A Matter of Knives

by Ed Greenwood

Chapter One: In the House of Blades

"I do not waste time dealing with slaves," the citizen in the splendid red doublet informed her. "Go and fetch your master. Now."

"Come back tomorrow," the halfling said flatly, her eyes two flames of fury. She stood on the shop counter facing him, chin thrust forward and hands on hips, as if she owned the place.

Which she didn't, of course. She was indeed a slave—and a halfling of shorter stature than most halflings, to boot.

The citizen looked down his nose at her, dubiously. It was unusual in splendid and sprawling Canorate to see a slave openly armed, but this one had daggers that looked like they'd serve her as swords strapped to her arms and legs.

Yet this was Hroalund's House of Blades, a shop that sold knives and daggers. The problem was, this arrogant little above-herself slave looked ready, willing, and one angrily spitting moment away from using them.

"Yes," she hissed, as if reading his mind, her hands suddenly stroking dagger-pommels. "I hit what I throw these at. Every time." Her voice became a menacing purr. "Would sir care for a demonstration?"

The citizen opened his mouth to say something sneering and dismissive—and then thought better of it. "Tomorrow, then!" he snapped, then spun on one magnificently booted heel and stormed out.

Through the shop window, Tantaerra Loroeva Klazra watched the embroidered tail of the citizen's fine cloak swirl in his wake, and sighed.

The Master steps out on business for the afternoon, and half of Canorate comes in here to try to bully the shop slave into giving them things for a quarter their worth—and a sixth of the asked price. It was hardly surprising—she was, after all, an outlander and a little child of a creature, no doubt untutored and naïve.

Pah. Molthuni were such aggressively arrogant idiots.

That went double for rich Canorate citizens out adventuring beyond the walls of the gilded Sweet Orchard district, to where the lungs of Canorate breathed, the real daily business of Molthune was done, and shops that sold useful things crowded together along busy streets.

Tantaerra plucked one of the mirror-bright sample knives from an upright fan display of them atop the polished countertop, buffed it on her sleeve, then turned her back on the now-empty shop and strode right off the countertop, tossing the knife casually back over her shoulder as she started to fall.

Those who judge Tantaerra based on her size are fools indeed.

It thunked into the target even before her feet sank into the heap of soft mats the Master had accumulated behind the counter as his gout steadily worsened.

She did not have to look to know she'd struck the target dead center. She was, after all, better at demonstrating the throwing knives Argulk Hroalund was deservedly famous for than the Master was himself.

The shop guards watched her pad across the shop and leap up to retrieve the blade, their faces as impassive as ever, but when she sighed loudly and told the ceiling, "If one more overblown scion of Canorate's elite comes in here before we close..." she saw the ghost of a smile pluck at the lips of one of them, just for an instant.

As if her lament had been a cue, the singing clash of crossing swords rang out, courtesy of the enchantment on the shop door. Well, it was better than those annoying bells any day.

Tantaerra swallowed a sigh, fixed a professional smile on her face, and sprang atop the stool behind the counter once more. After all, if the Master didn't eat, neither would she, and Canorate wasn't the cheapest of places to—

Her smile became genuine. It was the Master.

Yet the grin faded as quickly as it came, and she found herself struggling to get the professional smile back into place. The Master was worried.

And it took a lot to worry Argulk Hroalund.

He was the best maker of throwing knives in five lands, probably more, and offered the best stock of knives of all sorts—from tiny hide-in-your-hair ladies' death-needles to joint-an-aurochs cleavers—in Molthune. And had been for fifty years, perhaps sixty. Which meant he'd dealt with a lot of Molthuni. And anyone who sold arms and armor had to be ready to defend themselves, as well as tough as mountain stone against intimidation, or...

"Braerand, Luthkul, Orrlehm—have my thanks; this day's shift is done. Be off home with you. The House is closing until the day after tomorrow. So tomorrow is yours, though I'll pay you for it as if you were here."

The guards were surprised, yet said not a word. They merely nodded and went.

As the Master shot the bolts in their wake and reached to swing the metal doorbar down into place, Tantaerra set the first trap, but he turned with a frown and held up a hand to stop her.

Surprised, Tantaerra stood on the counter and watched him shuffle back to her from the door and begin the routine of setting all the traps himself.

He was worried.

Most shops had traps against thieves, but the Master's were the best. Oh, a knife shop's traps almost had to be, but even the Orchard-dwellers in Canorate hired Argulk Hroalund to trap their homes.

