by Mel Odom
“No,” he admitted, “but I don’t want to be driven from home.”
“I’m glad you feel that way,” Madame Iitaar said with a small smile. “I guessed that was the way you felt, but you’ve never said so, not in so many words.”
“This is your home,” Jherek said, hastening because he felt like he’d overstepped his bounds, “but I’ve enjoyed the time I’ve spent here.”
“Good, but you need to realize this isn’t the only home you’ll know,” the woman said. “Your home was also Butterfly and the sea. That will always be your true home, Jherek. I’ve seen it in the castings I’ve done concerning you. In the future, you’re never far from the oceans.”
“Everything now seems destined to keep me from the sea,” Jherek said. “I couldn’t sail with—” His voice faltered. He couldn’t bring himself to say the word “father.” “—with the crew of Bunyip.”
“The river always finds its way out to sea eventually,” Madame Iitaar stated. “The ties that bind you to the sea are as strong as any of those in nature.”
“ ‘Live, that you may serve.’ But serve who?” he asked. “For what reason?”
She looked at him and shook her head. “I don’t know, but I know I’ve had a part in this. In all the years I’ve lived here, my home has never been harmed by the weather. Some thought it was because of the location, and others thought I managed a weather control spell. The same year the wind ripped the shingles from my roof, I’d also learned about a young boy who worked for Shipwright Makim who was good with wood and his hands. As you know, I went to Shipwright Makim and made a bid for your time since all the other roofers in Velen were busy, too busy even for me. It wasn’t long after that I found out you were renting space in a stable for a bed and asked you to move in here. That’s not behavior I’m accustomed to.”
“Then why did you do it?” Jherek demanded.
“After I saw you, I was given a dream that you would be the one to repair the roof on my house. As you know, I never ignore my dreams. They all come true.”
Jherek put sweet butter on another piece of bread. He didn’t really feel like eating, but his survival instinct made him eat. When he’d first come to Velen as a homeless boy, before he’d gotten the job with Shipwright Makim, there’d been several hungry nights. He’d learned to eat his fill whenever he could since he didn’t know when the next opportunity would occur. Thinking of leaving Velen inspired the same kind of fear in him, especially when he remembered how the wages Finaren had given him had been taken.
“Whoever—whatever—I am to serve, is it good or evil?” he asked.
Madame Iitaar shook her head. “I can’t say. As you know, those things don’t touch me the same way they do others. I look at the person and how I relate to him or her. Even the best person is capable of an unkind word or thought, and even those who’re considered evil by others are capable of gentleness and mercy. I judge them by their dealings with me and with what I see.”
The answer didn’t sit well with Jherek. It never had. Growing up as he had in the wild and lawless abandon of pirates, unnourished by a mother’s hand or gentle kiss, he’d known no security. When he’d arrived in Velen, fleeing for his life, he’d lived in absolute fear that had left him paralyzed for days before his meager store of stolen rations had given out and he’d had to find a way to eat. Even then, he knew he’d never steal. He’d made rules for himself, starting out with the things he knew he would never do. Working hard at the jobs he’d found, especially on Butterfly, he was just starting to figure out what he could do.
“You have a choice,” Malorrie put in, turning to better face Jherek. “When the time comes, you’ll have a choice whether or not you serve whatever has marked you.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I know you,” the phantom said. “I’ve trained you, boy, and so has the lady. We know what’s in your heart. No one will lead you where you don’t want to go.”
“How can you be so sure I’ll have a choice?”
“Because I did.” Malorrie paused, reflecting. The window behind him showed through him. “I’d been dead a long time, boy, when I was asked to seek you out and train you.”
Jherek was too stunned to speak.
Malorrie smiled in that wry way of his, drawing himself up to his full height. “You thought your meeting me was simply a chance encounter?”
“Velen is filled with ghosts.”
“Not mine. I was summoned here from somewhere else.”
That was news to Jherek, who’d always assumed the phantom had been a native. He knew Malorrie’s body was buried on Widow’s Hill. “Summoned by who?”
