R. Salvatore - The Sword of Bedwyr

“The commoners may help this one,” another merchant warned, trying to deflect the vicious duke’s ire.

“Help him what?” Morkney replied skeptically. “Steal a few baubles? By your own admission, this thief seems no more active than many of the others who have been robbing you of late. Or is it just that his calling card, this shadowy image, stings your overblown pride?”

“The dwarf in the square . . .” the man began.

“Will be punished accordingly,” Morkney finished for him. He caught the gaze of a merchant at the side of his desk and winked. “We can never have too many dwarvish workers, now can we?” he asked slyly, and that seemed to appease the group somewhat.

“Go back to your shops,” Morkney said to them all, leaning back and waving his bony arms emphatically. “King Greensparrow has hinted that our production is not where it should be—that, I say, is a more pressing problem than some petty thief, or some ridiculous shadows that you say you cannot remove.”

“He slipped through our trap,” one of the merchants tried to explain, drawing nods from three of the others who had been in on the ambush at the Avenue of the Artisans.

“Then set another trap, if that is what needs be done!” Morkney snapped at him, the duke’s flashing amber eyes forcing the four cohorts back a step.

Grumbling, the merchant contingent left the duke’s office.

“Crimson Shadow, indeed,” the old wizard muttered, shuffling through the parchments to find the latest word from Greensparrow. Morkney had been among that ancient brotherhood of wizards, had been alive when the original Crimson Shadow had struck fear into the hearts of merchants across Eriador, even into Princetown and other cities of northern Avon. Much had been learned of the man back in those long-past days, though he had never been caught.

And now he was back? Morkney thought the notion completely absurd. The Crimson Shadow was a man—a long-dead man by now. More likely, some petty thief had stumbled across the legendary thief’s magical cape. The calling card might be the same, but that did not make the man the same.

“A petty thief,” Morkney muttered, and he snickered aloud, thinking of the tortures this new Crimson Shadow would surely endure when the merchants finally caught up to him.

“I work alone,” Oliver insisted.

Luthien stared at him blankly.

“Alone with you!” Oliver clarified in a huffy tone. The halfling stood tall (relatively speaking) in his best going-out clothes, his plumed chapeau capping the spectacle of Oliver deBurrows, swashbuckler. “It is very different being a part of a guild,” he went on, his face sour. “Sometimes you must give more than half of your take—and you may only go where they tell you to go. I do not like being told where to go!”

Luthien didn’t have any practical arguments to offer; he wasn’t certain that he wanted to join the Cutters anyway, not on any practical level. But Luthien did know that he wanted to see more of Siobhan, and if joining the thieving band was the means to that end, then the young Bedwyr was willing to make the sacrifice.

“I know what you are thinking,” Oliver said in accusatory tones.

Luthien sighed deeply. “There is more to life, Oliver, than thievery,” he tried to explain. “And more than material gain. I’ll not argue that joining with Siobhan and her friends may lessen our take and our freedom, but it might bring us a measure of security. You saw the trap the merchants set for us.”

“That is exactly why you cannot join any band,” Oliver snapped at him.

Luthien didn’t understand.

“Why would you so disappoint your admirers?” Oliver asked.

“Admirers?”

“You have heard them,” the halfling replied. “Always they talk of the Crimson Shadow, and always their mouths turn up at the edges when they speak the name. Except for the merchant-types, of course, and that makes it all the sweeter.”

Luthien shook his head blankly. “I will still wear the cape,” he stammered. “The mark . . .”

“You will steal the mystery,” Oliver explained. “All of Montfort will know that you have joined with the Cutters, and thus you will lower your budding reputation to the standards of that band. No, I say! You must remain an independent rogue, acting on your own terms and of your own accord. We will fool these silly merchant-types until they grow too wary, then we will move on—the Crimson Shadow will simply disappear from the streets of Montfort. The legend will grow.”

“And then?”

Oliver shrugged as if that did not matter. “We will find another town—Princetown in Avon, perhaps. And then we will return to Montfort in a few years and let the legend grow anew. You have done something marvelous here, though you are not old enough to understand it,” the halfling said. It seemed to Luthien that this was about as profound and intense as he had ever heard Oliver. “But you, the Crimson Shadow, the one who has fooled the silly merchant-types and stolen their goods from under their fat noses, have given to the people who live on the lower side of Montfort’s wall something they have not had in many, many years.”

“And that is?” Luthien asked, and all the sarcasm had left his voice by this point.

“Hope,” Oliver answered. “You have given hope to them. Now, I am going to the market. Are you coming?”

Luthien nodded, but stood in the room for several minutes after Oliver had departed, deep in thought. There was a measure of truth in what the halfling had said, Luthien realized. By some trick of fate, a chance gift after a chance meeting with an eccentric wizard, and that after a chance meeting with an even more eccentric halfling, he, Luthien Bedwyr, had found himself carrying on a legend he had never heard of. He had been thrust into the forefront of the common cause of those who had been left out of King Greensparrow’s designs for wealth.

“A peasant hero?” remarked the young man who was not a peasant at all. The furious irony, the layers of pure coincidence, nearly overwhelmed Luthien, and though he was truly confused by it all, an unmistakable spring was evident in his step as he ran out to catch up with Oliver.

The day was cold and gray—typical for the season—and the market was not so crowded. Most of the worthy goods had been bought or stolen and no new caravans had come in, or would for many months.

It didn’t take long for Luthien and Oliver to wish that more people were at the plaza. The two, particularly Oliver, were quite a sight, and more than a few cyclopians, including one who wore a thick bandage around his bruised skull, took note of the pair.

They stopped at a kiosk and bought some biscuits for lunch, chatting easily with the proprietor about the weather and the crowd and anything else that came to mind.

“You should not be out here,” came a whisper when the proprietor shuffled away to see to another customer.

Luthien and Oliver looked at each other, and then at a slender figure, cloaked and hooded, standing beside the kiosk. He turned to face them more squarely and peeked up from under the low hood, and they recognized the male half-elf they had met the previous night.

“Do they know?” Oliver asked quietly.

“They suspect,” the half-elf answered. “They’ll not openly accuse you, of course, not with witnesses about.”

“Of course,” Oliver replied. Luthien continued to stare off noncommittally, not wanting to give away the secret conversation and not understanding much of what the half-elf and Oliver were talking about. If the brutish cyclopians suspected him and Oliver, then why didn’t they simply walk over and arrest them? Luthien had been in Montfort long enough to know that the law here required little evidence to haul someone away—gangs of Praetorian Guards were commonplace in the area near to Tiny Alcove and usually left with at least one unfortunate rogue in tow.