Of course, even if she was victorious, it wouldn't necessarily mean she was out of danger. The losers might resent the humiliation and decide to molest her anyway. But for the moment at least, she was safe. The spectators perceived she had such a good chance that some of them were betting on her, and everyone wanted to see how the contest would turn out
Miri would do her best to return before the end, so that whatever happened, Sefris would have a comrade to help her escape harm. For surely, wager or no, the monastic had no intention of submitting herself to the brutality of a gang of ruffians and goblin-kin, nor as far as Miri was concerned, did honor require that she should.
The ranger skulked along the wall until she reached the doorway, then slipped through. On the other side was a corridor with chambers opening off to either side. Storerooms held beer barrels and racks of wine. Blocks of ice, an expensive commodity in the Border Kingdoms with their warm climate and lack of mountains, cooled the larder. Rather to Miri's relief, none of the red-and-white hanging carcasses was human, the menu she'd noticed earlier notwithstanding. Inside the steamy kitchen, a fat cook in a stained apron screamed curses and beat a cringing goblin assistant about the head with a ladle.
And that was it. The hallway didn't seem to go anywhere else. Yet the yuan-ti had sworn that the reclusive Naneetha Dalaeve lived somewhere on the premises.
If so, Miri had to find the mage's personal quarters quickly, before someone else stepped into the corridor and spotted her. Knowing that spellcasters sometimes used illusions to hide that which they wished to remain private, she peered closely at the sections of wall around her, and when that failed to yield results, she ran her hands over the brick.
At first that didn't work, either, but then roughness smoothed beneath her fingers. Once her sense of touch defeated the phantasm, her vision pierced it a moment later, and she was looking at an oak door.
She tried the brass handle, and found the panel was unlocked. She slipped warily through into a suite dimly illuminated by the soft greenish light of everlasting candles. The sitting room was lavishly furnished in a frilly, lacy style that set her teeth on edge. It looked like the habitation of a nobleman's pampered daughter, not the lair of a wizard who ran a tavern catering to dastards of every stripe. The books on the shelves were of a piece with the rest of the decor. Instead of tomes of arcane lore, they were ballads and romances, tales of knights slaying dragons for the love of princesses both beautiful and pure.
A small dog yapped, and in response, a feminine voice laughed. Miri followed the sound through the apartment. She crept past one room that manifestly was a wizard's conjuration chamber, with a rather slim grimoire reposing on a lectern, sigils of protection inscribed on the walls, and the memory of bitter incense hanging in the air, then came to the source of the noise. Beyond another doorway, a blond woman in a shimmering blue silk dressing gown tossed a rawhide chew toy for a little fox-red terrier, which bounded after the plaything and fetched it back to her. The dog's mistress sat with her back to the door.
"Mistress Dalaeve," Miri said.
The terrier rounded on her and barked. The blond woman gave a start then, without turning around, swept her hands through what was clearly a cabalistic gesture.
"No spells!" Miri nocked an arrow and drew the fletching back to her ear. "I'm not here to hurt you, but-"
She broke off the threat because Naneetha obviously had no intention of heeding her. Her hands kept moving.
Such stubbornness posed a dilemma. If Miri was prudent, she'd loose the arrow before the wizard could complete the magic. But she wouldn't be able to question Naneetha if she killed her, and common sense told her it was difficult for any marksman, even a wizard, to target a foe while looking in the opposite direction. So she hesitated a heartbeat, and the blond woman pressed her hands to her own face.
As far as Miri could see, nothing happened as a result.
Naneetha uncovered her features and said, "Quiet, Saeval!"
The terrier yipped a final time, then subsided. The wizard turned, revealing a flawlessly beautiful heart-shaped countenance worthy of a heroine in one of the sagas on which she evidently doted.
"Who are you," the woman asked, "and what do you want?"
Miri released the tension on her bow and pointed the arrow at the floor, but kept it on the string.
"My name is Miri Buckman. I'm a guide of the Red Hart Guild. I apologize for bursting in on you this way, but my business is urgent, and your staff didn't want to let me in to see you."
"I like my privacy."
"I won't intrude on it any longer than necessary. I just need you to answer a few questions. A robber stole a strongbox from the courtyard of the Paera-"
"I know. Everyone does. You must be the ranger who lost the prize."
Miri sighed and said, "What everyone doesn't know is the name of the thief, or at least, no one's been willing to tell me. But I've learned he's a friend of yours. He and his three accomplices drank here often."
"As I'm sure you've seen, the Dance is a busy place. Many rogues squander their loot here."
"But sometimes you invited this particular scoundrel, who's young, lean, fit, and wears a goatee, to wander back to your suite and visit you."
"You're mistaken."
"I don't believe you," Miri said, "and I promise, I'll pay for information."
"The Dance brings in all the coin I need," Naneetha said. "Now, please go."
"I'm sorry, it isn't that easy."
"Let's be clear, then," the woman asked. "Are you threatening to shoot me if I refuse to betray a friend?"
Even as frustrated as she was, Miri didn't have the stomach for such callous retribution, but she didn't have to admit as much.
"Why shouldn't I kill you?" she asked. "You provide a haven for the worst kinds of vermin to conduct their business and pursue depraved amusements. That makes you as bad as they are."
"It must be nice out in the wilderness, where everything's so simple… good or evil, gold or dung. In Oeble, we live as best we can."
"If your goal is to live, give me the robber's name."
"No," Naneetha said. "I don't have many friends. It's hard to make them when you spend your days in a cellar, and Saeval and my books aren't enough to hold the loneliness at bay. The few companions I do have brighten my days with the stories of their adventures, and the lad you seek has told me some splendid ones."
Miri wondered if Naneetha was an invalid or such a notorious fugitive that she dared not show her face in the city above, for she seemed to be saying she felt unable ever to leave the confines of the Talondance.
"Whatever lies the wretch feeds you," Miri said, "he's a common thief, not a hero out of your storybooks."
The wizard shrugged.
"Look," Miri persisted, "it's nice you have someone to keep you company, but a good many people will suffer if I don't recover the lockbox."
"Why?"
"I'm not at liberty to say, but you have my word that it's the truth."
"Well, you have mine that I'd sooner push a hundred strangers into the Abyss than betray one friend." Naneetha lifted her hands, making a show of poising them for further conjuration, and added, "Now, are we going to fight?"
No, Miri thought bitterly, we aren't.
Naneetha had called her bluff, and that was that. It felt in keeping with the fundamental perversity of Oeble that the first even vaguely honorable person she'd met in the Underways had proved just as unwilling to help her as all the black-hearted scoundrels she'd questioned hitherto.