City of the Dead

by Rosemary Jones

  Sophraea giggled and shook her head. “No, a sprig of evergreen, usually, or one of the herbs that grant long life.”

  “And do all the carvings have a message?”

  “Most do. But the meanings change with the generations. That’s why we keep the ledger, so we remember why a family asked for a particular decoration and who carved it. And you should avoid tombs like that.” She pointed out a grave marker that was set flush into the ground. Above it, a cage of iron was mounted, with the bars sinking into the earth.

  “Why?”

  “It’s a dead safe,” explained Sophraea. “Judicious came up with the design. It keeps the restless ones from leaving their graves and roaming through the City.”

  “Do corpses walk much around here?” Gustin glanced over his shoulder. They were the only ones on the path, surrounded completely by monuments.

  “Not as much as they used to. But a particularly unquiet grave sometimes needs something extra like that. Most of the dead safes aren’t within these walls, but out at the other graveyards.”

  As they walked on, the pathways became more overgrown. While not derelict, the tombs were obviously smaller and less visibly kept up than the more important public monuments in the southern part of the City of the Dead.

  When Sophraea made a turn to the left, she told Gustin, “This should cut through to the place where I first saw the light.”

  When Gustin questioned Sophraea about her sense of direction, she realized that he didn’t know about the family talent.

  “All the Carvers can just do that,” she finally said, “those of us born into the family always know where we are in the City of the Dead. Some of the aunts and sister-in-laws seem to have the talent rub off on them too. Perhaps it comes from working here all the time.”

  “But you don’t work in the family business. You’re a dressmaker or will be soon.”

  “Odd, isn’t it? Maybe it is because I was born a Carver. Anyway, we just can’t get lost inside the City of the Dead,” she told him.

  Skirting around a large and rather foreboding marble tomb, the roof overhung with grim gargoyles carved from dark red granite, they came upon a memorial statue of a woman in full armor, weeping into her hands. Sophraea stared into the little basin of clear water at the statue’s feet. An old memory stirred. “I know this place,” she said.

  The long-legged wizard twisted around. “I swear that bush over there moved,” he said.

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “No, it moved, it changed position.”

  “What?”

  Gustin cocked his head to one side. “Interesting. See, it was all bunched up there. Now it’s longer, with a pointy bit at the very end over there. Sophraea?”

  “Hmm?” She knew, in that strange way that she’d always known exactly where she was in the City of the Dead, that they were too far south of the place where she had first seen the light. That was more north and west of their present location, near that small tomb where she first met Lord Adarbrent. “Brick and mortar,” said Sophraea out loud, fixing the location in her mind. “With a bronze door.”

  “Sophraea,” Gustin sounded much more insistent. “Do you see shapes in bushes?”

  “What are you talking about?

  “Shapes in bushes, like you see shapes in clouds?”

  “I don’t know. Sometimes you see faces in the shrubbery here, shadows of things that have gone. Ignore it.”

  “No, I mean that bush really looks like a tail, a big long twitching tail and that bit … that round big bit … that looks like a hind leg ending in a large clawed foot.”

  Sophraea glanced over her shoulder at the dark green hedge surrounding a round memorial, a simple pillar polished and carved to look like a storm-blasted tree. The hedge obscured the carving, but Sophraea pushed aside the leaves to look at details, she could see the stone cut in the shape of bark and broken branches protruding from the trunk.

  “This is really old, probably one of Fidelity’s, for somebody famous, I just don’t remember the name,” she said to Gustin, circling the hedge to find an opening. When she came to an open place, she crossed the winter-browned lawn to examine the stone tree more closely. A druid, she thought, the family used to carve tombstones like this for druids but there weren’t many inside the graveyard walls.

  “Sophraea, I think the bush is moving again,” said Gustin.

  “It’s just a hedge, they used to plant hedges like this around certain gravesites, mostly to keep people from getting too close,” said Sophraea, moving closer to take a better look. Moss covered a metal plaque set halfway up the trunk of the stone tree.

  “I swear that bit looks like a snout, a dragon’s snout,” said Gustin.

