replaced properly. Anything else would cause serious problems. But we don't usually get them trying to dig their way out through a feeder line.'
'How far from here did you find these bones?' Sophraea asked.
'Almost to the wall. Most of the lines directly under the wall are small or gated. This one had gotten stuck in one of the smaller tubes, just south and east of the Andamaar gate.'
That would put the skeleton on a direct underground path to the Dead End gate, Sophraea thought but didn't bother to explain to the cleric. Instead she pointed out the Irlingstar site. 'If you can get him laid down there,' she said, 'I'll send my uncle Judicious to put a dead safe over the grave. That should keep these bones from wandering again.'
'You're a Carver,' observed the gnome leader of the group. Sophraea nodded. 'Good. Save us a trip and take a message to Astute that we're seeing more disturbances down below. Nothing as big as this, but we're getting more dirt falls from the City above into the lines.' i 'I'll let my father know. The City Watch is looking for the cause,' she added.
The gnome leader snorted. 'Like that group of soldiers understand anything about dirt and digging. Tell your father to send along that Feeler and Fish. I think a couple of graves on the far north are starting to collapse. They'll know what to do. I'd shore them up myself, but you know how it is. Guild rules. We're only supposed to work on the sewer lines.'
'Who should they ask for at guild headquarters?'
'Tollemar, that's me, or Firebeard. We're in charge of the City of the Dead's sewers,' said the gnome.
The cleric directed the other sewer workers on the digging and placing of the still slightly twitching skeleton in the Irlingstar grave.
'That should hold,' she told Sophraea and Gustin after a long blessing over the bones. 'But this one has been tough to settle. I had to use almost a full bottle of holy water to keep those bones quiet during the trip back here.'
'We appreciate your help,' Sophraea answered. 'I'd suggest being out ofthe City before dark. Things have been…' She trailed off, not sure how to describe the constant march of the corpses and haunts out ofthe Dead End House's gate.
'Don't worry,' answered Tollemar instead. 'I'm not letting any of my people in or under the City after nightfall. Guild rules.'
'Probably for the best,' Sophraea agreed.
'Now, where did you see Firebeard?'
Sophraea pointed out the right path to follow the missing dwarf. The guild members carefully closed up the grate leading into the sewers, double-checked the lock, and then shouldering their tools, they marched after their missing friend.
Once the members of the cellarers' and plumbers' guild were out of sight, Briarsting and the topiary dragon emerged from behind the tomb where they had been eavesdropping on the exchange.
'If the dead are going into the sewers,' said the thorn, 'that's bad.'
'I know,' Sophraea said. 'It means all the protections are crumbling.'
'What protections?' asked Gustin.
'When they first dug the sewer lines under the City, the Blackstaff laid certain protections against the dead using those tunnels to escape. You still do get things down there, but usually not straight from a grave.'
'But the wall continues to hold,' observed Briarsting. 'You heard the gnomes. That skeleton didn't get completely free.'
'But for how long?' fretted Sophraea. 'And what if they are trying to use the lower ways into Dead End House?'
Gustin shook his head. 'I think the gate is still the only exit that the ritual allows them to use. After all, that skeleton got stuck. It didn't get out.'
'That's not a lot of comfort. We need to settle the dead permanently and completely.'
'There are great wizards in Waterdeep,' said Briarsting slowly. 'Ones who can command the dead.'
'I'm not going to the Blackstaff,' said Sophraea. 'Nor to any of the wizards in the Watchful Order. It would be too many explanations and the family is sure to get into trouble about the gate.'
'We can hire someone less legitimate,' suggested Gustin.
'And how do we pay? I have a silver ring with half a wish,' said Sophraea. 'I don't think that's going to be enough fot the type of magic we need.'
The topiary dragon waggled its ears and scratched at the earth with one forepaw.
'There are treasures still in this graveyard,' Briarsting translated. 'We could borrow a few gems.'
'That's not a bad idea,' said Gustin.
'No,' said Sophraea firmly. 'I'm a Carver. And the one thing that we never do is steal from the dead. It leads to uouble. k always does. What do you think happened to Fitlor?'
'I was going to ask you about that,' Gustin began. 'Didn't he used to sleep in my room?'
'He was a distant cousin,' Sophraea emphasized. 'And he took something that he shouldn't have, something he found when he was helping Leaplow repair a tomb.'
'And then?'
'He went through a portal and never came back.'
'Maybe he's just traveling,' Gustin suggested hopefully.
'We'd like to think so. But we can't take things from the dead. It never goes well. Look what damage I've done just by removing that shoe!'
'Then why don't you bring it back?' suggested Briarsting. The two humans stared at him and the thorn shrugged. 'Look, it's just logic. If taking it out caused the problem, maybe putting it back where you found it will quiet down the dead.'
'That's brilliant!' said Gustin, shaking the little man's hand so vigorously that the thorn's feet bounced off the ground. 'I should have thought of that. After all, I am the wizard. He's right. If we could get back what started the spell, we should be able to cast some type of basic reversal. I know a ritual that might work like that in a pinch.'
'But I don't have the shoe. It disappeared from the house, the night that the dead started walking,' Sophraea protested.
'Hmm,' Gustin tugged his beard, a green flash burning bright under his long lashes. 'Bet I know where it is. But you won't like it.'
'Where?'
'Stunk's mansion.'
'Oh, no.'
'Makes sense. From a wizard's point of view. It's the token, the object that draws the dead through your gate. And keeps drawing them back to one specific place, Stunk's mansion. If it was still at your house, they'd be knocking on the Dead End door all night.'
'So we have to go to Stunk's and ask politely to search his house for a shoe that was taken from the City of the Dead?' Sophraea asked.
Gustin nodded. 'We could do it.'
'How? His servants will recognize us immediately. Stunk knows me. And once he sees me, he'll assume that the Carvers are involved. Which means he will try to cut my family into tiny pieces.' She heaved an enormous sigh. 'All right, I'll go to the Watchful Order. Perhaps they will know some way to end this.'
'No, no,' Gustin said excitedly. 'We don't need those wizards. I'll tell Stunk that I'm a ghost banisher from Cormyr, able to perform miraculous exorcisms. You can be my assistant. Nobody will stop us from removing a cursed item from his house. And when we do, the noble dead will stop bothering him. Stunk will be happy.' Gustin grinned. 'He might even pay us. And then I could pay your father for my statue. This could work!'
'But the minute we set foot on his doorstep, his servants will recognize us!'
Gustin pulled out his disguised spellbook. 'Illusions! What do you want to be? Redhead, blonde? Halfling? Elf?' He unfolded the map from the back of the guidebook and began muttering, tracing blue and brown lines that transformed from Waterdeep's familiar streets and buildings into spiky symbols and rounded letters. The air began to sparkle around his wildly waving brown curls.
