"Zandria, should I throw him out?" the swordsman-Brunn-asked. He moved into a menacing position directly behind Jack..
"No. Beat him within an inch of his life, and then throw him out."
Brunn's hand came down on Jack's shoulder, and the powerful fighter started to haul the rogue out of the chair. "Nothing personal," he grunted. Pinning Jack with his iron grip, he drew back his other hand to begin the pummeling.
"I've solved Cedrizarun's riddle," Jack said conversationally. He tried not to shrink from the impending blow. "And I know how to find the Guilder's Tomb."
Brunn furrowed his brow. He had a heavy jaw and a flat, square face that might have looked dull-witted except for the keen alertness in his hard blue eyes. "Zandria, you've been trying to make heads or tails of Cedrizarun's riddle for weeks now. He says he can help. What's the harm of hearing him out?"
"You don't know him like I do," she snapped.
"So? Who is he, anyway?"
Zandria just crossed her arms. Brunn shrugged and turned to Jack. "Fine. So who are you, anyway?"
"I am Jack Ravenwild. I am an adventurer like yourself, although I am currently between companies. I have some learning, some skill at difficult places, and some magic." He carefully extricated himself from Brunn's grasp and fished out the copy of the tomb inscription from his belt. He held it up so that the swordsman could see it. "I'll tell you how to read this if you consent to my presence on your upcoming expedition and agree to cut me in for a fair share of the Guilder's loot."
"That's it," the mage growled. She stepped around the table and stalked up to Jack, murder in her eyes. "There is no arrangement, no employment, no consulting fees. We want nothing to do with you, do you understand me? Now get out of here before I flay the skin from your worthless carcass!"
Jack flinched from her vitriol. He stood in silence for a good minute, weighing her words. Then he nodded slowly. "Very well. I shall not trouble you with my presence again, my lady." He rolled up the parchment and stuck it through his belt. "If you'll excuse me, I have an appointment with the mage Skellar the Unjust, of the Company of the Dead Troll. Perhaps he'll be interested-"
"Stop right there," Zandria whispered in a deadly voice. "You will not show that parchment to anyone else."
"Then allow me to show it to you," Jack replied. "Bring me your bottle of Maidenfire Gold."
"That brandy is worth a thousand gold crowns," Zandria replied. "I am not going to let your larcenous hands get within ten feet of it."
"Then you might as well cut my throat right now!" Jack roared. " 'At the center of all the thirty-seventh!' Do you want to know what that means or not?"
The mage eyed him coldly. Thinking, then she spun on her heel and stormed out of the room, returning a moment later with the ancient bottle, almost black with age. She set it on the table in front of him without another word.
Jack took the parchment and spread it flat beside the bottle. "See this exquisite border work? Leaves, vines, a curiously undwarven design? Why do you suppose it is there?"
Behind him, the swordsman shrugged. "Cedrizarun was a distiller and vintner," he said. "Not all dwarves work in stone and steel."
Jack took the sheet of paper on which he'd copied the rubbing and turned back to the bottle. " 'At the center of all the thirty-seventh, encircled by these leaves of autumn."' He looked carefully at the bottle; it was spun glass that had been shaped while warm, pressed and sculpted with a relief showing dimly a field or farmland. The same design was repeated four times around the bottle's circumference-the field under winter snow, spring plowing, summer with high waves of grain, and autumn reaping. The sun shone down over each scene. " 'Mark carefully the summer staircase."
Using the sun over the summer scene as his starting point, Jack wrapped the parchment clockwise around the bottle. The distance that the sun stood over the field he used as the rise of the winding.
The inscription fit exactly three times in circumference. And it inclined just enough that the bottom border overlapped itself, revealing a faint line of dwarf-runes concealed amid the leaf design. "Bring me some sealing wax," Jack said softly, holding the parchment in his hands. Zandria stirred and retrieved a block of red wax from her work desk, muttering a small cantrip to soften it. "Now adhere the sheet to itself at just this position. I will hold it steady." The mage did so, frowning in concentration as she worked around Jack's hands.
Gingerly, Jack released his grip and stepped back, leaving the bottle standing on the table in its parchment wrapping. He bent low to study the runes without touching or displacing them, Zandria's face just beside his.
"Another message," she breathed in wonder. "Ten paces south. Speak 'kharaz-urzu.' Raise the sevenstone."
Jack stood up straight and grinned in delight. "Shall we discuss terms?" he said.
CHAPTER SEVEN
They settled on two of eleven shares for Jack, which was better than he had expected. Zandria's adventuring company included five other full partners, each entitled to a full share. She claimed three shares as the leader of the band. The remaining share was set aside to split between several men-at-arms and specialists retained by the Company of the Red Falcon in order to shore up its numbers for the recovery of a major hoard from the depths of lost Sarbreen. Zandria was willing to assign Jack one share for solving the puzzle, but refused to consider more than that until he promised to share in the company's risks and labors by participating in the expedition.
Even then, Jack thought that the mage agreed too quickly. Upon leaving the company's headquarters, he went straightaway to Anders and Tharzon and began planning the operation by which Zandria's band would be relieved of the burden of managing their newfound wealth. And he also set the Northman to watching Zandria's band night and day, expecting that she would be tempted to use the knowledge he'd provided without actually observing every detail of their agreement. In Jack's experience, a quick assent in any negotiation of this sort meant that the other party had decided they could get what they wanted by more expedient means.
That attended to, he returned to his apartment to prepare for the day's more significant event-the exchange with Elana. He'd been thinking of her more and more frequently as this day approached, until he found himself almost shaking in nervous anticipation as sunset neared. He bathed and dressed with care, selecting clothes that marked him as a serious professional, a man confident in his own abilities, a man who got what he wanted by hard work and hard choices.
Elana was a trained swordswoman, a woman versed in discipline and confidence; she had no patience for fops or dandies, but a fellow thief, daring but not boastful, businesslike but not mercenary… who knew what might happen?
"After all," Jack told himself in the mirror as he shaved, "it would be a matter of common sense to make it as easy as possible for the lady to uphold her end of our arrangement."
Jack dressed in plain black with a padded doublet of glossy leather and well-brushed boots that matched handsomely. He disdained any flamboyance, covering his head with a simple cap and sheathing both rapier and poignard on his left hip in the Vilhonese style. Then he disarmed the numerous traps he'd set over the Sarkonagael's hiding place, wrapped the heavy tome in plain burlap, and stuffed the whole thing into a leather pouch secured to his shoulder.
He sallied forth an hour after sunset, turning up his face to the fine mist that hung in the air. More spring rain-a sign of turbulent weather to come. Yellow lanternlight gleamed on the wet cobblestones, and Burnt Gables was quiet save for the occasional carriage clip-clopping by in the damp night.