Olive ground her teeth. Now she was going shopping for the warrior-woman, her pet paladin, and the mage. Even Akabar had a tendency to treat her like a child or a thief. He was the hero of Alias’s rescue, his spells made the difference, while it had been the lizard’s skill in battle that had recruited Mist in the first place. But she, Olive, had been useless. And Akabar would have left her on Mist’s back, left her to die, when he flew off to rescue the paladin.
Part of her mind refused this interpretation, knowing full well that everyone had good reasons for doing what they did. But the small part of her mind was easily ignored. What difference does it make? she thought. Sooner or later, Phalse’s friends were going to show up and take Alias away.
“I could use a drink,” she muttered. “Better yet, several drinks.”
She was just passing the Vhammos yards, its paddocks jammed with horses and caravan oxen, when suddenly someone addressed her. “Hello, Lady Olive.”
Ruskettle was startled. Perched on a fence post was a short, familiar figure. He was dressed in sunburst yellow taffeta, fashioned into the costume of a Vilhon Reach merchant. His smile stretched nearly ear to ear in an inhuman mockery of the humanoid form.
“Phalse!” Olive wondered if the pseudo-halfling could read minds. “A Fortune. Well met.”
“A fortune and well met to you, dear lady. You’ve surprised me. I did not know you were bound for Westgate. May I accompany you into the city?”
Ruskettle nodded, and Phalse hopped down from his perch. He paced the halfling as she walked. “The river gate?” he asked.
“However did you know?” Olive grinned pleasantly.
“Thinking like a halfling, my lady,” he answered. “I must repeat, I am astonished to see you here so soon. Were you involved with the sky display earlier?” He waved an arm toward the seven mounds south of the city.
Olive’s eyes narrowed. “Maybe,” she replied coyly, but she wondered how he could possibly know that.
“Maybe—that’s a straight answer from a halfling. I take it the human woman is with you?”
Ruskettle shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe.” She had the uncomfortable feeling that her time with Alias was going to end much sooner than she’d expected.
Phalse smiled. “I see. Will ‘maybe’ be the answer to my inquiries about your other traveling companions, the mage and the lizard?”
“Maybe.” She wondered what the pseudo-halfling’s interest was in Akabar and Dragonbait.
“I think you and I should have a drink,” he said. “Several drinks.”
The small couple approached the gates, where a squad of soldiers was posted, checking credentials. Phalse took Ruskettle’s arm gently, and they strolled through gates, into the city, completely unchallenged.
“I’m impressed,” the bard said, jerking her head back at the gate guard. “What’s your secret?”
Phalse winked one of his peculiar blue eyes. “Clean living. Let’s find a nice, quiet bar with private booths and low ceilings. I have a deal that I am certain will interest you.”
“As long as you’re buying, I’m all ears.” Olive moved a little closer to Phalse, and he tightened his grip on her arms.
“Well?” Alias said, pursing her lips.
“Gone,” Akabar replied. He’d been peering at the swordswoman’s arm and the saurial’s chest with a tiny magnifying glass. “The surrounding pattern hasn’t just covered up its sigil, the sigil has disappeared completely.”
“Do you think the sigil might return if Moander gets another body in the Realms?”
“I’m afraid that’s a possibility,” the mage sighed.
They were all cleaned up now, wrapped in towels and blankets while their clothes dried in the late afternoon sunshine. Dragonbait had played nurse, helping Akabar with his bath, a service that had made the Turmishman mildly uncomfortable, but which he had accepted gratefully since his only alternative was Alias’s help. In the meantime, Alias had fashioned him a cushioned sling to cradle his arm until Dragonbait could repair it properly.
Akabar leaned back on the room’s lower bunk. “So where does this development lead us?”
“Into more hot water. We’re just outside the city where Cassana and the Fire Knives are supposed to reside. I have a hunch that our mystery bull’s eye sigil owner resides here as well. And now that we’ve exploded a very large calling card over their city, odds are they know we’re in the area.”
“Maybe they’ll reconsider their actions and leave us alone. We destroyed one of their partners already—the god.”
Alias shook her head. “No. They’ll just become more ruthless. Akabar, I want you to go home to Turmish—take Olive and Dragonbait with you. Being near me is too dangerous.”
Akabar asked, “What good do you think you can accomplish alone?”
“Find these people,” said Alias, “Talk to them. They need Dragonbait to put their plans into motion, so they won’t be able to control me as long as he’s safely hidden somewhere.”
“They could always just brand another victim to sacrifice.”
Alias shook her head again. “I don’t think that would work. Remember, Moander said I drew my independence from Dragonbait, that we’re linked until his death. They won’t kill me; they’ve even taken precautions to see that I’m not injured. But all the rest of you are targets.”
Akabar harumphed. “They haven’t shown a tendency to talk before. Bully, threaten, and battle, yes, but never talk. They won’t negotiate with you. As far as they’re concerned, you’re no better than a horse, to be owned and ridden and slain as need be. If they already have you in their sights, it will be that much easier for them to accomplish their ends. All they’ll have to do is search out Dragonbait. Running and hiding won’t do us any good.”
“Maybe not, but if you stay here you’re at risk. Please, Akabar,” Alias pleaded. “I don’t want to see you killed.”
“There are worse fates. You and I both know that.”
Dragonbait knocked on the side of the bed, summoning their attention. Using a charred stick, he drew on the flagstones the four sigils he and Alias both wore and also the unholy symbol of Moander.
“Yes?” Alias prompted.
Dragonbait pointed to Alias and himself and then scuffed out the flaming dagger—the mark of the Fire Knives.
“Yes, we beat the assassins,” Alias agreed. “They weren’t very tough, were they?”
He pointed to Alias and himself and Akabar and then scuffed out the sigil that might or might not still belong to Zrie Prakis, the sigil of interlocking circles. Then he pointed again to himself and Alias, drew an inverted tear drop with a mouth and scuffed it out along with the insect-squiggle of Cassana’s mark.
“We beat the crystal elemental and the kalmari. The kalmari belonged to Cassana?” the mage asked.
Alias nodded. “She told me in a dream. You dreamed the same thing, didn’t you?” she asked the saurial.
Dragonbait nodded. He pointed to Akabar and rubbed out the unholy symbol of Moander like he was squishing a bug. Alias noted that the paladin gave all the credit for the god’s death to the mage. Then he pointed at the three of them and splashed water from the kettle onto the flagstone.
Akabar laughed. “He’s right, you know. Between the four of us we’ve defeated everything your would-be masters have thrown at us. If we remain together, we can defeat the lot of them.”
“Only if you continue to cooperate,” a sharp female voice said from the doorway, “and if we do not. But your little demonstration this afternoon persuaded us to unite.”
Alias, Akabar, and Dragonbait leaped to their feet, their eyes fixed on four people who had entered their cottage apartment. Three men, dressed in black leather, and the woman from Alias’s dream in Shadow Gap.