The Alabaster Staff

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Not knowing what else to do, Kehrsyn shouldered her bag, left the building, climbed down the ladder, and headed for the Thayan enclave to see Eileph.

He wanted to study that thing, she thought, so I guess there's nothing stopping him now. Not that there's anything really left to learn-Tiglath said the magic was fading-but really, I owe him the pieces of the wand.

She worked her way through the crowded streets of Messemprar. The snow had been plowed to slush and pressed away to the margins of the streets, leaving slick cobbles, cold mud, and, in places of greater shade, ice for her to contend with. The wind had picked up again and blew from the southeast in gusts. Kehrsyn pulled her cloak tighter around her face and shoulders and tried to ignore the fact that it smelled of someone else.

When she was most of the way to the enclave, Kehrsyn stopped in her tracks, rolled her eyes, and changed her course for the Mage Bazaar. Of course Eileph would be there, in his tent, selling to a desperate public instead of lounging in his sanctum. She only hoped she would not have to wait long to see him.

At the entrance to the curtain walls that encircled the Red Wizards' pavilion, the guard informed her that Eileph was not selling merchandise that day. He had remained in the enclave engaged in research. Kehrsyn rolled her eyes again and retraced her steps all the way back to the enclave.

She was admitted promptly, and once more found herself entering Eileph's laboratory and erstwhile reception room. As she entered, the deformed wizard was carefully studying a small organ he had cut from the cadaver. The toad sat upon the corpse's flayed face, an image that made Kehrsyn's lower lip quiver with revulsion.

"Um… Eileph?" she said.

Eileph hobbled around, leaning on a gnarled cane as misshapen as he was. So did the toad, its amphibian feet slapping on the cold, dead musculature as it rotated its obese bulk in place. Kehrsyn tried very hard to ignore it, but the beast was unavoidably visible in her peripheral vision.

"Oh, mm-hmm, it's you," said Eileph. "I must tell you, it is rare I find myself anticipating anyone's interruption, but you've managed to make yourself an exception, even if you are built like a wee wisp of an elf."

"Thanks," she said.

As she tried to figure out how to break the news, Kehrsyn smiled hollowly.

"Do your people have another commission for me? Hmm?" asked Eileph, waggling his fingers. "More gold for this tired old soul?"

"Well… no," said Kehrsyn. "Basically, um, the reason I'm, y'know, here, is that they-well we, that is-we agreed that… you could sort of… study the, uh… the staff. When we were through with it. And… I guess we're kind of through with it."

With those words, Kehrsyn placed the broken halves of the wand on a relatively flat pile of papers on the worktable, there being no spot that was actually clear of clutter.

Eileph's jaw dropped, and his skin went deathly pale. One hand clutched at his jersey, just over his heart. He began to hobble over to the remnants of the staff.

The toad began croaking loudly, and Eileph burst into braying laughter. It was a jarring duet. Kehrsyn tried to smile, but her unease made it look like she was going to vomit, which, truth be told, was not entirely out of the question.

Eileph drew in a deep, gasping, rasping breath and slapped the table.

"You shouldn't scare an old man like that, young lady, you really had me going!" He closed his solitary eye and began pounding on his forehead with two stubby fingers. "Oh my, oh, dearie me," he laughed, "I don't think I'll be able to spit for a tenday, you scared me so bad!"

"What?" asked Kehrsyn.

"What? Why, because this is the decoy, youngster!" guffawed Eileph, wiping a tear of laughter from the corner of his empty eye.

"Decoy?" echoed Kehrsyn, trying very hard to catch up with events.

"Well," he said, "I see that it fooled you, eh, young lady? Don't let it stop your wee little heart. This is what I was working on for you lot, a copy of the staff you'd marked for acquisition. Here," he said, as he hobbled over and picked up the halves, "let me show you what I did. Superb carving work, if I do say so myself."

He moved so close that he had to crane his head up to look at Kehrsyn. He held the halves aloft for her inspection, spinning them and pointing to the pieces as he spoke.

"See? First of all, this is stone, not bone like the original. Didn't have any good bones handy, but it looks much the same as a weathered bone, and anyway that organic stuff is a regular mess to carve properly. But stone is heavier, so I had to hollow it out just like this to match the weight properly. Now this side you already saw in the sketches I showed you, but I didn't know what this side looked like, so I had to wait for your delivery to be able to duplicate it. Hard work, too, but I'd already had practice in the style with this first side here. The river and setting the jeweler made, and laid the black amber and smoky quartz to match the original. Then I cast Mythrellaa's Lust upon it-that's a rather more stylish version of the Fool's Aura, a little trick the zulkir gave me in payment for a small service I'd rendered her. And there it was, all but indistinguishable from the original, except, of course, it wouldn't work."

