Thieves World 3 – Shadows of Sanctuary by Asprin, Robert

very easy to get lost in this warren of streets and alleys, niches and blank

canyons.

The scrape of a boot, instantly stilled, brought her out of her mental

wanderings. They wished to try to follow her? Good luck to them.

Wess was a hunter. She tracked her prey so silently that she killed with a

knife; in the dense rain forest where she lived, arrows were too uncertain. She

had crept up on a panther and stroked its smooth pelt – then vanished so swiftly

that she left the creature yowling in fury and frustration, while she laughed

with delight. She grinned, and quickened her step, and her footfalls turned

silent on the stone.

Her unfamiliarity with the streets hampered her slightly. A dead-end could trap

her. But she found, to her pleasure, that her instinct for seeking out good

trails translated into the city. Once she thought she would have to turn back,

but the high wall barring her way had a deep diagonal fissure from the ground to

its top. She found just enough purchase to clamber over it. She jumped into the

garden the wall enclosed, scampered across it and up a grape arbour, and swung

down into the next alley.

She ran smoothly, gladly, as her exhaustion lifted. She felt good, despite the

looming buildings and twisted dirty streets and vile odours.

She faded into a shadowed recess where two houses abutted but did not line up.

Listening, she waited.

The soft and nearly silent footsteps halted. Her pursuer hesitated. Grit scraped

between stone and leather as the person turned one way, then the other, and,