"The gems," Alashar said sternly, and Grenway laughed again.
Even Alashar couldn't react fast enough to dodge the hand that burst out of the floor behind her, trailing an arm the color and texture of the sitting-room floor. It shot up behind her, up over her head, and came down to palm her scalp and continue pulling back. Her neck snapped, the sound echoing sickeningly in the big stone room. The force of it almost ripped her head off her shoulders. Her body fell backward. The hand followed the arm back into the floor and was gone before Alashar's body stopped its death spasms.
Grenway finally stopped coughing. The ancient arch-wizard stood weakly and spared a happy glance at the head on the floor, not bothering to acknowledge the corpse of his own assassin. He turned, whistling a little tune from his youth, and shuffled to the door to his private bedchamber and opened it.
"Good evening," Alashar said.
Grenway stopped and looked up as fast as his brittle neck would allow. They were there, alive, both of them.
The simulacrums…
He opened his mouth to begin an incantation, but no sound came out. Shadow smiled, and Alashar drew her rapier and stepped forward.
Shadows Of The Past
Brian M. Thomsen
The first thing I can remember is the face of an angel, the real-world variety, with an expression of satisfaction that usually follows a night's satiation.
I quickly returned her smile, sat up to kiss her… and immediately felt a thunderous headache that shattered my focus. I quickly blacked out, not conscious even long enough to sense my surroundings.
All I could remember was the face of the angel.
I awoke again much later-at least I thought it was much later, since the room seemed to have been brighter upon my first awakening.
Careful so as not to repeat the outcome of my first endeavor, I allowed my eyes to get accustomed to the ambient light. I slowly scanned as much of my surroundings as I could without moving my head and jarring my obviously bruised brains. I still felt a certain throbbing tenderness in my skull. Ever so slowly, I turned my head to the side.
The woman I first took for an angel was still in the room. She was turned away, her curvaceous figure backlit by an alcoved lantern. She cast a decidedly human shadow on the opposite wall. I could not make out her face. Saving my strength, I waited for her to turn around.
After a few moments, my patience was rewarded.
As she pivoted toward me, I closed my eyes for a bit more than a wink, to give the impression I was only now coming around.
She noticed my optical flutterings. Her footsteps were soft as she crossed the room to come to my side.
"Easy now," she purred. "No sudden moves. We don't want a repeat of your last episode, now do we?"
With more careful maneuvering, I turned my head to face her. I opened my eyes to behold the face of the angel that filled my memory. Our eyes made contact, and a smile came to her lips.
The fog that filled my head began to dissipate, and the scene around me came into focus.
I was lying on a makeshift cot in some storeroom. The angel of loveliness who had first inspired thoughts of ecstasy, passion, and compassion also became clearer. Far from the angelic vision of my dreams, she had the ragged look of a gutter snipe. This is not to say she was hard on the eyes, mind you, only that she was of the common sort one usually found along the docks of Waterdeep.
Waterdeep! I must have been mugged in some Dock Ward alley. Well, that explained how I'd gotten here, and the abuse my cranium endured.
She smiled again, and whispered, "Good. You're coming around. I was afraid you were going to pass out again."
The tone of her voice had not changed, and what I had taken for the sensuous purring of an amorous angel was probably just the modulated tones of a careful nurse. Perhaps, too, she was reluctant to announce our presence to passersby, predators, or watches.
I slowly turned to the side, raised my head up with the support of elbow, arm, and hand, and hazarded a question. "I'm in Waterdeep, right?"
"You are correct," she answered tentatively, as if expecting another question hot on its heels.
"Good," I replied with false bravado. "It's always good to know where you finally wind up. It's almost as important as your own name."
Even now, I cannot be sure whether the tension that crossing my nurse's face was real or imagined. At the time, I was too distracted to pay attention. Only then did I realize I hadn't the foggiest notion in all Toril what my name was, or for that matter, what my past was.