  “Where?”

  “That bit hanging over your head.”

  Sophraea looked up. The wizard was right. The long leafy branches overhanging her head looked amazingly like a long nose. Whiffs of mist clung to the branches, giving the impression of smoke curling up from a dragon’s nostrils. Smooth, curved thorns resembled fangs. The longer she stared, the more teeth seemed to appear, rather as if a large mouth was opening wide above her head.

  “Sophraea!” Gustin yelled. The wizard rushed forward, only to be swatted aside by the twiggy spikes of the creature’s tail.

  Sophraea leaped away from the hedge as the giant jaw snapped closed above her. As she stumbled backward, a leafy paw sprang out and caught the edge of her cloak. She tripped and fell. The shrubbery pounced on her like a large cat on a very small mouse.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Sophraea squirmed under the leafy paw holding her effortlessly down. The pressure was firm on her back but not painful. She pushed her hands into the muddy ground and shoved back. Twigs and branches curled around her, flipping her over effortlessly.

  Sophraea blinked at the long and definitely draconic face looming above her. “Let me up!” she commanded.

  The creature curled up its long neck and twisted its head to one side. Large and leafy ears waggled back and forth. Sophraea found herself staring into a bright red berry eye.

  “Go on,” she said in as firm a voice as possible when sprawled on the ground and pinned down by a bush. “Get off me!” The eye blinked but the paw did not shift and she was held fast by the creature. “Please!” The nostrils twitched and the head dropped. Long slender vines sprouting on either side of its mouth tickled under her chin.

  “Oh, how perfectly ridiculous,” said Sophraea, recognizing this gesture as something similar to the way that the baker’s dog begged to have its ears scratched.

  “You’re a very nice bush, a good shrub,” she said. “Now, get off of me!”

  The creature rustled its leaves in a pleased manner but kept Sophraea pinned to the ground.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Sophraea saw Gustin stalking forward. Something burned between the loosely closed fingers of his hand. His eyes were blazing emeralds under his long black lashes.

  “Don’t set it on fire!” Sophraea yelled. She hated to think of this beautiful if inconvenient creature being destroyed.

  “This should just sting a little,” Gustin said, neatly leaping over another sweep of the long spiky tail. “But cover your face.”

  “No!” cried Sophraea.

  “Stop!” the shout reverberated through the clearing. “Leave the guardian alone.”

  “Not if it keeps holding her,” responded Gustin, lifting his arm to throw his spell.

  “Stop! At once!” A tiny green-skinned man sprang forward, stabbing at Gustin’s knee with a long thorn that he wielded like a sword. Although he only came up to the wizard’s waist, this diminutive fighter obviously had no fear of the bigger man. He lunged again, attempting to stab Gustin.

  The wizard yelled and jumped to one side, narrowly avoiding a skewered knee. Sophraea swatted her basket at the nose of the creature holding her down. “Bad bush!” she scolded, no longer willing to coax it. Gustin was under attack and needed her help.

  The leaf
y head swung up. Sophraea’s basket missed it and flew through the air to hit the little man in the back.

  “Ouch!” he cried, tumbling to the ground. He dropped his sword, which Gustin scooped up and held high above the little man’s head.

  “By the vine and twisted bramble, I hate big people!” cried the small but ferocious warrior, kicking out at Gustin’s ankles.

  “Let her go!” Gustin dodged this way and that, trying to fend off the little man while Sophraea yelled encouragement from where she was trapped.

  “Only if you promise not to hurt the guardian,” huffed the little man.

  “Absolutely. Certainly. Just let her go.”

  The little man whistled three notes in a descending trill, more like a birdsong than any language, and the leafy paw lifted from Sophraea.

  With a sigh of relief, the girl scrambled up, grabbing her basket and shaking the worst of the mud off her skirt. Around her, she could feel that heavy silence that meant somebody or more likely several souls were listening hard. The usual almost unnoticeable whispers were gone.

