Marsheila Rockwell - Skein of Shadows

Tellingly, the crest portrayed one house larger than the other two. Sabira was sure that must be Cannith South, headed by Merrix d’Cannith and controlling the family’s holdings in Breland, Zilargo, Darguun and now, apparently, Xen’drik.

As they entered through the gates, Greddark paused.

“It’s very… blue.”

Sabira snorted. It was that. Everbright lanterns in the shape of dragonshards adorned virtually every curved cornice, rounded windows blazed with light, and the undercarriages of magically-powered lifts similar to those in the City of Towers glowed even in the noontide sun. And they were all a bright, blinding blue.

“Maybe it’s Merrix’s favorite color?”

The Burnished Bull was on the left, but Sabira’s attention was caught by a House Cannith monitor challenging a group of three warforged just to the right of the enclave gate. Though she couldn’t hear everything, it seemed clear that the warforged were unhappy at being treated as mere laborers-or worse, virtual slaves-and were taking out their frustrations verbally on the hapless human. Sabira decided she didn’t particularly want to be around when the argument moved from heated words to unsheathed blades.

“This way.”

She led Greddark over to the tavern, passing beneath the sign that spun between two dragonshard-tipped horns. The motif was carried throughout the entire establishment-and indeed, the whole district-with the ends of steam pipes fashioned to look like snorting bulls and posts and poles on every edifice echoing the curvature of a gorgon’s horns.

The Canniths liked to style the Burnished Bull as an open-air establishment in the same vein as the Bogwater over in the Phiarlan enclave. But where the Bogwater was spacious and open to the sky, the Bull was dark and cramped, huddled under a wooden building supported by heavy vertical timbers, with some tables situated in the resulting shade and others open to the elements on a small patio. Posters were tacked up on some of the posts and on the patio walls, advertising everything from repair services for warforged to custom goggles for artificers. One small sheet showed a picture of an iron defender and offered grooming services, but Sabira was fairly certain it was meant as a joke.

The still was actually the most remarkable thing about the tavern. Like everything else in the ward, it glowed blue. Pumping pistons and shifting gears moved around its central vat, but Sabira was fairly sure they were only there for show, to make the tavern’s tinkering patrons feel as if they’d never left their cluttered workshops.

Despite Loghan’s assertion, there were only two warforged in the tavern, one of whom was the barkeep. The only other patrons were a halfling woman in a teal dress, a female elf with dark hair lounging against a post and reading a book, and another elf-blond and male-sitting on the patio admiring the view. None of them looked like artificers to her, a fact which the second warforged was loudly lamenting. She was beginning to wonder if Loghan might have misled her.

Greddark, who’d been content to follow her lead since they’d met in Sharn, stepped around her and walked up to the bar, taking the seat beside the complaining warforged.

“I understand you’re in need of an artificer? You’re in luck, friend. Darkgred d’Kundarak, Artificer and Other Things, at your service.” He stuck out a hand to the warforged. “What seems to be the problem?”

The warforged turned to him, the violet crystals of his eyes glowing. Though the metal construct’s face wasn’t capable of expression, he appeared to be sizing Greddark up. Seemingly satisfied with what he saw, he took the dwarf’s hand and answered.

“Dark Red? But your hair is white.”

Greddark blinked and Sabira had to stifle a laugh. His hair did look white in the glow from the still.

“ ‘Dark’ is fine. And you are?”

“Kupper-Nickel. And as a matter of fact, I do need an artificer’s service-either that, or a carpenter’s.” He lifted up a metal plate on his left arm to reveal sinuous muscles formed of wood. There were several discolored patches where the brown fibers were cracked and flaking.

Greddark clicked his tongue.

“Dry rot. Made a trip to the islands recently?”

“How did you know that?” If the warforged had eyebrows, Sabira was sure they would have shot up in time with the Wayfinder’s surprised tone.

“It’s caused by a fungus-not something you’d be likely to get doing airship runs to and from the desert. And it requires more moisture to take hold than you’d get here in the city, even with the constant drizzle.” Sabira was so used to the periodic warm rain that she hadn’t paid any attention when it had started again, but this was the dwarf’s first time in Stormreach, so of course he’d noticed. “Could have gotten it spelunking, I suppose, except it looks like the light in your right eye is a little dim, so I’m guessing you haven’t been seeing as well in the dark as you normally do. You’d have noticed the difference if you’d been underground recently.”

Sabira was impressed. She knew the dwarf was good at what he did-Aggar wouldn’t have sent him along otherwise-but she hadn’t expected him to be quite so observant. She resolved to be a little more careful what she revealed around him from now on.

The bartender spoke up.

“So he will lose the arm, then?”

“ What?” Kupper-Nickel exclaimed, his voice somehow managing to convey a higher octave than his vocal chords were actually capable of making.

“No, no,” Greddark hastened to assure him. “It’s true, when found in a building or a ship, a carpenter’s first reaction is usually to hack out the affected wood and graft in new timber, but you’re neither of those things-and I am not a carpenter. I’m an artificer, and we do things the right way.”

He pulled one of the silver charms off his gold armband. It grew in his hand until he held a short length of carved ivory that bore a large sapphire on one end and a diamond on the other. He grinned at Sabira.

“Whipped this up when Aggar told me we were going into the desert. Didn’t think I’d get a chance to try it out before then.”

“Try-?” Kupper-Nickel repeated, but Greddark grabbed the warforged’s wrist and jabbed the blue tip of the wand into the diseased wood.

“Don’t worry, this won’t hurt. Much.” He thumbed a silver switch on the side of the wand and said, “Desiccate!”

Nothing seemed to happen for a moment, but then she saw the warforged stiffen. She watched as the blue color bled from the sapphire and into the diamond on the other end, like water flowing from one vessel to another. When the once-blue sapphire was as white as the diamond had been, Greddark thumbed the switch again and removed the wand from Kupper-Nickel’s arm. It shrank back down to the size of the other charms, and he replaced it on his bracelet.

“How’s that feel?”

The dark spots on the warforged’s arm had lightened to match the color of the rest of the wood. The Wayfinder used his other hand to peel off chunks of dried-out wood like scabs, revealing normal-looking “muscle” below. He opened and closed his empty hand a few times, and Sabira watched as the wooden sinews flexed in response.

“Good as new,” the warforged replied, a smile that would never grace his face still infusing his words with pleasure. “But what did you do?”

“Trick I learned from a ranger I knew once, actually. ‘If it’s dry rot, then dry it’s not.’ It’s simple: Fungi need moisture to survive. Get rid of the water and the fungus dies. I actually figured we’d find the hydration properties of the wand more useful, but even when an artificer gets it wrong, he gets it right.”

Sabira rolled her eyes. Greddark was a little too self-satisfied for his own good, but before she could find just the right quip to bring him down a notch, Kupper-Nickel laughed, a strange tinny sound made even more bizarre by the fact that the warforged’s mouth didn’t move.