Under Fallen Stars

by Mel Odom

  * * * * *

  By the time Pacys had finished recounting to Khlinat Ironeater details of the battle of Waterdeep and his own meeting with Narros, the shaman of the mermen living in Waterdeep Harbor, the beeswax taper had burned down to its final inch.

  “Ye have an incredible task ahead of ye, Pacys,” the dwarf acknowledged, “but are ye sure there’s no mistake about the young swab? Oh now, and he’s a brave one, and some skilled at weapons. I’ve seen him in action this night, and I know how deadly he can be. I question whether ye have the right person even in spite of all the good qualities the swabbie exhibits. He’s hardly more than a boy.”

  “I know,” Pacys agreed. He glanced at the stub of the candle, the hot melted wax spilling over the sides of the holder. He turned and peered out the window, seeing the streets filled with people who were returning cautiously to their homes. Occasionally during their conversation there’d been cries of warning about sahuagin, pirates, or some foul creature lurking in the shadows. The old bard hadn’t known if those really existed, or were the product of overactive imaginations. They hadn’t seen any on the trek back to Khlinat’s home. “How far away is the apothecary?”

  “Not far,” Khlinat said, “but I’ll wager me good boot that the swabbie hasn’t found anything there. The Flaming Fist would have descended on all them places and taken what they needed already. Maybe he’s giving a look ’round and seeing what he can turn up. Betwixt ye and me, I think he needed some time to himself to think.”

  Pacys nodded. Still, the creeping feeling that something might have happened took root in his mind. He’d come so far to find the boy, and had so much riding on the finding of him.

  “So why do ye seek the swabbie?” Khlinat stuffed the bowl of his pipe with pipeweed and set fire to it. “Them mermen could have found anyone to deliver the message.”

  Pacys deliberately hadn’t revealed his own part in the prophecy. “You mean someone younger.” His fingers continued to stroke the yarting’s strings, and to his great joy, he found additional chords as he sought them out. They were notes and measures that normally signaled traveling. It was confusing.

  “If ye insist on being so indelicate,” the dwarf said with an unabashed nod, “then aye.”

  Pacys smiled, showing he took no offense at the suggestion. “I don’t know. All I can say is that I was told this was meant for me. Tell me, friend Khlinat, have you heard of Thoreyo?”

  “Him who sang ‘Short-Hafted Hammer and the Wizard’s Tall Black Tower?’ ”

  “Yes.” Pacys had chosen the song deliberately.

  “As a dwarf, how could I not know of that song? It is one of the most popular dwarven brawling songs—harkening back to the days when the dwarves warred with one another to build their empires across the Far Hills.”

  “What about Yhitmon?”

  There was no hesitation in the dwarf. “Ah, ‘Strangled Leaves of Lily-Grass and the Goblin-King’s Betrothal.’ I’ve hoisted a few pints of bitters and sang along with that one meself.” He grabbed his cup and held it high.

  “And would-be noble, himself a worthy warrior among goblinkin,

  “In his own eyes,

  “Did take upon himself to find a wife.

  “So sword to hips

  “And prayer to lips,

  “He did ride, so boldly ride,

  “To the House of the Rising Sin.”

  At the end of the stanza, the dwarf burst into laughter that turned into a coughing fit.

  Pacys waited patiently till it passed.

  “Now there, by Marthammor Duin’s watchful eyes,” Khlinat swore, “is a drinking song made for men who love the taverns.”

  “Yes,” Pacys said, “and when you think of Pacys the Bard, what songs come to mind?”

  Khlinat looked embarrassed. “Ye have caught me at a bad time, singer, otherwise I’m sure I would know of one.”

  “No,” Pacys said quietly. “I’ve written songs, and good songs at that, but never a song that has captured the hearts of Faerûn the way the ones we’ve mentioned have. I was drawn to the music early. Now I am in the winter of my years and I find I have no legacy to leave.”

  “Ye believe the story of the Taker is yer legacy?”

  For a moment, Pacys felt uncomfortable. Part of him felt embarrassed about making something so grandiose about his part in the dark war rising from the seas of Faerûn, and part of him felt silly for believing so easily. But the song had existed, so he believed.

