by Ed Greenwood
What his dead father had liked to call “a brief and bloody affray” was about to erupt.
Marlin smiled and pulled open the breast of his jerkin to let Thirsty fly free.
One distant Dragon wasn’t running to meet the sellswords, but was instead trotting off down a side passage. Marlin pointed at the man the moment the poison-painted stinger of his pet stirge was safely out past his arm.
“That one!” he snapped—and Thirsty flapped off in untidy, streaking haste.
Marlin waited, ignoring the first grunts and clangs of hard-swung swords as the rushing men met. Swords flashed and thrust, a Dragon fell with a groan, and a hiresword and another Dragon guard slumped with nigh identical wet gurgles.
Marlin still stood motionless, head cocked and listening hard. Gods, this was taking forever …
Then Thirsty flapped back into view, almost nonchalantly, and fell on the neck of one of the Dragon officers, stinger lancing down hard. Marlin allowed himself another smile.
That Dragon had gone down before the alarm could be raised. No doubt the man was lying paralyzed on the floor, not far from the gong he’d been running to reach.
So sad—but then, life was a series of such sadnesses. The trick was making sure every one of them was suffered by someone else.
Thirsty was no ordinary stirge, the well-known vermin that sucked blood from cattle until sated. Rather, it liked the tastes of many victims—and was even now winging to another one.
One of Marlin’s hirelings died on a Purple Dragon blade thanks to being startled at the sight of Thirsty flapping past, and the guards had already hacked down two more sellswords—but those hirelings hadn’t been idle, either. The smartly uniformed patrol had been reduced to a trio of frightened, surrounded men, beset by too many swords to stop.
The Dragons fought desperately, sending one of Marlin’s sellswords staggering away cursing weakly, then slashing out the throat of another. Yet with the numbers they faced and the veteran skills of those seeking to slaughter them, their fates were never in doubt.
The last Dragon died spewing blood with two swords through his body.
Leaving two of Marlin’s hireswords still standing and a third on his knees gasping out blood, his face twisted in pain.
As Thirsty flapped back to its master almost lazily, the two able-bodied sellswords looked to their patron for orders.
Marlin pointed at their wounded fellow. “Kill him,” he said curtly.
They gave him expressionless looks for a moment, realizing their own fates if they got hurt, then did his bidding, turning again from the corpse to learn his will.
“The sacks we brought along,” Marlin told them promptly as he caught up the chalice from the floor where its death-struck recoverer had carefully placed it. “Retrieve them. Behead all of the dead, and collect the heads in the sacks; they’re coming with us.”
That earned him another pair of expressionless looks.
Marlin sighed. “So there’s nothing left that can possibly have seen us or wag tongues about that, when the war wizards come prying with their spells and asking their foolish questions.”
Chalice safely in the crook of his elbow, Marlin then applied himself to close scrutiny of his maps. By the time his two hirelings joined him with their dripping sacks, he was ready to lead them confidently away from the Chamber of the Wyrms Ascending, through a secret passage in its walls behind the rearing dragon statue.
Gods above, but the Obarskyrs had loved secret passages.
“This is heading deeper into the palace,” one of the sellswords muttered, as Marlin waved them to move ahead of him. It was a safe bet that the chalice would earn them more, sold illicitly, than any sack of heads. Unless that sack had, say, the king’s head in it.
“So it is,” he snapped. “Rest assured that I know exactly what I’m doing—and what you’re thinking, too, come to that.”
After climbing a precipitous flight of steps right after departing the Wyrms Ascending, the passage ran straight and narrow for what seemed a very long way, obviously inside the thickness of a wall. It climbed and then descended once, presumably to hop over a connecting door, and then, for no apparent reason, took an angled bend to the left.
“Stop,” Marlin murmured. Just as his most expensive map showed, part of the angled section of wall could be slid aside to reveal an older, damper stone passage. He took care to put that panel carefully back into place after they’d stepped through it, then cautioned his two men to keep as silent as possible.
