Bruce Cordell - Key of Stars

Anusha started. “Yes,” she said. “That’s a nice thought.”

After she’d awakened, jubilation had rippled through her body. She’d been flush with renewed life. And there he’d been: the object of her earlier infatuation and a symbol of the wider world denied her before he’d come into it.

But following their assignation in the cramped ship’s cabin, an odd shyness had fallen between them. Of course, he had his project since they’d come back to the mansion, which he’d taken on at her request. Its execution kept him busy day and night.

But it was more than that. He seemed reluctant to intrude, as if he was uncertain or having second thoughts.

No, she didn’t truly think Japheth was having second thoughts; the man had proved he would go to the Hells and back for her, that he would barter the world itself for her safety.

He wasn’t having second thoughts; he was waiting for her to make the next move. If so, then so far he had awaited to no avail, because she had not sought him out. She could not deny it-she was uncertain about the wisdom of forming an enduring relationship with the warlock.

For all Japheth’s allure and his proven dedication to her, Anusha’s basic quandary with him remained. Could she really allow herself to fall for a man who was addicted to demon drugs, and drew his power from pacts with nightmares?

Thoster slapped a handful of coins onto the board. “That enough for a down payment?”

“Aye, Captain. For starters,” said the short woman standing opposite him. “More’ll be needed for what we’ve already done to restore Green Siren to sailing trim, but this’ll pay for the canvas and lumber.”

Thoster nodded. He’d worked with the dwarf before. Karna Stonekeel was one of Impiltur’s most sought-after shipwrights. Her services didn’t come cheap because her dwarven crew worked quickly and efficiently. Ironic, he thought, that few of them ever sailed on the ships they built and renovated.

“Let me know the tally when you know it, Stonekeel,” he said.

“I’ll send a courier, special delivery,” she replied with a smile. “What in Umberlee’s name happened to her anyhow? Almost looks like Green Siren spent a few days ’neath the waves.”

Thoster grinned. “Something like that,” he said.

The moment he turned to depart, his easy smile slipped. The image of the beastly city hanging in the sky was never far from him.

Xxiphu had followed Green Siren to the surface.

Its wrongful presence had clawed at the air, pulling a cloak of storm around it.

He remembered how the surge around Green Siren intensified, so quickly the ship nearly capsized. More worrying was the strange music. A brassy, fluting, echoing melody glimmered just on the edge of hearing. In that sound, Thoster felt yearning. Something in him wanted to reveal itself to the music maker, but … that would have been crazy!

A many-armed mass broke the surface off Green Siren ’s starboard. A kraken. Perhaps Gethshemeth itself. It leapt from the water, but failed to fall back. The kraken heard Xxiphu’s call too. Some sorcery held it aloft while its will remained bent on the city of aboleths. The undulating sea monster took up station around the storm-wrapped city, circling it with erratic loops.

Thoster screamed orders over the tempest, commanding the crew to bring Green Siren around. If they hadn’t got her prow turned into the surge when they did, the ship probably would have capsized. He’d ignored the music. None of his crew had heard it, nor apparently had the half-elf. Raidon had retained his place on the pitching deck, standing at the center of a half-obscured magic circle, his features slack.

The ship shuddered into its new facing as a wave burst across the bowsprit. The wave lacked the energy the captain had feared would swamp Green Siren .

Thoster remembered it as if he were on the pitching deck again …

Thoster glanced up. Xxiphu was rising farther into the sky. As it moved, it pulled the storm with it.

“Thank the Sea Mother,” murmured the captain. He let one hand fall across his amulet. The music yet played, still calling to Thoster. But what Seren had fashioned for him retained its charm. Thoster was free to ignore the call.

The question was, who was the caller? The crazy half-elf had prevented the aboleths from waking their progenitor. Could the Eldest yet reach out with such strength despite not being entirely conscious? Perhaps. Thoster could count all the things he knew about half-divine legendary beings on one finger: stay clear of them. Still, the music, growing dimmer as the awful city continued to recede, had a grasping, intelligent nature to it that Thoster didn’t ascribe to the Eldest. Xxiphu sought something. An object. It was … right on the tip of Thoster’s tongue.

The captain blinked.

The memory swirled away as the present intruded. He was standing on a busy New Sarshell walk outside the shipbuilder’s office. People jostled him as they went about their day.

“Damn me, I thought I drank enough rum last night to erase that memory,” the captain said.

A man gave him an odd look as he passed.

Thoster chuckled. He said, louder, “Guess I’ll try again tonight. The key is to not accept half-measures! The key …”

The key. Why was that word familiar? It put him in mind of a song.

The music from his memory battered Thoster, as loud and as demanding as when Xxiphu had frowned down upon Green Siren days earlier.

“The Key of Stars is what Xxiphu seeks,” he whispered.

The captain clutched his hat to his head and dashed down the walk in the direction of Marhana Manor.

The Year of the Secret (1396 DR)

New Sarshell, Impiltur

Seren narrowed her eyes at the man sitting across the table from her. He blanched.

“I’m not sure I believe you,” Seren said. “Surely, a few maps of Mulhorand survive. The Spellplague didn’t reach all the way to New Sarshell and erase them as it did the landscape!”

She made a show of flicking away an imaginary piece of lint from her red robes.

The man’s eyes followed her movements. His pale face and dry lips indicated that her robe’s color had not escaped him. If he believed Seren was a member of Thay’s mageocracy, she judged fear would make him more pliable.

“Well?” she said.

“Uh, my lady, the world changed …,” the man replied. “Of what use to me were such maps? It’s been over a decade since Mulhorand was wiped away. The old cartography is useless.”

“I will pay you triple your going rate for a map of Skuld that details the old temples,” said Seren.

“My lady,” the man’s voice said, quavering, “I just don’t have them! Skuld is no more!”

Seren pounded a fist on the table and stood. “We’re done,” she said. “Maybe one of the cartographers across town will prove more helpful.”

She pushed out of the shop crammed with star charts, maps of coastlines, and castle floorplans from Waterdeep to Telflamm.

“Useless,” she muttered.

The air in the street was cooler. She paused a moment to savor it. Passersby glanced at her, then away. Like the worthless map seller, they assumed her Red Wizard garb was sanctioned by Thay. Why wouldn’t they? No one would be foolish enough to wear the red robe who wasn’t an actual Red Wizard.

Unless one’s name was Seren. She’d lived in the shadows for ten years, hardly showing her face, let alone hints of her old affiliation. By doing so, she’d managed to avoid Thay’s notice.

But a wizard taker named Morgenthel had found her in Veltalar anyway!

So she was done with hiding. Thay would accept her back, Seren believed, once she paid the price Szass Tam or one of his subordinates had placed on her head. Until then, she’d wear the colors of her lost affiliation, confident it was only a matter of time before the garments represented more than hope.