Baelar’s voice dropped to a low growl. “But if you’re certain you can learn more about whoever is behind this, and do everything in your power to ensure that no one but you and the shopkeeper touch that gold bar, and if you turn it in immediately afterward…”
“I’ll swear a thousand oaths if I have to,” Torrin said. “One for every hair in Moradin’s beard. I’ll ask him to smite me with every misfortune imaginable, should I fail, even though the weight that’s already upon my shoulders is heavier than any anvil.” His jaw clenched, as he thought of Ambril and her babes, of Kier, of Maliira. “I’m responsible for enough suffering already.”
Baelar sighed. “It wasn’t your fault, Torrin. Nor was it Kier’s. The gold would have been found, regardless of my grandson’s misadventure. The new earthmote had been noted. The Peacehammers had already been ordered to investigate it, after they realized its drift would carry it over the city. Our knights are skilled in the art of detection. They would have found the secret room themselves.”
The sound of booted feet interrupted them. Two Steel Shields marched up the corridor. As they passed, they gave Torrin a baleful look, then bowed to Baelar. He waved the knights on with a gauntleted hand.
“I suppose you’re right,” Torrin said in agreement. He thought a moment. “Perhaps I was meant to find that gold. Moradin led me to the earthmote, showed the gold to me, then gave me that dream. I am, after all, the one dwarf who can handle the gold without succumbing to its curse. I was reincarnated into this body because Moradin foresaw that I’d need this form, in order to save my people.”
Baelar nodded, but appeared unconvinced.
“Do you believe the Morndinsamman led me to that gold?” Torrin asked. “That Moradin himself has chosen me to save my people?”
Baelar opened his mouth as if to answer, seemed to reconsider, and shrugged. “When Eralynn first introduced me to you, all those years ago, I thought you were delusional,” he said. “You are clearly not a dwarf, no matter how much you might try to look and sound like one.”
Torrin’s shoulders slumped.
“But the heart that beats within your chest is as stout as that of any dwarf, and as true,” Baelar continued. “I first realized that after Eralynn told me how you’d refused to plunder the tomb she followed you to. How you drew that magical mace of yours, and threatened to use it to bring down the ceiling of the tomb, burying the both of you, if she plucked so much as a single garnet from the walls. That gave her pause. And not just because her parents died in a similar manner.”
Torrin smiled. “Eralynn still thinks I’m crazy.”
“That she does,” Baelar replied, nodding. “As do I, much of the time. But you struck gold, if you’ll pardon the expression, in puzzling out the truth about those gold bars. You’ve saved many lives this day, and that’s a fact. There are veins of truth to be uncovered yet, I’ll warrant. The stoneplague won’t affect you, and that gives you a chance to dig up that truth, to find out what’s behind this.
“But no time for chatter,” Baelar continued. “I’ll get that sending stone for you. And I’ll arrange for one of the Peacehammers-someone I trust-to listen in as you confront that shopkeeper.”
Torrin’s eyebrows rose. “But I thought you yourself would-”
“Not possible,” Baelar said. He patted his sword. “I’ve a cure to find.”
“You know of a cure for stoneplague?” Torrin asked, startled.
“Shh,” said Baelar, raising an armored finger to his lips. He beckoned Torrin closer. In a low voice, he said, “Dragon’s blood.”
Torrin’s eyebrows rose. Had Baelar gone mad? “But that’s… just a children’s tale,” he said, choosing his words carefully so he wouldn’t offend the longbeard. “If dragon’s blood did everything the sagas claim-instantly healing all wounds, driving all poison from the body, making old men young again-the stoneplague would have been cured long ago. Why, there’d be no need for clerics!” Torrin shook his head. “Everyone knows dragon’s blood is just… blood.”
Baelar’s jaw clenched. “Just as everyone knows,” he said in a low voice, “that the Soulforge is in the Dwarffather’s domain, and not here on Faerun.”
Torrin swallowed hard. That stung. But the point was taken. What’s more, Baelar was the head of Clan Thunsonn, and Torrin’s patron. He deserved respect.
“My apologies,” Torrin said, bowing low.
Baelar sighed. “You’re quite right, of course. It likely will turn out to be just a children’s tale. But I’ve got to try.”
Torrin recognized the pained look in the old dwarf’s eyes. His own face was set in the same weary lines. “Where will you get dragon’s blood?” he asked.
Baelar laughed. “Don’t you remember? You gave me the answer yourself, when you told me about your misadventure with the red dragon a few days ago. With a little luck, those wyrmlings shouldn’t prove too hard to kill. Their mother, however, will be another story. You and Eralynn were blessed by the Luckmaiden that day you escaped her.”
“I suppose so,” Torrin replied.
“What’s more, I’m not the only one to grasp at this straw,” Baelar said as he glanced up and down the corridor. “It’s gone unnoticed in the general commotion, but several of the Steel Shields and Peacehammers have vanished,” he whispered. “Some say they’ve abandoned their posts-taken their families and fled-but that’s not true. They’ve gone to the Wyrmcaves, chasing the very thing I’m seeking, and the dragons have killed them. But they didn’t know about the two young wyrmlings. Nor did they have a frost axe, or magical armor ensorcelled to shield against fire.” He thumped his breastplate and jerked a thumb at the axe strapped across his back, a weapon with an icicle-shaped sliver of clear topaz set into the top of its shaft, between the double blades.
“I’ll succeed where all those others have failed,” Baelar continued. “I know my way around the Underdark. I have magic to silence my footfalls. That wyrmling’s throat will be slit, and I’ll be on my way back with its blood before the mother dragon even realizes it.”
“But-”
Baelar shook his head. “My mind is set,” he said. “And keep your mouth shut about where I’m off to. Just concentrate on your part of it. You’ve got your own quest ahead of you-learning where that gold came from. That, my lad, is what the Morndinsamman intended for you.”
Baelar straightened. “Now let’s get you that sending stone and arrange for someone to listen in while you confront the shopkeeper. May Vergadain the Trickster grant you a silver tongue, and words that slide from it like silk.”
“My thanks for the blessing,” Torrin said. Although he knew Baelar’s quest would likely prove futile, he returned the blessing. “And the same to you. May Clangeddin Silverbeard make your axe strike true. And may Marthammor Duin speed your steps.”
Chapter Nine
“As every thread of gold is valuable, so is every moment of time.”
Mercuria’s shop, at the edge of a cobblestone plaza, was in one of the oldest permanent buildings in Hammergate. According to Eralynn, the door that led to it was magical. Knock once with the left hand, twice with the right, and thrice with the left, and the door would open onto Mercuria’s shop. Any other combination, and it revealed the soakroom of a tannery, a place with a stench so vile no one entered if they could possibly avoid it.
Torrin knocked correctly, and opened the door. The combined smells of sharp spices and dust filled his nostrils as he stepped into the cluttered shop. The shelves were packed with the varied ingredients of ritual casting: animal skulls of every description, rolls of bark, squares of fur, jars filled with powdered ore, ground horn, and dried berries. Herbs hung in bunches from the rafters. Needles from a dead pine branch covered the floor’s threadbare
