The Shattered Mask

Chapter 17

Shamur watched with admiration as Thamalon, seemingly recovered from the ill effects of his head wound, approached the dais and throne at the far end of the cavernous chamber. With his chin held high and his easy smile, he looked more like an honored envoy at the court of some friendly monarch than a prisoner in a den of robbers and murderers.

Meanwhile, the chieftain of the Quippers, a blond, square-jawed hulk as huge as Talbot or Vox, evidently liked to affect the appearance of a simple fisherman, for he sported the sandals, slop-hose, and open, sleeveless tunic that such folk often wore in clement weather. The creature on his knee, however, rather spoiled the illusion, for it was a gray, red-eyed galltrit. Such gremlins lived in filth and, like leeches, subsisted on the blood of others. No common waterman would treat such a nasty beast like a pet. Shamur suspected no one would, unless his own disposition and habits were equally foul.

Arriving at the foot of the dais, Thamalon inclined his head, respectfully but by no means servilely. "Good morning, or is it afternoon by now? Either way, you must be Avos the Fisher. My name is Balan, and my companion is Evaine. We work for the House of Karn."

It was a bold lie, but not, Shamur thought, an idiotic one. Though Thamalon had opposed the Quippers off and on for a number of years, it had always been through the medium of the Scepters and other agents, never face to face. It was quite possible that none of the rogues assembled in this room had ever seen him up close, or her either. Or at least, not unless the knave in question was one of the those who had accompanied Master Moon into the woods.

Even if some of them had, the Uskevren still might go unrecognized. They'd changed their appearances since the previous encounter, and, by venturing unescorted into the Scab, had behaved in a manner that no one would expect of an aristocrat. Moreover, all the scoundrels gathered here presumably "knew" that Shamur and Thamalon were dead, and that false certainty might serve to disguise them best of all.

She held her breath as she waited to see if he was going to get away with the deception.

By the time the ruffians in the street had finished subduing and disarming her, she'd realized she hadn't been stabbed or cut in the back after all, just clubbed very painfully, and thereafter, all the toughs had contented themselves with battering her with the flats of their blades, their boots, or other blunt implements. Evidently they wanted to take her and Thamalon alive for questioning.

The bravos tended in the most cursory fashion to their wounded comrades, rifled the pockets of the slain ones, then roughly hauled the nobles to their feet and marched them away, one scoundrel running on ahead to carry the news of their apprehension. At first the Quippers virtually had to carry Thamalon, but to Shamur's relief, he revived by the time they reached their destination.

On the outside, that terminus was yet another grimy, crumbling brownstone tenement. Inside, she saw that the Quippers had transformed the bottom two floors of the building into what might almost be deemed a parody of a spacious, lordly hall, tearing out the ceiling and most of the interior walls to create a single open space. The renovation had left scars and grit behind. Rats scuttled in the shadows. Trash and litter rotted wherever anyone had cared to drop it.

Yet atop the rubble and decay lay a veneer of luxury, like sweet frosting on a toadstool. Costly furniture, disintegrating rapidly from the hard and careless use it was receiving, stood haphazardly about the floor, along with kegs of ale and racks of wine. Paintings and tapestries hung crookedly on the walls. Some had been used for target practice, and the hilts of throwing knives jutted from their surfaces. Others had been scrawled upon in the expression of a coarse and ribald wit. Shamur surmised that all these once-fine articles constituted booty stolen from the docks. A miscellany of nautical implements, including oars, harpoons, nets, and a collection of painted figureheads, added yet another note of bizarreness to the decor.

The hall was likewise full of surly-looking toughs and their hard-eyed doxies, many of whom had peered curiously as the Uskevren's captors shoved them toward Avos the Fisher's seat.

Now the huge rogue sneered down at Thamalon. "What did you think you were playing at," he rumbled, in a voice as deep as Shamur had ever heard issue from a human throat, "poking around in my domain?"

