Bruce Cordell: Stardeep

Gage peered into another passage like the one above. More doors, though; two on each side and one at the far end.

He suspected the door at the end was his ultimate destination. Still, prudence dictated he check the other four on the way.

The first door on his left smelled like a chamber pot. Sure enough, a privy, and none too clean. He doubted Sathra used this one.

Across the hall from the privy he found an office. A man sitting at a desk strewn with parchment and quills looked up as Gage peered in. "Yes?" said the man.

Startled, Gage slammed the door closed. Nice. If he sat thinking for an eternity, he doubted he could imagine a more suspicious response.

He jerked the door open again. The man was rising, his open mouth wide with alarm. "Hey!"

Quicker than thought, Gage flicked a knife from the concealed scabbard below his left arm, flinging it across the room with the same graceful motion. The knife plunged into the man's mounting yell, silencing him.

The thief dashed forward and caught the body before it crashed onto the desk. He lowered the still-twitching form to mud-smeared floorboards. He retrieved his dagger and cleaned it on the man's pants. Poor bastard. He told the glazing eyes, "You asked for it, working for Sathra. I'm sure you've done far worse in your time."

He stood, sheathing his knife. Gage checked the hallway to see if he'd roused any activity, then pulled back, closing the door. Returning to the desk, he skimmed through the papers scattered across it. He discovered the man he'd just knifed was a mid-level functionary, captain of the muscle upstairs and another group on this floor. Not part of Sathra's personal force, then; the captain apparently didn't measure up enough to be counted among the so-called "Shadow Cadre." Gage hated that name. According to a rough floor plan he found, the cadre was housed on the ground floor. He kept reading.

He found documents describing traffic in hellborn drugs, a protection racket broader than he'd imagined the Shadow Tongue could engineer, the outline of a scheme to blackmail the ruling council of Laothkund by implicating them in a made-up alliance with Thay, illicit slave trade in children. . things that would curdle the stomachs of any moral person.

But Gage wasn't here to right wrongs. He looked for a clue, any clue to the singular article he sought.

Was this it? A note about a detachment of Sathra's cache deployed to retrieve an item, unnamed. Whatever it was, Sathra had issued specific instructions-the item was not to be fenced under pain of death to her underlings. She wanted it returned directly to her, in this building, as her prize.

That had to be it! For Sathra to name something as a trophy instead of merely selling it, an item had to be particularly special. As he knew it to be. Gage had never seen anything quite so beautiful, and no trinket had before awoken his acquisitive nature so surely. If he could, he'd keep it for a prize, too. .

Gage shook his head. He couldn't let his covetousness overmaster him-the object wasn't for himself.

When Sathra's people stole it from under his nose, Gage was furious. He was here to steal it back.

He quit the chamber. Back in the empty hall, he didn't bother to check the remaining two doors. He made directly for the door at the end of the hallway. No more distractions. He glanced at a document he'd snatched from the desk: a map of Sathra's base.

He was close to retrieving his prize.

He was close to claiming Angul, the Blade Cerulean.

The door at the hall's end opened on a wide warehouse. Wooden crates of various sizes were piled everywhere in haphazard stacks. Dangling lanterns from above provided weak light. The smell of wet stone was strong in the chamber. Gage crept along the outer wall, ready to fight or flee should he be discovered. Voices in the central portion of the room bantered back and forth. Were they members of Sathra's Shadow Cadre, or merely brute laborers?

A man's rough voice echoed, "Didn't listen, did ye? Didn't listen when old Bendar told ye not to take that snake charmer's coin. Oh, no! And now look what ye got!" A laugh.

A different voice answered, this one slurred with drink or disfigurement. "Damned hedge wizard. How'd I know he could make good on his promise to curse me? I had to slit his throat, though. Passing phantom coin just ain't good business. He had it coming. I don't deserve what I got in return, I'll tell ye that."

"Snakes keep finding ye, eh? Even in winter's cold. Gotta watch where ye step, eh?"

A grunt in return.

"Ha! Old Bendar told ye!"

Gage left behind the bantering voices as he slipped into a side passage. He caught his breath-a huge form was propped on a stool too small for it, blocking most of the corridor. An ogre! Tattooed and pierced, Gage recognized it as one of Sathra's trained guardians. The figure shifted and loosed a hooting snore. Not trained well enough.

He eased past the creature and tiptoed to the passage's end. Another look at the map, a grin, and he found the secret catch in the floor. Down the narrow, steep stairs he disappeared, guided by the greenish glowing eye on his left gauntlet.

He came to the secret sliding panel the map promised, and paused to listen. All was quiet in the chamber beyond. He slid aside the panel and saw a wide vestibule. To one side, broad steps mounted upward. On the other side, a rounded door closed off Sathra's personal quarters.

Gage moved along to the iron valve that sealed Sathra's vault.

Sathra's name was inscribed on the rusted surface. Rumors suggested Sathra's personal quarters served double duty as the treasury vault of the Shadow Tongue criminal organization, but he hadn't believed them. His skepticism may have been misplaced. Either way, vault or personal quarters, it seemed likely he'd find the sword Angul within. A pitted metallic wheel protruded from the iron door, next to a keyhole. To the side was a pull chain. A few heartbeats examining the wheel and keyhole revealed expertly wired elements of a mechanical trap. Mechanical, probably riddled with spells to boot. Sathra could afford to be lavish with her security.

But Gage was no slouch. He pulled his packet of alchemically hardened, arcane-proofed tools from his belt. It was rare that a mechanism, trap or otherwise, got the better of him. He just needed to study it awhile, get a feel for it…

The wheel spun, squealing. Someone was behind the door, about to emerge!

He stood from his crouch, dropping his tools to the floor. The sound of the turning wheel covered the noise of his metallic files as they slipped loose from their case and clattered on the floor. He kicked the implements into a corner.

No place to hide in the vestibule. Up was the only way to go.

He jumped, right arm straight up. His palm slapped the ceiling. Crunch-the mouth on his gauntlet bit into the stone, as he'd hoped. The little beast would bite anything it could get its mouth on. Hard. The trick was making the glove let go. He'd once used it as a climbing aid, but feeding the demon something tastier than stone with every handhold proved too cumbersome.

With his gauntlet holding flat against the ceiling, he swung his legs back and forth, and with a stifled groan managed to swing them up flush to the ceiling, then thrust them into the corner where two walls met.

The wheel ceased spinning and the iron door below Gage slammed open. Sathra stormed out, screeching. She cradled one hand in the other. The cradled hand was red and blistered. It trailed smoke and the odor of burnt flesh. Had she just botched a spell or alchemical mixture?

The decorative metal spikes in her hair barely cleared the thief's suspended form. The description Gage paid good coin for was accurate. Sathra's infamous gluttony was visible in a full figure beneath folds of black silk. An overabundance of black metallic jewelry pierced her flesh.