The Alabaster Staff

by Edward Bolme

  Massedar set the salve casually on the table and stalked back to his library of concoctions. He pulled out two flasks, one small and made of dark glass, the other large and formed of cut crystal. He slid the smaller flask into a pocket and removed the stopper from the larger, crystal flagon. He drizzled the contents over Ekur’s body, starting at the head and working his way down, until almost the entire corpse had been wetted. The liquid smoked and fumed with the smell of sulfur as it struck the skin, but Ekur’s body appeared unchanged by whatever magical reaction was taking place. Finally, Massedar tilted Ekur’s head back and poured some of the concoction into his nostrils. That done, he set the bottle down on the table next to the balm and elevated Ekur’s shoulders a little bit, letting his head sag backward. Kehrsyn figured that would help some of the strange potion to drain down Ekur’s throat without being blocked by his dead tongue.

  Massedar returned the corpse to its original position. Then, his outstretched hands gripping the edge of the table, he leaned low to Ekur’s ear.

  “Ekur,” he said.

  The body did not move.

  “Ekur of Shussel, answer thou me,” he commanded.

  Kehrsyn shuddered and closed her eyes as she saw the corpse’s mouth move. It made no noise other than the wet, sucking sound of an unattended tongue flopping around in a dead mouth. She realized that, after the nightmare of two days past, she couldn’t bear to keep her eyes closed. Instead, she opened them and stared at the ground, shielding her eyes from the abomination taking place on the table.

  “Thou must inhale,” said Massedar.

  There followed a guttural, empty, choking sound of air being pulled past dead flesh.

  “What is thy wish, my lord?” asked Ekur, in a sighing, falling, monotonous voice, his diction listless and slurred.

  The remaining air exited the fat, dead lungs like a death rattle.

  Kehrsyn heard a cork pop. She cast a quick glance up and saw that Massedar was pouring some of the contents of the small glass bottle into Ekur’s slack jaw.

  “Swallow thou that,” said Massedar, “that thou mayest speak only the truth.”

  The body swallowed it noisily, open-mouthed. Kehrsyn looked away, gooseflesh crawling over her like a million scarab beetles.

  “Thou hast conspired to betray me, Ekur of Shussel. What is thy goal?”

  The body inhaled again, a horrid sound that made Kehrsyn wince and curl her lip in disgust.

  Again, the slurred voice came in a hollow, even-paced decrescendo, saying, “Thou art weak in the face of Bane … Bane shall take this land from the dead hand of Gilgeam and drive the—” the body inhaled again, slowly, noisily—“Mulhorandi back to the River of Swords … Unther shall rise, and I shall lead them to glory against the pharaoh.”

  Again the lungs rattled their way to emptiness.

  “With whom hast thou conspired? Speak!” said Massedar, the anger in his voice was palpable.

  “We schemed with Tiamat and Furifax to steal the Alabaster Staff …” said the airy, dead voice, “then we turned one pawn against the other … I—” another hideous snoring inhalation—“will use the staff to raise an army of undead and defeat the Mulhorandi forces … their own dead shall rise to—” the wet noise of flaccid inhalation sounded yet again—“serve me … and I shall rule this empire for our new lord god Bane … thy devotion to—”

  “Enough!” barked Massedar.

  His explanation aborted, Ekur let the rest of his air escape his cold lungs.

  Massedar scowled at Ekur’s body, drumming his fingers on the side of the table and thinking. Kehrsyn realized that she was unconsciously holding her breath, waiting for Ekur to breathe again. The silence was unnerving. She glanced up, freakishly hoping to see Ekur’s chest rising and falling, so that she’d feel less awkward about breathing herself. Instead, she saw the green striations beneath his skin starting to fade and suspected that Massedar had little time left for his grisly interrogation.

  “Where lieth the Alabaster Staff?”

  With a fleshy, wet breath, Ekur said, “It was brought to the Bow Before Me … they sent it to a lair I know not of.”

  Massedar twisted his lips in frustration. He clapped a hand over Ekur’s nose and mouth so that he couldn’t exhale. With a grimace, Kehrsyn turned her head away. She realized she was holding her breath again, in sympathy for the image of Ekur being suffocated, and she forced herself to breathe.

