Wyn nodded his agreement and fell into step beside his friend. Silverymoon’s Spring Faire always culminated in an open-air concert on the vast grounds of Utrumm’s Music Conservatory. The school was a fine one and justly famed, built as it was upon the remnants of an elder barding college. All the finest bards had trained at the conservatory at one point or another in their careers, and the spring pilgrimage brought back most of them from all over Faerûn and beyond. Other entertainers came as well, to perform, to pick up new songs, or to purchase instruments. The final concert of ballads yielded an excellence and variety that was exceptional even for Silverymoon.
The skald and the elf made a strange pair as they elbowed their way through the milling crowds. Kerigan was heavily muscled and broad of chest, and he stood nearly seven feet tall on incongruously thin, bandy legs. His helm was decorated with a broad pair of antlers; that, his bulbous nose, and his whisker-draped jowls brought to mind an image of a two-legged moose. The skald sang to himself as he walked, and his voice was a fog-shattering bellow that harmonized perfectly with his uncouth appearance. Wyn’s progress through the crowd was silent and graceful, and his manner so refined that to all appearances he did not notice the stares leveled at his rough companion, nor did he seem aware of the admiring gazes his elven beauty elicited. Wyn possessed the golden skin and black hair common to the high elf people, and his large, almond-shaped eyes were the deep green of an ancient forest His ebony curls were cropped short, and he was elegantly turned out in butter-soft leathers and a quilted silk shirt the color of new leaves. Even his instruments were exceptional. In addition to his silver lyre, he carried a small flute of deep green crystal, which hung from his belt in a bag fashioned of silvery mesh.
The two ill-matched musicians squeezed into the courtyard just as the herald’s horn announced the concert’s beginning.
“Where’d you like to sit?” boomed Kerigan, his voice clearly audible above the crumhorn’s blast.
Wyn glanced around. Not an empty seat remained, and precious little standing room. He knew that this would not deter the brash skald. “An aisle seat, perhaps a few rows from the front?” he suggested, naming the area that Kerigan would have chosen regardless.
The Northman grinned and plowed forward through the crowd. He bent over two half-elven bards and whispered a threat The bards obligingly abandoned their seats, their faces showing relief to have escaped so easily. With a sigh, Wyn made his way toward the beckoning Northman. At least Kerigan had acquired the seats without drawing steel—probably a first for the Northman, noted Wyn with a touch of wry amusement.
Wyn’s face lit up when the first selection was announced: a gypsy ballad about a long-ago alliance between the Harpers and the witches of Rashemen. The tale was told entirely in music and dance, and few were the artists who could master the intricate steps and gestures that spoke as plainly as words.
Applause rang through the courtyard as the musicians filed onto the platform—small, swarthy people carrying fiddles, simple percussion instruments, and the triangular lutes known as balalaikas. The storyteller was a young Rashemite woman, tiny and fey, dressed as was customary in a wide black skirt and embroidered white blouse. Her feet were bare, and her dark hair had been tightly braided and wrapped crownlike around her head. She stood immobile in the platform’s center as the music began with a rhythmic, low-pitched plinking from the huge bass balalaika. At first the storyteller spoke only with compelling dark eyes and small gestures of her hands, but one by one the instruments joined in, and her movements quickened as she danced the tale of magic and intrigue, battle and death. The story-dancing of the Rashemite gypsies held a unique magic, and this woman was among the best Wyn had seen. Yet something about the performance struck him as not quite right.
The problems were subtle at first a misplaced gesture of the hand, a sinister note in the wailing of the fiddle. Wyn could not guess how this had occurred; the faire’s ballad performers were carefully screened, and only the best, most authentic storytellers were selected.
Within moments, Wyn realized that the classic tale had been significantly altered. The Harper theme, a wandering arpeggio that was usually played by the soprano balalaika, had been eliminated entirely, and the roguish bass tune that represented Elminster, the Sage of Shadowdale, had been twisted into a halting tune that suggested a doddering and inept menace. As the appalled elf watched, the dancer’s steps faltered, then picked up the thread of the story. Faster and faster she whirled, her bare feet flashing as she followed the new telling.
Wyn tore his gaze from the stage and glanced up at Kerigan. If the skald noticed anything other than twirling skirts and bare legs, it didn’t show in his broad leer. The troubled elf searched the crowd, expecting to see outrage on the faces of more discerning bards. To his astonishment, every member of the audience watched the ballad with smiles that spoke of enjoyment and, even more disturbing, recognition. When the gypsy dance ended, the assembly burst into huzzahs and enthusiastic applause. Beside Wyn, Kerigan whooped and stomped in loud approval.
The elf sank low in his seat, too stunned to join in the applause or to notice when it ended. A sharp jab from the skald’s elbow brought Wyn’s attention back to the stage, where a chorus of beautiful priestesses sang a ballad extolling Sune, goddess of love. Wyn noted that this ballad had also been altered.
On and on the storytelling went, and each ballad was vastly different from the ones Wyn had learned in the bardic tradition, passed down unchanged throughout generations of bards. Yet not once did Wyn see any other bard display the slightest sign of distress. The rest of the concert passed like a dream from which he could not awaken. Either he had gone mad, or the past had been rewritten in the minds and memories of hundreds of the Northland’s most skilled and influential bards.
Wyn Ashgrove was not sure which prospect frightened him more.
One
In the very heart of Waterdeep, in a tavern renowned for its ale and its secrets, six old friends gathered about a supper table in a cozy, private room. Thick walls of fieldstone and ancient beams muffled the sounds coming from the tavern kitchen and the taproom beyond, and in the center of each of the four walls stood a stout oak door. On each door was a lamp that glowed with faint blue light. The lamps, magical devices that kept any sound from leaving the room, also barred inquisitive mages from scrying in. In the center of the chamber was a round table of polished Chultan teak, and the deeply cushioned and well-worn chairs around it spoke of many long, comfortable visits. A dome of pale, incandescent azure surrounded the supper table, ensuring that no words would pass the magical barrier. In a city whose lifeblood was equal parts gold and intrigue, multiple privacy spells were not unusual. In all, the scene was common enough; the friends were not.
“I learned of this just last evening,” said Larissa Neathal, a striking red-haired woman who, despite the early hour, was draped in white silk and ropes of pearls. She circled the rim of her wine glass with one slender finger as she spoke, idly coaxing a clear, ghostly note from the singing crystal. “I was entertaining Wynead ap Gawyn—a prince of one of those lesser Moonshae kingdoms—and he spoke at length about crop failures on one of the islands. The fields and meadows for miles around Caer Callidyrr withered mysteriously, almost overnight!”
“That’s a misfortune and no mistake, but if it doesn’t touch Waterdeep, we haven’t spare tears to shed,” observed Mirt the Moneylender, folding his arms over his food-stained tunic in a gesture of finality.