The Temple of Yellow Skulls

by Don Bassingthwaite

Kri raised his head—and gave him a sharp but approving look. “Well considered,” he said. “Unfortunately, we still lack the means to perform the appropriate rituals, but the idea does suggest there may indeed be a serviceable brain between your pointed ears.” He closed the book and regarded Albanon. “Moorin taught you nothing of the Order of Vigilance, did he?”

  “Nothing.”

  “He should have. He should have passed on his knowledge—the Order has never been large and it’s the responsibility of each member to train one or two to follow him.” Kri folded his hands over the book. “You have questions. Ask.”

  Albanon’s eyebrows jumped up high. “Any question?” he asked. Kri just cocked his head in silent response. The eladrin ran his tongue over his lips, trying to think of the right thing to ask. “Have you trained new members for the Order?”

  A flicker of pain crossed Kri’s face. “Any other question,” he said.

  Discomfort warmed Albanon’s cheeks. “I’m sorry.” He thought again. “Are all members of the Order clerics or wizards?”

  “Not at all. Links to the arcane and the divine are common because of the nature of what we protect, but a strong warrior and a cunning rogue are just as welcome. Most members are worldly, brought into the Order because they have seen much and learned to survive it. The most significant criteria, however, are that potential members are thought to be interested and trustworthy.” Kri held his gaze steady on Albanon. “Did Moorin not trust you?”

  The heat in Albanon’s face burned hotter. “He trusted me!”

  “Then maybe he had some other reason. Maybe he thought you weren’t interested in becoming a member of the Order.” Before Albanon could react, Kri pursed his lips and added, “I think he might have been wrong.”

  Albanon’s mouth turned dry and his heart beat a little faster.

  And downstairs, there was a crash as the door of the tower flew open. Somewhere, Splendid screeched in alarm—and was drowned out by Shara’s voice. “Albanon!”

  He started to call back to her, then hesitated and glanced at Kri. The old cleric just gestured for him to answer. “Our discussion can wait.”

  Albanon nodded gratefully and raised his voice. “In the library!”

  Shara came trudging up the stairs and pushed through the door. Her face was flushed from running. She was breathing heavily. “I’ve picked up Uldane’s trail. The night we had our fight, he went to the Lucky Gnome.”

  Kri’s eyebrows rose. “A tap house in the lower town,” said Albanon. “Not the best place in Fallcrest.” He stood up and offered Shara his chair. She shook her head, though she gripped the back for support as she brought her breathing under control. Albanon frowned at her. “Have you been running?”

  “Halfway across Fallcrest,” she said, then took a final swallow of air and stood straight. “I ended up at the river above the falls. One of the porters who works the upper quays was in the Lucky Gnome that night and remembers seeing Uldane there, too.” Her face tightened. “He was talking to Raid.”

  “That’s no surprise,” said Kri. “His note mentioned Raid.”

  “And you told Raid to go to the Lucky Gnome that night if he wanted to find adventurers,” Albanon pointed out.

  Shara scowled at him. “Well, it sounds like he found them. The porter says he saw a human named Tragent and a half-orc named Dohr with Raid and Uldane, all of them celebrating like priests with their hands in the poor box.”

  Kri’s eyebrows rose higher. Shara wrinkled her nose. “Sorry, Kri. You know what I mean. They were up to something.”

  “And your porter knew nothing else?” the old man asked.

  “No, but if they were making plans, someone might have overheard something. We need to go down to the Lucky Gnome. Three can ask around better than one.”

  “Two can ask questions as effectively as three,” said Kri. He slid the book he had been reading on to a pile and selected another. “I’ll remain here. Someone has to do something to find Vestapalk.”

  Shara’s hand slammed down on the book before he could open it. “If you want our help, we want yours.”

  Kri tilted his head and looked at her with hard, steady eyes. “We?”

  Both of them looked at Albanon. The wizard winced, all of his frustrations coming back to him. He let out a long breath and tried to think of a way to get the two of them working together. “Yes,” he said. “We. I want to find Uldane, too. I’m concerned about him and if we can find him, I’m sure he’ll be valuable in tracking down Vestapalk. You’re not having any luck locating anything in the books, are you? Come with us, help us find out where Uldane is”—he turned and glanced at Shara—“and Shara will help with the lore of the Nentir Vale.” He gave the warrior a pointed look.

