Spellslinger (Spellslinger #1)(108)
A Binding of Clarity
My editor, the delightfully kind and utterly persistent Matilda Johnson, forced me to answer all the questions about Kellen and his world until I was almost convinced the magic would actually work.
A Spell of Sparkling
The eagle-eyed Talya Baker at Hot Key Books not only brought polish and crispness to the prose, she also found holes that I’d missed.
A Prestidigitation of Publication
This book would never have seen print without my incomparable agents, Heather Adams and Mike Bryan, who found the perfect home thanks to the indomitable Mark Smith who took a chance on me both with my first series and now with this one. Thanks also to Jane Harris, for helping me solve the esoteric dilemmas surrounding certain homicidal furry creatures.
A Summoning of Kindred Spirits
Thanks to all of you who take chances on new authors and books. One of the great pleasures of this business is meeting and hearing from readers who aren’t simply fans but rather fellow travellers down the strange pathways of fantasy and adventure.
Look out for the next SPELLSLINGER book, SHADOWBLACK.
Read on for a preview.
The way of the Argosi is the way of water.
Water never seeks to block another’s path, nor does it permit impediments to its own. It moves freely, slipping past those who would capture it, taking nothing that belongs to others. To forget this is to stray from the path, for despite the rumours one sometimes hears, an Argosi never, ever steals.
1
The Charm
‘This isn’t stealing,’ I insisted, a little loudly considering the only person who could hear me was a two-foot-tall squirrel cat who was, at that moment, busily picking the combination lock that stood between us and the contents of the pawnshop’s glass display case.
Reichis, one furry ear up close to the lock as his dextrous paws worked the three small rotating brass discs, chittered angrily in reply. ‘Would you mind? This isn’t as easy as it looks.’ His tubby little hindquarters shivered in annoyance.
If you’ve never seen a squirrel cat before, picture a mean-faced cat with a big bushy tail and thin furry flaps of skin between his front and back legs that let him glide through the air in a fashion that somehow looks both ridiculous and terrifying. Oh, and give him the personality of a thief, a blackmailer and, if you believe Reichis’s stories, a murderer on more than one occasion.
‘Almost done,’ he insisted.
He’d been saying that for the past hour.
Thin lines of light were beginning to slip through the gaps between the wooden slats in the pawnshop’s front window and beneath the bottom edge of the door. Soon people would be coming down the main street, opening their shops or standing outside the saloon for that all-important first drink of the morning. They do that sort of thing here in the borderlands: work themselves into a drunken stupor before they’ve even had breakfast. It’s just one of the reasons why people here tend towards violence as the solution to any and all disputes. It’s also why my nerves were fraying. ‘We could have just broken the glass and left him some extra money to cover the damages,’ I said.
‘Break the glass?’ Reichis gave a kind of half-growl to convey what he thought of that idea. ‘Amateur.’ He turned his attention back to the lock. ‘Easy … easy …’
A click, and then a moment later Reichis proudly held up the elaborate brass lock in his paws. ‘See?’ he demanded. ‘That’s how you pull off a proper burglary!’
‘It’s not a burglary,’ I said, for what must have been the twelfth time since we’d snuck into the pawnshop that night. ‘We paid him for the charm, remember? He’s the one who ripped us off.’
Reichis snorted dismissively. ‘And what did you do about it, Kellen? Just stood there like a halfwit while he pocketed our hard-earned coin, that’s what.’
To the best of my knowledge, Reichis had never actually earned a coin in his life. ‘Shoulda ripped his throat out with your teeth like I told you,’ he continued.
The solution to most thorny dilemmas – to squirrel cats anyway – is to walk up to the source of the problem and bite it very hard on the neck, preferably coming away with as much of its bleeding flesh as possible.
I let him have the last word and reached past him to pull open the glass doors and retrieve the small silver bell attached to a thin circle of metal. Glyphs etched along its edge shimmered in the half-light: a quieting charm. An actual Jan’Tep quieting charm. With this I could cast spells without leaving the echo that allowed bounty hunters to track us. For the first time since we’d fled the Jan’Tep territories, I felt as if I could almost, almost breathe easy again.
‘Hey, Kellen?’ Reichis asked, hopping up on the counter to peer at the silver disc I held in my hand. ‘Those markings on the charm – those are magic, right?’
‘Kind of. More like a way to bind a spell onto the charm.’ I turned to look at him. ‘Since when are you interested in magic?’
He held up the combination lock. ‘Since this thing started glowing.’
A set of three elaborately drawn glyphs shimmered bright red along the cylindrical brass chamber. A moment later the door burst open and bright sunlight filled the pawnshop as a silhouetted figure charged inside and tackled me to the floor, putting an abrupt end to a heist that, in retrospect, could have done with more planning.