Dragon Precinct Read Online Free PDF Page B

have.” The grin fell. “In any event, one doesn’t take such an item onto a pleasure cruise—especially if one is a dwarven general of Ubàrlig’s reputation. If he’s brought that axe, he intends to use it.”
    “So whatever heroic quest these idiots were going on, it’s been derailed. We need to find out what it was.”
    “I spoke to a few of the patrons who were sitting next to our merry band last night. Apprently, Brightblade, Ubàrlig, lothSirhans, and Bogg spent most of the night telling stories of their assorted campaigns, conquests, battles, and triumphs—and,” he added with a grin, “that was just their sexual exploits. Speaking of which, I can’t imagine that any of Bogg’s—that’s our barbarian—were with a woman who had a nose. I’m quite sure his skin has never known the touch of soap, and I’d be willing to bet several silvers that it hasn’t even encountered water that wasn’t rain. He spent most of the interview talking about how he would cut off the head of whoever killed Brightblade and then eat it.”
    Before Danthres could respond to the visual image that provoked, she heard a door open from up the stairs. She looked up to see the squat form of Boneen exit the room. Dressed in a brown linen shirt that was about a size too small for him and matching pants that were a size too big, the magical examiner came down the stairs on his stubby legs, a scowl deepening his already heavily lined face. His oversized pants flapped as he came down. The pungent, spicy aroma of the spell ingredients preceded him, and Danthres could see the residue of same on his hands.
    “What is it about you two?” he asked without preamble. “You always get the cases that give me heart-burn.”
    Danthres felt her stomach flutter. “What do you mean? What did the spell tell you?”
    “Not a damn thing! The victim was just standing in the room when his neck broke and he fell to the floor.”
    Torin blinked. “He can’t possibly have broken his neck when he fell down. The angle—”
    “Please, ban Wyvald, pay attention when I’m talking to you,” Boneen snapped. “His neck broke, then he fell to the floor.”
    Now Danthres’s stomach went into a full-on grind. “Magic.”
    “No.”
    This time, Danthres blinked. “What do you mean, ‘no’?”
    Boneen raised his eyebrows. “I assume you know what the word means….”
    “Very funny.”
    “I can assure you that I could detect no magical forces at work at all anywhere in that room.”
    Danthres shook her head. “How can someone’s neck just break like that without magic being involved?”
    Folding his arms, Boneen said, “That, Tresyllione, is an excellent question. I, for one, am grateful that answering it is not my problem, but rather yours, since this is your case. Best of luck to you. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going back to the castle and finishing the nap that was so rudely interrupted for this exercise in futility.”
    With that, the M.E. turned and stalked out of the inn—as much as a several-hundred-year-old wizard with short stubby legs wearing oversized pants could stalk.
    When he opened the door, Danthres noted that the crowd had thinned out considerably, down to only a dozen or so stragglers.
    “It could still be magic,” Torin said. “Remember, some priests have a modicum of magical ability.”
    “A very small modicum,” Danthres said. The Brotherhood, in their infinite generosity, permitted some priests to manipulate magic to a slight degree, a stipulation that Danthres chalked up to the political expediency of not pissing off people who had direct lines to the assorted pantheons of gods. Of course, as she had seen, Genero was hardly an ordinary priest, either. “Anyhow, I doubt Boneen would miss that. Even when he’s being this peevish, he takes pride in his work.”
    “True.” Torin sighed. “We’ve been proceeding on the assumption that Brightblade was killed by someone he knew. What if it was someone he knew