  Shara’s lips pressed together tightly for a moment, but she nodded. “I want to find Vestapalk, too, but not without Uldane beside me.”

  Kri seemed to consider that for a moment, then he slid the book away. “Fair enough,” he said. “Let’s find your halfling.”

  Relief broke over Albanon. “Splendid,” he called. “We’re going out.”

  “Good!” the pseudodragon called back. “Your arguing is keeping me awake. Try not to slam the door again.”

  Over the seven years that he’d lived in Fallcrest as Moorin’s apprentice, Albanon had managed to avoid the Lucky Gnome on all but a few occasions. The tap house looked no better by day than it did by night. Even with shutters thrown wide, it was filled with a kind of dismal, unsavory shadow.

  No one took any notice of him, Kri, and Shara as they paused inside the door. The afternoon was growing old, the day’s work was finishing, and the place’s clients were more interested in a tankard of ale than they were in who crossed the doorstep. Albanon looked around the room at the tired, dour faces and a disappointing thought entered his mind. “These are the wrong people,” he said quietly. “Uldane and Raid were here later at night. All these people would have gone home by then.”

  “You’ve never done this before, have you?” said Shara. “Every tavern has people who are there all the time. We start with them.”

  She pushed through the tavern to the bar and Albanon realized what she meant. At one end of the bar leaned a thin elf woman in a dirty coat too large for her. At the other slumped a man with his arm wrapped protectively around a mug. And those were the customers—the scruffy, scowling man who stood behind the counter looked as if the only daylight he saw was what came through the tap house windows.

  Shara walked up to him and spread three fingers. The bartender turned away without comment to draw three tankards of ale. Albanon’s stomach recoiled at the thought of drinking whatever was brewed here, but he tensed his belly and reminded himself they were doing this for Uldane.

  “We’re looking for someone,” Shara said as the bartender set down a full tankard and started to fill an empty one. “A halfling. He would have been in last week.”

  The bartender’s eyes flicked to her, then to Albanon. They lingered on Kri. The old man gave a smile that would have soured milk. The bartender’s eyes went back to the tankard. He swapped it for a third. “Lots of halflings come in here,” he said.

  “He would have been with a half-orc and two human men. One of them a little older, big man with thick hair running a bit to gray, pale eyes, two axes on his belt,” Shara continued.

  “Sounds to me like he’s the one you want to find, not your halfling.”

  “The halfling is a friend of ours,” said Shara. “Do you remember them? One of the porters from the upper quays said he saw them celebrating in here.”

  The bartender slid their ale across the counter to them. “Lots of porters come in here, too,” he said. “They like to talk but you can’t believe everything you hear from them. You don’t give good information away for free.”

  He tapped the fingers of his left hand on the bar top meaningfully.

  Albanon saw Shara scowl, but she reached for a pouch on her belt.

  Kri’s hand caught her
arm. “Pay for the ale,” he said. “Nothing else.”

  Shara looked at him questioningly. He gave her a twitch of his eyebrow and a slight tip of his head. The bartender just shrugged. “Pay for what you want. Doesn’t matter to me.”

  His hand turned palm up. Shara dropped some coins in it, then gathered their tankards. “What was that about?” she asked Kri as they moved away from the bar.

  “Why pay for grapes when you have wine?” said the cleric. “He may or may not know anything, but she definitely does.” He nodded again, pointing with the tilt of his head. “Be discrete.”

  Albanon took one of the tankards and turned casually to lean against the wall and glance around the tap house. It took him a moment to realize that Kri was indicating a serving wench, a lean, worn-looking girl. As if she felt his eyes on her, she glanced up—and right at him. Albanon slapped a stupid grin on his face and raised his ale in salute.

  The server’s eyes dropped immediately and she hurried away to another table.

  Kri slapped Albanon’s arm, making ale slosh out of his tankard. “Idiot. I said be discrete!”

