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"Now, how to let living mages know of it, without causing them to crowd in here by the elbowing thousands?" ghostly lips asked the utter darkness.
The darkness did not answer back.
A frowning ghost strode to the bottom of the shaft and began to blur, unraveling in a spiraling wind of her own making, until once more a whirlwind of flickering lights danced in the darkness, spiraling slowly up the shaft. "And how to keep my mage-catches here for more than one night?"
At the top of the shaft, the chiming whorl of lights hovered over the well ring, and a soft, echoing voice issued from it. "I must weave mighty spells, to be sure. The runes must respond only to me...and then only one a month, no matter what means are tried. That should cause a young mage to linger here long enough."
With sudden vigor the mist darted to one of the rents in the walls and plunged through it, snaking through the trees trailing wild laughter and the exultant shout, "Long enough for a good feed."
Thirteen: Kindness Scorches Stone
Cruelty is a known scourge, too seldom clever...for which we should all thank the gods. Kindness is the stronger blade, though more often scorned. Most folk never learn that.
Ralderick Hallowshaw, Jester
from To Rule A Realm, From Turret To Midden
published circa The Year of the Bloodbird
The tall, thin stranger who'd given them a cheerful smile as he'd gone into the Maid was back out again in far less than the time it took to drain a tankard.
The two old men on the bench squinted up at him a mite suspiciously. Folk seldom turned their way...which is why it was their favorite bench. It sat in the full shadow of the increasingly ramshackle porch of the Fair Maid of Ripplestones. A cold corner, but at least it wasn't in the full dazzle of the morning sun.
The stranger was, though, his face outlined in gold as he tossed his nondescript cloak back to lay bare dark and dusty robes and breeches that bore no badge or adornment, as...wonders of the Realms!...Alnyskawer came bustling out with the best folding table, and a chair ... and food!
The tavern master shuttled back and forth, puffing, as the two old men watched a meal the likes of which they'd not seen in many a year accumulate under their very noses: a tureen of the hot soup that'd been making two old bellies rumble all morn, a block of the sharpest redruck cheese...and three grouse pies!
Baerdagh and Caladaster scratched at various itches and glared sourly at the hawk-nosed stranger, wondering why by all the angry gods he'd had to choose their bench as the place to set his mornfeast on. Everything they'd dreamed of being able to afford for months now was steaming away under their noses. Just who by the armpit of Tempus did he think he was, anyway?
The two old men exchanged looks as their all-too-empty bellies rumbled, then with one accord stared the stranger up and down. No weapon ... not much wealth, either, by the looks of him, though his travel-scuffed boots were very fine. An outlaw who'd had them off someone he knifed? Aye, that would fit with all the money thrown out on a huge meal like this, coming down out of the wilderlands a-starving and with stolen coins in plenty.
Now Alnyskawer was back with the haunch of venison they'd smelled cooking all yestereve, all laid out cold amid pickled onions and sliced tongue and suchlike, on the platter used when the High Duke came by ... it was too much to bear! Arrogant young bastard.
Shaking his head, Baerdagh spat pointedly into the dust by the stranger's boots and started to shift himself along the bench, to get out and away before this young glutton tucked into such a feast as this under their very noses and drove him and his empty vitals wild.
Caladaster was in the way, though, and slower to move, so the two old men were still shifting their behinds along the bench when the tavern master came back again with a keg of beer and tankards.
Three tankards.
The stranger sat down and gri
"Well met, goodsirs," he said politely. "Please forgive my boldness, but I'm hungry, I hate to eat alone, and I need to talk to someone who knows a fair bit about the old days of Ripplestones. Ye look to have the wits and years enough .. . what say we make a deal? We three share this...and eat freely, no stinting, ye keeping whatever we don't eat now...and ye give me, as best ye know, answers to a few questions about a lady who used to live hereabouts."
"Who are you?" Baerdagh asked bluntly, at about the same time as Caladaster said under his breath, "I don't like this. Meals don't just fall out of the sky. He must have paid Alnyskawer to get even a quarter of this out here on a table, but what's to say we won't have to pay summat, too?"
"Our thin purses," Baerdagh told his friend. "Alnyskawer knows just how poor we are. So does everyone else." He nodded his head toward the tavern windows. Caladaster looked, already knowing what he'd see. Near everyone in the place was crowded up against the dirty glass, watching as the hawk-nosed stranger poured two full tankards and slid them across the table, emptying eating forks and trencher knives out of the last tankard and sliding them across too.
Caladaster scratched his nose nervously, raked a hand down one of his untidy white-and-gray mutton-chop whiskers...a sure sign of hurried, worried thought...and turned back to the stranger. "My friend asked who you are, an' I want to know too. I also want to know whatever little trick you've readied for us. I can leave your food an' just walk away, you know."
At that moment, his stomach chose to protest very loudly.
The stranger ran a hand through unruly black hair and leaned forward. "My name is Elminster, and I'm doing some work for my Lady Master, work that involves my finding and visiting old ruins and the tombs of wizards. I've been given money to spend as I need to, in plenty...see? I'll leave these coins on the table ... now, if I happen to vanish in a puff of smoke before ye pick up that tankard, there's enough here for ye to pay Alnyskawer yourselves."
Baerdagh looked down at the coins as if they were a handful of little sprites dancing under his nose, then back up at the stranger. "All right, that tale I'll grant," he said slowly, "but why us?"
Elminster poured his own tankard full, set it down, and asked, "Have ye any idea what weary work it is, spending days wandering around a town of increasingly suspicious folk, peeking over fences and looking for headstones and ruins? By the first nightfall, farmers always want to thrust hayforks through me. By the second, they're trying to do it in droves!"
Both old men barked short and snorting laughs at that.
"So I thought I'd save a lot of time and suspicion," the stranger added, "if I just shared a meal with some men I liked the look of, with years enough under their belts to know the old tales, and where so-and-so lies buried, and..."
"You're after Sharindala, aren't you?" Caladaster asked slowly, his eyes narrowing.
El nodded cheerfully. "I am," he said, "and before ye try to find the right words to ask me, know this: I will take nothing from her tomb, I'm not interested in opening her casket, performing any magic on her while I'm there, or digging up or burning down anything, and I'd be happy to have ye or someone else from Ripplestones along to watch what I do. I need to be able to look around thoroughly...in good bright daylight...and that's all."
"How do we know you're telling the truth?"
"Come with me," Elminster said, doling out platters and cutting into one of the pies. "See for thyselves."