by Novak, Kate
Walinda, apparently oblivious to the foul air, was looking at the buildings that surrounded them. “Everything is leaning in toward us,” the priestess remarked.
Joel and Jedidiah surveyed the street. Indeed, everything did seem to tilt in their direction, as if they were in the bottom of a great bowl. Joel realized they were inside a torusthe ring they had seen from the Outlands. The city of Sigil curled up around them wherever they were, and the buildings that were built perpendicular to the inner surface of the torus would always look tilted unless the visitors were standing inside the buildings or very near to them. Joel looked straight up, hoping to see the part of the city that must hang above them, but the fog obscured the view in every direction.
The passersby, mostly cloaked and hooded against the chill of the air, completely ignored themexcept for one. A blue-skinned elf with pointed teeth, wearing a cloak with great padded shoulders, sidled up beside Joel. “Core, guv’nor. Yer orbing the scenery,” he said. “You clueless?”
Puzzled, Joel turned and addressed the elf. “Excuse me?”
“Wot, yer barmy?” the elf asked, tilting his head slightly. “I asked if you were clueless, cutter. Newly arrived to the Cage. Out-of-towner, by the fresh smell on you. Looking for a kip and a bit of a ride, I bet.”
The three adventurers exchanged questioning looks.
“Do either of you have magic to understand his tongue?” Walinda asked.
“I don’t think a spell would help,” Jedidiah grumbled. “This is the local dialect.” Passersby continued to ignore them, save for the elf. “Ah! Definitely clueless!” the elf exclaimed, rubbing his hands together. “Fortunately for you lot, I’m a most well-lanned tout and knight of the post in the Cage, which is the native name for Sigil, berk. Top-shelf, I am. Guaranteed to get you where you need to be for a bit of jink or a sparkle. I got maps to all the major portals, the passwords of the best kips, and a full listing of all the factions. Can’t tell the Dustmen from the Godsmen without one. I got a special today on holy relics. I got the toenails of Mordenkainen, the eye of Tiamat, the Hand of Bane, and the vorpal chiv of Arthur hisself”
Walinda laughed. “You have the Hand of Bane?” she asked, her tone implying she thought the possibility most improbable.
“Of course,” the elf replied, straightening with pride. “It’s what every sod in the Cage is hunting for. Got it right in here.” He patted a large pouch beneath his cloak. “Let’s move to a blind and we can negotiate.”
“You’ll be in the deadbook if you try that, berks!” a rasping, high-pitched voice cried out. A female dwarf barreled out of a doorway and plodded over to them. “He’s in the cross-trade, looking for conies.”
The elf wheeled on her. “Bar that! I’m their tout here, and I resent your implication.”
The dwarf snorted. “You’re just after their jink. Then you’ll give ‘em the laugh. Besides, everyone knows I have the Hand o’ Bane.”
Jedidiah raised his eyebrows and glanced at Walinda. The priestess sneered but made no comment.
“Shut yer bone-box!” the elf snapped. “I got the hand. You’ve got a piece of Vecna. At least that’s what you told the last bit of berks you turned stag on.”
“Here’s the dark of it,” the dwarf growled to the elf. “You’re on the peel, and peery peel at that. ‘I got the Hand of Bane; just step inta the alley’ indeed. They’d tumble to you in a dabus’s heartbeat.”
“Scan this, rube,” the elf snarled. ‘These are my conies, and I’m gonna keep ‘em. So sod off with that Hand of Bane bob and go to the mazes.”
Jedidiah took a step backward. The two natives failed to notice as they continued to argue in their nearly impenetrable native language. He set one hand on Joel’s shoulder and the other on Walinda’s. Priest and priestess looked back at the older man, who made a backward jerking motion with his head. Joel and Walinda stepped back from the disputing pair. Then all three stepped backward two more steps. Then, as one, the three spun about and stepped into the flow of the pedestrian traffic. Both elf and dwarf remained oblivious to the loss of their would-be customers.
“Where are we headed?” the priestess asked.