  “How shall I find the Alabaster Staff and recover it?” Massedar asked, pulling his hand off Ekur’s face.

  “Two days hence at midnight the—” he inhaled—“ritual begins, in the Deep Hall beneath the Temple of Gilgeam … it shall be there.”

  “With all the Zhents,” muttered Demok.

  The city of Messemprar was starting to stir in the predawn darkness when Demok and Kehrsyn finally entered the empty building on Wheelwright’s. They had slipped Kehrsyn out of Wing’s Reach without incident, and the former guildhouse seemed the best place for the young woman to hole up until the appointed time.

  Demok started a fire in the kitchen and unwrapped a stock of provisions. Kehrsyn tossed her cloak on the floor of the foyer, sat in a chair, and stared at the growing flames.

  Once the food was heating, Demok opened up some windows to vent some of the smell that had accumulated in the building. The weather had eased off, loitering somewhere between a rain and a drizzle, though the air was no less cold.

  They ate in silence as the first glimmers of the winter sun’s light filtered through the cloud cover. The heat from the fire fought the cold air from outside, but their breath and the food both steamed. Demok ate his food mechanically. Kehrsyn poked at hers and didn’t really eat until Demok leaned close and ordered her to.

  Once it was clear that Kehrsyn was finished, Demok took her plate and flipped the food out the window. The extravagant waste would ensure that people thought the building was fully occupied.

  He set the dishes aside and sat down next to Kehrsyn. He looked at her face as she stared into the fire.

  “You all right?” he asked.

  After a pause, Kehrsyn nodded.

  “Hard to watch?”

  Kehrsyn nodded again, exactly as she had a moment before.

  “Thought you hated Ekur,” he pressed.

  Kehrsyn bit her lip and drew in a trembling breath. “I do,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

  Demok leaned in closer to hear her over the fire.

  “He killed my father,” she continued, “he tormented my mother, used her for pleasure. I’ve always hated him and I always will.”

  A long pause.

  “Go on,” said Demok.

  Kehrsyn drew in another deep breath through her nose, and Demok noted that her trembling was diminishing.

  “He’s an evil man,” she said, “and I’m glad he’s dead. I don’t mind that Massedar used his … used him like that. But it was an ugly thing to hear, and … I’m … I guess I’m just … put off that Massedar could do such horrid things with such a casual air.”

  “Sometimes we must do tasteless things,” said Demok.

  She glanced over at him. He dropped his eyes.

  “I guess he did what he had to,” continued Kehrsyn after a moment’s reflection. “And now we know what’s been going on.”

  Demok nodded. They sat in silence for a while, and Demok tended to the fire. Finally, he stood up and leaned against the wall, facing Kehrsyn.

  “Ever know your father?” he asked.

  Kehrsyn shook her head, regret and longing marring her features.

  “No,” she said, “I didn’t. Ekur killed him about a year before I was born. All I’ve ever seen of him is the rock that marks his grave. It’s just a rock. Doesn’t even have his name on it. Just the pollen stains of countless wildflowers.”

  “Come again?” said Demok.

  “A rock,” said Kehrsyn, measuring with her hands. “About this wide around or so, pretty heavy, really, so I figure Momma had some frien
ds help her.”

  “No, about your father.”

  “Never knew him, I said.”

  “Died a year before you were born.”

  “Yeah, Momma told me that once when she was drunk.”

  “Pregnancy takes nine months,” said Demok.

  Kehrsyn’s face went pale, and she raised her hands to her open mouth.

  “Oh my word,” she gasped, “I never thought of it that way.…”

  Demok regretted his rashness, letting surprise guide his tongue instead of his intellect. He reached for Kehrsyn, but she rose and walked over to the window, her blanched face unmoving. She looked alarmingly like the walking dead.

  “I don’t believe it,” she murmured as she stared, unseeing, at the falling rain.

  As the sun rose somewhere to the east, Kehrsyn leaned her hands on the windowsill and began to cry. She tried to hold back her sobs but failed, whining in pain as she exhaled, and inhaling trembling, reluctant breaths.