Shamur felt a frisson of excitement. Avos hadn't challenged Thamalon's assertion that the two of them were mere agents of the House of Karn. Evidently he believed it. The nobles were still in deadly peril, of course, but perhaps not quite as much as if the Quippers had known who they really were. It was just conceivable that they might be able to talk their way out of this predicament.

Thamalon smiled up at Avos. "In retrospect, it doesn't seem like such a good idea. But our master commanded us to come to the Scab and ferret out information. We hoped we could obtain it and depart without attracting unwanted attention. Plainly, we were overly optimistic." Avos snorted. "Aye, cully, you were. There was a time when you might have slipped in and out unnoticed, but not anymore. These days, I rule the Scab, and I know it every time a roach crawls or a louse bites. Now, what were you trying to find out?"

Thamalon shrugged. "If your spies"-at this the gall-trit preened and leered, baring its pointed fangs, and Avos scratched it behind the ear-"overheard us, you presumably know already. We're inquiring into the murders of Shamur Uskevren, who was born a Karn, and her husband."

Some of the watchers muttered to one another. Avos ji shot them a glare, and they subsided. "Why, I didn't even if know they had been murdered," the big man said, in a tone of mock innocence that made it plain he didn't care whether Thamalon believed him or not. "What makes you think the Quippers had anything to do with it?"

"Lord Karn is certain you did," Thamalon replied. "As I understand it, one member of your band, a fellow with fish-scale tattoos and a gold ring in his lip, related the tale to the wrong streetwalker, who subsequently sold it to my employer."

"That pinhead!" one of the onlookers exclaimed. "Quiet!" Avos snarled, then gave Thamalon a malevolent smile. "I can't imagine how you'd ever be able to repeat anything I say, but I suppose I should deny everything just as a matter of principle."

"That would be prudent, though futile," Thamalon said. "The assassination of two of the most prominent nobles in the city is a grave matter. Should your involvement become common knowledge, Selgaunt might rouse itself and do whatever's necessary to eradicate the Quippers. Fortunately for you, however, Lord Karn understands you fellows were acting for someone else, a peer from a rival House, most likely, and that's the man he particularly wants to chastise. So I propose a bargain on his behalf. Give up the person who hired you, and the House of Karn will keep your secret and leave you in peace. We'll even pay you."

Avos's piggy pale blue eyes narrowed. "Why didn't you seek me out right off if you wanted to make a deal like that?"

"Because we didn't actually want to," Thamalon said. "The Karns would have preferred to learn their enemy's identity without having to spare you the retribution you deserve, let alone compensate you. But my partner and I are realists. Our current situation being what it is, we'd much rather reach an accommodation with you than have you kill us."

Avos grinned. "But that's what I ought to do. It would send a message to everybody else who might want to come sniffing around my little fiefdom."

"It's not a message that will deter Lord Karn. He has plenty of other agents."

"Maybe so, cully, but we're not afraid of any of them. Lots of high-and-mighty merchant nobles have tried before to wipe out the Quippers, and we're still here."

"But I imagine life is pleasanter when you're spared the necessity of defending yourselves against such a siege."

"That's doesn't mean we'd turn traitor or informer to keep it from happening."

"Of course not," Thamalon said dryly. "I'm sure you're a steadfast band of brothers. Loyal as paladins in a romance, but only, and this is the key point, to one another. I suspect that any outsider who opts to trust you takes his chances. Am I right?"

"No, you're not right," the big man growled, "not always. But… I didn't altogether like the way this particular job went down. Oh, Uskevren and his lady dying, that was grand. That was fine as cakes and wine. But too many of the lads have been killed or hurt, lads I need to attend to my business, and nobody bothered to warn me what we were getting into. I don't appreciate that. So, Balan, swear by your god that Lord Karn will abide by any agreement you make, and then tell me how much gold you're offering." "No!" shouted one of the onlookers, a small man with a pointed black goatee, and lines of gold piping running up the legs of his breeches and the breast of his doublet. "You can't set these snoopers free. She killed some of our mates! That woman there!"

"Shut up, Donvan!" Avos roared, and the little man quailed. "If a female could kill them, we're better off without them."

