Thieves World 7 – The Dead of Winter by Asprin, Robert

The Tysian Hazard-class adept lay unmoving, listening to his breathing rasp

unwilling to answer, to hope, or to even long for Niko’s presence. For that was

what the witch wanted, he finally realized. Not his magic Globe of Power, bound

with the most deadly protections years of fighting Roxane’s kind had taught

mages of lesser power to devise; not the Aske Ionian panoply without which,

should he somehow survive this evening, Randal would never sleep again because

that panoply was protection against such magics as Roxane’s sort could weave

about a simple Hazard-class enchanter. Not any of these did the witch crave, but

Niko-Niko back in Sanctuary, in the flesh.

And Randal, who loved Niko better than he loved himself, who revered Niko in his

heart with all the loyalty a rightman was sworn to give his left-side leader

even though Niko had formally dissolved their pairbond long before, would gladly

have given up his soul to Roxane right then and there to prevent a call going

out on ethereal waves to summon Niko into Roxane’s foul embrace.

He would have, if his mind had been able to control his fear. But it could not:

Roxane was fear’s drover, mistress of terror, the very fount from which the

death squads plaguing Sanctuary sprang.

She began to make arcane and convoluted passes with her red-nailed hands over

Randal’s immobilized body and Randal began to quake. His mouth dried up, his

heart beat fast, his pulse sought to rip right through his throat. Panicked, he

lost all sense of logic; unable to think, his mind was hers to mold and to