They advanced just far enough so that the torch lit the dark comers of the room. Tessali braced his hands on his hips and, being careful to avoid looking at what lay piled on the tables, stood in the heart of the light.
"We're pursuing a tiefling sorceress and a bronze-armored warrior."
A rutterkin stood, ripping a hunk of meat from a haunch of flesh that looked slender enough to be elven, and glared directly into Tessali's eyes. There was no other response.
"If you'll tell us where they are, we'll retrieve them and be gone," Tessali said. "They're barmies, both of them, and quite dangerous."
This drew a chorus of wispy teeters. One of the Mercykillers drew his sword and stepped in front of Tessali, pressing the blade to the throat of the rutterkin who had risen to mock the elf.
"The Factor asked you a question, berk."
The rutterkin calmly raised a misshaped arm and placed his bare hand over the blade. "Uh… et ur… mood air… ut brey… feast."
The rutterkin's words were so slow and thick that it took the Amnesian Hero a moment to puzzle them out. By the time the Mercykiller had done likewise, Tessali had pulled the fellow away and pushed him back toward the door.
"We're here for everyone's good," the elf said. "We are not looking for a fight."
"Then leave," croaked Brill.
Mateus whirled on the slaad. "At first glance, some of that meat seems human. You wouldn't want me to take a closer look, would you?"
Brill squared his massive shoulders. "Imported. Scavenge it from the Blood War myself."
"And I suppose you have the permits to prove that?"
Brill's gulp was audible even. through the storeroom door. His beady eyes darted toward the tiny chamber. Mateus took the torch and began to lead the procession toward the storeroom.
The Amnesian Hero hissed a quiet curse.
"What is it?" Jayk whispered.
"Brill betrayed us," the Thrasson whispered. "Get ready."
He reached for his sword and felt Jayk's hand on his arm. "Brill did not turn stag. It is part of the bob."
The tiefling pulled him through the darkness to the back comer of the room, guiding him into a hiding place between two large casks. In the next instant, the warped door flew open and Mateus, with one of the Mercykillers close behind, charged across the threshold.
Their torch hissed and went out at once. The Amnesian Hero heard a brief purl of water, then two splashes and a pair of gurgling screams. A musky river smell filled the storeroom, but even that faded almost before the Thrasson had identified it.
"What happened?" It was Tessali. "Light!"
The sleepcaster uttered a brief incantation, then the tavern was flooded with a brilliant sapphire light that shone from the blade of her dagger. It was difficult to say whether Tessali or the Amnesian Hero was more surprised to find the rutterkin surrounding what remained of the elf's party.
"Lut… toe… bite!"
A rutterkin snatched the glowing dagger from the sleepcaster's hand, then tossed it into the storeroom. This time, the doorway filled briefly with swirling black currents, and again the purl and musky smell of a river suffused the air.
"Time for you to leave, elf," croaked Brill.
The Amnesian Hero peered over a cask and saw the murky outlines of the rutterkin stepping aside to let Tessali pass. The elf led his party back to the door, then managed to garner his courage and stop. His face was barely visible in the purple candlelight.
"I know they came in here – a human and a tiefling. I'm not leaving until I know what happened to them."
Brill's arm arced through the dim light, swinging toward the storeroom. "They went through that door, just like your guards." He croaked several times, chuckling. "Go ahead. Take a look."
A wave of sibilant snickers rustled through the tavern.
"Your humor is not appreciated." Despite his words, the elf turned a thoughtful eye toward the storeroom. "And you may be assured the Harmonium will return to inspect your licenses."
"There is no reason for that." The voice, that of a human female, triggered one of those vague sensations of familiarity that sometimes troubled the Amnesian Hero. A chair scraped in a dark corner, then the woman continued, "I have been sitting here for several hours, and I can assure you that the ones you seek are not here."
Tessali turned toward the voice, which seemed to be approaching the counter. "And who are you, milady?"
"A woman alone and in distress."
A tall, statuesque beauty clothed in a simple white gown walked into the dim light. With glistening olive skin, high cheeks, and proud emerald eyes, her face was as regal as it was stunning – and it was one the Amnesian Hero knew as well as he knew his own.
"Perhaps you would be kind enough to escort me to a safer part of the city?" The woman glanced around the dark room as though surprised to find herself in such a place. "I seem to have lost my way."
The Amnesian Hero slipped from his hiding place and crept forward, barely able to hold his tongue. Jayk grabbed his arm and pulled him back, then gently closed the storeroom door.
"Zoombee, what has happened to you?" she hissed. "We're almost safe!"
The Thrasson pressed his eye to the peephole. "It's her! The woman who appears-" He almost whispered 'when I drink wine,' but caught himself and said instead, "The one I know from before!"
"Pah! That cannot be."
In the main room, Tessali was rubbing his chin and studying the woman with a thoughtful air. "This is a bad district for a woman of your… appearances. How did you come to be here?"
The woman shook her head, her expression dazed. "I cannot – I honestly don't know. I was at home, then this."
"Yes, perhaps you should come with me." Tessali wrapped an arm around her shoulder, then glanced at Brill. "Is her account settled?"
Even the slaad could not think quickly enough to make a profit from her unexpected appearance. He only shook his head, croaking, "Didn't know she was here."
"Good." Tessali motioned for his remaining guard to open the door. "We'll be going."
"No," gasped the Amnesian Hero.
He tried to pull the door open, but found it blocked by Jayk.
"Zoombee, don't be a fool!"
"I can't let him take her!" the Thrasson whispered. "She knows who I am!"
"What is she doing here? How did she find you?" Jayk demanded. "This woman, she must be a sleepcaster's trick."
"Out of my way!"
The Thrasson pushed Jayk away, then remembered the portal and fumbled around in the darkness until he found the wine. He returned to the door and jerked it open, but by then Tessali had already taken the woman and left. The Amnesian Hero raised the jug to his lips, then rushed across the threshold, leaving both the amphora and his tiefling guide behind. Dabus
Dim has fallen over the city. It would be wrong to call it dusk; there are no rays of sunlight fanning up from the skyline, no silverlit clouds hanging low over the horizon, no deepening hues of blue spreading across the heavenly vault. There is only the waxing gray gloom, spilling from the alcoves and niches of the city's hundred-thousand hovels, spreading over the scum-coated cobblestones, rising like a ground fog to fill the avenues with a thickening ashen murk. In Sigil, we have no twilights before the dawns, no endings presaging fresh beginnings, no deaths begetting new births; we have only that eternal ashen instant that follows what was and precedes what will be, that wavering gray span that separates the dying and the death.
Once the Amnesian Hero has dodged past the rutterkin tables and dashed by Brill's gloomy counter and burst from Rivergate's doors, it is into this gray eventide that he stumbles. Already has the street filled with the scuttling denizens of the night: bustling, dark-cloaked figures who melt into the shadows as suddenly as they emerge. Already has the throng swallowed Tessali and the white-gowned beauty, carried them into the ashen gloom and swept clean their trail. Already has the Thrasson lost his quarry and his good sense as well; he will go after the woman, search her out in winding lanes he has never walked.