“For the moment, we’re just heading away,” Jedidiah replied. “Stay alert and don’t gawk. That’s probably what marked us as tourists.”
“Any other sage advice?” Walinda retorted sarcastically.
Jedidiah shook his head wearily. “I’ve never been here before, but an old friend once gave me some pointers. Number one is if a woman wearing cutlery on her head walks towards you, turn and run in the opposite direction.”
They walked on for about half a mile, keeping their eyes forward, until the surrounding neighborhood improved. The streets here were free of debris and paved with white granite. The buildings were larger and less tightly squeezed together. The shouts from pedestrians on the streets were less vulgar. The gray fog, however, was just as dense.
“What’s this ‘Hand o’ Bane’ look like?” Jedidiah asked Walinda, mimicking the speech of the dwarf.
Walinda’s eyes narrowed suspiciously, but after a moment’s thought, she said, “I will show you.” From inside her breastplate, she pulled out the page she’d stolen from the book in the Temple in the Sky. She unfolded the page and showed it to Joel and Jedidiah. Beneath some writing, in a language Joel could not read, there was a painting of a taloned hand.
“The hand is about twice the size of an average man’s hand,” Walinda explained. “It is carved from obsidian. The claws are fashioned from pieces of garnet.”
“Now that you know what it looks like, try the stone,” Jedidiah told Joel. “Look bored and indifferent, as if you’re measuring the town for a sewer survey or something.”
Joel pulled out the saurials’ half of the finder’s stone. Walinda stared curiously, realizing it was identical to the half her master held, but she said nothing.
Joel concentrated on the Hand of Bane, and a light beam immediately lanced from the gem off to their right and upward through the fog.
“It must be in a tower,” Walinda said.
“Not necessarily,” Joel replied. “The beacon could just be following the straightest line to another spot on the curve of the city.” He slid the stone back inside his tunic.
They couldn’t follow the beam directly, so they meandered along the streets, trying to maintain the same general direction. Often they had to turn in a different direction to avoid buildings or dead ends. Finally they paused before a huge statue of a three-eyed horse surrounded by armed guards.
“Better take another reading,” Jedidiah suggested. “We could have gotten turned about some.”
They were indeed off the correct heading by several degrees. The angle of the light beam had lowered considerablyan indication, Joel thought, that they were getting closer. They corrected their direction and walked on.
After they’d passed through what seemed like miles of meandering city streets, Joel drew out the finder’s stone again. Now the angle of the beam was not very steep at all.
“We’re in the neighborhood,” Joel whispered excitedly.
“We’re also being followed,” Walinda said calmly. “Oh?” Jedidiah replied with a tone of disinterest.
The tall, pale individual in heavy armor,” the priestess of Bane said. “Wearing a skullcap helmet and a thin little sword. He’s been with us for at least half a mile. To your right.”
Joel glanced to his right immediately. Jedidiah was more casual. The individual Walinda mentioned was talking to a fruit merchant, holding up a pear and examining it as if it were a diamond. His skin was as white as moonlight.
“At the next intersection, let’s turn left,” Jedidiah suggested. “We’ll see if we can lose him.”
Joel glanced back once they’d made the turn. The pale warrior was still following them. The adventurers increased their speed and turned left once more, then made a dash to the next corner and made yet another left turn.
Joel looked back. “We�
��ve lost him,” he said.
They had almost reached the street where they’d taken their last reading when the tall, pale man popped around the corner just in front of them. Joel and Walinda started. Even Jedidiah looked surprised by his sudden appearance.
“Excuse my imposition,” their stalker said. He was choosing his words slowly, as if he wasn’t speaking his native tongue. Besides being inhumanly pale, the man had cat’s eyes and unusually long, slender fingers. “Are you priests of Finder or Bane?” he asked.
Jedidiah sighed. He pointed to Joel and himself and said, “We’re priests of Finder.” Then he indicated Walinda. “She’s a priestess of Bane.”
The pale man in armor bowed low. “I was told to expect you,” he said. “And a fourth one, a dead one?”
