"Why what a lovely name! Let me guess-you made it up all by yourself?"

"Indeed, fair damsel. Indeed!" The elven warrior whipped out his sword, instantly becoming a target for Cappa Mannicci's crossbowmen, hidden all about the hall. "For now when I cry out my name, all around me can turn and ask of me, 'Pure Knight-where come thee by such a title? Tell us of thy deeds!' "

Miliana fended off the man's imminent death with a wave to her father's sniper corps.

"Lovely! Well when you do cry out your name, do be careful not to scare the horses." Miliana peered evilly over her spectacle frames. "Next!"

The elven lady-a pale, spectral creature with hair that almost swept the floor, gave a grave bow to Miliana. As her eyes came level with the rose-pink pearl about Miliana's throat, the elf's eyes went wide. She sucked in a breath of utter disbelief, shot a hand up to her own throat, then numbly let herself be led away without another word. Miliana cocked an eyebrow after the departing elf, shook her head in wonder, and promptly put the incident out of her mind.

The inward traffic had ceased, and Miliana took the opportunity to escape. She placed a hand on her beautiful new pearl, felt a sudden rush of warm affection, and skipped off into the party in search of Lorenzo.

The titanic palace hall had been packed shoulder to shoulder with dignitaries. The festival crowds had almost tripled from the norm; the presentation of the Sun Gem and the year's victorious campaign had brought Sumbria a bounty of potential allies, along with the attendant rush of saboteurs, assassins, sorcerers, and spies. The air crackled with frustrated scrying spells, spells of charm and mind control. In the Blade Kingdoms, these little tools were as common as wood lice and just about as easily squashed. Miliana wandered through the festivities, seeking for signs of her friend. She meandered past Captain Toporello and his anti-thievery committee, then pushed past a team of elephant-headed loxoth who had mistaken Lady Ulia's favorite flower arrangement for the punch.

Elves clustered together, staring at Miliana and talking in avid, animated whispers. Miliana mentally classified them as intellectual midgets and went proudly on her way.

Passing before a jasmine bower, Miliana heard a rich voice pitching itself into a smooth, seductive litany.

"You and I… two creatures almost from different worlds. Who knows what adventures might greet the explorer's eyes? The pounding pulse-the alien touch of scents and dreams. We owe ourselves the experience-let us seize it while we may!"

A sharp slap cracked out like a gunshot; surging from the bower there came a furious young woman with a pointy hat and veil. Miliana let her pass, then opened up the bushes and leaned across a rail.

"Luccio, isn't it?"

Looking up from rubbing his reddened cheek, Luccio Irozzi blindly surged up and took Miliana by the hand.

"Luccio, my flower? 'Tis Luccio indeed!" The vivacious nobleman clasped Miliana's little hands against his heart. "And how I have been longing for this small moment alone. For you and I are two creatures almost from different worlds. Who knows what adventures might greet the explorer's eyes? The pounding pul-"

"Save it!" The girl flicked Luccio sharply on the nose. "It's me, Miliana. I'm looking for Lorenzo."

"Oh! I am so sorry, highness!" Seeing Miliana's face at last, Luccio hurriedly straightened his attire. "Lorenzo is still in our rooms. He was having trouble finding clothes that lacked scorch marks or burn holes."

With a sorry shake of her head, Miliana left Luccio consulting his list of potential trysts and marched past the guard and off into the passages that led to Lorenzo's rooms.

Behind her, the elven swordsman Brightlightning Dragonsbane swapped a meaningful glance with his mistress. The elven lady turned and thrust her way toward Ulia Mannicci with murder gleaming in her slitted eyes.

The palace sparkled like a beacon filled with fireflies; windows glowed, the colonnades thronged, and the courtyard fountain bubbled like champagne under a night sky sugared white with stars.

Behind the brilliant public rooms there lay the "business end" of the palace: the stables, kitchens, barracks, and armories that allowed the palace to operate as both a household and a fortress. Here the carriages and riding beasts filled the courts in patient rows as the sounds of merriment swirled past on the summer's air.

Walking through the palace gates there came a lean, strutting hippogriff bearing a silent rider. The hippogriff twitched the long equine ears atop its eagle's head, muttering irritably to itself as if resenting the ignominy of an entrance made on foot.

The creature's front limbs were equipped with talons, and its rear legs with hooves. Leaving mismatched prints across the dust, it walked the familiar path to the Mannicci stable stalls.

The Mannicci guards had been quintupled in number for the evening revels; two soldiers supervised each bay of stable stalls. Ugo Svarezi reined in his beast as he approached a sergeant; the man held aloft a short wand and scanned him for offensive magics before sheathing the instrument and allowing Svarezi to dismount.

"Sir? Are there any special instructions for the care of your beast?"

The Colletran passed the soldier his reins.

"No."

A blade shot out of the Blade Captain's sleeve; Svarezi stabbed the soldier in the throat, ripped open his windpipe, and rammed the dripping blade into his victim's heart. The guard fell, clawing at the ground as blood hissed up to splash stinking streams across Svarezi's boots.

Behind him, something heavy thudded to the ground; the hippogriff Shaatra had decapitated the other soldier with her beak, shearing through sinew, flesh and bone with the ease of a machine. The slim mare gave a fastidious hiss, sneezed in distaste and shook the blood free from her plumes.

She would have cleaned her feathers then and there if Svarezi hadn't curtly ordered her into the stable stalls. Spitting in spite, the hippogriff left bloody tracks as she strutted out of view. Svarezi rolled the corpses out of sight, unmoved by the simple act of murder. It was a task he had performed at least a dozen times before. In the Blade Kingdoms, assassination was a uniquely personal task. The city-states had been established by mercenary companies, and the spirit of free enterprise was, sadly, an established undercurrent of everyday life. A wise man trusted no one but himself; potentially, every servant could be bribed; every soldier might be a spy.

A murderer therefore acted best when he acted alone-unless his accomplice had an equal claim to guilt. Svarezi moved out of the darkest shadows of the stable doors, flashed moonlight from the mirror pommel of his knife, and waited while Gilberto Ilego strolled over from the palace colonnades.

Ilego held a large, leathery bat upon one arm. The creature perched and chivied like a prized hunting hawk, stropping at its master's leather gauntlets with its fangs. Without a word exchanged between them, Ilego and Svarezi walked toward the palace's farthest tower.

Within the tower, all the genius of Sumbrian security had been brought to bear. The Sun Gem was a prize of incalculable value; with a sneak-thief on the loose within the city walls, every precaution had been taken to assure the safety of the gigantic diamond.

Prince Mannicci maintained a dozen sorcerers in his personal retinue, specialists whose skills were attuned to the arts of war. The prince had nevertheless spared three of his best men to secure the priceless gem.

At the heart of the hollow tower, they sat; an enchanter scanning a crystal ball, a summoner sitting in the center of a thaumaturgic circle, and a battle mage who passed his time reading from a huge, dusty old tome that was substantially larger than the mage himself.