"That's… very impressive," said Kehrsyn, stepping back to get some personal space between her and the sour-smelling magician.

"Humph," said Eileph, inspecting the pieces. "Of course, that doesn't explain how this came to be broken."

"They don't tell me such things," said Kehrsyn, pleased that she'd come up with such a plausible non-answer off the cuff.

"And who does?" yelled Eileph, flicking a finger at Kehrsyn. "Oh, I know all about such things," he said as he hobbled away, then stopped dead in his tracks. "Or, more accurately, I don't. You see, the zulkirs and tharcions, and all the Red Wizards are very good at not telling things." He hobbled back over to Kehrsyn and stood too close again. "Which makes it very scary," he whispered, "when one considers all that one has been taught by others who thrive on secrets. It makes one wonder how much knowledge they hold back! And that makes all of us hunger for that knowledge, plot for it, scheme for it…" Eileph's arm started to tremble, tapping his cane on the floor. "Good thing I'm such a stable person," he said.

Kehrsyn nodded. She didn't trust her voice not to crack were she to lie at that moment.

"Well," said Eileph, as he started back to the cadaver.

He tossed the halves on his table as he passed. Kehrsyn thought maybe the fake one would pass inspection at Wing's Reach, at least until she got the real one. She feared returning empty-handed with Ahegi lurking around.

"Um, Eileph, sir?" asked Kehrsyn. "Can you fix it?"

Eileph whipped around, staggering when his whirl exceeded his balance.

"What?" he bellowed. "First they destroy my art and now they say, 'Jump, Eileph, fix the staff!' What do they think I am, a trained homunculus?"

"Standard rates," said Kehrsyn, raising her voice to be heard over Eileph's tirade. "Double for a rush job."

Eileph's countenance softened in an instant. He picked up the two halves and fitted them together, working his jaw from side to side.

"Humph," he said. "I can do it, young lady, never you fret. I can have it for you tonight, if you don't mind a bit of a crack, or tomorrow for a job as good as new. If you want one carved afresh, that'll take a while."

"How big a crack are we talking about?"

"Oh, not a very big one," said Eileph. "Fit the halves together and take a look. I can make it a bit better than that."

Kehrsyn fiddled with the broken pieces. The crack would be just a hair wide.

"That'd be great," she said, handing the pieces over.

Eileph limped back over to her and patted her hand gently, almost tenderly.

"Don't you fret your heart, young lady. I'll have it delivered tonight," he said, with a smile that was the picture of warmth despite the malformed frame in which it appeared.

Massedar stood at the window in his study, gazing out at the pale winter sky. Sunshine slanted into the room but did not warm it. He felt the outside chill pouring in through the open window, counterbalanced by the warmth radiating from the roaring fire. The blaze warmed his back and the hands clasped behind, and the reflected flames glinted merrily in his rings.

A knock came at the door-not the door that led to his private bedroom, of course, but the doorway that led to the audience hall in which he had alternately cowed and impressed their young thief.

"Enter thou," he said, not turning his head. His breath misted in the chill draft.

He heard the door open and close again. One pair of footsteps came over to his side.

"Ahegi, faithful servant," said Massedar. "Thou wouldst speak with me in privacy ere the interrogation?"

"Indeed, sir," said Ahegi, likewise in High Untheric.

Massedar turned. Ahegi's head was freshly shaved, and the two circles that adorned his forehead glistened. Ahegi's close-set and piggish eyes, set deep beneath heavy brows, glowered with black irises and blacker thoughts.

"Speak thy heart, then," commanded Massedar.

"My heart ponders, belike we have erred to entrust ourselves unto that maiden," said Ahegi. "Would that we had plied her lips forcibly with red irons and turnspindles, that we might have such knowledge of our trespassers unto ourselves."

Massedar smiled thinly and said, "The spangled sandpiper feigneth grave injury to lure the wolf from its nest, and the butterfly spider feigneth comeliness to lure a mate to its doom. If a simple animal understandeth that nectar draweth the prey willingly whilst the fire repelleth, wherefore dost thou despair of this lesson?"