Shamur could tell from his subordinates' expressions that some resented their leader's cold dismissal of the deaths of their comrades, but no one saw fit to voice another protest.

Her heart raced with exhilaration. Against all rational expectation, Thamalon had succeeded. His glib trader's tongue had won them their lives and even the information they had sought.

Or so it seemed until someone shouted, "Hold it!" She turned and saw a plump, unhealthy-looking man in a costly but hideous mauve and chartreuse doublet, the same would-be coxcomb who had stood with Master Moon and the shadow creature at the edge of the clearing, scurrying forward. Evidently he'd entered the brown-stone unnoticed a moment or two before.

"What do you want, Garris?" Avos asked, an edge of impatience in his voice.

"Look at them!" Garris cried. "Everybody look! Don't you recognize them? Avos, I know I said I watched them die, but somehow, these people are Lord and Lady Uskevren themselves!"

The room fell silent as everyone gawked at the nobles. Shamur looked at the armed men clustered all around her and decided it would be pointless to try to break for the door. Finally, Avos exclaimed, "Umberlee's kiss, it's true!"

His composure unruffled, Thamalon gave Garris a nod. "You have a keen eye, sir." He turned back toward the giant on the throne. "I see no reason why this revelation should spoil our negotiations. I'm still willing to pay for the name of the man who hired you, and now, of course, to ransom my wife and myself as well."

Avos laughed. "You've got brass, old man, I'll give you that. But I don't suppose you truly believe we'd ever turn you loose. You've always gone out of your way to persecute the Quippers, and now we're going to return the favor. Then later, after we've had our fun, I'll sell what's left of you to your secret enemy. You can find out who he is when you look him in the face, that is, if we let you keep your eyes. Grab them, mates!"

So be it, Shamur thought. Thamalon's gambit had failed, and now she must try the ploy she had conceived on the walk to the outlaws' lair. One of the toughs who were moving in to seize her was half a step in advance of the others. Rounding on him, her bruised limbs protesting, she shouted, "Bring a waste, cove!" Then she kicked him in the groin.

Someone tried to grab her from behind. "Shamur knows that cog," she growled.

She thrust her elbow back into his gut, stamped on his foot, and then, when his grip loosened, pivoted and smashed her forearm into his jaw. His front teeth broke, and he reeled backward.

She spun back around to face the rogues rushing up behind her. "Come on!" she screamed. "You capons! You cousins! Shamur will bash out your crashing-cheats! She'll curb out your glaziers and eat them like grapes!"

Since she knew she had no chance of fighting her way free, her resistance was in one sense a sham. But she had to buy herself sufficient time to let them hear her rant. For all she knew, they might have intended to stuff a gag in her mouth before commencing whatever torture they had in mind.

Now, plainly, they had heard her. They were hanging back and staring, some with more comprehension than others. "She speaks Cant," Donvan said.

Cant was the secret patois of the most professional of thieves, useful both for confounding eavesdroppers and as a means of mutual recognition. Shamur had mastered it in her youth, and still remembered most of it though she hadn't had occasion to use it since her displacement in time.

"You're damn right, copesmate," she said. "Of course, Shamur talks Cant. She pledged to Mask when she was only a rumpscuttle lass, before any of you flicks and ferrets were even born. She's practiced the figging law, nipping purses with a cuttle-bung. She's been a charm and a cony-catcher, a foin, a padder, and a prigger of prancers, a warp and a stall. Later, she married that gentry cove j there." She jerked her chin at Thamalon, currently standing battered and helpless in the grip of two of his captors. "But slipping on his fambling-cheat didn't change what Shamur was inside."

"You've led a colorful life," Avos drawled, "but so what? Did you think we'd spare you just because you were once a fellow rogue? Not likely!"

"I was more than a rogue," Shamur replied. "I was a Quipper."

The bravos and doxies babbled to one another. Avos said, "Nonsense."

"It was more than thirty years ago," she replied, "before your time or that of anyone in this hall." And since she was lying, thank the gods for that! "But I can still give the sign: Sharp eyes, sharp blade. Still tread, still tongue." In her mind, she blessed the lovesick, drunken Quipper who had once whispered the gang's secret protocols in her adolescent ear.

