Thamdros was clearly offended by this breach of etiquette, and Korvaun promptly committed another: he clasped the old man's shoulder as one close friend might reassure another.
'Lord Roaringhorn knows your measure as well as I do, and I promise you he meant no offense. He was counting on your integrity to relay something he dared not entrust to paper. He knew you'd report his behavior to me, letting me know without dire words that matters are not as they should be.'
The steward's face cleared, and he bowed. 'Thank you, Lord.'
Korvaun broke Beldar's seal, unfolded the note, and read: Meet me within two bells at Tamsrin's? Firm friendship always. Beldar's rune was scrawled below. Shaky handwriting, obviously scribbled in haste.
What now? Tamsrin's Thirst was as bright and busy a wine-and-chat bower as North Ward offered-far too crowded for conspiracies or dirty work. Too noisy and too plagued by the preeningly self-important for Korvaun's taste, but like everyone who dwelt north of Waterdeep Way, he knew where it was.
'Trouble, Lord?' Thamdros dared to ask.
Korvaun held out the note. It might be wise to have someone know his whereabouts.
'An invitation to wine and idle chat?' The old steward was indignant.
Korvaun smiled. 'That I don't believe for a moment. I'd best go see what's on Lord Roaringhorn's mind. Perhaps this most important matter is happy news rather than grave. He might even have fallen prey to a lady's charms at last.'
'If so,' Thamdros observed sourly, 'you'd do better to hasten to the lady's door and attempt to bring her to her senses.' He promptly purpled in shame, clearly regretting that the words had ever left his mouth.
His jaw dropped open when Korvaun gave him a wide grin.
'Better yet, I'll introduce her to Lord Jardeth's new ladylove. Perhaps the gods will smile on two otherwise doomed ladies and bring them to their collective senses.'
The aged steward emitted a swift, hard wheezing that might have been laughter. Korvaun waited long enough to be sure Thamdros wasn't choking or plunging into a fit and then broke into a run, dashing to answer Beldar's summons.
He smiled wistfully. Just as in our days of yore.
Just as things should be. Korvaun knew his friends were now looking his way for leadership, but in his mind, that mantle and a certain red gemcloak would ever be one and the same.
Tamsrin's was as crowded as always, both with chattering revelers and with all manner of ferns and hanging floral vines, dappled with sunlight falling through glass roof-tiles. Amid all the delighted shrieks and tipsy laughter, two men could have bellowed treason back and forth at each other without being overheard.
Silent gestures summoned wine, whereupon Beldar and Korvaun sipped, clinked glasses in salute, and bent their heads together over the table, sliding the inevitable basket of hot onion bread out of the way.
Before Korvaun could speak, Beldar tilted his glass of foaming firemint, inspecting its contents as if he'd never before tasted one of his favorite wines. A dollop of foam fell to the table. He swiped it flat, and casually began to draw in it with a forefinger.
Korvaun's eyes narrowed.
Beldar smiled a little sadly. 'No fell magic. I'm still the Roarer who's led us all into…'
'So much trouble,' Korvaun finished dryly, as Beldar realized where his own words were going and let them trail off.
'Yes, but let's permit the, ah, unfortunate wagers of yestertimes be forgotten, shall we? Those horses might not have won, but some of them made excellent glue!'
Beldar went on to another weak jest, but Korvaun barely heard it. He was watching a Roaringhorn forefinger wandering idly through the puddle-and realizing what it was doing.
Sometimes boyhood codes can come in useful. Beldar chuckled loudly at his own joke, and Korvaun joined in with a grin, lifting his gaze long enough to give Beldar the slightest of nods. Then he raised his glass again, to make anyone watching think he was saluting the jest, and glanced down once more.
'New eye under patch. Controlling me!' Beldar's hand waved idly across the foamy puddle, sweeping away his writing.
'Hah! I've got one for you?' Korvaun announced delightedly, and leaned even closer. Nose to nose with Beldar and very curious as to what was lurking under the eyepatch so close to him, he murmured, 'Who?'
'I can't say,' Beldar said with a wide, false grin, 'and I mean that quite literally: I cannot shape the right words.'
As he spoke, he drew their private runes for, 'They're seeking next Piergeiron.'
Korvaun reached for his own tallglass, deliberately jostling it so that some spilled onto the table. 'We're going to need more wine soon,' he said loudly, quickly finger-writing, 'Piergeiron ALIVE. Healing well!'
Beldar sat back, slapping the table as if Korvaun had said something uproariously funny. 'So I've heard, but who knows what to believe these days?'
'You'll hear even better tales at the Purple Silks revel,' Korvaun said, trying to impart some important information of his own. 'Everyone'll be there, even-'
'No, no, no!' Beldar interrupted loudly and delightedly, waving his hands in a wild caricature of a gossiping housewife. 'Don't tell me!'
Then he leaned closer, offering his ear in broad parody of that delighted gossip, and wrote, 'Say nothing. Being listened to.'
'WHO listen?' Korvaun wrote as he whispered some meaningless scandal. 'Whence came eye? Wizard?'
Beldar roared with laughter and wrote: 'No. Beholder.'
Korvaun felt his face change. He forced the horror from his eyes and levity into his voice. 'What news of Roaringhorn acquisitions?' It was a standing joke that Beldar's elder male kin almost daily bought horses or small city shops-or tried to buy beautiful women. Yet even as he spoke, Korvaun winced. 'Roaringhorn acquisitions,' indeed!
Beldar's smile went wry. 'My esteemed cousin acquired three this morn, I'm told, each crossing the finish line first. Impressive, until one heeds the gossip of disgruntled fillies claiming the future Roaringhorn patriarch confuses racing grounds with bedchambers.'
'Far be it from us to spread gossip,' Korvaun responded archly, lifting his tallglass.
'Far indeed.'
They clinked glasses in an ironic toast, not incidentally spilling more foam, and sipped again.
Suddenly Beldar touched his eyepatch, and his face cleared. 'They're gone for the moment, gods be praised,' he muttered. 'Doubtless driven off in sheer disgust. Now heed: I may not have time to repeat this.'
Korvaun leaned close. 'Speak!'
'Come to the revel, Gemcloaks all, ready for trouble: Real weapons, not fancy show-blades. Expect to fight men with monster claws and tentacles and such, two score or more, led by a mad priest who wants to put his own thrall on Piergeiron's throne: Me-did I not say he was mad? His son's a sorcerer, and they can move the Walking Statues to do their bidding. Through me.'
'Marvelous,' Korvaun replied loudly, slapping the table and sitting back as a serving lass saw the state of their glasses and hastened up with fresh wine. 'Simply splendid!'
When she was gone, he hissed, 'Beldar, we should tell the Palace at once! Piergeiron plans to attend the revel!'
'Tell them what? That I'm hearing voices? I'm sure they'll drop everything to listen to an idle young blade so stupid he'd allow his own right eye to be cut out of his head and a beholder eye enspelled into its place! Something that's strictly illegal, according to magisters' case-law, by the way. Did I mention that?'
'No.'
'I suppose I also failed to mention the halfling I killed last night, when the eye was controlling me.'
Korvaun stared at his friend. 'Surely a mage or priest could prove your words true-and break this hold over you.'
Beldar shook his head. 'I've tried. A onetime witch of Rashemen lies dead not far from here, as does a barber whose only fault was greed. I'll not be responsible for more deaths. This is my fate, and I must put it right.'
