Page 24 of Astarion

“Serious as the pox, mate.”

As deals went, it was one of the easiest Astarion had ever made. “Very well. Assuming this window is useful to me, I’ll get it for you.”

“Shake on it?”

“How, exactly?”

Rooftop Henry stood on one leg and extended the other. Hoping that no one on the roofs of Baldur’s Gate happened to be looking in their direction, Astarion carefully shook the little red claw.

“Right,” Henry said. “C’mon, then. And go easy on the shingles, unless you want a quick trip to the ground.”

—

The window was exactly as described, tucked at an awkward angle against the chimney that had once vented heat and gases and was now home to more bats than Szarr Palace. The stone walls were whitewashed with bird shit. Astarion tucked his cloak fastidiously around his shoulders to make certain that none of it got on his clothes.

If there was a spell on the window, it was too subtle for his senses to detect. There was a trip wire, but that was just common sense. He clamped it delicately into place and removed the windowpane under Henry’s mad gaze. There was a desk under the window, but it left just enough of a gap that he could slide the glass pane down between it and the wall.

“I don’t suppose you know what’s waiting inside?”

“Oh, sure, mate, they invite me around for tea every holy day, regular.” The bird spat again.

“Perhaps they would if you had better table manners.”

“Don’t start with me, bloodsucker. I saw what you did to that pigeon.”

Astarion realized that he was on the losing end of a verbal battle with an enchanted seagull and decided to quit while he still retained some shred of dignity. The window wasn’t large, but Astarion was nothing if not flexible, as a number of lovers knew to their delight. He put an arm through and moved it cautiously. No eldritch tingling sensations, no unexpected transformations, no difficulty crossing the threshold…Excellent.

“I’ll just keep watch out here, shall I?” Rooftop Henry said, and he tucked himself into a neat gray-and-white loaf shape while Astarion went to rob someone blind.

—

The window let into a room that had probably been an office at some point but that now looked like the scene of a small, localized blizzard of paper. Astarion climbed in atop the desk and spent several minutes planning out where to put his feet. There were only a few bare spots. Everything else was practically designed to rustle, crunch, or fall over.

Eventually, he slid down and made his way to the door, walking on his toes. The only bad moment was when his cloak brushed against a small mountain of scrolls and they began to slide. He caught the top one before it could hit the ground and spent several minutes carefully resettling them so that he was not trapped under an avalanche of paper.

Ugh, this was probably the wrong cloak to wear. It was just a hair too long, but if he’d worn the good one, it would currently be covered in pigeon shit. And to launder it would require going all the way across town to the Guild washerwoman, who could be trusted not to raise a fuss about little things like fresh blood or garottes accidentally left in pockets, and it would have been more annoyance, and not the fun kind of annoyance where you got to pick locks and stab people. He was willing to do a favor for Dalyria, but there were limits.

He crouched down and slid a highly polished knife blade under the door. To the left, he saw only a dim hallway that ended in a staircase down to the third floor. To the right, more hallway, and a narrow door that might have been a broom closet but probably wasn’t. For one thing, most broom closets didn’t have a spell-lock that glowed blue.

“Gurgan kept his most valuable items in a safe room on the fourth floor,” Dalyria had told him. “Unicorn blood among them, since he kept trying to sell it to me. Rumor has it that the current owner can’t even get into the safe room, so it should still be there.”

Astarion was just about to pull the knife back when he saw movement.

Something very large came padding down the hallway. It was pitch black, a dark silhouette against the gray shadows of the hall. Astarion caught a glimpse of a squared-off head and stifled a groan.

Where the hell did Gurgan get a shadow mastiff? The old bastard was far too cheap to pay for a whelp, surely. Astarion had known a widow long ago who attended salons with a shadow mastiff on a leash, but she’d been the sort who could drop two hundred gold on a canine monstrosity from the Shadowfell without even noticing.

Astarion tried to remember what he knew about shadow mastiffs, and all he could think of was that the widow’s pet had been named Ruffles. No, no, focus. Their vision’s not good, is it? At least, that’s what she said when Ruffles attacked that bard’s lute. Of course, their hearing is excellent, which is presumably why it was attacking the bard in the first place…

He slowly pulled the knife back, breathing silently through his mouth. What about smell? He hadn’t worn his signature scent—he never did on a job; you never knew who would take offense to rosemary, bergamot, and brandy. If anything, he probably smelled strongly of pigeon blood and pigeon shit.

Pigeon shit. Yes.

Moving as soundlessly as he could, he pulled the edge of his cloak forward. The streaks of white stood out brightly against the dark fabric. He pressed it against the gap under the doorway and waited.

Click…click…click…click…

The mastiff’s claws clicked strangely on the wooden floor, as if the sound were echoing in some distant room. Astarion listened to it approach, seized by the memory of hiding in the alcove, listening to Violet and the demon coming closer.