And then he was alone.
A short while later, a shadow of wine-red velvet and white lace slipped past the bored guard beyond the door.
The salt-and-pepper-haired ghost padded through carpeted hallways, just slipping into dark doorways as stewards and ladies hurried by. They were blinded from the stranger's presence by their duties. Guards protected doorways, ignoring the arched halls behind them.
Pinch stayed to the darkest hallways, stuffed with their out-of-fashion trophy heads, past the servant quarters, along long avenues of interconnected halls. From the open windows that looked out over the courtyard where a squad of trainees drilled came the whiff of roasted sulfur and animal dung.
Trainees, he thought as he caught glimpses of the recruits bungling their drill. By rights, only the elite served here, but these amateurs bore the crest of Prince Vargo. These men were hasty recruits brought in as fodder to strengthen one princeling's hand. So it's come to this, each prince dredging the city for his own personal guard.
In the western wing, the search ended at a trio of guarded doors. That amused Pinch-the hopeless thought that his underlings would be challenged by a stand of overtrained watchmen. In this he was sure Cleedis or whoever was just naive; believing that only he was the threat, they underestimated the others.
It did not take long for Pinch to find a way to slip in unnoticed, and if he could get in, they could get out.
'He's fobbed you with a bale of barred eater-treys,' the regulator chuckled as he sauntered off the balcony and interrupted Therin and Sprite's friendly dice game.
The game stopped in midthrow as the two twitched alert, their faces openly showing their native suspicion.
'Well, well. Doesn't need us for a damn, does he? Now look who walks in.'
The halfling, perhaps with a better sense of caution, kept his mouth shut.
'You should know how things stand, Therin.'
'Perhaps I do-Master Pinch. Or is it Lord Janol here?'
Pinch sidled away from the open window, just in case someone was watching. 'As your prefer. Tell me, should I call you a fool?'
'Watch your prattling!' The dagger that suddenly appeared the man's hand reinforced his warning.
The regulator remained unruffled. 'You really think I'd given you up, after I'd saved you from hanging in Elturel? It's a game, Gur, like those dice you hold. If they think you're worthless to me, then they'll not kill you to make me mind. Put your skene away and use your head.'
The halfling gave a gentle restraining tug on the bladesman's sleeve. 'Whether he's telling the truth or lying, he's right, Therin. Maybe we don't mean anything to him and maybe we do-but if they think we're a hold over him then we're all dead as a surety.'
The master rogue nodded agreement to the halfling's words. 'The game's to get them to think what you want them to think, not to play fair.' He pointed to the dice in Therin's palm. 'I'll wager you a groat you can't roll a five or a nine with Sprite's dice.'
'I would never, not to my friends!' Sprite protested in his tinny voice.
The Gur eased back from his coil, slid his knife away and eyed the dice casually. 'That might be,' he drawled with particular serenity to make his point, 'or maybe I've crossed him with a bale of contraries.' He reached into his blouse and produced a pair of identical-looking dice. 'That's how the game is played.'
'Unfair! You've been figging me!' squealed the half-ling. He scrambled to gather up the winnings before anyone might stop him. Therin moved almost as quick, and there was a flurry of reaching and grabbing as the coins and notes in the pot vanished from the floor.
'Well played, high lawyer!' The release of anxiety welled up inside the regulator and translated itself into spurt of laugher.
When they were finished, Pinch settled into the softest chair in the room. Compared to his, this small bedroom was spartan; compared to the previous rooms of the lot, it was luxurious. The rascals had been given a set of three connected chambers, which gave them more space than they really needed.
'How fare you three?' the rogue asked.
'Well enough…' Therin was too busy counting his loot to be bothered.
'Can't say much for the rooms, but they made a fine breakfast.'
Pinch wasn't sure if the halfling was being sarcastic or true to his nature. Whenever there was loot, Sprite- Heels was always squandering his on homey comforts and food, pretending to live the burghermeister's life. He'd talk about going home, describing a place of rich fields, rolling hills, and barrow homes where he could work an honest life and everyone was 'Uncle' or 'Grandmother' or 'Brother.' Contrary to this, a few times when he was truly drunk, the Hairfoot revealed another choice for his upbringing: an orphan's life in cold, wattled shacks along Elturel's muddy riverbank. Pinch could only wonder which, if either, was real.
'Where's Maeve?'
The Gur nodded toward the closed door on the left wall. There were three doors, one on each wall, and the smallish balcony behind Pinch. The door to the right was open, hinting at a room like this one. The door on the wall opposite was larger, probably locked, and a guard stood on the other side. That left the third door where Maeve was, in a room identical to this one. But not perfectly identical; from the outside only the center room had a balcony.
'She sweet-talked a guard for a couple of bottles of bub last night and she wasn't in a sharing mood. Sleeping it off, she is.' Sprite pocketed his crooked dice and brushed his clothes clean.
'Damn Lliira's curse. Roust her.'
The other two exchanged a wicked grin. 'As you say!'
In a few moments, a splash followed by a shriek of sputtering outrage echoed from the other room. This was followed by man and halfling tumbling through the door.
'By troth, she's in a foul humor!' Therin's words were punctuated by a sizzle of sparks, green and red, that arced over his head followed by a billow of bitter smoke, a pyrotechnic display of her anger.
Pinch planted himself on the balcony and waited for Maeve's handiwork to clear.
Maeve emerged with eyes of red sorrow, her body sagging in the knot of nightclothes, wet with water dripping from her stringy hair. Spotting Therin, she fumbled into her sleeves looking for some particularly nasty scrap of bat wing or packet of powdered bone.
'Good morn, Maeve,' Pinch interrupted as he stepped from the balcony.
Without missing a beat, the wizardess bowed slightly to the thief. 'Greetings to you, Master Pinch. You sent these wags to soak me?
'I sent them to wake you. You were drunk.'
The witch drew herself up. 'Hung over. Not drunk.'
'Drunk-and when I need you sober. Fail me again, and I'll cut you off.' With that the rogue turned to other business, turning away from her in disdain for her temper and her spells. 'What have you learned?' he asked of the other two.
'Damned little. It's only been a day.'
'We aren't going to have many days here,' the regulator snapped back. 'Do you think this is a pleasure trip? How about escape-the ogre and the hounds?'
As he expected, the pair had done more than they allowed. 'The hounds are kenneled in the southeast corner,' Sprite began. 'I don't know where the ogre sleeps.'
'Close by his pack would be the best guess,' the Gur added.
'After that, there's three gates to the city. Counted those when we came in.'
'What about getting out of here?'
'They keeps us locked in all the time, 'cept for meals and necessaries.' The halfling scratched his furred foot. 'Well, there's the balcony where you got in. The other two rooms got windows we can climb down.'
'You maybe, you little imp, not me,' Maeve sniped.
'You'll do as you must, dear. What about secret passages-Sprite? Therin?'
'None we found, Pinch.'
The older man nodded. 'I'm thinking there's one in mine.'
'What do we do now, Pinch?'
