Beldar smiled grimly at his reflection in the tall robing room mirrors-a smile that froze when a grim thought smote him: The Dathran had said nothing about the sort of men he'd lead nor the nature of his great and unknown destiny. Did not scoundrels require leaders more than honest men? Had he taken his first step to lordship over rogues and villains?
Frowning, he swept down the back stairs and out into the street. He knew not what he sought, aside from trouble. He'd welcome another chance at that half-dragon-or Hoth, for that matter. And this time, he'd fight his own battle!
"I am Beldar Roaringhorn," he proclaimed in a self-mocking murmur as he turned a corner, hand on hilt, "and 'twere best, m'lord, if you feared me."
A Watchman lounging in the lee of a greathouse gate-pillar waiting for a certain personage to obligingly step out of that gate to be arrested, overheard that murmur, and rolled his eyes before carefully not smiling. Young idiot.
He would have been more than surprised to know that for all his grandly carefree air, Beldar Roaringhorn agreed with his assessment.
Not knowing this, the Watchman had to settle for being surprised to notice a halfling in leathers the hue of mottled gray stone-and with hair to match-stroll along the street after Beldar, pausing briefly here and there to admire carved faces on pillars and grand ornaments on iron gates, but glancing repeatedly at the young noble.
A bit old and small for a cudgel-thief. Ah, but perhaps the elder Roaringhorns had hired a "vigilant eye" to see where their young lance went and what he got up to… yes, that must be it.
It must be pleasant to have coins to waste on such matters. Heh, if he came into gold, he'd find better uses for it! Fine horses, hunting hounds, perhaps a lodge on the verges of Ardeepforest where he'd guest friends for days a-hunt and nights of loud, laughing revelry. Warm fires, games of dice and cards, plenty of sizzling roasts and cold ale to wash them down with-and pretty lasses to serve it all, aye!
He went on thinking such thoughts long after his memories of Beldar Roaringhorn's passage faded.
Sun or starlight, Waterdeep never slept. Beldar's aimless stroll had taken him into Castle Ward and past the Palace, where the hurrying throngs were always thickest. The streets were busier than usual, but as he turned into Sea Ward, he looked back, as was his wont, to admire the lamplit Palace, standing forth proudly from the rocky flank of Mount Waterdeep.
Descending its magnificent stone, his gaze fell upon a small, gray-clad figure. Nothing unusual about an aging halfling walking a street in Waterdeep; as Taeros never failed to observe, they were scarcely in short supply.
Ha ha. Yet when he turned a corner nigh Myarvan the Minstrel's gaudy mansion, glanced idly back again, and saw the same halfling, Beldar grew thoughtful.
He knew no hin personally-not beyond nodding and handing coins to those who worked in shops he frequented. Beldar was obviously armed and just as obviously young and strong, so no skulk-thief would think him easy prey.
Easily spotted, yes, and thus easily known. Moreover, known to the gossips of Waterdeep as an idle young blade, not the Roaringhorn heir, and hence worth no ransom, nor likely to be carrying serious coin. So this was a spy rather than a thief… but for whom? Who had reason to follow Beldar Roaringhorn?
Who but Golskyn of the Gods and his surly son?
Hmmm. The most likely culprits, yes, but they'd hire no halpfling. Their sneak-eyes would be a human with some beast claw or tail hidden under-cloak.
Well, he'd take an unusual route and so make certain this was a spy.
Beldar turned onto one of the paths-stairs, actually-cut into the flank of the mountain, ascending to the City wall. Too narrow and windswept to be used by the Guard, who had their own tunnels inside the mountain, safe from winter sleet and summer storms, this sparsely lamplit way was mostly used by folk desiring to hold long conversations in relative privacy, such as shady traders and lovers. Thankfully, there seemed to be a shortage of both at the moment.
Perhaps a hundred steps up, Beldar stopped and looked back. The small gray figure was right behind him, hurrying now that concealment was impossible.
Beldar came back down the steps to meet his shadow. "You have business with me?"
The halfling's reply was to hurl a small cloth bag at Beldar's face-a bag that flew open as it came, spilling sand in a flurry intended to blind. Beldar leaped up and back, catching his heel on the next step and almost falling as he came down hard.
A second bag was already bursting blindingly across his gaze, its onrushing hurler behind it.
Beldar raced a few steps higher, whirled as he snatched down his eyepatch-and glared at the hin.
The running halfling faltered. Beldar drew his sword from its scabbard and took another careful step up and back, his eyes never leaving the halfling's face.
That face wore a deepening horror now, staring back at him with eyes going wild. Suddenly, the hin whirled to flee.
Beldar flung his sword under the blur of gray boots, and the little spy crashed to the steps, bouncing with a loud gasp.
Beldar sprang down the stair like a hungry wind. Before the hin could roll to its feet, the Roaringhorn seized a gray shoulder, clawed the winded spy over, and glared into the sharp-nosed, paling face.
A small hand tried to snatch at a belt-dagger, but Beldar was ready for that and slapped it away, hard.
Winds rose around them as the man and the halfling stared into each other's eyes-Beldar smiling grimly as the hungry warmth arose in him… and the halfling sagging into slack-jawed darkness as Beldar's beholder eye worked its wounding magic.
"Who are you working for?" Beldar snarled, pinning the spy against the steps and thrusting his head forward until their noses were almost touching. "What were you after? My life?"
"N-nay," the dying halfling whispered. "Something you stole, high and mighty lorrrr…"
That last word became a gurgling rattle, and the flickering light in those doomed eyes faded.
Leaving Beldar Roaringhorn holding a dead halfling on the side of Mount Waterdeep in a cold, rising breeze-and uncomfortably aware of the City Guard lookouts somewhere above and behind him and the watching city spread out below.
Stunned, Beldar cradled the body of the hin as if comforting a chilled friend.
He'd just murdered someone. In the space of a few breaths. A stranger, who didn't seem to be carrying anything more than two daggers-just small knives, for all their wicked sharpness. Someone trying to recover something he, Beldar, had stolen?
That made no sense. The gauth whose eye he now possessed was dead, sliced into dozens of bloody cantels to yield up eyes and innards to the Amalgamation. Beyond that, Beldar couldn't think of anything he'd taken, beyond a few kisses at the Slow Cheese, before…
Before everything had fallen, and Malark had died.
Beldar shivered and thrust the halfling away from him. Head lolling, the body started to topple. In sudden horror Beldar caught hold of it and arranged it hastily in a lounging position on the steps. The head lolled over again.
He put it back in a reasonably lifelike pose, and it slowly lolled to one side. Again.
Sickened, Beldar stood up, fetched his fallen sword, and hurried on up the steps, trembling in revulsion. He'd just done murder.
So swiftly, so easily.
"Gods," he whispered aloud to the wind, "what have I become?"
Behind and below him was a city full of mages and priests who could snatch secrets from the newly dead, Watchmen who arrested murdering young lords, and black-robed Magisters who pronounced sentence with the full force of Waterdeep's laws…