It was obvious that he was thinking on his feet. “Call in the magistrates and all of the city guard,” he said, speaking as much to himself as to anyone else. “We will show them stakes. Now is the time for us to stand strong and resolute, the time to rally the city around us and force the high captains to acquiesce to the greater good.” He paused and looked directly at Drizzt, showing the drow his strength before squarely laying down the gauntlet.
“Or they will lose their standing,” he said. “We will dissolve the ship of any who will not swear fealty to the office of governor.”
“To you, you mean,” said Regis.
“No, to the office and to the city. They are bigger than any man who occupies the seat.”
“A bold statement,” said Drizzt. “Lose their standing?”
“They had their chance to show their value to Luskan throughout the long winter night,” Deudermont steadfastly replied. “Other than Suljack, to a one, they failed.”
The meeting adjourned on that grim note.
“’E’s on our side, what?” one of the soldiers formerly of Ship Suljack who had just signed on with Deudermont asked his companion when they exited the palace to join the fighting, only to spot Drizzt Do’Urden at work on a couple of Baram’s ruffians.
“Aye, and that’s why meself’s noddin’ yes to Deudermont,” said the other.
The first nodded back as they watched the drow in action. One of Baram’s boys took an awkward swing, apparently trying to cut the drow’s legs out from under him, but Drizzt nimbly jumped, snapping a kick in the man’s face as he came over.
The second thug came in hard with a straight thrust from the side, but the drow’s scimitars beat him to the mark. One blade crossed to easily drive the thug’s sword out wide, the other stabbed straight out, driving right against the man’s throat. Drizzt then swept his free blade back across in time to loop it over the other ruffian’s blade as it came up from its low position. A twist and flick of the drow’s wrist had that one flying free and the suddenly unarmed ruffian, like his friend who stood immobilized with a sharp tip against his throat, was caught.
“The fight is done for you,” Drizzt announced to the pair, and neither was in a position to disagree.
The two men rushed down the alley to join the drow, skidding to an abrupt stop as Drizzt turned a wary eye on them.
“We’re with Deudermont!” they yelled together.
“Just signed up,” one clarified.
“These two are fairly caught,” Drizzt explained, and turned to his prisoners. “I will have your words of honor that you are out of the fight, or I will spill your lifeblood here and now.”
Baram’s boys looked at each other helplessly, then offered undying oaths as Drizzt prodded with his blades.
“Take them to the eastern wing of the first floor,” Drizzt instructed the new Deudermont recruits. “No harm is to come to them.”
“But they’re with Baram!” one protested.
“Was them what killed Suljack!” said the other.
Drizzt silenced them with an even stare. “They’re caught. Their fight is ended. And when this foolishness is done, they will again become a part of Luskan, a city that has seen far too much death.”
“Oh yes, yes, Mister Regis, sir,” a voice interrupted, and all five at Drizzt’s encounter glanced to see Regis entering the far end of the alleyway. A pair of thugs—Taerl’s boys—trailed him stupidly, their eyes locked on a particularly fascinating ruby that Regis spun at the end of a chain.
“No more fightin’ for me,” said the other hypnotized fool.
Regis walked right by Drizzt and the others, offering a profound sigh at the inanity of it all.
“We win by preserving the heart and soul of Luskan,” Drizzt explained to the thoroughly confused new recruits. “Not by killing everyone who’s not now with our cause.” Drizzt nodded to the still-armed ruffian to drop his blade, and when he didn’t immediately respond, the drow prodded him again in the throat. His blade fell to the cobblestones. With his scimitars, Drizzt then guided the pair to the new recruits. “Take them to the eastern wing.”
“Prisoners,” one of the new recruits said, nodding.
“Aye,” said the other, and they started off, the captured thugs before them and following the same line as Regis and his two captives.
Despite the enormity of the calamity around them—the streets around Deudermont’s new palace were thick with fighting, as both Baram and Taerl, at least, had come against the governor fully—Drizzt couldn’t help but chuckle, particularly at Regis and his effective tactics.