  Demok could do nothing but sit and wait as the city awakened and the air filled with the sounds of pedestrians. Periodically, he stoked the fire. He wished he could help her, but she was lost somewhere in the past, experiencing pain he knew nothing of.

  Kehrsyn raised her head to the sky, wiped her eyes with the heels of her hands, and turned back around to face Demok.

  “I don’t believe it,” she said. “After all this time, he didn’t kill my father.” She sniffled and ran the heel of her hand across her eyes again. “I love my father!” she sobbed, her voice crescendoing as she struggled to maintain control. “What am I supposed to do now?”

  She buried her face in her hands and began weeping openly. Full-force grief wracked her body, waves of anguish pounding against her throat. Demok hemmed for a moment, then awkwardly reached out to hold her. She ended up resting her head against his breast, but he wasn’t sure she was aware of it.

  He held her to the best of his ability, his jaw set in a grim line as he stared out at the city, a cold, gray world beset by warfare and hunger with little room for a hopeful, compassionate juggler. He could only see it as an allegory for her entire life.

  The tide of her grief eventually receded, leaving her spent and quiet, her arms still pulled close and her head leaning on his breastbone.

  “Kehrsyn,” he said.

  “Yes,” she answered, her voice like a little girl.

  “Your father is still your father.”

  “No, he’s not,” she said.

  “He’s done more to raise you and guide your steps than Ekur ever did. Even after his death, he was your mother’s helper and your companion. He’s far more your parent than the one who sired you.”

  “But—” began Kehrsyn.

  “Nothing Ekur can do can change that,” interrupted Demok. “Don’t you give it away. Hold onto it. Protect it. Your father makes you who you are.”

  A long pause.

  “All right,” said Kehrsyn.

  Demok took a deep breath. While these personal talks were curiously rewarding, they still made him nervous, scared. He preferred to deal with threats that could be stabbed through the heart or beheaded. It was so much easier, so much clearer.

  “And you can thank the gods that you look like your mother,” he said, looking to end the moment before he foundered somewhere beyond his understanding.

  Kehrsyn snorted.

  “Yeah,” she said, pulling away from him to sit by the fire once more.

  The day was a quiet one. Kehrsyn kept her own council, while Demok cleaned out the corpses downstairs and disposed of them. Periodically he’d stoke the fire, and usually he found Kehrsyn sitting in a chair by the hearth, staring out the open shutters at the continuous drizzle.

  Later that evening, Kehrsyn and Demok sat at the table, quietly eating the supper he had prepared. Kehrsyn set down her knife and fork and leaned her cheek on one fist.

  She looked over at her companion with vulnerable eyes and asked, “Am I a bad person, Demok?”

  He blinked twice, then replied, “Why do you ask?”

  “I’m a thief. I steal things. It’s against the law, and it’s wrong. I’m sure my father wouldn’t have liked it, either. I just take things from people. Sort of like my actual father.”

  Demok took a deep breath and looked at the ceiling.

  “You just want me to talk,” he said.

  Kehrsyn giggled in spite of her serious mood.

  Demok crossed one arm across his chest to support the elbow of the other. He ran his thumb across his lip between sentences as he spoke, a professorial tone to his voice.

  “Every creature does what is required to survive. You grew up hungry. You stole food. When you could eat without stealing, you stopped. I see no fault.”

  “Yeah, but I promised myself that I would never steal again,” confessed Kehrsyn. “Then, when that sorceress pushed me, I fell right back into it.”

  “You were cornered. Theft or death. You did what was required to survive.”

  Kehrsyn sat back in her chair, folding her arms. The chair creaked with age, making a sound of wood snapping.

  “But we’re supposed to know better,” she said. “We’re supposed to have values and ideals.”

  “You do,” replied Demok. “You never steal for gain. You steal for survival. Given the chance to make amends, you did.”

  “But it’s still theft, and I still broke my promise,” protested Kehrsyn.

  Demok considered that, and said, “If you’re asking whether you should have died rather than steal, that’s between you and your gods. I couldn’t fault that choice, either. I don’t have the answer to that question. I only have my answer.”

