Robert Asprin - Aftermath

He crossed his arms and looked down at her. At least he had that advantage: he was taller. He said; "Go on, let's hear it."

"I won't tell anyone about the altar, or what's in it, as long as no perceptible trouble comes from it, if you'll give me the talisman you were going to give to it."

"How do you find this crap out?" he blurted. "Is it Randal, your pet mage? You been following me? What?"

She just looked up at him, her eyes full of a surety and power that her little, female body shouldn't have been able to contain, let alone radiate. It was Tempus's blood in her, some more-than-human attribute, he was certain.

He said then, "No. I'm not doing anything like that. Why should I?" and turned to go back down the hill.

And Straton was there, on that freakish bay horse everybody knew about, come from nowhere, out of nothing, leaning on his saddlehorn, meaning his thumbnail with a glittering blade. There, right between Zip and the path down to the riverbank.

"Going somewhere, pud?" said Strat.

"Strat," said Kama, "I can handle this."

"I was just leaving," Zip replied.

"No you can't," said Strat to both of them. Then: "Zip, what she wants, you give her. What she ordered, you do. Or deal with me. Kama, there's something more important than piffles going on out there. Finish with your boy toy and let's get going."

Kama winced but held out her hand steadily and said to Zip, "Either give me the talisman, or Strat and I are going down there and crush five or six of those stones. Do you want to risk that, and what will follow if the three of us have a falling-out?"

Zip looked from the big fighter to the slight woman and saw a shared purpose there; an implacable, uncaring deadliness common among those ure that their Cause was worth serving. He had to leam to match their pirit. Until then, he'd never win against them.

He reached into his beltpouch and handed her the object a girl had bund in the seawrack. It hardly glittered. It wasn't even gold, just bronze. "Here, take it. And take out your lust somewhere else, from now on. I don't want to mess with you no more."

He heard Strat's raw titter as he stalked away, and it scratched blood from his soul- He wondered if the thing in the altar would consider the extenuating circumstances under which he'd lost its gift.

And what would happen if it did not.

Ischade's Foalside home was dimly lit, numinous. When they got there, Kama recognized Crit's gray horse and squeezed her eyes shut. No wonder Strat had come running to get her: Crit at Ischade's was naphtha too close to a torch.

"Gods, Strat, we both still love him, you know?"

"I figure," Strat agreed in an odd tone. "But he doesn't love us. Get him out of there, Kama. If I go in, it's just more trouble. She isn't going to take kindly to him sticking his nose in where it doesn't belong."

Kama was already off her horse, handing Strat its reins. "I know. You stay here, there's no use of you two getting into a brawl over this." Poised to sprint for the door, she turned back: "Strat, we have to get used to things the way my father left them. It hurts all of us. Crit didn't want this command. Not this way."

"That and a soldat will still get you laid at Myrtis's."

Bitterness unanswerable. Kama sprinted for the door she'd always shunned, behind which was something she didn't want anything to do with: Ischade.

Through the gate, up the steps, and stop, hearing your own breathing, wondering what you'll do if she's hurt him, ensorcelled him, gotten her claws into him like Strat, and Janni, and Stilcho and the rest . , .

Knocking with your heart pounding louder, suddenly aware of more than one male in there behind that forbidding door, and hoping those other voices aren't undead voices. You've only seen the undeads at a distance, and even the memory raises gooseflesh ... "Ah, Madame Is- chade, I'm here for Crit." Blurted like a fool in a voice higher than you've heard yourself use since school days.

Inky eyes deeper than any uncursed well, a pale face whose features are somehow indiscernible, and a hand cold as anything Kama could remember touching.

"Good," nodded the creature in her cowl. Behind her were colors, rioting jewel tones, but Ischade was all white and black. Black. "Come in." Black eyes, so deep you could sleep in them. -

Don't fall into any trap. Don't look at her too long. "Crit?" On tiptoes. "Crit?" The swathed shape moves away. "C/7Y?"

There he is, with two men she recognized: Vis, and a beggar with a stutter, a creature called Mor-am. Wrong company, wrong place, wrong something going down here.

Kama shivered and feit throwing stars she'd gotten from Niko nestled in her belt. Could you kill anything here? Would it stay dead? Could she take out the beggar, the mere, and Ischade if Crit needed that much help?

She could try, couldn't do less. But then Crit came slowly to the door, his gait telegraphing annoyance, but nothing worse. "Good evening," he said and Kama couldn't figure where the vampire had disappeared to. "What brings you here, Kama?"

He somehow shouldered her outside and then the door was closed, his hands on her shoulders, tight and hard, digging. "Fool," Crit whispered, "don't mix in this. I've got enough troubles." His lips hardly moved when he spoke; the hollows under his cheeks were too deep; his whole bearing was wrong and she was terrified.

"Crit, gods, whatever it is, you can't do it alone. Strat's with me, we're here to-"

"Strat? With you? He bunks here, Kama. Sleeps here. Does whatever he does here. For her. Not us. Go away. I'm finding someone for Torchholder. Special orders."

She tried to shake off his grip. It wouldn't shake. She said defiantly, "Whatever you're doing, I'm doing. Special orders."

He couldn't verify that, not without going to Randal. And Randal might lie for Kama, might say Tempus had sent a message.

The touch of him made her ache and she suddenly wondered whether if, for just one night, every lover in Sanctuary could be in the right bed, things might straighten out.

Critias's usually handsome Syrese face had none of its gentility tonight; it was a fright mask, just shields for eyes and a slash where his mouth should be- He tucked in his chin, bowed his head to stare into her face, then shook his head infinitesimally: "You want in, fine. We're going up- town to the ruined blocks, see if we can't find Tasfalen in one of the houses left standing there. That's where she says to look. Me, the two backstreeters she owns, and you. But no Strat."

"Crit, he-"

"Can't be trusted. Too much her creature. Tell him to back off, out of sight till I leave. Tell him if he wants to talk to me, get rid of the horse as a sign of good faith. Or of returning sanity. I don't need a ghost horse, or a ghost rider, which is what he's becoming. Go on. Tell him. Then meet me at the gate."

He gave her a little push and she wished he felt so strongly about her, even if those feelings were as hard and fierce as what he felt for Strat.

Like a page in court, she ran back to Strat's horse and said, '"He says he's going uptown to find Tasfalen for Torchholder. Doesn't want you involved. We'll talk to you iater. You stay with Ischade. If this goes wrong, we need someone on the outside who knows where we went and what happened. And we may need Ischade's-your help."

"He didn't say that."

"No, he didn't. I'm going with him, and I'm saying it."

"I'll come-"

"He did say that, Strat. He wants you here, just in case ..." It sounded like what it was, a whitewash.

Strat's horse backed a few steps and from there she heard Straton say, "Go on, then. Ischade's warned him off, told him something. I'll find out what. You need help, you'll get it." His voice was thick.

She was glad she couldn't see his face. She ran blindly to her horse, grabbed a handful of mane, vaulted to its back, and urged the skittish roan toward the iron gate where weird flowers bloomed. In her belt, the talisman she'd taken from Zip seemed hot against her leathers, hot enough to make her sweat.