  “Give him back his sword,” she gestured at Gustin. “Quickly.” Out of the corner of her eye, Sophraea noted that the stone hand of the warrior woman had shifted slightly, so she was no longer weeping but peeping at the small group assembled before her.

  “I beg your pardon? And have this mite hamstring me?”

  “I am a guardian of the tomb,” declared the little man.

  “You heard him, they are guardians.” She turned to the small warrior. Now that she wasn’t lying under a bush, she could see that he was clothed from head to toe in dark green leaves, overlapping each other in the same manner as a warrior might wear armor. Brambles curled around his wrists and waist as further protection. With his green skin and dark brown hair, he blended perfectly into the shrubbery around them.

  “I apologize, I should have known better than to go so close to that monument. Have you been guarding it long?” Sophraea asked.

  “You’re a Carver, aren’t you?” The little man retrieved his thorn sword from Gustin. He made quite a flourish as he sheathed it by his side. “One of Fidelity’s?”

  “Great-granddaughter.”

  “Really. Fidelity was the last one that I spoke to, but that has been more than a few seasons. So Fidelity’s great-granddaughter? A short one like you. Who’d have thought it?” The little man pointed a thumb at Gustin. “And who’s the long shanks? He’s too skinny to be a Carver and your line never ran to magic.”

  “I’ve either been insulted or complimented,” observed Gustin.

  “His name is Gustin Bone. And yours?” asked Sophraea, ignoring the wizard.

  “Briarsting.”

  Sophraea walked up to the leafy creature that had retreated to curl around the monument. “It’s a topiary dragon,” she told Gustin, gently stroking the quivering long branches that served as the creature’s whiskers. “I thought these were all destroyed long ago.”

  “This one is the last,” admitted Briarsting. “We used be a full Honor Garden, a complete thirteen of petals, thorns, and topiary beasts. But now there’s just this old boy and myself.”

  “Do you know what he is talking about?” Gustin asked Sophraea.

  “Some tombs, important ones, have guardians. This one must have been very special, a memorial garden filled with more than just the usual shrubbery.”

  “She was a great hero,” said Briarsting, looking at the stone tree that once marked the center of the Honor Garden. “And died in the defense of Waterdeep. But she was a druid too, and it was thought a living memorial was more fitting than an ordinary tomb. So we came, and the elves set such magic here as to give us both a task and good living.”

  “I’m sorry that we disturbed you,” said Sophraea. “I didn’t think that there was a topiary beast left in the City of the Dead.”

  The little man seemed mollified and even inclined to chat. “We don’t have any visitors these days,” he said. “Just the odd person wandering by and looking for something else.”

  “Have you seen any wizards here lately?” Sophraea was almost certain that the lights that she’d seen in the City of the Dead were signs of magic, although she couldn’t imagine why a wizard would want to venture into the graveyard after dark. The dead tended to punish those who cast spells near their graves. And the Blackstaff took an even dimmer view of unauthorized magic in a place so prone to peril.

  “Haven’t seen any wizards where they shouldn’t be. Other than him.” The thorn pointed rather rudely at Gustin, who made a face back at the little man.

  Sophraea settled herself comfortably on a memorial bench set near the topiary dragon. She rummaged through her basket, pulling out a little of the dried fruits to share with both Briarsting and Gustin. “I’ve been seeing a light in the City of the Dead, usually in the middle of the night. Perhaps it’s the dragon or another guardian.”

  “It’s not us,” Briarsting said. “He doesn’t glow in the dark and I don’t light fires near him. Too many dry leaves this time of year.” The dragon sat back on its haunches and waggled its ears as if it knew they were talking about it.

  “How about ghosts?” asked Gustin.

  “They don’t usually glow that brightly,” started Sophraea only to be interrupted by Briarsting.

  “It might be one of the more substantial dead,” said the thorn. “Two tombs were opened recently. The remains were removed to other parts of the graveyard. And the dead can take offense at such actions. Especially if the removal is being done by amateurs.”

  “Amateurs?” Sophraea asked. “If a family requests a removal, it’s usually us or one of the other funerary families.”

