City of the Dead

by Rosemary Jones

  The only demand that Volponia ever made was that the other turret bedroom, the one that shared the same floor with hers, “not be occupied by one of those great galumphing male Carvers. I love my nephews, my grandnephews, and my great-grandnephews, but they all take after my brother. He snored loud enough to wake every soul in Waterdeep and I have enough trouble sleeping without listening to such thunder every night.”

  So, as the only girl born in two generations and a silent sleeper, Sophraea occupied the other bedroom and received regular doses of Volponia’s advice growing up. Also a fair amount of criticism as in “well, why are you standing dithering in the doorway. Step in or step out, but don’t make a draft!”

  Whisking her skirts around the tippy tables and wobbly china and crystal mementos with the ease of long practice, Sophraea hurried to the bedside and kissed Volponia’s parchment dry cheek.

  “I came to ask about a glowing light in the graveyard, not to be scolded,” she said with mock severity as she plopped down upon the bed. The mattress was very firm, probably stuffed with horsehair, Sophraea guessed.

  “A light in the graveyard?” said Volponia, hitching herselfhigher on her satin-covered feather pillows. “What was it?”

  “I don’t know,” said Sophraea, “but it moved around the City of the Dead, from far to the north along the paths to our gate.”

  “Well, I can’t see the City from my windows. Just a bit of the wall and watchtower. A dark night, last night, and a stormy one. I barely slept with all the rattle of the wind and rain. I’m sure I would have noticed any light if it had moved around the house.”

  “The rain woke me too. That’s why I saw the light. It was definitely inside the City and never passed the gate.”

  “Perhaps it was the Watch upon patrol.”

  “No,” Sophraea could be just as firm as Volponia. “I’ve seen the Watch chasing thieves through there before. Lots of torches and shouting, lots of lights. This was just one light, and it seemed to move around on its own.”

  Volponia frowned. “A haunt?”

  “It didn’t look like a spirit,” replied Sophraea with the sophistication of a seventeen-year-old who had grown up in Waterdeep. “At least not the sort of ghost that you usually see. It was brighter, or moved differently. The things you see on the streets, the mists, they tend to float around. This looked like it went where it intended to go.”

  “Magic, perhaps?” Volponia speculated with a frown. “But it would take an unusually brave wizard to be casting spells in the City after dark. There are things buried there who don’t like disturbances. And I can’t see the Blackstaff being all that kind to anyone who meddled with magic inside the graveyard. Perhaps you should tell your father. He can always get a word to the right ear.”

  “Perhaps,” agreed Sophraea, “if I knew what to tell him. It was just one light, and rather small. But there were these handprints on our gate today. Leaplow thought it was rust at first …”

  “But?” asked the shrewd Volponia.

  “I thought they were handprints, dark red-brown handprints, from somebody reaching from the City’s side.”

  “The color of old blood?” Volponia spoke with the relish of a former pirate captain. “Just the sort of trick that ghosts like to play. Or those who mean you to think the dead are making trouble. You should talk to your father; Astute’s no fool.”

  “He’s busy. Stunk came today.”

  “A troublesome man, from all that your grandmother has told me,” said Volponia. Although the old lady never left her bed as far as the family knew, she liked to hear the news and Myemaw was her major source of information.

  “I don’t like him,” admitted Sophraea.

  “If you really want to know what that light was, you should ask a wizard,” Volponia stated.

  “I don’t know any,” Sophraea replied. Then she thought of Gustin Bone, but she wasn’t sure what he was. Did making all the laundry jump on the line make him a wizard? Maybe he was just an adventurer with some type of magic ring or conjuring piece. Such things were not unknown in Waterdeep.

  “There’s that old woman down on Coffinmarch, but everyone says she is crazy mad witch,” Sophraea added, because she did know where Egetha kept her shop and she had no idea at all where Gustin Bone had come from or where he went.

  “That’s just your brothers’ opinion of Egetha and that’s just because she caught them sneaking around her back windows, trying to watch her conjure. But Egetha never did much more than sell beauty charms to old maids and protections for young men with mischief on their minds.”

  “Really, I didn’t know that.”

