The boy went wide-eyed and let his hand, which had been inching surreptitiously toward his belt, dangle limply.
'Here's how it's going to be,' said Gale. 'You listening?'
The boy nodded, but looked on the verge of passing out.
'I don't know who you work for and I don't care, but after tonight this house is off limits. Understand?'
Another desperate nod.
Gale gave a final, meaningful glare, and released him. The would-be thief collapsed to the floor, gasping.
'Collect yourself. I'm going to show you out.'
'But my coat,' the boy protested. 'It's cold.' He realized immediately that he should not have opened his mouth.
Gale stared at. him The boy's eyes found the floor. 'Forget it,' he muttered.
He climbed slowly to his feet and Gate led him through the receiving room to a side door that opened onto the patio. He pulled the door open and the blast of cold, Deepwinter air set the boy's teeth to chattering.
'Through the gardens, left to Sam Street. Don't let me see you again.'
The boy nodded, crossed his arms against the cold, and hurried out.
After closing the door and securing the deadbolt, Gale congratulated himself for solving a problem without bloodshed. Ten years ago, he'd have taken the boy into the gardens and put him down, just to be thorough. I have changed, he realized with a soft smile. Thazienne would be proud.
•(c)• •(c)• •(c)• •(c)• -(r)
Crouching amidst the tall shrubbery, Araniskeel hungrily eyed the two humans. The tall one said some- thing and shoved the smaller one out of the door of the great house. Light, sound, and life spilled from the open door like blood from a wound. Araniskeel growled, low and dangerous, and a soft chorus of snarls sounded behind him in answer. The power of the two humans' souls glowed in his eyes, tempting him, whetting his appetite to feed. The tall human's soul shone with power, hah0 of it white, half of it shadow, as though it fought a war with itself. The smaller human's soul, though a mere gray spark in comparison, elicited an anticipatory purr from the demon..
The fifteen former humans hidden in the gardens with him sensed his pleasure and shifted eagerly. 'Feed us,' they whispered. 'Feed us.'
Araniskeel turned to face them. Silence, he thought to them, and they fell on their faces to the dirty snow, abject. He regarded them with contempt, as he did all humans. Araniskeel's master Yrsillar had possessed the leader of these humans-these Night Knives-and named himself the avatar of their god. Now these ignorant fools literally fell over themselves in their frenzy to serve. Yrsillar had taken their zeal and used it- used it to twist their bodies, warp their minds, and pollute their souls until they had become tools suitable to his purposes. Now, not even Araniskeel would feed upon the twisted, black things that served as the corrupted humans' souls.
The door to the house slammed closed. The sound jerked him back around. The tall human had retreated within, but the short one remained outside. Silence, he projected again to the corrupted humans. As always, they obeyed. They soundlessly rocked back and forth, hungry for flesh, their daws alternately clenching and unclenching fistfuls of frozen earth.
Patience, he thought. Soon you will feed.
The small human, his arms crossed against a cold Araniskeel did not feel in this form, muttered to himself and walked from the house toward them. Araniskeel allowed his hunger to build, savored the growing anticipation that would soon be sated. The small human neared and walked past unsuspecting. Araniskeel stepped from the shrubs and reached for him.
The human's startled gasp ended almost as soon as it began. Araniskeel flashed a claw and opened the human's throat. His wings beat in ecstasy as the paltry soul pulsed screaming from the wound and into his being. Araniskeel's black form swallowed and utterly devoured the small human's life-force.
'For Mask,' the corrupted humans chanted into the dirt. 'For Mask.'
Finished with the feeding, Araniskeel let the dried body fall to the pavement. Feed, he ordered.
Growling eagerly, the corrupted humans leaped to their feet, dragged the corpse into the bushes, and began to feast on the dried flesh. Their mindless gob-bung delighted Araniskeel, so he allowed their frenzy to continue until only the tattered clothing remained of the corpse.
As the corrupted humans fed, he savored the lingering sweetness of the human's soul. In all the world, only humans had such a complex, delicious life-force capable of sating the perpetual hunger of his kind. Yrsillar, Araniskeel, and Greeve would turn this city of humans into a slaughterhouse. Tonight's feeding would be the first of many.
More souls resided within the house, he knew. Many more. He could sense them through the walls even at this distance. He sensed their essence on the winter wind. Araniskeel did not know why his master had chosen this house as a target and did not care. There was food within. That was enough.
Come, he said to the corrupted humans. There is more food within.
Their long, purple tongues lolled over gray lips and needle-sharp fangs. He took pleasure in their anticipatory slavering. 'Food,' they hissed. 'Food.'
CHAPTER FOUR
I with himself for not harming the would-be thief, Gale walked back through the receiving room hall and into the parlor. The thick Thayan floor rugs-each depicting red dragons in flight-felt wonderful beneath his sore feet The cozy feeling of the parlor tempted him to kick off his boots and collapse into one of the richly upholstered chairs and retire for the night, but he resisted the urge. Instead, he strolled around the room and admired the thematic oil paintings that adorned the walls. The first painting depicted a roiling sky, against which elf knights mounted on hippogrifls warred with orogs mounted on wyverns. Each subsequent work represented a different point in the aerial battle, with the elves finally defeating the orogs in the last painting. Gale smiled as he moved from one to another, captured by the artist's skillfull rendition of the combat. Thamalon had commissioned the half-elf artist Celista Perim to paint the works two years ago. Ever since, Cale had found himself drawn to them. J:Apart from his own sparsely furnished bedroom, $lthe parlor had become his favorite room in Storm-weather. Rarely used by anyone else in the family, at night it seemed his own private refuge-just he and oUie elves. When his troubled conscience kept him awake and he did not feel like reading, he often came down here to think, to lose himself in the unblemished 'heroics of a war that had occurred only on canvas.
Bathed in the dim light of a single candle and the soft glow of embers in the fireplace, he collapsed into his favorite overstuffed chair, put his feet up on the hassock, and allowed himself a moment to enjoy the solitude.
This would be a good time for a smoke, he thought wistfully. If only I smoked. He thought fondly of his pipe- toting friend, Jak Fleet, and smiled.
The distant bustle of the ball carried through the hall and nearby double doors, but the parlor itself was quiet, removed from the celebratory tumult. The candlelight flickered off the four suits of ceremonial armor that stood silent guard in each of the room's corners-each suit was engraved with a crossed hammer and sword on the breastplate, the arms of some long forgotten Selgaunt noble's house. The parlor's decor reflected his lord's love for the history of other peoples, places, and times.
Maybe that's why I like it so much, he thought. Because I'm from somewhere else.
Unlike most of Selgaunt's Old Chauncel, Thamalon did not consider the city such a beacon of cultural superiority that other cultures were not worth studying.
;.
Though most obvious in the parlor, the whole of Storm-weather fairly brimmed with unique antiquities drawn from the four corners of Faerun. The library alone was stocked with treatises from all over the continent, some written in languages even Cale did not understand. Though he despised Selgaunt generally, he loved Stormweather.
He allowed himself a few more moments of peace before forcing himself to rise. He adjusted the cast bronze
