Free Winter Witch by Elaine Cunningham Page A

picked up the wizard’s satchel and slipped out the attic window. After pulling herself up onto the roof, she crouched in the shadows of the chimney and scanned the roofs, the streets, and the skies for anyone or anything that might have followed the wizard. Apart from the imps and dragons that occasionally whizzed past, intent on their skirmishes, the only sign of life was a trio of students staggering down the street, arms draped over each other’s shoulders as they sang a drunken hymn to brotherhood. They sang with gusto, despite the fact that only one of them seemed to know the words.
    Across the street, a second-floor window banged open and a scowling, white-bearded man leaned out to heave a chamber pot at the singers. The pot shattered against the street cobbles, splattering the students’ robes with urine.
    A shouted exchange of insults ensued, giving Ellasif all the cover she needed to scramble down the back side of the building to the second floor and then drop onto the roof of a large dovecote, a rounded tower with many tiny arched doorways on each nesting level. From there her climb was easy, and the only sound that marked her passage was the murmuring whirr and coo of the birds inside. It was, in her opinion, considerate of Korvosans to provide housing for the city’s doves, not to mention convenient handholds for those who wished to come and go unobserved.
    Ellasif circled around to the Jittery Quill, a public house that stayed open throughout the night. The few patrons who’d lasted to this hour wore the strain of their efforts. Men with faces dulled by too much ale and too few proud memories slumped back in their chairs. Students and scribes drooped over their books and parchments and steaming cups of bitter-smelling brew, their fingers stained with ink and the shadows under their eyes as dark and hard-won as bruises. All were too deeply steeped in their chosen libations to take much note of her. She chose a seat that put her back to the wall and gave her a clear view of the lodging house.
    Olenka entered the house at sunrise, as agreed. After a few moments, she returned to the street, “Ellasif’s” body rolled discretely into the bedchamber’s carpet and slung over one shoulder.
    Ellasif smiled. When the transformation spell wore off, the ship would be well on its way. The elders of White Rook would not be fooled, but she would be rid of Olenka for the foreseeable future.
    Now all that remained was arranging secure passage to the northlands for herself and the other wizard for whom she had plans, one Declan Avari.

Chapter Three
    The Rare Magic
    Declan’s pell-mell ride through Korvosa came to a halt a few blocks from Kendall Amphitheater. In his haste, he’d forgotten there would be a midnight performance and crowds of theater patrons thronging the streets.
    Empty carriages streamed past him as drivers, having dropped off their wealthy patrons, headed toward taverns and alehouses for a different sort of entertainment. Up ahead, small parties of riders dismounted and handed their reins to the theater’s yellow-clad hostlers. Many of the patrons came on foot, and the crowds were especially thick near the Janderhoff Gate, an entrance for people who could not afford the full price of a ticket and were willing to risk sitting directly over the spot where dwarves labored to shore up the cavernous sinkhole beneath.
    The clock in the castle’s Epochal Tower chimed. Declan turned the stallion northward toward Midland. The open-air market would be closed at this time of night, and the roads clear.
    His reasoning might have been sound, but it fell short of reality. Declan’s impatience grew as he wove a path through carts trundling down the roads, drawn by sullen donkeys or pushed by sweating servants. He had to move off the road completely while a small caravan of ice carts rolled past, the precious cargo packed in straw and sawdust against the heat.
    Finally the south bridge came into sight, a broad