Dawn of Night (23 page)

Though unfortunately dressed, Ahmaergo was powerfully built. The horned dwarf cut a swath through the street traffic by the sheer force of his reputation and physicality. Skulkers cleared a path for him more quickly than they had for the bugbears. The dwarf’s heavy gaze looked out from under his thicket of brows, took in Azriim, those skulkers in the immediate vicinity, the layout of the buildings, the rooftops, and the catwalks overhead. Apparently satisfied with what he saw, the dwarf brushed past Azriim toward a nearby alley.

“Follow, Thyld,” Ahmaergo ordered.

His voice sounded like stones grating against stones, and his key ring jangled.

Azriim fell in behind the dwarf.

The moment they got off the street and into the deeper darkness of the alley, Ahmaergo whirled on Azriim, took him in two ham hands, and smashed him up against the alley wall. Startled rats scurried past Azriim’s feet and his breath went out of his lungs. Ribs cracked, but the rapid healing of his kind began to reknit them instantly. Ahmaergo punched him hard in the stomach. Azriim doubled over in agony, temporarily unable to breathe.

By the time he recovered himself, Ahmaergo had unslung his axe and had the shining head spike pointed at Azriim’s chest.

“You’ve been in contact with that dog, Kexen, who serves that snake, Ssarmn,” the dwarf spat, and pressed the tip of the head spike into Azriim’s chest. “You trying to game me squid?”

Azriim took that last to be a derogatory reference to Thyld’s membership in the Kraken Society.

“No… game,” Azriim replied, feigning fear and breathlessness.

The dwarf’s gaze darkened.

“Anyone crosses Ahmaergo, that anyone decorates this axe with his blood.”

With effort, Azriim resisted the temptation to smack Ahmaergo for referring to himself in the third persona personal peeve of Azriim’s. At least the dwarf didn’t make casual use of expletives.

“I did meet with Kexen on a matter unrelated to you or the Mmathar,” Azriim said. “But during that meeting he asked me if I could locate a buyer for certain magical goods.”

Ahm.lorgo managed to keep his crenellated face expressionless, but Azriim sensed the sudden tension in his body. For days, Skullport’s underworld had been abuzz with news of an ambushed Xanathar caravan and its store of magical goods. The Xanathar, Azriim knew, was eager to avenge the attack and needed only the slightest nudge to move against Ssarmn.

“Continue,” the dwarf commanded. “And be truthful. If Ahmaergo does not like your story, he can have your corpse questioned almost as easily as your living body.”

Azriim let his eyes show concern, though he felt an almost uncontrollable compulsion to gut Ahmaergo.

“Here is evidence of the truth, Ahmaergo,” Azriim said.

He unslung the satchel bag at his shoulder, and the head spike of the axe pressed more firmly into his chest.

“Slowly,” Ahmaergo said, his voice low and dangerous.

Azriim nodded and reached into the satchel. From within, he slowly withdrew four garnet-tipped wooden wands wrapped in leather oilcloth. The appearance of the magical devices had the desired effect. Ahmaergo lowered his axe and seized them from Azriim’s hand.

“How did you get these?” he asked.

Azriim kept the smile from his lips. “I had a contact arrange the purchase from Kexen. These wands are from among those items for which he asked me to find a buyer. It seems he has many more. When I heard about the… unfortunate events that befell one of the Xanathar’s caravans, I purchased only these, declined further dealings with Kexen, and resolved to inform you.”

“Ssarmn,” Ahmaergo hissed.

“Indeed,” Azriim said. “And there is still more, Ahmaergo.” He adopted the mien of Thyld-the-businessman. “We need only discuss my price first.”

The horned dwarf was notoriously cheap, but he surprised Azriim by saying, “Name it.”

“Four thousand in gold coins,” Azriim said. “Waterdhavian mintage.”

That amount was the exact fee that Kexen had charged Azriim and Dolgan to provide an armed escort for the bait caravan. Azriim enjoyed the symmetry.

“Very well,” Ahmaergo said. “But if this is a set-up, Thyld, or if you tell me a half-truth … death will not come quickly.”

Azriim feigned the appropriate amount of fear while saying, “If I wanted to set you up, I would have employed a middleman to convey this information.”

Ahmaergo tilted his head to concede the point. He also put the wands in an inner pocket of his shirt. Apparently, the dwarf meant to keep them.

