leaned far to the side, turning her prow back toward the east, back toward the far-distant shore.
Through the spyglass, Catti-brie saw a woman kneeling over the dead man while another man cradled his head. An emptiness settled in Catti-brie's breast, for she never enjoyed such an action, never wanted to kill anyone.
But that man had been the antagonist, the driving force behind a battle that would have left many innocents on the schooner dead. Better that he pay for his failings with his own life alone than with the lives of others.
She told herself that repeatedly. It helped but a little.
Certain that the fight had indeed been avoided, Drizzt looked down at the crystal shard once more with utter contempt. A single call to a single man had nearly brought ruin to so many.
He could not wait to be rid of the thing.
Chapter 16 BROTHERS OF MIND AND MAGIC
The dark elf leaned back in a chair, settling comfortably, as he always seemed to do, and listening I with more than a passing amusement. Jarlaxle had planted a device of clairaudience on the magnificent wizard's robe he had given to Rai'gy Bondalek, one of many enchanted gemstones sewn into the black cloth. This one had a clever aura, deceiving any who would detect it into thinking it was a stone the wizard wearing the robe could use to cast the clairaudience spell. And indeed it was, but it possessed another power, one with a matching stone that Jarlaxle kept, allowing the mercenary to listen in at will upon Rai'gy's conversations.
'The replica was well made and holds much of the original's dweomer,' Rai'gy was saying, obviously referring to the magical, Drizzt-seeking locket.
'Then you should have no trouble in locating the rogue again and again,' came the reply, the voice of Kimmuriel Oblodra.
'They are still aboard the ship,' Rai'gy explained. 'And from what I have heard they mean to be aboard for many more days.'
'Jarlaxle demands more information,' the Oblodran psionicist said, 'else he will turn the duties over to me.'
'Ah, yes, given to my principal adversary,' the wizard said in mock seriousness.
In that distant room, Jarlaxle chuckled. The two thought it important to keep him believing that they were rivals and thus no threat to him, though in truth they had forged a tight and trusted friendship. Jarlaxle didn't mind that-in
fact, he rather preferred it-because he understood that even together the psionicist and the wizard, dark elves of considerable magical talents and powers but little understanding of the motivations and nature of reasoning beings, would never move against him. They feared not so much that he would defeat them, but rather that they would prove victorious and then be forced to shoulder the responsibility for the entire volatile band.
'The best method to discern more about the rogue would be to go to him in disguise and listen to his words,' Rai'gy went on. 'Already I have learned much of his present course and previous events.'
Jarlaxle came forward in his chair, listening intently as Rai'gy began a chant. He recognized enough of the words to understand that the wizard-priest was enacting a scrying spell, a reflective pool.
'That one there,' Rai'gy said a few moments later.
'The young boy?' came Kimmuriel's response. 'Yes, he would be an easy target. Humans do not prepare their children well, as do the drow.'
'You could take his mind?' Rai'gy asked.
'Easily.'
'Through the scrying pool?'
There came a long pause. 'I do not know that it has ever been done,' Kimmuriel admitted, and his tone told Jarlaxle that he was not afraid of the prospect, but rather intrigued.
'Then our eyes and ears would be right beside the outcast,' Rai'gy went on. 'In a form Drizzt Do'Urden would not think to distrust. A curious child, one who would love to hear his many tales of adventure.'
Jarlaxle took his hand from the gemstone, and the clairaudience spell went away. He settled back into his chair and smiled widely, taking comfort in the ingenuity of his underlings.
That was the truth of his power, he realized, the ability to delegate responsibility and allow others to rightfully take their credit. The strength of Jarlaxle lay not in Jarlaxle, though even alone he could be formidable indeed, but in the competent soldiers with whom the mercenary surrounded himself. To battle Jarlaxle was to battle Bregan D'aerthe, an organization of free-thinking, amazingly competent drow warriors.
To battle Jarlaxle was to lose.
The guilds of Calimport would soon recognize that truth, the drow leader knew, and so would Drizzt Do'Urden.
'I have contacted another plane of existence and from the creatures there, beings great and wise, beings who can see into the humble affairs of the drow with hardly a thought, I have learned of the outcast and his friends, of where they have been and where they mean to go,' Rai'gy Bondalek proclaimed to Jarlaxle the next day.
Jarlaxle nodded and accepted the lie, seeing Rai'gy's proclamation of some otherworldly and mysterious source as inconsequential.
'Inland, as I earlier told you,' Rai'gy explained. 'They took to a ship-the Quester, it is called-in Waterdeep, and now sail south for a city called Baldur's Gate, which they should reach in a matter of three days.'
'Then back to land?'
'Briefly,' Rai'gy answered, for indeed, Kimmuriel had learned much in his half day as a cabin boy. 'They will take to ship again, a smaller craft, to travel along a river that will bring them far from the great water they call the Sword Coast. Then they will take to land travel again, to a place called the Snowflake Mountains and a structure called the Spirit Soaring, wherein dwells a mighty priest named Cadderly. They go to destroy an artifact of great power,' he went on, adding details that he and not Kimmuriel had learned through use of the reflecting pool. 'This artifact is Crenshinibon by name, though often referred to as the crystal shard.'
Jarlaxle's eyes narrowed at the mention. He had heard of Crenshinibon before in a story concerning a mighty demon and Drizzt Do'Urden. Pieces began to fall into place then, the beginnings of a cunning plan creeping into the corners of his mind. 'So that is where they shall go,' he said. 'As important, where have they been?'
'They came from Icewind Dale, they say,' Rai'gy reported. 'A land of cold ice and blowing wind. And they left behind one named Wulfgar, a mighty warrior. They believe him to be in the city of Luskan, north of Water- deep along the same seacoast.'
'Why did he not accompany them?'
Rai'gy shook his head. 'He is troubled, I believe, though I know not why. Perhaps he has lost something or has found tragedy.'
'Speculation,' Jarlaxle said. 'Mere assumptions. And such things will lead to mistakes that we can ill afford.'
'What part plays Wulfgar?' Rai'gy asked with some surprise.
'Perhaps no part, perhaps a vital one,' Jarlaxle answered. 'I cannot decide until I know more of him. If you cannot learn more, then perhaps it is time I go to Kimmuriel for answers.' He noted the way the wizard-priest stiffened at his words, as though Jarlaxle had slapped him.
'Do you wish to learn more of the outcast or of this Wulfgar?' Rai'gy asked, his voice sharp.
'More of Cadderly,' Jarlaxle replied, drawing a frustrated sigh from his off-balance companion. Rai'gy didn't even move to answer. He just turned about, threw his hands up in the air and walked away.
Jarlaxle was finished with him anyway. The names of Crenshinibon and Wulfgar had him deep in thought. He had heard of both; of Wulfgar, given by a handmaiden to Lolth and from Lolth to Errtu, the demon who sought the Crystal Shard. Perhaps it was time for the mercenary leader to go and pay a visit to Errtu, though truly he hated dealing with the unpredictable and ultimately dangerous creatures of the Abyss. Jarlaxle survived by understanding the motivations of his enemies, but demons rarely held any definite motivations and could certainly alter their desires moment by moment.
