Spellstorm (25 page)

They trudged back through the dark cellars again, and were just ascending the last
few steps of the grand staircase back onto the ground floor when Alusair swept out
of the air and stood facing them.

She was her ghostly self, and looked exasperated. “Mreen thinks, but isn’t
entirely
certain, that certain spices and cleaning oils in the kitchen have been handled and
slightly depleted since she last touched them. More importantly, one of the rings
of servants’ keys that was hanging in the butlery is missing from its hook.”

Mirt smote his forehead. “Gah! We should have hidden those keys,” he growled. “We
should hide the rest of them right now!”

Elminster shook his head. “Nay. I wanted them found and taken. Their theft I expected,
but earlier than this.”

“You
wanted
—?”

“When we were preparing highsunfeast, I coated all of the hanging keys with a little
turmeric and then dipped them in deepfire—dwarven brandy. It surface-dries in a clear
coat that makes the turmeric gray when seen through it, but won’t really be dry all
the way through to the metal until around dusk—when the turmeric will make it fall
away like dust. The turmeric will thereafter get onto the fingers of anyone handling
the keys, and will be its proper ochre. So anyone you see with stains of that hue
on their fingers, or someone who suddenly takes to wearing gloves … but let’s hurry
back to the cellar! Luse, fly ahead of us, and watch to see if anyone goes in—or out!—before
we reach it.”

Alusair turned her nod into a formless plunge down the stairs, passing between them
like a chill wind.

Mirt shivered in the wake of her passing. “She’s
enjoying
this.”

“She’s dead; grant her that small pleasure, will ye?”

They hurried back through the sequence of dark cellars, and found Alusair waiting
for them outside the cold-cellar door.

“Locked,” she reported, “and no one has entered or departed since my arrival. Yet
I fear I came too late: two bodies are missing. Skouloun and Maraunth Torr.”

Elminster smiled mirthlessly. “Of
course
two are missing. But is one of them merely a decoy, or has the slayer a use for it?”

“Why don’t we manacle Tabra to her own bedposts, or go stand guard over her?” Mirt
growled. “I don’t mind pulling her fingernails out by the roots, if it’ll make those
of us who’re left safer!”

“She’s not the slayer I’m thinking of,” El murmured. “I suggest we all return to the
kitchens, prepare an evenfeast from scratch and trust none of the spices and such
that are there—so, aye, it’ll be rather bland; we’ll use boiled fruit peel instead—and
spend some of the later evening, after everyone’s dined, searching the rooms in Oldspires
we’re not using. I suspect we’ll find one of the two missing bodies hidden somewhere.
If, that is, our slayer doesn’t get too ambitious and something spectacular ensues
to interrupt us.” Mirt and Alusair grew frowns as they tried to
pick holes in the Sage of Shadowdale’s planning, but both soon shrugged, giving up
their attempts.

As the ghost princess summed up: “We the Force of Good can’t search during evenfeast
without splitting up, as someone has to serve the food forth and keep poisoners from
getting unobserved into the kitchen to tamper, and above all we mustn’t split up,
what with murderers on the loose who might have left all manner of traps behind in
their rooms. You who have vulnerable human bodies
must
stick together. And for evenfeast, I’ll be with you, playing old Lord Halaunt the
host. So we stand together, or we fall separately.”

“Too late, too late,” Mirt and Elminster replied in unison, quoting the same old bawdy
song, then chuckled together.

“ ’Tis never too late to chuckle at thine own pratfalls,” El added. “As it happens,
I’ve gotten good at it, down all the years.”

“I’ve noticed,” Alusair replied dryly, and flew away.

T
HEY TOOK ALL THE PRECAUTIONS
E
LMINSTER HAD SUGGESTED
—
AND
nothing untoward happened.

Evenfeast was served in the feast hall to Lord Halaunt and the three surviving guests,
who had grown understandably wary. They shot sharp glares in all directions, often.

And were more sharp and difficult than ever.

As Myrmeen put it, peering through the doorway at them, “Just three now, but that’s
still
too many.”

“You don’t like wizards?” Mirt asked her. “Or you want them to choose the winner of
the Lost Spell by whittling themselves down to just one mage still standing?”

“I don’t like
these
wizards,” Myrmeen replied. “The Harpell possibly excepted. And don’t tempt me; as
cook, I can whittle by poison all too easily.”

Lord Halaunt was visibly dozing over his wine, down at his end of the table. Around
the other end of it, Manshoon, Shaaan, and Malchor conversed in low tones, as if fearing
being overheard. Mirt eavesdropped shamelessly anyway, as he set down steaming platters
for them, and was roundly ignored.

The wizards were more interested in discussing the deaths here in Oldspires. As they
recalled matters, in midbadinage Maraunth Torr had muttered, “Too much wine,” risen
and set down his drink, walked out to seek a garderobe—and had never returned.

“This house around us,” Shaaan observed rather bitterly, “seems increasingly like
a trap. Which we happen to share with a rather enthusiastic murderer.”

“Or two,” Malchor told the roll he was buttering.

“I,” Manshoon said darkly, “suspect Elminster.”

“I don’t,” Malchor replied flatly. “Not his way, any of this. He’s sly, but not when
facing down foes. He’d have had it out with us one at a time, not here with us all
gathered together, where we could make common cause and overwhelm him.”

“Let’s,” Shaaan suggested silkily.

Manshoon snorted. “And fall straight into whatever trap he’s prepared for us? He got
here first, remember, and has had ample opportunity to prepare matters.”

“Forethought. Strategy. Bah! I’m growing sick of such things,” Mirt commented, setting
down the last platter and boldly taking his place at the table among the wizards.
“What splendor is there, in a life spent forever planning ahead, scheming for the
morrow? Doing so leaves you no ‘today’ to enjoy!”

