Residents of the City of Towers often joked that it took about an hour to get wherever you were going in the city, regardless of whether it was from one district to its neighbor or from Skyway to the Cogs. The truth of the matter was, of course, that it took however long the coach drivers decided it was going to take, and an hour was about what most people were willing to pay for before they started getting unruly.
Sure enough, the sixth bell was sounding throughout the city as the driver pulled up near the Bridge of Giants. Having lived in Xen’drik, which had once been the home to actual giants, Sabira always found the grandiose title of the massive stone edifice amusing. It might be large by human standards, but it would have been dwarfed beside a true relic of the Age of Giants, like the statue of the Emperor that stood guard over the Stormreach harbor.
Digging out gold from her pouch this time, Sabira stepped off the coach and was immediately enveloped in a fine mist that smelled vaguely of feet. She hurried over to the spiral wrought-iron staircase under the bridge and wound her way down, the wail of shardhorns and the scent of Thunderherder bacon rising up to greet her before she’d made it halfway.
The door to the club was guarded by hobgoblins in ornate armor, but the blades at their sides were practical enough, and Sabira found one pointed at the middle of her chest before she could so much as open her mouth.
“Name?”
She knew from experience that this wasn’t the greeting most of the club’s clientele got, but then most of them didn’t look like they’d gotten lost on their way down to the slums of Lower Dura, either.
“Sabira Lyet d’Deneith.”
The hobgoblin who’d kept his sword sheathed made a show of looking at the list he held in one clawed hand, but it was clear he had no intention of letting her in, whether her name was on it or not.
“Sorry. Better luck next time.”
Sabira gave the green-skinned oaf her most provocative smile.
“Are you sure there’s nothing I can do to get inside?” she asked, tossing her coppery hair over her shoulder coyly and licking her lips.
The bouncer with the list snorted indelicately, but the one with the sword lowered it an inch or two to get a better look, his fanged mouth widening in a lascivious grin.
“Show me what you’ve got under that shirt and we’ll see.”
Sabira’s smile widened.
“Oh, I was so hoping you’d say that.”
She reached slowly for the top laces of the simple tunic she wore over her armor. The moment the hobgoblin’s eyes focused there instead of on her other hand, she slapped his blade away and was inside his guard, her urgrosh out of its harness and its Siberys shard spear tip pressed up against the hobgoblin’s throat. Then she carefully pulled her Marshal’s brooch from underneath her armor, making sure the light of the club’s everbright lanterns caught its enameled surface so there was no missing the Deneith chimera it bore.
She held it up on its leather cord so the other bouncer could see it as well.
“I’m thinking maybe you might want to check the list again?”
The other hobgoblin didn’t even bother glancing at the paper in his hand. He pushed the club door open and waved her in.
“Welcome to the Glitterdust, Marshal. Enjoy your stay.”
Inside, the club was divided into two distinct areas. On the left was a dim dining area filled with wealthy patrons busily feasting on all manner of delicacies prepared by the House Ghallanda chef that the club’s owner kept on retainer. In addition to the Glitterdust’s signature bacon-wrapped shrimp, Sabira could make out the aromas of roast threehorn from the Talenta Plains, honeyed chicken in panya leaves, and even the distinct tang of dwarven ironspice drifting up from something that looked like it might once have been an alligator. But as tempting as the club’s menu was, Sabira turned her attention to the right and the lounge.
Even more poorly lit than the restaurant, the lounge boasted leather-upholstered booths and tables, a large dance floor already filled to overflowing and a stage on which the gnome Hart Brantby was currently performing with his band, the Jumping Horns. Luminous red and purple glitter snowed steadily from the unseen ceiling and in the sparkling light, Sabira searched for the card tables.
Though the Glitterdust didn’t officially sanction gambling, players in the know could always find a game here. Sabira had played here herself, and won big more than once. But tonight she was more interested in the players than the stakes.
She found two tables in the corner of the lounge farthest from the stage. At one, three elves were playing a game of Elements with the corresponding four-suited deck. Though it was popular among dabblers, true gamblers preferred the more challenging five-suited games, like her own personal favorite, Jarot’s Bluff.
The players at the second table were engaged in a regional variant of the game that involved progressive betting. It was a particularly aggressive form of Jarot’s Bluff that could yield enormous pots in a very short amount of time-and equally enormous losses. Breven’s letter of credit weighed heavy in her pack as she felt the familiar itch to join in the game, but she fought the urge, contenting herself with examining the players instead, wondering which of them could be Aggar’s friend.
None of them were dwarves, which made identifying the likely candidate a bit more challenging. Two of the players-humans-had respectable stacks in front of them, and a third-a female shifter-was not far behind. The last two players at the table, a gnome and a smallish warforged, looked like they only had half-a-dozen antes left between them.
As she focused on the two humans, trying not to draw any unwanted attention to herself, someone jostled her, and her hand closed reflexively around her pouch. She turned to see a heavily-muscled half-orc whose tattoos, ritual scarring, and mohawk identified him as a member of the Jhorash’tar clan from the Ironroots.
He was eyeing her shard axe with a derisive look.
“Funny,” he said, somehow managing not to lisp around those oversized tusks. “You don’t look like a dwarf.”
“Funny,” she replied in kind. “ You do.”
Implying that a dwarf might have mated with an orc was an insult so profound to both races that she was lucky there were no dwarves within range to hear it. As it was, the half-orc’s eyes went red, and she barely dodged the fist he sent sailing at her mouth.
So much for keeping a low profile.
She responded with a kick to the half-orc’s knee, which he couldn’t quite twist far enough to avoid, and she followed it up with an elbow to his jaw which probably hurt her more than it did him. As she shook her arm to relieve the shooting pain, the patrons at the surrounding tables scrambled away, going just far enough not to get hit by any bodily fluids. Sabira could already hear bets circulating; the Jhorash’tar was a ten-to-one favorite.
“You’ll pay for that, you Karrnathi whore,” the half-orc growled, spitting a mouthful of blood at her feet. Nice to see she’d done some damage, after all. Unfortunately, she didn’t really have time for a bar brawl, as fun as it might be to teach this buffoon some manners and watch a score of pampered nobles lose money because they were stupid enough to bet against her.
With a regretful sigh, she flashed her brooch.
“That’s ‘Sentinel Marshal Karrnathi whore’ to you,” she said brightly as a groan of disappointment went up from the gathering crowd. “So unless you want to spend the rest of the night in some dank little cell that smells like piss, with a roommate who probably smells worse, I’d suggest you go find someone else to lavish with your oh-so-considerable charms.”
The half-orc actually looked like he was considering his options for a moment, so she casually reached behind her and unharnessed her urgrosh.
“Do you have any idea what it takes for a human to be awarded one of these? No? Do you really want to find out?”