  “I’ve been told that it will be.”

  “And ye believe?”

  Pacys hesitated only a moment before saying, “Yes.”

  Khlinat nodded. “Belief is a strong thing. And song, by the gods, there’s something to forge a man’s belief to his dream, make him reach for something that he never thought would be his. There’s such power in songs.”

  Pacys felt pride at the dwarf’s description.

  “I remember a tale,” Khlinat said, “told me by me old grandda, and it twice-told at least a thousandfold ere he ever gave it to me. About Twahrm Kettlebuster, a hidden dwarf of the Far Hills.”

  “I’ve heard of it,” Pacys said, remembering the little known song. He didn’t play it much except in front of a select dwarven audience, and there had been few of those in recent years.

  “Now mind ye,” Khlinat went on, “old Twahrm weren’t no trained bard, nor was he gifted in any way. Them what heard him sing said it was punishment should be set for only the most black-hearted of folks. But one day while wandering, scouting for a new vein of metal for his village where he smithed, he come upon a hunting party of ogres.”

  Unconsciously, Pacys’s fingers found the yarting’s strings and played an accompaniment to Khlinat’s words. The dwarf picked up on the rhythm, became trapped by it, and fell into cadence with it.

  “They had him outnumbered, and surrounded in a trice. So Twahrm hit his knees and began singing of how he’d courted Haela Brightaxe, also called the Lady of the Fray, and goddess of dwarven warriors. She’d spurned his love, he said, and he was ready to greet death. He sang of how much he would love to die and how pleased he was to see them. Meaning that he wouldn’t have to die alone.”

  The bard’s plucked notes flowed through the room.

  “And the strength of his song was such that the ogres believed him and grew afraid. When he finished and took up his great battle-axe, the ogres left. See, they believed him about him being ready to up and die, and they didn’t want to get taken with him.”

  “It’s a good tale,” Pacys agreed, “and it’s exactly what I was talking about. I’ve been chasing this song for fourteen years. I came across part of it the night Narros and the other mermen came to Waterdeep after the Taker destroyed their city. Since that time I’ve wandered what seems like all of Faerûn pursuing it, never able to get more than a few scraps of it here and there.”

  “But now there’s more.”

  “Every day,” Pacys agreed. “It led me to Narros, and it led me here, to the boy.”

  Khlinat shook his head. “It’s a powerful lot for a man to think on, but have ye given any thought to what if yer wrong?”

  “No.” Pacys, who was never at a loss for words because it was those words that kept food on the table, tried to find the right ones.

  “The swabbie’s just a boy,” Khlinat said. “If he’s to go up against this thing ye call the Taker as ye say, he’s got a lot of growing up to do.”

  “I know,” Pacys admitted, “but this search for him, and finding him here at a time when this attack happened, and him being part of the effort that turned the tide of battle, it all sounds right.”

  Khlinat’s tired eyes sparkled with merriment. “Ye mean to say old Khlinat Ironeater’s going to be in yer song?”

  Pacys smiled gently back at him. “My friend, you’re going to live forever.”

  “Hopefully well and handsome in them verses, singer.” Khlinat raised his cup in a toast.

  Pacys toasted him and they drank. He put
his cup down and searched the yarting for any new chords for the song.

  At that moment, the candle guttered, reaching the end of the wick and drowning in the pool of melted beeswax. Pacys thought again of the long time that Jherek had been gone and wondered if something had happened to the boy. Then, for the first time that night, he hit a discordant note. A chill settled over the old bard as he put a hand over the strings to quiet them.

  “What is it?” Khlinat asked.

  Pacys pushed up from the table and settled his yarting over his shoulder. He picked his cloak up from the peg on the wall. “I have to go find the boy. Something’s happened.”

  The dwarf tried to get up, but the pain drove him back to his seat. “Damn me for a weakling. I’d go with ye, but I can’t. Let me know, will ye?”

  Pacys nodded and let himself outside, hurrying down the stairs. He paid attention to the sounds around him. If a person only listened to the noises around him, he’d know music was being made all the time.

  Now, beyond the street noise made by the wagons and Flaming Fist mercenaries filling the city, a discordant resonance hung over all of Baldur’s Gate. The old bard knew he was probably the only person who heard it, but it told him that no matter what efforts he made, he was already too late.

