R. Salvatore - The Sword of Bedwyr

He nearly jumped out of his boots at the sheer speed of the half-elf’s movements. She whipped about, a short sword coming out of nowhere, and Luthien shrieked and ducked the metal blade clicking off the stone above his head. Luthien tried to move to the side, but the woman paced him easily, her sword flashing deftly.

In the blink of an eye, Luthien was standing straight again, his back to the wall, the tip of a sword at his throat.

“That would not be so wise,” came Oliver’s comment from behind the woman.

“Perhaps not,” came a melodic, elven voice from behind the halfling.

Oliver sighed again and managed a glance over his shoulder. There stood one of the woman’s companions, grim-faced, sword in hand and its tip not so far from the halfling’s back. A bit to the side, further down the alley, stood the other female, bow in hand, an arrow trained upon Oliver’s head.

“I could be wrong,” the halfling admitted. He slowly slid his rapier back into its sheath, then even more slowly, allowing the elf to watch his every move, reached for a pouch and produced his hat, fluffing it and plopping it on his head.

The woman’s green eyes bored into Luthien’s stunned expression. “Who are you to follow me so?” she demanded, her jaw firm, her expression grave.

“Oliver,” Luthien prompted, not knowing what he should say.

“He is a stubborn fool,” the halfling gladly put in.

Luthien’s expression turned sour as he regarded his loyal companion.

The woman prodded slightly with the sword, forcing Luthien to swallow.

“My name is Luthien,” he admitted.

“State your business,” she demanded through gritted teeth.

“I saw you in the market,” the young man stammered. “I . . .”

“He came for you,” Oliver put in. “I tried to tell him better. I tried!”

The woman’s features softened as she regarded Luthien, and a note of recognition came into her eyes. Gradually, she eased her sword away. “You came for me?”

“I saw him hit you,” Luthien tried to explain. “I mean . . . I could not . . . why would you allow him to do that?”

“I am a slave,” the woman replied sarcastically. “Half-elven. Less than human.” Despite her bravado, a certain tinge of anger and frustration became evident in her tone as she spoke.

“We are standing in the street,” the male elf reminded them, and he motioned for Oliver to get back into the alley. To the halfling’s relief, the thief put up his sword and the other one eased her bowstring back and removed the arrow.

The half-elf bade Luthien to follow, but hesitated as he walked by, looking curiously at the shadowy image he had left behind on the wall. Smiling with a new perspective, she followed Luthien into the alley.

“You are all half-elven,” Oliver remarked when he had the moment to study the three.

“I am full Fairborn,” the woman with the bow answered. She looked at the male, an unmistakable connection between them. “But I do not desert my elven brethren.”

“The Cutters,” Oliver remarked offhandedly, and all three of the elven thieves snapped their surprised looks upon him.

“A notorious thieving band,” Oliver explained calmly to Luthien, who obviously had no idea of what was going on. “By reputation, they are all of the Fairborn.”

“You have heard of us, halfling,” the woman with Luthien said.

“Who in Montfort has not?” Oliver replied, and that seemed to please the three.

“We are not all elves,” the half-elven woman answered, looking back over her shoulder at Luthien, a look that truly melted his heart.

“Siobhan!” the male said sternly.

“Do you not know who we have captured?” the woman asked easily, still looking at Luthien.

“I am Oliver deBurrows,” the halfling cut in, thinking that his reputation had preceded him. To Oliver’s disappointment, though, none of the three even seemed to take note that he had spoken.

“You have left a curious shadow behind,” Siobhan remarked to Luthien. “Out in the street. A crimson shadow.”

Luthien looked back that way, then turned to Siobhan and shrugged apologetically.

“The Crimson Shadow,” the male half-elf remarked, sounding sincerely impressed. He slid his sword completely away then, nearly laughing aloud.

“And Oliver deBurrows!” the halfling insisted.

“Of course,” the male said offhandedly, never taking his gaze from Luthien.

“Your work is known to us,” Siobhan remarked, her smile coy. Luthien’s heart fluttered so badly he thought it would surely stop. “Indeed,” she continued, looking to her friends for confirmation, “your work is known throughout Montfort. Truly you have put the merchants on their heels, to the delight of many.”

Luthien was sure that he was blushing a deeper red than the hue of his cape. “Oliver helps,” he stuttered.

“Do tell,” the deflated halfling muttered under his breath.

“I would have thought you a much older man,” Siobhan went on. “Or a longer-living elf, perhaps.”

Luthien eyed her curiously. He remembered Brind’Amour’s words that the cape had belonged to a thief of high renown, and it seemed that Siobhan had heard of the cape’s previous owner, as well. Luthien smiled as he wondered what mischief the first Crimson Shadow might have caused in Montfort.

“It grows late,” remarked the elven woman from further down the alley. “We must go, and you,” she said to Siobhan, “must get back inside your master’s house.”

Siobhan nodded. “We are not all of the Fairborn,” she said again to Luthien.

“Is that an invitation?” Oliver asked.

Siobhan looked to her companions, and they, after a moment, nodded in reply. “Consider it so,” Siobhan said, looking back directly at Luthien, making him think, in the secret hopes of his heart, that the invitation was more than to join the thieving band.

“For you and for the esteemed Oliver deBurrows,” she added, her tone revealing that extending the invitation to Oliver, however kindly phrased, had come more as an afterthought.

Luthien looked over her shoulder to Oliver, and the halfling gave a slight shake of his head.

“Consider it,” Siobhan said to Luthien. “There are many advantages to being well connected.” She flashed her heart-melting smile one last time, as if confirming to the stricken Luthien that she had more than a thieving agreement in mind. Then, with a nod to her departing companions, she started across the street toward her impromptu rope.

Luthien never blinked as he watched her graceful movements, and Oliver just shook his head and sighed.

Feigning interest, Duke Morkney leaned forward in his wooden chair, his skinny elbows poking out of his voluminous red robe, hands set on his huge desk. Across from him, several merchants spoke all at once, the only common words in their rambling being “theft” and “Crimson Shadow.”

Duke Morkney had heard it all before from these same men many times over the last few weeks, and he was truly growing tired of it.

“And worst of all,” one merchant cried above the tumult, quieting the others, “I cannot get that damned shadow stain off of my window! What am I to reply to the snickers of all who see it? It is a brand, I say!”

“Hear, hear!” several others agreed.

Morkney raised one knobby hand and thinned his lips, trying to bite back his laughter. “He is a thief, no more,” the duke assured them. “We have lived with thieves far too long to let the arrival of a new one—one that conveniently leaves his mark—bother us so.”

“You do not understand!” one merchant pleaded, but his face paled and he went silent immediately when Morkney’s withered face and bloodshot amber eyes turned upon him, the duke scowling fiercely.