"Mayhap I find the act of dissimulation cometh less easily unto me than it doth thee," Ahegi replied, his lips pressed together. "By my troth, I find that falsehood taxeth my patience."

"That, old friend, maketh thee an advisor of great worth," said Massedar.

Ahegi bowed and turned back to the door.

He opened it and said, "Demok, thou art granted audience to the Lord of Wing's Reach."

Demok stepped in and nodded slightly but respectfully. He kept his eyes studiously unfocused, looking at a vacant spot in the air to give his peripheral vision the greatest advantage.

"Sir," he said.

"My advisor Ahegi sweareth that thy maiden-thief lieth beyond trust," said Massedar. "What opinion hast thou?"

'Trustworthy," said Demok, nodding. "Sound heart. Looking to impress, find a home."

"Sound heart?" echoed Ahegi with a sneer.

"Good with kids," said Demok. "Cares about people."

"We shall not abide a net of such flimsy braids," said Ahegi. "She hath led us unto the lair of our enemies. Henceforth shall we vanquish them by advantage, striking the vipers in their den."

"Can't," said Demok with a set jaw.

"Thinkest thou not that I possess the power to smite whomever draweth my wrath?" asked Massedar. "Thou hast shadowed her unto the gates of her guild. We strike."

Demok looked at Massedar, then at Ahegi. "She spotted my tail. Got away. Tried to follow; no luck. Don't know where the guild is."

Massedar stepped forward, drawing a breath to say something, but then stopped, closed his eyes, and exhaled bitterly.

"Perforce must we wait," Massedar said eventually. "These are ill tidings, Demok. I pay thee handsomely for better. Leave thou me."

Demok nodded again and left the room in a flickering with his efficient, graceful movements.

Massedar and Ahegi stood silently for some time.

Ahegi said, "He speaketh not the truth unto us," he said.

"I know," Massedar said, nodding, "but we know not yet wherefore. Arrest ye him not before the measure of his deceit hath been revealed in full. Someone within Wing's Reach cleaveth to the Zhentarim. If it be he, must we then proceed with great prudence, lest we alert those who bring our doom."

By the time Kehrsyn left the enclave, the streets had been freshly washed by a squall. The smell and humidity of winter rain hung in the air. Heavy drops of water fell from the eaves and splattered into the sodden drifts of slush.

Kehrsyn had a promise from Eileph that he'd send the repaired decoy staff to her as soon as it was completed. All she had to do was wait for it… at "the guild's" headquarters at sixteen Wheelwright's.

Kehrsyn gathered her cloak around her shoulders and shivered. The chill came not from the weather but from the dread within her breast. She did not want to return to that house. To keep her feet from dragging, Kehrsyn distracted herself by trying to sort out events.

The followers of Tiamat had attacked Furifax's people to seize the Staff of the Necromancer. The Furifaxians had already prepared a decoy, either to fool the Tiamatans or to reinsert in Wing's Reach. That made it seem more likely that the rebels had deliberately double-crossed the dragon cultists… or, she mused, that they knew the dragon cultists would double-cross them.

The Tiamatans attacked and slaughtered the defenders. How convenient that the Zhentarim had provided a large, loud crowd of people right there to conceal the noise of the fight. At some point, someone broke the decoy. On top of that, the real staff had been taken. That she knew because someone had said it was "downstairs," which pretty obviously meant Tharrad's office. So either Tharrad had broken the decoy wand, hoping to fool the Tiamatans, or else the Tiamatans had found both wands and broken the false one out of spite. Since all the rebels were dead, it didn't really matter which was the truth. The question remained, where was the Staff of the Necromancer? Did the Tiamatan church have it, which is to say, did Tiglath have it? Or had her followers been working with or for someone else and turned it over to them for safekeeping?

Kehrsyn found herself nearing the lair of the Furifaxians. The crowds around the Chariot Memorial had thinned, and in the buzz that lingered in the wake of the Zhentarim's dealings Kehrsyn went unnoticed. She stood at the foot of the ladder leading to the front door. Her hand flexed on the cold, wet ladder, knuckles alternately turning white from tension and red from chill as she tried to work up the courage to go back inside.

She did, mounting the ladder slowly, heavily, and pausing at the door. She felt compelled to open the door quietly, holding her breath as it swung wide.

She slid inside and closed the door. The atmosphere was morbid, exuding an air of pointlessness. The smell was the bitter, raw odor of the slaughterhouse. The winter sun slanted in through the windows, falling on the cyanotic faces of the dead.