That grin was blown away a few moments later, however, when Drizzt ran to the far end of the alleyway, arriving just in time to see the less subtle Robillard engulf an entire building in a massive fireball. Screams emanated from inside the burning structure and one man leaped out of a second story window, his clothing fully aflame.
Despite his and Deudermont’s hopes to keep the battle as bloodless as possible, Drizzt understood that before the fight was over, many more Luskar would lie dead.
The drow rubbed his weary eyes and blew a long and resigned sigh. Not for the first time and not for the last, he wished he could rewind time to when he and Regis had first arrived in the city, before Deudermont and Lord Brambleberry had begun their fateful journey.
CHAPTER 31
THE PROVERBIAL STRAW
D eudermont, Robillard, Drizzt, Regis, and the others gathered in the governor’s war room shared a profound sense of dread from the look on Waillan Micanty’s face as he entered the room.
“Waterdhavian flotilla came in,” the man said.
“And…?” Deudermont prompted.
“One boat,” Micanty replied.
“One?” Robillard growled.
“Battered, and with her crew half dead,” Micanty reported. “All that’s left of the flotilla. Some turned back, most are floating empty or have been sent to the bottom.”
He paused, but no one in the room had the strength to ask a question or offer a response, or even, it seemed, to draw breath.
“Was lacedons, they said,” Micanty went on. “Sea ghouls. Scores of ’em. And something bigger and stronger, burning ships with fire that came up from the deep.”
“Those ships were supposed to be guarded!” Robillard fumed.
“Aye, and so they were,” Waillan Micanty replied, “but not from below. Hundreds of men dead and most all of the supplies lost to the waves.”
Deudermont slipped into his chair, and it seemed to Drizzt that if he had not, he might have just fallen over.
“The folk of Luskan won’t like this,” Regis remarked.
“The supplies were our bartering card,” Deudermont agreed.
“Perhaps we can use the sea ghouls as a new, common enemy,” Regis offered. “Tell the high captains that we have to join together to win back the shipping lanes.”
Robillard scoffed loudly.
“It’s something!” the halfling protested.
“It’s everything, perhaps,” Deudermont agreed, to Regis’s surprise most of all.
“We have to stop this warring,” the governor went on, addressing Robillard most of all. “Declare a truce and sail side-by-side against these monstrosities. We can sail all the way to Waterdeep and fill our holds with—”
“You’ve lost your mind,” Robillard interrupted. “You think the four high captains will join an expedition that will only secure your power?”
“For their own good as well,” the governor argued. “To save Luskan.”
“Luskan is already dead,” said Robillard.
Drizzt wanted to argue with the wizard, but found no words to suffice.
“Send word to the high captains for parlay,” Deudermont ordered. “They will see the wisdom in this.”
“They will not!” Robillard insisted.
“We have to try!” Deudermont shouted back and the wizard scoffed again and turned away.
Regis sent a concerned look Drizzt’s
way, but the drow had little comfort to offer him. They both had spent the previous day battling in the streets around Suljack’s palace, and both knew that Luskan teetered on the brink of disaster, if indeed she wasn’t already there. The only mitigating factor seemed to be the wealth of supplies streaming up from Waterdeep, and if most of those were not to arrive….
“We have to try,” Deudermont said again, his tone and timbre more quiet, even, and controlled.
But there was no mistaking the desperation and fear embedded in that voice.
Baram and Taerl wouldn’t come to him personally, but sent a single emissary to deliver their message. Kurth and Kensidan didn’t even answer his request for a parlay.
Deudermont tried to put a good face on the rejection, but whenever he thought that Robillard or Drizzt weren’t looking his way, he sighed.
“Twenty-seven?” Robillard asked in a mocking tone. “A whole day of fighting, a dozen men dead or near it on our side, and all we’ve got to show for our work are twenty-seven prisoners, and not a one of them pledging to our cause?”
