Realms of Mystery a-6

by Elaine Cunningham

  The dockyard was my home turf and she knew I could take care of myself. I arrived at the meeting an hour early so as to have the advantage. I was about half an hour too late.

  I realized this only when I felt the initial blow of a firm cudgel on the crest of my cranium. My adversaries had already laid claim to the advantage by arriving even earlier.

  I came to a while later, lying on some cold and damp cellar floor, my wrists and ankles bound, Blondel and a nondescript gentleman standing over me.

  “He’s coming around,” the unknown figure announced.

  “It’s about time,” the creature that had become Blonde! answered. “Though I guess we really couldn’t have asked for a more cooperative opponent, walking right into our clutches and all. I probably would have let you go on living if’ you hadn’t posed a threat to our other associate.”

  “The one posing as Nymara Scheiron,” I replied.

  “Exactly. Your queries were getting in the way of her fulfilling her part of our mission, and our master was growing quite impatient. We never really feared that you would uncover the full extent of our plot since you had obviously chosen to settle the matters at hand before carrying out your patron’s wishes. Such arrogance and rage can only get in the way, and for what? A slim chance to avenge the death of a friend? A person of your abilities should have known better. But then again, if memory serves, experiences are the best teachers, and you seem to have forgotten most of yours. At this point I would like to add that it was quite refreshing to read such an uncluttered mind as yours.”

  “I’m glad I could accommodate you,” I replied cockily. “Little did I realize that I would have to avenge the deaths of two dear friends.”

  “Blondel’s crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” the thing that was passing for Blonde! explained. “Your Kitten on the other hand was very necessary for our plot. The new Kitten should be on her way here now. Too bad you won’t be around to meet her.”

  “Why didn’t you just kill me and get it over with?” I asked. “It would have saved you the trouble of tying me up and all.”

  “True,” it replied, “but unfortunately my nondescript colleague whose appearance was dictated by an equally unlucky nobody applied his cudgel to your skull a little too quickly. I hadn’t yet had the chance to leaf through the pages of your mind to make sure that you hadn’t informed your unknown patron of our little meeting, and unfortunately such reading of thoughts is more difficult when the subject is out cold.”

  The thing that had become Blondel looked in my eyes. I sensed hunger in her thoughts.

  “You have so many questions inside of your head,” it said with a sigh. “I’m afraid I can’t answer any of them for you. It’s a shame, going to your death without ever knowing your own identity, your past, or even your own name.”

  “You could at least tell me the reason Kitten and Blondel had to die.”

  “Beyond the simple reason that we had to take their places?” it replied, and shrugged. “Too bad you can’t read minds. Oh well, I can’t see the harm in it, and besides, Kitten should be here soon. We probably should wait for her.”

  The thing leaned in close to me, and purred in the manner Blondel used to when she wanted to get me hot and bothered. The knowledge that this wasn’t the member of the gentler sex with whom I had shared a few passing evenings did little to quell my response to her seductive tones.

  “Our master has engineered a new plan to reassert his influence in the fair city of Waterdeep. He has recognized the necessity of controlling the, how should I say, ‘word about town’ in order to carry out his plan. The Inn of the Hanging Lantern was brought down quite inadvertently by a busybody hack writer and a know-nothing publisher. Our job was to replace the publisher with one of our own so that such a turn of events wouldn’t happen again.”

  I laughed sardonically at the black humor of it all.

  “All of this for one lousy publisher who would probably have been open to a bribe anyway,” I said in ironic resignation.

  “Indeed,” it replied, “but the master didn’t want to take that chance. Bribes don’t usually instill loyalty, and most publishers seem to relish the idea of renegotiation even after a deal and price have been set provided that the matters at hand seem to be in their favor. It was to be the first cautious step in his great new plan… but I am afraid that we can’t wait any longer. Kitten or no Kitten.”

  It withdrew a poisoned black blade dagger from it’s bodice and began to place it beneath my chin, ready to insinuate its deadly edge into the fleshy part of my neck.

  “Good-bye, man without a past. Give my best to your Blondel. She should be happy to see you, if I recall correctly,” it purred.