  “Exactly how old are you? I keep losing track with your generation.”

  “Seventeen.”

  “That’s still too young for me to be discussing most of Egetha’s stock with you. Go ask your mother if you’re curious.” Volponia fidgeted in her bed, obviously dismissing the topic to the disappointment of Sophraea’s curiosity. But her next words caught the girl’s wandering attention.

  “The quality of magic may have sadly deteriorated from the days of my youth, as have a great many other things,” said Volponia, “but there must still be a place where you can find a decent wizard for hire in Waterdeep.”

  “I’m sure I don’t know where, Auntie,” said Sophraea, “and I’m certain that I wouldn’t know how to pay one if I did find him.”

  “When I was still captaining my own ships, you went to Sevenlamps Cut if you wanted a wizard, especially the cheap kind whom nobody would miss if they drowned or were eaten by sea serpents.” Volponia sniffed. “If you asked around, you could find someone to hire out on the streets.”

  “Well, wizards cost money and I don’t have that much.”

  “Promise to pay with a kiss.” Volponia actually smirked. “Used to work for me when I was your age.”

  “I’m not going to kiss some smelly old wizard, you wicked thing!”

  “That’s the problem with your generation. No imagination.” The old lady rooted with one hand under the covers of her bed and pulled out a tarnished brass box, decorated with strips of faded green ribbons. She shook it and listened with a frown to the tinkle of the contents. Twisting one end of the box open, she emptied a single silver ring onto her covers. Handing it to Sophraea, she said, “There’s probably half a wish still left in that ring and that might interest the right type of wizard.”

  “I don’t know. A wizard might be more trouble than he’s worth,” Sophraea answered, still thinking about the twinkle in Gustin Bone’s bright green eyes.

  Fidgeting with Volponia’s gift, she slid it on her middle finger. A plain ring, a little tarnished, with no fancy marks or flashing gems, it looked like one of those trinkets that the foolish bought in the cheaper parts of the Dock Ward. It was hard to believe that it contained any magic at all.

  “Maybe I shouldn’t worry about the City of the Dead,” she said to Volponia. “After all, Leaplow is probably right, the dead don’t bother Carvers.”

  “Especially if Leaplow restrains himself from punching them in the face,” chuckled her ancient relative. The tale of Leaplow’s misdeeds last spring had risen quickly to the old woman’s chamber.

  “But if someone is stirring up trouble, shouldn’t I find out who?” Sophraea continued to twist the ring on her finger, but she kept looking out of the closest window, wondering if the light would reappear in the City of the Dead that night.

  “Well, if you do make up your mind any day soon,” Volponia said with a shrewd glance at Sophraea’s wrinkled and rather worried forehead, “do let me know. It will give me something to fret over. I have so very few distractions at my age. It may be some time before Leaplow creates another scandal.”

  Sophraea smiled and slid from the bed. “I’ll let you know if I decide to investigate, I promise. Do you want me to bring you anything?”

  “No need,” said Volponia, reaching for her crystal bell. “I’ll ring up whatever I want later. And your grandmother will be al
ong once her supper is done for a little chatter.”

  “Don’t tell too many good stories without me,” said Sophraea on her way out the door.

  Volponia called her back. “Weren’t you going to talk to Lord Adarbrent? About that letter of recommendation?”

  Sophraea sighed. “He hasn’t been back in almost a full month.”

  “He will be. He’s just as obsessed with his final rest as that Rampage Stunk. So you’re going to do it? You’re going to take that job with the dressmaker?”

  “It’s an apprenticeship,” said Sophraea for the umpteenth time. “And she won’t take just anyone. You have to show that you have a noble sponsor.”

  “Sounds like a snob,” Volponia had expressed this opinion many times too.

  “She’s considered the very best in the Castle Ward. And what am I to do? Stay here and sew shrouds?”

  “Your aunts Catletrho and Tanbornen seem to enjoy it. As do a couple of their sons.”

  “Not me. I want to work with fine materials.”

  “Some of the nobility like silk shrouds as much as silk shirts or sheets.”

  “I want to see my creations on the living!”

