Skein of Shadows

by Rockwell, Marsheila

  Or under it.

  The Lyrandar piloting the Seeker swung her expertly over the harbor, giving his passengers a magnificent view of both the lighthouse and the giant Emperor Cul’Sir with his double handful of light spearing up into the heavens. They passed over the Marketplace with its iconic red tent and then docked smoothly at Falconer’s Spire under the watchful eye of Zerchi the Spire-Keeper.

  As they waited for the gangplank to be lowered, Sabira turned to Greddark, finally deigning to respond to his comment.

  “And what do I think it means?”

  The dwarf cocked a blond brow at her tone.

  “Oh, I don’t know … that you’re destined to destroy everything and everyone?”

  “Well, see, that’s the funny thing. First the Prophecy was referring to Tilde, and then Tilde failed to regain the artifact—or only partially succeeded, at any rate—and now suddenly it refers to me. And if I don’t make it back, then they’ll find someone else … Granite d’Deneith from Lakeside, maybe. That’s how prophecies and oracles and auguries work—they predict what someone in power decides they’re going to predict, and even if they don’t, they’re made to. It’s all a bunch of superstitious nonsense—something I’d think a self-proclaimed inquisitive and artificer would know.”

  Greddark frowned.

  “Prophecy is just another form of magic, which both artificers and inquisitives use quite liberally. Why wouldn’t I believe in its power?”

  “Precisely. You use magic and make it do what you want it to. Just as people like ir’Dayne and Breven use Prophecy to do what they want it to.” She looked at him askance. “If the Prophecy is real, then whatever it predicts is going to happen regardless of what we do, so why bother with it at all? Unless you want to use it to control what other people do.”

  Greddark laughed and shook his head in mock amazement.

  “Aggar was right about you. You are a dwarf in a human body.”

  Sabira snorted.

  “Better than a human in a dwarf’s body, Sir Shortbeard. And what was that back in Sharn, anyway? ‘Make mine tea.’ Tea? Really?”

  After ir’Dayne had dropped his “end of the world” bombshell, he’d succumbed to a long coughing fit, making further conversation impossible. When he’d recovered, he’d summoned Hendra, who’d taken them to a small sitting room while the Wayfinder wrote out a quick letter of introduction to his cohort, Brannan ir’Kethras. Hendra had offered them drinks while they waited. Sabira had requested Frostmantle Fire. Greddark had asked for Silverleaf tea.

  “It’s a drink that stimulates without dulling the senses or loosening the tongue,” he responded haughtily. “Something quite beneficial in my line of work—and in yours, too, I would imagine.”

  “Like I said,” Sabira replied smugly. As far as she was concerned, the dwarf had just proven her point for her.

  She was saved from having to hear his response by the airship captain, another Lyrandar.

  “Wayfinder Kupper-Nickel can take you the rest of the way from here, if you can afford him. He’s the warforged lurking around the base of the docking tower—can’t miss him.”

  Sabira nodded her thanks to the fair-haired half-elf, then headed down the gangplank, Greddark in tow, fuming.

  Wayfinder Kupper-Nickel was not, as it turned out, lurking at the base of Falconer’s Spire, but Loghan d’Deneith was. The mustached and goateed lieutenant called out to her as she and Greddark passed by.

  “Sabira! Change your mind about helping me with my little problem?”

  She paused, considering. She wasn’t going to help him, of course—the idea of leaving the Gladewatch garrison undefended in an attempt to lure the area’s raiders into an ambush was lunacy, and not something she wanted any part of. But Loghan might know where the warforged Wayfinder had gotten off to, so it might actually be worth a few moments of her time to speak to him, just this once.

  “Still not interested in leading soldiers to their untimely deaths just so you can try to jump ranks, no. But if you help me with something, I might be able to recommend a few men who are a little more suicidal than I am.”

  “Done!” he said, a little too eagerly for her taste. “What do you want to know?”

  “Have you seen Kupper-Nickel?”

  The Deneith man arced a curious brow.

  “Headed out to the desert? What for?”

  “My dwarf friend here’s spent a little too much time underground; Rhialle over in the Jorasco enclave prescribed some sun. Now, do you know where the Wayfinder is or not?”

