After two or three minutes of incessant hammering, the door was suddenly thrown open from within. Ontrodes, dressed in a wine-stained robe, stood there, rubbing his eyes blearily as he stared at Jack. "What harm have I ever done to you, you impudent whelp? Have you not done enough? What is it to be now?"
Jack paused and rubbed the heel of his hand, somewhat sore from pounding on the sage's lintel. Ontrodes stared at him with undisguised contempt, even anger, but that of course was to be expected when waking the old codger in the middle of the night.
"Wise Ontrodes, what has become of your domicile? What catastrophe befell your noble residence?"
The sage's face darkened into a drunken, bitter anger so vehement that Jack took a step back. "You ask me what became of my tower? You ask me? By Gond's wondrous brass balls, Jack, do you think that I find anything amusing about this? I am a peaceable man, a man of wit and learning, but I swear by Cyric's black heart that if I ever catch sight of you again, I will pull off your head and defecate down your throat!"
With that the sage slammed his door so thunderously loudly that two more stones jutting out from the maimed wall of his home clattered down onto the rubble, and the door-latch flew from its place to land in the mud at Jack's feet.
"That," thought Jack, "was not the expected result of this conversation."
He walked in a small circle, thinking hard. Ontrodes was clearly incensed-no, enraged-at him, but he still needed shelter and he did earnestly desire to understand exactly what he had done, other than waking the man in the middle of the night, that could possibly have earned him such vitriol. He wrapped his arms around his torso and stamped, growing chilled in the damp night air. The old dwarven bottle was round and warm in his coat pocket.
Gingerly, Jack stepped up and rapped his knuckle on the door. "Ontrodes!" he called softly. "I do not know how I have caused you such anger, but I would dearly like the opportunity to make amends. I have brought you a distillation concocted by old Cedrizarun himself, seized just yesterday from the jaws of a dragon in the Guilder's Vault! Please, allow me to make a gift of it to you!"
The sage snuffled and grunted in his cottage, but remained silent for a long time. Jack began to fear that he might not reply at all, but finally the door creaked open again.
"I do not believe you," the sage said through an inch-wide gap, "and there is no liquor on the face of the world that could possibly atone for the wrong you have done, but, just for the sake of curiosity-show me."
Jack withdrew the dark bottle from his coat and held it up for the sage to see. "I found it in Cedrizarun's tomb," he said quietly. "Look at the bottle. It matches precisely the bottle Zandria showed you, does it not?"
"You probably stole it from her, poured out the contents in ignorance, and filled it with swill," Ontrodes said, "but the bottle itself may be valuable. Give it to me!"
"First, wise Ontrodes, noble Ontrodes, I wish to know: Why are you angry with me?"
The sage's face reddened, but with the prize suspended before his eyes, he managed to retain a deadly calm. He waved one hand at the wreckage of his tower. "Is it not obvious?"
"You believe that I caused the collapse of your tower?" Jack snorted in amazement. "Ontrodes, the tower was decrepit. It might have fallen for any number of reasons. I certainly had nothing to do with it."
"Oh? I thought that the magical blasts you used to destroy the beams holding up the second floor hastened my tower's demise considerably!" Ontrodes snapped. "How can you stand there pretending innocence, when not six hours past you were dancing around my crumbling home, singing those inane, insulting limericks and hurling blast after fiery blast into my very home! Why, if I hadn't thrown myself out the window of the study, I would have been killed!"
"I have no memory-" Jack began, and then he halted. Of course he didn't have any memory of wrecking the sage's tower, because he did not do it. But was it not possible, perhaps even likely, that his shadow had been here instead? "Ontrodes, believe this or not, but it is the truth: Two days past I discovered that I have a sinister and malicious copy at large in the city, a spiteful fellow who wears my likeness and apparently delights in tormenting my friends and acquaintances. My doppelganger wrought the ruin of your tower."
The sage merely blinked at him. "You expect me to believe that? What an incredibly convenient explanation!"
"I had thought I might call on you and ask for shelter for the night," Jack continued, stroking his beard, "but now I see that I have need of your professional services too. Here, I freely offer you this rare and exceedingly valuable dwarven brandy by way of apologizing for my counterfeit's uncouth actions." He handed the sage the bottle from the Guilder's Vault and then stepped inside, easily avoiding the old man's groggy attempt to impede him at the door. He would have gone straightaway to the sage's study, but that of course no longer existed, so he turned instead into Ontrodes's kitchen and drew up a chair by the hearth. "Now what are the means by which some villain might copy one's appearance or create an evil duplicate of a person?"
The sage stood by the doorway, bottle in hand, still grappling with the fact that Jack had eluded him and was now ensconced in his kitchen. "Come back tomorrow with one hundred pieces of gold, and I'll consider your question. Until then, Jack, I want nothing to do with you."
"Sample the brandy, then. It is Cedrizarun's work. A chance to savor it should be worth a thousand gold crowns, let alone a hundred."
"I expect that you have simply poured more Sembian horse piss into this noble vessel, hoping to deceive me in that manner," Ontrodes rumbled, but he complied.
He took a pair of sturdy tongs from a hook on the wall and carefully broke the seal of the bottle, removing the cork with surprising deftness and care. Then he held the bottle to his nose and inhaled.
Ontrodes's bloodshot eyes flew open wide, and his mouth fell open. He stared down at the bottle in frank amazement and then inhaled again.
"I do not know if this is Cedrizarun's work or not," he whispered, "but it is surely an old, mature, exquisite and potent dwarven brandy. There can be no doubt of that! Jack, I might almost find it in my heart to forgive you the destruction of my home." He hurried to find a suitable glass.
Jack smiled. "As I said before, what are the means by which a person might copy someone's appearance or create a duplicate of the target for nefarious ends?"
Ontrodes poured a dram of the golden liquid into a fine tall glass on the sideboard. Jack used a minor cantrip to do the same for himself, bringing his glass dancing through the air to his hand. The sage glared at him, but Jack had been careful to help himself to the merest portion.
"I am not an expert in these matters," the sage said. "My learning lies-"
"I know, I know, Ontrodes. Liqueurs, cordials, wines, and brandies. I seek your advice in this matter fully cognizant of your limitations."
"Fine, then. I can think of five principal methods on first examination: spells of illusion, spells of transformation, magical items permitting the same, the natural abilities of certain monsters such as doppelgangers or demons, and simulacra or clones. There may of course be other means."
"Could we narrow the field by limiting the means to those that would copy abilities other than sheer physical characteristics? For example, personal knowledge or magical ability?"
"That is easily done. Illusions and transmutations do not generally confer any special knowledge or magical ability upon the person changed, nor do magical devices duplicating their effects." Caught by the question, Ontrodes thought for a long moment. "I have heard of doppelgangers that could copy such things, but only by slaying the target and devouring his brain."
"We can rule out that one, thank the gods," Jack said.