He designed the most elaborate and best hidden mechanical traps, from half a dozen for a small shop to scores of silently waiting deadlinesses in a grand mansion; elaborate mechanical traps that could wound intruders with "knives or darts, launched or thrust." Tantaerra knew the Master's skill well; because she was deft, supple, and small even for a halfling, she was often set to work installing his creations in spaces too cramped for the Master himself.

The knives were the daily soup and cheese of the House of Blades, but the trapping was big coin.

"Anything I should know?" he growled at her as usual, as he checked the day's takings. Not too worried to entirely abandon routine.

"Two odd deliveries, both crates. The smaller from Garldrake and Sarpent, the larger from no one who wants to share his name, and who ships in crates that could double as coffins; it's labeled ‘To Be Opened By Master Hroalund Only.' So I left it. I opened the other, though. Forty-six gorgets, steel, all the same size—and utter slop. I bent some accidentally, between two fingers, lifting them out. You can't sell them. You're being insulted. Or set up for a fall, somehow."

The Master frowned and then sighed. He looked old and tired—but not surprised. "You left them in the back?"

At Tantaerra's nod, he set off for his private rooms, pinching the lamps dark as he went. Tantaerra scampered after him. His abrupt and early closing meant she hadn't even warmed the water atop the little stove, but she could rub oil into his gouty feet while supper was cooking, rather than after...

"I'd like that," the Master grunted, and she froze. She must have said her thoughts aloud.

Then he turned and proved again why he was the best Master any slave could have. "And we'll talk. My worries are bothering you, and I need someone to talk to. I trust you, Little Firebrand. You've more sense than any twenty Canorate shopkeepers—or any forty Sweet Orchard highcloaks—put together."

"Flatterer," she told him affectionately. "See if you can be as complimentary about my supper—and I'll try not to burn it."

∗ ∗ ∗

Tantaerra's stomach was both full and warm; she was finally getting the hang of hot savory pies. The Master belched and smiled, several times each, then stopped smiling and told her, "It seems Garldrake and Sarpent may turn out to be difficult trading partners. At best."

"Oh? Share?"

"Nothing to share but suspicions. Yet. Let's be looking at the larger crate."

A few shuffling moments later and they were standing over it, eyeing the crate that looked very like a coffin.

To Be Opened By Master Hroalund Only. That boldly lettered label was imperious enough.

The Master looked at her.

Tantaerra sighed. "You want me to open it, don't you?"

Hroalund nodded, looking a little ashamed and a little sad.

"Not here," she said crisply. "In the cellar. Back corner, next to the big stack."

The big stack was the one fixture in the cellar of the House of Blades. Hroalund's only deadwood; a six-crate-high tower almost brushing the ceiling beams. Bigger crates than most carters made these days, full of shields silently rusting away—shields the Master would never be able to unload, now that Molthune's armies used a new design. Not without scouring clean and reshaping every last one, and they just weren't worth the time and expense.

The Master nodded and went for his cart.

One of Tantaerra's tasks was keeping its side-ramp well greased, and she did tasks thoroughly. The Master only grunted twice as he shoved the coffin-crate up onto the cart; its journey was swift and easy.

Tantaerra had improved the winch on the pulley-lift so it rarely creaked, and gave off sighs rather than its former high, raw groans. A few pumps of the handle and cart and burden were down in the cellar.

The Master wheeled the cart to right beside the stack of crates and gave his slave a questioning look.

She nodded, and he stepped back. She pointed at the handle of the cart.

"Ah," he said, after a moment. "Take the cart away. Good thinking."

He did that, then stopped halfway across the cellar to watch. Tantaerra gave him an exasperated look, then used the prybar she'd fetched down with her to point at the ceiling, then at him, then at the ceiling again. Imperiously.

Hroalund nodded reluctantly and set off up the stairs. She made sure he wasn't halting to turn and come back down before she hastily downed breeches and emptied her bladder all over the polishing-rag she'd brought with her.

She tied the damp result over her nose. A feeble defense against poison gas, but better than nothing. She was still tightening its knot behind her ears when the Master reappeared. He had a long length of cord in his hands.

"What're you—?"

He tied it securely around her waist. "In case I need to drag you to safety."

He'd brought the long reaching-pole from the shop with him, and used its jaws to thrust the free end of the rope up through the open pulley-lift hatch in the ceiling. When he started for the stairs again, Tantaerra caught hold of the reaching-pole. "Leave it."

