orders for the wait staff to send another Dragon's Breath out every half hour, and keep doing so until I was no longer able to send the empties back. I sought to stave off the oncoming hangover from the previous night by launching directly into the next one.
The Nauseous Otyugh, by the way, is a bit ramshackle, a former general store put out of business by Aurora and her catalog. The second floor was set back from the first, creating a wide porch, suitable for the major Scornubel sports of drinking oneself into oblivion and watching others do the same on the street below. I had gotten quite good at both activities for the past two weeks, and was quite prepared to begin my career as a Waterdhavian expatriate, sopping up the sun and the alcohol and telling people about how horrid it was to live in a city like Waterdeep, where every second noble is a mage, and most of those are relatives.
And, of course, now I mentally kicked myself for not leaving Scornubel. Ampi had strongly recommended we keep moving a week ago, but I demurred. I would not be like some of my cousins, ordered around by servants, controlled by their butlers, mastered by their own magical homunculi. If I was to be banished from Waterdeep, I had told Ampi at the time, there was no better place to begin my exile than the balcony of old Nauseous, watching the caravans go by. But Scornubel was only a few hundred miles down the Trade Way from Waterdeep, and apparently not far enough from Granduncle Maskar's plots.
My mental wandering was interrupted when I was made aware of a youth to my right, instead of the patient barmaid that had been bringing my drinks. Surely it could not have been noon already, I thought, and the changing of shifts. Someone would have come out with a lunch menu, at the very least.
I strained to focus a bloodshot eye and discovered that the newcomer, bearing ale on a silver plate, was a halfling. His wide ivory grin was visible in the shadows of a badly woven straw hat. I blinked twice, and when he failed to disappear, ventured a conversational gambit.
'Yes?' I asked, that being the soul of wit I could manage at the moment.
'Beggin' yer pardon, sire,' said the small demihu-man, sweeping off the hat to reveal a tangle of red hair, 'but I understand that yer the gentlem'n that was lod-gin' on the top floor yesterday eve? The one that had all the thunder and shoutin' and whatever?'
I deeply wished I had some form of native magical ability at the moment, for a comprehend languages spell, or a distill dialect, or whatever would be useful. I chose to stay with a time-proven response. 'Yes?'
The halfling shifted uneasily on his furry pads. 'Well, sire, I was outside and heard a lot of it, and the big god-voice said ye was huntin' the Raven.'
I nodded my head, slowly, hoping I would appear sage but in reality praying my melon would not pop loose from my shoulders and roll around on the porch. 'And you are…?'
'Caspar Millibuck, at yer servants,' the halfling continued. 'Well, I'm huntin' the Raven meself, and I fig-gered that one like ye, with such powerful god-voices, could help one like me, bein' small and short and all, and we could both nab the thief together.'
'Uh-huh,' said I, banishing most of my foggier thoughts back to the corners of my mind. 'And why do you want the Raven?' I had not just fallen off the spell-wagon, and knew that halflings always had at least three reasons for doing anything, two of which would violate local laws.
The halfling examined his fur-covered pedicure. 'Well, it's just that the Raven staled from me family as well, and I'm s'posed to get me money back. I can't go home till I get it'
Even in its ale-induced state, my heart went out to the small individual, trapped in a similar situation to my own. 'And what did the Raven steal from you?'
'Gold, sire,' said the halfling quickly, 'all the gold in me orph'nage.'
'Orphanage?' I shook my head. 'I thought you said it was stolen from your family?'
'Indeed, sire,' the halfling bobbed his head up and down rapidly. 'Ever'body in my family's an orphan. We're very unlucky.'
'Indeed,' I muttered, and wondered what the halfling was really after. Of course, Ampratines was nowhere about, and here it was nearly noon. If I could wrap things up without my erstwhile ally, that would show both the genie and my granduncle I knew a thing or two myself.
'Very well,' I said. 'Take me to the Raven. We'll sort things out, man to man.'
