recognized a 'greater good' impulse from Angul coloring his attitude, he tried to take the opposite tack.
Raidon poured a steaming cup and sipped. Warmth filled his mouth and descended to his center. The sharp, green odor and tingling heat did indeed calm his agitated state. He inhaled deeply and caught the captain's eye.
Thoster grinned but refrained from further comment.
The server also set upon the table another foaming mug for the captain and a crystal goblet filled with purple liquid for Seren. Thoster immediately grabbed up his tankard and downed a goodly portion.
Seren looked up from her tome and said, 'Raidon, do you remember your promise? You will devote yourself to gathering a lord's treasure when we're done with all this?'
'You have my word,' agreed Raidon.
She nodded. 'Good. These tomes and scrolls from Japheth's suite-they're not a bad down payment'
The monk nodded, then said, 'We need to descend to Xxiphu, it's too late for half measures. Do you know how we can burrow down into the earth to reach the city?'
'Halruaa used to have flying ships,' interjected Captain Thoster. 'But those are destroyed, save for a scant few.' 'What good would that do us?' snapped Seren. 'We need to sail the solid veins of dirt and stone below the world. None of those Halruaan craft had that ability.'
'Did you ever fly one?'
'They were called flying ships, not burrowing ships, idiot,' Seren retorted.
Thoster paused, considering, and took another pull at his ale. He mumbled, 'I was hoping you could whip us up some magic sails for Green Siren, or somesuch.'
Seren rolled her eyes, then paused. 'Hmm. Well, I can't do that. But perhaps… something'
'What?' asked Raidon.
She glanced at the captain. 'You remember those albino fish in the pool on Gethshemeth's island? The ones swimming around in that cave where the black dragon ambushed us?'
Thoster nodded.
'When I arrived,' said Raidon, 'that pool was drained and all the fish in it were dead. I met the dragon. He called himself Scathrys. I left him alone… but Anusha managed to hurt him somehow.'
'Really?' Seren asked, then shook her head. 'Never mind. Do you remember the fish, Thoster?'
'Aye,' Thoster said. 'Them and everything else in that accursed room. They were eyeless slivers darting around, each one aglow. At the lip of that pool, Nogah and my first mate died '
'Before she died, Nogah said the fish were rune-scribed creatures,' Seren said. 'In their presence, she said one could walk the depths of the sea floor as if strolling a green meadow.'
Thoster wiped foam from his face and said, 'Hmm, perhaps my mind was elsewhere. I don't remember all that. Mayhap because of the kuo-toa trying to kill us?'
'Typical. Well, I know those fish. I remembered an account of similar creatures described in the great library in Silverymoon.'
Raidon nodded, recalling his one visit to that gem of the north during the decade he spent hunting aberrations.
'Does Silverymoon survive?' he wondered.
Seren shrugged. 'How should I know? I fled the enclave and gave up the red robe…' a Red robe?' Thoster prodded.
'Forget that. What's important are the rune fish. They school in the Elemental Chaos, swimming through boiling earth and fire like regular fish through water. They're called gleamtail jacks.'
'Elemental Chaos, aye, I know that place,' said Thoster, though his tone indicated he was being sarcastic. 'Odd Gethshemeth was keeping them.'
'Not at all. They are naturally adept at slipping between boundaries. The great kraken wants to do the same- maybe that's why it was able to spend so much time breathing air instead of hiding beneath the waves.'
'How does this help us, Seren?' interrupted the monk.
She raised her hands as if in supplication. 'Are you an idiot too? If we can secure for ourselves a school of gleamtail jacks, or perhaps just one or two larger specimens, we can use them in a ritual. A ritual that would send us on a trip beneath the Sea of Fallen Stars and even into the earth itself.' The wizard's eyes glittered at whatever image played behind them.
'How likely are we to achieve that?' Raidon wondered. 'Seems like a difficult ritual to perform. In my understanding, extraordinary rituals require extraordinary preparations. We've made no preparation.'
'That's where you're wrong, Raidon.' So saying, Seren produced from her satchel a bone scroll case. She unscrewed the end and tipped out a dried, smelly shape about the size of Raidon's thumb. It was limp and flaking with rot.
'Hey!' protested Thoster, pulling back his tankard.
'A rune fish,' Seren proclaimed, as if showing off a crown jewel.
'This is from Gethshemeth's island?' Raidon asked, pointing at the dried thing lying on the table.
Seren nodded. 'I had to have one.'
'You were grubbing for one of these here fish as we got ambushed by Gethshemeth's pet kuo-toa?' demanded Thoster, real heat in his voice. 'No wonder we got strung up on the yardarm. You weren't doing the job I paid you for!'
Seren narrowed her eyes and replied coolly, 'You'd be dead now without my help on that damn island.
Anyhow*you're no longer my employer. Raidon is.' The captain stood, leaving his mug behind. He said, 'I'll be across the way. I've got a hankering for some cards.'
Raidon and Seren watched Thoster leave.
The wizard snorted. 'Don't let him fool you, Raidon. He's not mad. He's been itching to lose his coins in a game of chance since we came down here, now he has an excuse.'
The monk returned his gaze to the dried fish and said, 'So how does this help us, specifically? Can you use it in one of your workings?'
'All things find a use in time,' she replied, then said, 'Yes. With a little research, and with this specimen in hand, I should be able to modify a summoning ritual and commandeer a school of gleamtail jacks.'
'Then we can travel to the aboleth city. I can use my Cerulean Sign to navigate.'
'Yes, down to Xxiphu. At least we'll have the comfort of our cabins on Green Siren. Until we arrive at our destination and are promptly killed and eaten by monsters.'
'I have Angul and this,' said Raidon. He touched his chest. 'Two weapons forged to fight aberrations. We are not the ones who will die.'
She studied him a few more moments. Raidon met her scrutiny with a serene expression. He wondered if she was having second thoughts.
Seren shrugged and said, 'Come on, let's go see about purchasing the ritual I need. Someone in Veltalar sold Japheth all his books. They should have what I'm looking for.'
Thoster was absorbed in his cards. Raidon and Seren left him to it while they questioned Lorious patrons. They asked who in Veltalar sold potions and old tomes, and they learned such wares could be had at Rose Keep, a trade enclave on the edge of town.
A Red Wizard enclave. Raidon frowned. He'd been attacked by Red Wizards in the Dragonjaw Mountains years earlier.
Seren was taken aback too. She said, 'I should have guessed'
'Guessed what?'
The wizard only shook her head.
Raidon wondered if the trade compound operated beneath the law, but the patrons of the Lorious described the place in an open and nonconspiratorial fashion. Their tones didn't suggest they were passing on illicit information. The monk would have detected otherwise.
The two of them circled back to Thoster.
'You ready?' Seren said.
'Not hardly! I'm winning. I'm holding on to this hand,' said the captain. His eyes didn't leave the fan of cards he clutched.
The monk said, 'We'll be back in a few hours.' The captain grunted.
