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leave nothing—not even a damp footprint—that would enable Assante’s minions to trace her back to the bathhouse. The thin silk garments she’d chosen to wear for her first day at the Foaming Sands were ideal for this. Not only did they dry quickly, but they were of a sandy pink hue, one especially woven and dyed to blend with the marble of Assante’s palace.
    The dungeon’s silence was broken by distant footsteps that echoed though the marble corridors like large hailstones on a slate roof. Behind the labored tread was the scrape and clatter of some large, heavy object being dragged along. Soon the sound of a disgruntled male voice joined in the general racket. Arilyn got the gist of the situation from the muttered complaints and the occasional resonant clang that occurred whenever the servant stopped and kicked what she surmised to be a water-filled cleaning bucket.
    The Harper crouched behind the fountain and waited. This was precisely the type of opportunity for which she had hoped.
    Her optimism wavered for a moment when the servant entered the room, a mop over one shoulder and the bucket dragging behind him. He was a male dwarf, with a form that resembled nothing so much as a squat, two-legged mushroom and a face that brought to mind an image of storm clouds over a craggy mountain. The dwarf was young by the measure of his people—seventy or eighty, judging from the length of his dun-colored beard—and not more than four feet tall. Yet the Harper, for all her skill with the sword, was hesitant to tangle with the obviously ill-tempered little man.
    On the other hand, what choice did she have?
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The Harpers
    Arilyn watched as the dwarf dipped and wrung the mop, then turned away and fell to scrubbing the marble floor, muttering imprecations all the while. She rose and silently came up behind him, her sword in hand. A well-placed kick overturned the bucket and sent a tide of soapy water racing toward the dwarf. He spun to face the sound, saw the battle-ready elf, and instinctively kicked into a running charge.
    The dwarfs booted feet shot out from under bom before he’d taken three steps. After a brief, airborne moment, he landed flat on his back. His shaggy head hit the marble with a thud so resonant that Arilyn could feel it in her bones and teeth. While the dwarf was still trying to uncross his eyes, she strode forward and plunged the tip of her sword through his beard until it pressed hard against his throat.
    “Take me to the treasure room,” she demanded.
    “Rooms,” the dwarf corrected her in a deep rumble. Arilyn noted that the gravel-filled voice had more in common with rain felling on a kettledrum than with human speech. “More’n one room, there be. Lots of ‘em. But they’re guarded by armed men the size of me mother-in-law’s temper, and locked up tighter’n a gnome’s navel. Don’t have a key. Ain’t none of the servants got keys.”
    “I don’t need keys,” Arilyn asserted, “and I’ve never met a man whose sword could match mine.”
    Since the sword in question was still pressed against his throat, the dwarf had opportunity to consider this claim and the fighter who made it. His gaze slid thoughtfully up the shining length of the blade and stopped at the Harper’s resolute face.
    “You got a lotta brass fer an elf woman,” he admitted at last. “Might it be that you also got a way outta here?”
    “Same way I got in,”
    A light kindled in the dwarfs eyes. “I’m a good hand at fighting, if you’d care t’ pass over one of them knives you carry. Take me with you when you go, and Fll do fer you what I can. By Morodin’s beard,” he swore fervent—

Silver Shadows
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    ly, fer the chance to get outta this place, I’d be tempted to help you loot me own ancestors’ burial chambers!”
    Arilyn hesitated only a moment; it was not in her to leave any intelligent creature in slavery. She slid her moonblade out of the thicket of light-brown beard and backed off a few steps. The