Thieves World 3 – Shadows of Sanctuary by Asprin, Robert

hated Hanse, at least for the evening, and plotted elaborate and public

revenge…

And blinking in the vapours up from the harbour and in the Uncertain focus of

his eyes, he found his way intersected with a woman’s in the alleyway. No

ordinary doxy, this: a courtesan of quality strayed from some rendezvous, an

opportunity some fickle god had tossed into his path or him into hers.

‘Well,’ he said, and flung wide his arms, leaned from one side of the way to the

other to block her attempt to walk around him … a little fun, he reckoned. And

again, owlishly: ‘Well.’-but she made a quick move to go past him and he seized

her in that swift pass, grabbed and grasped and felt female roundnesses in

delightful proportions. His prey writhed and pushed and kneed at him, and he

gripped her hair through the hood, drew her head back and kissed her with fair

aim and rising passion.

She struggled, which motion only felt the better in his hands, and she gave out

muffled cries, which were far from loud, his mouth covering hers the while. He

held her tight and sought with his eyes for some more convenient alcove among

the broken amphorae and barrels, a place where they might not be disturbed.

All at once another sound penetrated the fog of sense and sound, the scuff of

another foot near him. Sjekso started to spin himself and his victim about, went

the least bit over to that foot and had a hand clamped on to his own chin, his

head jerked back, and a deadly keen blade at his throat in the same instant.

‘Let the lady go,’ a male whisper suggested, and he carefully, trading in all