R. Salvatore - The Last Threshold

“Do you mean to wound the morale of my crew before we have even left the harbor, man?” he said. “If so, do tell before we are too far out for you to swim back to the docks.”

The salty first mate lowered his eyes and respectfully answered, “Me pardon, Captain.”

“Your last pardon, Mister Sikkal.”

“Aye, Captain, but I isn’t saying any what th’others ain’t thinkin’,” he replied and he dared to look up. “Five land dogs.”

“Five formidable warriors.”

“Aye, but no friend o’ Luskan is Drizzit Dudden, not matterin’ what Captain Kurth’s sayin’!”

“The water is cold,” Cannavara replied somberly, and threateningly.

“Me pardon again, then, or still me first pardon stretched longer.”

The captain turned and pushed the door to make sure it was properly closed, then motioned Sikkal to follow him to his desk.

“I care for this no more than you do,” he quietly explained-quietly, but of course, Artemis Entreri was in perfect position, wrapped around a beam above the net above the desk, to hear every word.

“I was, we were, given no choice in the matter,” he went on. “Beniago’s orders were clear, and I’m hardly to go against that one!”

“What’s his tie to these dogs?” asked Sikkal. “The little man’s carryin’ his poker!”

The captain shook his head. “More a tie to the dark elf, I expect. Beniago is doing as he was instructed to do, as I expect that High Captain Kurth is doing as he was instructed to do.”

“Kurth? Instructed?” Sikkal started to reply, but then his face brightened as he said, “Them damned drow’re back.”

“So I would guess.”

Up above them, Artemis Entreri clutched at the beam and fought very hard against growling at the surprising news. Were they speaking of Jarlaxle? It had to be, or of Bregan D’aerthe, at least. So suddenly, everything changed from Entreri’s perspective, for so suddenly, he wasn’t so sure that this was about Drizzt at all. Surely Jarlaxle’s band had an interest in Drizzt, but wouldn’t their greater interest be in him, in Entreri? If they knew that he had broken free of Herzgo Alegni, then Jarlaxle and that wretched Kimmuriel surely understood that they were not safe.

Jarlaxle! The name screamed through Entreri’s thoughts. He recalled the last look the drow had thrown him, one of sadness perhaps, or at least resignation-but behind any such emotions lay Jarlaxle’s greatest feeling, Entreri knew: relief. For as Entreri lay there, caught in a net, surrounded by enemies, Jarlaxle had found freedom, walking through the ranks of the Netherese with hardly a care.

Entreri forced the memories to the back of his mind and reminded himself to pay attention.

“Bah, but it’s only a couple tendays or so to Baldur’s Gate, as we’ll find a favorable tide,” muttered Sikkal, but the captain was shaking his head with every word.

“We’re swinging wide,” Captain Cannavara replied, and he motioned to the chart he had sent the man to retrieve. “Wide to Baldur’s Gate and wider back to Luskan, for we’ll be ordered to Memnon once we’re in port.”

His eyes went even wider as he echoed incredulously, “Memnon?”

“We’ll be surprised by the order, of course, but to Memnon we’ll sail, and perhaps all the way to Calimport beyond that.”

“What’re ye talkin’ about? What goods’ve we got for them places?”

“It is not about goods, Mister Sikkal.”

“It’s about them five!”

“Aye, and we’re to keep them out of Luskan for the whole of the summer and to the last northern run before the winter.”

“What …?” Sikkal started to ask.

“I do not care to argue with Beniago, and care less so to take up any complaints with Kimmuriel’s band. This is their demand-I do not know why.”

Sikkal groaned, but the captain laughed and patted him on the shoulder.

“Easy work!” the captain explained. “We’ll find the whole season on the waves where we belong, and should we encounter any foolish enough to disrespect the flag of Ship Kurth, be they pirates or minions of Umberlee, or even a warship from the lords of Waterdeep, then know that we’ve got grand protection, by sword or by parlay, in the five we have taken aboard.”

“Aye, but they’re not to be doin’ any work, are they?”

“You could probably convince Drizzt Do’Urden to pull his share. He is quite familiar with the sea, after all.”

“Aye, sailin’ with that cursed Deudermont!” Sikkal spat upon the floor.

“However he came by it.”

“Might be that he’ll have a bit of an accident, then.”

The captain stared at him sternly, and Entreri took comfort in that response. “We left with five, we return with five-alive unless unforeseen circumstances, and circumstances not of our own making, befall us. You would risk the wrath of the drow, brave Mister Sikkal, but know that if you do, my own wrath will put you in a shark’s belly long before Minnow Skipper ever docks in Luskan again.”

The man, looking down at the floor again, nodded. At the captain’s bidding, he unrolled the chart on the desk and the two plotted their run to Baldur’s Gate. Up above, Artemis Entreri watched it all, thoroughly intrigued. He feared that they were being set up, delayed on their return to Luskan until Jarlaxle and Kimmuriel could arrange a proper greeting for them at the docks.

But he assuaged those fears with the reminder that Jarlaxle was not an enemy of Drizzt Do’Urden, and anything involving him surely went deeper than any fears or grudges the drow might have with a relatively minor player like Artemis Entreri.

He didn’t manage to get out of the captain’s quarters until the sun was low in the sky, giving him many hours to contemplate all that he had learned. He decided against sharing the information with the others.

If an ambush by Bregan D’aerthe was awaiting them in Luskan, then he surely wouldn’t be around to watch it, but if something else … perhaps he could get a chance to repay Jarlaxle’s treachery, and that, of course, would be worth the risk. He kept putting his hand to the hilt of his jeweled dagger whenever he thought of Jarlaxle, imagining the sweetness of stealing that one’s black soul.

Effronpaced the vast docks of Baldur’s Gate as he had every morning for more than a month now. He found himself at a loss-the boat should have been in to port soon after his arrival. Every day he came down here; every day he asked every dockhand he could find who would take a few moments to speak with him.

Nothing.

No word of Minnow Skipper , and looking out at the vast, dark water rolling before him this rainy day, it was not hard for Effron to imagine that the boat had been lost to this inhospitable environ known as the Sword Coast. In fact, this particularly dreary morning, the warlock was certain of it.

The ocean had taken her, and all aboard, likely, or some sea devils or a great shark or whale or kraken even, had splintered her hull and pulled her under to feast on the crew.

If he was right, then his mother was dead, and his purpose in life had run into an abrupt end.

Or maybe his mood was a result of the weather and not some reasonable conclusion. The air felt heavy this day, though spring fast raced toward summer.

Effron dismissed that superficial notion. The weather might not be helping, but this was not nearly as abrupt an ending as it seemed. This morning came as a logical conclusion of his building dread. For two tendays now, Effron had been fighting a nagging feeling that they were gone, swallowed by the sea, and that his perspective on life-on his own life-was about to dramatically shift.