Skif had managed—by luck and a glib tongue—to squeak out of danger again.

7

IT was a good, dark night—not quite moonless, but it had been a day moon, shining in the blue sky half the afternoon, and it would be down before Skif was done with tonight’s job. Right now, the shadows were perfect for getting into his target. Skif sniffed the air appreciatively, but silently; it was crisp and cold, with a hint of wood smoke, but not as much as there would have been if all of the fireplaces in his target house were running. With a dry autumn this year, there was no treacherous ice on the roof or tops of the walls. In the fall the first bit of cold kept people off the street at night and tucked up in a cozy tavern, instead of wandering about, taking a chance of getting run off by the Watch for the fun of gawking at the show homes of the rich. All except for the rich themselves, of course, who were making the rounds of their estates—if they had them—or their friends’ estates. It was hunting season, and no one who was anyone would be caught dead in Haven at this time of year, not when they could go out to the country and use the slaughter of wild game as an excuse to have house parties.

It was very strange. Granted, wild game was a luxury, and featured prominently in the menus of the rich. But surely their foresters and servants could do a better job of going after it than people who didn’t hunt for a living.

Still, all to the good. A smart lad with the wit to go and hold horses outside the Great Houses always knew who was having a country-house party and who was going to it. When the master was away, the servants left behind took their own sort of holiday, and getting into and out of a place was child’s play.

Well, it was if the “child” was Skif.

Hidden in a join of two walls, where one stuck out a little farther than the other and left a vertical slot of dark shadow, Skif waited until the Watch passed. There was always the Nightwatch to reckon with, in the fine neighborhoods. When he’d worked by day, snatching things out of the laundries of many of the fancy houses he now robbed, he hadn’t had to worry about the Nightwatch.

Not that he worried too much about them now—so long as he knew the schedule. He kept his head turned away as they passed with their lantern to keep from having his night vision ruined, then nicked across the top of Jesolon’s wall to the top of Kalink’s.

The home of the arrogant “new money” grain merchant Kalink was his goal tonight. The irony was that this Kalink wasn’t even the one who made the money—that had been the work of the old man, who according to gossip had been perfectly content to live quietly, if comfortably, in the country until he died. Not the son, though. Gossip grudgingly admitted he had as good a head for business as the old man, maybe better, but he wasn’t going to molder in the countryside, not he! He got himself a show-wife, long on looks and short on wits, and had this brand new manor house built right up against Jesolon’s, first tearing down the smaller place that had been there. He hadn’t been content to simply add on—no, nothing was good enough for him but brand new, nor would he hear any advice on the subject. It didn’t matter to him that having walls run right up to the side of a house just made a road for a thief to walk on—hadn’t he the very latest in locks and catches and other theft-foiling hardware? Hadn’t he ornamental ironwork on all the windows?