I panicked and lurched forward. I wanted to escape this storeroom and seek a clue to my identity. The nurse tried to press me back to the cot. I quickly dodged her grip and got to my feet…
And promptly passed out again for all my hasty efforts.
Sounds from outside the storeroom soon brought me around. Numerous dockworkers were none too quietly heading to their jobs. My nurse was once again present, slightly the worse for wear, as if she had just finished a hard night's work. This time, she was accompanied by a burly fellow for whom the term gentleman would have been wishful thinking.
I also noticed a few measures taken to facilitate my rehabilitation. A cool compress was on my forehead, and my arms and legs were tied down, evidently to keep me from further damaging myself; at least I hoped so.
"I've learned my lesson," I said groggily. "No sudden moves for me. Now will someone please tell me who I am?"
My de facto nurse looked at her male companion as if seeking approval, and then back to me before saying, in the innocent tone of the truly naive or the extremely deceitful, "Excuse me?"
I blinked. She couldn't be lying. Even though I didn't know my name, I knew I had a knack for judging a person's character. I decided to change my tack.
"You can untie me," I assured her. "I have no desire to do myself or anyone else any harm. I just want to know what's going on."
She looked at me, and then at him.
He nodded. She started to untie me.
The proximity of her body tempted me with its earthy aroma: I was already well on the mend. Perhaps the preceding hours of unconsciousness had done me good.
Her burly companion stepped within bashing distance, should I try anything. She helped me into a sitting position.
"Thanks," I said absently, then added, " I hope I haven't been too much trouble, Miss…?"
"Scheiron," she replied. "Nymara Scheiron, but you can call me 'Kitten.'"
"I shall," I answered, and turned my attention to her companion. "And the same goes for you, my good man."
The fellow looked at me, then at Kitten, harrumphed, turned, and left me alone with my nurse. The sounds of his weighty footsteps echoed long after his hulking bulk had already left the room.
"Quite the conversationalist, isn't he?" I gibed.
Kitten's face became quite serious.
"I wouldn't talk that way about someone who had just saved my life," she scolded. "If he hadn't fished you out of the harbor, you would have been brigand bait for sure."
"The harbor?" I queried.
"That's right," she insisted. "He brought you back here himself, undressed you, and nursed you back to health, only leaving long enough to tend important business. Even then, he left me to watch over you."
He was my nurse. He rescued me, tended my wounds, undressed me…
I quickly snatched the blanket that had previously covered me and fixed it in place.
Kitten giggled. She stood up, saying, "Nothing that I haven't seen before, so don't trouble yourself."
Looking down, I realized my cover was unnecessary since I still wore pantaloons. I joined her laugh.
"Did I have a purse when he brought me in?"
"No," she replied, "and Lothar would surely have returned it to you if you had."
I slowly tried to stand, but was quickly discouraged by a forceful yet delicate hand that pressed me back to the cot.
''Later," she cooed. "You need your strength."
I r
eached out to bring her closer to me, but she quickly dodged my grasp.
"I guess you are feeling better," she replied.
"Where am I?"
"You were right with your first guess," she answered. "Waterdeep, the Dock Ward, Lothar's crib."
"And you are Kitten, Lothar's-"
"Friend," she interrupted, "and sometime business associate."
"Business?"
"There's plenty of time for that later."
For Kitten, later was a response to many things.
"How do you feel?" she asked, not quite as tenderly as before.
"Better," I replied. "No worse than if I had been dragged from Undermountain to Skullport by the hair of my head."
She smiled again.
I ran my hand over the top of my noggin, to make sure I wasn't bald, and said, "I just can't remember who I am, where I'm from, or what I'm doing here."
"What you are doing here is easy," Kitten replied. "You're getting your strength back. Perhaps you hit your head and fell overboard from one of the ships in the harbor. A blow like that can cause memory loss."
"So I've heard," I replied, and quickly realized something. "Funny that," I observed, "I didn't lose all of my memory."