The Master looked surprised, but relinquished it readily enough.

Tantaerra positioned it against the wall behind the stack of crates. When she returned from behind them, Hroalund was upstairs and peering down at her through the hatch, the cord tied to her waist hanging from it.

She waved cheerily and set to work with her prybar.

The nails were few but secure. Tantaerra hauled and heaved, and it went swiftly enough; this was work she did every day. As she finished one side and started around the end of the crate—it did look like a coffin, to be sure—she caught sight of her master watching her. He looked anxious.

When every nail was out, she levered the lid up and hauled it back, keeping behind it as if it was a shield.

Silence. Stillness.

And then, as she'd expected, something erupted up out of the crate with a clatter and clang of ringing steel. The Master shouted in alarm.

The thing emerging looked like a man's skeleton sheathed in a metal cage-work—if, that is, human skeletons came with eight arms, each of them ending in wicked-looking sword blades.

It stepped out of the box and toward her, blades reaching...

Like Tantaerra the plucky halfling? Read more of her adventures in the new Pathfinder Tales novel The Wizard's Mask, coming soon!

Coming Next Week: Professional rivalry in the weapons business in Chapter Two of Ed Greenwood's "A Matter of Knives"!

As the creator of the Forgotten Realms, Ed Greenwood is one of the most famous RPG designers of all time, with a veritable dragon's hoard of game setting products under his belt. In the Pathfinder universe, he's the author of the new novel The Wizard's Mask (also featuring Tantaerra) and the short web fiction story "Guns of Alkenstar." In addition, he's written more than twenty Forgotten Realms novels (many dealing with his signature character, Elminster) and ten independent novels.

Illustration by Eric Belisle

A Matter of Knives

by Ed Greenwood

Chapter Two: When Someone Wants You Dead

Tantaerra hastily transferred her hands to just the bottom edge of the crate-lid as she backed away—and the first slashing blows fell on it, numbingly hard.

A few splinters flew, but the swift dark swords were sharp, and the arms that drove them very strong. Steel sliced deep and caught, binding in the wood.

The silent slayer shook its swords to free them. Tantaerra let go of the lid before she was shaken dizzy and darted around behind the huge stack of crates. Time to enact her clever plan.

She ran right up the reaching pole and kicked out hard against the cellar wall, slamming her back against the big stack of shield crates. She hit hard, readying herself to leap clear of the avalanche as the crates overbalanced and came down on top of her attacker.

Yet the big stack of shield-crates wavered not an inch.

Tantaerra cursed foully, then cursed even harder as she felt swords biting into the far sides of the crates she was now clinging to. The manyswords thing was hacking and hewing crates as high as it could reach, cleaving wood that was a lot older and damper than the lid it had just flung aside; its blades were through one crate-side already.

Tantaerra climbed wood that shuddered and groaned at each sword-blow, and was a crate higher when a sudden cacophony of sliding metal announced the riven crate was abruptly spilling all of its shields.

Spilling them right onto the head of the manyswords monster, or automaton, or golem, or whatever it was. The thing came staggering into view around the edge of the stack. By then, Tantaerra was atop the uppermost crate and holding onto one of the cellar ceiling beams, sneezing out dust.

The manyswords thing regained its balance and determination, and charged back at the stack, hewing at the next crate down.

Sparks and shrieks flew as metal struck metal, and all too soon the deluge of rusting shields emptying out of a half-destroyed crate rang out again—but this time, the weight of two full crates stacked atop the two now-empty ones was too much, and Tantaerra's perch groaned, toppled, and came down on the thing of swords with a thunderous roar.

Tantaerra rode the ponderous fall almost to the cellar floor, but sprang free at the last moment to land in a dead run up the stairs.

She halted halfway up, listening as the crash rebounded off the walls, ready to continue running at the slightest stirring in the shield pile. Yet no new sounds interrupted the fading echoes.

She turned and moved cautiously down again, halting two steps from the bottom, peering into the cellar's half-light.

Nothing was moving but eddying dust. Swords lay still here and there on the floor, and a few corners of the cage-like apparition that had been their wielder could be seen protruding from under a great heap of shattered crates and flakes of rust.

Stairs creaked as the Master moved down into the basement. "Is it dead?" he asked.

"Well and truly crushed," she responded.

