Thieves World 4 – Storm Season by Asprin, Robert

Rankan capital. Walegrin thought of the letters he had sent to his rich patron

in the Imperial hierarchy, and of the replies he had not received. In anger and

suspicion he tore at the dead man’s clothes until he found what he knew must be

there: a greasy scrap of parchment with his mentor’s familiar seal embossed upon

it. While his men slept he read the treachery into his memory.

Kilite’s treasury had financed his quest almost from the start. The ambitious

aristocrat had said that the Enlibrite steel, if it could be found, would assure

the Empire swift, unending victories-and swift, unending fortune for whomever

made the legend reality. Walegrin had dutifully informed the Imperial Advisor of

all his movements and of his success. He cursed and threw the scrap of parchment

into the fire. He’d told Kilite his exact route from Enlibar to Ranke.

He should have known the moment his first man died-or at least when he lost the

second. The hill tribes had been peaceful enough when they’d come up through the

mountains and they, themselves, could make no use of the raw ore. He counted the

dead man’s gold into his own pouch, calculating how far he and his men could

travel on it.

Things could have been worse. Kilite might have been able to bribe the

tribesmen, but it was still unlikely he could find the abandoned mine. Walegrin

had never entrusted that secret to paper. And Kilite had never known that

Walegrin’s final destination had not been the capital, but back in Sanctuary

itself. He’d never told Kilite the name of the ugly, little metal-master in the