imagine.’
‘What is it, then, old man?’
‘Come closer. Hell Hound, and say what you will pay.’
‘How can I tell you how much it’s worth until I hear?’ The horse snorted, raised
his head, sniffed a rank, evil breeze come suddenly from the stinking Downwind
beach.
‘We must haggle.’
‘Somebody else, then, old man. I have a long night ahead.’ He patted the horse,
watching the crowd ofllsigs surging round, their heads level with his hips.
‘That is the first time I have seen him backed off!’: a stage-whisper reached
Tempus through the buzz of the crowd. He looked for the source of it, could not
find one culprit more likely than the rest. There would be a lot more of that
sort of talk, when word spread. But he did not interfere with sorcerers. Never
again. He had done it once, thinking his tutelary god could protect him. His
hand went to his hip, squeezed. Beneath his dun woollens and beneath his ring
mail he wore a woman’s scarf. He never took it off. It was faded and it was
ragged and it reminded him never to argue with a warlock. It was all he had left
of her, who had been the subject of his dispute with a mage.
Long ago in Azehur…
He sighed, a rattling sound, in a voice hoarse and gravelly from endless
battlefield commands. ‘Have it your way tonight, then, Wriggly. And hope you
live ’til morning.’ He named a price. The storyteller named another. The
difference was split.
The old man came close and put his hand on the horse’s neck. ‘The lightning came
and the thunder rolled and when it was gone the temple of Ils was no more. The