Those who have followed the first three volumes of THIEVES' WORLD are alreadyaware that facts vary and contradict one another depending upon the characterviewing or narrating an event. This fourth volume will be a bit more difficultto follow because of time-sequencing. While in the earlier volumes I have triedto keep the stories in the order in which they occur, this has proved to beimpossible in STORM SEASON. The length of time covered by some of these tales issignificant, causing the events to overlap or, in some cases, to occur withinother stories. Rather than try to cut and splice the stories into a smoothchronology, I've left it to the reader to understand what is happening andconstruct his/her mental timeline as necessary. Just rest assured that all thestories herein occur between the end of SHADOWS OF SANCTUARY and the end ofthe STORM SEASON.

It had been a long time since Hakiem, Sanctuary's oldest storyteller, hadvisited that section of town known only as the Fisherman's Quarters, but hestill knew the way. Not much had changed: the stalls with their flimsy awningsto keep the sun off the day's catch; the boats bottom up along the pier and, onthe beach, a few nets hung for drying and mending. All was the same-only morefaded and worn-like the people... like the rest of the town.

Hakiem had watched Sanctuary's decline over the years; watched the economy dryup as the citizens became more desperate and vicious. He had watched andchronicled with the detached eye of a professional tale-spinner. Sometimes,though, like this-when a prolonged absence made the deterioration more apparentto the eye than the day-to-day erosion of his more favored haunts, he felt a