Кейт Новак - Masquerades

Kimbel placed his hands on the head of the taller Night Master facing Olive. An aura of ball lightning erupted from the thief’s head. His hair stood upright from his scalp, and Olive could see the bolts of energy crisscross the flesh left exposed by the mask. The Night Master fell forward, steam pouring from his ears.

Olive gaped at Kimbel with astonishment. If she’d told every halfling in Westgate that the Dhostar assassin had helped her, not one of them would believer her. She didn’t believe it herself.

Kimbel blew on his hands. With a sly grin, he asked, “Haven’t you ever seen a shocking grasp spell before, Mistress Ruskettle?”

The remaining Night Master engaging Olive was distracted just enough by the fall of his fellow for Olive to deal him a critical blow. Kimbel moved on to give another shocking grasp to the Night Master battling Jamal.

In the meantime, Winterhart dispatched the Night Master before her with professional precision just before the Faceless returned to the fray.

Olive turned to a corner where two Night Masters without swords cowered, waiting for the tide to carry them one way or the other. Olive barked an order for them to surrender or fight. To the halfling’s delight, they surrendered.

Jamal and Kimbel bullied the remaining three Night Masters into lying with their hands over their heads.

Olive looked out across the hall.

The superior teamwork of the watch was delivering the victory to them. For years they had fought their enemy in the streets, where the thieves could too easily go to ground. Now, however, the watch’s more conventional combat training had the Night Masks pinned, and the thieves were surrendering in droves. Some lay down or played dead with the plan of creeping off once the battle front crossed over them, but these were thwarted by the watch, who dropped heavy nets over them before moving forward. Durgar was in the middle of the room, charging the dais, his glowing mace administering his judgment against those who had disobeyed his command.

Kimbel, Olive, and Jamal stood back and watched as the Faceless attempted a powerful strike against Winterhart, which she parried with a strength beyond any Olive might have credited to a halfling. “Admit your guilt, Victor Dhostar,” Winterhart demanded, “and surrender to the watch, or you will pay for your crimes with your life.”

The Faceless snarled like a beast, but admitted nothing, and neither did he surrender. He and Winterhart battled on. It soon became apparent which combatant had more skill. Every stab the Faceless delivered to the halfling she matched and bettered.

Olive was just beginning to realize that there was something familiar about Winterhart’s parries and attacks when the Faceless’s blade caught on the fabric of the young halfling’s sleeve and tore it away from her arm.

Olive gasped, and even the Faceless stepped back in surprise. Winterhart’s right arm was marked by an azure brand, a tattoo of thorns and cresting waves, with a blue rose at her wrist.

“I knew she had to be a cheap hero,” Jamal declared with a chuckle. Beside the actress, Kimbel muttered some unintelligible spell words.

A shimmer of light rippled across Winterhart’s body and the halfling began to transform before their eyes. Her frame grew to human size, her muscles took on the definition of a warrior in training, and her plump cheeks and rounded chin grew more drawn and angular. She became the former defender of Westgate—Alias the Sell-Sword. With the polymorph magic dispelled, the chain-mail armor, boots, and cloak she’d worn upon her transformation into a halfling were now revealed. The scar from Victor’s ring still blazed across her cheek.

Alias swung her weapon with an uncustomary fierceness and let out a blood-curdling battle cry as she dashed at the Faceless. Shocked, the Night Mask retreated three steps, stumbled on his long robes, and fell on his back. The swordswoman stepped up to her foe and set her booted foot down on his sword hand, keeping enough pressure on it to prevent him from raising it. With the tip of her blade she pried off the coin mask, which obscured his features.

Victor Dhostar’s face appeared at her feet. “I should make you pay for your crimes now, with your blood,” Alias said coolly, “but I will give you instead to Durgar for trial. The quick death of a warrior is too good for you.”

“Alias, my darling, no!” Victor cried. “It wasn’t me! It was Kimbel! He was never enchanted to serve my family. It happened the other way around. All those years ago, he put me under his spell so he could use my family and finally destroy them. I tried to resist, but he was too strong. All I have done has been at his command. He is the true Faceless.”

“Why did he help us in combat then?” Olive demanded.

“And why,” Durgar said, climbing the stairs to the dais, “did he turn over all the Night Masters’ books to me and dispel all their magic yesterday?”

Victor glared up at the assassin standing beside Jamal. “You will pay for your treachery!” he screamed. Pointing a ringed finger at the assassin, he snarled, “Kreggarish.”

Kimbel grabbed the sides of his enchanted mask, screaming as Melman had when he had been branded.

“Enough,” Alias commanded, smacking at the nobleman’s hand with the tip of her blade, leaving a crimson streak across his fingers. Victor whimpered like a child, but a moment later he laughed at the assassin. “The brand is permanent Kimbel. You’ll never be rid of it. You shall always feel the pain,” the vanquished Faceless gloated.

Kimbel tossed aside the white mask with a hearty chuckle. His face was untouched. “Sorry, old boy,” he said, “but not only do you have the wrong man—” Kimbel’s figure began to glow and shimmer as Winterhart’s had when she had transformed into Alias, and in a moment he reappeared as none other than Mintassan the Sage. “—but a magic ring like that hasn’t held power over me for decades.”

“If you’re not Kimbel,” Olive asked, “who is?”

“Why Kimbel is, of course,” Mintassan replied. “Though at the moment he’s chained in the dungeon of Castle Dhostar and looks like a feeble-minded sage named Mintassan.”

“And where’s Dragonbait?” Olive demanded.

Alias looked up at Mintassan. “Where is Dragonbait?” she asked.

In the swordswoman’s moment of distraction, Victor Dhostar slid his wounded hand deep into the sleeve of his robe and pulled out a twisted glass vial. He smashed the vial against the floor.

Quicksilver dribbled from the broken glassware. The liquid metal glowed white-hot until it bathed Victor Dhostar in a glaring light. When the light faded a moment later, Victor Dhostar had vanished.

“What was that?” Jamal asked, blinking away the spots on her eyes.

“He’s slid through a dimension door. He cannot have gotten far,” Mintassan explained.

“Spread out,” Durgar ordered a patrol of his men. “Search the entire castle.”

“I’ll check the lair, in case he tries to escape by one of the portal mirrors,” Mintassan said. “Silver path, Faceless’s lair,” the sage murmured, then vanished.

“Thistle!” Olive cried. “He would go after Thistle and try to snatch something from Verovan’s hoard. Mist said she’s—”

“At the top of the south tower,” Alias shouted. The swordswoman dashed from the hall with Olive and Jamal at her heels.

Thistle Thalavar paced anxiously on the roof of the southern tower of Castle Vhammos. Her heart was heavy, her mind uneasy. The evening was not turning out as she had imagined it would. In the daydreams she indulged in all day, Victor had been amazed when she proved she really did know how to reach Verovan’s treasure. He had recognized how clever she was and had considered her his equal. He had made her his confidant on all matters of state. Once again he had declared his love. In her fantasy, they had spent the rest of the evening in one another’s arms.