“A man I once knew and trusted. A man who’d died for me when the time came. When he asked me to look after you and train you in the ways of thinking and swordsmanship, I agreed.”
“Did he know me?”
Malorrie shook his head. “This man died long before you were born, boy. He couldn’t have known you. He was asked to contact me by someone else.”
“Why you?”
“I don’t know. There was a chance I wouldn’t have been able to train you, I suppose. Phantoms and ghosts, even here in Velen, are usually not taken up with.”
Jherek paused, trying to take it all in. “Why haven’t you ever told me all this before?”
Malorrie shrugged. “I’d always assumed there’d be a right time to go into all of it, boy. Now, there’s no more time. You’re leaving and you’ll be given your choice soon enough.”
Jherek finished mopping up the last of the soup with the bit of bread he had left. “What if I’m not given a choice about whether I serve this—this thing?”
Malorrie gave him a dark glance and said, “Trust me, boy. With life, there’s always a choice.”
“Come, Jherek,” Madame Iitaar said. “If you’re going to be at that ship on time tonight, you have to be going.”
“Thank you for the meal,” he said as he always did when she cooked for him. He cleared the dishes from the table and took them into the kitchen.
After a few unbelievably fast moments, he stood again on the porch, ready to leave everything he’d ever truly known and ever trusted. The brine in the air from the harbor filled his nostrils.
“I’ve put aside a few silvers for your trip,” Madame Iitaar said, folding a coin pouch into his hand. “Be careful. Should you need anything, the captains along the Sword Coast trade routes will be able to get a message to me.”
“Thank you, lady,” Jherek said graciously, “for all that you have done for me these last years.”
The old woman’s eyes brimmed with tears and she reached for Jherek with strong arms, pulling him close and holding him tight for a moment. “It was my pleasure, Jherek, and it will be again. This I know to be truth.” She pushed him back, holding him at arm’s length to take a final look at his face. She touched his cheek lightly. “By Azuth, how you have grown and yet how young you yet remain in spite of everything. Come back home as soon as you can, son.”
Tears streaked Jherek’s cheeks as well, and for once, he didn’t feel shamed by them. “I will,” he promised.
Malorrie cleared his throat, and said, “I’ll do my leave-taking here as well, boy. If I followed you to the dock and someone aboard Breezerunner spotted me, it might draw unwelcome attention to you.” He extended a hand.
Jherek took the phantom’s hand, feeling the strength in the grip. “Thank you, too,” he said. “I would never have survived at sea without your training, nor would I have completed myself as much as I have without your guidance in reading.”
“Just you remember,” Malorrie said, “love is more powerful than any magics. It’ll make a strong man weak and a weak man strong. Don’t be afraid to give of yourself when you’re asked and you believe in the cause.”
“I won’t.”
“There’s my boy,” the phantom said, tousling Jherek’s hair.
Jherek shouldered his travel kit and turned his steps toward the docks. His mind w
as numb with all the changes he’d been through, all the things he’d lost, but the smell of the brine in the air reminded him he still lived. He paused only once in his journey, stopping in the tree line to gaze back at the house that had offered him the only security he’d ever known.
Live, that you may serve.
The words nestled coldly in his thinking, like a serpent coiled in the early dawn. He went down the hill, losing sight of the house as he entered the lower reaches of the city.
XVIII
30 Ches, the Year of the Gauntlet
Pacys joined the battle in front of the Mermaid’s Arms festhall as soon as he caught up with the group Piergeiron Paladinson led. The guard and watch members spearheaded the charge after their commander. The great war-horse showed no hesitation about rushing into the sahuagin ranks, breaking them down with his weight and ferocity. Dreadnought reared and brought iron-shod hooves down on the heads of the sea devils within reach, crushing them. Piergeiron swung his sword and chopped into the sea devils.
It was bloody work, and the bard followed the carnage. His feet, legs, and arms grew slippery with the coppery blood of men and sahuagin. He swung the staff with skill, avoiding the tridents of the invaders, and slashed them with the concealed blades.
