"Safe journey, you two, and call if you need us."
CHAPTER FIVE
28 Uktar, the Year of Lightning Storms (1374 DR)
The pair stepped out into the night, and Tsarra noticed the courtyard looked normal despite the damage from earlier. The tower repairs itself, as does the wall and gate, and Laeral helped it along.
Tsarra shook her head and whispered at Khelben, "Why didn't you just say that? That makes my head ache." "Because I didn't wish to be overheard by anyone," he whispered in reply. "The Tower exposed too many secrets today, even if no one managed to profit from that breach.
I'll not suffer another such exposure for the next century." Tsarra nodded but replied, "Do you realize you speak differently when you're outside the tower? It took me two years to realize that you put on a far more formal and forbidding face when you're out in public than the one you show your students." "Indeed?" Khelben didn't say anything more as they exited the courtyard. The repaired gates glistened with night mist and opened as they approached, closing behind them with no gestures or castings at all. Khelben turned and headed north on Swords Street at a fast clip. Tsarra followed quickly, walking at his side within a pace or two. She preferred the woods to the City of Splendors, but she did enjoy the city at night. It was slightly quieter, at least away from the inns and taprooms, and she could hear herself breathe-a task impossible in the daytime hustle and bustle.
She drank in the darkness and the cool mists cloaking the rooftops and alleyways. Here and there, she spotted lantern-bearers guiding noble parties to and from their destinations. On the winds she heard far-away criers hawking tidbits of news into the night. "Last inbound caravans due at highsun! Four die in harbor accident! Lady Tian Simgulphin to marry, come spring!" Tsarra took a mental note to ask one of Maresta's apprentices about the news, as they were on rumor details that ride. For the next two bells, Khelben led Tsarra on a maddening chase, crisscrossing the city in a seemingly pointless and meandering path. He stopped a number of times, casting minor spells or dropping small parcels into odd places, such as a drainpipe in Tarlaek's Court and the mouth of a lion statue on the walls of the Maernos estate. They didn't take a direct path until they had skirted the City of the Dead and turned up the Coffinmarch to follow it across the High Road into Buckle Alley. Khelben ducked into a modest establishment, its sign proclaiming it to be the Griffon's Grog tavern. The wizard's hand signal suggested Tsarra wait a moment before following him into the building, so she stared at the sign a moment.
The sign, covered partially in mold and in need of fresh paint, showed a carved griffon volant, its upper claws gripping a foaming mug. After a short interval, Tsarra entered the smoky taproom, the inhabitants of which paid her less heed than the mugs in front of them. A reedy-voiced bard-Tsarra recognized him as one of many students who passed near Blackstaff Tower from the New Olamn bards' college-sang acapella while quickly fixing his broken lute string. No other noise rose above the murmur of conspiracies. Tsarra found Khelben talking at the far end of the bar with the owner, a fat, peg-legged man with only a thumb and forefinger on the right hand scratching his face. The two men nodded, concluding their business. When Khelben turned to motion to Tsarra, his cloak rendered him as an older Calishite gentleman, rings aplenty on the hand with which he waved her on. The pair ducked behind a hanging tapestry, and Tsarra's nose wrinkled at the acrid smell of a badly tended privy. Khelben tapped on the wall twice in two spots, and the wall pivoted, allowing them access to the back alley.
Without any further explanation, Khelben continued southward on a twisting path among middens and old courts. Tsarra knew the city well, but even she found some alleys into which she'd never looked, let alone stepped. Stop worrying so, Tsarra. We're only taking Traslim's Cut to avoid notice of our entering the Elf stone. Khelben's ommunication to her was the first beyond hand signals in the past hour. Within moments, they found themselves at a back entrance to a well-kept building. Tsarra sensed his arrival before she heard his wings, and put her elbow out at an angle to allow Nameless a place to land other than her shoulders. Tsarra had never set foot inside the Elfstone Tavern, since her mother insisted she avoid it. She always told Tsarra she would not be welcomed, not only for being a half-elf but for being her daughter. Tsarra guessed her mother held an old grudge against its proprietress or vice versa. Since Khelben brooked no argument on the matter, she crossed the threshold and found herself, despite all warnings, feeling strangely at home. They doffed their hoods as they entered, revealing their identities to those inside the tavern. The back entrance they used off Traslim's Cut led directly into the central taproom. The only thing between floor and the roof thirty feet overhead were living branches and a few floating tables with elves among them. To Tsarra's amazement, the nondescript but well-kept building allowed living trees to thrive inside, a few dotting the floor in various places. Four large oak trees dominated the great room at its corners, growing up from beneath the floor, their canopies spreading across the space. On either side of the greatroom, ceilings lowered and boxed in both ends of the building to provide upper-story rooms for either privacy or a night's lodgings.
Despite the usual smells of tavern cooking and many people in close quarters, the tavern reminded Tsarra of the light woods northeast of the city. Torches on the walls and among the chandeliers glowed with silver-white flames to complement the moonlight streaming through the skylights in the roof. A small bar directly across from their entrance served many of the guests in the greatroom, but Khelben's grip on her elbow moved her to the right side of the room with its main taps.