“I don’t see you out there laying traps for the beasts, so you can quit the temper. I’ll get more when I get more.”
“Let’s hope you don’t die before then.”
Finias huffed a wheezing laugh, rattling his chest in wet rasps, the meaning behind her words not lost on him. “I don’t have the gold for your services, Necromancer. I’ll happily be swallowed by the trees when it’s my time.” She frowned until he added, “Twenty silvdans?”
“Ten, you conniving scoundrel!”
Twelve fewer silvdans later, Lux bid Finias farewell. His laugh had bothered her. A permanent entry into the nameless forest flanking Ghadra’s western edge didn’t seem far off. She wouldn’t miss the man himself—he was a perfect cheat—but he was the only merchant who maintained her supply of howler teeth. Her brow furrowed over the impending obstacle.
One item down and many more than she’d like to go, a hushed conversation found her from two stalls down.
“Stabbed, they said. Both of them. Can you believe it? That’s three now.” The greasy-haired man’s attempted whisper carried on the smoky breeze for all to hear.
“Saints above, devil below.” The woman signed a cross over bony shoulders. Leaning over her booth, long nails clawed for more information. “What of the eyes?”
The man’s gaze swept over her, absorbing the openly eager face before him. He grinned. “Slit. Just as before.”
She clapped her hands with a delighted gasp. “How tragic! A serial murderer in our midst.” With a hooded glance about the square, as if the assailant lurked within the shadows, she leaned in again. “Do they have a clue who it might be?”
With hands placed strategically on either side of the woman’s own, he moved within an inch of her. “A bloodied dagger. And a trail of red. Whoever it is, they didn’t walk away unscathed this time.”
With a puffed exhale and a sweeping tongue across her teeth, the woman gripped the hands beside hers. Lux knew she wouldn’t be getting further gossip from the pair any longer—at least not of a variety of any interest to her. When they abandoned the stall for a more private venue, she muttered an oath beneath her breath.
That woman sold the particular bat wings she needed.
With a glance around to ensure no one paid her any mind, she hurried to the booth, tucking several bags of wings within her purse. Concealing the coin from passerby, she placed a more than fair amount within eyesight of the seller should she return from the direction she exited. Lux turned to move on.
A hand clapped painfully upon her shoulder. “This isn’t the Light here, girl. I’ll cut off your thieving fingers before you can run.”
Lux shut her eyes. How she hated the living. With a resigned sigh, she dug carefully sharpened nails into the hand clamping down on her. When he yelped, loosening his excruciating grip, she spun, landing a kick to his knee with her booted heel. The brusque man dropped with a thud onto the injured limb.
She leaned over him. “Cut off my fingers? Use some imagination, man. That vendor abandoned her booth, and what’s on it is ripe for the picking as far as the rules go. Touch me again, I’ll next dig my nails into your throat. And I’ll gladly refuse to bring you back.”
Lux observed the wheels of his mind grind through the statement. His lips parted. “You’re the necromancer?” His eyes swept over her, absorbing the thin build and average stature, wild hair curling at her waist and green eyes snapping in irritation. “You don’t look like much.” He actually appeared disappointed.
“The horns and fangs emerge come nightfall.”
She turned her back on the surprised guffaw. He didn’t bother her again, and having had enough of talking, breathing people for one day, Lux hurriedly purchased the rest of her supplies without so much as an attempted haggle before taking to the alleys once more.
Slit eyes. The two bodies she’d observed in the wagon bed seemed to have been assigned new identities: victims. Lux’sbloodied doorstep had been washed clean by the rain, allowing her to leave the night behind, but no longer.
Whoever it is, they didn’t walk away unscathed this time.
“Who did you bring me, little girl?”
And would she bring him back?
Chapter four
“You followed directions. Grandjob.”
The rain-soaked child from the evening prior sat upon Lux’s rough stone step, her golden hair dried and shining. The building was narrow but tall, with a truly awful seamstress' shop above Lux’s home, and an apothecary above that. Lux had no markings about her door to identify whom she was or what she did. If her services were required, she was found. If not, she enjoyed her life of solitude. All nine years of it.
The young girl’s expression hardened at her tone. “Yes, I did. Now will you please bring my brother back?”
Lux pushed the hair from her face. “If you’ve the goldquins.” The girl presented a frayed pouch that jingled and clanged. “Excellent. Where is he?”
She followed the child around the building’s corner. Lux couldn’t claim more than an average height, but this girl was positively tiny. She couldn’t help but be impressed the girl had lugged her towering brother to her door, not once but twice.
