Steward Temigast returned and announced that the coach was ready, and Meralda went straight to him, but she was still not quick enough to dodge the young man's last attempt to steal a kiss.
It hardly mattered. Meralda was beginning to see things clearly now, and she understood her responsibility to her family and would put that responsibility above all else. Still, it was a long and miserable ride across the bridge and down the road, the young woman's head swirling with so many conflicting thoughts and emotions.
Once again she bade the gnomish driver to let her out some distance from her home. Pulling off the uncomfortable shoes Temigast had sent along with the dress, Meralda walked barefoot down the lane under the moon. Too confused by the events-to think that she was to be married! — Meralda was barely conscious of her surroundings and wasn't even hoping, as she had after her first meeting, that Jaka would find her on the road. She was taken completely by surprise when the young man appeared before her.
"What did he do to you?" Jaka asked before Meralda could even say his name.
"Do?" she echoed.
"What did you do?" Jaka demanded. "You were there for a long time."
"We walked in the garden," the woman answered.
"Just walked?" Jaka's voice took on a frightful edge at that moment, one that set Meralda back on her heels.
"What're you thinking?" she dared ask.
Jaka gave a great sigh and spun away. "I am not thinking, and that is the problem," he wailed. "What enchantment have you cast upon me, Meralda? Oh, the bewitching! I know miserable Feringal must feel the same," he added, spinning back on her. "What man could not?"
A great smile erupted on the young woman's face, but it didn't hold, not at all. Why was Jaka acting so peculiar, so love-struck all of a sudden? she wondered. Why hadn't he behaved this way before?
"Did he have you?" Jaka asked, coming very close. "Did you let him?"
The questions hit Meralda like a wet towel across the face. "How can you be asking me such a thing?" she protested.
Jaka fell to his knees before her, taking both her hands and pressing them against his cheek. "Because I shall die to think of you with him," he explained.
Meralda felt weak in her knees and sick to her stomach. She was too young and too inexperienced, she realized, and could not fathom any of this, not the marriage, not Lord Feringal's polite and almost animalistic polarities, and not Jaka's sudden conversion to lovesick suitor.
"I. ." she started. "We did nothing. Oh, he stole a kiss, but I didn't kiss him back."
Jaka looked at her, and the smile upon his face was somehow unnerving to Meralda. He came closer then, moving his lips to brush against hers and lighting fires everywhere in her body, it seemed. She felt his hands roaming her body, and she did not fear them-at least not in the same manner in which she had feared her noble suitor. No, this time it was an exciting thing, but still she pushed the man back from her.
"Do you deny the love that we feel for each other?" a wounded Jaka asked.
"But it's not about how we're feeling," Meralda tried to explain.
"Of course it is," the young man said quietly, and he came forward again. "That is all that matters."
He kissed her gently again, and Meralda found that she believed him. The only thing in all the world that mattered at that moment was how she and Jaka felt for each other. She returned the kiss, falling deeper and deeper, tumbling away to an abyss of joy.
Then he was gone from her, too abruptly. Meralda popped open her eyes to see Jaka tumbling to the ground, a raging Dohni Ganderlay standing before her.
"Are you a fool then?" the man asked, and he lifted his arm as if to strike Meralda. A look of pain crossed his rugged face then, and he quickly put his arm down, but up it came again, grabbing Meralda roughly by the shoulder and spinning her toward the house. Dohni shoved her along, then turned on Jaka, who put his hands up defensively in front of his face and darted about, trying to escape.
"Don't hit him, Da!" the young woman cried, and that plea alone stopped Dohni.
"Stay far from my girl," Dohni warned Jaka.
"I love-" Jaka started to reply.
"They'll find yer body washing on the beach," Dohni said.
When Meralda cried out again, the imposing man turned on her viciously. "Home!" he commanded. Meralda ran off at full speed, not even bothering to retrieve the shoe she had dropped when Dohni had shoved her.
Dohni turned on Jaka, his eyes, red from anger and nights of restless sleep, as menacing as any sight the young man had ever witnessed. Jaka turned on his heel and ran away. He started to, anyway, for before he had gone three steps Dohni hit him with a flying tackle across the back of his knees, dropping him face down on the ground.