“And why are you here, Old Wolf?” Manshoon asked coldly. “When did you become a clever
mage obsessed with Lost Spells?”

“Oh, that’s not one of my schemes yet,” Mirt replied, skewering a whole roast braerwing
and transferring it to his plate. “I’m in no hurry to become a wizard. Not when I’m
still wondering why wizards are all such arrogant fools, who miss so much joy while
they’re shut up with their books and armored in their disdain for the rest of us.”

“Have a care, dullard,” Shaaan reproved Mirt coldly, but Malchor was chuckling.

“Well said, Lord of Waterdeep,” he commented, “if you are still a Lord of Waterdeep.”

“Never renounced the title,” Mirt said, “but quite a count of years slid past while
I was caught in a magical trap.” He looked at Shaaan. “So I know a thing or two about
traps.”

“And what do the likes of
you
do, when caught in a trap?” she asked in soft challenge.

“Set aside all feuds and grudges to work together and get out of it,” Mirt replied
promptly. “You should try it sometime.”

“I agree,” Malchor said firmly. “Too many have fallen already not to think one of
us will be next.”

“You propose a temporary truce?” Manshoon asked sharply.

Mirt carefully didn’t look at Elminster—who’d been keeping silent in his comings and
goings, ferrying wine into the room and decanting it.

Keeping his gaze on his own reflection in the goblet he was holding, so as not to
look at any of the three wizards and give them cause to take offense, Mirt asked,
“Why temporary? Strikes me you’d all get a fair sight more done in your lives, if
you all cleaved to the same code, or an accord like we in Waterdeep sign with cities
and realms we want to trade with; a few clear, simple rules all can trust in.”

“A pretty notion, churl,” Shaaan told him coldly, “but your words contain one fatal
flaw: that word ‘trust.’ None of us are foolish enough to indulge in it.”

“Oh?” Mirt looked back at her. “Strikes me the foolishness is in not seeing you’ve
more than reached the point where all of you
need
to trust in a code.”

Manshoon smiled thinly. “You really think you can get archmages to behave? You
are
a fool, old man.”

Mirt snorted. “I don’t think
I
can get you to do anything. Nor can anyone armed with but words and a sword, for
that matter, even if they gather a great armed host of their friends to stand with
them. Accords between wizards only work if the wizards want them to, and do the agreeing
themselves. Strikes me it’s all up to you.”

And he got up from his place, wiped grease from his chin with the back of his hand,
sighed gustily, belched, and added, “That wasn’t a bad feed. Must go fetch your desserts
now.”

And he left, not looking back. He knew the gazes watching him go would be less than
friendly, and there was no novelty in being glared at. Lords of Waterdeep soon get
used to it, if their fellow citizens know they’re lords.

E
LMINSTER HAD ALREADY
finished setting out a row of full decanters and gleaming-clean goblets in a neat
line down the center of the table, and was departing, supporting the stumbling, seemingly
half-asleep Lord Halaunt. Desserts-bound, Mirt lurched off after the Sage of Shadowdale,
old boots flapping at every step.

The wizards, left alone, all looked at each other.

“There’s truth in what he says,” Malchor observed quietly.

“And so?” Manshoon asked, spitting out those words in a fierce challenge.

“
I’d
like to live to enjoy more wine as good as this,” was the calm Harpell reply. “Is
agreement between us on a few simple rules of conduct that impossible?”

Shaaan shrugged. “To put it in uncouth terms, what’s in it for me?”

“Your life?”

M
YRMEEN HAD THE
warmed hand towels, jug of rosewater, and bowls ready when Elminster and Mirt reached
the kitchen.

They thanked her with smiles and nods, but took far more time readying themselves
for a return to the feast hall than “real” servants would have.

When they did return to the evenfeast table to set out the towels and bowls of rosewater
for guests to wash with, Malchor looked up at them and announced, “We three have agreed
upon a … truce of sorts.”

El and Mirt kept silent, but put on identical half-smiling expressions of eager interest,
and Malchor obligingly explained.

“No poisons, no attempts to enspell each other, no knives used on each other, and
no behind-doors deals regarding the Lost Spell—negotiations will be in the open, in
front of everyone.”

El lifted his eyebrows in frank disbelief, but Manshoon and Shaaan both nodded coldly.

“Amazing what good wine, comfortable chairs, and a few consecutive moments alone in
a calm room can achieve,” El remarked, sitting down at the table and pouring himself
a drink. “So tell me now, what are the deeper details of this accord? The ‘and if
ye break it, this is what we’ll do’ provisions. Pray elucidate.”

“As for praying,” Shaaan observed glacially, “you might want to bear in mind, Elminster
Aumar, that we needed no Chosen of Mystra—nor the blessings of the goddess, for that
matter—to reach agreement. We are our own adequate salvation.”

“So ye are!” El agreed heartily. “I can retire now!”

“You might want to see if they manage to make it last at least a day, first,” Mirt
pointed out, earning himself thin smiles from Malchor and Manshoon, and an even colder
look from Shaaan.

“Ye may have noticed,” Elminster told the three surviving guests, “that Lord Halaunt
has been frequently, ah, indisposed. He and I are both having a hard time deciding
which of ye will make the best recipient of the Lost Spell. We shall probably wait
until the spellstorm subsides before announcing our choice—so try not to break too
many things around Oldspires, searching for the spell ye won’t find. Like many an
elder, Lord Halaunt gets testy with those who break his keepsakes. Ye’d do better
to try to convince us that ye’re the best candidate, if ye can leave off being nastily
high-and-mighty for long enough to do so. I know it’ll be a strain.”