Azriim closed his satchel bag and went on, “I have learned that Kexen has arranged for a heavily armed troop of over twenty men and mages to escort a caravan into the northern caves of the Underdark within the next eight cycles.” Azriim and Dolgan were still negotiating the exact time with Kexen. “The remainder of the magical goods are to be in that caravan. I believe he used another agent to arrange a meeting with a buyer.”

The creases in Ahmaergo’s brow deepened to chasms.

“Twenty you say, eh?” He reslung his axe. “You stick down the time and tell me immediately. I know those tunnels. That caravan won’t get more than a quarter league into those tunnels before I kill them all.”

Azriim had to hold back a smile. He knew the tunnels too, and thought he guessed the likely spot that Ahmaergo would set up the ambush.

“I expected nothing less, Ahmaergo,” he said.

Cale came back to himself in darkness, floating on his back in water as black and cold as a devil’s heart. The weight of his gear threatened to pull him under. While not a strong swimmer he managed, sputtering, to right himself and stay afloat. His skin was clammy and tingled with gooseflesh. His breath sounded loud in his own ears. He knew he had to get out of the cold water quickly or it would suck the body heat from him. The last thing he remembered he had been rolling, tumbling, falling forever over the Dragon’s Jaws—and he found himself somewhere else, with his head above water. A gentle current propelled him slowly downstream.

A vast, winding tunnel loomed over him and ran before and behind as far as he could see. The wide, curving ribbon of the river in which

he swam tracked the tunnel’s course, its water still and foreboding. Sharp-tipped stalactites hung from the ceiling, a crowd of pointed fingers accusing the river of something unspeakable. Water dripped from many of the stalactites to plop, with ominous echoes, into the water. Phosphorescent orange lichen clung in sporadic patches to the crannies of the rough wall and ceiling. The plants cast little light and Cale could see in the otherwise pitch darkness only because of his transformed vision. Jagged rocks and stalagmites littered the narrow riverbanks to either side. Smaller side caves too dotted the riverbanks, holes in the walls of the river’s channel that led off into darkness. Some caves were large enough for an ogre, some were small enough to accommodate only a halfling. Some had been worked, others were natural. Bats fluttered overhead. The damp air carried a mineral tang.

The Underdark, Cale realized.

He was half a league under Faerűn’s surface in a world that never saw the sun. He felt comfortable with the darkness, but uncomfortable with the comfort. And the realization that the world literally hung over his head gave him a sense of oppression that he could not shake.

“Jak,” he called, and his voice echoed loudly in the tunnel, reverberating down the river’s course as if there were ten of him. He winced, and more softly called, “Magadon. Riven?”

“Here,” Magadon responded, from somewhere to Cale’s right. A soft splashing sounded. “I’ve got Riven. He’s alive, but nearly drowned.”

With effort, Cale paddled himself around and saw the guide’s head bobbing above the water a stone’s throw behind him. Magadon had an aru wrapped around the unconscious Riven’s throat and used his other hand to help keep them both afloat.

“Jak?” Cale asked.

“I don’t see him,” Magadon answered.

Cale spun around, kicked himself as high out of the

water as he could, and scanned the dark surface. The halfling was nowhere to be seen.

“Jak!” Cale called.

He swam through the water between him and Magadon, spreading his arms out wide, waving them under the water, increasingly concerned. He swallowed several mouthfuls of river water; it tasted like iron.

“Jak! Little man!”

Cale’s hand brushed up against a small form floating just under the water. He grabbed the halfling by the hair and pulled him to the surface. Jak’s eyes were closed; his face pale. Cale couldn’t tell if he was breathing. He wrapped an arm around him and held his head out of the water.

“I’ve got him, Mags,” said Cale. “But he looks nearly drowned too.” He scanned the riverbank. “That beach to our right, the one with the clear spot between the tall boulders. See it?”

“I see it,” Magadon said.

For the first time it occurred to Cale that Magadon appeared to see well in darkness too. Another gift from his fiendish father, Cale supposed.

A dim white luminescence flared on the beach between the boulders—Magadon’s psionic power manifesting. Pale lizards scrabbled out of the sudden light, and bats fluttered in agitation above.

“Get Jak to shore,” Magadon said. “I’ll bring Riven.” With Jak in his arms, Cale shadow-stepped from the water to the beach.

Behind him, Magadon swam for the shore, dragging the unconscious Riven and grunting as he splashed through the water.