  He felt the rift between himself and the younger man, but he quickened his steps anyway, trying to find the direction, frustrated because the young sailor’s tune seemed lost to him, a distant whisper of what it had been.

  XI

  7 Kythorn, the Year of the Gauntlet

  “Have a care there, lad. You took a pretty good knock to your melon.”

  Rough hands steadied Jherek, holding him down. He knew from the weakness filling him that it didn’t take much effort. The liquid motion beneath him told him he was on a ship, though that motion was somehow off. The movements were too quick and sharp. The stink of stale sweat and sickness filled the air he breathed. His stomach rolled and rumbled in protest.

  “Easy there,” the deep voice advised. “Else you’ll be throwing up everything we’ve managed to put down you the last day or so.”

  The back of Jherek’s throat was raw. He cracked his eyelids open, feeling a sticky and gummy substance binding them. Sunlight stabbed into his eyes and exploded with the ferocity of smoke powder, blinding him. He groaned and his stomach rolled again.

  “You still live, lad, and Selûne willing, that’s a good sign. Come on around and let me see if you’ve still got your wits about you.” A big, callused hand patted his cheek sharply enough to sting without jarring his head. “I’ve seen such blows as you’ve taken leave a man addled for the rest of his life, not knowing much more than a child.”

  Jherek tried his eyes again, squinting against the harsh light. Tears ran down his face but he kept them open. He quickly discovered he was on a ship, but he was in the cargo hold, in a portion that had obviously been set up as a makeshift brig. Iron bars above let the sunlight in but he couldn’t tell if it was morning or afternoon. The sound of rigging creaking in the wind and someone calling out sharp orders reached his ears.

  “Don’t know if you remember me, lad, but the name’s Hullyn.” He was a short man, but nearly as broad as a dwarf, with thick sloping shoulders heavy with muscle. His skin carried a permanent windburn red from weathering the elements. He wore his graying blond hair tied back, letting his great beard and mustache roam free.

  “I remember you,” Jherek said. Hullyn was part of Breezerunner’s crew. That gave the young sailor some hope. “Where’s Sabyna?” He sat up with assistance, putting his back against the bulwark for support.

  Hullyn scowled. “She’s topside with those thrice-damned pirates what’s got our ship. They’re using her as blackmail to keep us in line.” He reached to a small bowl and took out a damp cloth, then pressed it against Jherek’s head.

  Jherek winced in pain, but he looked around the brig. From his previous experience aboard her, he knew Breezerunner carried a crew of twenty men. All of them appeared to be there, including Captain Tynnel.

  The captain stood leaning against the iron bars that separated them from the empty ship’s hold. His arms crossed his chest and he looked disapprovingly at Jherek. He was short and had a small stature, but fierceness showed in every inch. Blond hair the color of bleached bone was tied back from his hatchet face. Bright blue eyes held the cutting edge of diamond. For the first time ever, his clothing appeared disheveled.

  “You going to live?” Tynnel asked.

  Jherek nodded, then regretted it immediately when pain shot down his neck and back. “Aye sir.”

  “You’re a lucky man,” Tynnel commented. “Vurgrom and his people were going to kill you, but Sabyna talked them out of it.”

  “They came looking for her.”

  “I know. From what I’ve gathered, they were in Baldur’s Gate on bad business. Perhaps they even had something to do with the sahuagin raid as Vurgrom claims. I’m not certain.”

  “They took the ship?”

  Tynnel blew out a short breath. “Would have been nine or ten of them against us, but they had Sabyna. If we hadn’t cooperated, Vurgrom told me he would kill her. I believed him.”

  “Bastards like as not will kill us all afore it’s over with. We’ll have just put our necks in the executioner’s noose for nothing.”

  Jherek turned his head slightly, spotting Aysel against the left side of the brig. Large and hairy, Aysel resembled an ape trying to pass itself off as a sailor. He was broad shouldered and heavy bellied, covered in scars. His shaggy black hair hung to his shoulders, almost covering the finger-length daggers that hung from ear hoops. He held his hands one on top of the other, two digits missing from his left hand. A soft leather shoe encased his right foot.

