Thieves World 01 – Thieves World by Asprin, Robert

youthful, and somewhat vacuous face.

‘Read, Your Highness!’ she insisted fiercely, and almost forced him to take hold

of it.

The instant the prince caught its tenor, he froze. Nizharu did the opposite.

Spinning on his heel, he shouted for his men and broke into a run.

The knife which Jarveena carried in her writing-case served other purposes than

the sharpening of reed-pens. She withdrew it with a practised flick, aimed,

threw.

And, howling, Nizharu measured his length on the ground, pierced behind the

right knee where there was only leather, not metal, to protect him.

The crowd shouted in alarm and seemed on the brink of panic, but the incoming

guard had been warned. Throwing back his visor, Captain Aye-Gophlan ordered his

men to surround and arrest Nizharu, and in a fine towering rage the prince

bellowed at the onlookers to explain why.

‘This message is from a traitor at the imperial court! It instructs Nizharu to

assign one of his guards to murder me as soon as he has found someone on whom

the charge can be falsely pinned! And it says that the writer is enchanting the

message to prevent the wrong person’s reading it – but there’s no difficulty in

reading this! It’s the court writing I was first taught as a child!’

‘We – ah – arranged for the magic to be eliminated,’ hinted Melilot. And added

quickly, ‘Your Highness!’

‘How came you by it?’

‘It was dropped by Nizharu when he inspected our guardhouse.’ That was Aye

Gophlan, marching smartly forward. ‘Thinking it important, I consulted Master

Melilot, whom I’ve long known to be loyal and discreet.’