  The poisoned tip of the deadly dagger had furthered its insinuation into my flesh and was about to penetrate and seal my fate when the sound of the whistle of flying steel breezed through the cellar.

  The thing that had become Blonde! slumped to the side, quite dead, the poisoned blade barely missing my throat with nary a nick, as her associate also crumpled to the floor.

  A familiar face stepped out of the shadows pausing momentarily to retrieve her blades from their well aimed destinations deep in the dopplegangers’ backs before turning her attention to me.

  “Now that wasn’t too hard,” the familiar voice of Kitten exclaimed. “There’s a whining tub of lard in the other room. He’s in a large sack labeled ‘bad actor for shanghai’, but I don’t think he’ll mind if I tend to you first.”

  My oldest friend explained the matters at hand as she undid my bonds.

  “Sorry that you had to be kept in the dark about all of this,” she said, “but it was the will of the Lords. When the doppleganger tried to remove me and take my place, it woefully underestimated me.”

  “A common mistake…“ I interjected.

  Out of the corner of my eye I discerned a movement from the direction of the supposedly dead doppleganger accomplice of Blondel, and with my recently freed hand extracted a throwing knife from one of my secret harnesses and let it fly in the direction of the noise, hitting home in the forehead of the now really dead doppleganger. It seems Kitten’s dagger had lost most of its killing power when its mortal flight had been interrupted by some well placed chainmail.

  “…and common mistakes do have a way of continuing to crop up,” I added.

  “Point well taken,” Kitten conceded.

  “I immediately sent word to Khelben Arunsun, who alerted the Lords. It was they who concocted this plot to uncover this latest conspiracy of the Unseen. We needed to know who the others were and what they were doing. Given their exceptional mental powers, the Lords knew I would never be able to pass myself off as one of them. We therefore needed a reason that I would cease interacting with the others in the plot, namely that I was being followed by one of the Lord’s men.”

  “Me,” I offered, mentally making a note that my current patron was one of the Lords, confirming a suspicion that I had been harboring of all of my so-called benefactors, “the perfect blank slate.”

  “Exactly,” she replied. “Your well intentioned quest for vengeance-yes, the Lords knew what you intended to do-made you the perfect judas goat to draw them out while providing me with the perfect cover.”

  “I was the bait, and you were the trap.”

  “Exactly.”

  With her help I stood up and rubbed the circulation back into my wrists and hands. “Blondel is still dead.”

  “I’m afraid so,” Kitten replied, a supportive hand placed on my shoulder, “but her killers are now dead also.”

  “All to protect a stupid publisher whom the Lords have had numerous problems with.”

  “Indeed, Justin Tyme is no friend of the Lords,” Kitten answered apologetically, “but we didn’t know that he was their target at the time. And we could rule out the usual suspects like Khelben, Danilo Thann, Myrt the Moneylender, and others. If we had known, maybe things would have been different. Maybe we would have tak
en a different tact.”

  I secretly made a second note of her use of the word “we.”

  “Blondel would still be dead. Some things don’t change.”

  Kitten looked down at the toes of her boots as if to avert my stare.

  “It’s a small consolation, but the Lords’ plan worked as well as it needed to. A new Unseen plan nipped in the bud.” Kitten raised her head, and looked me in the eye. “Let’s get out of here. It’s time for you to claim your payment for services rendered. But first we should free the hapless actor… unless of course you think we could fetch a good price for him on the seagoing market.”

  “Not likely,” I replied, still distracted by the new revelations at hand. I quickly regained my wits and, not wishing to alert my feminine benefactor to my realization, I added, “It wouldn’t be worth the effort.”

  It took bare minutes to free the terrified Pisspot from the very large sack that imprisoned him and an interminable few minutes more to get him to stop groveling.

  We quickly gained the streets of Waterdeep at which point the rotund thespian sped off in search of a bar where he would no doubt soon be bragging about his latest adventure. Kitten and I set off to claim a new piece of the puzzle that was my past, the taste of unnecessary death still fresh in my mind as well as new suspicions about whom I could really trust.

