Кейт Новак - Azure Bonds

Their walk out of Suzail was pleasant and uneventful. Alias deliberately set out in the wrong direction and doubled back twice in case anyone had followed her from the inn. Dragonbait proved to be as tireless a hiker as she, and they reached their destination just before dusk.

Dimswart Manor was a sizable farm, an estate just large enough to be considered a suitable “summer home” by a Waterdeep noble. A red-tiled roof set with three chimneys crowned the solid stonework walls of the main house. Alias scowled, knowing that a sage who lived so well would not sell his services cheap.

Despite the gathering gloom, there was a great amount of activity around the house as she approached, as if the grounds were the site of some tremendous siege. Gardeners were trimming hedges and lawns and reorganizing flowerbeds. At the rear of the house, canvasmen were laying out the poles of a huge tent. Dwarvish stoneworkers were arguing heatedly with elvish landscapers over the correct placement of their creations of rock and wood, while a tired-looking gnome tried to mediate between them.

In the midst of the chaos stood a tall, straight-shouldered woman with a sunburst of red hair. She hustled about from worker to worker, consulting with each from rolls of plans tucked under her arms. As Alias approached the house, she could hear the woman shouting for some elves to start hanging lanterns in the newly replanted trees.

Alias pounded on the front door with the hilt of her dagger. She had to knock twice before a parlor maid, loaded down with tapestries, opened the door. “Sorry, but the mistress isn’t hiring any more entertainment people.”

Alias shoved her boot in the door before the girl could close it. “I’ve come to see the sage—on personal business.”

“The master’s very busy. Perhaps you could come—”

Alias stepped into the hall and gripped the girl’s shoulder. She smacked Winefiddle’s letter of introduction down on top of the pile of tapestries the servant was carrying. “Give him this. It’s from the Temple of Tymora. Urgent.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the maid nodded, showing a little more courtesy. “Would you take a seat and wait right here, please? I’ll send someone to stable your pet.”

Alias squeezed the girl’s shoulder firmly, and hissed with annoyance, “He’s not my pet.” Then she sat down on a bench against the wall. Dragonbait sat beside her.

The servant blanched, nodded, and hurried away.

While she waited, Alias scowled at the opulence of her surroundings: an estate full of servants; new, gold-threaded tapestries hung in the hall, undoubtedly replacing the older, less stylish ones carried off by the parlor maid; landscaping that required the services of four separate races; a wedding tent big enough to billet an army, and likely enough food and drink to feed them as well.

No wonder sages aren’t cheap. Dimswart should be delighted to see me. How else is he going to help defray all these costs? Whatever happened to ancient, cranky, unmarried sages who preferred pursuing knowledge over wordly goods?

To keep from fidgeting, she studied Dragonbait. He waited more patiently than she did. The lizard sat with his tail over his shoulder, flicking the tip back and forth in front of his face, following it with his eyes.

What is he? she wondered with aggravation. Maybe the sage can shed some light on his origins. Not likely, though. If I’ve never seen anything like him in all my travels, what chance is there that he’s in any of the sage’s books?

Despite the obvious chaos of the household, a butler finally arrived to escort her to the sage’s study.

If Alias had met Dimswart before her visit to Suzail, she might have ungenerously described his build as chunky. But compared to the innkeep of The Hidden Lady and Winefiddle, the sage appeared broad-shouldered but lean. He rose from his seat by the fire and clasped her extended hand in both his meaty paws.

“Well met, well met,” he said, smiling like a halfling with an extra king in the deck. “Sit down here by the fire, and tell me what a humble book-banger can do for a warrioress.”

Warrioress? Now there’s a title you don’t hear every day, Alias thought. It marked Dimswart as a very old-fashioned sort of sage. “It’s a little complicated,” Alias began.

“We should start with the essentials,” Dimswart cut in. “If you will indulge me, I’d like to exercise my skill. Leah, our maid, told me I was to expect a sorceress and her familiar. But this creature—” he nodded toward Dragonbait—“is too large to be a familiar, and few sorcerers carry quite so much steel about their person.”

“All I said to your maid,” Alias interjected, “was that Dragonbait wasn’t a pet.”

“Quite,” Dimswart agreed, motioning for her to have a seat opposite him. “We are very reclusive out here in the country, though, and Leah, never having seen such a creature, leaped to the conclusion that if it wasn’t a pet, it must be a familiar, so you must be a sorceress. You are not. You’re a hired sword. From your lack of old scars, I’d say you were either a very new one or a very good one, and you have strange tastes in traveling companions.”

Dragonbait cleared his nostrils in a noticeable hwumpf , as he stood by the fire, watching the sage.

Dimswart continued. “You’re a native of … let’s see, brown hair with a tinge of red, hazel eyes, strong cheeks, good carriage … Westgate, I’d say, though from your fair complexion I’d guess it’s been a while since you’ve lived there.”

Alias tried to interrupt, but the smiling sage pressed on.

“Furthermore, you’re not some hot-blooded youth looking for information to lead you to riches beyond belief; you have a problem, personal and immediate. A serious problem, otherwise you would never have come to consult with an over-priced, over-educated land-grubber.”

Alias spied Winefiddle’s letter of introduction lying on the table beside the sage with its seal still intact. “What method do you use, wire under the wax, or do you just hold the letter up to a strong light?”

“You wound my fragile ego, lady. I swear to you I have not yet opened the good curate’s letter. I prefer to start afresh. That way nothing can prejudice my reasoning.”

Alias shrugged, willing to take the sage at his word—for now, at least.

Dimswart resumed. “You sit at ease, but you keep your right arm beneath a cloak. Hmmmm.”

Alias waited for him to give up guessing and let her explain, but after a theatrical beat the man snapped his fingers, saying quickly, “You have a tattoo, or a series of tattoos, that resists all normal magical attempts to cure. They are on your right arm and … they are blue, aren’t they?”

Alias’s brow knit in a puzzled furrow. Winefiddle had shown her the letter before he’d sealed it. There was nothing in it about the color of the tattoo. “How do you know that?” she asked with astonishment—certain he had some sort of trick, but completely unable to guess what it was.

“Good artists never reveal their secrets.” Dimswart winked. “But maybe, if we hit it off, I’ll let you in on this little one. Now, how about giving me a look at that arm.”

Alias, feeling like a much chewed bit of marrowbone, held out her arm in the firelight. The room was warm, and drops of perspiration beaded the skin over the symbols.

“Hmmm,” was all Dimswart said for several moments, and he said it several times. He reached for a magnifying glassware and studied the symbols on her arm even more closely. Dragonbait positioned himself behind Alias’s chair and tried to see what the sage did. Dimswart raised his head so the lizard could peer once through the glass, watching bemused as Dragonbait pulled back, apparently astonished at the sight of human flesh in such detail.