by Kate Novak
At Holly's invitation, they sat around a low table made of blond ash. Holly sat with them. Bors stood in the doorway.
"This is a Sensate safe house," the paladin said. "Sensates dedicate their lives to living completely in the here and now," she explained. "They're always seeking new sensations, new experiences, new perspectives. They feel it gives them a greater grasp of the world around them. They use this place as a sort of a retreat, a place to cleanse their mental palate between forays into especially intense sensational experiences."
"'Especially intense sensational experiences,' "Jedidiah repeated with a chuckle. "Is that a euphemism for a debauch?"
"No!" Holly protested. "Well… yes, sometimes," she corrected herself. "The Sensates aren't just a bunch of hedonists, though. They don't believe in a cynical repetition of the same sensation. But they certainly wouldn't say no to a debauch if they'd never tried one before."
"A fitting place for a paladin of Lathander," Walinda stated, "a god revered for his enthusiastic beginnings, but who never actually accomplishes anything."
Holly's eyes narrowed at Walinda's words, but then she smiled. "You should try it sometime, Walinda," the paladin suggested. "Exploring new sensations can be quite liberating. From what Jas told me about you, I suspect it might help you grow beyond your pathetic need to be abused and to abuse others in return."
Walinda stared daggers at the girl. "You are a fool," she replied.
"This is fascinating," Jedidiah interrupted before the conversation grew any more hostile, "but you haven't told us how you got here."
"Well, when I arrived I encountered Bors. He's a paladin from another world, but he's made Sigil his home. He's a Sensate. He brought me here. He and his friends have kept a lookout for your arrival."
Joel was more than a little impressed. He had never doubted that Holly was a remarkable girl. Now she seemed even more so. She was vibrant and completely self-assured. Joel also knew her well enough to know that she was being evasive about something.
"But how did you get to Sigil?" the young bard asked. "And what happened to Jas?"
"Jas is fine," Holly said. "I left her in good hands. I got here by a portal, one that brought me straight to Sigil. I can't imagine why you had to go all the way through the Outlands. Bors says that Sigil is full of portals to other worlds."
"The lich wanted to use Cat's Gate," Jedidiah said, "no doubt because it was large enough to accommodate the spelljammer."
"So where's the ship? And where's the lich?" Holly asked.
"We lost the ship," Jedidiah explained. "The lich is in the astral plane, searching for Bane's body. He still has my half of the finder's stone."
"So you're still looking for the Hand of Bane?" Holly asked.
Jedidiah nodded.
"You might have a little problem there," Holly said. "I'm afraid that when I arrived, I was less than discreet in my initial inquiries. Several of Bors's friends among the Sensates offered to help, since searching for an ancient artifact would be a new experience for them. They took to it a little too enthusiastically, though, and ended up creating a market for Hands of Bane. Now half the thieves of Sigil have at least one Hand of Bane in their inventory. Usually it's the hand of some poor unfortunate they've knifed in the alley."
"You did this to make our task more difficult," Walinda said icily.
"No I didn't," Holly retorted. "Can I help it if I'm just too open and trusting?" Then she smiled slyly. "But I couldn't have come up with a better stratagem if I'd actually planned it. I should warn you, I tried divinations to locate the hand, but had no luck. It must be protected by some special magic. Many of the Sensates who were helping me have given up because they became bored or frustrated with our lack of progress. They did discover an old tiefling who claims that several hundred years ago there was a temple to Bane in the Market Ward, but it's gone now."
"We have a way to track the hand," Jedidiah said. "In the meantime, since Sigil is full of portals, as you say, it would be useful if you could discover for us a portal to the astral plane."
Holly looked to Bors.
The Shattered Temple," the Sensate paladin said. "The Athar give tours featuring dead gods."
Holly chuckled. "The Athar are mostly disillusioned priests. They spend their time trying to prove the gods aren't divine. Amusing, no?"
"Hilarious," Jedidiah replied, rubbing his temples with his fingertips.
"So how are you tracking the Hand of Bane?" Holly asked. "With the other half of the finder's stone?"