He shook his head, and they crossed the cellar together to peer at the fallen swords and shields, then examined the coffin-like crate lying open and unscathed. The lid had borne the "Hroalund Only" directive; the solid box was well used and empty, and bore no other markings save the usual chalked street-carters' mark that meant "delivery fee paid."

Tantaerra looked again at the label on the lid. Although its lettering was different than the label on the crate of gorgets they'd received from Galdrake and Sarpent, the labels and glue were the same.

"Someone wants you dead," she told her master grimly, tugging the rag from her face.

He looked angry, but said only, "I believe we both know who."

"So what happens now?"

"I go and do the work they've hired me for," the Master told her, his words flat and hard. "Argulk Hroalund doesn't run from threats."

"Argulk Hroalund can't run, these days," Tantaerra replied. "From anything."

The Master of the House of Blades gave her a scowl that lightened slowly into a chuckle and a nod. "You have the right of it, little one. And I see from your face that you have an idea." He started for the stairs, and added over his shoulder, "Your ideas have never led me astray thus far, so..."

When she reached the head of the stair, he was holding out his belt-flask.

"Drink," he ordered. "You've earned it. Then talk."

∗∗∗

Loryn Garldrake is a snake of a man—making him an excellent merchant.

It was hot and cramped inside the box, even wearing only light gauzy silks. Tantaerra had taken the hood off, and resolved to stay that way until Hroalund was actually opening the catches. She wore a smoke suit: tight-fitting breeches, slippers, a jerkin, and a full-head hood, all mottled gray to make the wearer hard to see in mist, shadow, or dim surroundings. It was identical to the sort favored by Molthuni scouts and sneak-thieves of all lands, and she was surprised they'd been able to find one small enough to fit her—once the arms and legs were doubled back on themselves, that is. Sometimes it proved useful to work in a shop that sold war-gear.

Useful, but not precisely comfortable. She was bumping and rumbling along on the House of Blades' freight cart, in a box that had only two tiny air-holes where nails had gone "missing" (thanks to the Master's prybar), and huddled on a bed of coiled cords inside a frame that held a tray of the Master's smaller tools just above her nose. Her carrybag was across her legs, reassuringly heavy. The traps Master Argulk Hroalund installed were almost always activated by trip-cords or wires, and his working gear also included many pulleys, hooks, ring-catches, hinged treadles, and the like. So the cart held no less than six boxes—because Garldrake and Sarpent could afford the best, and wanted it.

The holes were too small for Tantaerra to see the splendid carved sign that proclaimed "Garldrake and Sarpent/Arms and Armor For All," but as she was carried through its doors—double doors!—she could tell that it was brighter and roomier than the House of Blades.

She did catch a glimpse of the fabled polished copper ceiling. The Master had spoken scornfully of that particular addition to the main showroom of what was increasingly his chief rival in Canorate. Sheets of copper that were polished nightly, there to make everything grander and brighter, reflecting everything on display and showing the counter staff what patrons were up to in every back corner and aisle. Ornamental pillars and moldings had been added everywhere, and doors turned into tall archways, to make the premises appear much grander.

The prices had soared, of course, but unlike the Master, Garldrake and Sarpent were happy to charge extra for their fancy show room. And it had worked—not only had they retained most of their patrons, they had gained some new ones; foolish nobles who judged a smith on the beauty of his store rather than the quality of his steel.

Where the House of Blades was crammed with knives, knives, and more knives, Garldrake and Sarpent had lots of empty space, and lone suits of armor standing on their own in gleaming displays. The shop still carried far more wares than the Master did, but most of them were on shelves filling room after room opening off the showroom.

You could do that, the Master had said a trifle enviously, if you'd taken over the next-door shops on both sides, and had coin enough to swallow more. Over the last eight years, Garldrake and Sarpent had gone from strength to strength, buying out many—no, most, by now—competitors. They were the purveyors of armor and weaponry to Molthuni of wealth and discernment.

And welcome to it, she'd often heard the Master say, but from time to time he'd sounded wistful while saying it. The rest of the time, he sounded merely bitter.

"Well, well, Master Hroalund! I am most pleased to see you!"

To Tantaerra, Loryn Garldrake sounded more astonished than pleased. That confirmed her suspicions: that the manyswords thing in the coffin had been expected to kill him, and this prearranged hiring to outfit their store with traps was an alibi—for who would kill the best trap-fitter before he did his work for you?