“He couldn’t make it,” Joel answered before Walinda could muddy the issue concerning the lich.
“Very well,” the pale man answered. “I am Bors. You are to come with me, please.”
“Excuse me,” Joel said, “but why are we to come with you, please?” Bors smiled. “She wishes to see you,” he explained.
“She?” Joel asked.
“Come. She will explain all,” the pale man insisted. “Please.”
Joel glanced at his companions. Walinda looked suspicious; Jedidiah merely shrugged.
“Very well,” Joel said. “We will come with you, please. Lead us to her, whoever she is.” He fell in beside Bors. Jedidiah and Walinda followed.
“I don’t like this,” the priestess muttered.
“Neither do I,” Joel replied, “but if someone knows about us, I’d rather know who and why than not know.”
Their new guide led them into an area with wider streets and even larger buildings, surrounded by iron fences. There were no vendors in the streets, and the pedestrians and sedan chairs moved along in a more sedate fashion. It had all the signs of being the neighborhood of the wealthy and noble.
At the door to a modest house, at least compared to those that surrounded it, Bors halted. “She is here,” he said.
The three adventurers hesitated before the ornate doorway decorated with stone gargoyles and other monsters. Their guide motioned for them to enter.
“If this is a trick,” Walinda whispered, “and we are forced to flee and become separated, I will meet you near the big horse statue.”
Joel nodded.
The door swung open suddenly to reveal a familiar figure wearing a bright red robe.
“It’s about time you got here. It seems like I’ve been waiting forever,” Holly Harrowslough declared. She smiled at Joel and Jedidiah, ignoring Walinda. “Come on inside and I’ll fill you in.”
The interior of the parlor into which Holly led them was spartan and neat. The walls were painted a flat white. The mantel and stonework about the fireplace were of white marble. The carpeting was white wool.
The few pieces of furniture in the room were made of light-colored wood. The only splash of color in the room was a painting over the fireplace of a large red sphere, which seemed to hover in front of the wall.
At Holly’s invitation, they sat around a low table made of blond ash. Holly sat with them. Bors stood in the doorway.
“This is a Sensate safe house,” the paladin said. “Sensates dedicate their lives to living completely in the here and now,” she explained. “They’re always seeking new sensations, new experiences, new perspectives. They feel it gives them a greater grasp of the world around them. They use this place as a sort of a retreat, a place to cleanse their mental palate between forays into especially intense sensational experiences.”
“‘Especially intense sensational experiences,’ “Jedidiah repeated with a chuckle. “Is that a euphemism for a debauch?”
“No!” Holly protested. “Well … yes, sometimes,” she corrected herself. “The Sensates aren’t just a bunch of hedonists, though. They don’t believe in a cynical repetition of the same sensation. But they certainly wouldn’t say no to a debauch if they’d never tried one before.”
“A fitting place for a paladin of Lathander,” Walinda stated, “a god revered for his enthusiastic beginnings, but who never actually accomplishes anything.”
Holly’s eyes narrowed at Walinda’s words, but then she smiled. “You should try it sometime, Walinda,” the paladin suggested. “Exploring new sensations can be quite liberating. From what Jas told me about you, I suspect it might help you grow beyond your pathetic need to be abused and to abuse others in return.”
Walinda stared daggers at the girl. “You are a fool,” she replied.
“This is fascinating,” Jedidiah interrupted before the conversation grew any more hostile, “but you haven’t told us how you got here.”
“Well, when I arrived I encountered Bors. He’s a paladin from another world, but he’s made Sigil his home. He’s a Sensate. He brought me here. He and his friends have kept a lookout for your arrival.”
Joel was more than a little impressed. He had never doubted that Holly was a remarkable girl. Now she seemed even more so. She was vibrant and completely self-assured. Joel also knew her well enough to know that she was being evasive about something.
“But how did you get to Sigil?” the young bard asked. “And what happened to Jas?”