Joel nodded. "Perhaps we should wait until night to continue," the young bard suggested to Jedidiah. "After people are asleep."
"There is no real night here," Holly explained. "Only a period where the smoke turns from light gray to dark gray. There will still be plenty of people out at night. They'll just be a different type."
"Well, we'll wait for the dark gray anyway," Jedidiah said, rising slowly. "Because right now I need some rest."
"I, too, require rest," Walinda said.
Bors showed the priest and priestess to rooms where they could lie down. Joel remained behind with Holly. "Jedidiah doesn't look well," the paladin noted. "He looks like something's sucked all the energy out of him."
"He was up late last night singing," Joel explained, although it was uncanny the way she had actually described exactly what had happened to Jedidiah.
"And Walinda?" Holly asked.
"Walinda had a little too much of some strong Kara-Turan drink," Joel said. He related to Holly their adventures since they'd left her, without, of course, mentioning Finder's loss of godhood. He also left out any mention of his previous evening's conversation with Walinda. Holly, in turn, described to him some of what she had learned about Sigil: its political factions, its geography, its primary places of interest.
Sometime near antipeak, the Sigil midnight, the four Realms adventurers set out with the finder's stone. The stone led them to an alley behind a bookshop on Copperman's Way.
"We're being watched again," Walinda said. "I can feel it."
"We're always being watched," Holly said. "This is Sigil. Watching is the city's favorite pastime, right up there with rat-baiting and cheating customers."
Joel used the finder's stone again in the alley. The beacon of light lanced from the stone straight down to the ground.
"Subterranean tomb, or perhaps a hidden shrine," Jedidiah guessed.
"Or it could have just been buried when they built the road," Holly suggested. "Bors said that they often just build the street up, making first floors into basements and basements into subbasements."
"I would prefer to keep our business out of the public eye," Jedidiah said. "Let's see if we can't find a more private means of excavation than digging in the street."
The four adventurers circled around to the front of the shop. A sign over the front door read, Dits's Books. They entered the front door. There were shelves and shelves of tomes of all sizes. At the moment, the shop was empty of customers.
The proprietor, Bits, was a bariaur, a creature with the body of a mountain sheep and the upper torso of a man, with a ram's horns on his head. He lowered his head and peered at them over the rims of a pair of blue-tinted eyeglasses. "Can I help you?" he inquired.
"Perhaps," Jedidiah said. "We, um, need to dig in your basement. We're willing to pay you for the privilege and for any inconvenience, of course."
"Indeed," the bariaur replied, as if there was nothing very unusual in the man's request. "Why?"
"It's a long story," Joel said.
The bariaur's eyes lit up. "Long stories are my specialty."
Surprisingly, they came to an agreement rather quickly after that. Bits consented to the excavation, provided they paid him a sizable sum of gold and related to him the story behind why they were digging in his basement.
"Why does he need to know the story?" Walinda asked suspiciously. "What difference does it make to him?"
"He's a bookseller," Holly said with a sigh of exa
speration. "He probably writes books, too. A good hero's tale is worth a lot of money in Sigil. The populace eats them up, so to speak."
The bariaur led the group down an iron staircase. Jedidiah pulled out a light stone to reveal an empty, windowless basement with walls of fitted stone and a dirt floor. The finder's stone beacon pointed toward the base of the back wall. Just above the beacon was a black granite archway sealed with mortared red brick.
"I don't come down here often," Bits declared. "It's too damp to store books. Tried renting it to some Anarchists, but they said it was haunted and moved out. Never saw a ghost myself, though I sat here for a few nights waiting for one. Very disappointing."
"We'll need some tools to break through this wall," Jedidiah said.
"I can arrange that," Holly said.
"I will go with you," Walinda added.
"That's all right. I don't need any help," the paladin replied.
"But I need to be sure you are not mustering your hedonist friends to attack us and steal the Hand of Bane for yourself," Walinda retorted.
"Fine," Jedidiah said. "Go. Joel, you can start paying this man by telling him our story."
"What will you be doing?" Joel asked.
"Thinking," the older man replied.