  “I’m pretty sure he headed over to the Cannith enclave, probably the Burnished Bull. Warforged seem to like it there; I guess because it’s where all the artificers go to drink.”

  “Probably because they serve tea,” Greddark muttered, but Sabira pretended not to hear him.

  “Thanks, Loghan. Try down at The Rusty Nail. Ask for a fat halfling named Gurobo, or find him at the bar. He’s got a long brown goatee and wears spectacles—I think he thinks they make him look smarter. Anyway, don’t let his appearance fool you; he’s actually a very accomplished wizard and he’s got a lot of friends. I’m sure he’ll be happy to help you out.” Well, for a price, but she’d let Loghan do his own haggling. And then Gurobo would help himself to a little more while the lieutenant wasn’t looking. Which would serve him right for going ahead with this ridiculous plan in the first place.

  “Obliged,” the Deneith man said, nodding at them both as he headed off for the tavern.

  “Come on,” Sabira said to Greddark after the lieutenant had left. “Let’s go get you some tea.”

  Sabira was wary as they walked the short distance through the Marketplace toward the Cannith enclave. It was a little too close to that of House Kundarak, and if Thecla had already been released from custody, it was a fair bet that Arach had, as well. If he’d ever actually been arrested at all. She would have preferred to wait for the warforged Wayfinder to return to his post, but there was no telling how long that would take, and Sabira could well imagine every hour they delayed being tallied on Tilde’s skin with a bloody stylus.

  She could have gone to the Phiarlan enclave and found Iosynne. The fair-haired elf archer led a caravan out to the desert on a fairly regular basis, but that would take days compared to hours on the airship. Sabira simply couldn’t afford the delay.

  Or rather, Tilde couldn’t.

  She tried not to think about the fact that Ned’s sister might already be dead. Or what it would mean for Sabira—and Elix—if she were.

  The gates to the Cannith enclave were emblazoned with a stylized bull overlaying a tower that represented the House’s Manufactury, a vast complex that was home to all the enclave’s offices, warehouses, laboratories, and workshops. The foundation of the Manufactury was a golden gear, and three golden houses floated in the background—one each for Cannith South, Cannith East and Cannith West. The House had fractured after its ancestral forgehold in Cyre was destroyed on the Day of Mourning and the House patriarch was killed, leaving no direct heir.

  Tellingly, the crest portrayed one house larger than the other two. Sabira was sure that must be Cannith South, headed by Merrix d’Cannith and controlling the family’s holdings in Breland, Zilargo, Darguun and now, apparently, Xen’drik.

  As they entered through the gates, Greddark paused.

  “It’s very … blue.”

  Sabira snorted. It was that. Everbright lanterns in the shape of dragonshards adorned virtually every curved cornice, rounded windows blazed with light, and the undercarriages of magically-powered lifts similar to those in the City of Towers glowed even in the noontide sun. And they were all a bright, blinding blue.

  “Maybe it’s Merrix’s favorite color?”

  The Burnished Bull was on the left, but Sabira’s attention was caught by a House Cannith monitor challenging a group of three warforged just to the right of the enclave gate. Though she couldn’t hear everything, it seemed clear that the warforged were unhappy at being treated a
s mere laborers—or worse, virtual slaves—and were taking out their frustrations verbally on the hapless human. Sabira decided she didn’t particularly want to be around when the argument moved from heated words to unsheathed blades.

  “This way.”

  She led Greddark over to the tavern, passing beneath the sign that spun between two dragonshard-tipped horns. The motif was carried throughout the entire establishment—and indeed, the whole district—with the ends of steam pipes fashioned to look like snorting bulls and posts and poles on every edifice echoing the curvature of a gorgon’s horns.

  The Canniths liked to style the Burnished Bull as an open-air establishment in the same vein as the Bogwater over in the Phiarlan enclave. But where the Bogwater was spacious and open to the sky, the Bull was dark and cramped, huddled under a wooden building supported by heavy vertical timbers, with some tables situated in the resulting shade and others open to the elements on a small patio. Posters were tacked up on some of the posts and on the patio walls, advertising everything from repair services for warforged to custom goggles for artificers. One small sheet showed a picture of an iron defender and offered grooming services, but Sabira was fairly certain it was meant as a joke.