"Welcome, welcome!" Garldrake went on, more heartily. "And you've brought all your, ah, fixings and fittings, I see! Can you have it all done today, d'you think?"

Loryn Garldrake was one of those who could melt butter on his tongue, jovially and heartily. Probably until the instant he thought you were crossing him, and then—watch out.

"I fear not," the Master replied gently. "I could if you closed your doors, but your partner was most firm that the shop—"

"Establishment, please!"

"Ah, pray pardon—the establishment should stay open, and that one room at a time would be curtained off as I worked. Here's the chart we agreed upon; please let me know if there are any changes you'd like, or..."

"No, no," Garldrake spoke slowly, his voice sharp and shrewd. No doubt he was studying the chart. "No, this is all in order. You're the best, Master Hroalund, and the best is what we want. You'll start at the back, then?"

"Yes."

"My lads will carry your boxes through. Six, aren't there?"

"Six and my little satchel, here," the Master replied agreeably. "My thanks. The curtains? Ah, good, good..."

A few bumpy moments later, Tantaerra felt her box being set down. With care, thank the gods.

"No, leave them closed, thank you," the Master said firmly. "I'll open them as I need them. Until then, less clutter, and easier to move if a patron needs something I'm in front of. Thank you."

There were murmurs from Garldrake's shop workers, booted feet shuffling away, and then the familiar clinks and clanks of the Master getting out tools and starting to hum softly to himself.

Though Garldrake and Sarpent ran to nothing so common as a shop-bell to announce the front doors opening, Tantaerra didn't have to see to know the shop was busy. The hubbub of many voices never stopped, not a few of the nearest inquiring what was behind the curtains. Hastening feet fetched things from nearby shelves on more occasions than she could count. It made the pace in the House of Blades seem one step from the grave, by comparison.

Abruptly the catches on her hiding place were thrown back. She only just had time to tug on her hood before the Master was dragging her out by an elbow and murmuring, "Now."

After the dimness of the box, the light even in this back room seemed nigh-blinding, but she was out in it for barely long enough to snatch two quick breaths before being plunged into darkness again—dustier and faintly moldy darkness this time, with a cool draft.

The Master had bundled her into the Garldrake and Sarpent dumbwaiter—or rather, atop the box that traveled up and down the shaft on furry-with-dust but well-oiled cables. Easily done by hauling on cables and thrusting a foot down into the box, when all one needed was enough space for a lithe halfling to pop through. Tantaerra checked that her carrybag was leashed securely to her wrist; it was heavy with trap-guns, triplines, and cork-guarded darts coated with poison that brought swift and deep slumber to those they stung.

She was here to spend the night, peering and hearing as she stayed unseen. Riding the top of the dumbwaiter, or climbing its ropes to get higher, the better to spy.

Being discovered would bring almost certain death, because the Master had a pretty fair idea of what Garldrake and Sarpent were up to: cheating the rulers of Molthune by providing inferior armor and weaponry—like those gorgets—and undercutting competitors' prices, driving said rivals into business failure or forcing them to sell out to Garldrake and Sarpent. No doubt they knew that Master Hroalund would never willingly hand over his shop, and had decided it would be easier to acquire his share of the market after his untimely death.

They had to know they'd be found out eventually, but obviously planned to make their fortunes first, and probably buy merchant ships and buildings in the heart of bustling cities in other lands, so they could leave Molthune in haste and still keep some wealth. Or perhaps they'd simply quietly pay off the injured parties whenever their shoddy quality was discovered—and in the meantime, grow to dominate Molthune's arms and armor trade, and heap up coins as high as they could.

A fine plan in theory. Yet if Tantaerra could discover evidence of it, Hroalund could easily use that knowledge to expose them—or perhaps simply hold it over them, using it to secure his own safety.

Safety—and more than a little gold, if Tantaerra had her way. For anything that threatened Master Hroalund also threatened his slave. And no one threatened Tantaerra and got away cheaply...

Like Tantaerra the plucky halfling? Read more of her adventures in the new Pathfinder Tales novel The Wizard's Mask, coming soon!

Coming Next Week: Darts in the dark in the final chapter of Ed Greenwood's "A Matter of Knives"!

As the creator of the Forgotten Realms, Ed Greenwood is one of the most famous RPG designers of all time, with a veritable dragon's hoard of game setting products under his belt. In the Pathfinder universe, he's the author of the new novel The Wizard's Mask (also featuring Tantaerra) and the short web fiction story "Guns of Alkenstar." In addition, he's written more than twenty Forgotten Realms novels (many dealing with his signature character, Elminster) and ten independent novels.