Kehrsyn narrowed her eyes in an attempt to stop her eyelids from trembling. Yes, the Untheri prided themselves on prospering under even extreme hardship, but while she had endured a lifetime of stoic suffering, she was unsure whether she could withstand hours of waiting among the restless souls of betrayers and victims alike.

She stalked into the kitchen, boots making a noise so slight it could be noticed only among those who drew no breath. The lowering fire still burned in the hearth. Though the building was beginning to cool off, she could not bring herself to stoke the fire. Somehow, having a merry blaze burning brightly in the midst of the massacred dead seemed incongruous, perhaps even sacrilegious, and Kehrsyn wanted to do nothing that might attract their spirits back to harry the sole living creature in the building.

She circled the upper floor as gingerly as possible, and finally located a place where she could sit with only marginal discomfort. One of the rooms held only two bodies, and they lay by the doors. She found a tall stool and set it in the center of the room so that she could wait with wide spaces all around and no corpses reposing behind her. Thankfully, her nose seemed already to have become numb to the stink of pierced innards.

She sat on the stool, dropping her shoulder bag next to it. She waited, legs drawn up and back hunched in uncomfortable self-consciousness. She heard the hearth fire popping and hissing as it wound its way down to coals. The light grew dimmer and the air cooler, yet she dared not leave the building for fear of missing the courier. Neither could she bring herself to rebuild the fire or light lamps, for, as the darkness grew, so did the chance of stumbling over a dismembered body, and that was a possibility she wished to avoid.

As she waited, she found her thoughts drifting to her parents. She was surrounded by death, conscious of the lives that had ended so abruptly that cold winter's day. She knew that some of these men and women had left behind families, a legacy of pain and want that they could not ease. Just like her father.

She had never known her mother's husband. He had been killed by Ekur, one of the powerful priests of Gilgeam and ruler of Kehrsyn's hometown of Shussel. Ekur had ruled with a hand that was incompetent in action and potent in reaction, and he had lusted after Kehrsyn's mother Sarae. Loving and devoted, Sarae refused Ekur's obscene propositions, turning down even a wealth of livestock and spices for the dalliance of a single evening. In the end, Sarae's loyalty turned and bit her as does a trained asp, for Ekur's soldiers brought the hapless woman to him, killing her husband in the process. Ekur didn't take the widow in. He simply took her.

As a child, Kehrsyn had wished that she could have known her father, had someone to love her and protect her in all the ways her mother, desperate just to find enough food, could not. Ever since the pivotal spring day by the plum tree, when she passed out of childhood and into adulthood, Kehrsyn had since wished that her father could have known her, to have had the opportunity to hold his child even once before he'd died. She found it unquenchably sad that the man had died for Sarae's faithfulness without ever getting the chance to see the fruit of their union, and the grief was made all the worse that she, that child, had been an extra mouth to feed, an extra burden on one who unwillingly sacrificed her mate on the altar of love and devotion.

By the time Kehrsyn shook herself from her melancholy, it was entirely dark outside, and she heard a light winter rain falling, droplets tinkling on the shutters and trickling down the walls. She could see a faint red glow in the kitchen from the dying embers of the hearth, but no other light remained. Assailed by the chill from without and her longing from within, Kehrsyn moved to the corner of the room, gathered a few cushions and pillows by touch, and arranged some of them on top of her to keep her warm and some beneath her for comfort. Her bag did its usual double duty as her pillow. She intended merely to rest, or maybe to catch a catnap, while she waited for the courier.

The pillows soon began to warm to her body. Brooding over memories that never were and lulled by the weeping sky, Kehrsyn let herself slide into a slight doze.

At first, Kehrsyn didn't register the significance of the fact that she'd heard the floor creak, but then she heard the whispered, bubbly voices of the dead, maddeningly just beyond understanding, like a string of familiar syllables jumbled in a nonsensical pattern.

She heard the corpses rising to their feet, whispering of blood and dark magic. They moved quietly, but in the dead of night every sliding footstep rang like a tolling bell. Their murmuring voices drew closer. Their eyes, glowing like lanterns, scanned the darkness looking for the living. The nearest zombie's neck was broken, and his head lolled around, casting irregular patterns of light and darkness as he looked for her, calling in the gurgling tongue of the deceased.