  The still was actually the most remarkable thing about the tavern. Like everything else in the ward, it glowed blue. Pumping pistons and shifting gears moved around its central vat, but Sabira was fairly sure they were only there for show, to make the tavern’s tinkering patrons feel as if they’d never left their cluttered workshops.

  Despite Loghan’s assertion, there were only two warforged in the tavern, one of whom was the barkeep. The only other patrons were a halfling woman in a teal dress, a female elf with dark hair lounging against a post and reading a book, and another elf—blond and male—sitting on the patio admiring the view. None of them looked like artificers to her, a fact which the second warforged was loudly lamenting. She was beginning to wonder if Loghan might have misled her.

  Greddark, who’d been content to follow her lead since they’d met in Sharn, stepped around her and walked up to the bar, taking the seat beside the complaining warforged.

  “I understand you’re in need of an artificer? You’re in luck, friend. Darkgred d’Kundarak, Artificer and Other Things, at your service.” He stuck out a hand to the warforged. “What seems to be the problem?”

  The warforged turned to him, the violet crystals of his eyes glowing. Though the metal construct’s face wasn’t capable of expression, he appeared to be sizing Greddark up. Seemingly satisfied with what he saw, he took the dwarf’s hand and answered.

  “Dark Red? But your hair is white.”

  Greddark blinked and Sabira had to stifle a laugh. His hair did look white in the glow from the still.

  “ ‘Dark’ is fine. And you are?”

  “Kupper-Nickel. And as a matter of fact, I do need an artificer’s service—either that, or a carpenter’s.” He lifted up a metal plate on his left arm to reveal sinuous muscles formed of wood. There were several discolored patches where the brown fibers were cracked and flaking.

  Greddark clicked his tongue.

  “Dry rot. Made a trip to the islands recently?”

  “How did you know that?” If the warforged had eyebrows, Sabira was sure they would have shot up in time with the Wayfinder’s surprised tone.

  “It’s caused by a fungus—not something you’d be likely to get doing airship runs to and from the desert. And it requires more moisture to take hold than you’d get here in the city, even with the constant drizzle.” Sabira was so used to the periodic warm rain that she hadn’t paid any attention when it had started again, but this was the dwarf’s first time in Stormreach, so of course he’d noticed. “Could have gotten it spelunking, I suppose, except it looks like the light in your right eye is a little dim, so I’m guessing you haven’t been seeing as well in the dark as you normally do. You’d have noticed the difference if you’d been underground recently.”

  Sabira was impressed. She knew the dwarf was good at what he did—Aggar wouldn’t have sent him along otherwise—but she hadn’t expected him to be quite so observant. She resolved to be a little more careful what she revealed around him from now on.

  The bartender spoke up.

  “So he will lose the arm, then?”

  “What?” Kupper-Nickel exclaimed, his voice somehow managing to convey a higher octave than his vocal chords were actually capable of making.

  “No, no,” Greddark hastened to assure him. “It’s true, when found in a building or a ship, a carpenter’s first reaction is usually to hack out the affected wood and graft in new timber, but you’re neither of those things—and I am not a carpenter. I’m an artificer, and we do things the right way.”

  He pulled one of the silver charms off his gold armband. It grew in his hand until he held a short length of carved ivory that bore a large sapphire on one end and a diamond on the other. He grinned at Sabira.

  “Whipped this up when Aggar told me we were going into the desert. Didn’t think I’d get a chance to try it out before then.”

  “Try—?” Kupper-Nickel repeated, but Greddark grabbed the warforged’s wrist and jabbed the blue tip of the wand into the diseased wood.

  “Don’t worry, this won’t hurt. Much.” He thumbed a silver switch on the side of the wand and said, “Desiccate!”

  Nothing seemed to happen for a moment, but then she saw the warforged stiffen. She watched as the blue color bled from the sapphire and into the diamond on the other end, like water flowing from one vessel to another. When the once-blue sapphire was as white as the diamond had been, Greddark thumbed the switch again and removed the wand from Kupper-Nickel’s arm. It shrank back down to the size of the other charms, and he replaced it on his bracelet.

