Tonguth’s roving eye, sliding over the throng, suddenly brightened. “Hai!” He grinned. “There’s our lank-limbed new jester, the piper, ogling the womanflesh … Piper! Ho! Hither—stir your skinny legs when your betters call!
Perion slid through the thinning crowd, his mule in tow.
“Good morn unto my Lord Tonguth!” he crowed merrily. “And to his Reverence, the shaman—cheerful-eyed as ever, by my soul!”
Abdekiel eyed the grinning little minstrel coldly, slitted black eyes glinting wickedly in his bald, bitter-yellow face, but disdained to return the greeting. Tonguth chuckled expansively.
“Up with the dawn, I see, eh, piper?” He glanced at the wicker basket strapped to the beast. “You could not wait to begin spending the Warlord’s bounty, eh? And are you here to add a juicy morsel of female flesh to your tonnage of new purchases, which is already about to break yonder mule’s spine?”
Perion simpered coyly, spreading his bony hands. “A man can look, lord! But I fear yonder beauties are too expensive for my purse, which is as slender as my shanks… .”
“Aye, scrawny, a man can look—but a capering goggler like you would better seek a fat aska for bedmate,” the Chieftain said, cocking a thumb at a mangy specimen of the Argionid domestic pet, sunning itself at the nearby alley-mouth. He boomed a heavy laugh, heartily amused at his own wit, and an obsequious cackle from Perion joined in the jest.
Abdekiel, placidly ignoring these drolleries, was engaged in looking over the wickerwork hamper with a coldly speculating eye. He cut in.
“What is in yonder basket?”
Perion beamed, thrusting out his small chest and rocking on his heels with pride.
“My purchases, lord shaman! A few trinkets to brighten my quarters. For, now that the royal sun allows me to bask in its glow, I needs must live up to my new station… .”
“A few trinkets?” Tonguth exclaimed. “That basket’s fulsome enough to carry half the loot of Argion!”
“What is in the hamper?” Abdekiel repeated.
“A fine green-and-scarlet Faraz carpet,” Perion began, ticking his treasures off on beringed fingers, one by one, “and a brass lamp from Shimar that burns perfumed oils … a flagon or two of almond liqueur from my native Hillis … a new cloak of scarlet, lined with the transparent silver-silk the one-eyed weavers of Pel-Tharma loom from their metallic trees … but no! My lord!”
His boasting broke suddenly into a squawk of dismay, as the shaman strode past him with a step remarkably swift for one of his bulk, and, drawing a sickle-curved steel blade from the depths of his dull gray robes, slashed through the binding and uncovered the basket.
“Now, Piper-by the Scarlet Heart of Hell!
Crouched in the otherwise completely empty hamper, Lurn the dancing girl stared up at them with wide, frightened eyes.
There was a long interval of silence.
It would be difficult to say who, of the four, looked most astonished. They gasped with bugging eyes at the girl’s white, oval face, pale beneath the mop of ash-silver hair. Tonguth’s jaw dropped ludicrously. The shaman smiled a slow, placid smile, his cold slitted eyes disappearing in his fat yellow face.
Perion howled.
“My goods! My gorgeous Faraz carpet! My scarlet cloak! My lovely, lovely goods! Oh, you wicked girl, what have you done with them?” Dancing from one foot to another, face incandescent with rage and fury, the Piper seized the hamper violently and rudely dumped the dazed and frightened young girl out on the cobbled street. He paid no attention to the dancer, but thrust both arms into the empty basket, rummaging about vainly.
He lifted tragic eyes in a woebegone face to Tonguth and the shaman, who were watching him intently.
“Gone … all gone. All my lovely goods! Aiee! My little brass lamp that burns the sweet, sweet oil … my pretty carpet! What did you do with them, you—you thieving slut?”
A mute huddle on the cobbles, the girl looked back at him with huge fawn eyes of dimmest purple.
“How did you get in my basket? Where are all my goods? Aieee … my flagons of sweet Hollis liqueur!”
He rocked back and forth, moaning his woe. Tonguth and the fat shaman exchanged a puzzled, suspicious glance. Abdekiel bent over the girl, addressing her softly, his oily voice purring.
“A good question. How did you get in the basket, girl? Did yonder scrawny clown conceal you—or did you hide yourself?”
She stared up at him, tears of terror trembling on her sooty lashes, but made no answer. With one fat hand he tenderly picked up her slim arm, and repeated his question once again in a soft, caressing voice. When she did not reply, but only stared with wide, frightened eyes, he exerted a subtle pressure with his fingertips on the nerve-centers at her elbow. Lurn winced and bit her lip, but said nothing.
The shaman increased the pressure. “Answer me!”
“Ah!” she gasped. “Ill speak—touch me not!”
Abdekiel smiled, and released the girl’s elbow. She staggered to her feet, panting.
“I—hid myself—I do not know this little man. I was— hiding yonder, in an alley. He—this man—came past to bargain with a wine-peddler of Shazar. His mule was blocking the mouth of the alley. I saw the great basket on its back—and I—emptied out his things and hid myself inside. In the bustling of the crowd, no one noticed… .”
Abdekiel lifted a protesting hand.
“I do not believe you,” he said gently. “But, to go along with your absurd story for a moment, if you escaped by yourself and without the aid of our little juggler here—how did you do it?”
Tonguth shouldered near, rumbling angrily.
“Yes, speak up, girl!” he said gruffly.
“But I never said I escaped all by myself!” she protested. “Nor did I. I only said I climbed in this man’s basket without his knowledge or complicity.”
“Then—who helped you?”
Her white brow clouded, as she struggled to express herself.
“I—don’t know. I was asleep—and then—”
“Yes?”
She shrugged, biting her lip. “It was all so confused. A shadowy figure in the darkness of the cell. A sweetish smoke—some vapor-drug, I think. I slept, and woke—here. In the alley, just before dawn. I was frightened—I hid. Until this little man came along with the mule …”
The shaman leaned close to her, his eyes narrowing to slits of icy jet, burning coldly into her own. With one subtle hand he touched her, brow and breast—and smiled.
“You lie. It was the Piper.”
Perion, who had confusedly been trying to follow this rapid crossfire of question and counter-question, woke up suddenly with a cry of astonished outrage.
“I? Help her?” he shrilled unbelievingly. “Lord Shaman, can a man believe his ears? I steal the Warlord’s precious prisoner? What would I want with her? Who am I to meddle with such high affairs? … assassins and shadowy figures in the night, and … Nay, by the Brazen Bowels of Onolk! I am Lord Drask’s humblest but most devoted servant. The gods are my witnesses!” he concluded, stoutly, folding his broomstick arms.
Slow-witted Tonguth regarded him with puzzlement … staring next at the white-faced girl, then at the cold, impassive face of the shaman.
“Warlock—is this possible? I mean, could he have rescued the girl? How? Is he a magician—this scrawny little pippin of a man? Do you mistake him for … the White One?”