Cale laid Jak down on his back on the beach, just at the perimeter of Magadon’s psionic light, and tapped the halfling’s cheeks. No response. Cale pulled his soaked mask from his pocket, laid his regenerated hand on Jak’s chest, and whispered the words to a healing spell. Still nothing.

“Mags….”

“Turn him around, hold him upright, and squeeze his chest,” Magadon called, still swimming. “His lungs are filled with water.”

Cale nodded, picked the halfling up from under his armpits, adjusted his hold, and squeezed his ribcage. “Jak!”

The halfling lay limp in Cale’s grasp. He squeezed again.

With shocking suddenness, the halfling spasmed back to life, coughed up a stomachful of river water, then immediately vomited his partially-digested rations from breakfast. Cale couldn’t help but smile. He lowered Jak, still coughing, to the ground.

Cale knelt beside him, put a hand on his shoulder, and asked, “Are you all right?”

Jak coughed a bit more and dry heaved before the fit passed.

He groaned and managed a weak, “I’m all right. Thanks.”

Cale nodded, thinking that Jak still looked pale.

By the time Magadon neared the shore, Riven had already regained consciousness.

“I can swim, godsdamnit,” said Riven, sputtering. “I don’t need to be ca—”

The assassin inhaled a mouthful of water, sending him off into a fit of coughing and cursing.

“Keep your mouth closed,” Magadon ordered.

The guide continued to swim to shore until they reached the shallows and could wade. There, he helped Riven get his feet under him and the two stumbled onto the beach.

“You look like all Nine Hells,” Riven said to Jak. The halfling was too tired to respond.

With all of them safely on the black sand beach, they sagged to the ground and lay there for a time, saying nothing, with Faerűn for a ceiling and a score of stone noints aimed at their chests.

“We convinced the river fey,” Magadon said at last, with a touch too much disbelief.

“You sound surprised,” Cale said.

Magadon shook his head, sat up, and wrung out his hat. Somehow, he had managed to keep it, though he had lost his oversized backpack to the river.

“Not surprised, just… pleased. What did you tell him?” the guide asked Cale.

“What I plan to do someday,” Cale answered. Magadon accepted that without further questions. Once Jak was more or less recovered, he looked around

with interest. He took in the tunnel, the river, and the darkness.

“The Underdark, eh?” he said, and reached for his pipe. He frowned when he found it and the pipeweed sodden. “You have any dry leaf, Zhent?” he asked Riven.

“You ought not smoke, Jak,” Magadon admonished.

The halfling waved the guide’s advice aside and said, “I’m guilty of a handful of vices, Magadon. I’ll not let a little river water keep me from my favorite.”

Magadon said nothing and Riven tossed Jak his tin.

Jak popped it open and smiled when he saw that the interior was still dry. The halfling tamped the pipe and tried to light it, but the river had left his tinder-twigs soaked. Cale smiled at Jak’s forlorn expression.

“That’s Tymora looking out for you, Jak,” said Magadon. “Smoke later.”

“First thing I get when we get to Skullport,” the halfling said, “is a tinder-twig.”

He tossed the dry tin of pipeweed back to Riven, who absently snatched it from the air.

Riven climbed to his feet and wrung out his cloak and gear as much as he could.

“We follow the river’s current,” the assassin said. “It empties into the harbor outside Skullport. The cavern containing the city is not far.”

They all nodded but no one else stood. Cale gave Jak and Magadon a short time more to recover themselves before climbing to his feet.

“Ready?” he asked and extended a hand to Jak.

“Ready,” Jak answered.

He took Cale’s hand and pulled himself up.

Magadon rose, checked his blades, inventoried his gear not lost to the river, and nodded.

The City of Skulls and the slaadi awaited.

*****

Following Riven’s lead, they picked their way between the sharp rocks along the riverbank’s black sand beaches for what felt to Jak like hours. The phosphorescent lichen provided just enough light to travel by, albeit slowly. Throughout, the halfling alternated his gaze between the water and the cave mouths that opened in the wall of the tunnel. Both the water and caves were black and quiet, as though they hid dark secrets. They made Jak nervous.

“They’re just holes Fleet,” Riven said, “and ordinary river water. In truth, I’m surprised we’ve seen no ships. There are invisible, intangible portals all along the river, each made visible and operational by a unique magical phrase. That’s how most of the slave ships arrive and leave.”