“But all agreeing that they’re out of the fight, so if we win…” Drizzt started to reply.
Robillard cut him off with a smirk and said, “If?”
Drizzt cleared his throat and glanced at Deudermont, then went on, “When we win, these men will join with us. Luskan need not be burned to the ground. Of that much, I’m sure.”
“That isn’t much, Drizzt,” Robillard said, and the drow could only shrug, having little evidence to prove the wizard wrong. They had held Suljack’s palace that first day, but the enemy seemed all around them, and several of the adjoining streets were fully under the control of Baram and Taerl. They had indeed lost at least twelve fighters, and who knew how many more had been killed out in the streets near the palace?
Deudermont couldn’t win a war of attrition. He didn’t have thousands behind him, unlike when he’d gone against Arklem Greeth. The supplies might have renewed that faith in him, but the main source had been destroyed at sea and nothing else had arrived.
Regis entered the war room then to announce the arrival of Baram and Taerl’s ambassador. Deudermont sprang out of his seat and rushed past the other two, urging Regis along to the audience chamber.
The man, a scruffy-looking sea dog with a hairline that had receded to the back of his scalp, wild gray strands hanging all about him, waited for them, picking his nose as Deudermont entered the room.
“Don’t waste me time,” he said, flicking something off to the floor and staring at Deudermont the way a big dog might look upon a cornered rodent—hardly the usual look Captain Deudermont of Sea Sprite was used to seeing from such a bilge rat.
“Baram and Taerl should have come and saved you the trouble then,” Deudermont replied, taking a seat before the man. “They had my word that no harm would befall them.”
The man snickered. “Same word ye gived to Suljack, not a doubt.”
“You believe I was involved in the death of Suljack?” Deudermont asked.
The man shrugged as if it hardly mattered. “Baram and Taerl ain’t no fools, like Suljack,” he said. “They’d be needing more than yer word to believe the likes of Captain Deudermont.”
“They project their own sense of honor upon me, it would seem. I’m a man of my word,” he paused and motioned for the man to properly introduce himself.
“Me own name ain’t important, and I ain’t for tellin’ it to the likes o’ yerself.”
Behind Deudermont, Robillard laughed and offered, “I can discover it for you, Cap—Governor.”
“Bah, no one’d tell ye!” the ambassador said with a growl.
“Oh, you would tell me, and do not doubt it,” the wizard replied. “Perhaps I would even etch it on your gravestone, if we bothered to get you a gravesto—”
“So much for yer word, eh Captain?” the sea dog said with a broken-toothed grin, just as Deudermont held up his hand to silence the troublesome Robillard.
“Baram and Taerl sent you here to hear my offer,” said Deudermont. “Tell them…”
The filthy ambassador started laughing and shaking his head. “Nothing they want to hear,” he interrupted. “They sent me here with theiroffer. Their only offer.” He stared at Deudermont intensely. “Captain, get on yer Sea Sprite and sail away. We’re givin’ ye that, and it’s more than ye deserve, ye fool. But be knowing that we’re givin’ ye it on yer word that ye’ll not e’er again sink any ship what’s carrying the colors o’ Luskan,”
Deudermont’s eyes widened then narrowed dangerously.
“That’s yer deal,” the sea dog said.
“I’m going to burn this city to rubble,” Robillard growled under his breath, but then he shook his head and added, “Take the offer, Captain. To the Nine Hells with Luskan.”
Beside Robillard, Drizzt and Regis exchanged concerned glances, and both of them were thinking the same thing, that maybe it was time for Deudermont to admit that he could not succeed in the City of Sails, as he’d hoped. They had been out on the streets the previous day, after all, and had seen the scale of the opposition.
For a long while, the room lay silent. Deudermont put his chin in his hand and seemed deep in thought. He didn’t look back to his three friends, nor did he pay any heed at all to the ambassador, who stood tapping his foot impatiently.
Finally, the governor of Luskan sat up straight. “Baram and Taerl err,” he said.