Some of the blackguards were visibly impressed by her recitation. Avos simply scowled and said, "I still don't believe you were ever one of us, but if you were, you're now a traitor for slaying some of your own brothers, and we have even better reason to hurt you."

"I slew them in self-defense," Shamur said, "as our rule permits. But we don't even need to debate that, and I'll tell you why. We say, once a Quipper, always a Quipper, do we not? Even death can't break the bond; the shades of our predecessors are waiting to welcome us into the chapter of the brotherhood they've established in Hell."

Avos grinned. "Then if you're telling the truth, you'll be seeing them soon."

"Not necessarily," Shamur replied, "because it is likewise our tradition that any of our members accused of wrongdoing has the right to demand a trial by combat against the chieftain of the gang, and go free if he prevails."

The big man laughed. "You want to fight me?"

"Yes," she said.

"Do it, captain!" someone shouted. "We haven't watched you scrap in a while."

Shamur could see enthusiasm for the idea running through the crowd like a fever. In all likelihood, a number of the rogues simply craved the spectacle of a bloody duel. Some seemed to think it a splendid joke that the slender captive would think to challenge their enormous and no doubt formidable leader. While others, perhaps, wanted to see Avos annoyed and inconvenienced, because they still resented his indifference to the slaying of their fellows, or disliked his bullying ways in general.

"Don't be stupid," Avos said to his followers. "The wench is lying. How many female Quippers have there ever been? Damn few!"

"She knows Cant and the Quipper signs," said Garris, and then flinched when Avos scowled at him.

"Who cares if she was a Quipper or not?" cried another ruffian. "Let's have a little sport!"

"Yes," Donvan said ironically, "why not? After all, Avos, if you can't defeat a female, we're better off without you."

The blond hulk snorted. "All right, mates, if that's how everybody wants it, I suppose it doesn't matter if Lady Uskevren here"-his sneering tone turned the title into a mockery-"dies quickly. It's her man I truly want to pick apart, just as he's the package our associate will really want to buy. But I can't promise you much of a show. Not only is the prisoner a woman, she's well past her prime."

"I wouldn't be surprised if the Quippers I've already killed thought that very same thing," Shamur replied. "Give me back my broadsword, and I'll do my best to make our contest as interesting as possible."

Avos sneered. "If you truly were a Quipper, you should remember that in a duel like this, he who was challenged has the choice of weapons."

In fact, Shamur hadn't known, and now she felt a twinge of apprehension. "Oh, of course," she said lightly. "What did you have in mind?"

Til show you," he said.

Avos snapped his fingers, gave the galltrit a final caress, then set the creature gently on the arm of his chair. As he rose and stepped down from the dais, one of his underlings hurried up with two unusual sets of weapons, each composed of a short sword and a fishing gaff, a sturdy, four-foot shaft of wood with a barbed steel hook at the end.

Shamur had never heard of anyone fighting with such a tool. She wondered if Avos had invented this particular mode of combat, and was its sole master. That would certainly tilt the odds in his favor whenever any of his fellow Quippers dared to challenge him.

"Look them over," Avos said, "then choose the ones you like."

She took him at his word, hefting the weapons to check their weight and balance and finding little to choose between them. She settled on the gaff that was a hair lighter and the short sword with the narrower, sharper point. "These will do," she said.

"Good," he said. "Now, just so we're clear: Your husband doesn't claim to be a Quipper, and even if a god reaches down and smites me, which is about the only way I can see you winning, Thamalon stays with us." "Fair enough," she said. "Let's do this." "After you, milady." He waved her toward a circle sloppily painted on the concrete floor. Judging from the rusty stains inside it, it had served as a dueling arena on a number of previous occasions.

Shamur and Avos took their places at opposite ends of the ring. The other ruffians crowded around its border. Garris, assuming the director's role, declared, "The fight will continue until one duelist yields or is unable to continue. Fighters, come on guard.'' Shamur copied her opponent's stance, slightly crouched, with the gaff in the lead hand. "And… begin!"

