Paul Kemp: Shadow witness

Excitedly, he removed from his belt pouch his current holy symbol-a bejeweled snuffbox taken from a Red Wizard of Thay exactly one year ago tonight. Intoning in a whisper, he cast a spell that enabled him to see enchantments and magical dweomers. The stronger the enchantment, the brighter it glowed in his eyes. When he completed the spell, he looked around the eourtyard and let out a low whistle. Trickster's hairy toes!

So many spells glowed in the courtyard that they looked like the campfires of an orc horde. Enchantments littered the grounds from end to end-this statue, this fountain, this seemingly empty patch of ground. No wonder the guards restricted their patrols to the outer walkway. It would be impossible for them to remember where all the spells lay. If they patrolled the inner courtyard, the Soargyls would have magical pyrotechnics and dead house guards nearly every night.

The two guards that had just passed him must follow a predetermined route from the manse to reach the wall perimeter, where, he saw, there were no spells. He reprimanded himself for not paying closer attention to their path. He could have followed in their footsteps and saved himself some trouble.

Ah, well, he thought with a grin, saving yourself trouble is not how you work. "Or you either," he whispered to Brandobaris the Trickster.

Many of the enchantments revealed by his spell must have served only harmless utilitarian purposes-the glow spells, for example, or spells that protected a sculpture from the weather, or made an iced-over fountain shimmer in the moonlight. But at least some of them had to be alarms or wards, and his spell was not sensitive enough to tell the difference. Fortunately, his spell did allow him to discern the really dangerous enchantments. They glowed with a bright, red-orange intensity that indicated powerful magic and promised an ugly end to anyone who triggered.them. No mere alarm spells, those. Most had been cast on the valuable pieces, so that anyone moving a sculpture without uttering the safety word would trigger the spell and find himself aflame, paralyzed, or electrocuted. One such spell protected the satyr fountain beside him, he saw. It had been pure luck that he had hidden behind the unprotected manticore and not the fountain.

He grinned, blew out a cloud of breath, and tapped the agate luck stone that hung from a silver chain at his belt. The Lady favors the reckless," he whispered, to invoke Tymora's blessing, and followed it quickly with, "and the Trickster favors the short and reckless." He stifled a giggle, gave his holy symbol a squeeze, and replaced it in his belt pouch. As he did, he muttered, "This is your last dance, old friend." After tonight, he would make an offering of the snuffbox to Brandobaris and use an item taken from tonight's job as a new holy symbol.

Worshiping the Trickster makes for some interesting evenings, he thought wryly. Each year, Brandobaris required him to sacrifice his current holy symbol and acquire a new one with feats of derring-do. The nature of the item itself did not matter much-though protocol and Jak's pride demanded that it be valuable-so long as he acquired it through a risky endeavor undertaken on this night.

Before tonight, he had hoped that lifting a snuffbox from the pocket of a Thayan Red Wizard in the midst of spellcasting would have earned him a year off from this divine silliness, but to no avail.

So here he was, at the Soargyl manse-Sarntrumpet Towers. He had decided to hit Sarntrumpet because of the reputed brutality of Lord Boarim Soargyl. If he were caught stealing here, he knew he would not be turned over to the city authorities-in the city of Selgaunt, the nobles wielded their own authority. No, if he were caught here, he knew Lord Soargyl would have him tortured and executed. His body would be dumped into the frozen water of Selgaunt Bay and some fisherman would find his corpse days later, if the sharks didn't get to it first.

"That risky enough for you?" he whispered into the air. He waited, but the Trickster made no answer. He sniffed in good-natured derision, gracefully climbed atop the head of the manticore he had used for cover, and studied the courtyard from above.

Though winter, only a light coating of snow dusted the flagstones. A labyrinth of fountains, statues, pillars, and decorative urns dotted the stone yard, some aglow with magic, some not. From above, the courtyard looked even more a forest of stone than it did from ground level. All of the sculptures and urns were of the finest workmanship and materials-the abundance of jade, ivory, and precious metals had Jak fairly slavering. The haphazard placement of the artwork left him with the impression that the pieces had been tossed randomly about in a snowstorm and left where they landed.

An artist with style buys for the Soargyls, he thought, but a tasteless clod does the decorating. Probably Lady Soargyl herself, he speculated. Mora Soargyl was a big woman reputed to be a bit like a dwarf when it came to fashion-lots of wealth, little grace, and even less taste.

Still, the price of any one of these urns would have kept Jak in coin for a month. But that's not why I'm here, he reminded himself.

Surrounded on all sides by the tasteless artistic trappings of Soargyl wealth, Sarntrumpet's squat towers jutted out of the center of the courtyard like five thick stone fingers. Crimson tiles shingled the roofs of each spire, blood red in the starlight. As with everything in the courtyard, the manse was built entirely of stone-marble, granite, and limestone mostly-with wood used only as necessary and evergreen shrubbery absent altogether. The few windows cut into the stark exterior were dark-bottomless mouths screaming from the stone. Hideous gargoyles chiseled from granite perched atop the roof eaves and stared ominously down on the courtyard.

To Jak, the grounds evoked the image of a grand cemetery surrounding a great mausoleum, or one of the cities of the dead built around an emperor's tomb like those he had heard about in tales of distant Mulhorand.

He had approached the manse from the back, so he could not see the main entrance. A few outbuildings stood in a cluster in the northwest corner-a stable and servants' quarters, he assumed.

From atop the manticore, he had a full view of the perimeter walkway that surrounded the courtyard and saw that not one, but three pairs of torch-bearing guards patrolled it. Not only that, but a full squad of guards in heavy cloaks patrolled around the manse itself. The Trickster only knew how many more men were within.

Could be worse, he thought with a grin, and jumped down from his marble perch.

Still using the magical vision granted him by his spell, he determined a safe path through the enchantments. Always alert to the location of the guards, he darted from shadow to shadow, from pillar to fountain, until he stood amidst a tight cluster of tall statues within fifty paces of the manse. Close enough that Sarntrumpet itself stood within the range of his spell, he saw that the high windows also shone with enchantments, though the actual tower walls did not. He nodded knowingly, having expected as much. There was too much wall space to protect it all with spells, but windows provided access for flying wizards and climbing thieves. Only a fool left them unprotected.

He focused his attention on the central tower, the tallest of the bunch by over two stories. The great spire was windowless on this side except for three expansive, closely packed panes near its top. All three glowed with the bright, red-orange light of powerful magic. That has to be the place, he thought, while he eyed the sheer walls critically.

He had not come into this job unprepared. Though he worshiped Brandobaris-the halfling god of rogues who ran pell-mell into the Abyss itself and still managed to escape with his hide-he nevertheless made it a habit to plan carefully before taking risks.