Paul Kemp - Realms of War

"We're trapped here," Lady Roselarr said quietly. "Are you trapped, too? Is that why you're keeping silent?"

"Or have you been enthralled by the vizier's pet wizards? Or hatching your own betrayals?" Narbridle asked, even more softly. Mirt did not have to look to know that the bald noble had drawn a little poisoned needle-dagger, under the table.

Instead, he looked to Roselarr. "To your queries: yes." Then he turned to Narbridle. "To yours: no. So put your tainted steel away."

Sighing heavily, Mirt told them truthfully, "I have no intention of betraying either of you, yet I see no road by which I can aid you in any way that has even the slightest chance of achieving your freedom. Your offer tempts me even more than its amount, which is certainly what merchants in Waterdeep's poorer wards would term 'staggering.' Yet I know not how to escape Ombreir. The Just Blades-"

"Are camped the other side of yonder hill," Narbridle agreed. "While that sneering sadist Ongalor smiles, watching us all with those lazy-lidded eyes, and waits for them to close his little trap."

"We hate and fear him," Roselarr whispered. "Warrior, admit it: So do you."

"Admitting things is seldom wise for anyone in my profession," Mirt replied, "let alone someone in my current situation. That is the only reply I can give you, other than to say I understand you fully, I deeply appreciate your truly generous offer, and I shall be in touch with both of you-with utmost discretion, for all our sakes-as soon as I can. Whenever that 'soon' may be. You have my word on this."

The two Amnians sat as if frozen for a moment. Then they sighed and took up their figurines, not looking at each other. Both little carvings still glowed as they vanished once more beneath concealing clothing, signifying that their shieldings remained active.

Turlos wordlessly held open the door, and Mirt nodded the two Amnians out of the turret room, keeping his face carefully expressionless.

After the Amnians had descended the stairs out of sight, the two sellswords stood listening for a long time ere closing the door again to wall out the rest of Ombreir.

Then, leaning against it, nose to nose, Mirt and Turlos regarded each other.

"Well, now," Turlos murmured. "Well, now.. "

Mirt shook his head grimly. "By Tempus and Tymora both, I know not what I'm going to do. This trap is intended to end in all our deaths. Things are going to get far nastier before they get better."

"Oh, yes," his trusted bodyguard replied softly, as his body shivered and shifted shape, the grim face of Turlos melting back into the sneering visage of the vizier. Ongalor was smiling a crooked smile as he warningly held up fingers that bore magic rings glowing with sudden power. "I've no doubt of that."

"Another moonlit night," Deln said grimly, checking the hilts of his many blades.

"Another feast to which we're not invited," Marimbrar added, drawing on his gauntlets.

"Aye," Loraun put in sarcastically, "it seems the vizier doesn't need us to stand guard over the food this time."

"That means either he doesn't want us there to see what happens," Tauniira murmured, "and it'll probably be something fatal, to someone who's displeased Lord Most Highnosed Ongalor-or he believes his loyal wizards and bullyboys hidden among the Amnian captives can handle any trouble the rest of the Amnians might give him."

Mirt nodded. Of those hired into the Rightful Hands with him, Tauniira and Loraun were the two he most trusted, longtime veterans of his various mercenary pursuits. Not that they were much to look at. Under Tauniira's ever-present mask was a face melted into grotesquerie by the biting edge of a spell that had slain many and only just spared her, and the tall, laconic, cold-eyed Loraun was a wereserpent. Yet they missed nothing that was going on around them, and Tauniira wore literally dozens of throwing knives all over herself, many of them hidden, that had a way of swiftly sprouting in darn near everything nearby that offered her trouble. Sinister viziers, for instance.

"Before anyone asks," Mirt told his fellows, "Targrath isn't missing because he's snoring alongside our off-duty fellows. He's standing guard inside their door, on my orders. Turlos is dead."

That got their attention, instant and absolute.

"Our mutual friend the vizier," Mirt explained, "killed Turlos somewhere, and recently, and hid the body without any of us noticing. When he revealed himself to me up in South Tower earlier today, he flashed his fist, and there were rings on every last finger that glowed with magic. He did that to keep me from trying to slaughter him on the spot, but what he slew was the last vestige of any obligation I felt to him. So be not slow to blow your belt-horns, sword-comrades; Ongalor is as much our foe as the Just Blades or any friend of the Araunvols who might come calling with drawn sword and fire in their eyes. If Tymora smiles on us all, it'll be another boring night of standing sentinel, staring vigilantly at nothing. If she does not… well, be warned; we're at war right now."

With nods and sour grunts of acknowledgment, everyone stalked off down the darkened passages, seeking their posts. Tauniira lingered at Mirt's shoulder, watching them go.

She knew he wouldn't move until those they'd relieved-Brarn, Landyl, Elgan, Brindar, Hargra, and Torandral-came trudging back to seek their beds in the chamber Targrath was guarding. Commanders who didn't take care to mark the comings and goings of their warriors tended to lose respect instantly, warriors soon, and their own lives sooner than they'd hoped.

Some of those trudges would be long. Ombreir was a sprawling place, a massive, towering stone house rising three stately floors from the ground, with the general shape of a rider's spur connecting three towers, one to the south and a northwest-northeast pair. At the junction of the spur were a splendid sweeping stair-ornate luxury compared to the narrow, bare spirals inside the towers-and a central block of grand chambers surrounding a glass-roofed courtyard. The easternmost of those lofty rooms was a grand entry hall, for the entrance to Ombreir lay in the east. A foregate ramp approached the mansion between two ponds to reach a spired gatehouse in Ombreir's surrounding fortress wall. All around that wall was a dry ditch moat large and deep enough to swallow a man on a horse, and all around the moat were tilled fields, slopes stretching away with not a tree in sight.

Ombreir was pleasant to the eye, from its soaring stone shy;work to the fruit-tree shade-bower out back-enspelled to keep birds away-to the southwest, the stables to the west with their gabled servants' quarters above the stalls, and the gardens to the northwest.

Not that Mirt could gaze on those amenities just then. All he could see was the quiet luxury of the paneled, bedchamber-lined upper passage in which he and Tauniira stood. At that spot in its long, curving run, it briefly became a balcony over shy;looking the central courtyard. Though the sun was quite gone, its light shining through stained glass skylights had earlier dappled the yard with spectacular patterns. The courtyard held a well surrounded by three soaring darm-fruit trees-and Mirt loved darm. They looked like rose red oranges but had soft, sweet red flesh like the watermelons of the Tashalar. Five darm had vanished from those trees already. Mirt had tossed the peels down among the knee-deep mint that grew thickly along the outer wall.

Mirt looked grim. Tauniira tried to cheer him by leaning in to kiss his neck, just under his jawline. He stood as unresponsive as a statue, so she lightly patted his codpiece.

"Not now," he growled promptly.

"No?" she pouted teasingly. "Well, before morning?" Mirt's sudden grin seemed to crack his face. "Of course."