Rising Tide (35 page)

“Her honor?” Aysel guffawed, seeming genuinely amused. “She’s a damned ship’s mage, boy. She’s used to men of the sea, and their ways. You jump on deck with your manners and your baby face and think she’s just as virginal as you?”

Thunder crackled ominously in the back of Jherek’s mind. He felt the precious control Malorrie had trained into him coming unhinged. His fingers felt like wire meshed around the cutlass’s hilt. He tried to ignore Aysel’s coarse words.

“If you see the captain, let him know I was looking for him.”

He took three steps back, out of reach of the big man’s battle-axe, stepping around a table to put between them as well, then turned and walked away. He made himself release the cutlass.

“She’s known men before, boy,” Aysel called after him, “better men than you.”

Every word cut into Jherek. He tried to force them from his mind.

“These past few days,” Aysel continued, “I’ve tried to understand what it was she sees in you besides that courtly manner and those smooth features, but damn me if I’ve been able.”

Jherek walked, breathing deeply, searching desperately for the control that Malorrie’s training had given him.

“One thing I want to know, boy,” Aysel roared.

Jherek was almost to the door, but not out of earshot.

“I want to know if she’s as good looking naked as I’ve thought she was,” Aysel said.

Anger took Jherek then, snapping to life the way a candle wick took to flame. He made himself reach for the door as his breath tightened and turned cool in his throat.

“I look at her,” Aysel said, “sometimes with the sun behind her and you can just about see through some of those clothes she wears. I see enough, then I go back to my hammock and think about her.”

The tavern crowd urged him on, asking rude questions and making ribald statements.

“I imagine how she looks,” Aysel croaked, “all sweaty from being used hard, and the way she smells. Like a woman instead of those fragrances she wears. And then I-“

The sailor got no further.

Jherek turned, slipping through the distance separating him from Aysel like a barracuda. He left the cutlass sheathed because he didn’t think the big sailor would have time to bring the battle-axe up to defend himself. In fact, Aysel seemed stunned, barely beginning to react as Jherek vaulted to the tabletop and threw himself at the man. He flung his arms wide, taking in all of Aysel’s broad frame. The bigger man wrapped his meaty arms around the young sailor as they slammed backward.

Aysel’s breath whooshed out of him when he hit the floor, and his grip on Jherek broke. The young sailor pushed himself up and drew back a fist. Raw emotion burned through him. He seized Aysel by the hair with his free hand, knotting his fingers securely.

“Poke your fun at me, Aysel, and talk of me without respect, but not the lady. A lady’s honor is her own, and I won’t stand by while you defile it with your words.” He hammered the man in the face, putting all his strength into the blow.

Aysel’s head snapped to the side and blood gushed from his split lip. He roared with inarticulate rage, shoving against the floor with his hands and feet in an effort to dislodge Jherek.

Drawing his arm back, Jherek set himself to strike again. Before he could, rough hands wrapped around his arms and face, pulling him off Aysel. Jherek struggled against the three men that held him, tearing free of their grip. He turned to face Aysel again.

Aysel recovered quickly, pushing himself to his feet and fisting the haft of the battle-axe. Blood dripped down his swelling lips, turning his smile crimson. He wiped them with the back of his free hand and looked at the bloody smear.

“By the gods, you little bastard,” the big man declared, “now that you’re going to die for!”

XXVI

“Your song is beautiful.”

Turning from the westering sea spreading out from Waterdeep, Pacys looked down at the speaker.

The priest Hroman looked up at him. A sling held his right arm, broken in the raid on the city. A healing potion would have quickly righted it, but even Waterdeep’s vast stores had been hard pressed trying to save lives. Even Hroman’s own abilities to heal himself through prayer had been given to the makeshift hospitals scattered throughout the city.

“Thank you for your kindness,” the bard replied. His fingers caressed the yarting’s strings, making bridges and notes soundlessly, though his ear could hear every one through the touch of his fingers. “It’s only one of the many songs that will be sung about the battle for Waterdeep … nothing unique.” He felt bad about sounding so bitter. “Forgive me, my friend. I must sound very selfish in light of all that these people have been through.”