Illustration by Mariana Gomez

A Matter of Knives

by Ed Greenwood

Chapter Three: An End to All Skulking Games

"Helms don't have feelings," a sultry female voice announced sharply. "They really don't care if you leave them in those crates. Now go. Bendrar and I need to confer."

Boots went, hastily.

From her hiding place behind a stack of shipping crates, Tantaerra leaned forward, trying to get as close to the conversation as possible without being seen. Bendrar was Loryn Garldrake's son, and the woman giving orders had to be Semdeira Sarpent.

"Ah, good, good, you're both here," said a hearty voice; Loryn Garldrake. "Ben, we were hoping to leave you out of this, but things have changed, and we need you to be able to say and do just the right things if you're questioned by the guard. This is all happening rather fast, but... uh..."

Semdeira is just like the blades she sells—hard and sharp.

"Let me," Sarpent interrupted firmly. "Our plan has always been to find a scapegoat for when the General Lords send for us, someone we can blame for tricking us—supplying us with inferior weapons and armor. A scapegoat who promptly gets killed, the body too damaged for any priest to work with. The dead defend themselves poorly. He takes the blame, we pay whatever fines the Lords want to levy, and if need be we depart Molthune. The problem is, a certain official here in Canorate is suspicious of us already. Too soon."

"We intended to frame Alsaerdus," Bendrar's father put in, "and rid ourselves of a big creditor, but he's out of the country. So we need someone else. Right now."

"Hence Master Hroalund," Sarpent purred. "Knife-hurler and trap-spinner. Who insists on providing his own knives for his traps, and has many suppliers, some Drumish—and high Molthuni officials dislike those who have too much to do with foreigners. What we sent to kill him the fastest, tidiest way failed, but our cleverness at engaging him has brought him right here, and we have his demise in hand right now. When he's dead, we'll claim to have killed him and his assistants in a desperate fight, because they tried to murder us when we confronted Hroalund about shoddy knives he'd provided to us."

"You're going to, ah, kill him here? Now?" Bendrar sounded nervous.

"No." Sarpent's voice was crisp. "At his shop. If the bloodcoats want to search and pry, we want them to be confiscating and rummaging his stock, not ours."

"Never you mind where and when yet, son. For now, get out to the front counter before Indur and Yelhar do anything foolish, and run things until closeup. Make certain no patron gets near Hroalund or sees his work. A trap someone's seen is useless to us."

Tantaerra heard Bendrar hurry away.

"Tonight," Garldrake muttered. "Velar will come at nightfall. Shall I tell him to bring Urling and Taethur?"

"No. Too apt to be clumsily over-enthusiastic. We need far quieter, during and after. I know who to get."

In her hiding place, Tantaerra grit her teeth. That was it, then. Garldrake and Sarpent had to die, or the lives lost would be hers and the Master's. The rest of the staff she could take down with her sleeping darts–without their masters, the underlings would be no problem when they awoke, if indeed they even knew of the plan. For Sarpent and Garldrake, though...

Well, mercy was just one of many things a humble slave couldn't afford.

∗∗∗

Nine darts were gone, all well sped, and the Master long since headed home by the time Bendrar Garldrake met the tenth—and dropped a decanter as he slumped.

The crash brought Loryn Garldrake around the corner at a run. He had a decanter of his own. Upon seeing a dark-swathed assassin—even a half-sized one—standing above his unmoving son, he howled and threw the glass carafe without hesitation.

It shattered just above Tantaerra's head, drenching her with something reeking and sticky.

She ran, but Garldrake snatched a long horse-lance down from a wall-rack and used it more wisely than she expected. Instead of trying to spit her, he swung it like a club, raking her feet out from under her.

Tantaerra landed groaningly hard on her hip against a wardrobe—and then he lowered the lance to run her through.

"Hah! Roast halfling on a spit tonight!"

Tantaerra promptly grabbed the wardrobe doors and toppled the massive thing over on top of herself.

The falling furniture caught the lance-tip and bore it down. It shrieked along, digging a deep gouge out of the polished floor, before breaking—but held up more than long enough for a hurrying halfling to hurl herself out from under the wardrobe.

And turn to race right up the lance-shaft at its wielder.

