"The only trouble lies in persuading Zandria to accept a renegotiated deal," he said aloud. "She probably cares little for the gold itself, and is far more interested in acquiring the magic in my possession; Red Wizards are like that. It might be useful to make sure that Anders and Tharzon are nearby, in case she is unusually resistant to the notion."
Without further delay, Jack departed the Ladyrock and set off in search of Anders and Tharzon. Both Northman and dwarf hadn't seen much reward for their labors in Sarbreen, so an opportunity to enjoy a cut should be welcomed by both. He decided to call on Anders first, taking the ferry over to Bitterstone and then heading north into the Temple District. The streets were crowded with workers heading home after a long day's labor, women scurrying out to purchase something for the stew pot, and gaily dressed rakes and ladies beginning the night's revelry a little early. Jack liked crowds; they provided him with a comfortable anonymity and plenty of opportunities.
He followed Blacktree Boulevard all the way through Holyhouses and Gowntown to the Market District. Anders rented a small room in the shadow of Purtil's Tower, a ramshackle structure of stone and rusted iron that comprised the city's oldest water tower. Jack turned east on Broken Bit Lane and then north again into the narrow alleyway winding almost beneath the dilapidated columns of the water tower. He crossed a small, sodden courtyard strewn with garbage and climbed up the wooden staircase that zigzagged across the back of Anders's building. The Northman lived in a very modest room on the uppermost floor.
He had just set his foot on the topmost stair when the deluge struck. From the water tower's flank fifty feet above, a great torrent abruptly broke loose. Metal groaned and stone creaked ominously as tons and tons of water poured out of the torn side of the tower and fell atop the boarding house where Anders lived. Jack was washed back down the stairway, striking step after step until he caught himself halfway down and found his feet again.
"Catastrophe! Calamity!" he cried in astonishment. "What now?"
As if in response to his question, the roof of Anders's building gave way beneath the weight of water falling from the tower overhead. Jack recalled that it was not much of a roof in any event, a frail structure of wooden shakes that admitted freezing drafts in wintertime and clouds of noxious insects in warm weather. The cascade of water continued from the breached tower, filling the upper floor faster than it drained away to the floors below.
The entire building groaned horribly. Inside, beams cracked beneath the watery assault, and the boarding house started to lean noticeably to Jack's right. The rogue hurried down the stairs and dashed out into the open courtyard to get clear of the failing structure. Rivulets of water ran past his feet.
"Anders!" cried Jack. "If you can hear me, run for your life!"
At that moment the Northman's door on the uppermost floor burst open, revealing the tall warrior. Anders Aricssen was soaked to the skin, and a torrent of water followed him out of the doorway. He was burdened with a double armful of whatever possessions he'd managed to gather up. Without ceremony Anders hurled his valuables from the porch. Then he caught sight of Jack in the courtyard below.
"You fiend!" he shouted. "You backstabbing, underhanded wretch! You whelp of a she-goat and a goblin! If I-"
The Northman was interrupted by watery disaster. The boarding house sagged over entirely on its side in a rumble of falling timber and a gush of water from every window. The wooden stairs collapsed like matchsticks, leaving Anders comically suspended in midair for one brief instant before joining the general ruin of his home. A wave of water half a hand high washed over Jack's feet where he stood, rooted to the spot in amazement. The torrent pouring out of Purtil's Tower slowed to a stream, then a drizzle, and finally a drip.
Jack looked up, craning his head to study the side of the water tower. Dozens of neighbors and passersby stood gawking at the scene, just as he was, but atop the tower he caught sight of a familiar black-clad figure-his shadow!
"It seems my twin has a great liking for mischief," Jack muttered.
The dark figure leered down at the ruined building, white teeth flashing in a fierce grin, and then vanished from sight. Jack sighed and doffed his cap, wringing water from it. Jack approached the sodden wreckage of Anders's house carefully, looking for any sign of the Northman.
Anders was pinned under a tangle of heavy wooden beams that should have killed him outright, but some fluke of chance had left him mostly unharmed from the building's collapse. Battered, bruised, and dazed, the Northman stared up into the sky, speechless.
"Good Anders, are you all right?" Jack said, picking up a board and heaving it aside. "Can you speak?"
"When I can stand," Anders said from beneath the rubble, "I mean to rend you limb from limb."
Jack paused in his efforts to extricate his friend, and surreptitiously rearranged the wreckage to hinder Anders if he suddenly tried to get up. "What offense have I given you?" Jack said slowly, although a terrible suspicion was forming in his heart.
'What offense have you given me? What offense? You have ruined my house and inundated my belongings! You came within a whisker of killing me! What offense have you given me?" Anders howled in rage and struggled to find his feet again, shrugging off hundred-pound timbers like matchsticks. "I am going to tear off your arms and beat you to death with them, O very prince of dung beetles!"
Jack backed away cautiously. "Anders, I should take this opportunity to advise you that I have been illicitly copied. For the last three days, a dark and sinister copy of me has been prowling the city, causing all kinds of mischief. I am afraid that the scoundrel has wrought the destruction of your house. I had nothing to do with it."
"You don't recall taunting me not ten minutes ago? Calling me an unwashed barbarian and promising me a bath? Twisting my nipple and pulling my beard?" With each exclamation the Northman heaved another board out of the way, drawing closer to freedom. "I take great pride in my personal hygiene, Jack. I swim every day. I am hardly unwashed, and I did not need a bath!" Anders staggered to his feet, bruised and bleeding, eyes burning like coals.
"Anders," said Jack, "how am I dressed?"
The Northman kicked a broken step out of his way and closed on Jack. In fact, Jack was dressed handsomely in red and yellow, with a plumed cap and a blue velvet waistcoat. Anders halted, squinting at the rogue.
"Ten minutes ago you wore gray and black. When did you change?"
"As I said, I am plagued by a duplicitous doppelganger who delights in harrying my friends. Two days past he pulled down Ontrodes's tower. Today he visited you. Believe me, the minor inconvenience you have suffered in the loss of your home and the destruction of your personal property is nothing compared to the lasting damage the villain has inflicted on my good name and honorable reputation."
"If this is some kind of trick-" Anders growled.
"Anders, would I stand here before you and tell you a story of such an outlandish nature if it were not strictly true?"
The Northman glowered. "I suppose you are going to tell me that you had nothing to do with the fire started in the Smoke Wyrm yesterday by someone answering to your exact description? Or the shameful fashion in which noble Tharzon's beard was dipped in flammable wax first, so that he ran down the street with his head on fire until he managed to smother the flames by plunging his face into a filthy mud puddle in the middle of Manycoins Way?"