Keeping quiet was, after all, only prudent when trying to sneak out of a palace.
This new hidden way had a lower ceiling than the previous ones they’d used, arches built of crude, massive stone blocks. Its walls were rougher, too, and it smelled old.
According to his map and the tales that had come with it, the passage linked the royal palace with the deepest winecellar of the Old Dwarf, a long-established Suzailan tavern, passing right under or between various cellars of the royal court. It had probably been dug by the Old Dwarf himself—whoever he’d been—and no doubt used often by the legendary womanizer Azoun IV to move unseen between the palace and willing wenches all across Suzail. Or Azoun’s father before him, or any of the half-dozen randy Obarskyrs before that.
A plague on them all. Their day was almost done.
“Long live King Marlin, first of the Stormserpent line,” Marlin murmured to himself. Then shook his head and grinned wryly.
Perhaps that would be his fate, but he doubted it. Wasn’t there something about a sky full of hungry dragons returning to devour and ravage and seize Cormyr back from all humans, if no Obarskyr backside warmed the Dragon Throne?
He shrugged, glanced behind him—nothing but darkness—and devoted himself to following his cautiously striding hirelings. There’d be time enough later to ponder old legends …
“Later” as in after he was dead, most likely. A demise Marlin Stormserpent fervently hoped would occur in his sleep in some gigantic bed with gold-glister sheets and dozens of beautiful, willing, bare bedmaids in a suitably opulent chamber atop whatever palace he was then ruling most of the Realms from. About a century or so from now.
CHAPTER
TEN
HARDER THAN HARBOR RAIN
Arclath smiled his customary easy smile.
Both of his two unlikely friends were nervous and tired. It must be the upcoming council and their superiors shouting at them about this particular exacting preparation and that specific niggling detail. As the days dwindled down to that grand gathering, the tension behind the palace doors would rise to shrieking heights that would need far more than a mere knife to cut. These days, it always did.
Wherefore Lord Arclath Argustagus Delcastle, who prided himself on being a benevolent, enlightened noble who was considerate of his lessers—as well as being the airily outrageous, flamboyant flame of Suzailan fashion, though he knew some folk described him far more bluntly, “an utter fop” being one of the politer descriptions—had conducted them that evening to the Dragonriders’ Club, an establishment they’d otherwise never have spent coins enough to enter, for it was both exclusive and very expensive.
These were factors he dismissed in less than an instant. His coins would be spent, not theirs, and his purse could easily cover the patronage of two hundred nervous and tired young men. Besides, those who hoarded their coins only lost them in the end to such perils as the Silent Shadow, without ever enjoying them.
“Come, Belnar! Ho, Halance!” he said merrily, turning in a whirl of his rich and splendid half cloak. “Come and stare at the best mask dancers in all Suzail!”
He reached to fling wide the doors and usher them in, but the club door guards, who knew him well, hastened to open up for the trio.
The revealed maw of revelry made Belnar and Halance both hesitate, so Arclath smilingly strode forward and led the way out of the night and into warm, welcoming hedonism. As he’d expected, they followed readily enough.
Lanterns of
leaping flame were reflected from scores of polished copper wall adornments and artfully placed mirrors; a constant murmur of chatterings and chucklings washed over everything; and a thudding, piping tune was undulating and swirling sinuously from somewhere close behind the red-lit raised stage at the heart of the dimly lit sea of small—and crowded—round tables.
The Dragonriders’ had been open for only two summers but had established itself firmly at the social height of the “daring” private clubs that catered to the young and rebellious, rather than oldblood money, centuries-old heritage weighing in membership, and stiff courtesies. Anyone who had coin enough could roll into the Dragonriders’ to drink and talk, but no one would if they didn’t also want to watch mask dancers. Or even do more than watch them by paying steep extra fees and seeking out back rooms with doors decorated by painted masks to match those worn by the dancers they’d seen on the raised stages out front—wearing only masks.