  “I tried to be—then she looked at me. What was I supposed to do?” Albanon stared after the woman. “She’s scared of something.”

  “Indeed,” said Kri. “She was serving a table close to the bar when Shara described Raid. She must have overheard because she went stiff and got away from us as quickly as she could.”

  “It makes you wonder what exactly she’s afraid of, doesn’t it?” Shara glanced at the other woman, then away. She took a drink of her ale, then passed the tankard to Albanon. “I want to talk to her.”

  “You’re not going to be able to talk,” said Kri. “She’s watching us. She’s going to run away if we try to get close.”

  “If you try to get close, she will. Find a place to sit. Somewhere out of the way.” Shara walked away, not toward the serving wench but around the outside of the room.

  Albanon stared after the warrior. “What’s she up to? What’s she planning on doing—sneaking up on her?”

  Kri gave him a hard look. “For a smart person, you can be really slow sometimes.” He turned away. “Let’s find that place to sit.”

  There were a few narrow booths at the back of the tap house. All of the booths were occupied, but it only took a few quiet words from Kri to persuade some patrons to make way—Albanon didn’t hear what he said, but the former occupants of the booth hurried away with pale faces. Kri settled himself in the shadows and sipped at his ale. Albanon sat where he could keep an eye on Shara and the frightened serving wench.

  At first he wondered if maybe he had been right and Shara was trying to sneak up on the other woman. She approached the serving wench slowly, almost as if she was stalking a deer in the woods. She didn’t make any effort to hide, though. When the server got skittish and moved, Shara just nodded to her, smiled, waited a few moments, then shifted closer. But never too close. After moving away a couple of times, the serving wench stopped and watched her. Albanon saw Shara speaking, but the two women were too far for him to even guess at what they were saying. Eventually though, Shara was standing right in front of the server, hands spread wide and a calm expression on her face. In contrast, the server’s face was stiff and pale, and she shook her head frequently. Shara just kept talking until finally the serving wench nodded once. Shara smiled at her, then came over to join them at the booth.

  “Her name is Jewel,” she said. “We’re meeting her outside shortly.”

  “How did you get her to agree to talk to us?” Albanon asked in awe.

  “Remember when I said there was something about Hakken Raid I didn’t like?” Shara took her tankard back from him and drank from it. “I was right.”

  “He threatened her?” said Kri.

  Shara nodded. “Jewel didn’t want to go into detail, but she didn’t deny it when I asked. She definitely saw him with Uldane, though.” She twitched her head toward the door. “Let’s go.”

  Outside the Lucky Gnome, Shara led them around to the back of the tap house. The area was empty save for discarded barrels piled against the building’s walls and the long shadows of dusk. There was no sign of the serving wench. “You don’t think she made a run for it, do you?” Albanon asked

  “She’ll come.”

  “I’m here.” The thin woman slipped out from among the barrels so suddenly that Albanon jerked in surprise. Jewel ignored him. Her gaze flicked around the area, then settled on Shara. “You don’t tell him nothing, right? I didn’t talk to you. You’ve never met me.”

  Her voice was strained. Her eyes were wide and wild. Albanon felt a surge of pity for her. “We just want to find our friend Uldane, the halfling you saw with Raid,” he said. “If we see him, we won’t mention you at all. Hakken Raid is nothing to us.”

  Jewel turned to stare at him. “Have you ever talked to him?” she asked. “Have you ever stood in the dark and stared into those pale eyes of his? You wouldn’t say that if you had. There’s something wrong with him.” She shivered and took a step away. “I shouldn’t be talking to you. He said if I talked to anyone, he’d find out and come back for me.”

  “Jewel, wait.” Shara took her hand before she could leave. “Whatever Raid said, we won’t let him hurt you. I won’t let him hurt you. Tell us what you know about him and Uldane.”

  The server looked at her for a moment, then her fingers squeezed Shara’s. She moved a little closer, though she didn’t relax at all. “That night they were here, I served them. First just him and Tragent and Dohr—I know them a little, they come in sometimes. They talked quiet and it looked like they came to some kind of agreement, because they called for more ale. While I was fetching it, your halfling friend showed up. They didn’t look pleased to see him, but then they relaxed and started talking. There’s no mistaking adventurers heading out of town, so when I came back, I listened.”