"Meralda begged you not to hit me!" the terrified young man pleaded.
Dohni climbed atop him, roughly pulling the young man over. "Meralda's not knowing what's best for Meralda," Dohni answered with a growl and a punch that jerked Jaka's head to the side.
The young man began to cry and to flail his arms wildly, trying to fend off Dohni. The blows got through, though, one after another, swelling Jaka's pretty eyes and fattening both his lips, knocking one tooth out of his perfect smile and bringing blue bruises to his normally rosy cheeks. Jaka finally had the sense to bring his arms down across his battered face, but Dohni, his rage not yet played out, only aimed his blows lower, pounding, pounding Jaka about the chest. Every time Jaka dropped one arm down lower to block there, Dohni cunningly slipped a punch in about his face again.
Finally, Dohni leaped off the man, grabbed him by the front of the shirt, and hoisted him to his feet with a sudden, vicious jerk. Jaka held his palms out in front of him in a sign of surrender. That cowardly act only made Dohni slug him one more time, a brutal hook across the jaw that sent the young man flying to the ground again. Dohni pulled him upright, and he cocked his arm once more. Jaka's whimper made Dohni think of Meralda, of the inevitable look upon her face when he walked in, his knuckles all bloody. He grabbed Jaka in both hands and whipped him around, sending him running on his way.
"Get yourself gone!" the man growled at Jaka. "And don't be sniffing about my girl again!"
Jaka gave a great wail and stumbled off into the darkness.
Chapter 9 THE BARREL'S BOTTOM
Robillard scratched his chin when he saw the pair, Wulfgar and Morik, moving down the alley toward the front door of the Cutlass. Deudermont was still inside, a fact that did not sit well with the divining wizard, given all the activity he had seen outside the tavern's door. Robillard had watched a seedy character come out and pay off a street urchin. The wizard understood the uses of such children. That same character, an unusual figure indeed, had exited the Cutlass again and moved off into the shadows.
Wulfgar appeared with a small, swarthy man. Robillard was not surprised when the same street urchin peeked out from an alley some distance away, no doubt waiting for his opportunity to return to his chosen place of business.
Robillard realized the truth after putting the facts together and adding a heavy dose of justifiable suspicion. He turned to the door and chanted a simple spell, grabbing at the air and using it to blast open the portal. "Mister Micanty!" he called, amplifying his voice with yet another spell.
"Go out with a pair of crewmen and alert the town guard," Robillard demanded. "To the Cutlass on Half-Moon Street with all speed."
With a growl the wizard reversed his first spell and slammed the door shut again, then fell back intently into the images within the crystal ball, focusing on the front door of the Cutlass. He moved inside to find Deudermont leaning calmly against the bar.
A few uneventful minutes passed; Robillard shifted his gaze back outside just long enough to note Wulfgar and his small friend lurking in the shadows, as if waiting for something.
Even as the wizard's roving magical eye moved back through the tavern's door, he found Deudermont approaching the exit.
"Hurry, Micanty," Robillard mouthed quietly,
but he knew that the town guard, well-drilled as they were, wouldn't likely arrive in time and that he would have to take some action. The wizard plotted his course quickly: a dimensional door to the other end of the docks, and a second to the alley that ran beside the Cutlass. One final look into the crystal ball showed Deudermont walking out and Wulfgar and the other man moving toward him. Robillard let go his mental connection with the ball and brought up the first dimensional door.
*****
Creeps Sharky and Tee-a-nicknick crouched in the shadows on the rooftop. The tattooed man brought the blowgun up to his lips the second Deudermont exited the tavern.
"Not yet," Creeps instructed, grabbing the barrel and pulling the weapon low. "Let him talk to Wulfgar and Morik, and get near to my stone that'll kill any magical protections he might be wearin'. And let others see 'em together, afore and when Deudermont falls dead."
The wretched pirate licked his lips in anticipation. "They gets the blame, we gets the booty," he said.