Arclath was much of an age with his two palace friends and knew they might be stiffly mortified—or trying to seem so—for the first few drinks, but would be hungrily watching thereafter. By the Dragon, the dancers were beautiful and skilled enough that he loved to watch them, and he could hire his pick of lasses anywhere in the city or enjoy the company of many an ambitious beauty for free, purely on the strength of being Lord Delcastle. Yet he loved to watch here as hungrily as the next man.
Mask dancers had been the rage in Suzail for less than three summers, but it was a fury that, as far as Arclath was concerned, could last forever. Some began their dances clothed, and others didn’t bother, but always their faces were hidden behind grotesque, long-beaked, birdlike masks. These lasses danced on raised stages, almost—but never quite—touching the front-row patrons.
Tress was already smilingly showing the men to Arclath’s usual table, right in front of the club’s lone half-oval stage. She was the owner of the Dragonriders’ and more properly known as “Mistress,” but it had been two years since Arclath had heard even a Watch patrol address her thus. Just “Tress” she was, to everyone. She was tall, urbane, and always clad in leathers that made her resemble some bard’s fancy of what a sexy, wingless, humanoid dragon might look like. But she never danced on the stage, and there was no backroom door with any mark of a dragon on it. He’d looked.
She patted Arclath’s shoulder like an old friend, murmuring, “Your guests, Lord?”
“Of course,” he smilingly assured her. “And I do believe they’re as thirsty as you are strikingly beautiful, high lady!”
“Flatterer,” she purred fondly, gliding away to fetch some decanters herself, rather than signaling her maids.
The two uneasy, blushing young men sitting beside Arclath might have bolted from their seats right back out into the street if they’d had the slightest idea how much Tress knew about them at a glance, though they’d never darkened her doors before. She caught Arclath’s eye as she came back with the wine, interpreted his grin and slight shake of his head correctly, and did not address either of his companions by name.
Even as she smilingly called them “saers,” and bent over them to give them their choice of wine and a pleasant view of the dragon she’d painted sinuously arising from her cleavage, the owner of the Dragonriders’ knew the paler, thinner one in plain street tunic and breeches with the black curly hair was the young but dedicated Wizard of War Belnar Buckmantle. While the slightly larger, agile, and darkly handsome man in palace chamberjack’s livery was Halance Dustrin Tarandar, an amiable courtier of low rank but longtime, trusted service. It was the business of many club owners to know faces and names. For one thing, it prevented husbands and wives from encountering each other unexpectedly and unpleasantly when they were availing themselves of a club’s services to temporarily forget each other. For another, it kept inferiors and superiors in common service from seeing each other to the embarrassment—or worse—of both. It was also always handy to know when a senior courtier or a noble was in the house and not wanting to be recognized. It was even more useful to know when a wizard of war was visiting. Or several war wizards, especially if their faces warned that they might be ready for trouble and expecting it.
The style of Tarandar’s uniform sleeve told any Suzailan who cared about such things that he was a senior chamberjack, head of a duty of eight chamberjacks, the fetch-and-carry men who ran errands, delivered messages and small items about the palace, moved furniture as required, announced guests entering a chamber, and guided visitors through the chambers of state. The crook of the smile on Tress’s face told Arclath she regarded Tarandar as a fellow underappreciated and underpaid toiler in personal service to the too often ungrateful. If that smile had been a comment, it would have been “Poor lad.”
Seated beside Arclath Argustagus Delcastle—in his beribboned clothing, gilded wig, curl-toed boots, and all—his two court friends looked like two of his drab, timid servants. Who suddenly, despite their wide-eyed stares at the stage, were yawning. Tired little servants of the Crown, the both of them.
“So,” Arclath began, when Tress had poured each man his mumbled choice from the decanters and smilingly had withdrawn, “tell me about this Council of Dragons from the inside, as it were. Will there be wine? Dancing? And are we all going to have to put on fetching little dragon suits like the one Tress pours herself into?”
