Rosemary Jones: City of the Dead

"We should have Myemaw look it over too," said Perspicacity, "but I think it is legal."

"I am afraid that you are right," agreed Astute. "But who would have thought that a family could sell off their deeds like that?"

"It's property," said Perspicacity. "Just like a house or any land, I suppose. And it's not like this one was close to them or would even remember who was lodged inside. The seller is a fourth cousin on the distaff side, I think. I'd have to look at the ledger to be sure."

"Well, they do say Waterdeep is changing and changing fast. But who would have thought…" Astute noticed his daughter and the young man close behind her. "I am sorry, saer, but I am just finishing some business here. Give us a moment more."

"No rush, no rush at all." Gustin bowed slightly in the direction of all the men in the workshop. Stunk's servant ignored him but Perspicacity gave the younger man a friendly nod. Gustin turned away to examine Astute's chisels and mallets, all neatly hanging from rows of hooks set into the rough plaster walls.

"Tell your master that we will begin the work as soon as the materials arrive," Astute instructed the servant.

"He will be displeased by any delays," growled the man.

"He would dislike hasty work done with shoddy materials even less," replied the unruffled Astute. "Stunk only wants the finest, and that takes time, as any good craftsman knows."

The servant shrugged one shoulder. "Very well, I will give him your message." He stowed his dagger in his shirt. Passing by the Carver's open ledger, he paused to read a page.

"That's a curious book," he said, flicking over the pages much more quickly than Lord Adarbrent. "A lot of old names. My master likes old histories. He might pay you something for this."

"It is not for sale," Astute said with great finality and, turning his back on the hirsute doorjack, began to chat with Gustin about the stone that he had selected for the young man's statue. Perspicacity joined the two men in their discussion.

Only Sophraea noticed the servant tug sharply at a page in the ledger, digging in his yellow fingernails.

"Stop that!" she cried, attracting everyone's attention. "You will rip it!"

The hairy man backed away from the book, his hand snaking toward the dagger in his shirt as the two big Carver men advanced upon him. Behind them, Gustin's eyes glowed like twin emeralds.

"Leave me alone," whined the servant. "I didn't do anything."

Astute snapped the covers of the ledger closed and put the book away on a high shelf. "Go on. Your business is done here."

The servant hurried to the door, barking in a whisper to Sophraea as he passed her, "Meddling girl, you'll be sorry."

If she had been asleep, the sound of sobbing would have woken her. As it was, Sophraea was already awake, staring at the ceiling of her room and thinking of what she would say to Lord Adarbrent. She was sure that he would sign the letter, but what if he said no? And what if the dressmaker didn't think the Walking Corpse was quite the right type of reference? Of her own ability to do the job, Sophraea had no doubts. She was as gifted with a needle as her father was with a chisel and awl. And there was always good work available for a girl who was a clever seamstress, given the enduring passion of the Waterdeep nobility for the latest cut of the sleeve or the newest style of embroidery to decorate the collar, and the equally lasting obsession of the richest merchants to dress their own families in the style of the oldest blood of Waterdeep. But, ever since she'd seen those gilded chair legs, she'd really had her heart set upon working in that shop in the Castle Ward.

Still, nobody would believe that Lord Adarbrent knew anything about fashion of the current year, much less the past fifty years. His full coats and wide-brimmed hats matched the styles of her grandmother's youth. But he was definitely a lord and a well-known lord, given his constant muttering perambulations throughout all of Waterdeep.

Preoccupied with her plans, Sophraea first thought that the faint sobbing sound filling her room was just the moaning of the wind outside. But as it rose in intensity, and then faded away, only to come back again, the girl realized that something more than the wind cried in the City of the Dead.

With a strong reeling that she had done this before, Sophraea pushed back her blankets, slid out of bed, and padded across the cold floor to the window. Having latched the window tight earlier, she now had to wrestle with the bolt. Shoving hard against the casement, she finally banged it open and thrust the window wide. The wind caught it and slammed it hard against the outside wall to the ominous sound of cracking glass.

Sophraea decided she'd blame all damage on the storm. Leaning all the way out of her bedroom window, she could see the same strange light swirling along the boundary wall that separated the, courtyard of Dead End House from the City of the Dead. The ball of light seemed to hesitate and then stop in one spot. In the dark, Sophraea wasn't sure but she thought that it might be a little farther along the path to the Deepwinter tomb and not quite at the family gate.

The light continued to bob-in one place and then suddenly flashed brighter. Leaning so far out the window that she was forced to grab the edge of the window frame to keep her balance, Sophraea peered into the rain and the wind. She thought she saw another light, more yellow and dimmer than the first one, and this light was on the Dead End House side of the wall.

The sound of a woman sobbing faded away or maybe it was only the wind still murmuring in the gables. But Sophraea heard something else, a scraping sound, like an iron file on a steel lock, coming from the courtyard.

"Thieves!" she exclaimed. Thieves were trying to steal into the workshops. It had been years since anyone had been so foolish, but there was always some idiot adventurer attracted by tales of the stockpiles of materials that the Carvers kept in their workshops.

Not even pausing to grab her slippers, Sophraea flew down the stairs, banging on the doors at every landing, screaming at the top of her lungs, "Up the house! Thieves! Thieves!"

Behind her, the rumble of regular snoring was replaced by snorts and grunts and deep bass cries of "Waaa… What?" and, from her aunts and mother, "Get up! Get up! Roll over so I can get out of bed, man!"

Tripping over one of her brother's mallets left in the hallway, Sophraea hopped on one foot for a moment, waiting for the throbbing of her stubbed toe to subside. On the ground level, she paused at the door leading into the courtyard. Behind her, but still a couple of floors above her head, she heard the thump of big bare feet hitting the floorboards and more shouts of "Aarrgh, that's cold!"

She eased open the door. The wind blew the rain from the outside to the inside, splattering across her cold toes and making her think longingly of her warm fur slippers five flights of winding stairs above her.

In the yard, a dark shape was crouched over the lock on the door of Astute's workshop. A lantern sat on the cobblestones next to him, creating a small pool of amber light in the middle of the dark courtyard.

Seeing it was only one man, Sophraea grabbed the abandoned mallet and snuck across the courtyard. The thief was trying to pick the lock open with an iron file, obviously unfamiliar with the complexity of the locks built by Uncle Judicious to foil tomb robbers and other adventurers. Of course, the workshop lock was only an early model, but it still would take more dexterity and skill than displayed by the man worrying it with a bent file. The thief sniffed and licked his lips, a small growl escaping from his throat as the file slipped out of the lock.

Sophraea raised the mallet high and brought it down with a smash on the man's head.