by Mel Odom
“How well do you know this young man?” Closl asked.
“Well enough that you are asking me questions about him, Senior Civilar Closl. If you didn’t trust my answers, you should not have asked.”
Closl laid an apologetic hand over his heart and bowed his head. “Forgive me, Dame Qhyst, for I meant no offense. Of course you are right.”
“If I can be of any further help, please let me know.” She turned and nearly ran over the man standing suddenly and quietly in the doorway. “Oh, excuse me, Lord Piergeiron! I didn’t know you were there!” She backed away hurriedly and curtsied very low.
Closl straightened his own stance, coming instantly to attention.
“My fault, dame,” the Commander of the Watch of Waterdeep said. “I should have spoken up. Please continue on your way and know that no ill favor on my part has been garnered.”
The woman curtsied again, excusing herself, and disappeared into the house.
Piergeiron Paladinson strode into the garden, looking striking in his watch armor and colors. He was tall and graceful, much as his father had been. He gazed about the garden, then looked at his senior civilar. “This is a right and proper muddle of affairs.”
“Yes sir,” Closl responded, feeling like the whole arrangement had suddenly gotten many times worse than he thought it was going to be if Piergeiron himself was going to get involved in the murder investigation.
“Do we have any ideas about who did this?”
“Someone quite capable in the field of spell-casting, or someone armed with a magical weapon of some force.”
Piergeiron shook his head. “I knew that from the moment I found out it was Golsway who was killed. I knew that man as one of my teachers, as hard a taskmaster as a man would ever want to meet.”
“There’s not much else, sir,” Closl said. “Golsway didn’t have much in the way of friends.”
“There was always Keraqt,” the warden said. “Though I never knew what Golsway liked about the old pirate.”
“Sir, Keraqt was the other victim.”
Piergeiron looked surprised. “Well, rest his soul in peace then. If not friends, what of enemies?”
“Someone who could do this?”
“You’ll be working from a short list, then.”
Closl knew he wasn’t being let off the hook. “The people you’re suggesting, sir, well, we’ll be trampling on some blue blood toes to get the answers we’re looking for.”
“I know, and you’ll ask those questions on my order. If there are any who give you trouble, tell them I’ll free up my schedule to question them myself. I will have the answers for this.” Piergeiron looked out over the city. “Waterdeep stays with constant rumors and outright lies crossing her from one end to the other every day. I’ll not have this help feed the grist for that if I can help it.”
Closl said nothing, but he knew even the answers they found would only create more half-truths in their wake. “Yes sir. If I may, I’d like to suggest another route in this investigation.”
Piergeiron looked at his senior civilar.
“Baylee Arnvold,” Closl said. “I would send a watch team to find him.”
“Would you know where to look? He’s been gone from this city for months.”
“I think I might. Baylee is a ranger. I’ve a nephew who is a ranger. Young Varin has regaled us from time to time with tales of forgatherings. Festivals of a sort where rangers meet to discuss their trade and sharpen their skills. In a few days hence, the Glass Eye Concourse, one of the biggest of such meetings, is going to be held. It’s possible that Baylee will be there, or at least someone who knows him.”
“You want to send a watch team from Waterdeep there?”
“With your permission.”
Piergeiron stroked his chin as he considered the option. After a moment, he nodded. “Make it so, senior civilar. Whatever aid you need from me, consider it done.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“And let me know what your people turn up.”
“Of course. You’ll be the next man to know after me.” Closl watched as the lord walked away, deep in thought. The watch senior civilar sighed heavily, looking back at the house. He knew what Piergeiron’s deepest fear was even though the noble had not spoke of it: that Golsway’s death really was part of one of the many plots that began every day in Waterdeep instead of a separate act.
The senior civilar shook his head, imagining the power that had run rampant inside the house. And as skilled as the murderer or murderers were, he feared for any man that tried to take them in for the crime.
