The Fractured Sky

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Kashada the Nightwraith stood very still and waited, watching a doorway from the opposite side of Helm Dwarf-friend's great hall. It was late, and only a few lanterns burned, turned low to save oil. The hall, which soared three stories high with balconies ringing it at each level, lay shrouded in shadows. Kashada would not be seen among them.

A wisp of a girl in a nightshirt entered the hall from that far doorway. Though the other figure also stayed among the shadows, Kashada could see her plainly. It was Ansa, the Dwarf-friend's lover. The girl padded across the hall in Kashada's direction. Her shoulder-length curls bounced gently in a most provocative way as her hips swayed a tiny bit more than necessary.

Kashada grinned to herself in the darkness of her hiding place. Tramp, she thought. Dwarf-friend likes them saucy.

As the young woman passed the great table and its high-backed chairs, Kashada settled a bit deeper into her own shadows, comforted by their cloaking darkness. She brought a spell to mind, a simple trick that would allow her to become a shadow herself should Ansa hesitate and perhaps sense her presence there. Despite her seeming innocence, the girl was anything but, and Kashada the Veiled One would not risk ruining Zasian Menz's plan by getting caught spying.

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