The Pharoah Contract

Night fell, and no one came to set up the stage. Ruiz was briefly wilted with relief, then taut with hope and dread. Where was the boy? Had he disappeared down the same hole as Denklar and Relia?

An hour after sunset, he heard a patter of small bare feet and the rasping breath of a frightened child.

“What is it?” he whispered.

No reply came for a moment, but then a small quavering voice spoke. “Dead things,” Brumbet said. “The room got dead things in it. I waited till the man went down to supper, an’ crawled over the roof and in the hall window. There was dead things under the bed, two of ‘em, a fat man and a girl, but I wouldn’t look at the faces.”

Ruiz’s heart sank. “Did you get the tricks?”

“‘Course — they hid right where you said. I ain’t stupid. Didn’t go to Provost’s hut neither. Dead things’ll keep till you show me. Maybe I won’t need to tell anyone, ‘cause they’re starting to stink.”

“Good thinking. Well, give me the tricks.”

Brumbet seemed to consider. “Now wait. How do I know you’ll show me all?”

“You’re smart. Tell you what: I’ll do one at a time, and then give them back to you.”

“All right. Which first?” The boy unrolled the bundle, and metal bits glimmered in the starblaze.

“Hmmm,” Ruiz murmured, pretending to consider. “First, a simple passing-through-metal illusion.”

Brumbet sniffed, unimpressed. “Everyone knows the ring trick, even babies.”

“This version has a clever twist. Give me the fluted cylinder… yes, that one. And the silver half-ring, and that thing that looks like a pipe with lugs at one end.”

Somewhat reluctantly, Brumbet passed the pieces through the chink. When he had them all, Ruiz began to feel alive again.

He snapped the pinbeam laser together and burned off the lock in a shower of pink sparks.

He stepped out into freedom and drew a deep breath. The square was deserted, and he detected no rustle of alarm from the town. Brumbet stared up at him, shock masking his small features.

Ruiz snatched the bundle of tools from the boy.

Brumbet started to protest, but Ruiz looked at him and the boy skittered back, as though he had seen something dire in Ruiz’s face.

“Never mind,” said the boy, suddenly resigned. “You’re a mean man, too, meaner than he is — I see it now. I ain’t stupid.”

“No, you’re not. I’m sorry to have deceived you, but it was necessary. I’m grateful, too, but I can’t reward you just now.”

Brumbet sniffed. “I be young yet. Next year you wouldn’t a tricked me.”

“Probably so. Go home, Brumbet, and say nothing to anyone. Else I’ll have to hurt you,” advised Ruiz absently. He was already thinking of the man in the inn, and how best to capture him. He happened to look down at Brumbet one last time, and was startled by the contempt he saw in the small face. Then Brumbet ran away.

* * *

No light shone from the window. Perhaps his enemy was still at supper. Though Ruiz would have preferred to confirm the man’s whereabouts, he was still naked, still a condemned felon, and he could conceive of no safe way to reach the dining room. So he jumped, caught the edge of the window, and pulled himself up cautiously.

The smell of death was strong, but nothing moved in the darkness inside the room. Ruiz cut away the bars with his pinbeam and slithered in. No one attacked him.

He stood motionless for a moment, extending his senses, reaching out for any evidence that the room was booby-trapped or otherwise dangerous. He heard nothing, felt no vibration, saw no gleaming telltales. He twisted the pinbeam’s vernier, so that it gave a soft red glow, and examined the room thoroughly.

The man’s saddlebags hung from a peg. These Ruiz did not touch, fearing alarms or mantraps. He found no other obvious security measures, and marveled at the man’s confidence or ineptitude. He found the bodies of Denklar and Relia, jammed together under the bed, which showed evidence of recent use. The innkeeper had been dead for a day or two, Relia for a shorter time — her body showed cuts and bruises and other signs that her death had not been an easy one. Ruiz permitted a chill anger to fill his heart.

He squatted against the wall by the door, and readjusted his pinbeam. He felt no exhaustion; rather, his body sang with the need for violence, and he waited eagerly, growing more impatient with each minute that passed.

By the time heavy steps came down the corridor toward the room, he felt more like a feral animal than a human being. He felt his face; his lips were skinned back in a grin, so that his cheeks ached. He reached for calm and was partially successful.

The assassin threw back the door and swaggered inside heedlessly. Ruiz almost laughed at the man’s foolishness. To so disregard the possibility of Ruiz’s vengeance — incredible! The light from the hallway was perfectly adequate to Ruiz’s purposes. Without rising, he swept the pinbeam through the man’s spine. Before the legs had begun to collapse, he put a beam through one elbow, then the other.