“You know,” Giogi said, “you let me babble on so long, you never had a chance to tell me about my father.”
Sudacar grinned. “It’s part of my fiendish plot. Now you have to visit me another night,” he said.
“I’d like that,” Giogi said.
“We’ll keep an eye out for your purse, too. You really ought to get yourself an enchanted one, you know. The kind that makes some noise if it’s touched by someone else.”
“It was enchanted. Trouble was, I kept leaving it places, so whenever the servants found it anywhere and touched it, there was a big fuss. Uncle Drone fixed it so it would do something only if someone besides myself actually opened it.”
“What was it supposed to do?”
“I think Uncle Drone said it would make a fool or something out of the thief.”
“Well, I’ll tell my men to keep an eye out for any fools.”
Giogi giggled. “I’d hate to end up arrested for the theft of my own purse.”
Sudacar gave a disapproving frown and pointed a finger at Giogi. “You shouldn’t put yourself down like that, boy. His Majesty wouldn’t have entrusted you on a mission for the crown if you weren’t competent. As a matter of fact, now that you and your cousins are grown, Azoun will soon be relying on the services of all three of you, just as he did with your father and his cousins. Once you get this spur nonsense cleared up, it’ll be time for you to take up the responsibility of nobility—serving your king.”
“Me?” Giogi gasped.
“You,” Sudacar replied, chuckling at the shocked expression on the young man’s face.
Giogi had assumed he’d only been sent to find Alias in Westgate because he would recognize the sell-sword. It had never occurred to him that the king would ever require him on other missions. Apparently, finding the spur was no guarantee that his life would return to normal—the way it had been before last spring. “Wait a minute. How’d you know about the spur?” Giogi asked Sudacar. “You said Aunt Dorath wouldn’t tell you what was going on?”
“I have my sources,” Sudacar replied with a wink. “It’s getting late. Time to go.” He gave Giogi a pat on the back and strode south from the market square toward Redstone Manor. He called out, “Good night, Giogioni,” before he disappeared into the darkness.
Automatically Giogi called back, “Good night, Sudacar.” Sudacar had left him feeling bemused and astonished, but not in the least bit anxious. He headed west down the side street that led to his townhouse.
Tired and inebriated, the nobleman did not remember Drone’s warning that his life might “just possibly” be in danger. Nor did he notice the sound of clattering hooves on the paving stones made by the angry beast following him.
5
Mistaken Identities
After failing to recognize Olive in her transmuted condition, Nameless continued his inspection of the stable. He searched methodically in grim silence, slamming each stall door a little harder than the last. Olive could sense the anger and frustration building in him. Pulling a needle-thin dagger from his belt, he jabbed it into any bag of grain or stack of hay large enough to hide a halfling.
Finally, when Olive began trembling at the thought that he might study her bestial form more carefully and realize he had her at his mercy, she heard the sound of someone unbolting the stable’s front door. Nameless cursed and began muttering another spell.
The stable door opened, and a young woman carrying a lantern strode in. Olive recognized her as Lizzy Thorpe, the stable’s owner. Whether Lizzy was aroused by the noise or was just checking on the animals wasn’t clear, but when she spotted the cloaked figure in her stable without permission, she gave a shout. The cloaked figure vanished. Lizzy ran out, still shouting for help.
Olive noticed a peculiar churning of straw where Nameless had stood, and it moved down the center aisle to the stable’s front door. Olive also sensed the floorboards shift slightly and heard them creak from the weight of a human.
He’s gone invisible, she realized, but at least he’s leaving.
Lizzy returned less than a minute later with two of the night watch. “He was standing right there when I came in,” she told them, pointing to where the cloaked figure had turned invisible. Lizzy and the watchmen began to search the barn as methodically as Nameless had, though without his intense desperation.
Still hiding behind the sacks of grain, Olive heard Lizzy cry out, “Look what he’s done to my wall. Left a bloody huge hole in it, big enough to ride a paladin’s mount through!”
The two guards made their way back to Snake Eyes’s stall.
“Wood’s just vanished, edges left smooth as butter cut with a hot knife,” the older night watchman noted. “Looks like mage work to me. If it is magic, it’ll fade, and you’ll get your wall back, probably in an hour or two.”
“You’re lucky this pony had the good sense to stay put,” the other watchman said. “Any horses missing, Lizzy?”
Before Lizzy noticed the addition of one small donkey to her stable, Olive snatched up Giogioni Wyvernspur’s purse in her teeth and slipped quietly out the open stable door.
The halfling waited what seemed an eternity for Giogi to come out of the Immer Inn. Olive wondered if she were succeeding at hiding in shadows in her new four-legged configuration or if the people passing by simply weren’t keen on donkey-snaring this late at night. Whichever was the case, no one approached her.
For a while she savored the irony that the noble’s cursed purse had saved her life, but as the hour grew later and the night colder, she became annoyed. Now that she was no longer in immediate danger, her situation appalled her. By the time the young Wyvernspur finally emerged from the Immer Inn and wobbled down the street, she slunk after him, feeling considerable animosity.
She realized, however, that the streets were too open for a confrontation and that she would have to follow him home. Unfortunately, Giogi seemed to have no interest in going back. He wandered along the lakefront. Then the sound of music from the Five Fine Fish attracted his attention. He hurried over to the inn and disappeared inside.
Olive imagined with longing the fish and chips and ale the Fish served, but apparently the same things did not interest Giogi. He came out only a few minutes later and wandered over to the market green and began talking to one of the stone bandits.
That’s just great, Olive thought sarcastically. My fate is in the hands of a man who talks to statues. She hung back in the shadows, and she was glad she had, for just as the fop began serenading the statue—with another one of her compositions—Samtavan Sudacar came out from the Fish and called out to him.
The local lord had never shown Olive anything but the utmost courtesy when she entertained in the Fish. There was something about Sudacar’s thoughtful gaze, though, that convinced Olive he suspected her of something. It wouldn’t do to be seen holding Giogi’s purse in her teeth, even if she were an ass.
Sudacar talked Giogi into re-entering the Fish, and Olive was forced to wait for a second eternity before they came out again. They were the last patrons to leave the inn, and Lem locked the door behind them when they left. The moon had begun its descent as they crossed the market square to the statue of Azoun III. They lingered, chatting, beside the stone carving. Olive considered creeping closer to eavesdrop on their conversation, but she was still wary of Sudacar. Finally, the local lord left Giogi and strolled south.
Giogi watched Sudacar walk away, then headed west. Olive, her spirit by now burning with a righteous wrath, trotted after the long-legged Cormyte, her hooves clattering on the cobblestones. She no longer bothered to avoid his detection. She was determined to give the Immersea fop a healthy piece of her mind. “Only an irresponsible, thoughtless fool,” she planned to say, “would leave a cursed purse lying in the gutter where it would be found by some poor, defenseless halfling,” namely herself. First, though, she had to get him to change her back into the lovely, talented halfling she’d been born and bred to be.