Thieves World 4 – Storm Season by Asprin, Robert

himself very helpful in the increasingly difficult task of keeping track of

Mygdonia’s Nisibisi spies. As an immediate show of good faith, he was to begin

helping Niko and Janni infiltrate them.

When the last of the men had wandered off to game or drink or duty, he had

stayed at the shrine awhile, considering Vashanka and the god’s habit of leaving

him to fight both their battles as best he could.

So it was that he heard a soft sound, half hiccough and half sniffle, from the

altar’s far side, as the dusk cloaked him close.

When he went to see what it was, he saw Jihan, sitting slumped against a rough

hewn plinth, tearing brown grasses to shreds between her fingers. He squatted

down there, to determine whether a Froth Daughter could shed human tears.

Dusk was his favorite time, when the sun had fled and the night was luminous

with memory. Sometimes, his thoughts would follow the light, fading, and the man

who never slept would find himself dozing, at rest.

This evening, it was not sleep he sought to chase in his private witching hour:

he touched her scaled, enameled armor, its gray/green/copper pattern just

dappled shadow in the deepening dark. “This does come off?” he asked her.

“Oh, yes. Like so.”

“Come to think of it,” he remarked after a strenuous but rewarding interval, “it

is not so bad that you are stranded here. Your father’s pique will ease

eventually. Meanwhile, I have an extra Tros horse. Having two of them to tend

has been hard on me. You could take over the care of one. And, too, if you are