Garldrake got his belt-dagger out and slashed at her viciously, forcing her to leap aside, but her next leap slammed her headfirst into his crotch.

Garldrake shrieked and went down, and Tantaerra jumped up and down on his nearest ankle, repeatedly, until something broke under her.

He shrieked—and suddenly Semdeira Sarpent and three ruthless-looking men were in the room, drawn daggers gleaming in every hand.

Tantaerra used her next dart to stab Garldrake, and fled.

The rooms were dark, and there were many of them, but after three she saw the curtains and remembered the chart. The Master never seemed to hurry, but his work was swift, and she was shorter than the height his trap-bows would be set to fire at in here, so one of them should be just... here.

It was. Not loaded, but cocked and with its trip-line in position. Ready to demonstrate to Garldrake and Sarpent when—

Well, why not now?

Tantaerra dropped a dart into the little launcher's maw as she passed, then ducked around behind the next shelf. Deliberately jostled armor clattered.

One of the killers chasing her went for the bait, but Tantaerra was already two shelves away, loading trap-bows for all she was worth. She heard his heavy fall, grinned, and went right on scurrying, keeping low.

Before she slipped out of that room, a second of Sarpent's professional slayers had gone down.

Whereupon a tense, straining silence fell. Sarpent and her last slayer were closing in far more warily, and Tantaerra was running low on darts.

If she didn't move fast, they'd—

Too late. A door closed, and she was shut in an end room full of stock shelves.

She could hear her pursuers hastily moving things on the other side of the door. Blocking aisles, no doubt. Those display frames of spears and lances, set on their sides, would make deadly walls of sharp points. And a cargo net from their back room draped over the shelves could entrap a climbing or leaping halfling.

Then came a sound she knew well. Twice. Thrice. Three crossbows cocked, and no doubt loaded and laid ready.

Bright light flared under the closed door. Then the door slid open, and Tantaerra saw the last assassin standing ready with a crossbow.

The light came from an unshuttered storm lantern Sarpent was carrying into the room with a stepstool. All menacing catlike grace, she hung it on a ceiling-hook, lighting the room brightly.

"Let there be an end to all skulking games," she purred smugly, retreated to the doorway, and took up a loaded crossbow of her own.

Then she and her hired killer waited.

Tantaerra, comfortably flat on the floor under a shelf, smiled coldly, and resolved to wait them out.

Time unfolded.

∗∗∗

A lot of tense silence stretched before Sarpent and the assassin grew restless enough to enter the room and explore.

Which was Tantaerra's cue.

She heaved herself up off the floor, shoulders against one side of the shelf above her, and toppled it toward the doorway.

It crashed into the shelf next to it, and both shelves groaned, leaned, and started to fall. The swearing assassin got clear just in time—and the lantern fell, bounced clangingly amid falling stock, and ended up on the floor, half-crushed but alight. Tantaerra tossed her hood into its blazing interior.

Flames flared up, spreading swiftly across the polished floor, and Semdeira Sarpent spat something less than ladylike. Tantaerra scuttled along that aisle, back into darkness, straining to see where her foes were.

As it turned out, they were both in the room with her and staring at the open doorway, waiting for her to try to dart through it. Tantaerra found something suitable on a shelf and threw it through the opening—and two crossbow bolts chased it.

The flames spread merrily, and she repeated the gambit. Just one bolt, this time. Neither of them went for her next throw, but a distant shout told her someone had smelled smoke, and when she flung something much larger—a shield—two bolts rang off it.

Tantaerra knew how long it took to recock a crossbow. Line and trap ready through her belt, she risked a run.

There was Sarpent. Throwing a knife at her.

Tantaerra sneered. She'd demonstrate knife-hurling—and did, her own spinning blade striking aside the one coming at her.

The last hired assassin came charging out of the darkness. He avoided the little trap she was dragging along with contemptuous ease, but Tantaerra slowed, then sprinted again and tugged on the tripline. The little trap-bow sprang through the air and landed under the man's boots. He stumbled, staggered, clawed at her—and Tantaerra stabbed him through that reaching hand with one of her sleep-poisoned darts.

Then she was through the door into the next room, with Sarpent hard on her heels.

Time to play the agile little monkey. Tantaerra swarmed the nearest shelf to get out of reach.

There were the lance-barriers, and there was the netting overhead, just as she'd suspected. Sarpent jumped and grabbed at it, trying to pin Tantaerra atop the shelf—and succeeded.