7
Krystarn Fellhammer stared angrily into the darkness that stretched ahead of her. The underground passage twisted and turned and fell away down into the earth. The smell of decay filled the thick air around her. She kept her morning star in her fist. The battle with Fannt Golsway had left her more drained than she would have liked to admit.
She peered down over the crest of the hill she stepped out onto. She thought she knew where she was, but the chain of caverns was huge. If she was at the location she thought, she had more than an hour’s walk ahead of her. The teleport spell on the gem she’d been given had not worked as completely as she’d been told it would, or Shallowsoul had deliberately lied to her about where she would return in the subterranean lairs.
Having been raised in Menzoberranzan for the first forty-three years of her life, where a dozen acts of treachery could be committed before morningfeast—sometimes within her own family—being lied to came as no surprise. It only meant that even with the recent turn of events she hadn’t maneuvered herself into the bargaining position she’d planned to with Shallowsoul.
The complete lack of light in the caverns didn’t bother her either. The lights back at Golsway’s home had hurt her eyes. Drow vision was capable of seeing the heat of a living body, or even the subtle changes in temperature from rock to wall to rodent. She navigated the path through the broken rock with ease. Mice and rats scurried before her, finally packing together enough that they dared try to rush her and bring her down.
She read their predatory thoughts easily, then twisted the silver band on her left ring finger and said the activation phrase. The spell filled her and she directed it at the gathering of rats.
The wall of telekinetic force slammed into the vermin, knocking their bodies back against the cavern wall. The ones that weren’t killed outright died when they struck the wall in a series of meaty smacks. Twisted, broken corpses littered the rocks and uneven terrain.
Krystarn smiled to herself. Every death viewed, even the small ones, were worth watching. She would remember Fannt Golsway’s passing for a long time with joy. Her only regret was that there had been no time to savor it before being yanked out of the house, no time for the torture that could have been the prelude.
All around her were the dead of Myth Drannor. Some of them had been buried by the cataclysmic forces that had brought the City of Songs down so many years ago. Others had been hauled underground by the remnants of the Army of Darkness that had overwhelmed Myth Drannor. Gnolls and hook horrors and other flesh-eaters had joined up in the forces that had ripped the city to shreds.
Not many knew of the wide-spread system of pocket caverns that existed under the grounds where Myth Drannor and other cities had been. The ones that did know of the subterranean areas were not aware of the connecting tunnels that were often times disguised by corrupted and diseased bits of the mythal that had been laid to protect the city. The left-over magic forces these days were fickle things, choosing when and how to work, and often on whom.
She continued walking for a time, content in the darkness and the old death in a way that she hadn’t been settled in the Underdark. She preferred the solitude, even though it lessened the number of potential victims. Each victim she did choose, however, she was able to devote all of her energies to, Lloth willing.
A cacophony of chittering and squeaking and sometimes challenging growls kept her company as
she passed through narrow valleys that had been riven in the land, and through the remnants of dungeons and houses that had fallen in the battle. The only things she feared in the subterranean world beneath the corpse of Myth Drannor were the Phaerimm, the Sharn, and the baatezu. Only those stood a true chance against the magic forces she controlled. And those she knew how to avoid.
She walked into a large cavern that she identified immediately. Turning, she reached into the bag of holding at her waist and took out a pair of climbing claws that would cling to the rock better than her hands would. She put another set on, strapping them on over her boots.
Lean and limber, she scaled the side of the cavern with ease. Her piwafwi caused her to blend in with the shadows even as she moved. From a distance, she knew she would only be detected as an occasional ripple of movement, if at all.
At the top of the wall she put her climbing gear away and located the trail she’d been looking for. The path was scarcely two feet wide. She had to turn sideways to ease through the rift splitting solid rock. Sixty feet further on, the rift widened into another cavern.
