Covenant's End - Ari Marmell Page 0,30
three mangled Finders and three healthy people—the couple and the fourth man of what had been a quartet of brigands—fleeing into the night.
“Wasn't an accident,” Shins explained to her curious partner, shifting along the ledge in a futile effort to find a spot where she could still observe the wounded below yet wasn't soaking her backside in a puddle. “I wanted him to get away.
“Oh, I did so! Why would I make up—what?! Right, like I'm going to lie to make you think better of me. You already know I mess up a lot, so why…wait, that's not what I…oh, horsebubbles.”
After a few moments, when the tiny deity finally stopped laughing, Shins continued. “As I was saying,” she growled, “I don't think he got a good look at me. He just knows someone turned his friends into a hedgehog's bedsheets. Since these guys aren't really in any good shape to talk to me, and they probably don't know much anyway, I figure, let their friend come back with someone more important and less, um, bleedy.
“And don't even think of trying to tell me that's not a real word, either. You don't talk. You don't get a say in how words work.”
This continued for some time, punctuated by the moans from below. Shins was just in the process of actually defining the word “word” for Olgun's edification when he abruptly alerted her to someone's approach.
“All right. If you'd be so kind?”
The night grew brighter, the sounds sharper. She could hear them clearly, now, the slap of boots, the dull thump of sheathed blades against hips and thighs. “Heh. Guess they're coming prepared. I wonder how many people he said it took to flatten his team?”
Olgun snickered.
The gang finally reached the alleyway, led by the man who'd escaped earlier. Shins got ten at a quick head count, more than she really wanted to take on even with Olgun's help. More to the point, though, she also recognized one of those heads: bald as a snake's bottom, sitting atop a leather-clad body built more like a bear or a gorilla than a man.
“Well, well. Taskmaster Remy Privott, himself. I guess not all the gods are annoyed with me yet.”
She merely sniffed, then, at her own god's response, which translated roughly to Give them time.
It really was a stroke of luck, though. Second only to the Shrouded Lord—or the woman who'd taken his place, presuming Lisette hadn't drastically rearranged the Finders’ hierarchy—the Taskmaster would be privy to nearly everything happening within the Guild. She just needed the opportunity to ask the right questions….
She grinned, wide and vicious, as a thought occurred. “Your ears are still better than mine,” she whispered. “Are there any Guard or house patrols nearby?”
Considering how many she'd seen the prior night, she'd have been surprised if he told her there weren't.
She was not surprised.
“All right. Wait for it…”
At Remy's gruff instruction, several of the Finders moved deep into niches between buildings, kneeling to check on their injured compatriots. Several others stood at the mouth of the alleyway, hands dropping to the hilts of daggers, swords…or flintlocks.
“That one,” she whispered.
The weapon all but detonated, the catastrophic misfire warping metal and splitting the wooden stock clear from end to end. The explosive crack echoed through the Davillon night, as did the piercing shriek—more startled than pained but certainly made up of both—from the man who owned the gun.
Every man and woman in the alley had spun about or leapt to their feet, weapons drawn and hearts pounding. Remy wasn't even remotely finished cursing when, even without the divine aid that Widdershins enjoyed, the lot of them could clearly hear the shouts and rapid steps of an approaching patrol, drawn by the gunfire.
Shins knew exactly what was coming next. She was counting on it.
“Scatter!” the taskmaster hissed. The Finders obeyed, vanishing—alone or in pairs—in every direction. And it was, indeed, every direction. While most of the group remained on the streets, several of them began scaling the sides of nearby structures, as others sought shelter within.
Only one of them mattered.
Remy scrambled up the building next to the one on which Shins was perched, accompanied by a scraggly, unshaven thief who would have to clean up to aspire to “weaselly.” With impressive stealth, they jogged along the rooftops at a low crouch, hopping the narrow gaps between neighboring eaves, leaving the scene rapidly behind.
Widdershins found it laughably easy to keep up.
It would have been nice if the taskmaster had scampered off alone, but apparently