  Looking at the leather shoe, Jherek took small satisfaction from the knowledge that the fight that had cost him his berth aboard Breezerunner hadn’t left Aysel unmarked.

  “Is Sabyna all right?” Jherek asked. He tried not to think about Sabyna being alone topside with Vurgrom and his pirates, or what could have happened to her.

  “Aye,” Tynnel replied. “So far. She’s a mage, though still fairly new to her craft, but enough of one that none of Vurgrom’s curs has tried to touch her.” The captain’s hawk’s face tightened, and white spots of anger showed in his cheeks. “She could probably have gotten away from them if not for us. Vurgrom told her if she left, our lives would be forfeit. Likewise, if we try to escape, she’ll suffer.”

  “We’re not at sea,” Jherek said. He assembled the information he had, working through the pieces as Malorrie had always trained him to.

  “No,” Tynnel agreed. “We’re on the River Chionthar, heading east.”

  “Why?”

  A pirate walked by the iron-barred hold above, never even glancing down into the cargo area. All of Breezerunner’s crew watched the man, and no few curses and epithets were muttered.

  A sour look darkened Tynnel’s face and he asked, “You’ve never heard of Vurgrom the pirate, self-styled Vurgrom the Mighty?”

  Jherek shook his head. From his exposure while on his father’s ship, he’d learned names and stories of most of the pirates of the Nelanther Isles. Vurgrom was new to him, as was any reason why a Nelanther pirate would head inland across Faerûn.

  “If you get a chance to talk to the arrogant son of a bitch,” Tynnel said, “he’ll tell you all about himself. As he tells it, he’s the Pirate Lord of Immurk’s Hold in the Sea of Fallen Stars. He’s planning on taking Breezerunner as far east as she’ll go.”

  “That’s not possible,” Jherek said. “The River Chionthar doesn’t run all the way to the Sea of Fallen Stars. It branches out at the Reaching Woods, going on north and south and ending in the Sunset Mountains and the Giant’s Plain, respectively. Both are still leagues from the Dragonmere and the Sea of Fallen Stars.”

  Tynnel eyed the young sailor with renewed curiosity. “You seem to be well aware of the lay of the land here. Most of the men aboard Bree
zerunner couldn’t have told you anything more than that the River Chionthar was where Baldur’s Gate was.”

  “I’ve never been there,” Jherek said. “I had a harsh schoolmaster who had a love of cartography. He taught me how to find my way around by the heavens at night, and the places those star readings could take me.”

  “An education is a wonderful thing,” Tynnel said. “If you’ve had one, I have to wonder why you’ve settled for the life of a sailor.”

  “Settled?” Jherek echoed. “Captain Tynnel, living out on the sea is all I’ve ever aspired to do.”

  “She’s as harsh and demanding a mistress as ever was,” Hullyn said, interrupting the tension that had come up between Tynnel and Jherek, “ain’t she, Cap’n?”

  Tynnel remained quiet for a moment, eyeing Jherek suspiciously. “Quite right, Hullyn.”

  The pounding inside Jherek’s head was unrelenting. He cradled his head in his hands and wished the pain would subside while Hullyn continued ministering to him. A momentary lightness touched his senses. He waited it out, then took a deep breath, feeling some of the pain seem to leave when he exhaled through his mouth, controlling the pain the way Malorrie had taught him.

  “Steady, lad,” the big man said gruffly. “Now that you’re awake and the bleeding seems to have stopped, let’s see about getting you cleaned up.”

  Breezerunner suddenly came about, throwing everyone off-balance as she crested the river flow.

  “She’s against the wind,” Jherek said. “He’s tacking her from shore to shore to get any distance from her sails.”

  Tynnel nodded. “Aye, and she’s fighting the magery Vurgrom’s forcing on her.”

  “What magery?” Jherek asked.

  “Using Sabyna to keep us in check was only one of the reasons Vurgrom kept her. He took us so we couldn’t report to the watch in Baldur’s Gate and maybe stir up some kind of pursuit. He knew he couldn’t kill us outright because she’d have fought him, but Vurgrom’s using her to power Breezerunner.”