Welcome to Skullport, Sojourner, projected Azriim, when Vhostym allowed his son to sense the psionic contact. The arsehole of Faerun.
Vhostym went directly to the point and asked, Have you located the provenience of the mantle?
We continue to observe the activities of the Skulls, Azriim answered. We believe the answer, if there is one, can be learned there. You are certain that another chamber survived the destruction?
I am, Vhostym said. And it will be near the main chamber. The mantle could not exist without a focus. It is there.
Few knew that the mantle magic protecting Skullport was Netherese in origin. Still fewer had deduced-as had Vhostym-that a cavern entirely separate from the city itself must contain the magical focus of the mantle, the source from which the mantle emanated. It was in that focus that the seed of the Weave Tap was to be planted.
Vhostym suspected that the Skulls, Skullport's magical guardians, after whom the city had been named, had magically shrouded the chamber in which stood the mantle's focus. Accordingly, he had provided his brood with wands that would give them the ability to deal with any wards cast by the Skulls to disguise the mantle's origin. They had only to find its general locale.
Vhostym would have searched for it himself-after all, Skullport was underground-but his body was deteriorating, despite his spells. Besides, the Skulls would have immediately sensed his presence. Though he knew that he could destroy Skullport's guardians with relative ease, he was not yet ready for direct confrontation. The mantle could be damaged in the process, or worse, the Chosen drawn to the site of the conflict.
No, implanting Skullport's mantle with the seed of the Weave Tap required planning, stealth, and misdirection-Azriim's strengths. Vhostym would leave the implementation of that part of the plan to his eldest son. Azriim's reward for success would be transformation to gray.
Use the teleportation rods with caution, he projected to Azriim. Be especially cautious before teleporting within Skullport. Teleporting from one location in the Underdark to another location in the Underdark can sometimes have unpredictable results.
Azriim's mental voice, fat with insolence, replied, Your concern touches us all.
Vhostym resisted the urge to cause pain to his impudent son.
Continue your efforts, he instructed Azriim, then he broke off contact.
The rush of anger caused by Azriim's impertinence sent shooting pains along his thin body. He clutched his staff and mouthed the words to a spell that dulled his body's ability to feel pain. With effort, he calmed himself.
He already had waited centuries; he could wait another tenday, another month. His brood would find what he had sent them to find, and he would have the Crown of Flame before the end.
CHAPTER 5
STARMANTLE'S SHADOW
After everyone had awakened, Cale related what he'd learned of the Weave Tap from reading the tome. He didn't mention the silken mask he'd found within its pages, nor did he mention the fact that he'd slept perhaps two hours but no longer felt tired.
"So it's an artifact?" Jak asked, drawing thoughtfully on the pipe he always smoked upon waking.
Cale could only relate what he'd read, and didn't purport to understand it all.
"It is, but it's also a living thing," Cale said. "You saw it, little man. Shar's priesthood made it, or found and nurtured it, after the fall of Netheril as a way to spite Selune and the newly-birthed Mystra. Its roots extend into the Shadow Weave, while its limbs reach into the Weave proper."
"The warp and weft of magic," Jak said from around his pipe stem.
Magadon sat cross-legged in the gloom with his fingers steepled under his chin. His wide-brimmed hat cast his face in darkness.
"What does it do?" asked the guide.
Riven coughed and spat-as much the assassin's morning ritual as Jak's smoking-and asked, "Why do we care?"
Jak blew smoke Riven's way and shook his head in disgust.
Cale chose to ignore Riven and looked at Magadon when he said, "It siphons the magic of the Weave, magnifies it, and makes that power usable by the mage who possesses the Tap."
"How?" Jak asked.
Cale shrugged and answered, "The tome did not specify the method."
"Those slaadi were no mages," Riven observed.
"No," Cale agreed. "But I'll wager their master, this 'Sojourner',
is."
To that, Riven said nothing, merely studied his hands.
"If so, the Sojourner could be scrying us now," Magadon said, looking up into the starless sky.
Jak shook his head.
"I don't think so," the halfling said, and frowned at his pipe, which had apparently gone out. "Divinations do not seem to work in this place. At least mine don't. I'll wager he cannot scry us here. Besides, he may have no interest in us anymore. He might think we're dead at the bottom of the Moonmere. Why scry for the dead?"
The guide acknowledged Jak's point with a tilt of his head then asked, "What do we think this Sojourner wants to do with the power of the Weave Tap?"
Cale shrugged, chewed some trail tack, then said, "No way to know."
" 'Additional variables,'" Jak added, quoting Sephris, the chosen of Oghma and ostensible madman who had prophesied their fate, albeit in mathematical riddles. The halfling tapped the ashes from his pipe and stuffed it back into his belt pouch. "Whatever it is, we can be sure it's not good." He glared at Riven. "And that's why we care, Zhent."
Riven scoffed, stretched, and said, "Speak for yourself, Fleet." He paused for a minute then nodded at the belt pouch into which Jak's pipe had vanished. "You have an extra one of those?"
Jak, eyebrows arched, asked, "What? A pipe?"
Riven nodded.
Jak nodded back, shared a perplexed look with Cale, then took his spare pipe-a plain, wooden-bowled affair-from a belt pouch. He tossed it to Riven along with an extra pipeweed tin and a tindertwig.
"Keep it. And that's good pipeweed from Mistledale," the halfling said. "Don't waste it."
Obviously familiar with the paraphernalia, Riven tamped, lit, and began to smoke without saying a word. Cale's astonishment must have shown on his face.
"You've never seen a man smoke?" Riven asked him.
"I've never seen you smoke," Cale answered.
Riven blew out a series of perfect smoke rings, gave a hard grin, and said, "And I've never seen a man with yellow eyes who can move from shadow to shadow. I guess this place is changing us all, Cale."
To that, Cale could only agree.
"We've got to get back," Jak said, "find those slaadi, and stop the Sojourner. No one else even knows what's happening."
"And no one else needs to know," Riven said from around the pipe. "Understood?"
Jak looked at the assassin as if he had turned green and asked, "What in the Hells are you talking about? Did the pipeweed go to your head that fast? We need help with this."
Riven drew on Jak's pipe, discharged the smoke from his nose, and looked to Cale, who sighed and nodded.
"This is our light, Jak," Cale said. "It's personal; it's been personal right from the start. We end it, no one else."
Jak's mouth hung open.
"Our fight!" the halfling said at last. "Dark and empty! This is big, Cale, bigger than us. That Tap is an artifact. We're talking about the Weave itself. This isn't some guild grudge we're settling. We need help. I know some people who..."
Cale stared at his friend and Jak grew quiet. Cale knew it was big, but he also knew it was his.