  “That’s harder for a Carver, I’ll admit. Although, if your fancy dressmaker puts you to embroidering camisoles and petticoats, you won’t see much of those either after they leave the shop. I doubt she’ll have you dressing her best customers from the start.”

  “No, of course not, the apprenticeship is seven years. But her apprentices have established their own shops.”

  “Still seems a long time to tie yourself to someone who isn’t family. And she wants her girls to live in the shop, I hear.”

  “I’ll have a half-day free twice a month. I’ll visit.”

  “Won’t be the same,” grumbled Volponia, pulling her blankets closer around her thin old body.

  “Ah, don’t,” said Sophraea, dropping to her knees by the bed. She clasped one of Volponia’s long, thin hands in her own equally slender fingers. “Everyone has been arguing against this. But you don’t know what that shop is like. It’s so beautiful, all those piles of velvet, silk, ribbons, lace, and embroidery. And little delicate chairs with gilded legs. None of the ladies ever talk in anything but the most genteel tones. There’s no shouting or banging or kicking a stupid ball against the wall of the house at all hours! And nobody who works there smells of anything stronger than soap!”

  “Can’t say that about the Carver boys.” Volponia patted Sophraea’s dusky curls. “But we’ll all miss you. That’s why we fuss so.”

  “I know,” Sophraea said, springing up and hugging Volponia one last time. Every time she thought about leaving Dead End House, Sophraea couldn’t help the stupid tears clogging up her eyes and making her sniff. She loved her family but she really could not see spending the rest of her life sewing shrouds. And she certainly wasn’t big enough or strong enough to carve monuments or build coffins like some of her sisters-in-law.

  Besides, if she lived in Castle Ward, there would be some distance between her and her overly protective relatives. She might even get to flirt with the same man more than once!

  Much to Sophraea’s surprise, Lord Adarbrent arrived at Dead End House early the next morning. Since they had first crossed paths in the City of the Dead, the elderly nobleman never failed to greet her courteously. More than once, she had heard him refer to her as “a good girl” to her father.

  Of course, Sophraea was not sure that Lord Adarbrent actually realized that she was seventeen and fully grown. He still tended to offer her sweetmeats and pat her on the head, just as he had when she was five.

  But she had a letter of recommendation all written out for him in her very best hand and only one or two very tiny smudges from being carried around in her apron pocket for days on end. If he would only sign and seal it, she could apply for the dressmaker’s apprenticeship in the Castle Ward.

  Despite her best efforts, Sophraea could not attract Lord Adarbrent’s attention. The old man had hurried across the courtyard with only the barest of bows in her direction to knock on the door of her father’s workshop.

  “Lord Adarbrent,” said Astute Carver with genuine pleasure at the interruption. The two shared a passion for the history of the tombs contained within the walls of the City of the Dead.

  Usually during a visit, the conversation would turn from Lord Adarbrent’s current plans to the history of the City of the Dead. Lord Adarbrent greatly admired the Carvers’ family ledger, which recorded all the details of their work and had often called it an “incomparable history” of the cemetery.

  Once the old gentleman had found the design for a curl of seaweed carved by a Carver ancestor on a mausoleum’s door. He told Astute and Sophraea where that emblem could be found etched in a certain family’s crest. Lord Adarbrent then related how that twist of seaweed was linked to the long forgotten tale of a blue-skinned wife who came from Naramyr and vanished back into the Sea of Fallen Stars after her noble husband’s death.

  “They were a restless family after that,” finished Lord Adarbrent one rainy afternoon as a much younger Sophraea perched wide-eyed and wondering on an overturned urn, listening to his story of the elf wife. “None of them could ever bear to see a ship making ready to leave the harbor, for fear that the lure of the wind and water would be too great for them.”

  Lord Adarbrent, Astute Carver often declared, was the only man in Waterdeep who knew the great City of the Dead better than the family. And Lord Adarbrent would hem and haw in his usual manner, murmuring “You are too kind. I have learned a great deal since I began my visits here.”

  That day, however, the elderly nobleman was almost curt in his exchange with Astute.

  “I need to look over your ledger,” he said far more abruptly than usual.