She knew Shallowsoul couldn’t have been hoping to get her lost. In the four years she’d been down in the caverns with Shallowsoul, she’d explored much of the surrounding territory. She knew her way around the areas here. So she wondered what Shallowsoul’s intentions might have been. Second-guessing someone skilled in treachery was second nature to the drow, but Shallowsoul’s psychology added in the mercurial element of madness and paranoia. It was frustrating that one who had so much of what she wanted also came so powerful.
Voices below her caught Krystarn’s attention.
She froze in the opening and listened. They were still too far away for her to hear properly. Taking up her hand crossbow in her free hand, she crept to the ridge in front of her. The tip of the quarrel in the pistol was coated with poison, guaranteeing no human-sized survivors.
From the coloring of the ruby glow in front of her, the drow knew that someone had a fire going below. She peered over the edge.
A group of hobgoblins sat around a cookfire. Krystarn did a quick accounting, finding there were more than forty of them in all. Nearly half of those were male warriors. The rest were divided almost equally between females and children. She shifted, getting ready to creep even closer till she could hear them.
“You’re still doing his bidding, aren’t you?” a voice said at her side.
Krystarn leaped to her feet, the morning star and the hand crossbow at the ready. Her eyes narrowed when she spotted the figure in front of her. “Shouldn’t you be off rattling chains and haunting your crypt like a good little ghost?” she asked sarcastically.
The being drew himself up to his full height. Obviously of elven blood, he wore raiment fit for a king. He looked far too pale to be healthy, even for a Moon Elf. “You know very well I am no ghost,” he declared haughtily. “I am a baelnorn, sworn and loyal protector of my family’s wealth and power.”
“An annoyance by any other name.”
The baelnorn pursed his lips, the pride suffusing him coloring even his undead face. “You know that I have no respect for you, drow. Your kind were never welcome in fair Myth Drannor, even when the city opened its arms to the humans and dwarves.”
“Then allow me to pass in peace, ghost. I know that you won’t offer me any harm as long as I don’t try to unlock your family’s crypts or the secrets they left hidden behind when they fled before the Army of Darkness. And I have no intention of trying. I have found the treasure I seek.”
“Yes,” the baelnorn agreed, “and you scurry around Folgrim Shallowsoul’s feet like a sniveling lapdog. And you call yourself a warrior of the drow race. Hah!”
Anger threaded through Krystarn. If not for her training to prefer treachery and duplicity over face-to-face confrontation, she would have struck the baelnorn with her morning star. “You talk brave words, ghost. Is this your true form, or do you taunt me from a projection of yourself?”
“I should tell you?” The baelnorn grinned and shook his head. “Better that I should wear at you like the conscience that you do not possess.”
“Do not wear too heavily, ghost. If you try my patience too hard, it may be that I find it necessary to track you down to your lair and destroy you.” Krystarn gave the baelnorn a harsh look. “Or maybe you’ve lived so long down here that you no longer remember that it is possible to die a true death?”
“I would never fear a drow.” The baelnorn curled his lip at the thought.
“That is your choice, foul creature,” Krystarn said. “But in the year and a half that I have known of you, I find it interesting that you have never given me your name. Perhaps this is because I will find out who you are, and where you hide.”
“Finding me would only bring you your death, heartless wench.”
“I would find death, true, but that would only send me on my way to the Spider Queen. If you were to die, where would you go? You’ve already turned down the elven afterlife as your people see it.”
The baelnorn remained silent.
“And what of the precious treasures of the house you yet guard?” Krystarn taunted. “I have seen you fret and worry because of the wights and skeletons that roam these tunnels who might discover your secrets. Can you imagine the hands of a drow going through those treasures?”
A pained look flashed through the baelnorn’s eyes.
“I also promise you this, ghost,” Krystarn said, stepping closer to the baelnorn and drawing her remaining magic energies into a tight weave around her, “that any of those treasures that I find lacking, I’ll scatter above the ground in the ruins of Myth Drannor for any wandering band of adventurers to find. Each located far enough apart to guarantee that they’ll be found by separate groups. Your house, should they ever realize that you have failed in your assigned task to keep their legacy intact for a time when they could return from Evermeet and safely claim it, would take lifetimes tracking them all down again. And it would be your fault.”