"How so?" she queried, her expression again turning serious.
"I can't remember my name, but I recognized I was probably in the Waterdeep Dock Ward. I also knew about memory loss from a blow to the head, and all sorts of other stuff."
"What's the farthest back you can remember?"
"Waking up," I answered, quickly adding, "and seeing your angelic face."
She smiled.
I shrugged. "Well, it's a start."
A rapid thumping against the floorboards signaled that Lothar was once again approaching. He quickly shooed Kitten away and offered me a draught of something. I began to protest, but given my weakened condition, thought better of it, and accepted what I hoped was medicine.
A gentle drowsiness quickly seized me, and I was once again out like a light.
I awakened from my slumbers to the none-too-gentle prodding of Kitten, who seemed to have decided I no longer deserved coddling. She was right. The pain in my skull had disappeared, and my strength had indeed returned. I felt well rested and refreshed, and if it weren't for the fact that I still could not recall a single thing about my past, I might have been tempted to pronounce myself fit as a fiddle.
"Do you remember who you are yet?" she inquired.
"No," I replied, rubbing the sleep from my eyes, and thankful that the throbbing didn't return.
"Too bad," she answered flippantly. "I guess you'll just have to make do with what you know."
"Did Lothar tell you anything more? Maybe he knows something."
Kitten laughed heartily. Gone was the girlish giggle of my convalescence. "No such luck," she replied, "and just so you know, Lothar doesn't say anything. He can't."
"He's mute?"
"You might say that. Years back, his tongue was cut out after a particularly ugly argument with a particularly ugly brute."
'Too bad."
Kitten shrugged. "He doesn't seem to mind," she commented. "He can read and write and make his opinions known when he wants to."
"I'm sure."
"It's just an obstacle that needed to be overcome, sort of like losing one's memory."
I couldn't be sure if she intended her comment to be taken as encouragement or a malicious taunt. The only thing I really knew was that I desperately wanted to know who I was.
The formerly soft and sensitive Kitten grew impatient. 'Well," she said, tapping the toe of her soft-soled boot against the floor, "are you ready to get on with your life?"
I was perplexed. "What do you mean 'get on with my life'?"
"You seem well enough," she observed, setting her carefully manicured fingertip against her delicately tapered jaw. "I thought you might be in need of some employment, gainful or otherwise, unless of course you just planned on setting up housekeeping here with Lothar."
"What did you have in mind?" "I have this friend who is exceptionally good at judging the measure of a man. I'm sure he can size you up and situate you in an appropriate position." "What about my identity?"
"Suit yourself," Kitten replied with a shrug. "Personally, I always considered it more important to secure food, shelter, and whatnot before indulging in 'finding myself… but if you have some plan…"
This Dock Ward vixen was right. A question still nagged me, though.
"What sort of work can I do? If I don't know who I am, how can I know my abilities?"
"Don't you worry your damaged little head," she instructed condescendingly. "It's obvious you know a lot more than you realize. You're probably exceptionally good at a lot of things." She started toward the door.
"Just leave it up to Murph."
"Murph?" I asked, hot on her heels. "Who's Murph?" "Let's just say he's a broker of talents," she replied, hastening her step. "Hurry! He doesn't like to be kept waiting."
The door to my entire universe led to a hallway, which in turn opened on an alley. I'd been in a recently abandoned warehouse.
I was surprised how quickly my eyes adjusted to the broad daylight, until I realized our fast-paced journey through byways and back alleys of the Dock Ward was confined to shadowy areas. Like her surefooted namesake, Kitten scurried from patch of gray to patch of gray until I felt we'd walked for miles; we were probably only a few blocks from our original location. Whether she had an affinity for shade or some desire to evade pursuit, Kitten led me on a circuitous tour of the least splendid sights in the City of Splendors. We finally arrived at a boarded-up facade that had once been a tavern.