Holly, Walinda, Joel, and Dits climbed back up to the ground-floor level. After Walinda and Holly left the shop, the bariaur led Joel into a back room. The shopkeeper settled himself in a nest of pillows in front of a low writing desk, lifted a quill pen, and poised it over a huge roll of parchment. "Whenever you're ready," he said.
Joel began his tale in Berdusk, explaining how he'd met and become friends with Jedidiah, how he'd become a priest of Finder, and how he'd started out on his pilgrimage to the Lost Vale. He ended with his arrival in Sigil, his reunion with Holly, and their tracking of the Hand of Bane to Dits's basement.
Dits recorded Joel's story word for word, with an amazingly quick hand and in a fluid script. When he'd caught up with Joel's last words, he stopped and sat back. "There's something missing," Dits said. "Something you're not telling me. I can sense these things."
Joel started. He had, of course, deliberately left out the secret of Jedidiah's true identity and how the half of the finder's stone he now held possessed all the god's remaining powers.
"There are things I can't talk about," the young bard admitted.
"But the story isn't true without them," Dits objected in an annoyed tone. "And it's not finished, either."
"Not yet," Joel agreed.
The bariaur set down his quill and removed his eyeglasses. He bit down on the wire rims encircling the lenses. "I must have all the facts, including the ending," he insisted. "You'll have to come back and tell me what happens to you in the astral plane. You must also tell me what's missing."
Joel thought for a moment. Once they'd taken care of their business with the banelich, Finder's identity would no longer be at risk. The god would once again possess all his powers. "When I get back from the astral plane, I'll tell you what I've left out," he promised Dits.
"Ah. Time-sensitive material. I understand," the bariaur said. "Don't die on me," he said as he blotted the ink on his scroll dry. The parchment he rolled into two halves, the part that held Joel's story and the part that would hold the story's ending and Jedidiah's secret. "Please try to come back alive. I hate it when I have to change narrative voice in the middle of a manuscript. It's very disruptive."
Joel shuddered. It was certainly possible that he might die, he realized. They would have to contend with the banelich in the astral plane. And the banelich wasn't his only worry. Some other fearsome monster must protect the Hand of Bane. Jedidiah might die, too. The bard tried to mentally shake the notion from his head.
The sharp slam of the shop's front door brought Joel and Dits to their feet. Walinda was shouting his name. Her voice sounded terrified.
Jedidiah came running up the steps as Joel and Dits arrived in the front room. Walinda stood at the counter, bent over, gasping for air. She dropped a huge sledgehammer on the floor.
"What's wrong?" Joel asked.
"We were attacked," the priestess said without looking up.
"Who attacked you?" Jedidiah demanded.
Walinda shook her head. "I don't know," she gasped. "It happened in a dark street. Something fell on me from above and clawed at my throat. Holly hit it with her pickax, and it turned on her. I ran here."
"You left Holly behind in the street?" Joel said angrily.
"There was nothing I could do," Walinda protested. "I have no spells."
"You could have hit whatever it was with this sledgehammer," Joel growled, kicking at the tool she'd dropped at her feet.
"It's too heavy to wield accurately. Whatever attacked us was fast and huge. There may have been more than one. It was too dark to tell. I ran all the way here for help," Walinda shouted back.
"Show us where," Jedidiah said grimly. "We'll be back," he told Bits.
The priestess led them to a dark spot in a narrow lane several blocks from the bookshop.
There was no one around. Jedidiah bent over and retrieved a large pickax that lay in the street, the only indication that Holly had ever been there.
"It's taken her!" Joel exclaimed.
"Use the stone," Jedidiah said calmly.
Joel nodded. He pulled out the finder's stone and thought of the paladin. The beacon shone in the direction of the ward where the Sensate safe house was located.
"She's still alive," Jedidiah declared.
They followed the beacon. It led them right to the Sensate safe house.
Joel dashed inside, shouting the paladin's name.
