing words into the air on the Street of Tales insisted there were once three wizard towers in Old Oreen. A nondescript neighbourhood of middle-class shops and houses had grown up over the ruin of one, the squalid hovels and tenements of the Sink covered another, and the third stood alone. Had stood alone for as long as anyone could remember.
According to the storyteller, that middle-class neighbourhood produced more than its share of priests and artists and the totally insane. And the Sink – well, every city had a cesspool, the Sink was the cesspool of Old Oreen.
"Do the stories say how those two towers were destroyed?"
"They do." The storyteller sucked her teeth and waited, right arm raised so she wore her cupped hand like a hat, the bowl of her palm facing the sky. Or at least the awning over her square of pavement.
Terizan sighed and dropped a monkey into the old woman's hand. She waited patiently while the brass coin vanished into the folds of a grimy robe and a little less patiently as a small leather bottle was consulted.
"It was a dark and stormy night," the storyteller began at last, adding, as Terizan's brows rose, "No, really, it was. A dark and stormy night..." She cleared her throat. "...thunder, lightning, hail. A night that cleared the streets of all the good citizens of Oreen – as few as they were within the walls in those dark days. When the ground beneath the city shook and the air filled with the scent of burning hair and the screams of tormented souls rode on the backs of howling winds, no one dared to turn an eye to the cause. No one but one small boy," she added hurriedly as Terizan opened her mouth to protest. "A small boy who swore he saw ribbons of red spiralling from one tower, ribbons of blue from another, and bands of white around the third. In the morning there was but one tower remaining and blasted, empty, cursed ground where the other two had stood."
"Two of them fought, the third shielded himself."
"So it seems." Her hand rose once more to lie against her head and Terizan sighed.
"That wasn't worth another monkey. What was said of the remaining wizard?"
"Ah, young one, the stories I could tell you..."
Terizan twirled the coin between her fingers. "Give me the high points without embellishing and this is yours."
"Embellishing." Rheumy eyes narrowed. "A large word for one in your profession."
A second coin joined the first. "A large fee for one in yours."
"True enough, times being what they are."
Terizan didn't ask how times were. It would only lead to more stories and a higher expected payment.
"They say that the wizard remains in that tower to this day, extending his life by fell magics. That he is secretive, even for a wizard. That young women enter his tower and emerge as old women a lifetime later with no memory of their service. They say he lives on moonlight and dew. That those who try to breach his solitude meet a grisly doom." She snatched the tossed coins out of the air with the ease of long practice. "You know about the whole thief-mouse-cat thing?" When Terizan nodded, her face refolded itself into a new pattern of contemplative wrinkles. "Your guild must value your talents highly."
"Yeah, that's what they keep telling me..."
***
Although space was at a premium in Old Oreen, no one had attempted to build up against the wall that defined the triangular grounds surrounding the wizard's tower – which was more than a little annoying since it meant Terizan would have to cross a broad, open street in full view of the tower's upper windows no matter which part of the wall she approached. On the bright side, the neighbouring houses had turned their backs to the wizard, presenting no windows and therefore no likelihood that she'd be seen and the Guard called.
"Because there's nothing like worrying about being arrested when you should be worried about becoming a mouse," Terizan muttered. Torches in iron brackets jutted from the top of the wall not quite close enough together to prevent narrow bands of shadow between them – thieves' paths. The trick would be reaching one.
Hidden in the darkness where the back of one house joined another, she ticked off items on her mental copy of the servant's list.
"The gate and the path from the gate to the tower are heavily warded. Step through the gate, step on the path, and my master will know everything there is to know about you."
No problem. She hadn't planned on taking either the gate or the path.
"The thorn hedge that grows around the inside of the wall isn't magical, but it is deadly. You must move slowly, methodically to defeat it."
Defeat it? Terizan had no intention of fighting it.
"The only safe way to enter the tower is from above. My master keeps pigeons and has no desire to know everything there is to know about them, but they'll act as an alarm if you're not careful."
Pigeons. Flying rats. The thief who didn't plan for their presence on every rooftop in Old Oreen had a short career.
"I'll leave the trapdoor unbarred."
Once inside the tower things got... complicated, but she'd worry about that later.
The crescent moon slid behind a cloud.
Wiping sweaty palms against her thighs, Terizan took a deep breath, locked her gaze on the path she planned to use, and raced forward. Time had worn a handy ladder of hand and foot holds in the wall. At the top, her body pressed against the capstones, the sandstone still warm from the heat of the day, she turned in place, and slowly – very, very slowly – began to climb down between the thorns and the wall.
