Masquerades

by Kate Novak

  “Come,” the new croamarkh called out.

  A guard entered the room. “Excuse me, Your Lordship. Lady Thistle Thalavar is here.”

  “Thank you. Please show her in,” Victor said. To the accountant he explained, “I’m afraid my business with House Thalavar is more urgent than this problem. We will have to continue this discussion later. Make another appointment with my scribe.”

  “But, Your Lordship, we need—”

  “Dismissed,” Victor growled with an expression that would brook no argument.

  The accountant gathered his books and pens and bowed. He bowed again to Lady Thistle as she entered the room. As the accountant exited, Victor smiled with delight. The croamarkh had no appointment with Thistle, but on the off-chance she would take it into her head to visit him here he had left instructions that she be shown up immediately. “What service can I do for Your Ladyship?” Lord Victor asked.

  “I can wait if I’m interrupting your work,” Thistle began.

  “Lady Thistle, you are the head of one of the leading families of Westgate. I wouldn’t dream of keeping you waiting.”

  As he rose from his desk and circled around to stand before the girl, Victor noted how his flattery caused her to straighten with pride. “Besides, if I kept you waiting and you left, I would be disappointed that I’d missed seeing you.” He took up the girl’s hand and brushed his lips along her fingertips.

  “I’ve given a lot of thought to our conversation last night,” Thistle said. “I’m feeling very unhappy that I would not—could not give you the token you asked for.” She touched the feather brooch pinned to her gown. “After more careful consideration, I have decided to give you my wholehearted support, and you will have my token, tonight.”

  “Oh, Thistle, my darling,” Lord Victor whispered. He swept the girl up in his arms and kissed her as if she were a woman.

  “Lord Victor,” Thistle remarked when the croamarkh finally released her, “I fear you’ve mistaken my meaning.”

  Victor stepped back and turned his head away as if to hide his disappointment. “Forgive me, Lady Thistle, I thought … I dared hope …”

  “Oh, Victor,” Thistle whispered, stepping forward and taking the croamarkh’s hands. “It’s not that I don’t lo—that I’m not honored by your declaration. It’s only that I meant something different by offering my support.”

  Victor looked the girl in the eyes once more, confusion written on his face. “What did you mean, Thistle?”

  “I meant I will deliver Verovan’s hoard to you. So you can do all you said for Westgate. So you can make it the greatest city in all of Faerun.”

  A smile fluttered across the croamarkh’s face. “Oh, Thistle. Sweet lady. All that talk of Verovan’s treasure—that’s just dreams, faerie tales. Someday, I will do all those things I spoke of, but when I asked for your support I was thinking more realistically—I was thinking of the kind of support a woman gives a man. Thistle, I love you. I want you to be my wife.”

  Thistle beamed with pleasure, but she was still determined to prove herself. “There is no position I’d like more,” the girl replied, “but I will give you Verovan’s hoard. It’s not a myth. Meet me tonight at Castle Vhammos, and I will prove it.”

  Victor shook his head. “Darling, even for Verovan’s hoard I cannot meet you tonight. I must be at the Temple of Gond for the ceremony to initiate apprentices. If I did not attend, it would offend every artisan in the city, not to mention the priests of Gond, and probably Gond himself.”

  Thistle laughed. “You are so dutiful. Meet me tomorrow night then. You shall have Verovan’s treasure, and you shall have me.”

  “Very well,” the croamarkh agreed. He leaned forward and whispered in the girl’s ear, “Tomorrow night I’ll let you prove whatever you like.”

  The next morning, Thistle called Olive out to the veranda to join her for breakfast. The lady was watching Kretschmer and Winterhart drilling the castle guard. Marching in formation, the new recruits were beginning to look like a force to be reckoned with.

  “Miss Winterhart is better suited to her new post, I think,” Thistle commented.

  “Miss Winterhart tells me you visited Lord Dhostar yesterday afternoon, again without an escort,” the halfling retorted.

  “She followed me again? Of all the nerve! I want you to dismiss her at once.”