'Ach, ye can't do that,' slurred the halfling. 'The Raven's no man, but a doppleganger, and can change shape at whim. I think I know where to find him, but ye have to be ready to move, and move quick, when I call. Will ye be helpin' me? For the other orphans, at least?'
With tears in his eyes, he looked up at me, and of course, I said yes. Noble thing to do and all. And besides, this little fellow knew how to find the Raven, and that would make my job all the easier.
I took the ale from the halfling, but did not finish it. I sent the next ale back undrunk as well, and asked instead for a tablet and a stylus, and some of the house stationary. I was in the midst of composing a letter to Granduncle Maskar, telling him everything was under control, when Ampi reappeared. One moment there was nothing to my left shoulder, and the next, there he was-as noble a djinni as ever 'jinned.
'I take it you have something,' I snapped, the effects of the long-delayed hangovers coming to the fore. 'You've taken most of the morning.'
Ampi gave a small quarter-bow from the waist. 'A hundred apologies, Lord Tertius,' he said. 'It took some doing to ascertain the nature of the device and what exactly happened to it. I finally spoke with a sylph that your granduncle uses to clean out the chimneys. She apparently witnessed most of the news on this unpleasantness.'
'Well then, spit it out,' I said, impatiently tapping my stylus against the tablet.
'The Tripartite Orb is an artifact of Netheril,' said the genie, putting his hands behind his back like a schoolboy reciting his lessons. 'Netheril was a kingdom of wizards that fell thousands of years ago, before the founding of Cormyr or Waterdeep. The least of these wizards, it is said, was more powerful than the mightiest mages of the Realms.'
'A kingdom of Granduncle Maskars?' I barely suppressed a shudder. 'The mind boggles.'
'Indeed, it does, milord,' said Ampratines. 'The Tripartite Orb was apparently a most potent weapon in that kingdom, for it had the ability to kill all magic within its immediate surroundings. No fireball would explode in its proximity, no summoning would be effective, no ward would protect, and no magical weapon would gain its weal. You can see why this would be effective in a kingdom of wizards.'
'Right ho,' said I. 'You get one near it, and they're weak as puppies.'
'Effectively so,' said the djinni. 'So, as a result, most of its history in Netheril consists of mages hiding it in inaccessible places while other mages hired warriors to wrest it from those hiding spots. So it went through most of Netherese history, until the kingdom's fall. It remained hidden until a dozen years ago, when a group of adventurers found it in Anauroch. Your granduncle realized the danger of such a magic-destroying artifact immediately, and acquired it and locked it in his lowest dungeon.'
'Far away from any prying eyes or other magics,' I put in.
'Quite. The device appears as a set of three crystal globes, one floating within the next, which are made of iridescent crystal, such that they resemble soap bubbles, I am told. As with all artifacts, it is indestructible by most normal means, so your granduncle put it under lock and key in a safe location. And from that safe location, it was stolen two weeks ago by a thief called the Raven, who is apparently heading down the Trade Way to Scornubel.
'Which explains why Granduncle Maskar wants me to recover the thingamabob,' I said.
'In part,' said the genie. 'Also because you are one of the few members of the family without natural magical ability, perhaps he thought you would be less at risk if confronted with a lack of magic entirely.'
'Or less of a loss if I ended up dead,' I muttered. 'Well, at least I have your aid.'
Ampratines blanched, which for the genie was a strange thing. 'I fear I can be of less aid than you would prefer. This antimagic sphere will also remove any summoned creatures from the area, including myself. Indeed, its very antimagical nature prevents magical detection. Perhaps it would be to our advantage to notify the local authorities on this matter.'
My brow furrowed at the news. 'Local authorities.' I shook my head dismissively. 'If they got their hands on something like this, they'd lock it up under tight guard and magical key, and then Granduncle Maskar would be steamed at me until the next Avatar Crisis. No, we can do this on our own.'
'But, milord, the antimagical nature precludes…'
'No buts.' I held up a hand. 'While you were questioning a smoky hearth-wisp, I was diligently pursuing my
