The Necromancer's Stone; The Party, part nine

The guests started to arrive.  Thalia watched patiently from the balcony, biding time for the right moment.  She saw one couple after another, groups of singles, and even a few loners make their way in and begin helping themselves cautiously to the food.  She saw Happock busy at the bar, and Mia, his daughter, beside him mixing drinks.  Katie was with her friend, chatting on the far end of the room.  Weydon had even showed up, nervously sitting by the punch bowl looking across the room for someone.  She watched for a while before deciding that everyone had come who could, and making note of those who had ignored their invitations, or come without them.  Upon them, disproportionate justice would be wrought.  It was one of the few legitimately evil things she did, but she really hated to be stood up.  Thalia snapped, turning off all lights but those she had set up for this moment.
"Greetings, honored guests.  I've gathered you all together here so that we might enjoy the arrival of the new year together.  Eat, drink, and dance; have fun."
She stepped back into the shadows and the lights turned back on.  Bit anti-climactic really, but she figured it was only a matter of time before someone would...
"Thalia Thansfeld, You will pay for your crimes!"
Ah, there it was.  She dimmed the lights and directed a spotlight towards the voice.  It was a woman, but she had companions, and they were armed.  It was her favorite part of the night already.
"Don't suppose you have any particular crime in mind?"
"You charmed the wait staff, cheated your way into the TacSim league, and killed my brother in a bar fight."
"Did I invite you?"
"No, we took it from some of your other guests.  Crooks just like you."
"Crook?" She floated down to the floor in front of them.  "That's all?  What about the bribery, the extortion, and all of the spying I had to do in order to do those things?  I think that calling me a mere crook is mildly insulting.  True of course, but I rather believe I'm so much more than that."
A man to her left spoke up, but Thalia didn't hear a word he said.  He had the most entrancing eyes of anyone she'd ever met.  It was actually a matter of minutes before she managed to regain full awareness, at which time she realized she must have continued talking because the weapons were now very much out in the open.
"I'll give you one more chance to come quietly."
"How long is this chance exactly?"
"Now."
Thalia swept the woman's feet from under her and launched her towards the windows.  Then slid across the ballroom and picked the woman up by the throat.
"Offer rejected; care to try again?"
The man yelled.  "Let her go!"  He had a good, strong voice.  Plenty of resolution, courage, but it was also tender and caring.  She couldn't help but listen to his demand.  They'd find the body in Honor Glen weeks from now.  But as the man barreled into her, it occurred to her that they might find more than one body in the depths of the glen.