Paul Kidd - The Council of Blades

Elves clustered together, staring at Miliana and talking in avid, animated whispers. Miliana mentally classified them as intellectual midgets and went proudly on her way.

Passing before a jasmine bower, Miliana heard a rich voice pitching itself into a smooth, seductive litany.

"You and I… two creatures almost from different worlds. Who knows what adventures might greet the explorer's eyes? The pounding pulse-the alien touch of scents and dreams. We owe ourselves the experience-let us seize it while we may!"

A sharp slap cracked out like a gunshot; surging from the bower there came a furious young woman with a pointy hat and veil. Miliana let her pass, then opened up the bushes and leaned across a rail.

"Luccio, isn't it?"

Looking up from rubbing his reddened cheek, Luccio Irozzi blindly surged up and took Miliana by the hand.

"Luccio, my flower? 'Tis Luccio indeed!" The vivacious nobleman clasped Miliana's little hands against his heart. "And how I have been longing for this small moment alone. For you and I are two creatures almost from different worlds. Who knows what adventures might greet the explorer's eyes? The pounding pul-"

"Save it!" The girl flicked Luccio sharply on the nose. "It's me, Miliana. I'm looking for Lorenzo."

"Oh! I am so sorry, highness!" Seeing Miliana's face at last, Luccio hurriedly straightened his attire. "Lorenzo is still in our rooms. He was having trouble finding clothes that lacked scorch marks or burn holes."

With a sorry shake of her head, Miliana left Luccio consulting his list of potential trysts and marched past the guard and off into the passages that led to Lorenzo's rooms.

Behind her, the elven swordsman Brightlightning Dragonsbane swapped a meaningful glance with his mistress. The elven lady turned and thrust her way toward Ulia Mannicci with murder gleaming in her slitted eyes.

The palace sparkled like a beacon filled with fireflies; windows glowed, the colonnades thronged, and the courtyard fountain bubbled like champagne under a night sky sugared white with stars.

Behind the brilliant public rooms there lay the "business end" of the palace: the stables, kitchens, barracks, and armories that allowed the palace to operate as both a household and a fortress. Here the carriages and riding beasts filled the courts in patient rows as the sounds of merriment swirled past on the summer's air.

Walking through the palace gates there came a lean, strutting hippogriff bearing a silent rider. The hippogriff twitched the long equine ears atop its eagle's head, muttering irritably to itself as if resenting the ignominy of an entrance made on foot.

The creature's front limbs were equipped with talons, and its rear legs with hooves. Leaving mismatched prints across the dust, it walked the familiar path to the Mannicci stable stalls.

The Mannicci guards had been quintupled in number for the evening revels; two soldiers supervised each bay of stable stalls. Ugo Svarezi reined in his beast as he approached a sergeant; the man held aloft a short wand and scanned him for offensive magics before sheathing the instrument and allowing Svarezi to dismount.

"Sir? Are there any special instructions for the care of your beast?"

The Colletran passed the soldier his reins.

"No."

A blade shot out of the Blade Captain's sleeve; Svarezi stabbed the soldier in the throat, ripped open his windpipe, and rammed the dripping blade into his victim's heart. The guard fell, clawing at the ground as blood hissed up to splash stinking streams across Svarezi's boots.

Behind him, something heavy thudded to the ground; the hippogriff Shaatra had decapitated the other soldier with her beak, shearing through sinew, flesh and bone with the ease of a machine. The slim mare gave a fastidious hiss, sneezed in distaste and shook the blood free from her plumes.

She would have cleaned her feathers then and there if Svarezi hadn't curtly ordered her into the stable stalls. Spitting in spite, the hippogriff left bloody tracks as she strutted out of view. Svarezi rolled the corpses out of sight, unmoved by the simple act of murder. It was a task he had performed at least a dozen times before. In the Blade Kingdoms, assassination was a uniquely personal task. The city-states had been established by mercenary companies, and the spirit of free enterprise was, sadly, an established undercurrent of everyday life. A wise man trusted no one but himself; potentially, every servant could be bribed; every soldier might be a spy.

A murderer therefore acted best when he acted alone-unless his accomplice had an equal claim to guilt. Svarezi moved out of the darkest shadows of the stable doors, flashed moonlight from the mirror pommel of his knife, and waited while Gilberto Ilego strolled over from the palace colonnades.

Ilego held a large, leathery bat upon one arm. The creature perched and chivied like a prized hunting hawk, stropping at its master's leather gauntlets with its fangs. Without a word exchanged between them, Ilego and Svarezi walked toward the palace's farthest tower.

Within the tower, all the genius of Sumbrian security had been brought to bear. The Sun Gem was a prize of incalculable value; with a sneak-thief on the loose within the city walls, every precaution had been taken to assure the safety of the gigantic diamond.

Prince Mannicci maintained a dozen sorcerers in his personal retinue, specialists whose skills were attuned to the arts of war. The prince had nevertheless spared three of his best men to secure the priceless gem.

At the heart of the hollow tower, they sat; an enchanter scanning a crystal ball, a summoner sitting in the center of a thaumaturgic circle, and a battle mage who passed his time reading from a huge, dusty old tome that was substantially larger than the mage himself.

Outside the tower, hippogriff-mounted soldiers sat on the roof scanning the skies; trained umber hulks, hideous burrowing monsters, lay in wait inside tunnels under the floor. Thirty crossbowmen and halberdiers formed a ring of steel about a floor dusted with talcum powder, caltrops, and hidden mines.

The gem itself was held in the hands of a titanic golem made of porcelain, much like the lumpen, living statues made of clay found in other kingdoms, only painted white and bordered with patterns of blue flowers.

The security arrangements were painstakingly complete; all things considered, it seemed that Prince Mannicci was in one of his less trusting moods.

Four guards stood outside the tower door-guards augmented by a war priest armed with an array of battle spells. Ilego led the way past the patrol, halting with insolent ease beneath the shadows of a jasmine vine and bidding Ugo Svarezi to huddle at his side.

An arrow slit afforded a view into the crowded tower room. Gilberto Ilego smoothed his mustache, then leaned close to whisper softly into his companion's ear.

"Cappa Mannicci was never renowned for his subtlety of wit." The Sumbrian nobleman cast an eye across the troops, sorcerers, and giant golem just below. "In a few minutes time, a display of something called fireworks, imported from Shou Lung, shall begin-celebrations that I have it on good faith will cause everyone to look skyward. The confusion should cover any number of alarms.

"Now, I have here a bag of powder-'dust of darkness'-into which I have inserted a small smoke powder charge. When it explodes, it will spread a pall of absolute darkness. The guards will be utterly blind and helpless." Ilego tickled his pet bat beneath the chin. "My little companion here can navigate through the dark more easily than a hawk can fly by day. He will snatch the stone, return it to us here, and you may mount your hippogriff and spirit the Sun Gem onward to the next stage of our mutual project."

Svarezi-squat as a troll, silent and stinking of fresh blood-evaluated the plan with a scowl, then gave a curt nod of agreement. Ilego acknowledged him with a bow, eased himself over to the tiny arrow slit, and adjusted the fuse of his little bomb.