Marsheila Rockwell - Skein of Shadows

“No, Marshal. I learned from my mother, who learned from hers. I’ve had no formal training.”

Sabira hadn’t been expecting that. While self-taught mages weren’t unheard of, most at least spent some time studying with the masters at Arcanix, or the Tower of the Twelve, or one of the other smaller arcane colleges throughout the Five Nations. Well, she amended silently, most who were any good.

“What would be your assessment of your skills in relation to say, an instructor at Arcanix?”

“I have no idea; I’ve never met one,” Zi replied bluntly. “Why that particular unit of measure, if I may ask?”

Sabira figured it wouldn’t hurt to let him know, and it might just make him reconsider his superior attitude.

“Because the pretty blonde who went down into Tarath Marad taught there for several years, and all her power and ability didn’t suffice to bring her back out again.”

“So you are here to finish what she started,” Zi said, a smug smile forming at the corners of his mouth.

Well, so much for improving his attitude.

“Maybe I am, maybe I’m not, but I can tell you one thing- you won’t be part of it either way, unless you give me an idea of what you can do. Now.”

Zi considered her for a long moment. Then he shrugged.

“I don’t know what you want from me, Marshal. A list of spells? Would you even know what half of them did?” A valid point, she supposed, but she needed some way to quantify his abilities. She wasn’t used to working with magic-wielders who didn’t also wield more mundane weapons.

She shrugged, waiting.

“How’s this, then? I was born and raised in the Demon Wastes. I left home at eighteen and made it to Sharn, on my own. I lived there for five years before I signed on with a crew out of the Lhazaar Principalities. I rose to first mate before the captain lost a race with a hurricane and steered us into Shargon’s Teeth. I was the only one who survived, and I’ve been in Stormreach ever since. Saved Laven from some trouble in the sewers a few months back and decided to follow him out here when the guard got a little too interested in him.” His dark eyes burned into hers. “Don’t let the pauper’s robes fool you. I may not know cards, Marshal, but I know magic.”

Sabira was impressed in spite of herself. Surviving to age eighteen in the Wastes was an accomplishment in its own right, but to have made the two-thousand-mile journey from there to the City of Towers by himself, crossing some of the wildest and most dangerous terrain in all Khorvaire, was a feat worthy of a bard’s tale. Which might be exactly what he was feeding her, but somehow she didn’t think so-mostly because he didn’t seem to think she was worth the effort. If arrogance was any indicator, he and Tilde probably had comparable skills, based on that alone.

“Well, I guess we’ll find out, won’t we?” Zi inclined his head to her, not quite respectfully, but probably as close as she was going to get until the first time she pulled his backside out of the fire. “Make sure Greddark procures some new robes for you, though. I don’t want someone mistaking you for a tent in the middle of the night. Could be awkward.”

She turned away from him, not waiting for a reply. It was both a dismissal and a show of power-you only turned your back on someone who you either knew wouldn’t attack you, or who you knew you could defeat if they did. It wasn’t a tactic you used on someone you respected, but just as she had yet to earn the mage’s respect, he had yet to earn hers.

The line had moved while she’d been putting Zi in his place, and there were only three more people between her and the door.

“Name and business?” the bored-looking doorman asked the half-elf at the front of the line, but before he could reply, Brannan stuck his head out and waved her up, earning her venomous looks from the people she bypassed.

“Making new friends?” the Wayfinder asked as she brushed past him and entered the mayor’s foyer.

“No thanks to you and your tame drow,” she responded with a little more rancor than she’d intended. But not much.

Brannan’s eyebrows arched.

“My tame drow?” he repeated, before a look of understanding dawned. “Ah. The locals have been telling stories, I see.”

“Yes they have-quite entertaining ones, too, I might add. It’s a regular Livewood Theater out there. Or maybe the Phiarlan’s Carnival of Shadow would be a better comparison. With you as the ringmaster, of course.” At the Wayfinder’s puzzled look, she continued. “A ‘usage fee,’ Brannan? Really? From the guy who didn’t know a corpse would contaminate the town’s stagnant water source? Tell me you’re not behind this, and getting a percentage of it in addition to whatever you’re charging for hiring out your murderous guides.”

“He’s not.”

Sabira turned to see an older, heavy-set man with strokes of gray at each temple and two lifetimes’ worth of wrinkles on his face. The man’s shifting blue eyes widened in recognition when he saw her, though she was certain she’d never met him before. He hid it quickly, but Sabira had seen enough. The look, coupled with the too-symmetrical features and eyes that couldn’t quite stay the same color, let her know exactly what she was dealing with.

The mayor was a changeling.

And there was only one changeling on Xen’drik who would know who she was on sight.

She kicked the mayor in the chest, knocking him back against the foyer wall, then had her urgrosh out of its harness before either he or Brannan could react. With the Siberys shard tip pressed against the mayor’s throat, she leaned forward and smiled.

“Hello, Caldamus. Fancy meeting you here.”

Zol, Barrakas 17, 998 YK

Trent’s Well, Xen’drik.

What do you think you’re doing, Marshal?” Brannan asked, his voice more curious than concerned.

“Just catching up with an old friend,” Sabira replied, not taking her eyes off the mayor. She was aware of Brannan in her periphery and tracked his movements by the sound of his breathing, which was steady and even. For now. That could change in an instant, she knew, and if it did, she’d have to decide which of them to take out first. It wasn’t a choice she particularly wanted to make-they both deserved it so richly. “Isn’t that right… Mayor?”

“I have no idea-” Caldamus began, but stopped when Sabira applied pressure to the shard axe. A single drop of blood appeared on his neck, then snaked a slow red trail across the folds of old, wrinkled flesh.

“Save it, or I’ll just break your jaw again. Maybe add a leg or two in this time while I’m at it.” Changelings were masters of disguise and could take on the form of any comparably sized humanoid, but their features reverted to their natural blank state when they lost consciousness. “Then Brannan will see who you really are for himself.”

Assuming, of course, the Wayfinder didn’t already know, a possibility she couldn’t rule out.

The mayor sighed in resignation and Sabira watched as the skin on his face slackened and seemed to melt, then grew lighter and smoother, even as the whole shape of his head changed and became thinner and sharper. His features reformed into the pale, nearly noseless visage of a changeling.

“Sabira. Good to see you again.”

She didn’t let up on her urgrosh. If anything, she had to resist the urge to keep pushing the spear tip forward. Riv Caldamus had murdered a Defender, after all. And while she hadn’t been close to the man, Goren ir’Kados had been well-liked and well-respected and she’d mourned his loss along with the rest of her House.

“I doubt that very much. Now tell me what in the name of the Mockery’s toothless grin you’re doing back in Xen’drik when you should be chained up in an Aundairian prison.” She’d arrested him herself the last time she’d been in Stormreach, and she was none too happy to see him free, and here of all places.