*****
"Wulfgar," Captain Deudermont greeted him when the barbarian and his sidekick shifted out of the shadows and steadily approached. "My men said you came to Sea Sprite."
"Not from any desire," Wulfgar muttered, drawing an elbow from Morik.
"You said you want your warhammer back," the little man quietly reminded him.
What Morik was really thinking, though, was that this might be the perfect time for him to learn more about Deudermont, about the man's protections and, more importantly, his weaknesses. The street urchin had found the barbarian and the rogue down by the docks, handing over the small bag and its curious contents and explaining that Captain Deudermont desired their presence in front of the Cutlass on Half-Moon Street. Again, Morik had spoken to Wulfgar about the potential gain here, but he backed off immediately as soon as he recognized that dangerous scowl. If Wulfgar would not go along with the assassination, then Morik meant to find a way to do it on his own. He had nothing against Deudermont, of course, and wasn't usually a murderer, but the payoff was just too great to ignore. Good enough for Wulfgar, Morik figured, when he was living in luxury, the finest rooms, the finest food, the finest booze, and the finest whores.
Wulfgar nodded and strode right up to stand before Deudermont, though he did not bother accepting the man's offered hand. "What do you know?" he asked.
"Only that you came to the docks and looked up at Waillan Micanty," Deudermont replied. "I assumed that you wished to speak with me."
"All that I want from you is information concerning Aegis-fang," he said sourly.
"Your hammer?" Deudermont asked, and he looked curiously at Wulfgar, as if only then noticing that the barbarian was not wearing the weapon.
"The boy said you had information," Morik clarified.
"Boy?" the confused captain asked.
"The boy who gave me this," Morik explained, holding up the bag.
Deudermont moved to take it but stopped, seeing Robillard rushing out of the alley to the side.
"Hold!" the wizard cried.
Deudermont felt a sharp sting on the side of his neck. He reached up instinctively with his hand to grab at it, but before his fingers closed around the cat's claw, a great darkness overcame him, buckling his knees. Wulfgar leaped ahead to grab him.
Robillard yelled and reached out magically for Wulfgar, extending a wand and blasting the huge barbarian square in the chest with a glob of sticky goo that knocked him back against the Cutlass and held him there. Morik turned and ran.
"Captain! Captain!" Robillard cried, and he let fly another glob for Morik, but the agile thief was too quick and managed to dodge aside as he skittered down another alley. He had to reverse direction almost immediately, for entering the other end came a pair of city guard, brandishing flaming torches and gleaming swords. He did keep his wits about him enough to toss the satchel the boy had given him into a cubby at the side of the alley before he turned away.
All of Half-Moon Street seemed to erupt in a frenzy then, with guardsmen and crewmen of Sea Sprite exiting from every conceivable angle.
Against the wall of the Cutlass, Wulfgar struggled mightily to draw breath. His mind whirled back to the grayness of the Abyss, back to some of the many similar magics demon Errtu had put on him to hold him so, helpless in the face of diabolical minions. That vision lent him rage, and that rage lent him strength. The frantic barbarian got his balance and pulled hard, tearing planking from the side of the building.
Robillard, howling with frustration and fear as he knelt over the scarcely breathing Deudermont, hit Wulfgar with another glob, pasting him to the wall again.
"They've killed him," the wizard yelled to the guardsmen. "Catch the little rat!"
*****
"We go," Tee-a-nicknick said as soon as Deudermont's legs buckled.
"Hit him again," Creeps begged.
The tattooed man shook his head. "One enough. We go."
Even as he and Creeps started to move, the guards descended upon Half-Moon Street and all the other avenues around the area. Creeps led his friend to the shadows by a dormer on the building, where they deposited the blowgun and poison. They moved to another dormer across the way and sat down with their backs against the wall. Creeps took out a bottle, and the pair started drinking, pretending to be oblivious, happy drunks.
Within a few minutes, a trio of guardsmen came over the lip of the roof and approached them. After a cursory inspection and a cry from below revealing that one of the assassins had been captured and the other was running loose through the streets, the guards turned away in disgust.
