Bast almost made it out the back door of the Waystone Inn.
Technically, he had made it outside. Both feet were over the threshold and the door was only a crack away from being closed.
Then he heard his master's voice and went perfectly still. He knew he hadn't given himself away. He was intimate with every subtle sound the inn could make. Not just the simple tricks a child would think clever: carrying their shoes, leaving creaky doors open ahead of time, muffling footsteps on a rug . . .
No. Bast was better than that. He could move through a room barely stirring the air. He knew which stairs sighed when it had rained the night before, which windows opened easy and which shutters caught the wind. He could tell when a detour out and over the peak of the roof would make less noise than the straight way through the upper hall.
That would be enough for some. But on the rare occasion when he actually cared, Bast found success as dull as ditchwater. Let others settle for mere excellence. Bast was an artist.
Because of this, Bast knew true silence was unnatural. To a careful ear, silence sounded like a knife in the dark.
So when Bast glided through the empty inn, he played the floorboards like an instrument. A sigh, a pause, a click, a creak. Sounds that would catch a guest just drifting off to sleep. But to someone who lived there it was nothing. It was less than nothing. It was the comfortable sound of heavy timber bones settling slowly into earth, easy to ignore as a familiar lover stirring next to you in bed.
Knowing all this, Bast eyed the door. He kept the bright brass hinges oiled, but even so he shifted his grip and lifted so the door's weight didn't hang. Only then did he ease it slowly closed. A moth would make more noise.
Bast stood to his full height and grinned, his face sweet and sly and wild. In that moment, he looked less like a rakish young man, and more a naughty child who had stolen the moon and planned to eat it like a thin, pale silver cake. His smile was like the final crescent of remaining moon, sharp and white and dangerous.
“Bast!” The call came from the inn again, louder this time. Nothing so crass as a shout. His master did not bellow like a farmer calling cows, but his voice could carry like a hunting horn. Bast felt it tug him like a hand around his heart.
Bast sighed, then opened the door and strode briskly back inside. He made walking look like dancing. He was dark, and tall, and lovely. When he scowled, his face was still more sweet than others might look smiling. “Yes Reshi?” he called brightly.
After a moment the innkeeper stepped into the kitchen. He wore a clean white apron and his hair was red. His face held the stolid placidness of bored innkeepers everywhere. Despite the early hour, he looked tired.
He handed Bast a leather-bound book. “You almost forgot this,” he said without a hint of sarcasm.