Holly lay on the white carpet, staining the wool red with her blood. Bors knelt beside her, sewing closed a great gash in the girl's stomach. He used a glowing golden needle that, although unthreaded, left a trace of golden stitches in Holly's flesh. It was a magic Joel had never seen before. Some sort of magic from Sigil, or perhaps from Bors's homeworld, Joel guessed.
The three waited anxiously for the Sensate paladin to finish. When he looked up, Jedidiah asked, "What happened?
"I heard Holly scream," Bors said. "I saw this one run off" He pointed at Walinda. "Then I found Holly in the street, left for dead."
"You were following us," Walinda declared in an accusatory tone.
"Lucky I was," Bors replied coldly.
"Did you see what attacked them?" Joel asked.
Bors shook his head.
Joel gave the priestess of Bane a suspicious glare.
Sensing what the bard must be thinking, Walinda went on the defensive. "It was not I," she declared. "Look." She showed them claw marks streaking her throat and arms. "Besides, if I had attacked her, I would not have left the job half finished. Use your power to heal her and she will tell you so herself. Perhaps she got a better look at whatever it was."
"We can't heal her," Jedidiah explained. "Finder's power doesn't appear to extend to this place."
Walinda sniffed haughtily. "I told you he was a petty god," she said to Joel.
"At least he's not a dead god," Joel barked back.
Jedidiah knelt beside the girl. "Most of these are superficial cuts, as if whatever it was was just trying to hold Holly back. The belly wound seems the most life-threatening injury, aside from the loss of blood."
Holly moaned softly. Then her eyes blinked open.
"Holly," Joel asked, "are you all right?"
The girl moaned again.
"What attacked you?" Walinda demanded.
"Black thing. Furry, with wings," the young paladin whispered. "Like Bear."
"Bear!" Joel gasped. "That's impossible. We cremated him. Holly, are you sure?"
Holly shook her head. There were tears in her eyes. She turned her head toward Bors and said no more.
"She must rest," Bors insisted. "Yes," Jedidiah agreed. He stood up. "And we must get back to work," he said, taking up the pickax he'd retrieved from the street. "Joel, Walinda, let's go
. Bors will look after Holly."
"I will stay," Walinda said.
"What?" Joel asked.
"I have been injured myself," the priestess of Bane said, "and you cannot heal me. I have no spells. I would be more hindrance than help. I will nurse the girl. I am better at causing wounds than healing them, but I do know something of the art."
Jedidiah examined the priestess with a jaundiced eye, but after a moment he nodded. "We'll return when we've found something," he said. Then the older priest wheeled about and headed for the door. Joel followed in his wake.
Joel and Jedidiah walked back toward the Market Ward in the dark fog.
"That was strange, wasn't it?" Joel asked the older man.
"What?" Jedidiah replied.
"Walinda offering to nurse Holly."
"Oh, that. Indeed it was," Jedidiah replied.
"I would have thought she'd want to be there when we found the hand no matter how wounded she was."
"Unless the banelich has warned her that there may be a deadly guardian protecting the hand," Jedidiah pointed out.
"What do you think attacked Holly?"
"I don't think it was Bear. It could be another dark stalker. If the priests of Iyachtu Xvim caught wind of what Walinda was up to, they might have decided to send an agent here to prevent Bane's resurrection. Walinda said the creature attacked her first, and it left Holly once Walinda was gone."
"It left Holly for dead," Joel pointed out.
"But it didn't leave her dead. Did you notice Holly was crying?"
Joel nodded. "She must be in terrible pain."
"She turned her head away," Jedidiah said.
Joel thought about that for a moment. "Do you think she knows something she's not telling us? What could it be?"
"I think we should hurry back to the shop, just in case."
From some shadows off to their right, something hissed. Then, in his head, Joel heard a voice speak their names: Joel. Finder.
Jedidiah was brought up short, apparently having heard the same voice using his real name. Joel halted beside him, his hand on the hilt of his sword.
A figure glided out from behind the curtain of fog. It wore a robe of crimson, ornately trimmed in gold. A red fez with a gold tassel crowned its octopuslike head. It was a mind flayer, what Jas called an illithid, one of Ilsensine's chosen master race.