The Magic Thief Read Free

who stared back at him.
    Keeping my head down, I sat on the cold floorwith my back against the wall.
    At that, the minion shifted his glare to me. His eyes narrowed. “Here now. I know you, don’t I?”
    I sat very still.
    The minion nodded. “You’re that lockpick. Crowe has a word out on you.”
    Drats.
    The minion came over and, with hard hands, gripped me by the shoulders and yanked me to my feet. I shot Benet a glance, but he stood with his arms folded. No help.
    â€œMy master will want a word with you,” the minion growled.
    A word was not what the Underlord wanted from me.
    All at the same moment, I kicked out at the minion’s shin and twisted my shoulders and I was free. Ducking under his reaching arms, I raced down the shiny stone hallway toward the door Nevery had gone through.
    â€œHere, you!” the minion shouted. Then hecalled for the other minions and lumbered after me.
    I went through the door into an empty hallway. The second door I came to was unlocked, so I darted through and slammed it closed. I was in another hallway.
    I needed to find Nevery. My bare feet made no noise as I ran down the hallway, pausing to try each door. Locked, locked, locked. The hallway turned; I crouched down to peer around the corner. If a guard is looking out for intruders, he looks at his eye level, not down near the floor.
    In one direction, nothing but empty hallway. Down the other, two minions outside a door. Crowe still used it as his office, I guessed. Nevery was in there. I backed away from the turning and tried the nearest doorknob, a bumpy brass thing with a big keyhole. Locked. I peeked through the keyhole, checking for light: none. Put my ear against the door: silence.
    I fished my lockpick wires out of my pocket and picked the lock, clean. Easing open the door,I slid inside and pushed it shut again. The room was dark, but I could make out another door in the shadows at the other end.
    I crossed the room, quick-quiet to the other door, and did the thing with the lockpicks again. Still clear. Went through the next room, to the next door.
    Along the bottom of this door was a line of light. I crouched down and peered through the keyhole. Couldn’t see much. Flickering werelight, maybe a shelf of books, the corner of a gold-gilt picture frame.
    Then a sound. Click-tick , click-tick , click-tick-tick-tick . I knew what made that sound. The Underlord. A long time ago I’d done something stupid—picked Crowe’s pocket to see what he carried around with him. And what had I got for my trouble? The click-ticker. It was a little hand-sized metal device holding four bone discs with notches on them. Crowe used it for counting, for calculating, and each time a number came up, thedevice went click-tick .
    From inside the room, Nevery said something in a deep growl. He sounded angry.
    As I turned away from the keyhole, I realized that the room had a third door.
    I went over and crouched down to peer through the ornate keyhole. A man was standing directly opposite the door, shouting at someone else. The man was a white-haired wizard, but not Nevery; he wore a black robe with gold trim and had a locus magicalicus hanging from a gold chain around his neck.
    â€œâ€”without the slowsilver!” he shouted. “I must have another measure of it at least, or—” He lowered his voice and I couldn’t hear exactly what he said, but it sounded deadly, like sharp knives in a dark alley. Scowling, he pointed toward the corner of the room and I heard another door open and slam shut. Then the wizard turned his back and went to a bookcase. He looked around, and then pressed a panel beside the top shelf. Thebookcase swung open to reveal a dark doorway. The top of a stairway, I realized. The wizard went down. The bookcase-door stayed open.
    What was he up to? Wizardly things, maybe, and as a wizard’s apprentice, I should follow him and find out. Quickly I pulled out my wires and