The streets around the Dock Ward teamed with a number of extra wagons pressed into service on behalf of the Dungsweepers’ Guild. Debris filled several of the big carts, and their drivers headed them toward the Rat Hills while others came back for more. Their wheels clattered across the cobblestones, a constant undercurrent to all of the other activity filling the dock.

Out in the harbor, fishing vessels plied the waters with nets, sieving in the dead and the wreckage left from broken and burned ships. Not as many of the ships as had at first been feared had been lost during the attack. Even the damage to the waterfront along Dock Ward was reparable once new wood was brought in.

Most of the city’s dead had been reclaimed, but a large knot of people still gathered at Arnagus the Shipwright’s where the watch brought any corpses they recovered. So many were still missing, and many more than that were gone.

Hroman shook his head. “After something like this, it’s only natural to start acting human again. It makes the world small again, and you only have to think about your own troubles-which don’t seem too large for a time.”

Pacys nodded. “You’ve grown wise, like your father. He’d be proud.”

“I hope so.”

The bard sat at the edge of a badly listing dock. Over half of it had broken off during the attack and rough splinters shoved out from the end. He noticed the dark circles under the priest’s eyes. “Have you eaten?”

“Not yet. I’ve been working the night shift at the hospital, giving aid where I could, and last rites for those that needed them.” Tears of frustration and near-exhaustion glittered in Hroman’s haunted gaze. “We seem to lose so many more of the weak ones during the night.”

“Yes,” Pacys replied. “I think it’s because the night is more tender, more accepting. A dying man doesn’t seem to fight quite so hard when death is disguised as sleep.”

“It’s still death.”

“Each man has his own race to run, Hroman. Even you can’t stop that.”

“No, but Oghma willing, I’ll interfere with it whenever possible.”

“Come,” Pacys said gently, gesturing to the dock beside him. “Sit and share morningfeast with me. Several of the festhalls and taverns have remained opened night and day since they were able. Piergeiron, Khelben, Maskar, and several others of the city’s officials and wealthy have opened their own larders to stock the kitchens of every establishment willing to serve a meal to those who are helping clear the city.”

“I suspect a lot of graft is going on through the city while such generosity is being shown,” Hroman said sourly. Still, he sat beside the old bard, stretching out awkwardly as he struggled to find comfort.

“The guard is policing the streets with a heavy hand, and even the most arrogant of nobles and merchants are rumored to be helping keep the distribution paths open and safe,” Pacys said, removing the cloth that covered the basket he’d been given a few minutes ago. He’d played the yarting, trying to soften all the destruction and sadness that he’d toiled in for the last few days.

On the first day he’d helped remove most of the debris that clogged Ship Street and the nearby streets fronting the harbor. On the second day, since he was one of the eldest and suffered wounds of his own from the battle, he’d helped wash the corpses that had been recovered, getting them ready for burial. Most funerals were small things handled in the other wards. In the days since, the tasks had alternated between clearing away and recovering the dead.

“And how are you?” Hroman asked. “I’m forgetting my manners.”

“Well.”

“What about the wound in your side?”

Pacys stretched gingerly. A sahuagin trident had gouged his side, requiring a number of stitches, and there was the wound in his arm. Still, he appeared to be mending, though slowly.

“Troubling,” the old bard admitted, “but not disabling.”

Hroman glanced around at the battered and broken shops and taverns. “So many people lost everything they had.”

“At least they live,” Pacys pointed out, “that those material losses may be grieved over. They’ll rebuild.”

“In time,” Hroman agreed. He scratched at a dried blood stain on his shirt. “So is this the song that you believed you were called for to sing?”

Pacys hesitated, searching his feelings again for the answer himself, finding mostly a brittle, hollow ache left over from the raid. He shook his head. “I don’t know.”

“I listened for a time just now,” Hroman admitted, “before you knew I was there.”

Pacys didn’t refute the statement. He’d known the priest was there. A man living on the road, singing for his meals and lodging, such a man learned more than just pretty words and a lively tune.

“Your song truly is beautiful, old friend,” Hroman said honestly. “I felt the pain of this city and the people who live here, and I felt the fear that still hangs about in the shadows.” “There are too many songs like it already, and more coming.”

