The pawnbroker removed a wooden dish from a cupboard. He set it on the floor, and Fable jumped down. She immediately began chowing down on the bowl’s contents as if she hadn’t eaten in a tenday. The man gave the cat one more stroke, then straightened. His other hand still held the balled-up fabric.
Chant said, “Take this already! For someone so concerned about keeping it safe, you’re sure reluctant to get it back.”
Demascus took the scarf. He rubbed it between his thumb and forefinger; it was parchment smooth, and almost warm to the touch. It was the one from his vision! The mere touch of the fabric transmitted a feeling of satisfaction and relief through him.
“Let’s go, I’m hungry,” said Chant, and firmly pushed Demascus out into the street.
Chant turned to lock the the shop door, and for a moment, the splash of the water falling into the plaza fountain catchment was drowned out by the jangle of keys. They walked across the plaza, but Demascus paid no attention. He was utterly absorbed in what he held. The weave seemed finer than silk, but not slippery. It shimmered in the lamplight of the plaza, as if words might be hidden just beneath the surface.
A flicker of movement overhead was all the warning Demascus had. The next thing he knew, the scarf was torn from his grip.
“Thief!” yelled Chant, pointing.
A silver-skinned woman in a black mask spun up through the air, light as a cloud, receding. Demascus’s scarf made the pattern of the whirlwind as it swirled in her wake.
CHAPTER FOUR
AIRSPUR
THE YEAR OF THE AGELESS ONE (1479 DR)
RILTANA BOUNDED FROM WALL TO ROOFTOP, FROM FLOATING mote to suspension bridge, and from stone spire to empty air itself. The gossamer breeze swept her upward, all the way to her favorite look-over point on the northern cliff wall. The tempest in her soul called to the wind, and wind answered.
She laughed, and clutched her prize to her chest.
Finally, she had the damn scarf.
Her mark had looked as strange as he’d been described, with his skin nearly the color of chalk. His narrow face had looked at her with surprise so complete she laughed again.
She had not been told the man named Demascus was a member of the Firestorm Cabal. Usually the Cabal didn’t accept humans into their ranks, but her mark’s white hair showed that at the very least he wasn’t genasi. Cabal members had gulled most of Airspur with their crap about being noble vigilante defenders of the city. What a joke. She, at least, was wise to their lies.
And now one liar was light one scarf. She studied the length of fabric, wondering at its significance.
Riltana’s client, a hooded fellow with carrion breath, had specified to the hour when she could expect to see the white-haired man leave the pawnshop. Quite a prediction to make, considering it had been made about four years ago.
She’d sniggered when her client had first laid out the timeline for the job, thinking it was a joke. In response, the hooded man hissed. Apparently he wasn’t someone who made jokes.
Riltana had asked why, if Demascus was to pick up the scarf in the pawnshop, she couldn’t just go into the shop right then and steal it; why wait? Her client hissed again, louder and with more resonance than before. Not really the best explanation, but she’d decided not to press the issue.
Four years was a long time for even the best divination to go awry, but she’d been happy to accept the generous retainer. It provided a sum of coins large enough to ensure the lease on her loft for three full years plus change.
And today she’d shown up several hours before the specified time, crouching over the shop to await the appointed hour. The promised payoff had been too sweet to not see the commission through to the end.
Excitement tingled through her when she’d recognized her mark in the dingy courtyard. She’d had a moment of worry when drunks from the pub had intruded. She’d almost intervened then, but in the end she hadn’t had to. She watched him enter the shop following the fat human.
When he’d exited, he’d produced an appropriately shocked expression when she’d plucked the pale length from his hands. Shocked, and a little sad.
She smiled down on the wrap in her hands, then sniffed it; it smelled like parchment and library glue. Its knit was fine, but pliable. Probably woven with enchantment. Of what sort? She twisted the scarf and gently pulled at its length. Probably it contained a minor glamor that protected its wearer from cold, as was fashionable among the well-to-do. Whatever its nature, the thing was valuable to her client, which made it valuable to her.