She heard the door close and latch, sealing her in with the shuffling, hungry dead. She reached for her rapier but found herself naked…

Kehrsyn awoke with a start. She glanced around, eyes wide, pupils dilated in fear. She saw that one of the corpses was indeed not where she'd last seen it. Dread gripped her heart, and bile rose in her throat, impelled by her empty stomach. She saw a flicker of light in the kitchen, a dun splash moving in the darkness. It vanished. She heard the sliding sound again, and the feet of a body in the kitchen began to slide out of sight.

Confused, Kehrsyn shrank back unto the cushions. She pulled one of the pillows out from behind her and placed it in front. She panned her head back and forth, looking for movement, ears tuned for any noise, mouth open to aid the sharpness of her hearing.

In the kitchen, she saw a silhouette step into her line of sight. It held a bull's-eye lantern in one hand, easily recognized by the telltale red glow of the light behind its slatted louvers. Whoever-it-was opened the slats the tiniest amount and shone the light on the body on the floor.

"Nah," a male voice said, adding some explanation Kehrsyn couldn't quite hear.

He moved on, and two others followed him, passing through Kehrsyn's line of sight one by one. She heard the leader mutter under his breath, and a few moments later the other two passed by again, heading to the door, carrying one of the dead bodies between them, grunting quietly with the dead weight.

Hoping to evade detection, for it seemed they were seeking out the corpses that littered the building, Kehrsyn moved more of the pillows until she lay against the wall, concealed by soft cushions. As far as she knew, only her head was exposed, and that she kept hidden behind a large bolster with her hair veiling her face so that her eyes might not reflect the lantern light.

There she lay as the intruders moved around their grisly task, quietly moving corpse after corpse out of the building. Kehrsyn watched their progress carefully. They cleared her room, they cleared the kitchen, and they began to move deeper within the house.

Knowing they expected no one in the building to move voluntarily, Kehrsyn decided to discover more about the body snatchers. It might shed some light on the events surrounding the troublesome wand. She wriggled out from behind the pillows and worked her way across the room, against the wall where the floorboards were less likely to creak. She avoided the kitchen, in case the group chose to meet-or, worse yet, eat-there when they were finished. Instead, by dint of careful timing, she sidled across the hall and sneaked to the front room, where she hid among the camping baggage.

She watched as shadowy figures shuffled in and out, bearing their dead burdens. She heard the cold rain outside, and, hidden among the sounds of droplets splashing in the darkened streets, the distinctive drumming sound of rain on oiled tarpaulins.

As the activity wound down, the leader of the expedition stood near the front door, sipping brandy from a hip flask. Kehrsyn could smell the potent aroma spreading through the chill air.

One of the workers came in, dripping with rainwater. He wiped his face with a rag, then blew his nose loudly.

"They's all loaded up, sir. It's rather more harder than loading cordwood, if you take my meanin'."

The leader took another swig, recorked his flask with a satisfied sigh, and asked, "How many do we have?"

"I sure'n lost count, sir," came the reply. "But we got 'em all, and we can't do none better nor that, if you take my meanin'."

"Fair enough," said the leader, shrugging.

"So where to, sir?"

"We'll load them aboard Bow Before Me."

"What's that, sir?"

The leader waved a hand with some irritation and explained, "The merchant ship that came in the day before yesterday."

"But that's Zhentarim, sir," said the henchman with grave concern. "I don't think we want to be doin' that, if you take my meanin'."

Kehrsyn picked up the slightest pause before the leader answered, "Let's take a look at this carefully now, right? It's clear as a bell why this will be no problem."

He's stalling, thought Kehrsyn.

"What reasons would those be, sir?" asked the concerned lackey.

Another brief pause, then, "First of all, if these bodies get discovered in our possession, we're in serious trouble. Let's let the Zhentarim take the risk of stashing them until we're ready, even if they don't know they're helping. Second, it's a merchant ship. Anyone who sees us loading things up won't think it's out of the ordinary. People load and unload things from merchant ships all the time, day and night. Merchant ships have tight schedules, you know. But if we took them back to the temple, neighbors might see. They might talk."

The lackey scratched the back of his head through the hood of his cloak and asked, "You sure we'll be able to do this without them catching us?"

"The ship's guards don't know any more about what gets loaded than anyone else. They'll be happy to stay inside by the fire on a night like tonight. And if they don't, well, I can talk my way past them, no trouble. Trust me."

"Yes, sir." The lackey took a few steps down the ladder, then stopped to look one last time at the leader. "Glory to Tiamat," he said.

The leader nodded and said, "All glory."