Pacys drew a knife from his boot and cut slices from the small half loaf of bread he’d been given in the food basket. He covered the slices with ham spread made fresh that morning, then passed a sandwich to the priest.

Hroman accepted it with thanks.

“On every street corner,” Pacys said, “you’ll find a bard. They’re all composing songs about the raid, even those who weren’t in Waterdeep that night. They’ve come from far and wide, trailing word of the story back.”

“This is what you believed you were called for?”

“Yes,” Pacys said, “and I still believe that, but there is something missing.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve worked on the song about the raid for days,” the old bard replied, “and have it shaped much as I want it, but there’s more.”

“More? You’re sure of that?”

“Yes. Even as much work as I’ve done on it, the song yet remains unfinished.”

“How do you know?”

Pacys smiled at the younger man. “How do you know a prayer is left unfinished?”

“Every priest is trained on the elements of a prayer,” Hroman replied. “There’s the invitational, the declaration-, the body of the message, and the closing.”

“Sadly,” Pacys said, “many bards believe it’s the same with a song or a tale. Jokes, however, may be so mechanically inclined, but even within that art there are a number of allowances. In your vocation, my friend, the mind trains the ear, but in mine it’s the ear that trains the mind.”

“You remain hopeful, then.”

Pacys smiled. “I yet live, and my song is undone. I’ve been following it for fourteen years. I can’t allow myself to believe that I’ve been led this far and there will be no crescendo.”

Quietly and efficiently, Hroman bowed his head and asked a blessing on the meal. Pacys joined him, finding his spirits even further lifted by the sincere belief in Hroman’s words as he asked for peace and healing to descend on the city.

When the priest finished, the bard glanced up and out at the harbor. The morning sun was nearer to noon now, and the water glinted with diamond-bright highlights. He watched as a small group of mermen surfaced beside a large fishing boat with a boom arm hanging out over the water. Ropes led down into the harbor, letting the bard know they were going to attempt another underwater salvage.

“We’re missing so many things,” Pacys mused.

“They’ll be replaced,” Hroman stated. “Oghma willing, and if the need for whatever’s been lost is strong enough.”

“I’m not talking about city things.” The old bard offered the small cup of cherry tomatoes that had been packed in the basket. They were exotic, grown in Maztica, and proof that the most exclusive of larders had opened to feed the people who worked in the city. Hroman took a couple with a nod of thanks. “I’m talking about the song. We don’t know who arranged the attack on Waterdeep, or why.”

“It was the sahuagin,” Hroman pointed out. “We all saw them. As to why, the sahuagin have never gotten along with people living on the surface.”

“The sahuagin don’t use magic,” Pacys pointed out. “They don’t like it, and they don’t trust it. That night, of all things that can be said about it, was filled with magic. It’s more than the sahuagin. There’s an enemy out there who has aligned himself against Waterdeep … maybe more than just Waterdeep.”

“I can only pray that you’re wrong,” the priest said.

Pacys nodded. “I pray that as well, but in my heart I know I’m right. This song is far bigger than any I’ve ever done. When I finish, we’ll have to know who has commanded this thing and why.”

“Not all songs are as neatly sewn,” Hroman objected. “In Temdarc’s Folly’ the hero is kept constantly in the dark as to who’s controlling the events in his life, as is the audience. Likewise with ‘Lillinin’ and ‘The Calling of Three Shadows.’ There are dozens of songs that don’t fit the criteria you’re saying exists.”

“Not epic songs,” Pacys objected in a soft voice. He popped one of the cherry tomatoes into his mouth and chewed. The fruit was pulpy and delicious. “Those all have the same ingredients.”

Hroman was silent for a moment, as if hesitant. “Not all of those songs are finished, old friend. ‘Cask of Torguein’ remains incomplete to this day because the bard who wrote it-“

“Tweul Silverstrings,” Pacys said automatically. A bard was trained to give every master his due. Otherwise, how would a true bard worthy of the mantle gain fame?

“-had his heart ripped out by a peryton up in the Cloud Peaks. ‘Onyx Eyes’ is unfinished because the bard-“