To claim her payoff, she was to rendezvous with the hooded man just after midnight at the Sepulcher.
Once the Sepulcher had been the lair of goblins and orcs, before they were driven out by genasi settlers. Then it became home to shifty deals best made as far as possible from official notice.
She considered making her way to the meeting immediately; it wasn’t an easy place to reach, and required some time to navigate its approach.
But no. She’d been out for half the day, anticipating and preparing just the right place to fleece her target, then get away clean among the hanging earthmotes crowded with city architecture. She could use some down time. Besides, maybe today was the day Carmenere would return …
Riltana rolled the scarf into a ball. Her slim leather gloves tingled, and the bundle fell into the pocket dimension the gloves were keyed to. They were the perfect tool for keeping things safe. And, of course, the perfect tool for a thief as accomplished as herself.
She pulled off her mask, reached into the nothing again, and switched the mask for the signature blue and white robe of the Airsteppers Guild. She’d discovered long ago that city dwellers mostly ignored the scores of messengers bounding up and down Airspur’s cliff levels, whereas her stylish black bodysuit and mask would draw attention in full light. It’s easier to be invisible by blending in than by trying to physically hide.
Riltana pulled on the robe. Then she leaped into empty air, arms and legs wide as she plunged toward the bay that lay between the cliffs far below. Her left hand caught the pliant support wire of a suspension bridge that hung between two earthmotes, and her trajectory snapped outward, away from the cliff. She spun through the air, and came down easily on a roof of the next lower mass of drifting city, already running.
She dashed across rooftops, leaped gaps between buildings with impunity, and swung between motes, disdaining the city streets and bridges. She finally came to rest on a spire overlooking the Plaza of Leaping Fountains.
The open square hosted a dozen fancifully carved sculptures spouting water into the night air, which caught the light of hundreds of surrounding lamps that spiraled away from the square along the surrounding walkways. Revelers drifted along the cobbles touring the glittering theaters, cafés, shops, taverns, and other entertainments lining the streets. Many were singing, laughing, and sipping spirits shipped from exotic locales north and west of the Sea of Fallen Stars.
The Plaza of Leaping Fountains occupied a massive citymote that served as the central causeway between the facing cliffs. If something of note happened in the city, it frequently occurred at the Plaza. Which was why Riltana spent so much every month to secure her dwelling on it.
She jumped. Touching down only on the tops of iron lamp enclosures and roof tiles, Riltana traversed a quarter of the length of the citymote in a dozen heartbeats. Her path ended on the slanting roof of Barnard’s Tomes and Charms. A ladder ascended the side of the building from street level, but Riltana couldn’t even remember the last time she’d used it.
Her loft, which she rented from Barnard, was a large renovated attic that once stored a mishmash of moldering tomes. Riltana convinced Barnard a far better use of the space would be as an apartment, once it was cleaned up and refurbished with proper amenities. Barnard agreed, and spent some serious coin making the loft into a modern and comfortable dwelling.
Then he’d happily charged her an arm and a leg for the rent. Of course, he probably could h
ave charged some noble’s son double what he asked her. After all, wasn’t the place perfect?
Riltana unlocked the oak panel door and entered her home.
Tiny wisplights woke to her presence, revealing a living space of hardwood floors, high ceilings, and overstuffed chairs scattered around a fireplace. It was perfect, save for one glaring absence.
Carmenere wasn’t there.
Riltana walked to the tiled table that rested along one wall of the modest “great” room. The message she’d scrawled for Carmenere remained as she’d left it eight hours earlier. As had all the messages she’d penned for Carmenere over the last three months. All unread, and tossed into a drawer.
It was stupid to keep writing them. Carmenere was never coming back.
Riltana sighed and brushed the last note into the same cavity where all the previous pleas to lost opportunity waited in the dark. When she’d started writing them, they’d given her some measure of relief. Each one was like casting away a stone laden with sadness. Eventually, she thought, her burden of sorrow would be lightened.