  Darkly, Through A Glass of Ale

  Peter Archer

  The sun sank into a golden haze of clouds and darkness rolled gently from the east over the port of Tharkar on the borders of Ulgarth and the Free Cities of Parsanic. At the gates that breached a thick wall dividing the two states, guards yawned sleepily in the evening heat. Steam rose from the softly waving fronds that bordered the Free Cities, northernmost kingdom of the Utter East. On the Ulgarthan side, a horse-drawn cart kicked up a thick cloud of dust that obscured both driver and passenger. The guards bestirred themselves and raised hands.

  “Who seeks entry into the Free City of Tharkar?” inquired one in a bored tone, as he grounded his halberd by his side.

  The driver of the cart coughed and shook his head, clearing the dust from his eyes and throat. “I am Necht of the Free City of Whitevale. This,” he said, gesturing to his companion, “is Avarilous, a merchant of Ulgarth, with goods to sell.”

  “What nature of goods?” The guard yawned.

  “Fifty kegs of ale for the Tavern of the Tall Tankard,” said the driver.

  The guard, coming more awake than he had been all day, stepped back a pace and whistled loudly. From the long evening shadows of the gate behind him emerged the chief guard, a rotund fellow barely contained in his stretching chainmail. The chief glanced at his fellows and chuckled, turning his attention to the passenger.

  “Well, Avarilous of Ulgarth, as you’re doubtless aware, none pass into Tharkar without paying tax.”

  “Tax?” The merchant stared angrily at the guard. The driver put a hand on his companion’s shoulder and whispered urgently, but Avarilous shrugged him off. “There’s no entry tax. I paid for an import permit and for a scroll of sales submission. They cost me enough.”

  The fat guard stepped a pace nearer. Sweat streamed down his face, dripping onto the rolls of flesh that surrounded his neck. From the corner of his mouth came a tiny dribble of dark juice; he had been chewing kalava leaves, a mild narcotic that, while technically illegal, were nonetheless widely available in the Free Cities. He rested a hand casually on his sword.

  “This is a new tax,” he grunted. “A special tax on Ulgarthan slime-dogs. It comes to exactly two kegs of ale. And since you’re so anxious to pay it”-he glanced back at the other guards and grinned-”you can get down from there and unload the kegs yourself.”

  Avarilous stared at the dirty faces of the gate watch and snorted contemptuously. The driver descended into the roadway and smiled ingratiatingly at the guard. “You’ll forgive my employer, sir,” he said. “He’s new to the Five Kingdoms, and our ways.”

  Without moving his eyes from Avarilous, the guard brought his fist around in a smashing blow that knocked the driver on his back five feet away. Blood spilled from his lips and ran down his chin. The guard smiled at Avarilous, showing all his teeth. “Well, slime-dog?”

  The merchant hesitated and glanced at the driver, who sat up in the white dust of the road, wiping his mouth. A subtle signal seemed to pass between the two men. Avarilous climbed from his seat and, going around the wagon, unhitched the back flap. He quickly rolled out two of the barrels, setting them upright on the ground, and refastened the wooden flap. He began to walk back to the front of the wagon, but the guard hadn’t finished his game.

  “Just a minute,” he growled. “Let’s see if you’re paying this tax in good coin. Leethron, get a spout to tap this keg.”

  One of the other watchmen disappeared into a narrow recess in the wall, then reemerged a moment later with a tap and mallet. Swiftly, with the air of one well accustomed to such duty, he tapped the keg and, taking a dirty tin cup from one of the other guardsmen, filled it full of the frothy ale and passed it to his chief.

  The head of the watch took a long draught, then looked at the merchant and smiled soapily.

  “Pig’s piss. That’s what this is. But what do you expect from the hogs of Ulgarth? They’ve nothing to do all day but brew foul-smelling rot-gut like this.” He chuckled. “Here, merchant, you try some of this swill.”

  He held the glass toward Avarilous, but as the latter reached for it, the captain suddenly upended it and poured the ale onto the ground while his other hand, holding a blade, came up to Avarilous’s throat. “Well, merchant, go on. Drink up.”