Fortunately, the thorns were attached to large bushes rather than any kind of clinging vine and the space between the bushes and the wall, although not exactly generous, was very nearly wide enough to slide through unscathed. As long as she kept herself from snatching punctured body parts away from the thorns, she was reasonably sure she could avoid attracting further attention.
I'm worried about attracting attention from a bush. This is why I hate stealing from wizards.
One of the reasons anyway. That whole thief/mouse/cat thing didn't thrill her.
When her feet touched the ground, she lowered herself slowly sideways until she lay in the angle between the earth and the wall, and stared out between the twisted trunks of the shrubbery at a courtyard flat and entirely green and completely unnatural. Although she felt no magic rising from the ground this had to be wizardry for not even the very rich could get that much grass to grow together in one place. Crawling forward on fingers and toes, she tried t
o ignore the debris mixed into the leaf litter and the heated, heavy smell of rot. Her hand inched toward a heavy gold ring, but a hint of brass changed her mind. Moving on, she left it – and the finger bone that wore it – where it lay.
At the edge of the grass, she reached out and gently brushed a single finger across the blades – the smallest finger on her left hand, the one she'd miss the least if it came to it. To her surprise, the grass was soft. It bent beneath her touch, cool against her skin. While it wasn't the tough and wiry plant that forced its way up through the city's packed dirt and cracked cobblestones, it didn't seem dangerous. Slowly, carefully, she moved out from under the thorn bushes and let the grass take her weight.
Nothing happened. It smelled nice. Fresh. Alive.
Given that she had no strong cravings for cheese, she could only assume the wizard hadn't seen her cross the street to the wall. Of course, he could still look out a window and see her sniffing his grass. Up on her feet, she unhooked the crossbow from the chestpack, freed the rope, and fired the grappling hooks toward the roof. A faint hiss of metal against stone and two of the padded edges caught.
The walls had plenty of footholds and, tucked into shadow, the climb was the safest thing she'd done so far. By the time she reached the roof, it seemed that any pigeons startled by the appearance of the grapple had gone back to sleep. Shadow silent, Terizan coiled her rope, replaced the grapple in her pack and slipped past the coop.
The trap door was locked.
It wasn't supposed to be locked.
Isn't it fortunate I have trust issues. Carefully sliding a metal tube from the thief pocket in the wide seam of her trousers, she ran a fingernail through the wax seal, unscrewed the metal stopper, and used the contents to paint a rough circle in the centre of the door. She had no idea what the liquid was, but the alchemist had assured her it would get rid of problem tree stumps. He'd also warned her that it was highly illegal to use on anything but problem tree stumps and had winked broadly while pocketing his extremely high fee.
The wood dissolved.
Terizan found herself staring down into the emerald gaze of a plump calico cat. She tossed a fabric square stuffed with dried catmint down the spiral staircase – thief/mouse/cat implied there'd be a cat somewhere in the tower – and dropped to the landing as the cat disappeared.
According to information the Council had left with the Tribunes, his workshop and the curse anchor were off the next landing down. His servant had guaranteed he wouldn't be there.
A lit glass globe floated outside the door about a foot below the ceiling. Terizan waited until her eyes adjusted to the light, checked for traps, and, her finger-tips against a bit of wood where she could feel no magic, slowly pushed open the door. When there was no response, she slipped into the room.
Crowded with books and scrolls and a confused jumble of a hundred arcane objects, the wizard's workroom looked exactly the way she expected a wizard's workroom to look. Although she hadn't expected the wizard's servant to be pacing back and forth in front of an enormous full length mirror. At least Terizan assumed it was the servant. Middle-aged, she wore her hair pulled back in a sensible bun, a bleached apron over a sleeveless yellow shift, and thick cork-soled sandals, and when she saw Terizan's reflection appear in the glass, she spun around, one hand clapped over her mouth.
It was too late to run, so Terizan froze.
The two women stared at each other for a long moment.
"I didn't unlock the trapdoor," the older woman said at last, lowering her hand. "You've passed the final test."
It seemed she wanted to be sure she'd gotten her money's worth. Or the Council's money's worth, Terizan amended, her heart beginning to beat again. Those who expected the Thieves' Guild to solve their problems were seldom the trusting types – although usually when people paid to have things stolen, they took themselves elsewhere and surrounded themselves with credible witnesses. There were half a dozen taverns in Old Oreen willing to provide that essential service for a reasonable price.
This was the first time Terizan had ever worked with an audience. Still, in for a monkey, in for a caravan... A second glance around the room confirmed a complete lack of obvious heat anchoring items. "Where's the curse anchor?"
"The what?"
"The object the wizard's using to anchor the heat. The object," Terizan continued when the servant merely looked confused, "you suggested the Council have stolen."
"Oh, that."
