“Djeserka,” Marek said, “is it true that you once apprenticed to the man who built this vessel?”
Djeserka seemed surprised by the question, but gathered himself quickly and nodded.
Marek smiled, stomped a foot on the polished mahogany deck, and said, “Fine workmanship. Do you know its name?”
“She,” Djeserka answered, “is Heart of the Heavens.”
Marek laughed and said, “A strange custom that, referring to boats and ships as ‘she’ and ‘her.’ I’ll never understand why that is.” He looked at Kurtsson and winked. “We should start calling wands ‘she.’” The Vaasan chuckled.” ‘She’s as good a wand of fire as any created in the workshops of forgotten Siluvanede.’”
Aikiko laughed along though Marek could tell she didn’t really understand the joke. Willem looked out at the water with an unpleasant grimace. He didn’t seem to enjoy being out in the water, or could it be that he didn’t enjoy the reason. Marek didn’t care either way.
“Well,” the Red Wizard said, “on to the matter at hand, yes? We’re on our way to the site of the canal that we’re certain will one day link the Lake of Steam and the Nagaflow and on and on, talk, talk, talk. It’s an undertaking that I argued strenuously against when it was first presented to me. It’s something that I felt would have a profoundly negative overall effect on the city-state.”
He paused and smiled. Kurtsson at least knew that Marek had no interest in the overall effect that anything but his own trade in magic items might have on the city-state, but the others seemed to accept his words well enough.
Of the four of them, Willem looked the least interested. He appeared unwell, his skin was pale and deep, dark bags hung under his eyes. Somehow he was no less handsome. His eyes darted around, never focusing on anything for long. Marek couldn’t tell if he was drunk, frightened, or both.
“This whole thing was the work of one man,” Marek continued. “For all intents and purposes he’s a renegade from Cormyr who came to Innarlith with selfish designs. He had his way with our fine city-state for longer than he should have been allowed, indulging in his own desires without care for the greater good.”
Marek paused again, happy to see that Willem, Aikiko, and Djeserka seemed to be caught up in his disingenuous oratory. Kurtsson was more concerned with an errant cuticle, but then he was the smartest of the four.
“I’m happy to say that as time went on I changed my opinion of the canal itself,” Marek said. “I’m now of the mind that it will be a crucial part of the future of trade not only in the fair city-state of Innarlith but throughout the coastal regions of Faerun. What has changed is who will build it, and how it will be built.”
Aikiko smiled and clapped her hands in front of her mouth like a schoolgirl. Kurtsson raised a disapproving eyebrow at the gesture. Djeserka stared at Marek with a blank expression, waiting patiently to hear the rest of it. Willem grew more and more upset with each passing breath.
“You will build it,” Marek said. “You fournot one man alone, but a group of political-minded individuals who can bring different skills and various strengths to the endeavor. This is too big, and too important a job to be left to one man and his costly hubris.”
He watched Willem squirm at that.
“How it will be done,” the Red Wizard went on, “is through the careful and liberal use of the Art. Where once there was a small city of men employed to sweat and dig, there will still be some men, but alongside them will be workers of a less fragile nature. Where previously there was employed a dangerous mix of rare earth elements that but for Tymora’s gracious whimsy would surely have killed hundreds of innocent laborers, there will be predictable spells cast by responsible and experienced mages supervised by Kurtsson and supplied by the Thayan Enclave.”.
Marek paused one last time to take a breath and gauge their reactions. Nothing had changed, Aikiko was still the happiest, Kurtsson the most prepared and stoic, Djeserka the least intelligent, and Willem the most terrified.
“You will finish this,” Marek said, “by the command of Ransar Salatis, and with the aid of the Thayan Enclave, for the good of the people of Innarlith. Don’t bother to tell me you accept the responsibility. I know you do.”
He smiled, fended off Aikiko, who tried to embrace him, and watched Willem run to the rail and vomit over the side.
52
17 Flamerule, the Yearof the Shield (1367DR) The Sisterhood of Pastorals, Innarlith
Warm today, isn’t it?” Surero said to the girl who ladled soup into his bowl.
She glanced up at him, and he smiled as wide and as brightly as he could. The expression caught her eye, but she didn’t return his smile.
“Thank you, Sister,” he said.
“I’m not a sister,” she replied. She spoke with a thick accent that the alchemist couldn’t immediately place. “Not a proper sister, anyway.”
“Your accent,” he said. “You’re not Innarlan.”
She shifted her eyes as if ashamed, at least for a fleeting moment, and said, “I am Thayan.”
“Have we met before?” he asked, before he’d even thought to say it. She didn’t really look familiar, but there was something about her…
She shook her head, her blue eyes narrowed, and she seemed to try to place him but couldn’t.
“My name is” he started, but was interrupted by a nudge to his shoulder.
The man behind him in line, a rough-looking middle-aged sailor with skin like centuries-old leather was impatient for his soup.
The girl handed Surero his bowl and said, “Please accept this with the prayers of the Pastorals that you will find your way under the blessed eyes of the Earth Mother.”
He’d heard her say precisely the same words to the men in line in front of him.
Surero took the soup and said, “May I have one more, for my friend?”
“Aye, missy,” the old sailor grumbled, “and I’ll be needin’ a dozen fer me crew.”
The old man broke out in gales of toothless laughter, and Surero laughed a little with him. The girl appeared embarrassed.
“I’m sorry,” Surero said, “but it really is”
She silenced him with a wave of her hand and poured another bowl of soup for him. When she handed it to him she smiled.
“Thank you, Si” he stopped himself”sorry.”
“Halina,” she said. “Please accept this for your friend with the prayers of the Pastorals that he will find his way under the blessed eyes of the Earth Mother.”
“Halina,” he replied, “thank you.”
“Aye,” the old sailor cut in again, “thanks be to ye an’ yers, and now maybe the rest o’ us can sup a bit, eh?”
Surero shared another smile with the pretty Thayan girl, took the two bowls of soup, and made way for the rest of the hungry men. As he walked back to the table he tried to imagine that she was watching him go, but in truth he couldn’t feel her eyes on him. The exchange had lifted his spirits some, and he was still smiling when he set the soup bowls down on the table.
“Thank you,” Devorast said as Surero sat. “I could have gotten my own.”
“Think nothing of it,” the alchemist replied. “I thought I’d spare you the blessing. I know how you feel about gods, priests, and prayers.”
“Why the smile?” asked Devorast.
Surero blinked. Though it would have been a perfectly normal question from just about anyone else in Faerun, from Devorast it made Surero’s head spin.
“Why the smile, he asks me,” Surero said. “All right, then, Ivar, it was a girl.”
Devorast began to eat his soup, giving no indication that he was listening at all.
“You know, like people, only female?” Surero said.
“I’m familiar with the species,” Devorast replied between bites.
Surero wanted to laugh, but it caught in his chest. He took a deep breath as a wave of anguish washed over him. Sweat broke out in strange places on his body. When he looked down at the soup, his stomach quivered, and he couldn’t imagine eating it.