“Only deal ye’re gettin’,” said the pirate.
“Go and tell your bosses that Luskan will not go to the Nine Hells, but that they surely shall,” said Deudermont. “The people of Luskan have entrusted me to lead them to a better place, and to that place we will go.”
“And where might all these people be?” the pirate asked with dripping sarcasm. “Might they be shooting arrows at ye’re boys even as we’re talkin’?”
“Be gone to your masters,” said Deudermont. “And know that if I see your ugly face again, I will surely kill you.”
The threat, delivered so calmly, seemed to unsettle the man, and he staggered backward a few steps, then turned and rushed from the room.
“Secure a route from here to the wharves,” Deudermont instructed his friends. “If we’re forced into retreat, it will be to Sea Sprite.”
“We could just walk there, openly,” said Robillard, and he pointed at the door through which the ambassador had just exited.
“If we leave, it will be a temporary departure,” Deudermont promised. “And woe to any ship we see flying Luskan’s colors. And woe to the high captains when we return, Waterdhavian lords at our side.”
“The reports from the street are unequivocal,” Kensidan announced. “This is it. There will be no pause. Deudermont wins or he loses this day.”
“He loses,” came the voice from the shadows. “There is no relief on the way from Waterdeep.”
“I don’t underestimate that one, or his powerful friends,” said the Crow.
“Don’t underestimate his powerful enemies,” the voice replied. “Kurth succeeded in defeating the flotilla, though no ships from Luskan got near to it.”
That turned Kensidan away from the window, to peer at the globe of darkness.
“Kurth has an ally,” the voice explained. “One Deudermont believes destroyed. One who does not draw breath, save to find his voice for powerful magical dweomers.”
The Crow considered the cryptic clues for a moment then his eyes widened and he seemed as near to panic as anyone had ever seen him. “Greeth,” he mumbled.
“Arklem Greeth himself,” said the voice. “Seeking revenge on Deudermont.”
The Crow began to stalk the room, eyes darting all around.
“Arklem Greeth will not challenge you,” the voice in the darkness promised. “His days of ruling Luskan are at an end. He accepted this before Deudermont moved on the Hosttower.”
“But he aligns with Kurth. Whatever your assurances regarding the archmage arcane, you cannot make the same with rega
rd to Kurth!”
“The lich will not go against us, whatever High Captain Kurth might ask of him,” the unseen speaker said with confidence.
“You cannot know that!”
A soft chuckle came from the darkness, one that ended any further debate on the subject, and one that sent a shiver coursing Kensidan’s spine, a reminder of who it was he was dealing with, of who he had trusted—trusted! — throughout his entire ordeal.
“Move decisively,” the voice prompted. “You are correct in your assessment that this day determines Luskan’s future. There is nothing but the angled wall of a corner behind you now.”
CHAPTER 32
THE ONE I WOULD KILL
W e should be on the shore with the captain!” one woman cried.
“Aye, we can’t be letting him fight that mob alone!” said another of Sea Sprite’s increasingly impatient and upset crew. “Half the city’s come against him.”
“We were told to guard Sea Sprite,” Waillan Micanty shouted above them all. “Captain Deudermont put no ‘unless’ in our orders! He said stay with Sea Sprite and keep her safe, and that’s what we’re to do—all of us!”
“While he gets himself killed?”
“He’s got Robillard with him, and Drizzt Do’Urden,” Waillan argued back, and the mention of those two names did seem to have a calming effect on the crew. “He’ll get to us if he needs to get to us—and what a sorry bunch of sailors we’d be to lose the ship and his one chance at escaping!
“Now, to your stations, one and all,” he ordered. “Turn your eyes to the sea and the many pirates moored just outside the harbor.”
“They all fought with us,” a crewman remarked.
“Aye, against Arklem Greeth,” said Waillan. “And most of those coming against Captain Deudermont now marched with him to the Hosttower. The game’s changed, so be on your guard.”
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