*****
Morik spun and darted one way, then another, but the noose was closing around him. He found a shadow in the nook of a building and thought he might wait the pursuit out, when he began glowing with magical light.
"Wizards," the rogue muttered. "I hate wizards!"
Off he ran to a building and started to climb, but he was caught by the legs and hauled down, then beaten and kicked until he stopped squirming.
"I did nothing!" he protested, spitting blood with every word as they hauled him roughly to his feet.
"Shut your mouth!" one guard demanded, jamming the hilt of his sword into Morik's gut, doubling the rogue over in pain. He half-walked and was half-dragged back to where Robillard worked feverishly over Deudermont.
"Run for a healer," the wizard instructed, and a guard and a pair of crewmen took off.
"What poison?" the wizard demanded of Morik.
Morik shrugged as if he did not understand.
"The bag," said Robillard. "You held a bag."
"I have no-" Morik started to say, but he lost the words as the guard beside him slammed him hard in the belly yet again.
"Retrace his steps," Robillard instructed the other guards "He carried a small satchel. I want it found."
"What of him?" one of the guards asked, motioning to the mound of flesh that was Wulfgar. "Surely he can't breath under that."
"Cut his face free, then," Robillard hissed. "He should not die as easily as that."
"Captain!" Waillan Micanty cried upon seeing Deudermont.
He ran to kneel beside his fallen captain. Robillard put a comforting hand on the man's shoulder, turning a violent glare on Morik.
"I am innocent," the little thief declared, but even as he did a cry came from the alley. A moment later a guardsman ran out with the satchel in hand.
Robillard pulled open the bag, first lifting the stone from it and sensing immediately what it might be. He had lived through the Time of Troubles after all, and he knew all about dead magic regions and how stones from such places might dispel any magic near them. If his guess was right, it would explain how Morik and Wulfgar had so easily penetrated the wards he'd placed on the captain.
Next Robillard lifted a cat's claw from the bag. He led Morik's gaze and the stares of all the others from that curious item to Deudermont's neck, then produced another, similar claw, the one he had pulled from the captain's wound.
>
"Indeed," Robillard said dryly, eyebrows raised.
"I hate wizards," Morik muttered under his breath.
A sputter from Wulfgar turned them all around. The big man was coughing out pieces of the sticky substance. He started roaring in rage almost immediately and began tugging with such ferocity that all the Cutlass shook from the thrashing.
Robillard noted then that Arumn Gardpeck and several others had exited the place and stood staring incredulously at the scene before them. The tavernkeeper walked over to consider Wulfgar, then shook his head.
"What have ye done?" he asked.
"No good, as usual," remarked Josi Puddles.
Robillard walked over to them. "You know this man?" he asked Arumn, jerking his head toward Wulfgar.
"He's worked for me since he came to Luskan last spring," Arumn explained. «Until-» the tavernkeeper hesitated and stared at the big man yet again, shaking his head.
"Until?" Robillard prompted.
"Until he got too angry with all the world," Josi Puddles was happy to put in.
"You will be summoned to speak against him before the magistrates," Robillard explained. "Both of you."
Arumn nodded dutifully, but Josi's head bobbed eagerly. Perhaps too eagerly, Robillard observed, but he had to privately admit his gratitude to the little wretch.
A host of priests came running soon after, their numbers and haste alone a testament to the great reputation of the pirate-hunting Captain Deudermont. In mere minutes, the stricken man was born away on a litter.
On a nearby rooftop, Creeps Sharky smiled as he handed the empty bottle to Tee-a-nicknick.
*****
Luskan's gaol consisted of a series of caves beside the harbor, winding and muddy, with hard and jagged stone walls. Perpetually stoked fires kept the place brutally hot and steamy. Thick veils of moisture erupted wherever the hot air collided with the cold, encroaching waters of the Sword Coast. There were a few cells, reserved for political prisoners mostly, threats to the ruling families and merchants who might grow stronger if they were made martyrs. Most of the prisoners, though, didn't last long enough to be afforded cells, soon to be victims of the macabre and brutally efficient Prisoner's Carnival.
The Spine of the World pod-2 Page 13