  “How’s that feel?”

  The dark spots on the warforged’s arm had lightened to match the color of the rest of the wood. The Wayfinder used his other hand to peel off chunks of dried-out wood like scabs, revealing normal-looking “muscle” below. He opened and closed his empty hand a few times, and Sabira watched as the wooden sinews flexed in response.

  “Good as new,” the warforged replied, a smile that would never grace his face still infusing his words with pleasure. “But what did you do?”

  “Trick I learned from a ranger I knew once, actually. ‘If it’s dry rot, then dry it’s not.’ It’s simple: Fungi need moisture to survive. Get rid of the water and the fungus dies. I actually figured we’d find the hydration properties of the wand more useful, but even when an artificer gets it wrong, he gets it right.”

  Sabira rolled her eyes. Greddark was a little too self-satisfied for his own good, but before she could find just the right quip to bring him down a notch, Kupper-Nickel laughed, a strange tinny sound made even more bizarre by the fact that the warforged’s mouth didn’t move.

  “He does indeed! What do I owe you, Dark, Artificer and Other Things?”

  “How about passage to Trent’s Well?” Sabira answered quickly before the dwarf could respond. While Boroman ir’Dayne had written them a letter of introduction to Brannan ir’Kethras, he hadn’t given them any means of actually finding the head of the Tarath Marad excavation. And while she could have bought passage easily enough with Breven’s letter of credit, she wanted to save the bulk of that money for supplies and something resembling decent mercenaries.

  “Fair enough,” the Wayfinder replied, holding out his hand. Greddark shook it somewhat sullenly before shooting a glare at Sabira.

  The warforged turned to the barkeep, Glaive, to settle up his bill. Sabira took the opportunity to move closer to the dwarf, lowering her voice.

  “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  Greddark harrumphed.

  “I was going to tell him he could buy me a cup of tea.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Wir, Barrakas 4, 998 YK

  Stormreach, Xen’drik.

  Kupper-Nickel told them they were in luck. He had a desert run planned for tod
ay, but he had to leave right at the fourth bell. Gratitude notwithstanding, he had a schedule to keep. If they weren’t at Falconer’s Spire and aboard his red-winged airship by then, he’d have to go on without them and they’d either have to wait another two weeks for him to return or find someone else to take them. But considering the majority of the trips to Xen’drik’s interior were funded one way or another by the Aurum—which meant Arach—that wasn’t really an option. So Sabira’s next order of business was getting a group of men together to accompany her and Greddark across the desert and into the darkness below it. Quickly.

  “Why not just go to the captain of the Sentinel Marshal outpost here?” the inquisitive asked as they sat at a table at the Burnished Bull. “Once he knows Breven sent you, surely he’ll give you his best and brightest for the task.”

  Sabira laughed at that.

  “First, Greigur wouldn’t give me charge of his best men if Dol Dorn himself appeared and commanded it to be so.” The Sovereign God of Strength and Steel, most Marshals revered either him or his sister, Dol Arrah, the Sovereign Goddess of Sun and Sacrifice. Though if Sabira had been pressed to choose, she would have eschewed them both for Olladra. At least the goddess of luck didn’t pretend she was anything other than fickle.

  “Second, Breven doesn’t want him to know anything about it. Greigur would be far more likely to send his own men after the artifact than he would be to help the Baron retrieve it, so we’ve got to make sure he doesn’t know anything about it. Which is going to make hiring a handful of Deneith soldiers under his nose a very tricky proposition.”

  “Why do they have to be Deneith?”

  That gave Sabira pause. Breven hadn’t told her she needed to hire men from the House; in fact, he hadn’t specifically told her she needed to take anyone with her at all, though he must have meant for her to do so when he gave her access to his bank account.

  But thirty Blademarks and a powerful sorceress had gone down into Tarath Marad, and the only one who returned was their guide. If Sabira was going to follow in their footsteps, she wanted the best warriors she could find at her back. She’d just assumed they’d be wearing the Deneith chimera on their armor, but Greddark was right. There were other mercenaries in Stormreach, ones whose services could be bought without Greigur’s knowledge, and their steel was just as sharp as that of anyone who wore the green and yellow.