  “No, Lady, I will not,” Olive replied. Before the girl could protest, the halfling pressed on with an explanation. “I authorized Miss Winterhart to follow you. I couldn’t care less about your courtship of Victor Dhostar, but if you’re attacked by Night Masks, there must be someone present to defend you. I’m sure Lord Victor would agree with me that your safety is more important than your privacy.”

  “Yes, he probably would,” Thistle agreed, her tone softening at Olive’s assessment of the croamarkh. “He cares about me. Oh, Olive, he’s so wonderful. I wish grandmother were here. She would be so happy for me. I know she’d approve of my supporting him, don’t you think?”

  “That all depends,” Olive replied. “Your grandmother was the most dignified lady I ever met. I think she hoped you would be like her. Are you offering this support in a dignified fashion or like a schoolgirl?”

  Thistle straightened her back as if her grandmother had just chastised her for poor posture. “Of course I will offer my support in a dignified fashion,” she insisted.

  “Good,” Olive replied, “because however wonderful he may be, Victor Dhostar is still the head of a rival house. What was that thing your grandmother used to say about marrying into rival houses?”

  “ ‘You can marry into them, but don’t offer to cover their losses,’ ” Thistle replied. “Olive, Lord Victor doesn’t need my money, but if he did I would give it to him because I know he would use it for the good of all Westgate.”

  Olive tched just as Lady Nettel might have done.

  “Don’t you halflings have any sense of romance?” Thistle snapped with annoyance.

  “Sense and romance,” Olive sniffed. “Now there are two words that definitely don’t go together.”

  Thistle harrumphed and stormed off the veranda, just as she had the day before, leaving Olive in complete possession of her breakfast.

  After assigning duty rosters to the newly trained guards, Olive spent the rest of the day in her room, strumming nervously on her yarting. Try as she might, she could not shake off a sense of impending doom she had, not for herself but for Thistle Thalavar. The halfling was racking her brain trying to figure what Victor Dhostar’s game was. Thistle was a good match for any noble in the city, but men like Dhostar didn’t care about making a good match, Olive realized. They cared only about power.

  Jamal came calling on Olive at Castle Thalavar shortly after sunset. “There’s something very strange going on,” the actress reported. “Kel says there are all sorts of Night Masks out tonight. He followed a pair of them down to Castle Vhammos. He says he thinks they’re all holding some sort of war council.”

  Olive set down her yarting and began strapping on her scabbard. At that moment, Miss Winterhart burst into the room. The younger halfling was dressed all in leather and armed for combat with a human-sized sword strapped across her back in the fashion of warriors of the north.

  “Lady Thistle has gone to Castle Vhammos,” Winterhart reported, “but I didn’t dare approach too closely. The guards are letting all sorts of unsavory types enter, but I do not think they will let a halfling pass. I know another way in. Follow me.”

  Winterhart turned about and strode off with Olive and Jamal dashing after her. The younger halfling led them to her quarters in the lower regions of the castle. Olive was just wondering if there was some secret passageway Lady Nettel had neglected to mention when Winterhart plunged, like a diver into a pond, into the mirror hanging on her wall.

  Olive’s startled reflection rippled for a moment and then was still. “I’m probably going to regret this,” the older halfling whispered just before she stepped
into the darkness of the mirror.

  Jamal was left facing her own reflection. There was probably nothing she could do, she told herself. She wasn’t much of a fighter, and she doubted very much there would be any call for an actress wherever the mirror took her. “Some cheap hero you are,” she said, glaring at the aging face glaring back at her. Taking a deep breath, she leaped into the mirror, thinking, I know I’m going to regret this.

  Darkness seemed to fill the other side of the mirror. After a few moments, however, Olive’s eyes adjusted to the dim light cast by a brazier. She stood in the center of an underground cavern containing items removed from the lair of the Faceless—most notable were the remaining iron golems, the empty rack for the masks of the Night Masters, and the skull of the dragon Mist, with the red lights spinning in its eye sockets.

  “Where are we?” Jamal whispered.

  “The Faceless’s newest lair, I’d guess,” Olive replied. “Winterhart, how’d you get a magic portal mirror into here? What’s going on, woman?”

