Ariel Read Online Free PDF

and picked up the crossbow. Listening carefully for a moment revealed nothing more. I was about to tell Ariel to come around behind me when a deep voice reverberated below.
    "Hello?"
    I cradled the Barnett and crept down the stairs, hugging the banister.
    "Hello, is anybody here?"
    I saw him now, a faint, fairly large figure in front of the card files. His back was to me. I brought the Barnett up, resting it on the banister. "Don't move," I said, knowing full well that when he heard my voice he would move anyway. Sure enough, he turned toward me.
    "Don't move," I repeated, "or I'll kill you."
    That stopped him. I'd figured that, too.
    "I don't want any trouble," he said. "I'm looking for a kid. Came in today with a unicorn."
    "Why?"
    He stepped toward me. "Hey, is that a rifle you're holding? Don't you know that guns won't—"
    "It's not a rifle."
    "Oh."
    "You were saying."
    "Huh? Oh, yeah. This guy—I guess you're him; nobody else would be in here—you and your buddy—"
    "She's not a buddy. She's my Familiar."
    "Sorry. You and your Familiar managed to override my buddy's obedience spell. I want to find out how you did it. I never heard of it happening before; the guy who set the spell for me said it couldn't be broken."
    "You were on the overpass? With the leather jacket?"
    "Yeah."
    Snap decision: "Hungry?"
    "Since you mention it, yes."
    "I've got some food upstairs. Come on over here, but keep your hands where I can see them and move slow."
    He did as I said and stopped in front of me. "Oh," he said, seeing the Barnett, "a crossbow. I shoulda known. Stupid of me."
    I didn't bother to contradict him.
    "Name's Russ Chaffney."
    I lowered the crossbow. "Pete Garey." He held out his hand. We shook.
    "Food's upstairs," I said. "You'll have to go first. Ariel won't like it if I go ahead of you; she'll think you might have a weapon at my back."
    He agreed and I called to Ariel that we had company and were coming up. At the top of the stairs he hesitated, seeing Ariel watching him warily. She saw me behind him with the Barnett and relaxed.
    "Ariel, this is Russ Chaffney," I said. "Chaffney, my Familiar, Ariel."
    He looked at me as if I were crazy, then looked at Ariel. "Um, how do you do?" he managed.
    "Do what?"
    He gaped. He stood there, speechless. Looking at him, I told Ariel, "It's just a figure of speech. It means, how are you?"
    "Oh. I'm wonderful, except I want some peppermint candy. You wouldn't happen to have any, would you?"
    "I, uh, no, I don't have any candy. Sorry."
    "Don't worry about it," I said. "She eats too much of it anyway. She's getting fat. I'm going to ditch her in someone's stable if she doesn't leave the stuff alone."
    She lifted her nose. "Unicorns don't get fat."
    "Don't believe her," I stage-whispered. "She used to be skinny. Now look at her."
    "I was not skinny!"
    I shrugged. "Have it your way." To Chaffney: "She's always been fat."
    "Do you two always talk like this? I mean, I didn't know unicorns could talk." He was having trouble coping.
    Ariel pounced on the chance to use the old joke. "We can't talk. The hairless monkey over there is a ventriloquist."
    "Who you calling a hairless monkey, conehead?"
    Chaffney folded his arms and looked at her critically, trying to appear unfazed. "I also didn't know they could do magic," he said.
    "Magic?" she asked innocently.
    "Yeah. At the overpass this afternoon. Asmodeus—my falcon."
    "Oh. I thought I recognized you from somewhere. Humans all look alike to me."
    I made a rude noise.
    "Come on," I said. "I'm still hungry."
     
    * * *
     
    I leaned against the marble balustrade, listening to Ariel and Chaffney discussing magic. He still didn't understand how she could have bypassed a loyalty spell.
    "Look," she explained patiently, "a loyalty spell is nothing. You could weave one. Pete could weave one."
    I let it pass with merely a sneer.
    "All it involves is fixing the animal's attention on you," she continued. "The dumber the animal—that is, the smaller