"Nothing at all?" I said without looking around, as if commenting on the weather.
"Not a sound. Not even us, and our post is just a stone's toss up the street. Curious, I think." The speaker paused, perhaps sizing me up. "If you were a friend of this gentleman, you have my sorrow and sympathy. Nonetheless, I ask that you please do not touch anything until we've completed our investigation."
His condolences lacked something-a sense of heart, I thought. He was unmoved, disinterested. I calmly turned around. A short, lithe figure in gold chain mail and green cloth stood idly by the now-open front door. A three-foot metal watchman's rod hung lightly in the gloved fingers of his right hand. His curly black hair was the color of his high boots.
A halfling watch captain. A tall halfling, though. He came up to my sternum.
"My friend's house," I said. "We were going to have dinner."
"And your name is…" said the halfling.
"Formathio," I said. "Formathio, of Rivon Street."
"I thought I recognized you," the halfling said, nodding slightly. "You gave a talk for the watch officers last year on illusions and contraband. Your advice came in handy." He glanced past me at the Gondgunne on the floor. "Will you assist me in resolving this sad matter?"
I realized I was still holding the bottle of Dryad's Promise. I set it down by the wall beside me. "Of course," I replied. Of course I would.
"You must forgive my manner as we proceed," the half-ling said as he abruptly walked over and passed by me with a measured tread, his eyes scanning the darkening room. It occurred to me that he, like me, was having no trouble seeing in the poor light. "I never mean to be rude, but I wish to get to the heart of a problem as swiftly as possible." He suddenly looked up at me, chin high. "I am Civilar Ardrum, by the way."
He looked away again before I could respond. "Tell me about your friend, the Yellow Mage," he said, looking at the bloodstained floor and Gondgunne.
I collected my scattered thoughts. "I met him five years ago, when he came to Waterdeep from the south, from Lantan. I did a security check for him, of this house, and we became friends. We got together every so often to talk over things, to trade gossip about the order, trade spells and-"
"The Order of Magists."
"Yes, Magists and Protectors. He was… Snorri was…"
My thoughts came to a dead end. It hit me. I'd just said was. Snorri was really dead. For good. Forever.
Strange, I thought in my shock, that I have no intention of crying. How odd of me, and sad. My best friend is dead, and no one cries for him. I breathed the knowledge in, over and over again.
I don't know how long I was lost like that. When I looked up, Civilar Ardrum was eyeing me curiously. The room was almost completely dark.
"We should have light, if it will not bother you," he said. With a last look at me, he reached down and pulled open a pouch on his belt. A moment later, bright light spilled out of the pouch across the room. He lifted an object like a candle on a stand and placed it on a nearby shelf beside a brass paperweight. Clean white light streamed from the top of the short stick.
"Better," said the civilar. He pulled off his gloves, tucking them into his belt. "We have much to do and little time. I believe that the Yellow Mage's murderer may be about to flee the city, if he has not already done so. If you have any powers to aid our investigation, please tell me now, and let us begin our work."
"Murderer?" I repeated. I was doubly stunned. "His murderer?"
"Did I not say that no one heard any sound from this place?" The halfling was clearly irritated. "Yet he lay, clearly shot by an explosive projectile weapon. A girl selling scent packets found his door ajar and looked in, summoning aid. Five washerwomen gossiped outside not two doors from here for half a day and heard no sound of struggle, no explosion, nothing at all. As silent as a tomb, one said of this place. Yet the Yellow Mage died not earlier than noon. No wizard leaves his house door open and unlocked, even on the hottest day on the safest street. Do you?"
I opened my mouth-and closed it. "No, never," I said. Inside, I was still thinking murderer.
The halfling officer nodded with slight satisfaction. His manner was oddly comforting even if he was as empa-thetic as a stone. I looked around at the shelves, the furniture, the fish on the wall. A murderer had been here. "I received my training in the college of illusion," I said automatically, like a golem. "I worked for the watch ten years ago, then apprenticed myself and set up my own security-counseling business." I thought, then said, "To answer your earlier question, I believe I do have talents to lend you."
"Good." Civilar Ardrum knelt down to look at the Gond-gunne. He put his watchman's rod on the floor beside him, then pulled a small bundle from his pouch, unwrapped another magical light stick, and set it on a tabletop to his right. White light and doubled shadows filled the room. "You said you were once a thief, Formathio. When you gave your lecture last year."
"Yes." I added nothing, continuing to scan Snorri's jumbled possessions for missing or out-of-place items. I greatly disliked talking about the mistakes of my youth and how I'd paid for them. "The'knowledge has since helped me greatly in my business."
"So I would imagine. What were you hiding for your friend?"
I stopped and turned to the civilar. He was still examining the Gondgunne, though he had not yet touched it. "What?" I shot at him.
The halfling snorted impatiently as he looked up. "Any secret you hold keeps us from finding the murderer. I would think you would want justice and vengeance done as quickly as possible, and so send your friend Greathog Snorrish on to a peaceful rest."
Ardrum's remarks awoke a rage within me. Who was he, the little snot, to tell me that I… what?
"He told you his name?" My rage burned out in an instant, snuffed by yet another shock. "He never told anyone-"
And a new truth dawned.
Civilar Ardrum's lips pressed into a flat line. He looked up at me without blinking. He'd said too much, and he knew it.
"He worked for you," I breathed. "He was a watch-wizard. A secret watch-wizard." I understood now how Snorri always had ready gold for the best wines and foods, though he had so few spells and so little business from the order for retail spellcasting. But why had he never said anything to me about his work?
Ardrum looked down at the Gondgunne once more and was silent for a while. "He was very valuable to us," he said at last, without inflection. "He kept an eye and ear on various persons and groups, and he reported to the watch what he saw and heard. He was reliable in the extreme, always eager to serve, with a tremendous memory. He reported directly to me."
I felt I was losing my grip on the real world. I almost became dizzy. "Snorri was an informer? Who was he spying on? What did-"
"Formathio, I believe I asked you a question," Ardrum interrupted. "You helped him hide something. I must know what it was and where it is now. Answer me, please." The "please" was shod in iron.
I stared down at the watch captain, then turned toward the line of stuffed fish on the wall. I raised a hand toward them without warning and intoned a handful of words quickly, gesturing as if brushing away a fly.
The images offish faded away like blown fog. In place of each was an apparatus of wood and metal, most slightly shorter than my forearm from elbow to fingertips. They rested on hooks and struts on the wooden plaques that had once held dead carp, greenthroats, and crownfish.
It was Snorri's toy collection.
Though I had heard them called arquebuses, cavilers, or other things, Snorri called them gunnes or Gondgunnes. He acquired them from various specialty traders in his old country, Lantan. He thought the word "gunne" was a recent corruption of the name of Gond, the Lantanna deity called Wondermaker or Wonderbringer by the faithful. Gond oversaw inventions, crafts, and new things, and the inventive Lantanna had recently discovered the fine art of enchanting smoke powder and making "fiery arms" that spewed out small lead or iron bullets with outrageously loud reports. It was a magic that made my insides curdle, a weird and subtly frightening thing that simply fascinated Snorri.