Kitten looked right and left, gave three firm stomps to the establishment's coal chute cover, lifted it back, and gestured for me to follow her as she slid inside. She whispered the singularly unsentimental admonishment, 'Try not to hit your head. It seems to have sustained more than enough damage for one lifetime."
Pausing a moment to imprint my surroundings on the tabula rasa of my memory, I followed the chimerical Kitten down the chute and through a pair of blackout curtains. I landed on a stack of burlap. Before me sat a one-eyed poster boy for 'lard is good for you' and a band of unsavory brigands with fists the size of traveling kegs.
In the few moments I required to study my surroundings, Kitten took her place on the tub of lard's lap.
"You must be Murph," I ventured with as much false bravado as I could muster.
The tub of lard turned to Kitten and said, "It talks to us?"
"It appears to have forgotten its manners, Murph," Kitten offered, "as well as a few other things."
Murph nodded in acknowledgment. "Ah, so you said. So you said."
I decided to bide my time in silence, having no desire to further offend my amply protected host. I felt Murph's watery eyes sizing me up.
"It knows nothing of its past?" my host inquired.
"No, Murph," Kitten answered, shifting herself off his lap and onto the arm of the exceptionally strong armchair that supported them.
"And it needs our powers of observation," Murph murmured aloud, "… and perhaps a situation."
"Yes, Murph," the feline female replied, steel in her voice.
"It should come closer," the tub of lard instructed.
Before I could regain my feet, a brigand on each side of me grabbed the ends of the bag that had been my settee and tossed me and it closer to my host. I landed hard, in his dale-sized shadow. I could smell the stale sweat of his seldom-washed corpulence. Murph leaned forward and gestured with his fingers to the left and right. I was jostled from side to side by his flunkies so that he might observe some of my finer details.
"It has a tattoo on its left hand," Murph rambled, "perhaps a slave mark, or the mark of a thief. The hands are strong, yet uncallused. The knuckles have been bruised more than a few times. Both earlobes remain intact; no substantial gut from a sedentary life. Not much intelligence either. Looks just less than average
."
I had almost reached my limit of tolerance when Murph leaned back, sighed, and belched. "It no longer amuses us," he said dismissively. "Get rid of it!"
I tried to make eye contact with Kitten, but was immediately distracted by the breeze of a bashing blow that just missed my cranium. My shoulder was not so lucky. Without thinking, I rolled with the blow, turning as I tumbled until I regained my footing and a defensible posture, my back to the cellar wall.
The brigands hesitated just long enough for me to get my bearings. A quick look above failed to reveal the curtained chute, and the merry band would not give me time to find it. Turning my head once again forward, I spied my host, reclining as if awaiting the commencement of some boring gladiatorial combat. The chimerical Kitten was still at his side, the deadpan expression on her face failing to hide the fear and concern in her eyes.
Allowing myself a moment of self-satisfaction (realizing it might be my last), I thought silently-You dog, you! You've won her heart already. Too bad you won't have time to get better acquainted.
A quick blink and my concentration returned, and I faced the onslaught.
The brigands came at me one at a time, which didn't make much sense if they wanted to kill me. The first had a mace, the second a garrote, the third a dagger, and the fourth a short sword. In each case, I eluded my attacker with relative ease, surprising myself at my own agility and expertise. Having dispatched the fourth with the hilt of his own short sword, I seized the initiative.
I threw myself at the one I assumed would be the fifth. The heel of one hand smashed his forehead while the fingertips of the other extricated two carefully concealed throwing stars from the inner folds of his tunic. I propelled myself to the side and forward so that I was now situated on the lap of my host, deadly star poised against his jugular vein.
Before I could issue an ultimatum, the tub of lard hailed, "Enough!"
The brigands withdrew to the shadows.
Holding the star still in deadly place, I observed their retreat, and also noticed the tip of a dagger an inch from my own jugular. Its hilt was held steadfast by my own kittenish guide.
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