Page 2 of A Tower of Half-Truths
“As you’ve said every night this week,” he grumbled, then shooed her away with a wave of his hand. “Fine, go enjoy yourbooks.”
He turned his attention to the safe, body stiff and shoulders hunched. She didn’t need to see his face to know he was scowling, and she knew that arguing with him would be pointless.
Mavery headed down the darkened corridor and entered the library, where moonlight poured through the floor-to-ceiling windows. She touched the lantern on her hip, severing the connection between her arcana and the stone that fueled the light.
In most manors, the private library was little more than a status symbol. Roven’s was no exception. His shelves were coated in a thick layer of dust; even his servants didn’t give this room much attention. A neglected library presented a perfect opportunity.
Mavery searched the bookshelves for anything that stood out. She had a personal code when it came to pilfering books. She never took anything that was signed, gilded, or looked expensive enough to draw attention. Books with cracked spines and dog-eared pages were also off-limits, as they were more likely to be missed. Her prime targets were somewhere in the middle: mass-produced, but with enough literary or scholarly merit to be worthy of her collection. And if the book was small enough to slip into her pocket, all the better.
Finding a target among Roven’s collection was more challenging than she’d expected. The top three rows were filled with exquisite leatherbound encyclopedias. She would bet her cut for this job that the baron had never read a single entry. Below those books was a shelf filled with other reference materials: legal codes, dictionaries, almanacs…
She wasn’t expecting a non-mage to own any tomes on spellcasting or arcane history, but she was hoping for at leastsomethingwith a little panache. Roven didn’t seem to own so much as a book of poetry.
At last, a book on the bottom shelf caught her eye. A less discerning observer would have missed it entirely. Tucked between two large tomes on animal taxonomy was a thin clothbound book with yellowing pages:The Modern Gentleman’s Field Guide to Mushroom Foraging. It had been published fifty years ago, but its spine was pristine.
Flipping through it, she found dozens of detailed drawings of mushrooms. She wasn’t sure why this book was specifically for “the modern gentleman,” but she would have plenty of time later to discover that. She tucked the book in her pack as footsteps thundered up the main staircase. Her pulse quickened. Arcana hummed beneath her skin, waiting for her to unleash it on the approaching threat.
She was reaching for her dagger when a familiar mop of black hair passed the doorway. The youngest member of the crew, Itri, skidded to a halt. He doubled back and leaned against the doorframe, panting. Sweat glistened on his dark skin.
“Mave!” he gasped. “Oh, gods, we have toleave—now!”
“What? Why?”
“Hellhound! Coming this way!”
“You and Fennick couldn’t handle a pair of hounds?”
“Not a pair. There’s eight of ’em.” Itri shook his head. “No, nine. Fen missed the others when he was scouting the place.”
“How the hells does someone misssevenhellhounds?”
“Roven’s a breeder. Got a whole operation down in the kitchens and everything. A half-dozen pups and a bitch. Gods, was she pissed when she spotted us.”
She glanced over Itri’s shoulder and realized the boy was alone. “Where’s Fennick?”
“He distracted the bitch, told me to run for it and come find you. We only brought enough sleep tonic for two hounds, so—”
As if on cue, an otherworldly screech ripped through the manor. Mavery flinched, blood chilling and skin prickling.
Once she reclaimed her senses, she dashed out of the library with Itri on her heels. In the corridor, they narrowly avoided crashing into Neldren. From the look on his face—which was livid in every sense of the word—he’d overheard everything. He rounded on the boy, who flinched.
“Our mark is a fucking hellhound breeder? That’s a detail I should’ve known about!”
“Even the buyer didn’t know,” Itri squeaked. “Fen swore that Roven only had the two guard dogs.”
“AndIswear toFen, when we—”
The hound shrieked again. Louder, closer. Without another word, Neldren sprinted down the corridor.
“Wait!” Itri called. “What about Fen?”
“The bastard got himself into this mess, he can get himself out of it. Come on!”
Mavery and Itri exchanged glances, then ran after Neldren.
They retraced their steps from the break-in, scrambling down the corridor and up a narrow spiral staircase that led to the servants’ quarters. Three young women lay on cots, exactly where Neldren and Mavery had left them. Thanks to the sleep tonic Mavery had brewed earlier that day, they would continue sleeping soundly through the night.
One by one, Mavery and her accomplices tossed their packs through the window, then hoisted themselves out onto the roof. Mavery closed the window behind them. They tiptoed across the shingles, crouching as low as possible, lest a patrolling guard look in their direction. The hellhound’s cries had to have drawn someone’s attention. As Mavery climbed down the trellis, she tried to not think about that—or how high off the ground she currently was. Every movement made the wood rattle, and she had only the light of the first moon to illuminate the footholds. The climb down was somehow infinitely worse than the climb up.