She was stuck, but not helpless. Tantaerra snatched up pieces of armor from the shelf and flung them at Sarpent's face, one after another, until she saw blood on that enraged but hitherto unmarred visage.

"Who are you, you little rat?"

"A concerned citizen," Tantaerra panted, not slowing her armor-flinging.

The arms-dealer tried to fend off the rain of sharp metal and get closer.

"Citizen? You're a halfling! Slave, more like!"

"You want my Master dead—my master who's done no ill to you!"

"So you're Hroalund's wench, then? I should have known. But well enough—showing the guards how you attacked us in our own shop can only help us when we explain how we were forced to kill you both in self-defense!"

Then Semdeira Sarpent was close enough, with a needle-rapier in hand. She stabbed at Tantaerra.

Who kicked out at it, desperately—and shrieked as her foot got skewered.

Sarpent snarled and pressed the advantage, stabbing again and again.

Tantaerra twisted and arched and flung stock frantically, emptying the shelf and getting free of the netting. Sometime during all of that, the rapier skidded along her side, slicing open smoke suit and skin beneath.

She felt icy, and there was a lot of blood on her and all over the shelf.

She flung herself at Sarpent and managed to scissor her legs around the woman's sword arm, clinging to the blade's ornate knuckle guard and bearing the rapier down. Sarpent slapped at her, and Tantaerra clawed right back, the room a whirl around them as the arms-dealer tried to shake her off the blade. Sarpent tore at her ear and hair—and Tantaerra slapped her fingers across her foe's face, smearing her own sticky spilled blood into those glaring eyes.

The shriek was impressive.

When it sank into words again, they were a strangled, "Get off me, slave!"

"Certainly," Tantaerra snapped—and drove the second to last of her poison-tipped darts through the palm of Sarpent's descending hand.

Sarpent shrieked again, going wild.

"Oh, be quiet," Tantaerra snarled, driving the last of her darts deep into Sarpent's throat—and kicked her way free.

The arms-dealer went down, staring at Tantaerra in horror and disbelief as she choked and gurgled on her own blood. Yet already the poison was closing those terrified eyes.

Tantaerra was more interested in what she could see of the end room. It was now an inferno of raging flame.

"Ah," she panted, turning to burrow through the stock on the nearest shelf behind her and so get clear of the barriers and netting, "that has become useful."

Sarpent dead, Garldrake and the hired slayers all too asleep to escape the flames, their splendid business burning down. Satisfactory work, indeed.

Of course, those weren't the only people in the building. The ordinary staff she'd put to sleep were going to need to be woken up. Fortunately, Tantaerra never used poison without also bringing along the antidote, and there was a wide variety of sharp instruments with which to deliver it.

Already the smoke was hiding the high ceilings from view. Tantaerra sighed and sprinted for the stairs.

She was two rooms away before she wondered which useful tools the Master might have left, that she should fetch before the entire building burned down.

She settled for stuffing a helm full of coins to pay for them, instead. Better to save the people—but nobody said heroes had to work for free.

∗∗∗

When Master Argulk Hroalund cautiously opened the door, three throwing knives at the ready in his free hand, an exhausted and bloody halfling stood on his back doorstep.

Through the blood, she gave him a triumphant grin. "Your traps worked well."

Then she reeled and toppled.

Before his frantic grab could catch her, Tantaerra put a hand down to the cobbles and flung herself into a somersault that brought her unsteadily to her feet again.

Limping and wincing, Tantaerra handed her master the coin-filled helm, and gave him a harder grin.

"Bath," she said. "Something to drink."

They were not requests.

Her Master smiled down at her. "Of course."

She smiled back, and fell into oblivion.

Like Tantaerra the plucky halfling? Read more of her adventures in the new Pathfinder Tales novel The Wizard's Mask, coming soon!

Coming Next Week: An action-packed sample chapter from Ed Greenwood's The Wizard's Mask

As the creator of the Forgotten Realms, Ed Greenwood is one of the most famous RPG designers of all time, with a veritable dragon's hoard of game setting products under his belt. In the Pathfinder universe, he's the author of the new novel The Wizard's Mask (also featuring Tantaerra) and the short web fiction story "Guns of Alkenstar." In addition, he's written more than twenty Forgotten Realms novels (many dealing with his signature character, Elminster) and ten independent novels.

Illustration by Mariana Gomez