“Where’s he heading now?” Storm murmured, as the last of Stormserpent’s men vanished around that distant corner. “Not the Dragonskull, after all.”
The ghostly princess lifted shapely shoulders in a shrug. “He certainly knows where he’s going. Which is more than I do. Elminster?”
“Why do folk always think I know everything? Hey?”
“Perhaps because you’ve spent more centuries than I’d care to count very loudly pretending that you do,” Storm said sharply, before Alusair could say something worse.
The grin Elminster gave them both then was one Storm Silverhand had been seeing all her life. It had probably looked very much the same riding his possibly then-beardless face when he’d been about six summers old, back in long-vanished Athalantar.
“Well,” the Sage of Shadowdale said mildly, “he’s obviously going to wherever the treasure he’s seeking is really hidden. Somewhere nearby; near enough that he could use the Dragonskull Chamber as a navigational landmark to reach it.”
“A pirate, sailing my palace in search of buried treasure.” Alusair’s smile was bitter.
Elminster’s impish grin brightened. “That’s a very good way to think of Cormyr’s nobility. Rapacious pirates, all of them.”
“A wizard would know,” Alusair said over her shoulder as she departed the balcony through the nearest wall.
Storm and Elminster hastened to follow her. After all, they had to use the door.
Amarune danced at the very edge of the stage, tossing her head to let her unbound hair swirl as she crawled along the polished rim like a panther, growling and purring playfully at the men—and a few women, too—gazing longingly at her from the nearby tables.
Though not a hint of it showed on her face or in her manner—she was good at that—she was slightly irritated and almightily interested in what was going on at just one of the tables.
The one right in front of her.
Whereas the Lord Delcastle and his two companions seemed not to think she had ears at all, the way they freely discussed the council so close to her.
Oh, they knew she was there, all right.
The other two couldn’t keep their eyes off her, and Lord Fancybritches Delcastle, wearing his usual easy smile, was idly tossing coins to her in a steady stream, to keep her posing right in front of them.
His aim was as unerringly teasing as ever, too.
Yes, by the Dragon, the three genuinely seemed unaware she could hear all they were saying—and she was listening to them intently.
Such a gathering of nobles, after all, would mean the richest business of this season coming right into her arms, if she was able to spr
ead word of her charms just right. Exclusive, that’s what they’d want; something they can have that others won’t be able to taste … something thrillingly dangerous and dirty …
She’d seen the chamberjack just once, when visiting the royal court to pay her taxes. He was quiet, perhaps the politest courtier she’d ever encountered, and darned handsome to boot. That’s why she’d remembered him … Tarandar, that was his name.
The other one was a war wizard, but that was all she knew about him. Except that if he was a spy and a veteran hurler-of-spells, he was also the greatest actor in all the Realms. If he wasn’t an inexperienced, thoroughly embarrassed youngling, she’d eat her mask—right then, in his lap, and without sauce.
She decided she’d much rather decorate Tarandar’s lap, instead.
As for the loudly effeminate fop across the table from them, well, he was good winking fun, but there was a reason he was mockingly known among his fellow nobles as the Fragrant Flower of House Delcastle. Not that he preferred men in his bed, but because he was all overblown fripperies and dwelt in a Delcastle Manor that was legendary for florid, beribboned, rose-hued decor.
Tossing her hair as she caught Tarandar’s eye, she parted her lips longingly, ran her tongue around them—and watched him blush. Delcastle chuckled, of course, and the chamberjack looked so overwhelmed by her displayed self that she almost burst into laughter. His tongue was actually hanging out.
She wondered what his face would look like if she told him who and what she truly was: Amarune Lyone Amalra Whitewave, an orphan from Marsember, who for some very hard-bitten years had earned her meals with her body—and thievery. A string of bold thefts every wizard of war had been publicly ordered to stop, if they could, by any and all means.
Not that anyone knew she was the Silent Shadow.
So hearing who she really was would make his face change, to be sure.