Piergeiron wheeled his mount around in a half circle that knocked a small group of sahuagin in all directions. “Put fire in front of the building,” he roared. “Use the lanterns!”
Watch members grabbed the lighted lanterns from the festhall’s entrance and broke them on the ground in front of the building. The lanterns’ reservoirs carried over a gallon of oil each, enough to burn through most of the night. More decorative lanterns had been added for Fleetswake, and those were taken as well. In seconds, a line of oil was laid before the festhall then fired. Black smoke coiled up from it, making it hard to breathe. The sahuagin cowered at once, though, breaking from their assault on the festhall.
Pacys whirled with more skill than speed, using his hands and wrists to deflect the trident shoved at his face instead of jerking his body out of the way. In a continuous motion, he whipped the staff back and slit the throat of the sahuagin standing in front of him.
“Stand back!” a man nearby warned.
Turning, Pacys spotted a broad shouldered dwarf running from the festhall’s interior only half dressed. The dwarf carried a flaming sahuagin high over his head. He threw the burning sea devil into a small group of its fellows and all the sahuagin when down, struggling to get away from the flames.
The dwarf’s face radiated hatred. “Try and interrupt Ol’ Waggitt’s night of fun after all them days at sea, will ya?” he shouted. “Scare them girls what smell so nice and be so willing? Gonna give you a taste of Bloodrazor for your trouble, you damn beasties!” He reached back over his shoulder and freed a double-bitted broadaxe. With a harsh cry of challenge, he hurled himself into the group of sahuagin.
Pacys recognized the dwarf’s name. He was a fierce pirate from the north, but now his axe was turned in the service of defending the city. All surface dwellers, upstanding citizens as well as rakehells, depended on Waterdeep.
The sahuagin broke and retreated back to the pilings, trying to hold their position amid crates and barrels that were in the process of being off-loaded from the docked ships.
Piergeiron wheeled his mount again, yanking his sword from the skull of the sahuagin he’d just killed. He got his horse steadied under him and the light from the line of fire defending the Mermaid’s Arms festhall gleamed across his broad face when he lifted his visor.
Pacys painted the man’s look in his mind’s eye, knowing he’d forever have that image. Strong pictures stayed with him. He looked past Piergeiron and saw that Arnagus the Shipwright’s building still stood. Men fought from the warehouse doors, holding their own. The half-finished ship that had stood in dry dock was now wreathed in flames.
The Waterdhavian lord rallied his troops around him, then spurred his horse, calling out for archers to strike. Arrows feathered the cargo and the sahuagin, killing some while driving the rest to cover. Pacys joined the charge, following the watch and guard members.
Before they reached the sahuagin, a monstrous head lifted from the ocean still lapping over the pilings. Piergeiron held the charge up, but Pacys knew it would be too late.
The giant sea snake towered twenty feet out of the water, well within striking range of Dock Street. The wedge-shaped black and green head split suddenly, revealing large fangs and a forked tongue. The snake lashed out at once, and Piergeiron spurred his horse again, raising his shield high to intercept the strike.
Less than a yard’s length from the Waterdhavian lord, the sea snake was seized by a giant disembodied hand that reached down from the sky. The thumb and fingers wrapped around the neck. The hand stopped the snake’s strike just short of Piergeiron’s shield. In a show of incredible strength, the hand yanked the sea snake from the harbor and held it high overhead amid the circling griffon riders.
Pacys judged the snake close to seventy feet long, the biggest of its kind he’d ever seen. As he watched it coil and try to constrict the hand holding it, he didn’t doubt that the snake would keep some would-be sailors from ever going to sea again. The snake’s presence reminded every watcher of how unknown the depths were and how much of them covered Toril.
The giant disembodied hand squeezed more tightly, holding the snake high overhead with ease despite the creature’s struggles to escape. All of the fighting nearby that Pacys could see came to a halt as combatants stared at the strangling snake.