But months had passed, and her unhappiness seemed just as sharp as ever. She wondered if the daily scrawl had become its own burden. Had the notes transformed from something therapeutic into a behavior that prevented her from moving on?
She uncorked a half-full bottle of red wine and poured a generous amount into a crystal goblet. She dropped into a high-backed chair and sipped. Not bad, especially for a bottle that’d been open for three days already. But she’d better finish it soon before it turned; she hated to waste good wine.
Riltana swirled the glass. Images of her and Carmenere sharing drinks in her loft crowded around, as they always did. No one could laugh as loud as Carmenere, or make Riltana laugh back.
She had no one to blame but herself. She grimaced, wondering at her idiocy for the thousandth time.
Ego and pride has a price: loneliness.
Riltana downed her glass, stood, and snatched up a quill. She quickly dashed a new message to Carmenere, telling her how she was going to meet a client in the Sepulcher for a lucrative payment for services rendered. Thinking about the coin that would soon cross her palms gave her a jolt of satisfaction.
Looking forward to such a large payout was nearly enough to make her forget her troubles. Nearly … but not quite. But for now it would have to do.
Riltana changed back to her black jumpsuit and mask, and swept out of the loft.
The night was farther along, but the Plaza remained active. She sniffed the evening air, redolent with smoke and sea water, then raced across the roofs toward her destination.
The Sepulcher was concealed beneath Akanawater Falls, which surged into Airspur at the city’s westernmost limit. Observation points along the facing cliffs offered city dwellers and visitors alike one of the most beautiful sights in all Faerûn; so claimed a group of ebullient traders from Veltalar she’d once overheard. She supposed that by daylight the crystalline water crashing down the series of stony steps was impressive, especially when coupled with the body-shaking thunder that accompanied the panorama.
By night, the falls were not so beautiful; they were a roaring darkness of watery mouths leading to vortices capable of pulling a windsoul to her death by drowning if she wasn’t careful.
Many ne’er-do-wells in Airspur also knew the falls hid an entrance to an elaborate underground labyrinth that led to the Sepulcher. The Sepulcher hosted occasional illegal deals and chancy trades too dangerous to occur anywhere else. However, to reach the Sepulcher, one had to dive beneath the falls and swim past the vortices. Even then, brute strength or agile skill wasn’t always enough to win free of the grasping currents.
Riltana wondered how many would-be thieves had lost their lives trying that route. It was kind of a test; were you stupid enough to dive beneath the falls, or think twice? Would criminal masterminds subject themselves to such a risky path every time they wanted to unload a shipment of haepthum? No, of course not. Common sense dictated there had to be a way into the labyrinth that didn’t involve rushing water.
She eventually reached the alley she sought, midway up a switchback on Airspur’s north cliff face. A secret door concealed behind stacked flagstones provided entry into a dank cellar. Long abandoned, the cellar’s sole purpose was as a way in, one of three Riltana knew about, into the old tunnels that wound through darkness behind the cliff.
She snapped her fingers and produced a sunrod. She shook it, and yellow light spilled from its translucent length. Holding it before her, she entered Airspur’s labyrinth.
A complex of twisting tunnels and dead-end caves riddled Airspur’s cliffs. Some were natural caves and corridors, but others were obviously remnant delvings from a previous age, which included the sprawling Catacombs. The Catacombs had housed the Chessentan dead for centuries, and for fifty-plus years, genasi bones too.
Riltana detoured around the cemetery tunnels, which were lightly guarded by a detachment of peacemakers. She was looking for the farthest reaches of that expanse, some of which had been converted into malodorous routes for sewer runoff, despite that the ultimate destination of most of the black corridors remained unknown. Diverting the effluvia underground saved the bay between the cliffs from being the depository of the city’s waste.
Riltana had heard some of the corridors eventually opened into wider subterranean spaces. Crystal caverns, sunless seas, and fungus forests hung with sentient, carnivorous vines. She’d always assumed the stories were just that; tales told by thieves to frighten each other. Still, as she walked the tunnel, ignoring the many lesser ways and cave mouths that gave off the main passage, she wondered.