  “Why would anyone move coffins and urns?” asked Gustin, pinching a little more of the dried fruits and nuts out of Sophraea’s basket.

  “To make room,” said Sophraea, with the certainty of one raised in the funeral business. “The old tombs are all full. Sometimes, when a new family member dies, somebody has to be … well … shifted to another location.”

  “First come, first removed. Last come, last interred,” joked Gustin.

  “It’s not something that is done lightly!” Sophraea said. “You wouldn’t believe the arguments that some families get into about who should go and who should stay. And if the dead decide to get involved in the decision, then it can be a real quarrel.”

  “The dead do that?” Gustin paused, a handful of fruit halfway to his mouth, and looked over his shoulder at the seemingly peaceful tombs.

  “Sometimes, the dead want to travel,” Briarsting informed him. “Sometimes they don’t. But I don’t think it was anything like that. With those kinds of removals, the difficult kinds, you get Carvers, for one thing, supervising the opening and the closing. And I didn’t see any of your lot around.”

  “No, we haven’t done anything like that for ages,” Sophraea began.

  “Didn’t a Carver open up something in the south end last spring?” asked Briarsting.

  “Leaplow,” sighed Sophraea. “That was not official. And that’s been all properly sealed since.” Then she remembered the fat Rampage Stunk. “There’s a client now who’d like a couple of tombs opened, but nobody has started any work yet.”

  “Didn’t think I’d seen your lot around here. Where there’s Carvers, there’s always a nice funeral afterward, with the new resident being laid to rest and all, everything done just right,” concluded the thorn, snatching the last of the fruit out of the basket before Gustin could get to it.

  Sophraea resigned herself to stopping at the fruit seller’s place on the way home.

  “Still, there have been workmen nearby,” Briarsting said, settling back on the bench. “Amateurs. Clearing out a tomb, like I said.”

  “Which tombs were opened?” Sophraea asked.

  “Markarl and Vesham.”

  “Those certainly are Carver-built tombs. Old ones too. Both are down in the ledger. A bit north and east of our gate,” Sophraea said. “That would be
close to where I saw that light the first time.”

  “They’re working there right now,” said Briarsting.

  “Then we should go take a look,” Sophraea said to Gustin. “I don’t understand why Father or one of my uncles hasn’t reported this to the Watch. They know it’s not safe to trespass here. There’re laws for a reason. And only Carvers should work on Carver tombs.”

  The bronze door on the Markarl tomb was locked tight but the Vesham tomb stood wide open.

  Two burly men wrestled a marble urn through the door with grunts and some groans. The piece was heavy and the wide curling handles had to be angled precisely to fit through the door.

  “Smash it into pieces,” grumbled one man. “That would make it easier to clean out!”

  Sophraea started forward to stop such vandalism, but the topiary dragon caught her skirt on its thorny teeth and dragged her behind the evergreen hedge that marked the boundary of the plot nearest to Mairgrave.

  “What are you doing?” she scolded the bushy beast.

  “Shh,” said Briarsting, laying one green finger against his lips. “It’s the City Watch.”

  Gustin, who was almost bent double to hide behind the low hedge, added, “The little man says that the Watch has been coming by on regular patrols and they know all about those tombs being open.”

  “Well, they can’t approve of this,” Sophraea stated firmly. She popped up to peer over the branches at a trio of sturdy men in armor rounding the corner. Two were tall and rather young, but the third was an older man with a huge salt-and-pepper mustache clearly visible beneath his helmet. She waited for outcries and the scuffle that usually occurred when thieves clashed with Waterdeep’s defenders.

  Instead, to her surprise, one of the men hauling on the urn simply said, “Oh, you’re back. Give us a hand then. It’s heavy.”

  “Shift it yourself,” replied the mustached Watchman with a frown. “We’re not here to help you. We’re only here to make sure that you do not take more than you are allowed. And that you take proper care of what you remove.”

  “Like we want an enormous stone vase full of old ashes.” With another grunt and shove, the workmen finally freed the urn from where it was caught in the doorframe. They staggered onto the path and set it down with a thump.