“Jas is fine,” Holly said. “I left her in good hands. I got here by a portal, one that brought me straight to Sigil. I can’t imagine why you had to go all the way through the Outlands. Bors says that Sigil is full of portals to other worlds.”
“The lich wanted to use Cat’s Gate,” Jedidiah said, “no doubt because it was large enough to accommodate the spelljammer.”
“So where’s the ship? And where’s the lich?” Holly asked.
“We lost the ship,” Jedidiah explained. “The lich is in the astral plane, searching for Bane’s body. He still has my half of the finder’s stone.”
“So you’re still looking for the Hand of Bane?” Holly asked.
Jedidiah nodded.
“You might have a little problem there,” Holly said. “I’m afraid that when I arrived, I was less than discreet in my initial inquiries. Several of Bors’s friends among the Sensates offered to help, since searching for an ancient artifact would be a new experience for them. They took to it a little too enthusiastically, though, and ended up creating a market for Hands of Bane. Now half the thieves of Sigil have at least one Hand of Bane in their inventory. Usually it’s the hand of some poor unfortunate they’ve knifed in the alley.”
“You did this to make our task more difficult,” Walinda said icily.
“No I didn’t,” Holly retorted. “Can I help it if I’m just too open and trusting?” Then she smiled slyly. “But I couldn’t have come up with a better stratagem if I’d actually planned it. I should warn you, I tried divinations to locate the hand, but had no luck. It must be protected by some special magic. Many of the Sensates who were helping me have given up because they became bored or frustrated with our lack of progress. They did discover an old tiefling who claims that several hundred years ago there was a temple to Bane in the Market Ward, but it’s gone now.”
“We have a way to track the hand,” Jedidiah said. “In the meantime, since Sigil is full of portals, as you say, it would be useful if you could discover for us a portal to the astral plane.”
Holly looked to Bors.
The Shattered Temple,” the Sensate paladin said. “The Athar give tours featuring dead gods.”
Holly chuckled. “The Athar are mostly disillusioned priests. They spend their time trying to prove the gods aren’t divine. Amusing, no?”
“Hilarious,” Jedidiah replied, rubbing his temples with his fingertips.
“So how are you tracking the Hand of Bane?” Holly asked. “With the other half of the finder’s stone?”
Joel nodded. “Perhaps we should wait until night to continue,” the young bard suggested to Jedidiah. “After people are asleep.”
“There is no real night here,” Holly explained. “Only a
period where the smoke turns from light gray to dark gray. There will still be plenty of people out at night. They’ll just be a different type.”
“Well, we’ll wait for the dark gray anyway,” Jedidiah said, rising slowly. “Because right now I need some rest.”
“I, too, require rest,” Walinda said.
Bors showed the priest and priestess to rooms where they could lie down. Joel remained behind with Holly. “Jedidiah doesn’t look well,” the paladin noted. “He looks like something’s sucked all the energy out of him.”
“He was up late last night singing,” Joel explained, although it was uncanny the way she had actually described exactly what had happened to Jedidiah.
“And Walinda?” Holly asked.
“Walinda had a little too much of some strong Kara-Turan drink,” Joel said. He related to Holly their adventures since they’d left her, without, of course, mentioning Finder’s loss of godhood. He also left out any mention of his previous evening’s conversation with Walinda. Holly, in turn, described to him some of what she had learned about Sigil: its political factions, its geography, its primary places of interest.
Sometime near antipeak, the Sigil midnight, the four Realms adventurers set out with the finder’s stone. The stone led them to an alley behind a bookshop on Copperman’s Way.
“We’re being watched again,” Walinda said. “I can feel it.”
“We’re always being watched,” Holly said. “This is Sigil. Watching is the city’s favorite pastime, right up there with rat-baiting and cheating customers.”
Joel used the finder’s stone again in the alley. The beacon of light lanced from the stone straight down to the ground.
“Subterranean tomb, or perhaps a hidden shrine,” Jedidiah guessed.
“Or it could have just been buried when they built the road,” Holly suggested. “Bors said that they often just build the street up, making first floors into basements and basements into subbasements.”