The two combatants circled, sizing one another up, looking for openings. Shamur was likewise trying to figure out how one fought with this particular set of weapons. The essential principle seemed clear enough: Use the long gaff to snare an opponent, either by hooking one of his limbs or snagging his flesh with the barbed point, then yank him close and thrust the short sword into his vitals. With his superior reach and strength, Avos could no doubt execute all the variations on the basic maneuver very well.

Still, she could envision an effective counter. Parry her enemy's gaff with her own, then hold the parry to keep his weapon at bay while she closed the distance, bringing them both well into short sword range before he was expecting it. Caught by surprise at such close quarters, Avos would have a hard time defending against a low thrust to the belly.

The Quipper chieftain stepped forward just far enough to flick his gaffs hook behind her shoulder. Beginning the sequence of actions she'd devised, she parried, but her weapon never made contact with that of her opponent.

Instantly, with a quickness phenomenal in so huge a man, Avos dropped into a squat. He slipped the gaff around the calf of her lead leg and yanked it toward him. Shamur kicked frantically to free herself, and by sheer good luck more than anything else, her leg came out of the hook. The point caught in her leather boot for a second, then tore free.

Now she was reeling and in imminent danger of toppling backward. Avos surged up out of his squat and rushed her, his short sword leveled at her breast. Some of his comrades cheered in anticipation of the death thrust.

As well they might, for, utterly bereft of balance as she was, Shamur could neither parry, dodge, nor attempt a counterattack. She reckoned that all she could do was finish falling, and so she endeavored to do so as quickly as possible, hurling herself down to the cold, hard concrete floor.

As she'd hoped, Avos blundered right over the top of her. She tried to hook his ankle with her gaff before he could wheel back around to face her, but she missed.

She grinned as she scrambled back to her feet. Sometimes, for some perverse reason, it struck her funny when she cheated death by a hair, and this was one of those occasions.

"Very good," she said to Avos, "you nearly had me. But I think I'm starting to get the hang of this game. Feint, deceive, then attack, just like in ordinary fencing."

He sneered. "Got it figured out already, have you?" Advancing, he swung his gaff like a war club, whipping the head in a backhanded strike at her face.

She stepped back out of distance and kept on retreating around the circle, counterattacking and riposting vigorously enough to keep him from pressing her as hard as he might have otherwise, but essentially remaining on the defensive while she waited for him to use the same high feint, drop, and hook to the leg he'd tried before. She reckoned it was only a matter of time. The combination had almost won him the fight. Eventually he was bound to try it again. She just had to stay alive until he did.

Actually, that wasn't turning out to be an enormous problem. He was discovering the same thing she had learned while chasing Thamalon about the clearing. It was difficult to hurt an opponent who constantly gave ground. Indeed, she began to enjoy thwarting him, and grinned at the frustration in his ruddy, sweaty face and porcine eyes.

At last he threatened her shoulder, and her instincts told her he was attempting the compound attack she wanted him to make. She parried anyway, to convince him the trick was working and to protect herself in case she was mistaken, and he dropped to one knee. His gaff swept at her leg.

Having anticipated the attack, she hopped to one side and easily avoided it. Before he could come back to any sort of guard, she lashed her own gaff at his head.

She meant to set the barb in his flesh, but, perhaps because of her unfamiliarity with this peculiar weapon, that didn't happen. Still, clanking against his skull, the steel hook split open his scalp.

The spectators roared. Shamur aimed her short sword and lunged. Avos blindly swept his gaff up in a blow that, though it failed to connect solidly, brushed her back and gave him time to lurch to his feet.

Blood streamed from the scalp wound, trickling down the ruffian's face. Shamur relished the sight of it, and his shocked expression even more so.

"I told you I was getting the hang of it," she said.

Avos shouted and rushed her. She retreated, waiting for the right opportunity, and, thirty seconds later, bashed him again.

Thamalon supposed he should have been too concerned about the fundamental question of their survival to dwell on lesser matters, but once again, as at other moments during the past two days, he found himself marveling at Shamur's deportment in the face of danger.

