of vile rumour; a wizardous thief, a preyer upon wizards, a conniver in shadows
and dark secrets, this Ischade, with reason to hate the prey she chose.
And all her lovers died, softly, gently for the most part; but Enas Yorl was not
particular in that regard.
He paused a moment, hearing the great outer doors boom shut. The thief was on
his way, thief to take a thief. And Enas Yorl felt a sudden cold. Wizards died,
in Sanctuary, and this possibility fascinated him, taunted him with hope and
fear: with fear -because shapes like this he wore turned him coward, reminding
him there were pleasures to be had. He feared death at such times … while the
thief he had sent out went to find it for him.
Darous came back, softly stopped on the marble paving. ‘Well done,’ Enas Yorl
said.
‘Follow him, master?’
‘No,’ Enas Yorl said. ‘No need. None at all.’ He looked distractedly about
again, with the queasiness of impending change upon him. He fled suddenly, his
steps quicker and quicker on the pavings. Darous could see nothing – Darous
sensed, but that was another matter. There was, however, pride.
And within the hour, in a dark recess of the house with the basilisks prowling
the halls unchecked, something gibbered within a pile of midnight robes, and
with keen sense of beauty imprisoned in that moaning heap, longed towards
oblivion.
Darous, who saw nothing, sensed the essence of this change and kept himself to
other halls.
The basilisks, whose cold eyes saw very well, writhed scaly-lithe away in haste,
outstared and overwhelmed.