"Oh, that?" The general, all purpose, what-kind-of-an-idiot-steals-from-a-wizard bad feeling Terizan had had since her meeting with the Tribunal, began to grow more specific.
A sound on the landing outside the workroom took her from stool, to table's edge, to bookshelf, to crouched balanced on the top of the thick, open door. When the wizard – And who else would be on the landing in a wizard's tower outside a wizard's workroom? – came into the room, she'd drop behind him and make a run for it.
Thief-mouse-cat. Not going to happen.
Glaring down at the wizard's servant, she laid a silencing finger against her mouth just as the calico cat stalked into the room.
"My master isn't here," the servant sighed. "That's why you are. He's been stolen and I need you to steal him back."
Terizan opened her mouth and closed it again. Carefully avoiding the cat – all things considered, staying on the cat's good side seemed smart – she jumped off the top of the door. "The wizard's been stolen?"
"Yes."
"Don't you mean kidnapped?"
"No, stolen. Turned into a doll, and then stolen right from this room."
"By who?"
The servant glanced over her shoulder at her reflection. "Something from the mirror."
Something? That didn't sound good. "Another wizard?"
"I don't know."
Terizan glanced at the mirror and saw only the reflected servant, workroom, and cat. "You want me to steal him back?"
"Yes."
"From the something in the mirror?"
"Yes."
"Go into the mirror, and steal him back?"
"Yes."
"Are you crazy?"
"No."
She sounded so matter-of-fact that Terizan frowned. "Is there a spell that kicks in if he's not back by a certain time, destroying the city?"
"Goodness, no!"
"Then why would I agree to steal him back from something inside a mirror?"
The servant smiled. "Because you're the best."
"Oh for…" Throwing up her hands, Terizan pivoted on one heel, took two steps out onto the landing, pivoted again, and took two steps back. "First, how do you know that?"
"You're here."
Okay. Terizan had to admit that was fairly solid evidence.
"The Council went to the Tribunal," she continued, "and the Tribunal chose you. They wouldn't have chosen anyone but their best – that's why I went to them, why I told them the story I did. I couldn't risk not having the best, but nor could I risk the Council knowing my master is indisposed."
Indisposed? He was a doll. "So the wizard isn't causing the heat?"
"It's summer. It's always hot in the summer and people always seem to forget that."
"It's hotter than usual. And for longer."
The servant shook her head. "No, it isn't. What was your second point?"
"My what?"
"You said first. That implies a second."
Wondering why she didn't just walk away, Terizan reversed the conversation far enough to remember what her second point had been. "What does my being the best have to do with agreeing to steal the wizard back? Wouldn't you assume that, as the best, I'd be too smart to do something so stupid?"
"I assumed that, as the best, you would rise to the challenge."
Terizan found the urge to slap the smug smile off the older woman's face almost impossible to resist. The only thing that stopped her was the knowledge that she'd heard the plan, that nothing prevented her from leaving, and she was still standing in the w
izard's workroom. "What's in it for me? And if you're about to say the challenge think again. I'm a thief, not a hero."
"When he's safely returned to his tower, my master will reward you. My master has many, many treasures. Gold. Jewels."
"Your master is a doll," Terizan pointed out.
"Not once you return him here and I put this around his neck." The bronze amulet dangling from the servant's hand wouldn't have been worth more than a monkey on the street, maybe another monkey for the chain. "This protects him from magical attack. Had he been wearing it at the time, he would never have been changed and taken."
"Then why wasn't he wearing it?"
"It turns his neck green." Sighing deeply, she dropped it into her apron pocket. "Every now and then, he takes it off to bathe."
"Right."
Gold.
Jewels.
No other thief in the guild could claim to have stolen a wizard back from inside a magic mirror.
Oh no. Don't even think that. You are not… Terizan caught sight of the expression on the servant's face and sighed. Oh crap. Yes, you are, and she knows it too. "All right, you win. What do I have to do?"
"Just walk into the mirror."
"And he'll be right there?"
"If I expected it to be that easy, would I need the best thief in Oreen?"
Good point.
Her gaze locked on her reflection – which didn't look happy – Terizan crossed the workroom, tripped over a box of scrolls, and only just managed to stop herself from hitting the floor by grabbing a handful of the servant's apron.
"You're not filling me with confidence." She slapped Terizan's hands away from the bunched fabric and straightened it herself.
"You want confident?" Terizan muttered stepping forward. "How's this? If this is a trick and I find myself with my nose mashed against the glass and you laughing, I'm confident I'll kick your…
…ass."
Her body sizzling in reaction, she found herself standing alone in a reflected version of the wizard's workroom. Heart pounding, she spun around to face the mirror and discovered her reflection had not crossed over with her. A hand against the glass found only that – glass.