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.”Marlin stared at him, eyes brightening as he saw the way out of certain doom before him.“Yes!” he shouted, bringing an eager fist down on the table, which made the decanters dance.“By all the gods, yes! Brilliant, Lord Illance! Simply brilliant!”For so it was.Most nobles knew King Foril Obarskyr was a lot less than the kindly and just man the commoners thought him to be.He was a deluded, out-of-touch old fool.So this “rescue” of him from fell ghosts was almost certain to succeed.Storm paused at the open door, seeing the door opposite standing open as well.Then she strode across the grand passage as if she were a queen.A queen managing very regally to utterly ignore the fat, wheezing old man in floppy boots who was following her.What she saw three steps down the next stretch of narrow passage made her stiffen, then glide to one wall and freeze there, waving at Mirt to do the same.With a sigh that should have been soundless but wasn’t, he obeyed.Not that he could see past Storm’s curves to learn what had alarmed her.Storm cared not; she was too busy intently watching two Purple Dragons carrying a limp, senseless Amarune Whitewave off in the direction of the Long Passage, with a self-important young war wizard preening in their wake.“Can you proceed very, very quietly from here on?” she whispered over her shoulder.“I believe so,” Mirt growled amiably, not much louder than a husky whisper.Storm nodded and stalked forward in utter silence.He followed, just a trifle more noisily.Which meant the two curtly dismissed Dragons, returning to their posts in Loyal Maid’s Hall with mingled regret and resentment, didn’t hear either of them.Storm hoped that the door she chose to bypass the guards and reach the Long Passage unnoticed would lead to a deserted chamber.She and her wheezing shadow reached one door of what she knew was a war wizards’ dutychamber, in time to hear a faint rattle of chain.Unashamedly, she put her ear to that door.“They didn’t find any weapons,” a nasal young voice mused, “but I stopped their search, didn’t I? Which means it’s only prudent, before I awaken this intruder, to search her myself.Now how does this undo, I wonder?”Storm turned, met Mirt’s questioning gaze, and moved back to where she could whisper into his ear.“Go along the passage to the other side of this room, and very noisily bang open its far door.Take care to keep behind the door, in case he casts a spell.”Mirt grinned, nodded, and lurched off to obey.The moment she heard that far door bang, Storm wrenched open the door in front of her and launched herself at the back of the young wizard’s neck.He heard her and was starting to turn—But “starting” was more than a breath too late.To the floor he went, struck senseless, keys rattling out of his hand.Storm closed the door she’d come through, then went to the other door and looked out.There was no sign of Mirt.After peering up and down a deserted passage, she frowned, shrugged, and closed the door.The young mage had a wand at his belt, a slender coin purse, and a knife so small and blunt it could only see practical use spreading pastes and jams.She took the wand, knowing the symbols painted at its ends; this end gave sleep, and that one awakened.She touched Amarune with “that” end, then slid the lone ring from the wizard’s finger.By its design, it had to be one of the spell-reflecting bands Caladnei had enchanted, and betimes loaned to certain Harpers.Donning it, Storm caught up the keys and freed Amarune.Ankles in a walking chain, wrists to a chain passed around her back, and a throat collar chained to a wall-ring with a length of links short enough to keep her standing—or she’d strangle.Such restraints might prove useful later, but she had no place to hide them and no quiet way to carry them, so she let them be.“S-storm?” Rune asked quietly, staring around the room and feeling her throat.“What happened to me? One moment I was running, starting to lose my breath, and then—”“This bright young wizard cast a spell of sleep on you,” Storm told her.“Which means time enough has passed—being as I’ve heard no great tumult in that direction—that Arclath must have got out of the palace without dispute or alarm, and clean away into the city.”“Meaning?”“There’s no use chasing him.We’ll seek him at Delcastle Manor later, but right now I’m hungry, and by the rumblings your innards have been making, you are, too.So, kitchens first.Then we’d best have a little talk with Lady Glathra, if we don’t want wizards chasing us every time we turn a corner in this palace.”Rune opened her mouth to protest, then sighed and shut it again.She was hungry.And weary, too.Once again, the wisest thing Amarune Whitewave could do was give in
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