She passed one of the tunnels converted to sewer flow. The rancid, thick fluid rushed in a series of miniature brown rapids across her path. The odor of chamber pot was no less disgusting despite the fact that she’d been expecting it.
She continued onward for nearly another half hour, until she heard the muffled thunder of the Akanawater Falls vibrating through the rock. Had she been on the surface, the moiling roar might have deafened her. Down there, it was merely oppressive. She was close.
A dozen paces farther, and the dank smell of rotting fish made itself known. It overlaid the aroma of sewer … mostly. Another light, brighter than her own, glowed ahead. She doused her sunrod and stowed it with a pass of her gloves, then moved forward.
Riltana paused at the entrance of a large chamber. Several openings, including a few on the ceiling, provided entry into a cavern. The smell and humid air filled her mouth with a bitter tang. She stifled an urge to gag.
The light emanated from a crust of fungi coating the walls and ceiling of the cavity. By the horizontal lines staining the wall, it was obvious that the cavern had spent much of its past history partly and even completely submerged.
It was the Sepulcher. She’d only been there a few times before, once to fence an astral diamond, and another time to deliver a parcel. That second time she’d become lost on her way out, and had decided to avoid the place thereafter.
Then Kalkan had contracted her. Her earlier meeting with him had been in a café on the south face. She hadn’t been thrilled with the plan of handing over the scarf in the Sepulcher, but the coin was too good to squelch the deal.
Riltana entered the chamber, and saw several people had preceded her.
A brown-skinned man played alone at dice. A tiefling woman was engrossed in each throw the man made, her eyes squinting in concentration. And … orcs! Two orcs loitered along the far wall, apparently bickering over the contents of a ratty bag.
She’d seen orcs, of course, but hadn’t ever seen the beastly humanoids up close before. With their overlarge mouths, tusks, and grisly trophies dangling from their armor, they seemed like ghastly, ferocious parodies of true people.
She saw no sign of her original foul-breathed employer.
The man, an earthsoul, glanced up and saw her.
Riltana affected a jaunty wave. “I’m here to see someone,”
she said.
Everyone turned and stared at her. The tiefling woman grinned.
The silence stretched, and Riltana’s stomach sank.
She said, “Do you know who I’m talking about? Did someone in a hood send you to meet me, or are you all here for some purpose of your own?”
Great. Her client had skipped out. Something must have happened to him in the last four years, and—
“Yeah,” said the earthsoul, whose szuldar lines somehow managed to appear dank as they curled across his skin. “We’re here to meet someone, on behalf of our employer. You must be the thief with the parcel.”
The tiefling woman laughed. It was the laugh of an imbecile, and not a friendly one.
“Perfect!” said Riltana, forcing confidence into her tone, choosing to ignore the appellation; she hated being called a thief.
She continued, “Hand over the coin I was promised, and the package I was hired to deliver is all yours.”
A sound behind Riltana made her glance back. Oh, this was getting better and better; a third orc had emerged from a side passage and stood in her exit tunnel.
Again the idiot laugh.
“Will you shut it?” Riltana snapped at the tiefling.
The orcs near the wall allowed their guttural argument to lapse, and fixed their hungry eyes upon her. One shuffled closer.
Riltana raised one hand and said, “All right you freaks, everyone stay where they are, or I’m gone, and your boss is out one fashion accessory.”
A familiar voice sounded from above, “Don’t be hasty, Riltana. My hired hands are overeager, is all.”
Riltana glanced up and saw that one of the openings to the cavern, no more than a hole in the ceiling really, was occluded by the shape of a man. A man in a hood.
“Is that you, Kalkan?”
“Indeed. Now—did you meet the pale-skinned fellow I hired you to find? Did you take Demascus’s Veil?”
“Yeah, I met Demascus. Briefly. Do you have my payoff?
Kalkan held up a satchel and shook it. The sound of coins clinking was evident even over the background rumble of the Akanawater Falls.
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