  Winterhart held up a finger to indicate Olive should wait for a moment. The younger halfling stood before Mist’s skull, holding a small golden wand.

  “Your associate is in the chamber above with the Night Masters and their followers,” the dragon’s skull was saying to Winterhart. “There are over two hundred Night Masks waiting for the Faceless to lead them to Verovan’s hoard.”

  “Verovan’s hoard!” Olive gasped in astonishment. “But where are Lady Thistle and Lord Victor?” she demanded.

  “Lord Victor has taken Lady Thistle to the top of the southern tower,” Mist reported. “With no idea that her lover is the Faceless, Lady Thistle is showing him how to open the portal to Verovan’s treasury.”

  “Dhostar is the Faceless?” Jamal gasped.

  “Of course,” Olive said. “That explains how he managed to make it look like his father was the Faceless.”

  Mist growled at Winterhart, “I’ve fulfilled all my promises to you, warrior. Free me now, as you promised,” the dragon’s spirit demanded.

  Winterhart stepped forward and tapped the golden wand on Mist’s disembodied skull. “Rest now, wyrm,” the halfling said.

  The light spinning about in the skull’s eye sockets seemed to flow toward Winterhart’s golden wand, then vanished. The bone of the skull crumbled into dust. An eldritch wind blew through the cavern, blowing the dust about in a cyclone. By the glow of the brazier the dust seemed to take on the shape of a red dragon.

  “Farewell, you red-headed witch,” Mist’s voice whispered, “and farewell to you, Olive Ruskettle.”

  Then the wind increased, knocking Winterhart to one knee before carrying the dust away to some far plane.

  Olive had her sword pointed at Winterhart before the other halfling could rise to her feet. “You’ve known all along that Victor Dhostar is the Faceless?”

  “Of course,” Winterhart replied. In the blink of an eye, the prim halfling had drawn her own sword and crossed the blade against Ruskettle’s. “That is why I led you here, so you could witness his moment of triumph.”

  Twenty-Three

  Battle With the Night Masks

  With Winterhart on one knee, Olive pressed her advantage before the other halfling had a chance to demonstrate her superior skill with a blade. Olive circled to Winterhart’s left side and lunged with her blade, but the younger halfling switched her sword to her left hand and parried her opponent neatly.

  “Ruskettle, you’re making a mistake,” Winterhart declared. “I’m not working for the Faceless.”

  “Oh, no,” Olive replied sarcastically. “You just have a secret entry to his lair so you can come for tea.”

  As the two halflings faced off against one another, Jamal looked around for something, anything she might use to help Olive fight Winterhart. A two-handed broadsword hung on a wall behind the iron golems. The actress grasped the weapon by its hilt and slid it from the hooks that held it in place. The sword was unbelievably heavy, and Jamal was unable to raise it without her arms shaking from the exertion.

  “Perhaps you would care to try something smaller, Jamal,” a man whispered behind her.

  The actress swung around, trailing the broadsword with her, but unable to raise it to defend herself. Kimbel stood in a doorway, eyeing her with cruel amusement. She glared at the assassin who unfastened the scabbard about his waist and tossed it at her feet.

  Distracted by the sound of Kimbel’s voice, Olive retreated a step from her opponent, giving Winterhart a chance to get to her feet.

  “Winterhart,” Kimbel barked, “you haven’t got time for this. The Faceless is about to address his troops. You’ll miss your cue.” The assassin retreated through the doorway.

  Winterhart dashed after him, calling out, “Come on, Ruskettle, Jamal. You don’t want to miss the fun.” She disappeared into the darkness beyond the door.

  Olive exchanged a confused look with Jamal; then the halfling raced after Winterhart. Jamal dropped the ridiculously heavy broadsword. She considered for a moment the sword and scabbard Kimbel had given her. It could be a trick, but she needed a weapon. I really wish I’d read the script before I jumped into this play, she thought as she followed Olive.

  On the other side of the doorway, hewn into the bedrock, was a stairway. There were more than a hundred steps, and Olive was breathless when she reached the top. The door was a pivoting section of wall, which someone had propped open with a spike driven into the floor. A tapestry hung over the door on the far side, concealing it from view. With her dagger, Olive poked a hole in a threadbare spot in the tapestry and pressed her eye up close.

