'Now,' she said. 'About the other thing you have in mind ... well, that might come later, mightn't it? But you choose, Mradhon Vis. There's gold ... or other rewards. And you can tell me which you'd like. Ah. Both, perhaps. Ambition. But know me better, Mradhon Vis, before you propose anything aloud. You might not like my terms. Take the gold. The likes of Sjekso Kinzan is commoner than you. And far less to regret.'

So she had killed the boy. Markless, and cold and stiff within sight of the doorway which might have saved him. He thought about it... and the ambition persisted. It was power. And that was more than the money, much more.

'You'll go now,' she said very, very softly. 'I wouldn't tempt you. Consider we have a bargain. Now get out.'

No one talked to him after that fashion ... at least not twice. But he found himself silenced and his steps tending to the door. He stopped there and looked back to prove he could.

'I've needed a man of your sort,' she said, 'in certain ways.'

He walked out, into the sun.

4

It was one of those neighbourhoods less frequented by the inhabitants of the Maze, and Hanse had a dislocated, uncomfortable feeling in this guide and this place, creeping as they did through the cleaner, wider backways of Sanctuary at large. It was not his territory or close to any of his known boltholes.

And in the shadows of an alley far along the track, his guide paused and shed an inner and ragged cloak from beneath the outer one, proffering it. 'Put it on. You'll not want to be noticed hereabouts for yourself.'

Hanse took it, not without distaste: it was grey and a mass of patches. He swung it about his shoulders and it was long enough to hide him down to midcalf.

His guide held out a dingy bandage as well. 'For your eyes. For your own safety. The house has ... protections. If I told you only to shut your eyes, you'd forget at the worst moment. And my master wants you whole.'

Hanse stared at the offered rag, liking all of this less and less; and very softly he drew the dagger from his arm sheath and extended the blade towards the guide's face.

Not a flinch or blink. That sent a prickling up his spine. He brought the point of the blade very close to the blind eyes and, truth, the man did not react. He flipped the blade into its sheath.

'If you have doubts,' the blind man said, 'accept my master's assurances. But don't under any account look from beneath the bandage once inside. My blindness ... has reasons.'

'Huh.' Hanse took the dirty bandage, feeling far from assured; but he had dealt with nervous uptowners before, and under conditions and precautions more bizarre and hazardous. He wound it about his eyes and tied it firmly: it was true - about Enas Yorl's doorway there were rumours, and bad ones.

And when the blind man grasped his sleeve and began to guide him a quiet panic set in: he had no liking of this helplessness - they entered a street, he guessed, because he heard a change in the sound of their footsteps; he sensed watchers about, stumbled suddenly on an unevenness in the paving and heard the blind man hiss a warning, wrenching at his sleeve: 'Three steps up.'

Three steps to the top and a moment waiting while his guide opened a door. Then a tug at his sleeve drew him inside, where a cold draught blew on his face until the door boomed solidly shut behind him. Instinctively he put a hand on his wrist sheath, keeping the knife hilt comfortingly under his fingers. Again a tug at his sleeve drew him on ... the guide; it must still be the guide and no stranger by him. He wanted a voice. 'How much further with this?' he asked.

Claws scrabbled on stone on his left, a heavy body slithered closer in haste. He made a frantic move to get the knife out, but the guide jerked him to a standstill. 'Don't offend it,' the guide said. 'Don't try to look. Come on.'

A reptile hissed; and by that sound it was a big one. Something flicked over the surface of his boot and coiled about his ankle, instantly withdrawing. The guide drew him on, away from the touch and down a hall which echoed more closely on either hand, where the distance was all in front of them ... and into a place which smelled of coals and hot metal and strange, musky incense.

The guide stopped, on his right. 'Shadowspawn,' a new voice said, a throaty sigh, low, and to his left. He reached for the blindfold, hesitated. 'Go ahead,' the new voice invited him, and he pulled it down.

A robed and hooded form sat in this narrow marble hall - fine robes, in midnight blue and bright silver, in deep shadow, beside a heating brazier. Hanse blinked in the recent pressure on his eyes - the robes seemed to swell and sink in the vicinity of the chest, and the right arm, the hand resting visible ... it went dark, that hand, and then, a deception of his abused eyes, went pale and young. 'Shadowspawn.' The voice too was clearer, younger. 'You lost a friend last night. Do you want to know how?'

That unnerved him, a threat on a level he understood. His hand fidgeted towards his sheath-bearing wrist, his mind conjuring more and unblinded servants in the shadows.

'Ischade is her name,' the voice ofEnas Yorl continued, rougher now ... and was the figure itself smaller and wider? 'She's also a thief. And she killed Sjekso Kinzan. Do you want more?'

Hanse assumed a more careless stance, flipped the hand outward, palm up. 'Money got me here. Ifyou,want more of my time to listen to this, it costs.'

'She's in your own neighbourhood. That information might be worth even more than money to you.'

'What, this name of yours?'

'Ischade. A thief. She's better than you, Shadowspawn. Your knives might not stop her.' The voice roughened further. 'But you're good and you're smart. I've heard so. From - no matter. I have my sources. I'm told you're extraordinarily discreet.' He moved the fingers, a gesture sideways. 'Darous, give him the amulet.'

The blind man drew something from the heart of his robes; Hanse's eyes darted nervously from the wizard he was trying to watch to that distraction, a gold teardrop that spun and dazzled on a chain.

'Take it,' Enas Yorl said. A degree rougher yet. A sigh like the sea, or like hot iron plunging into water. 'This Ischade - steals from wizards. Steals spells and suchlike. Her own abilities are small in that regard... but she made a mistake once, and the spell on Ischade is nothing small or harmless. A man who shares her bed, shall we say? - discovers that. He dies ... of no apparent cause. Like your friend Kinzan. Like a number of others I know of. The curse affects her humour. Imagine - to pursue lover after lover and kill them all. If I hire you, Shadowspawn, you might be glad of such protections as I offer you. Take it.'

'Who says I'm to hire?' Hanse looked unhappily from servant to master. The hand which now peeped from the shifting robe was woman-delicate. 'Who says that a dozen Sjeksos are any of my concern? I'm my concern. Me. Hanse. I don't have any interest in Sjekso. So I just stay out of the whole business. That's what interests me.'

'Then you'll run, will you, and find some safer place to steal.' The voice ground like rocks tumbling. 'And you'll ignore my gold and protection. Both of which you may need. - It's no great thing I ask, simply a matter of spying out where she is. Did I ask you to go against her yourself? No. A small favour, well paid. And you've done favours like that before. Would you have that known - that you've worked in high places? Your past patron wouldn't appreciate that publicity. He wouldn't retaliate against me, no. But you - how long do you think you'd live, thief, if your connections went public?'