Page 96 of Wanted: Rogues and Bards

Fenric winced. Goddammit, why was Tookie like this? It was always hell bartering with this man. If he didn’t have such good, reliable information, Fenric wouldn’t even bother. Unfortunately, he did.

It was tempting to have Maxie pull out those eyes of his. Fenric almost encouraged it before thinking better of it. Instead, he waded in. “Seven gold, you thief.”

Tookie cackled in delight. “Twelve.”

They were going to be here a minute, and Fenric feared he’d end up paying ten gold no matter how much he haggled.

Lirion paced the sidewalk outside The Greasy Gull, his eyes shifting up and down the block along the moonlit horizon. Shadows lengthened, and the air grew uncomfortably cold. Lirion pulled his cloak tighter about his body, but it did nothing for the cold gnawing on his fingers. He should go inside and wait with the others, but he couldn’t sit still. After leaving Tookie’s place, Fenric had told him to take Maxie back to the inn and tell the others what they’d discovered. The squirrely thief wanted to go on one last fact-finding mission, but he couldn’t effectively do it with an incubus and a puppy tagging long.

“Relax,” Hapi admonished as he sat down on the wooden stairs leading up to the inn. Lirion almost jumped. He hadn’t even heard the elf step outside. He glanced over to find him somehow managing to look regal in a dark blue coat that fell all the way down to the top of his calf-high leather boots. Pale grey gloves covered his elegant hands, while his skin seemed to glow in the pale lamplight. Everything about him looked ethereal. It was hard to believe he was a necromancer. “The fact Fenric is the last to return is a good sign.”

“How’s that?”

Lifting his left hand, Hapi extended one finger. “Everyone else is here, which means no one got caught snooping and landed themselves in jail. Which, sadly, happens far too often with these miscreants.” He extended a second finger. “Because of Fen’s shapeshifting skills, he can sneak places most of us can’t with relative ease. It’s likely he’s poking around where your sister is being held, gaining valuable, timesaving information.” He extended a third finger. “And finally, your feelings for Fen are showing.”

Lirion’s mouth bobbed open and shut several times before his brain engaged enough to recall how to use his tongue. He wished it hadn’t, though. “Shut up.” He mentally rolled his eyes at himself. So witty. “This isn’t about Fen. It’s about saving my sister. We can’t exchange information and make plans until he’s back.”

“Until who’s back?”

Lirion spun around to find Fen striding down the block, a playful smirk tilting up one corner of his mouth. Gods, how much of their conversation had he heard? Preferably none of it. Yes, that was best.

“What-what took you so long?” Lirion stammered, grasping desperately at the strands of his fractured composure. “Did you find where they are holding my sister? Can we get in there?”

“Sorry about the delay. I wanted to take a peek at Count Pierres’s villa. This…” He paused to let out a heavy sigh. “This is going to be tricky.”

Hapi shrugged one shoulder. “Isn’t it always?”

“True,” Fen conceded. He wrapped an arm around Lirion’s shoulders, drawing him toward the inn, while Hapi rose smoothly to his feet. “Let’s grab the others so we can discuss what we uncovered today.”

The Greasy Gull Inn wasn’t nearly as bad as its name implied. It was a rather large three-story wood-and-brick building with a very large common room and a tavern on the first floor serving food that looked pretty damn greasy and had a small stage for entertainment. If Lirion hadn’t been so anxious about saving his sister at last, he would have bartered a few songs for their meals. But he wasn’t in the mood for singing and flirting with strangers.

The second and third floors were all rooms for rent. Upon returning with Maxie, Lirion had quickly glimpsed the room they’d gotten for him and Fenric. It wasn’t much—a bed, a washstand, a chair, and a small table with a candlestick. Apparently, they all looked roughly the same. Malfas and Hapi were sharing, while Bel and Maxie were rooming together. Rain had won the toss to have his own room and seemed to have hope of finding a bed companion or two before they destroyed the peace of the town by taking on Count Pierres.

The group had gathered in Belstrom’s room, where they were passing around a bottle of whiskey. Laughter rose up each time Maxie made a grab for the bottle but missed because they’d already tossed it to the next person.

“So,” Hapi drew the word out as he shut the door behind them, “now that everyone is here, exactly how fucked are we?”

“Enormously!” Malfas shouted.

“Royally!” Rain chimed in.

Lirion snatched up the whiskey bottle and took a slug, welcoming the sharp burn down to his chest. He was feeling bad. The job he’d promised to fulfill for Fen didn’t sound half as difficult as this one.

“It will be an exceedingly complicated endeavor,” Belstrom added. “However, I do not sense it will be any more arduous than the Lanoa affair.”

A low growl rose from Hapi and he glared at Bel. “You swore you’d never bring that up.”

Belstrom lifted both hands as if to ward off the necromancer and a quick death. “I only draw parallels as proof we have prevailed in more taxing matters.”

“What do we know about this Count Pierres and his little sex ring?” Fen broke in, cutting off their nonsense before it could spiral out of control.

“That this man is the king of selling sex!” Malfas stated.

“Not helping,” Fen snapped as he grabbed the half-empty bottle from Lirion and took a big gulp.

“What I mean is, the rich bloke has made his piles of gold by catering to the sexual whims of the wealthy,” Malfas continued. “He’s opened and closed high-end brothels all across the kingdom. The vast majority of his ‘entertainment’ are kidnapped people, usually quite young and who had the bad luck of having a pretty face and no one to protect them.”

Lirion swallowed hard and cursed himself yet again for not meeting his sister closer to their hometown. If he had been there, she would never have been grabbed.