  She looked out on a dais and, beyond that, a cavernous chamber. Once, long ago, this had been the audience chamber of King Verovan, but when the castle had fallen into the hands of House Vhammos it had been converted to a dining hall, with feasting tables on the dais and in the hall below.

  Now Night Masks packed the room, hundreds of them, dressed in costumes as varied as the citizenry of Westgate. There were merchants and priests, sailors and drovers, pickpockets and cutthroats, all wearing domino masks and all of them armed with deadly weapons. All had their attention focused on the dais. Ten figures wearing black robes and half masks of white porcelain stood on the stairs leading up the dais. Olive recognized one of them as Kimbel despite the mask he wore.

  A man dressed in a blood-colored robe of velvet stood at the top of the dais. His face was a magical blur of colors. He stepped forward, and a buzzing sound spread through the room as hundreds of Night Masks realized he was their master.

  “The Faceless,” Jamal whispered behind Olive. The actress had poked her own eyehole farther up the tapestry.

  Kimbel motioned for silence, and a hush fell over the room.

  “You see, I live while those who oppose me have perished!” the Faceless thundered. The magical distortion of his voice, caused by the mask that obscured his features, sent a shiver down Jamal’s spine. “The nobles opposed me, and they are no more. The croamarkh opposed me, and he is no more. The sell-sword Alias and her companions opposed me, and they are no more. This night I claim rulership of this city, and all of you who are loyal to me will be rewarded!”

  A cheer went up from the crowd.

  “Tonight begins a new era for Westgate,” the Faceless continued. “The treasure of King Verovan is ours to take—”

  At the mention of treasure another cheer rippled through the crowd. Gold always had a way of rallying the troops, the Faceless thought. He waited patiently for the din to die down.

  “There will be danger,” the Faceless warned matter-of-factly. “Verovan’s treasure lies in another plane, and like most treasure hoards is guarded by creatures that dwell in that plane. Your lives will be at risk, yet your reward will be great. All of you who survive will receive a share of what is looted from the hoard. Once that share is yours, you will no longer be criminals, but the wealthiest men and women in Westgate.”

  There was another cheer, but the Fac
eless cut it off with a sharp motion of his hand. “I am the one who made the Night Masks the most powerful guild in the Heartlands. I am the one who destroyed your enemies. I am the one who will lay Verovan’s treasure at your feet, but first you must pay my price.” The Faceless paused.

  The room went silent as each Night Mask worried what that price might be, and each considered what price would be too high.

  “I demand your fealty,” the Faceless announced in a sepulchral tone, “not as a crime lord, but as your king! I will make Westgate the greatest empire in the Realms, and you shall all share in the riches of that empire! If you share in my vision, if you accept my terms, kneel now before me.”

  Like faithful worshipers, the Night Masks below the dais knelt as a body. The Night Masters on the steps did not seem certain whether or not they too were required to join in this physical display, but when Kimbel knelt, the others followed. If any one of them held a republican sentiment or inwardly questioned the wisdom of agreeing to so empower an anonymous crime lord, they did not share it with their fellows.

  “All hail the Faceless,” Kimbel cried, “King of Westgate!”

  “The Faceless,” the crowd shouted, “King of Westgate!”

  The Faceless, surprised but very pleased by Kimbel’s call for the crowd’s allegiance, held up his arms and basked in the adulation of the thieves of Westgate. Unfortunately, his moment of glory was followed immediately by an uncomfortable silence as hundreds of Night Masks grew anxious for their reward and wondered if it was too soon to get off their knees.

  “All hail the Faceless,” a shrill but clear voice called out from the back of the dais. “Master of an honorless, greedy mob. Traitor to his duty and family. Murderer of his father and his lover.” The speaker leaped up on the feasting table behind the Faceless so that all could see the red-haired halfling woman in leather armor—Winterhart. The sound of her sword slipping from its scabbard slithered through the length of the hall. She aimed the blade at the Faceless’s neck.