He pulled the daggers from his belt. He looked across the courtyard as though judging the distance to one of the high windows.
'Wait, Kalen!' Fayne caught his hand, and he glared at her. His eyes burned. She swallowed a sudden rush of fear. 'You… saved my life,' she said.
'You stupid girl!' Kalen slammed his fist, dagger and all, into the wall beside her head. The blade rang against the stone, deafening her. 'What the Hells did you think you were doing?'
Fayne was stunned. 'Kalen, I-'
'Shut up. I'm tired of it,' he said. 'You're a spoiled child playing games. Just a stupid fool who thinks there aren't consequences to your pranks-that people don't die.'
'Kalen,' Cellica said, casting her eyes down, her cheeks reddening with embarrassment.
Fayne trembled. 'Please don't,' she said. 'Please, Kalen-I'm sorry!
But Kalen's eyes were cold. 'Begone,' he said. 'I want nothing to do with you. Now, pardon,' he said as he locked his helm in place, 'but I have someone worthwhile to save.'
He ran for the opposite end of the courtyard, leaping from table to table around battles, his enchanted boots guiding him. Screams went up in the courtyatd from startled nobles, and a few wary Watchmen fired crossbows in his direction. The bolts cut through his cloak and one cut open his left arm, but he did not falter. When he gained the far window, he paused and looked back-his colorless gaze cut into Fayne. Then he turned, cloak swirling, and was gone.
Fayne, shocked, pulled herself away from Cellica. She drew out her wand-the wand she could use to hide herself from the world, as she had always done-and glared.
'I'm sorry,' Cellica said. The halfling rubbed her hands together. 'Kalen… he-wait!'
The halfling staggered as Fayne turned her gaze on her and whispered a word of dark magic. Cellica pawed blearily at her face and seemed unable to see Fayne, who had pulled away and hurried down the stairs toward the brawl. Her longer legs meant Cellica could not catch her.
As she went, she growled. 'Didn't warn me about this, Father.'
Avaereene paused when they had run two blocks, to see how many of her men followed. It didn't matter-she held the wealthiest prize in her own arms-but every noble lass taken prisoner was more coin for the Sightless.
She was pleased to see that a dozen had escaped, carrying half that many girls among them. Not all of her men had made it, but desperate men were plentiful in Downshadow she could always hire more.
The lead man stopped at her side. He carried an unconscious Hawkwinter in his arms, head hooded, moaning up a squall through her gag. Though the face was hidden, Avaereene knew all the nobles in Waterdeep by figure as well as face. She had an excellent memory.
'Where, mistress?' asked her lieutenant.
They were panting from exertion. Avaereene wasn't breathing hard-she wasn't breathing at all, as she hadn't had to for almost a century.
'The sewers-keep a low cloak,' she said. 'I shall follow with haste.'
The man nodded and directed the other stealthy kidnappers to follow him. Downshadow men, all of them, and useful enough, even if scarred and ugly.
'Hasn't the spellplague warped us all?' she murmured. She thought of the horror lurking inside her and grinned. 'Some more than others.'
Avaereene stepped into an alley, where she found her employer stepping out of a bank of shadows. His cowl hid most of his face, but she knew he was a half-elf. And while he was not dead, neither was he alive. He was something like her.
'Well accomplished,' he said, indicating the girl in her arms. 'Give her to me.'
'The gold, first.' The blue-headed girl started to moan in her arms as Avaereene began to draw the life from her like a sponge from a pool of water. 'Or she dies.'
His face held no emotion. 'Very well.' He gestured, and a pouch appeared from his sleeve, heavy with coin. His black eyes never left the girl's face.
Instinct told Avaereene to grasp the reward while it was there, but pragmatism stayed her.
'Such a curious thing,' Avaereene said. 'To pay so much for a girl with no family or connections. I do not even know who she is, and I've spent more than a century in Waterdeep.'
Her employer reached out silently and stroked the girl's temple with his gloved hand.
Then he looked up, over A^aereene's shoulder, and she swore she saw his face for half an instant. His lips had drawn back in a hideous grimace, and his teeth seemed very long.
'Shadowbane,' he hissed, more like a serpent than a man. 'Damn that sword!'
'What?' Avaereene asked, but he was gone as though he'd turned to dust.
He had not taken the sleeping girl, but he had snatched the coins back from her. Avaereene snarled in anger and resolved to slay the first thing she saw.
A pair of her thieves came upon her. 'Mistress?' one asked. 'Mistress, what-'
Avaereene tossed the first one aside with a flicker of her will-he shattered against the alley wall. That made her feel better, and appeased the hungry magic within.
She thrust the sleeping girl inro the arms of the other one, wh «looked frozen in terror, and peered down the street. Sure enough, a man ran toward them, glittering steel in his hands, gray cloak trailing behind him. He followed on the heels of four more thieves carrying three noble girls. r 'Kalen,' the girl murmured as she stirred in the thief s arms.
TWENTY-FIVE
'Well met,' Kalen said as he caught the nearest thief by the arm. The man turned and Kalen drove both daggers into his chest.
The thief stiffened, blinked rapidly several times, then fell with a choked gasp as Kalen-hands free from the blades he left in the scoundrel-caught the woman he carried.
No time. He set her aside, ripped the curved sword from the thief s belt, and ran forward.
Ten paces farther, two men carried a bulky noble lass in a green gown between them. They cursed and fumbled, pushing her back and forth. Finally, the smaller of the men-an ugly, warty dwarf-took her, and the freed thief-a half-ore-turned to face Kalen.
The brute bristled with metalnails that stood out from his skin like ghastly pierced rings or jewels. The half- ore hefted a stout buckler on his left arm and a length of barbed chain in his other hand, and opened his mouth to challenge.
Kalen didn't slow-he leaped to twice the half-ore's height in the air, driven by his boots. The brute looked up as Kalen hissed down toward him, sword plunging, deadly as a hawk.
The half-ore interposed his buckler between himself and the airborne knight. Kalen's thrust, backed by all his weight, shattered the stout wood-but snapped in two as well. The half-ore howled in pain as shards of wood flew into his face, putting more shrapnel in his flesh than before. The broken scimitar blade tumbled away.
The half-ore, infuriated, swung his chain at Kalen, who interposed his left arm. The chain enwrapped it greedily, barbs barely short of striking his helm. The slashing razors would have split his face open like a boiled egg. The barbs sank instead into his flesh, deep enough* that he could feel them prickle. The chain-wielder grinned and Kalen realized his misfortune.
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'Tymora-' Kalen managed, before the half-ore jerked the chain and slammed him against a building. Pain swept through his stunned Consciousness, and he sank down.
The half-ore wrenched him over and he flopped like a limp doll to the cobblestones. The impact ripped through him, but he was still alive and still conscious.
'Stlarning Watchman.' He also growled a few Orcish words Kalen knew to be curses.
'Come!' shouted the dwarf, pausing near the half-ore and struggling to hold the kidnapped girl. 'No time!'
'Wait,' said the bruiser, and he reached down to seize Kalen's neck.
