Yet they were prospering. A dock had been built four seasons ago, allowing ships safe moorings along the rocky coast. Previously waterborne visitors had to make landfall at Marsember, then trek along the coast to Suzara’s City, Suzail. Merchants were now bypassing the swampy town in favor of the Obarskyr settlement. Baerauble’s contacts with the elves made it possible for the port to ship out elven cloth, nuts, and beast hides, receiving in return tools, weapons, and various fine mongery from the human cities on more southerly shores of the Sea of Fallen Stars.
Ondeth’s manor looked out over the city. Despite its two floors, it was a low, solid rampart of rough-cut stone and gray slate shingles, set partially into the hillside behind. Its stone foundation had been the first in Suzail, and envy of it had spurred the other families to build likewise.
Ondeth had talked of raising some towers at the ends of his home, but had been too busy to commit time enough to do so. When he built the manor, most of it was a single great hall, and here most of the populace of Suzail was wont to gather in the early evenings around the great fire pit in the center of the chamber. The families would come to cook their evening meals, gossip, and trade tales, lies, and legends. With the rising popularity of Suzail, even an occasional bard or minstrel would join those at the fireside, to swap sweet tales in exchange for a roof to sleep under.
And from a great chair close to the fire, Ondeth Obarskyr was the center of his own universe. He, too, had grown in the past decade, the heaviness of advancing years settling firmly around his waist. And though there were plenty of young and unattached women in town, particularly the daughters of the Silver brothers, he never stepped beyond mild flirtation with any of them. At least not at first.
Knowledge held him in check-the knowledge held by the folk of Suzail. Most knew Suzara, and knew about the heated rows she and her husband had shared. Ondeth had never convinced his wife that this was a place worth staying in, and all the stone foundations and swelling population in Faerun would not keep her here. Once, early on, there’d been a chance Ondeth might change his mind about carving a home from the wilderness, but that chance had died in one afternoon of elven horns and lights in the trees… and with it, their relationship.
Suzara took the youngest lad and returned to Impiltur, sailing away on the first boat to moor at the new dock. Ondeth did not see her off, but Faerlthann did. In the new settlement, he’d grown to be taller than his father, his muscles hardened by work, his face tanned by the sun, and his eyes keen. And there was something else in those eyes from time to time: a faraway misty look the young man would get when Baerauble would visit, with his tales of elven kingdoms and their wild hunts.
Yet in the four years since Suzara’s sailing, father and son had settled into their roles. Faerlthann was the dutiful son, Ondeth the desolate father, and both seemed comfortable in their parts. The young women of the Silver households respected old Ondeth, but their eyes lit up for young Faerlthann.
So things had gone until Minda Bleth arrived, after Mondar her brother. Mondar had shown up six years ago, hard behind Jaquor and Tristan, the Silver brothers. But while the twin Silvers had agreed to settle within the confines of the already cleared area, Mondar would have none of that. There was a glade a mile northwest of the main settlement, little more than a clearing burnt bare by some elder wyrm or lightning strike. It had water and wood close at hand, and the place was far enough away from Suzail to allow privacy and close enough to afford protection.
Or at least that was Mondar’s opinion in the matter, voiced loudly enough to ring from the rafters of Ondeth’s first house. Mondar was as massive as a thundercloud, with a temper to match. He was already balding, but he kept a thick beard that reached nearly to his belt. His forehead was plowed with deep lines, and when he was in full fury, which was often, he could outbellow, outshout, and outargue any man in the colony, including Ondeth. It was generally agreed that by allowing Mondar to settle elsewhere, Ondeth was keeping a potential rival at a safe distance.
Oddly enough, the two had eventually become friends and allies, sharing a love of both the land and of home-brewed ale. Ondeth was at the bedside when Mondar’s wife died giving birth to Arphoind. The night that Suzara left the town named for her, Mondar and Ondeth had gone on a roaring drunk, wandering in the night together bellowing out rude, impromptu lyrics to all the elven tunes they could recall.
Mondar and Baerauble hated each other instantly, of course, and the elder Bleth did not miss an opportunity to goad the elf-friend. Yet despite this and Mondar’s rapid clearing of the glade, the sky did not fall, the elves did not attack, and the world did not end. Suzail continued to grow, and others besides Mondar began to say that perhaps the elven restrictions were just grand old words, that perhaps by now the elves had come to terms with humans moving into their lands.
Ondeth held to the limits set down by Baerauble, for there was still more than enough land within the rambling town wall. Still, a distance had grown between the old farmer and the wizard, and when Baerauble came to visit, he spent more time with Faerltbann and the youngsters than with his old friend.
The arrival of Mondar’s sister, Minda, strained the new friendship between Mondar and Ondeth. She’d come to Suzail a year ago, as fair as her brother was rough-hewn. Her hair was the color of the darkest night, and her eyes glowed like bits of silver. Her face was unmarked and had a golden sheen to it. She was as tall as her brother and Ondeth and, like her brother, wouldn’t take no for an answer. Even if Mondar disliked the attention Minda paid to the older farmer, he could do little to dissuade her.
Minda spent more and more time in the manor hall. She brought gossip and tales from old Impiltur and told them with colorful flourishes. In a private moment, she told Ondeth that Suzara had officially dissolved the marriage and remarried a Theskan merchant. Ondeth never told Faerlthann, but afterward Minda’s presence in the Obarskyr manor became more frequent.
Until one day when she didn’t go home at all, and the morning brought spirals of black smoke rising from Mondar’s homestead.
The wizard appeared as they were laying Mondar’s corpse atop the others. Suddenly he was there, at the corner of the glade, as if he had just stepped out of the woods. For years Ondeth bad thought that the spell hurler walked through the woods, until finally he noticed the bending of light around the wizard when he first appeared. The mage arrived by wizardry and probably did not walk anywhere.
The passing decade had changed Baerauble not a whit, he was still lanky and emaciated, his hair and beard unbroken auburn. He carried a heavy, gnarled staff now, but Ondeth never saw him use it for support.
As the elf-friend approached, the Silvers and others pulled back. Several laid hands on their blades, ready to draw them if the wizard showed any sign of menace.
Ondeth and Faerlthann held their ground. The older Obarskyr nodded to the mage and spoke quietly. “Were you involved in this?”
“Not directly,” Baerauble replied, his face haggard and worn. Faerlthann noted that no shock chased across the wizard’s features as he glanced at the heap of corpses. “You need fire?”