'Indeed. We can safely assume that my acquaintance will not willingly divulge the location of the crypt to me. That implies that I can only come by the knowledge we require by some means she would resist. I must trick it out of her, steal it from her, coerce her into telling me, or simply watch her closely and see if she leads me to the spot I seek.'
'Throw a sack over her head and tie her up,' the dwarf suggested. 'You can hold her feet over hot coals until she's more cooperative.'
'Subtlety is not your strong suit,' Jack remarked. 'Your plan is simple and direct, but I'd rather obtain the knowledge without giving her reason to suspect that I've learned her secret. Then she would have no cause to be angry with me, since she won't know what I've done.'
'With my plan, you could just slit her throat and drop her in the harbor when you finished,' Tharzon said. 'She might be angry with you, but she couldn't do anything about it.'
'I am not a murderer, friend Tharzon. There's no art in it.'
'So you say. Well, don't rule it out as an alternative if more subtle tactics fail, eh? Pragmatism can be very practical.' The dwarf stood and shook off his heavy cloak, looking at the rubbing from Cedrizarun's tomb. 'Can I keep this?'
'If you like. I have other copies now.'
'Fifty-fifty, if I break the riddle and you find the tomb's location?'
'I find that eminently agreeable,' Jack said.
What he left unsaid was the obvious: If he cracked the riddle and found the tomb himself, Tharzon didn't need to be included as a partner. If the dwarf had any brains in his head-and Tharzon did-he must have noted that Jack didn't mention the identity of the mage who'd found Cedrizarun's tomb. Jack therefore guaranteed that Tharzon wouldn't have an opportunity to cut out Jack in just the same manner. One couldn't make a living at thievery, skullduggery, smuggling, and swindling without a certain willingness to discard obsolete arrangements at need or at least plan for the possibility that would-be partners might do so at their need.
'Good,' Tharzon grunted. 'Now to the other business of the day. This wall here stands between you and the wizard's cellars.' He rapped on one decrepit masonry wall, off to one side of the sewer chamber. 'My guess is a foot of hard stone, four or five feet of fill, and then another foot of stone in the cellar. This is old dwarf-work, built to last.'
'We're here already?' Jack studied the obstacle. It would take a solid day of digging, and the noise would be considerable-especially breaking through the cellar walls on the other side. And who knew what sorts of magical traps or horrifying monsters might be locked up in a wizard's cellar?
'I have to admit that I'm surprised. Digging in the sewers isn't your normal method, so to speak.'
'Iphegor's tower unfortunately offers no windows, and the rooftop is steeply pitched and sheathed in copper. Making use of the front door-the only entrance visible from the street-seemed to be somewhat rash.' Jack offered the dwarf a predatory smile. 'However, I should think that, were I a powerful and suspicious necromancer, I might want more than one exit from my tower. Let us search the area and see if we can't spot a secret door in this vicinity.'
'I've already earned my forty crowns by leading you to this spot,' Tharzon said. 'If you want my assistance in breaking in, you'll have to cut me in on the take.'
Jack rolled his eyes, but he reached into the folds of his cloak and retrieved a small purse. 'Your fee, good Tharzon. I will point out that I'm offering to cut you in on the Guilder's Vault, which is a far more valuable prize than the musty old book I seek today. And I'll also point out that if you simply help me find Iphegor's bolt-hole but choose not to dare the perils of the tower's interior, you aren't really helping me break in-you're still guiding me to Iphegor's tower, which is what you agreed to do for these forty crowns.'
The dwarf scowled. 'A fine distinction, if one exists at all.' But he started to examine the masonry wall closely, rapping his thick knuckles against the bricks and running his massive hands over every stone in reach. Jack joined him, working slowly along the passageway for a fair distance both up and down the tunnel. After a moment, Tharzon harrumphed. 'A hollow space here, Jack, but I think that your wizard has used some magic to conceal the door, since I cannot find it.'
Jack hurried over and worked the spell that rendered magical emanations and auras visible to him. As he expected, a five-foot-tall section of wall about two feet in width glowed with the unmistakable stigma of an enchantment. 'Good work, Tharzon.'
'Is it covered by some kind of illusion?'
'I'll see,' said Jack. He frowned and worked the spell that undid other magics, muttering the words and making the gestures he'd learned to shape the spell. He concentrated on the door's ensorcelment and sharpened his will into a white-hot blade, seeking to sunder Iphegor's concealing spell, but Jack's spell of negation failed, unable to pierce Iphegor's handiwork. 'That is not fortuitous,' he murmured.
'You can't undo the spell?'
'No, Iphegor appears to be too strong for me, but I have other ways of opening recalcitrant doors, including some that don't try my strength directly against the wizard's.'
Jack licked his lips and tried again. This time he simply worked a spell of opening that was designed to bypass Iphegor's defenses, not overwhelm them. Green chaos swirled and danced around his hand, soft wizard-light twisting into strange shapes and formless energy.
The wall shimmered and warped as the secret door swung open, spoiling the illusion. A dark passageway led inwards from the sewer. Jack grinned.
'Not so hard after all,' he said. 'I shall return in a few minutes, friend Tharzon. Tharzon?' He turned to look for the dwarf.
Tharzon hurried down the sewer away from Jack. 'This is where we part ways for now,' he called over his shoulder. 'If things go poorly inside, it would be advisable for me to be well away from here. I don't need to wait on the appearance of an angry archmage looking for accomplices!'
'Your confidence in my abilities bolsters my courage and steadies my hand,' Jack grumbled. 'What if I need your help?'
'I'm sure you'll do just fine,' Tharzon said. 'Farewell!'
Jack sighed and turned back the doorway. He worked spells of dark-seeing and invisibility, then another that would miscue any divinations cast upon him… say, by an angry wizard trying to locate an intruder and call down some horrible doom upon him.
With one hand on his sword hilt, he ducked his head and stepped into the darkness.
The secret passage wound halfway around the cellar, with two right-hand turns before it ended at a strong- looking door covered in dire runes. Working carefully, Jack studied them and disarmed the spells of locking and warning and killing, erasing crucial runes from each without setting off the spells in question. Negating them magically was out of the question; Iphegor was simply more powerful than he was, but even magical traps could be defeated with careful work. It took Jack almost half an hour to get through the secret passageway, but he finally opened the inner door.
He found himself in a small storeroom of alchemical supplies. Shelves full of perfect glassware custom-blown for particular sizes, shapes, or qualities lined the walls.
Jack ignored the glass (although it would certainly be quite valuable to the right buyer) and moved to the opposite door, cracking it open and peering outside.
He looked into a long, low vault lined with doors much like the one he was peeking out of. Wizard-lights burned in greenish globes suspended from sconces on the walls. Weirdly enough, a thick haze or fog hung in the air. It surged and welled to the impulse of air movements too subtle for Jack to sense. At one end of the vault a stone staircase with wide steps and ornate carvings led up into the tower proper. Still invisible, Jack slipped out into the main chamber and ventured glances into each of the rooms that opened out into the vault. Most were workrooms or storerooms, jammed with interesting oddities and arcane reagents. I'll check each in detail if I don't find a library upstairs, he told himself
The last door on the right-hand side was ajar. A voice within mumbled and whispered, sibilant echoes rasping over the cold stone floor.
