Free The Banshee's Walk by Frank Tuttle

enough to make insulting our hosts aloud perfectly safe. It was obvious no one was watching out for visitors from town.
    “Remember what I said. I’ll do most of the talking. You are my eyes and ears. I’d rather know what people do, who they look at, which ones say too much and which ones don’t talk at all. Got it?”
    Gertriss nodded. We hiked up the big old granite steps, put our bags down in the weeds that sprang up through the cracks, and I gave the yellow doorknocker a good solid half-dozen blows.
    I might as well have dropped a sack full of shadows. If anyone inside heard me, and over the din it seemed unlikely, no one bothered to come to the door.
    I took up the knocker and gave the door another half-dozen whacks. “Hello,” I shouted. “City Watch. Your house is on fire. Trolls in the yard. Tax collectors.”
    Nothing.
    I put my shoulder to the door and shoved.
    It wasn’t even latched. Sunlight spilled in, three dogs and a pair of cats spilled out, and the musicians didn’t miss so much as a single beat.
    The doors opened into a standard three-walled alcove. The missing wall, to our right, opened into a Great Room, and it was there the party remained in full swing.
    A band of sorts was parked up and down the grand, swooping stairs that led up into darkness. There was a pair of shaggy-haired skinny kids on long-necked Southern guitars, another pair whistling away on flutes, and another banging out a rhythm on a pair of old infantry drums. The drummer was so drunk he could barely stand, but his drumbeats were perfect.
    At the foot of the stairs, there were more kids, two dozen at least, mostly paired off in the usual boy-girl fashion doing what were either dances or some sort of fever-induced fits. They weren’t all dancing. Naturally, there were a half-dozen partiers of either sex hovering in ragged circles around the dance floor, either staring into their cups to make it obvious they didn’t care much about this dancing foolishness anyway or giggling at each other and whispering behind raised hands.
    I stepped inside. Gertriss followed. I let the door slam with a monstrous thud and it was only then that anyone noticed the House had been invaded.
    The place was dark, and it took my eyes a moment to adjust. I saw mouths drop open and dancers turn and go still. By the time I was used to the lamplight and the candles, the last beats and bangs from the musicians died and the House was suddenly silent.
    “You must be the finder,” said a kid.
    “We’re supposed to fetch Lady Werewilk,” said another.
    “Get him a beer first,” said a third.
    And, lo and behold, someone pressed a tall cool beer right in my outstretched hand.
    There was ice in it. Actual ice, cut out of a frozen stream last winter and stored in sawdust since.
    I saw Gertriss frown as I lifted the glass to my lips. Maybe a touch of sight runs in my family too because I heard, clear as day, Mama warning Gertriss that I was too much fond of all things fermented.
    It was good beer. Not one I recognized, either. A local brew, probably, one redolent of honey and an unusually sweet variety of hops.
    There was a sound on the stairs, way up in the dark, and before I could take a second drink the musicians and the dancers and the hangers-on scattered. Within seconds, nothing was left but empty glasses, a few scarves and a lone white dog, that tilted his head and looked up at me with innocent doggy bewilderment.
    “I do not ask for much,” said an icy voice from above. Gertriss mouthed “Lady Werewilk” as quick footfalls wound down toward us.
    “But I suppose even what I do ask is too much,” continued Lady Werewilk. “I apologize for your reception, Goodman Markhat. You were supposed to be greeted like a guest, not thrust into the midst of a drunken bacchanal.”
    Lady Werewilk reached us, somewhat winded and obviously annoyed. She was wearing another tight black dress, the skirt long but slit up her right side nearly to her waist. I decided