  “What’s your answer?” asked Kehrsyn.

  Demok’s thumb froze in place.

  “I’m a killer,” he said, no trace of pride or shame in his voice. “It’s my skill. People kill rabid dogs. I kill people. Because it needs to be done.”

  “That’s hardly reassuring,” mumbled Kehrsyn.

  “If someone were about to use something to cause widespread plague,” he asked, “and you had the chance to steal it, would you?”

  “Yes,” said Kehrsyn.

  “Thus you’d use your skills to save a hundred lives,” said Demok with finality.

  “That doesn’t make it any less wrong.”

  “Doesn’t make it any less right,” said Demok. He shrugged. “I don’t have the answer. Only mine. You find yours.”

  “Fine,” said Kehrsyn, a leaden tone to her voice.

  Demok studied her.

  “Something still bothers you,” he observed.

  Kehrsyn looked at him, then looked away, then tried to look at him again but failed.

  Demok waited.

  “I’m …” Kehrsyn said. “I know it’s wrong and stuff, but I just can’t help it. Especially these last few times. It’s … I don’t know, it’s, like, exciting or something, breaking in and stuff,” she confessed. “I think I’m starting to really enjoy it.”

  Demok smiled, a grim motion that didn’t touch his eyes.

  “I know what you mean,” he said. “Like an addiction.”

  The two sat in silence for a long time, lost in their own thoughts as darkness once more descended upon the city.

  The waiting was over. In contrast, the bitter winter weather was far from finished. A fresh, gusty wind blew in from the north, whipping people’s cloaks and bringing repeated hard showers to rake the land.

  It was a miserable day. For most people, it was a miserable night. Massedar, however, was happy to be out. The storms suited his mood, the dark temper that roiled beneath his calm and disciplined demeanor. It was time for revenge.

  Massedar rode in a wagon, thoroughly furled in his great, warm cloak. A trusted servant drove the unwilling horses through the darkened streets, quietly and calmly. Midnight was approaching on its own time; best not to attract attention with reckless speed.

  The only other passengers in the wagon were a pair of corpses in the rear, eac
h carefully swaddled in oilskin tarpaulins. Rain drummed on the hard fabric, a pleasing sound to the aging merchant prince. He matched the sound and rhythm, drumming his fingers impatiently on the inner folds of his heavy cloak. The lower lid of one eye twitched in barely contained fury.

  After all those years, he brooded, all those long years. After I took him in, made him an advisor, a confidante, even a friend, Ekur betrayed me. Sacrilege! He sold himself unto a foreign god and used me, used my house, used my wealth. How many years had it taken for me to recover the Alabaster Staff? And for how much of that time hath he, the traitor, been working behind the scenes, playing upon my faith, my trust, my mistaken impressions of the man?

  Massedar worked his jaw back and forth. If he truly were to have his way, he would storm the gathering of Bane-worshiping heathen Zhents with every guard at his disposal, as well as a platoon of Chessentan mercenaries. That way he could ensure that no one left the area alive (or, at the least, that no one survived the painful interrogations).

  Unfortunately, he did not have that luxury. The Zhents held the Alabaster Staff, and he had to recover it. That was crucial. He would not let the Zhentarim and their backstabbing servant wrest the staff away from him, not after all that time. But, more significantly, Ekur had been working for Bane, and therefore it was quite possible that one or more other people in Wing’s Reach were also Zhent agents. The way the Zhentarim worked, Ekur might not even have known. Thus, Massedar could not trust his own people. Even if he could hire any mercenaries in the midst of the war, it would attract attention. In the end, Massedar was forced to work with Demok and Kehrsyn, the only people in on the secret of Ekur’s adopted identity. They would have to be enough. They … and his other friend.

  Ahead, he saw that the wagon was approaching the Chariot Memorial. His eyes narrowed. If Demok and Kehrsyn kept him waiting, he would be quite upset.

  “Time,” said Demok, as he leaned in the front door of the former Furifaxian quarters.

  Kehrsyn stopped her pacing, blew out her breath, and said, “Right, let’s go.”

  “Got everything?” Demok asked.