The Uskevren lord had done plenty of fighting during his long and turbulent life. He liked to think he had seen it through with reasonable fortitude. But while he had certainly savored his victories, and taken pleasure in fencing and jousting for sport, he had never enjoyed the actual experience of mortal combat. That chilling awareness that if his opponent proved the better warrior, or perchance merely the luckier one, his life was quite possibly going to end.

Shamur, on the other hand, clearly did delight in it. Though she must be sore from the beating she d taken, her pleasure was manifest in her smile and the gleam in her eyes, a show of vivacity such as he had seldom seen from her in over a quarter century of marriage. Ilmater's tears, now and again she even laughed, generally immediately after a close call that would have left many people white and sick with shock.

When he'd first learned her secret, and she'd told him she needed this sort of stimulation to be happy, he had, in his consternation and anger, assumed she was talking nonsense. Now, however, he could see that her assertion might well be true, and sensed just how profoundly she had denied her own nature when she assumed her grand-niece's identity.

Perhaps her love of risk was part of what made her such a superb fighter, for that she surely was. Avos was younger, stronger, had the superior reach, and possessed the substantial advantage of having trained with the odd set of weapons, yet Shamur was beating him. Thamaion was glad that, assuming the Quippers honored their pledge, she at least was likely to leave this wretched.

Or so he thought until he chanced to glimpse a flicker of motion from the corner of his eye.

He turned his head to spy the galltrit flying upward toward the high ceiling. The stealthy little creature carried what appeared to be a toy crossbow in its diminutive hands.

Thamaion suspected the quarrel was poisoned. In all likelihood, no spectator would notice the tiny missile striking its target, yet the venom would be potent enough to hamper Shamur and allow the hard-pressed Avos to overcome her, win the duel by a cheat, and still maintain the respect of his underlings.

Thamaion would have liked to point out the gremlins obvious intent to the other Quippers, but there was no time. The rogues were focused on the duel, and by the time he managed to divert one's attention, the galltrit would already have taken its shot and fluttered away. Nor would it be efficacious to shout and warn Shamur. The way the crowd was yelling, she likely wouldn't hear him, and even if she did, the distraction might provide Avos with just the chance he needed to land a telling blow.

Fortunately. Thamalon's guards were as interested in the duel as everyone else, too interested to watch him especially closely. Exploding into motion, he shoved one away, snatched the poniard from the other's sheath, pushed him away as well, turned, and hurled the dagger.

The poniard wasn't well balanced for throwing, but it flew true anyway, and pierced the galltrit's breast. The bat-winged imp gave a thin, quavering cry and fell, thudding down in the combat circle.

By that time several ruffians were moving in on Thamaion with blades in their hands and murder in their eyes. Suspecting they had at best only a murky idea of what had just occurred, the noble pointed frantically at the gray, diminutive corpse.

"Look at the gremlin!" he roared in his most imperious tone. "Look at that little crossbow. The cursed thing was going to cheat on behalf of its master, and if I'm to be harmed for killing it to keep the fight fair, then by Тут Grimjaws, you stinking Quippers have no honor at all!"

The ruffians hesitated, then black-bearded Donvan said, "His lordship's got a point, and besides, we want to sell him, not kill him. Put up your weapons and watch the rest of the show."

The galltrit's body thumped down inside the dueling circle. As soon as Shamur caught sight of the little crossbow in the creature's hand, she understood what it had been up to. She grinned at Avos. "Did you signal the gremlin somehow, or did it simply know to intervene whenever you were losing a challenge?"

An ugly muttering started through the crowd. Some of the Quippers had no doubt watched Avos slaughter their friends inside this ring. Now they had reason to doubt that he'd beaten them fairly.

For a moment, Avos looked stricken. Aghast. Then his square, ruddy face grew redder still, and pure rage blazed in his pale blue eyes. He bellowed and charged, swinging the gaff at Shamur's face.

