'Ah.' Without more comment, Lissa strode through the mud, intent on catching up with Cleedis. Pinch was about to follow when his attention was snagged by the raised squeal of an enraged halfling.
'Put me down! It's not my fault you lost!'
The halfling was dangling by his arms at eye level with a swarthy trooper, so close he could have licked the man's grubby nose. 'Let's see yer dice,' slurred Sprite's captor.
Pinch sloshed casually through the mud, picking his way through the sudden clot of onlookers. He took his time, curious to see if Sprite just might lick the man's nose.
'It's not my doing you lost the hazard. How could I say I'd throw a bale of deuces? It's just bad luck and you're not taking it well!' the hanging thief protested.
'Pigsy luck, indeed. When it's 'Let's play for drinks,' he throws a whole set and never makes a point-'
'There, you see, just luck!' the halfling kicked and squawked.
'But nows it's 'Lets play for coin' and he can't lose. Play for my coin maybe. I'll be wishing… you'll be wishing you was wishing you was playing somewhere-body else.' The drunken trooper tried to unmangle his meaning while he groped for the purse at Sprite's waist. 'Lemme see them dice and then maybe I'll gut you-'
Darkness slid forward and dealt the man a sharp rap across his fumbling fingers.
'Maybe you want to gut me, too.'
The trooper looked at the bright-bladed dirk that hovered just over his hand, slithering to and fro in Pinch's shifting grasp. It was a snake, violently coiled and tempting the other to foolishness.
'Set him down and go, before I tell Cleedis you were boozing on duty.'
Fear-drunk eyes darted to his fellows for support, but he had gone invisible before their gaze. Suddenly, the soldier knew where he stood: alone, wet, and dirty in the beech wood. Something unholy hacked out an asthmatic howl just across the stream, a howl that almost shaped hungry words of welcome.
Slowly the man set the halfling down.
A pointed flick of the dirk sent the man scurrying, and without him the crowd drifted away to jeer his cowardice. Already the stinging puns and cruel poesy were forming in their minds.
'YOU,' Pinch intoned while snagging Sprite before he disappeared, 'give me the dice.'
Sprite fumbled in his shirt and produced the pair.
Pinch didn't even ask if they were loaded. There was only one answer.
'Get to the tent.'
'What's this, Pinch? Since when would you be knocking in fear from these king's men?'
The rogue answered the challenge by shoving the runt forward. 'It's time for a little talk,' he whispered through clenched teeth.
The tone was enough to get Sprite doing what he was told. The two squeezed into the small tent where Therin and Maeve were chatting, squatted on the ground.
'Listen well.' Pinch thrust Sprite onto a pile of blankets in between the other two. Ducking sideways to avoid the ridgepole, he continued without preamble. 'Well be in Ankhapur soon, a few days at the latest. When we get there, things are going to change. Cleedis came north to get me, and just me. I don't know why he's allowed the rest of you along, but I'd guess he means to use you to keep me in his shackles.' The old rogue smirked darkly. 'Though you're a damn sorry lot of hostages.
' 'Course, he might not be such a fool as to think you've got any sway over me. We all know what happens when somebody gets caught. He's on his own.'
Therin rubbed at the scar around his neck and noted bemusedly, 'You snatched me from the gallows once.'
Pinch didn't like being reminded of that now, or the others might think his motives then were sentimental. 'I didn't get you off the gallows. I let you hang and then I brought you back to life. And I did it for other motives. From here on, this is different. Ankhapur's not Elturel.'
'Ohhh?' Maeve cooed. 'They're both cities. What makes this one so special?
'Besides being your home,' Sprite chimed in.
Pinch looked at Maeve's thick-veined cheeks and the knobby little carrot that was her nose. He could not describe the true Ankhapur to her, the one that filled him with despised love.
'Ankhapur the White.' The words came reverently and then, 'Piss on it. Bloody Ankhapur, it's lesser known. City of Knives, too. Ankhapur's fair; it's got whitewashed walls that gleam in the sun, but it's all hollow and rotten inside. The Families'-Pinch stressed it so that there was nobody listening who didn't hear the salt in his words-'control everything they want, including lives. You'll never find a more cunning master of the confidence games than a man from Ankhapur. Who do you think trained me to run a gang like you? Elturel?'