  Avarilous gave him a disbelieving look and stared at the muddy spot on the ground. The driver, who had regained his feet, started forward with a cry, choked off as one of the other guards clamped a hand round his throat. Another, coming up behind the merchant, gave the back of his knees a violent kick, knocking him to all fours. The captain thrust his foot on the smaller man’s neck, pushing his head down. “Drink, Ulgarthan pig!”

  There was a roar of laughter from the rest of the watch. Avarilous twisted away and came to his feet, mud splashed around his mouth, streaking his cheeks. With as much dignity as he could muster he remounted his wagon and sat still, waiting for his driver. The man from Whitevale hastily climbed into his place and shook the reins. They drove down the winding street and out of sight. The guards laughed scornfully, then the captain thrust his glass at his lieutenant. “Here, lad. I’m off for the evening. Where did that fool say he was going?”

  “The Tall Tankard?”

  “Aye. Well, maybe I’ll seek him out there and make him pay another tax.”

  Avarilous and his companion proceeded through the streets of Tharkar in silence for some moments. Silent groups of heavily armed men glared suspiciously at the wagon from arched doorways. Avarilous took no notice of them; he was well aware of the tense stalemate that existed between the Five Kingdoms, whose rulers jealously guarded their most powerful magical items. The bloodforges allowed them to conjure armies to defend against attacks from fiends and from each other. In the Utter East, temporary, armed truce was the status quo.

  The oncoming evening was hot, and steam rose from the horses’ flanks. After passing a few streets, the merchant cleared his throat. “How is your mouth, Necht?”

  The driver shrugged and touched the blood crusted on his lip. “Could be worse.” He turned to Avarilous. “But you really must be more careful, sir. This isn’t Ulgarth, and our ways aren’t yours. The gate watch almost always steals from goods wagons, especially those from Ulgarth.”

  The merchant nodded humbly. “I see. I’ll try to do better in future.”

  He sank into a thoughtful silence, broken by Necht asking him, “Just what are you selling, sir?” Avarilous glanced at him, surprised. Necht, looking resolutely ahead, continued, “Mind, it’s really none of my business, but if you’re planning to get me into any more fights, I think I should know what’s going on.” He tur
ned from the road and looked his employer full in the face. “So what’s really in the barrels?”

  Avarilous gave him a look of astonishing blandness. “Why, ale, of course. Just what we told those louts at the gate.”

  Necht shrugged and shook the reins again. “Whatever you say, sir. Ale’s as good a story as anything else.”

  There was a moment of silence between the two men. Avarilous glanced sideways at his companion, then cleared his throat. “Just in case something does happen, though, I’d much appreciate a pair of eyes at my back.” He stared hard at Necht, who grinned back cheerfully.

  Necht swung his wagon into the courtyard of the Tavern of the Tall Tankard and leaped easily from his seat. The merchant descended more slowly, as befitted his greater age and weight. In the dark beneath the stars, his eyes glittered. From the open door of the tavern came light, music, and a blast of beery air. A figure emerged, observed the wagon, and approached Avarilous.

  “Ahoy, good sir. Have you goods for my master?”

  “Aye, boy, fetch him and some stout fellows to unload these casks.”

  In a few moments, the landlord came out of the door, a fat, oily man with the air of being constructed of badly pressed butter. Behind him were four helpers who, without a word, set to removing the barrels from the wagon and carrying them through a small side door into the tavern while the landlord directed their work. When they were done and his helpers had gathered behind him, he turned to Avarilous.

  “Now, sir, how much for the kegs, then?”

  Avarilous and Necht had watched the proceedings without saying a word or moving a muscle. Now the merchant spoke in a soft voice. “As you well know, Daltrice, the amount we agreed upon was five crowns per barrel. Forty-eight barrels makes two hundred and forty crowns.”

  Daltrice shook his head, smiling and rubbing his greasy hands. “Now, sir, you are mistaken!” the landlord exclaimed. “Why, I was right here all the time, and I’ll swear by Umberlee I counted only thirty-eight barrels carried into my establishment. I believe that brings your total to, let me see, one hundred and ninety crowns.”