  “Certainly, my lord,” said Astute, pulling down the big book bound in black leather and setting it on his worktable. “Can I fetch you a chair?”

  “No need,” said Lord Adarbrent as he waved him away. The old man leaned heavily on his gold-headed cane, carefully turning the crackling pages of the family’s ledger. “He’s gone too far … that upstart … this is a matter of honor.”

  Astute winked at Sophraea. In Waterdeep, old Lord Adarbrent was often called the Angry Lord for his mutterings as he stalked through the streets. Less kind souls also referred to him as the Walking Corpse for his dour physique. The Carvers rarely saw that side of his character, but obviously something had touched off the nobleman’s well-known fiery temper.

  Finally, with a hiss of rage, the old man turned away from the ledger. “Venal cur.” He glared out the workshop door as if he could see the person who annoyed him so through the walls and buildings of Waterdeep. “Well, that is what I needed to know.”

  He scratched his chin, a habitual gesture of contemplation for the old gentleman. “Now. What to do? What to do, indeed!” he muttered to himself.

  With an obvious start of recollection, Lord Adarbrent acknowledged Astute Carver. “I am sorry, more sorry than I can say, that I must leave so soon after arriving.”

  “You are welcome here, my lord, whether for a short visit or a long one.”

  “Very kind, very kind, I’m sure.” The old nobleman hesitated in the workshop doorway, as if trying to decide where to go next.

  Given the gentleman’s mood, Sophraea wondered if she should wait to ask him for his signature. A kitten wandered out from under her father’s workbench, part of the latest litter deposited there by the Carver’s striped mouser. The black-and-white furball tangled its tiny claws in her hem and purred. Even as she reached down to disengage the kitten, Sophraea decided she could not put off asking Lord Adarbrent for another day.

  The customers’ bell clanged. Two men entered through the street-side gate, the long and lanky Gustin Bone and the hairy doorjack of Rampage Stunk. Lord Adarbrent took one look at the latter man and spun sharply on his heel, striding across the yard to the gate leading into the City of the Dead.

&
nbsp; “My lord,” Sophraea started forward, dropping the kitten back with its littermates and pulling her letter out of her apron pocket. Two of her cousins carried a newly polished coffin out of Perspicacity’s workshop. Sophraea dodged around them.

  But she was too slow to catch Lord Adarbrent. He plunged through the gate and charged into the City of the Dead. Sophraea ran down the moss-covered steps leading to the gravel path, intent on catching the old man. But even as she rounded the Deepwinter tomb, she lost sight of Lord Adarbrent.

  With a sigh, she stuffed the letter back into her apron pocket and turned back toward home. The next time, she promised herself, she wouldn’t hesitate. She’d catch his lordship just as soon as he set foot in the Dead End courtyard and she would get that signature. She just couldn’t spend the rest of her life waiting. She needed to make her dreams happen.

  Yet, looking back at Dead End House looming over the cemetery’s walls, Sophraea felt the usual pang at the thought of leaving home. The long windows glowed a warm yellow, a sign that the aunts were already lighting the lanterns to chase away the late afternoon gloom. She could swear that the wind brought her a sniff of wood smoke and supper cooking from the house’s crooked chimney.

  As Sophraea retraced her steps, a faint sound caught her attention. A whisper of a noise, not nearly as loud as the rain beginning to patter on the dead leaves littering the pathway or the wind scratching the branches together.

  Sophraea stood perfectly still, listening. It faded away even as she concentrated, the sound of a woman sobbing, a very young woman sobbing as if her heart was broken, “lost … lost … lost.”

  The crunch of very real feet on the gravel distracted Sophraea. Gustin Bone was hurrying toward her.

  “There you are,” he said with a smile lighting his bright green eyes. Then, as he took in the Deepwinter tomb behind her, those same eyes widened. “Ah, this isn’t your kitchen garden.”

  “Of course not,” said Sophraea, a little impatiently, distracted by trying to tell if the whisper she’d just heard was the usual moan to be expected in the graveyard or something else. “This is the City of the Dead. Why would you think it was our kitchen garden?”