Therin flopped back on his rick, clearly unimpressed. 'So it's got competition. We've taken down worse.'
Pinch snorted. 'You're not competition-none of you are. What kind of competition are you for a king who kept a personal assassin on the payroll? Or his sons who taught playmates how to strike down their enemies? This isn't just doing the black art on a weak lock or ripping the cove from a temple roof.' Pinch slipped the Morninglord's amulet from his shirt and plopped it on the damp ground between them. 'They're playing for stakes that make this look small-title and crown of all Ankhapur.
'We're just a bunch of petty thieves. They're princes, dukes, and barons of the land. First Prince Bors, Second Prince Vargo, followed by Princes Throdus and Marac- there's a murderous lot. Bors is too much of an idiot to be any danger, but don't worry. Our dear Lord Chamberlain out there, the duke of Senestra, has gone begging for a fool to protect his own interests. Oh, and there's more. Tomas, Duke of the Port, is Manferic's brother, and Lady Graln was his sister-in-law. She's got whelps, princelings of the Second Order, for whom she'd kill to see crowned. Finally, there's the Hierarch Juricale. They call him the Red Priest, he's got enough blood on him. He and his sect hold the Knife and the Cup, so you can imagine no one gets crowned without his say.' With slender fingers, Pinch counted out the titles until there were no fingers left. 'Every one of them's a scorpion in the sheets. Compared to them, we're lewds.'
'They sent Cleedis up here for you,' Sprite mused, as his foot gently slid toward the bauble at his feet.
'Royal Ward Janol, Pinch to you,' the regulator mocked. A light kick with his boot kept the halfling's furred foot at bay. 'It's not as though the royal ward has any chance or claim. Cleedis wants me for some reason, but it's just as like there'll be a mittimus for your arrest as soon as we strike Ankhapur. From here on, abroad or in the city, cut your words goodly and keep your eyes open like quick intelligencers or somebody'll cut your weasand-pipe for certain.' That said, Pinch scooped up the amulet and turned to leave.
'And you, Pinch dear?' Maeve asked.
The rogue considered the truth, considered a lie, and then spoke. 'I'll stand by you all and cross-lay old Cleedis's plans any way I can.' He smiled a little, the way he chose when no one was to know his true thoughts. The afternoon shadows, creeping through the door, gave all the warmth to his thin reassurance.
Outside, after ten steps, he met Lissa as though she'd been lurking around waiting for this casual rendezvous. The woman had finally shed her saintly armor, and the effect was a transformation. Pinch had become so used to the rumpscuttle mien of a warrior woman that he was taken aback by her change to more demure clothes. Her silvery vestments, though long and shamefast, were still more flattering than battered steel made to cover every weak point of her sex. Her arms were half-bare to the cool air, and her slender, fair neck uncased from its sheath of gorgetted steel. Hair, brown and curly, tousled itself playfully in the breeze. Without all that metal, she stepped lighter and with more grace than did the clank and jingle of her armored self. The transformation from amazon to gentry maid was startlingly complete.
'Greetings, Lord Janol,' Lissa hailed, catching the rogue not at his best. 'How fare you and your companions? Lord Cleedis says we shall be upon Ankhapur on the morrow.'
'We?'
With a knowing, impish smile, Lissa brushed a loose wisp back into the tumble of her hair. 'Certainly. Like yourself, Lord Cleedis is a gentleman. He's offered me passage to Ankhapur rather than leave me in this wilderness.'
Either she now suspects me and favors Cleedis or the chamberlain is playing the game, using her and her temple as a threat over me. If that's the case, does she know her part, or can I still direct her? Taking up his mantle as the lordly Janol, Pinch smiled and bowed while making his cold calculations.
'As well the chamberlain should. And if he had not, I would have insisted upon it.'
'Well, I'm glad you would because I'm still counting on you to help me find a thief.' Her voice dropped to a
