"01 - Azure Bonds - Jeff Grubb & Kate Novak [4.0]" - читать интересную книгу автора (Finder's Stone)

tattooed on his backside. Maybe this is just a prank, too, she reassured
herself. A clerical cure will get rid of it for me.
The small hairs on the back of her neck rose, and Alias realized that she was
being watched. Turning slowly toward the window, she locked gazes with a
reptilian creature peering in at her from the alley.
Looking like a cross between a lizard and a troglodyte, the beast's head just
reached above the level of the windowsill. His snout was thinner and more
refined than the lizard men Alias had fought before, and he had a huge fin which
began just between his eyes and continued over the top of his skull. He had no
lips, only sharp, disjointed teeth, and his eyes were the yellow of dead things.
In his claws he held the smaller of the two dogs Alias had heard earlier. The
puppy, unharmed, had short, white hair, not long as Alias had imagined. Both
creatures watched her with an intense curiosity, the lizard still as stone, the
puppy wagging its tail, with its pink tongue lolling stupidly out of one side of
its mouth.
Alias reacted instantly with the practiced grace of an experienced adventuress.
She drew one of the daggers from her boot and, with a flick of her tattooed
wrist, shot it at her observer. The creature pitched backward without a sound,
but the dog fell into the room with a frightened yip. The dagger sank half an
inch into the oak window frame.
Grasping her flame-seared sword, Alias flung herself across the room in one
fluid motion When she reached the window, however, the creature was gone and the
alleyway empty. The short-haired dog yipped at her feet, rising on its hind legs
and placing its front paws halfway up her boots
"I don't suppose you know anything about this?" she asked the dog. The puppy
merely wagged its tail and whimpered.
Alias picked up the small creature, petted it briery, then dropped it outside
the window. The beast barked at her a few times, then began sniffing the
rubbish.
*****
"The lady has risen from the dead!" shouted the barkeep in a merry voice as
Alias entered the common room. She did not know this particular barkeep, but
knew others just like him who ran inns from the Living City to Water-deep. He
was a loud, boisterous man, full of "hail-fellow-well-met" attitudes, favoring
adventurers in his trade because the additional gold they usually carried made
up for the damage their barroom arguments caused.
A few heads turned to look at her, but there were no familiar faces among them.
Alias had decided to wear her armor plate after all. She looked more suited for
battle than for a few drinks, but many of the merchants, mercenaries, and
townsfolk were similarly armed and armored, so she fit in. Like most of those in
the room, Alias wore her weapon at her side. Like all of those doing so, she had
the blade's grip tied to its sheath by white cord, fashioned in "peace knot."
She took a table near an interior wall, away from any windows, where she could
keep an eye on both doors to the common area, and the barkeep as well. He was a
portly, balding man, obviously guilty of sampling his own stock. He took her
attention as a request for service, and after a few obligatory passes with a rag
over the bar, he filled a large mug from the tap and brought it over to her
table. Foam ran down the mug's sides, and beads of water condensed where the
rivulets did not run.
"Hair o' the dog what bit you?" offered the barkeep.