Piergeiron turned in his saddle and lifted his helm. A small smile twisted his lips and his eyes lighted with fire. “Maskar Wands,” he said, “hail and well met.”
Pacys turned quickly. In all his wanderings through Waterdeep and the rest of Faerûn, he’d never met the man, one of the Sword Coast’s greatest wizards. He moved away from the men around him, seeking a clearer view.
Maskar Wands stood in a flying chariot drawn by a pair of red firedrakes whose claws struck sparks from the sky as they ran. Though not six feet tall, Maskar appeared regal and grave. The wizard’s hairline had receded over the years to reveal his broad forehead, but silver hair still flowed in the wind. He wore the robes of a wizard, with a family crest—three gold stars on a field of purple with a black sleeve—was worked into the chest of the garment.
“Hail and well met, Lord Piergeiron,” Maskar called back. His dark gaze never left the strangling snake in the sky above the harbor. “I came as quickly as I was able.”
Excited murmuring drifted through the crowd Piergeiron had led into battle. Maskar Wands, though one of Waterdeep’s most famous residents, didn’t put in many public appearances, but when he did, it was to let everyone know his opinion on the ways magic was being abused. He and Khelben Arunsun had argued extensively on the subject, and bards scattered across Toril waited lustfully for the war everyone was certain would inevitably take place between the two wizards.
Piergeiron turned back to his command. “I want this street secured,” he ordered. “Take your men down to East Torch Tower, find those who yet survive there, and get them organized. I want whatever ships are there to be appropriated and used to retake this harbor.”
One of the watch captains nodded, then led his command across the intersection of Dock and Ship Streets, through the tangle of corpses.
Maskar gestured at the chariot and firedrakes and they disappeared. From all the legends Pacys had heard about the man, he knew Maskar Wands disapproved of any abuse of magic. The wizard gazed blackly at the snake hanging from the huge hand he’d conjured.
“Now,” he said sternly, “now we show these invaders that Waterdeep will never bend, much less break.”
He gestured at the fire consuming the building beside the Mermaid’s Arms and the flames stopped reaching across the building, bending to the mage’s will. Pacys watched as the fire gathered itself, then shot skyward in a whirling mass of colorful pyrotechnics that spread across
the dark heavens around the sea snake constricting around the giant, disembodied hand. The pyrotechnics limned the struggle, making it visible for miles, drawing all eyes.
The bard saw Maskar speaking, but his voice seemed to come from high overhead, a thunder of threat. “You’ve made a mistake in attacking the City of Splendors this night,” the mage roared. “Retreat while you can. There will be no mercy.”
Even before the echoes of his voice died away, the disembodied hand closed more tightly. The crack of the giant sea snake’s vertebrae snapping echoed over the harbor. Still, the great creature struggled, its body refusing to admit defeat or death.
The hand disappeared at a spoken word from the arch-mage. As the writhing mass of coils plummeted toward the water, the wizard pointed again. A fireball scored a direct hit on the snake, wreathing it in flames that burned with white-hot intensity. Only ashes drifted down to hit the storm-tossed water.
“No mercy!” Maskar repeated in that booming voice.
Pacys glanced around him, looking at the smoke-stained, bruised and battered faces, and saw renewed hope glow in the eyes of the Waterdhavians around him. They tightened their grip on their chosen or confiscated weapons. The battle for the city wasn’t lost, but it was yet to be won.
Laaqueel stood in the mouth of a sewer drain, the vile water trickling through a channel to her left. After the confrontation with the watch group and citizens had begun filling the city’s streets, Iakhovas had guided them into the maze of sewers beneath Waterdeep. The wizard showed an unsettling familiarity with them and brought them quickly to one overlooking the harbor from Coin Alley.
She watched the charred ash from the burned sea snake cascade onto the roiling water of the harbor. Her eyes still ached from the explosion of light only a moment ago.
“Ah, little malenti, that man,” Iakhovas declared, “could possibly prove a worthy opponent should the opportunity present itself. There are so few humans who are.” He smiled rakishly. “Another time, perhaps.”