She parried, and the force of his blow sent a shock down her arm. Instantly, contemptuous of any attempt she might have made to riposte, he stepped through with his back foot and drove his short sword at her chest.

She parried with her blade and attempted a thrust of her own, but he was still surging forward, spoiling her aim, and instead of piercing his bowels, her point simply grazed along his ribs.

Seemingly unfazed by this new wound, Avos slammed into her and sent her staggering. He tried to hook her leg and she barely managed to bat his gaff away with her own. Instantly he sprang forward and lashed the weapon at her head.

Recovering her balance, she swayed back, and the gaff missed her nose by half an inch. Whirling the weapon over bis head, he rushed her yet again.

She smiled, for she understood what he was doing. Since his tricks hadn't worked, he was playing the big man's game, trying to overwhelm her with sheer might and relentless aggression. It was a strategy that had won many a fight for many a strapping fellow like himself, but it was incompatible with a strong defense. If a fighter possessed the skill to withstand his onslaught for long enough-and Shamur reckoned that she did-Avos would inevitably leave himself wide open for a riposte or stop cut.

She gave ground, parrying, gritting her teeth at the appalling power in the strokes that stung her fingers and once or twice nearly bashed her weapons from her hands. Until finally Avos blundered forward with a poorly aimed attack, so poorly aimed, in fact, that she was confident he would be unable to correct and strike her if she simply sidestepped. As he plunged past her, she swept her gaff low, hooked his ankle, and pulled.

Avos crashed face down on the floor. His foot flailed free of the hook, and he tried to scramble up. Shamur swung the gaff high and slammed it down on top of his head, splitting his scalp anew. Losing his grip on his weapons, he slumped. Dropping the gaff, she sprang on top of him, wrenched him onto his back, and poised her short sword at his throat.

The spectators howled. Avos gazed up at her with astonishment and fear in his eyes. "I yield," he said. Shamur chuckled. "I figured you probably would." "So you can back off now. You're free to go." "Those were the terms before the galltrit tried to cheat for you. I think it's appropriate that we amend them. Lord Uskevren and I are both leaving."

Avos scowled. "No." She was surprised that he'd stick at releasing Thamalon with her blade at his neck, but perhaps he felt impelled to try to salvage a bit of his pride, or at least a scrap of his underlings' respect "He stays."

Shamur raised her sword to threaten his eyes. "Tell your friends to let him go right now, or by Mask, mine is the last face you will ever see. Nor will I stop cutting after that."

"You hurt me, the other Quippers will hurt him." "But you'll still be hurt. Don't play that game with me, Avos, you won't like the way it turns out. You should realize by now that I'm not the sort of woman who shrinks at the sight of blood, not even her husband's."

"All right," Avos growled, "let the nobleman go." Shamur held her breath, for she was by no means certain that the rogues would let such a lucrative prize slip through their fingers merely to save their defeated and discredited chieftain. But perhaps some of them still held Avos in some esteem. Others surely didn't, but maybe they also felt that Shamur had fought valiantly enough to earn her husband's liberation as well as her own. Or perhaps no one wanted to be the first to advocate allowing Avos's mutilation, for fear that nobody else would agree with him. Whatever the reason, after a moment, Thamalon's guards stepped away from him, and none of the other toughs objected.

"Good," Shamur said. "Now, someone fetch the weapons, money, and jewels you took from us."

Donvan collected the articles and handed them over to Thamalon.

"Now get out of here," Avos said.

"Call me a cynic," Shamur replied, "but I can't help wondering whether you'd still consent to our departure if my blade were no longer tickling you. So here's how it will be. You're going to walk us out of the Scab, with our sword points at your back every step of the way. Now stand up very slowly."

Thamalon sauntered to her side. "Nicely done," he said.

She smiled. "It would all have been for naught if you hadn't killed the galltrit."

"I believe we still require a name."

"You're right. I nearly forgot." She prodded Avos in the kidney with her sword. "Enlighten us."

"I don't know who the wizard in the moon mask is," the ruffian answered grudgingly, "but the nobleman who paid me to supply men to aid the spellcaster is Ossian Talendar."