“The Iron War Crown? From the vaults?”
“The vaults. They say Vangey’s frothing, for to get it out of there without triggering all of his personal warning-wards, the thief must be one of the Obarskyrs-or one of us. ”
Tathanter whistled. “Oh, that’s going to be sweet! Tantrums of Mystra, if he’s going to be mind-reaming every last one of us, the kingdom’ll go to the rutting dogs!”
“Pretty much,” Malvert agreed bitterly. “I caught just a touch-a stray edge-of one of his mind-probes once, that time he came after Talarla to find out who she’d been sneaking out at night to kiss and cuddle-remember? — and I thought I was going mad. My head hurt for days, and every few paces I took, memories kept tumbling out of nowhere and flooding my eyes. All I could see was them, not what was really around me. Couldn’t sleep, kept seeing Vangerdahast smiling, skeletons tumbling out of shadows or reaching for me, their grinning skulls always looking like Vangerdahast…”
“Mal! Enough! Say his name that often and you’ll have him down here reaming us for real!”
Malvert nodded quickly. “Sorry. Shouldn’t have… you really have no idea how horrible it was. I only have to think of it… Now, after all this time…” He clawed the air in a great sweeping away of something unseen, and added briskly, “So, would your wagered coins be on one of us, a bored Obarskyr playing at pranks or a parlor cult for nobles… or a sinister Obarskyr?”
“One of us, I’m afraid-though any of your royal alternatives sound far more entertaining.”
“Huh. No disagreement here. Remember the last scandal? Queen Fee’s mysterious stalker?”
Tathanter chuckled. “Aye, and I remember who it was, too. Alusair the toddler, spying on Mummy to learn how to be a queen! How humiliating for our Imperious Leader! I thought he was going to vomit up a litter of kittens on the spot, all down his royal magicianly robes!”
“Well, Vangey evidently remembers that too. For now, he’s not mindbursting all of us, but setting us all to hunt for the Arcrown. He seems to think it may have found its way to Arabel, so accordingly, I bring you your bright new orders.”
“The Dragon you do! What about our morrow-night card game?”
“If we’re lucky, we’ll be playing it with the Acting Captain of the Watch of Arabel, a-”
“A watch officer? They’ve got us working with guilty-if-I-don’t-like-you watch stoneheads now?”
“Well, he’s really a Purple Dragon ranker: the king gave secret orders a few years back, it seems, that thanks to the everlastingly rebellious tendencies in Arabel, all watch officers in that fair city be Purple Dragons, and so right under his thumb-”
“Huh. And we know which cunning royal magician was behind that, don’t we?”
“Aye, I doubt not. But Vangey’s cunning hand or not, this acting captain’s hight Taltar Dahauntul, and I’m told he-”
“Ah, yes, the stalwart Dauntless!”
“Hey?”
“ ‘Dauntless,’ everyone calls him. He seems to like it, and uses it himself now, too. Duke Bhereu once called him that: ‘dauntless in pursuit’ or some such thing, and the name stuck. He’s all right. A little grim and ‘it be against my sworn duty to laugh at anything,’ but then they all are. Old Thunderspell’s orders say anything about what wands and such we’re supposed to take?”
“No,” the inkwell under Tathanter’s nose said with some asperity, in a voice that made both war wizards freeze into instant gape-mouthed silence, their faces going pale, “but I’m on my way down to you two mirthful gossipers, to rectify that. Remain right where you are, though if you feel the need to wet yourselves, the potted plant by the window is quite dead; you can use its pot. Oh, and Doarmond: both merchants penned untruths into their little missives to you, but Harmantle is the one who should see a dungeon cell before the night is over. I’ll see to that. Both of you are going to be rather busy.”
“Sometimes it seems as if I’ve been walking in the forest with you forever,” Narantha mused, “yet it’s been just a few days. And this is our last? I don’t want it to end, now.”
“I’m afraid this must be our last,” Florin said. “Delbossan will be mad with worry-he’s probably been searching day and night since he lost you, and must be raving and reeling by now for lack of sleep. If he’s dared to tell Lord Hezom, there’ll be scores of men out searching for you, and if he hasn’t, Hezom will probably have sent riders south to see what’s delayed Delbossan. And if any war wizard has got wind of what’s befallen, your parents will know by now, and they’ll be tearing the Royal Court apart chamber by chamber getting Purple Dragons out of their barracks and onto horses and up here at fast gallop!”
Narantha made a face. “I don’t want Lord Hezom’s teachings. I want… oh, I don’t know what I want. I-”
Florin whirled and put two fingers over her mouth. “Be silent,” he whispered, and cocked his head to listen.
“Wha-” Narantha shut herself up and strained to hear whatever Florin was so intent on hearing. They were in deep forest, carpeted in dead leaves and great green ferns, with the huge trunks of shadowtops and duskwoods soaring up all around them like dark columns. There were ridges ahead, and beyond them the forest seemed lighter, as if more sun reached down through the trees there.
There came a very faint clink of metal on metal, and Florin turned to Narantha with a fierce warning to keep utterly silent blazing in his eyes. Then there came a slightly louder, lower rattling and whirring noise. Florin sank down to his knees, drawing the noble lass with him.
“Hear that?” he whispered into her ear, his breath as warm as a candle flame. “That’s a windlass: a crossbow is being winched ready to fire. No forester around here uses crossbows, nor do Purple Dragons.”
“Outlaws?”
Florin nodded grimly. “Most likely. Yon sunlight ahead is Hunter’s Hollow, where the Way of the Dragon runs through the forest, ’twixt Espar and Tyrluk. Well suited for an ambush.” He wagged a stern finger in her face. “Stay here and keep quiet. No screaming, unless someone or something is rearing over you, about to take your life.”
“You’ll leave me undefended?”
Florin slapped a dagger into Narantha’s palm, his eyes as iron-hard as its steel, and said grimly, “I must. This is what it means to love Cormyr. Above all else, serving the realm before oneself…”
And with that fierce whisper trailing behind him, Florin crawled ahead, swift and nigh-soundless on his hands and knees. Trotting, then slinking, then trotting again. Just like the panthers Lord Huntsilver liked to loose in his gardens, to keep thieves away from his revels-and to keep his guests inside his mansion, rather than slinking out into the night to tryst and make shady trade deals, or depart early with some of his more handsome candlesticks and painted cameos. Narantha stared open-mouthed at Florin; he seemed, right now, more beast than man.
She watched him rise up like a vengeful shadow on her side of a tree, just this side of the first ridge, and peer cautiously around it in the lee of a low, leaf-laden branch. At that moment there was a sharp snap, then another. A horse screamed. There were shouts of angry alarm, the ring of swords being drawn in scabbard-nicking haste-and Florin took off around the tree like an arrow, sword in one hand and dagger in the other, all stealth abandoned.
Narantha stared at where he’d vanished, over the lip of the ridge, then hefted the dagger he’d put into her hand, set her mouth in a determined line-and hurried after him.
Chapter 8
Glory always has a price, and that cost is almost always paid in copiously spilled blood.
Harbunk Jhelliko
One Halfling’s Wisdom published in the Year of the Wanderer
N arantha ran hard. Outlaws. Gods above, she and Florin might both be dead a few breaths from now!
“Mother,” she gasped aloud, “Father… forgive me for all the upsets I’ve caused you, all the disappointments I’ve occasioned, all-”