Philip Athans - Whisper of Waves

Willem didn’t know, which is precisely why he kept his mouth shut. Instead he looked across the seemingly endless ballroom at Khonsu.

The old man sat in a chair-a strange contraption with wheels on the sides. A blanket was draped over his frail, sticklike legs. His skin was the color of bleached parchment. What little hair he’d had was gone and his dull eyes were lined with red.

Behind him stood the old chambermaid. She didn’t look much healthier than her half-dead employer.

Willem crossed the room. He didn’t know why, but he wanted a closer look. He wanted to be sure the old man really was still alive. From a distance he looked dead.

“Senator,” Willem said.

Khonsu looked up, his eyes twitching and rolling, looking for the source of the sound.

“Senator Khonsu,” Willem repeated, leaning in a bit.

The old man’s eyes found him and bulged. He drew in a deep, ragged, phlegmy breath.

“Senator,” Willem said, glancing at the chambermaid. The old woman looked at him the way she might a melon in the marketplace, if she wasn’t in the market for melons. There was no recognition, no realization that the mysterious Mister Wheloon had crossed her path again. “You’re alive.”

The old man opened his mouth, and his chin quivered. His eyes twitched in their sockets.

“It’s all right, Senator,” Willem said.

“What do you want?” Khonsu rasped.

Willem looked at the maid again. Her mind was on the buffet on the other side of the room. Though she wasn’t paying any attention to either of them, Willem knew he couldn’t say what he really wanted to say.

“No one knows who did this to you, Senator,” he said instead.

Khonsu shook his head. His legs jumped a little under the blanket and he turned his face away as if afraid Willem was about to strike him.

“They say no one will ever know,” Willem chanced.

“No,” the old man whispered. “No.”

“You will let me know,” Willem said as he took a step back, “if there’s anything I can do for you.” And Willem lay awake the entire rest of that night wondering what made him say, “A cup of tea, perhaps?”

8 Flamerule, the Year of the Wyvern (1363 DR)

THE NAGAWATER

Svayyah had cast an array of spells on the bubble and on the man. She wanted to know if he was lying, what he was thinking before he spoke, what spells or magical items he might have had on his person, and so on-anything she could think of, and Svayyah could think of a lot.

They spent the first hour of their meeting discussing the bubble itself. The human was fascinated by it, as if he’d never seen magic in use before, but there was no awe in his eyes or voice. He asked the most bizarre questions, all focused on the fundamentals. He refused to accept that she’d made the sphere of breathable air ten feet below the surface of the long, narrow lake called the Nagawater simply by magic.

Ivar Devorast wanted to know how the magic worked-exactly.

Svayyah was perfectly capable of answering his questions. She wasn’t a mindless monster, as most dista’ssara believed. The Art was Svayyah’s life, and she knew what she was doing, and how she was doing it, at all times.

At the end of that first hour, though, Svayyah was forced to admit to herself that she had spent an hour explaining herself to a human who to her was still largely a mystery. Had it been any other human that would have angered her.

“Enough of that,” she said finally, though she knew Devorast was satisfied anyway. “You are putting us at a disadvantage.”

“I will never compete with you in the creation of magical air bubbles, Svayyah,” he said with that disarming smile.

“Careful how you speak to us, dista’ssara,” she warned. “You have to know that there are a thousand ways we could kill you right now in the blink of an eye.”

“Collapsing the bubble, for instance,” the human replied.

“To begin with,” said the water naga.

“In what way would that benefit you?”

Svayyah stopped herself from answering and thought about the question instead. Perhaps he did have her at a disadvantage after all.

“But,” he said, “we’re here to discuss something else.”

Svayyah nodded and replied, “We have discussed your intentions with our tribemates, and they are intrigued.”

“Do you speak for them all?”

“As much as anyone speaks for the Ssa’Naja,” she replied. “We do not gather into realms and kingdoms the way you lesser beings do. No single naga would ever agree to be placed under the dominion of another. There are enough of us, however, and we are enlightened enough, that here in the lake and in the river south, we consult one another, warn one another of dangers, and have been known to gather together to further a common goal.”

“They understand what this will entail?”

Svayyah suppressed an angry hiss and said, “We are not snakes, ape-creature. We have discussed, and we understand. Don’t forget that if you succeed in this-and we are not the only one among the naja’ssara who believes you will not-we will expect to be compensated for the use of our waters.”

“You claim the river and the lake,” Devorast agreed. “That will be fair, as long as you and your fellows are fair.”

“We will discuss, and we will decide,” she said. “You will abide.”

“I’m not in the habit of abiding,” Devorast said, “but I’m sure we can come to an agreement.”

Svayyah eyed him, and he stared back. She felt no fear in him, and his words echoed the thoughts she heard from his mind half a breath before he spoke. He really believed he was going to succeed in his scheme and that the naja’ssara would be cooperative partners.

Svayyah was growing increasingly convinced that he was right, so she checked again to make sure he was exerting no magical control over her. He wasn’t.

“What of the others?” she asked. “Have you spoken of this with the other interested parties? Those who would stand to gain or lose from the reality of this thing?”

Devorast shrugged and said, “I will take that as it comes, I suppose.”

“Now you’re just being naive, Devorast,” Svayyah warned him. “You mean to build a canal to join the Lake of Steam to the Nagaflow, which feeds into the Nagawater, which eventually empties into the Vilhon Reach. Nothing like this has ever been done before. You may have interested the naja’ssara , but what of, say, the Thayans?”

“The Thayans?” Devorast asked.

“Yes,” she taunted him, “the Thayans-the realm of wizards who travel through the Weave and who’ve been known to sell access to their portals? This canal could bite into that, no?”

Devorast shrugged. He really didn’t care.

“Cormyr might be on your side, but what of the sahuagin?” she asked.

“The sahuagin?”

“You know what a sahuagin is?” she asked, and Devorast nodded. “Then you know they’re not to be trifled with. The Inner Sea is acrawl with them, and there’s another race, deeper down, one we’re not sure your kind even knows of.”

“What are you suggesting?” he asked, and she thought he might be starting to get annoyed.

“What will the druids in Turmish think?” Svayyah went on. “Who will control the northern end of the canal? Your ransar will hold the southern end, perhaps, but what of the mouth of the Nagaflow at the Vilhon Reach? We don’t bother with those waters, but your fellows in Arrabar just might.”

Devorast shrugged.

“How is it that you get your goods, you humans, from the east to the west now, without this canal-with no navigable waterway between, say, Impiltur and Waterdeep?”