His last sight before the darkness moved them across Faerun was of Varra standing in the crooked doorway of her dilapidated row house.
CHAPTER 4
Cale, Magadon, and Jak materialized on a deserted side street in Selgaunt's Foreign District. The bustle of a thriving city hit their ears. Cale pulled up his hood and the three companions walked out of the alley to find themselves on Rauncel's Ride, one of the main thoroughfares of Selgaunt.
Selgaunt's plenty contrasted starkly with the ruin and deprivation of Skullport.
Shop after shop lined the broad, paved avenue, their doors thrown open, their proprietors offering seller's smiles at the passersby. The typical mix of travelers, traders, merchants, mercenaries, adventurers, pickpockets, laborers, and beggars populated the walkways. Horse-drawn carts, noble coaches, and humble farmers' wagons loaded with grain and other foodstuffs rolled along the cobblestone streets. Livestock lowed and grunted from roadside pens. A squad of Scepters, Selgaunt's city watchmen, walked amongst the milling crowd, eyes alert for thieves. Each wore black leather armor and a silver-hilted blade, with a green weather-cloak thrown over the whole. Out of habit, Cale avoided eye contact.
Children darted between the pedestrians. The call of street vendors filled the air, rising above the general rush of the crowd to hawk everything from dried flowers to three-day-old bread.
The afternoon sunshine did not quite offset the coolness of the brisk autumn wind. The air carried the faint tang of Inner Sea salt, horse manure, and the aroma of cooking meat. Everything looked, sounded, and smelled exactly as it always had, but Cale could not quite shake the feeling that Selgaunt was different.
Walking beside Cale, Jak said, "Not a slave in sight. Nice to be home, eh?"
It struck Cale then.
Selgaunt was not different; Cale was different. Worse, he was not sure the city was his home anymore.
"Cale?" Jak prodded.
Cale kept his brooding to himself and said to Jak only, "It is good to be back, little man."
Though he knew it would sting his skin, he decided to pull back his hood and endure the sunlight. He could not spend the rest of his life hiding from the sun or he would end up like the majority of Skullport's skulkers-pale shadows slinking furtively through the darkness. He wondered how Varra had maintained her dignity while living in such a sunless pit; he wondered, too, what she would think of Selgaunt, gleaming in the sunshine. Thinking of her reminded him of their kiss. He could still taste her lips. It took real effort to put thoughts of her out of his mind. He tucked the stump of his wrist into his cloak pocket and walked along.
"This is a different city than Starmantle," Magadon observed, eyeing the people, high fashions, and elaborately architectured buildings of Selgaunt. "Quite different."
Cale nodded.
In Starmantle, still more or less a frontier town, buildings and fashion were designed to be functional. In Selgaunt, one of the most sophisticated cities in the Heartlands, buildings and fashion were styled to be stunning. Wooden buildings with simple architecture predominated in Starmantle, while in Selgaunt, fully half the buildings were made of stone or brick, and almost all of them had one kind of architectural flourish or another. In fact, an architecturally ordinary home or shop in Selgaunt was a sign of tastelessness at best, financial distress at worst.
"Bit different from Skullport, too," Jak said, and there was no mirth in his voice.
"Truth," Magadon said somberly.
Cale said nothing, merely looked out on the sea of pale faces around him. He had little in common with them anymore, if he ever had. They were human; he was a shade. He wondered if he would happen upon anyone from the Uskevren household: Tamlin, Shamur, or. . Tazi. The thought summoned a pit in his stomach. He could imagine how they would look upon him now that he was. . transformed. Nine Hells, even Jak sometimes looked at him with fear in his eyes. Only Varra and Magadon looked at him like he was still a man, and Cale suspected that was because both of them knew darkness almost as well as Cale.
He pushed the maudlin thoughts from his mind and distracted himself by focusing on the passersby, noting weapons, movements, glances. He had not lost his trained eyes, and he picked out the professionals with satisfying ease. The thieves were apparent enough to him that they might as well have been wearing a uniform.
And something else was apparent to him, too-shadows. He was as conscious of the location of shadows as he was of his own hand-those cast by people, by buildings, by carts. They were his tools now; he was connected intuitively to the dark places around him. The realization both comforted and disquieted him.
"I think I'll purchase a new hat," Jak said, eyeing with admiration the wide-brimmed wool cap perched atop the head of a fat merchant with a ratty moustache. The little man doffed his filthy and torn hat and slapped it against his thigh, then replaced it on his head. "Mine is a little road worn. Some new clothes, too, maybe." He eyed his burned pants with dismay.
"We should re-equip entirely while we're here," Magadon said. "Rations. Field gear. Arrows for me. I'll handle that. I assume we won't remain long, Erevis?"
Cale did not know, so he shook his head. "We will see, Mags. It depends on what we can learn."
They had very little to go on. The Sojourner had mentioned the Eldritch Temple of Mystryl but the reference meant nothing to Cale. He thought he knew someone who might be able to help-Elaena, the High Priest of Deneir in Selgaunt. She had healed Jak once, when he had been wounded by a demon, and she, along with all priests of Deneir, valued lore and lost knowledge. She might have heard of the Eldritch Temple. Cale hoped she would remember them and agree to assist.
"Surely we'll be here at least long enough to clean up?" Jak asked. "I mean, look at you two. You look like you've been swimming in a sewer."
Magadon smiled. "We have been swimming in a sewer. And you look little better, Jak Fleet."
Jak grinned, doffed his cap, and bowed.
Cale agreed with Magadon's assessment. Skullport was a sewer, and its stink still clung tenaciously to his clothes, to his skin, to his soul.
"We ought to fill our bellies, too," Jak said, warming to his subject. "Roadtack and conjured food can sustain a halfling only so long."
Magadon nodded at Jak and smiled. "Especially this halfling."
"That's truth," Jak said, and patted his stomach. "Venison, I say. Or pork."
"Hot beef stew," Magadon said.
Cale forced a smile and nodded agreement. He knew that recent events had left a mark on his friends. Over the last few hours-hours, he thought, marveling that so much could have occurred in so short a time-they had fought the Skulls of Skullport, barely escaped a collapsing cavern in the Underdark, journeyed to and from the Plane of Shadow twice, and fought the most powerful spellcaster and mindmage that any of them had ever encountered. Jak and Magadon looked drawn, wrung out. Their banter told Cale that they needed to engage in something ordinary to remind them that all was not slaves, shadows, spells, darkness, and danger. Walking under the sun on the streets of Selgaunt, they looked as relaxed as Cale had seen them in a tenday. They needed human activity. Strange that Cale did not feel the same need.
"Let's take a meal now," Cale said to accommodate his friends. "And gear up. Afterward, we will call on Deneir's temple."
"Elaena," Jak said, nodding. "A good thought. Worth a die cast. But as you said, food first. So follow me. I know a place."
The halfling turned off Rauncel's Ride and led them a few blocks to a clapboard-sided tavern and eatery called The Workbench, frequented by watermen and laborers. Oars, a rusty anchor, and various old tools hung from the walls. The thin tapmaster took in their appearance, wiped his hands on his apron, and frowned. When Cale flashed platinum the man grew immediately solicitous.