“You have no honor.”
“Honor,” the drow said, “is merely one of the weaknesses I do not have. Thank you. I had not expected a compliment from someone such as you so early this morning.”
“I will relish the day that Folgrim Shallowsoul turns on you, witch.” The baelnorn turned and walked into the solid wall of rock beside it, vanishing without a trace.
Krystarn cursed the baelnorn and turned back to watch the hobgoblins below. None of the creatures had heard the exchange between her and the elven crypt guardian. An idea formed as she looked at the hobgoblins. Servants within the confines of the subterranean world were lacking. Especially ones that Shallowsoul did not know of.
Marshaling her strength, she stood up, making herself visible to the hobgoblins fifty feet below.
The females and the children scattered, taking the bedrolls and supplies from the illumination of the cookfire. With her drow vision, Krystarn could still see them all clearly.
“Beware, drow!” a hobgoblin male challenged. The dark gray hair covering the exposed parts of its body bristled. Its blue nose wrinkled in distaste, pulling at a ragged wound along its right temple. The naked length of a short sword reflected firelight in its right hand, and a coiled whip shook loose in its left, black leather slithering across the rock. “This place is claimed by the Sumalich Tribe!”
Krystarn almost laughed at the petty arrogance of the hobgoblin. “Who are you to address me in such a threatening manner?”
The hobgoblin stretched to its full height of nearly seven feet, taking a deep breath to throw out its chest. “I am Chomack, Taker of Dragon’s Teeth, chief of the Sumalich!” Another hobgoblin male trotted over to stand beside him, holding the tribe’s standard, a hand holding a spear thrust through a skull on a field of red and jet. “Taker of Dragon’s Teeth?” Krystarn said in obvious disbelief. “Were the dragons then asleep when you took them? Or were they through with those teeth? Maybe these were truly old dragons who kept them in
a pot by their bed.”
Chomack howled in rage. He gestured to a pair of his warriors. They nocked arrows to bows and fired without hesitation.
The shafts sped true. Before they covered half the distance, though, Krystarn unleashed her magic. A double-forked lightning bolt licked out and burned the arrows from the air in a blaze of white fire. The bolt continued across the cavern till it struck the other side, then doubled around and came back.
Krystarn stood her ground. With her drow vision, she knew the breadth of the cavern and she’d chosen the effect the rebounding would have. She opened her hand as the lightning bolt traveled back toward her. The gale winds that accompanied the electric energy swept around her, stirring up dust devils that held glinting bits of rock.
The lightning bolt faded to nothing less than five paces from her open palm. The drow looked down at the hobgoblin tribe and appreciated the way they had thrown themselves down to the ground. Only Chomack and a handful of his more seasoned warriors remained standing.
“Sorceress,” several of the hobgoblins whispered. The children cried out in fear.
Krystarn stepped forward, over the edge of the sheer ridge, and stood on empty air looking down at the hobgoblin tribe. “Know me, Chomack, and fear me, for I hold your life in my hands!” She made a fist. Allowing herself to descend within the semi-circle of fearful hobgoblins, she touched down lightly in front of the tribal chieftain. “I am Krystarn Fellhammer of the House Ta’Lon’t, loyal servant of Lloth, the Spider Queen!”
A snarl rippled across Chomack’s face, exposing his yellow teeth. “Kill me if you can, sorceress. I call no one master!” The tribal chieftain leaped at the drow, slashing with his short sword.
Krystarn met his attack with a warrior’s skill. She parried the short sword with her morning star. Sparks flared as the weapons crashed together. Chomack dropped back into a crouch, then cracked his whip at her.
Metal glinted at the tip of the leather braid as it flashed at her face.