Read Online Stardeep by Bruce R. Cordell - Free Book Online Page B

milled in front of the entrance of the Green Warrior Inn and Tavern. Her thirst had grown desperate as she’d walked, and she scowled when she considered there might be some kind of delay in quenching it.
    A crash, and an unkempt but hearty dwatf came huttling through the front door. He screamed some consonant-laden phrase as he regained his feet and charged back into the inn.
    More yells, the sound of bteaking crockery and splintering wood; she recognized the telltale signs. This early? The crowd must have carried over from a’particularly hard-drinking night, but…
    She sidled up to a swaying man at the edge of the gathering who stank of fish and gtease. She doubted she smelled any better considering how she had spent the night. “Who’s fighting?”
    The man, his skin a pallid yellow, slurred, “Crazy man
    come in this mornin’ afore dawn. Talkin’ to his blade the whole time. Arguing, like. Then he went after a couple women of the evening, like he wus’ gon’ cut them…”
    A crash blotted out part of the man’s stumbling story.
    “… so everyone tried stop ‘im. He’s in there, waving that blue sword around—”
    “Angul?” she exclaimed. Kiril shoved the drunk aside. He fell, complaining loudly. She paid no mind as she pierced the mob and chatged through the tavern’s gaping entrance. Xet clamped painfully down on her shoulder, holding on through the bustle.
    She saw Gage. And there… was Angul! Gage held the flaming sword in a scalded hand. The man whirled around like a marionette whose strings were snagged, brandishing the burning blade with jerky motions. The mob from outside spilled into the tavern, but only the most hardened and most drunk encircled Gage.
    How had Gage managed to pick up her sword—why hadn’t Angul fried him? By the look of Gage’s naked hand, the blade had at least tried. And what lunacy was Gage up to now?
    A bald man with a menacing tattoo branded on his scalp yelled, “We’re died of your performance, freak! Get out of here!” He hurled a wooden tankard. The sword twitched, but decided against deflecting the attack. The tankard struck Gage on his right shoulder. He grunted and yelled, obviously at the sword, “Defend me, or our deal is through!”
    A moment later, he screeched as a flaming blue ember dripped from the blade, licking Gage’s hand clutched on the hilt. But he didn’t give up his grip. He probably couldn’t. Kiril recognized Angul’s methods—punishment was its first recourse against a balky wielder. Which had never before been anyone but her, from the moment Angul was first forged.
    Kiril broke through the ring of people, said, “Gage!”
    Her old acquaintance whirled. “Kiril! Thank the Queen of Air! Make it let go!”
    “Make ‘him,’ ” she corrected. She hated the blade, hated him… but hate couldn’t blunt her dependence.
    Kiril held out a hand. Gage presented the sword, hilt forward, trepidation on his face. Relief washed all else away when Gage easily relinquished his grip to her.
    When her hands touched the hilt’s leather wrappings, she began to cry and curse. “I missed you,” she whispered. Angul’s angry flames flickered out, and a sense of utter well-being descended over the elf swordswoman. She didn’t fight it.
    Gage stood rubbing his hands together, one gloved, the other bare, looking at woman and sword reunited. His brow creased with the weight of his conundrum.
    In a private room at a different inn across town, Kiril and Gage shared a plate of olives and cheese. Xet perched near the door, annoying wait staff and customers in the outer chamber with its incessant tinkling. Or so Kiril assumed, though no one complained.
    “And here’s the strange thing,” said Gage, continuing the story of finding her stolen blade and stealing it back.
    “Yeah?”
    “Sathra didn’t crave the blade herself. She was in the employ of someone else who wanted it. Someone named ‘Nangulis.’ “
    In mid-swallow, Kiril choked.
    Shaking off