Page 23 of Astarion

Astarion’s personal favorite was that Henry had been a smuggler who had acquired a load of magical items, been cornered by the Watch, and, in a desperate attempt to hide the evidence, had tried to swallow a wand of wonder.

Regardless of his origin, Rooftop Henry fell somewhere between an extremely clever parrot and an extremely dim person. His memory for most things wasn’t good, though he knew down to the minute when the local inns put their trash out. On a good night, he was willing to act as sentry in return for a bite to eat. He was, in fact, a member in good standing of the Thieves’ Guild, though it was rumored that the treasurer covered his dues herself after he had attempted to pay in regurgitated herring.

“Breaking in, are we?” the bird asked, gazing over Astarion’s shoulder.

“That was also the plan.” Astarion worked his way around to the other side of the gargoyle and leaned down to examine the nearest window. The latch was absurdly easy, which meant that there were almost certainly alarm spells in place. He unrolled the soft leather strip that held his tools—lockpicks, assorted instruments, and a diamond ring so gaudy that he would never dream of wearing it but which served admirably for cutting glass. Yet another thing that Cazador didn’t know about. The Guild maintained several safe houses around the city with lockers where one could keep tools, a change of clothing, or even loot that had gotten too hot to handle. Astarion kept his equipment in one of them and made sure that his own dues were paid up regularly. Death was nothing compared to what the Guild would do if they found you working independently.

“Hey. Hey, mister.”

Astarion selected a thin metal implement with a hook on the end, which he’d stolen from a healer who specialized in tooth extraction. It was also very good for catching hidden wires.

“Hey, you. Mister vampire.”

Astarion sighed. He thought about denying it, but the drained corpse of the pigeon was literally six inches to Henry’s left. Fortunately, the odds of Henry remembering this conversation in an hour were minimal. “Yes?”

“You don’t want that window, mister.”

“Don’t I?”

“Nah.” Rooftop Henry began preening under one wing and appeared to get distracted. Astarion had reached out with the hook and was mere inches from the window frame when the bird remembered what he was saying. “There’s spells on that one.”

“There are spells on all of them, I imagine.”

It was impossible for a bird to smirk without lips, but Henry tried. “You’d think that, wouldn’t you?”

Astarion leaned back and gave the bird his full attention. “I assume that means there’s a window that isn’t spelled?”

“Might be, might be. I happen to know there’s one built at just the wrong angle by that chimney over there.” He gestured with a wing. “There’s an owl sleeps there during the day.”

“An owl.” Astarion folded his arms. “So is this owl a wizard? Has he dispelled the alarms on a window?”

“Don’t be daft.” The bird spat on the shingles. Astarion had never seen a bird spit contemptuously before and decided that he didn’t need to see it again. “It’s a regular owl. Eats mice and rats. Then it does what owls do…” He looked expectantly at Astarion.

“Makes more owls?”

“No, you addlebrained bloodsucker!” Henry bounced up and down on clawed red feet, clearly irate. “Don’t you know nothin’ ’bout birds? It pukes up owl pellets. All the bits and bones and hair that it don’t want cluttering up its guts.”

“How unpleasantly biological.”

“Yeah, well. Ashes to ashes, shit to shit.” He spat again. “Point is, the pellets hit the window every time, which sets off the alarms, so after about two tendays, the apprentice who sets all the spells stopped doing that one.”

Astarion sat up, suddenly very interested. “Have they, now?”

“Yep. Could even show you the window.” Henry cocked his head to one side, purely birdlike. “ ’Course, I’d expect a consideration in return, belike.”

Astarion smiled, keeping his lips over his teeth. “Naturally. May I offer you a dead pigeon?”

“After you’ve had your mouth on it? Shove off. I may be a bird, but at least I’m not a bloodsucker.”

“That is really not how vampirism works.”

“Says the vampire.”

Astarion rubbed his temples. He didn’t even know if birds could become vampire spawn. It had never really come up. I suppose I could ask Cazador, but…no, I don’t want to have to explain any of this. “Fine,” he said. “What do you want?”

Rooftop Henry told him.

“You’re serious?”