  “You make a habit of listening to adventurers?” Kri asked.

  “They usually have interesting stories.”

  The cleric gave her a level look. “When they’re getting ready to leave town?”

  Jewel shifted uncomfortably under his scrutiny. “All right,” she said after a moment, “I have an understanding with some of the local boys. If I find out someone is leaving Fallcrest for somewhere interesting, I let them know and they watch for them coming back. They lighten their load a little bit.”

  “That’s a dangerous business for them.”

  “They’re careful. Times are tough.”

  “Did you tell the local boys about Raid and the others?” asked Albanon.

  “Didn’t get a chance to.” Jewel shivered again. “Your man and the others left before the Gnome closed that night, but when I left to go home, he was waiting for me. He covered my mouth and dragged me back here behind the Gnome. I know how to stop a man having his way with me, but he was too fast. I couldn’t get a knee or a scratch into him. He didn’t try anything, though, didn’t even ask me if I’d heard anything. But he knew already, I could tell. He just held me, and said ‘If you talk to anyone about me, I will find out. I will come back for you and I’ll make sure you never talk to anyone about anything ever again.’ ”

  Just her imitation of Raid’s words was enough to make Albanon’s skin crawl. “He hurt you?”

  She ran fingers over her mouth. “Bruises. Nothing I haven’t had before. But it was the look he gave me. ‘The eye is on you,’ he said—”

  “The eye is on you?” said Kri sharply. The old cleric leaned forward with a speed that brought a flinch from Jewel. “ ‘The eye is on you,’ not ‘my eye is on you?’ ”

  “I know what I heard,” Jewel said. “He had me against the wall, those eyes of his staring right through me. He said ‘the eye is on you.’ I would have sworn on my daughters’ lives that I’d never talk, but just then Frober and Kide came out from the Gnome with the night’s barrels. Raid gave me one last look, then he let me go and disappeared. I don’t think he wanted to be seen. He
had me so scared that I didn’t even go to Frober for help. I just ran all the way home.”

  “What did you actually hear at the table?” said Shara. “What do you think Raid was trying to hide?”

  Jewel’s face twisted. “I don’t bloody know. I’ve been looking over my shoulder for the bastard every day and night since and the only thing I heard was something your halfling said. ‘I’ve been around. I’ve heard stories. The ruins lie to the west of Fallcrest.’ ”

  She was a good mimic. Albanon could recognize Uldane’s voice in hers. “That’s all?” he asked.

  “Raid saw me and shut him up right quick.” She clenched Shara’s hand and looked into her eyes. “When he said he’d know if I talked, I believed him. Maybe he was bluffing, but I don’t want to find out. If you find him, do me a favor. Make sure he never comes back to Fallcrest.” She pulled her hand free and stood up.

  “Jewel.” Kri held out his hand. Albanon saw the flash of silver and the gleam of gold in his palm. Jewel’s eyes went wide. For a moment, Albanon didn’t think she’d take them, but then she scooped them up and made them vanish.

  “You didn’t hear nothing from me,” she said again and trotted away, back around to the front of Lucky Gnome and the dubious safety of the tap house.

  Shara let out her breath—and cursed. She looked at Albanon and Kri. “Blood,” she said. “I don’t like this. Raid scared the wits out of her and all she heard was something about ruins to the west?”

  “Maybe he thought she heard more,” said Albanon. “What ruins do you think Uldane was talking about?”

  “That’s the problem.” Shara pushed a hand through her hair. “There are a lot of ruins around the Vale. Easily half of them are west of Fallcrest. Raid and Uldane could be anywhere.”

  “No,” said Kri. The priest stood with a hand half covering his mouth, his eyes narrow in thought. “Uldane’s note said he’d be back in a few days. To their destination and back again in a few days. They couldn’t have gone too far.”

  “We traveled east to Andok Sur and back in a few days,” Albanon pointed out. “If they went the same distance to the west, that leaves us with a big area.”