Brin shook Tam’s hand off. “Fine. I don’t intend to tell you. Better?”
“Much,” Tam said. “I’d rather you be honest than assume I can’t spot a simple lie.”
“I did all right before. You were perfectly happy to believe I was just some lovestruck idiot.”
Tam chuckled. “It made more sense than what we have here.”
“More sense than a silverstar traveling to Neverwinter for ‘a few days’ on the Harpers’ coin?” The road came to a bridge, a wide stonework pathway traced with carvings of fishes and sea life. They shouldered their way through the foot traffic. “I don’t see why you’re asking about me, anyway. It’s not your business.”
“Everything that doesn’t fit is my business,” Tam said. “Are you going to explain yourself, or let me guess?”
Neither, Brin thought. He was back to wanting to vomit. “Where are we going?”
“The Blacklake District. I told you. I need a hand with a ritual,” Tam said. “Your accent’s what’s troubling me. I’ve known Cormyreans enough to hear that your vowels are short, but not short enough. You don’t use much of the Suzailan slang. But you have the cadence down. And the manners.”
“My tutors would disagree,” Brin said.
Tam stopped and pulled Brin to a stop beside him at the end of the bridge. Brin’s stomach started doing flips. “Answer me one question, and do me the courtesy of honesty,” Tam said, all seriousness. “Are you fleeing Netheril?”
Brin nearly sighed in relief. Netheril, the shadow empire north of Cormyr, had swallowed whole nations in its expansion. They worshiped Shar, the goddess of loss and the ancient enemy of Selune, and generally had the rulers of every other nation on their toes and hoping their successors would do something about the Empire of Shade. If that was all the silverstar was worried about …
“No,” Brin said. “Only in the sense that I’m farther from them here than there.”
Tam pursed his mouth. “One hopes. Come along.”
At the end of the bridge, a strange sort of procession crossed their path: a small man, his fine lightweight suit soaked through with sweat, followed by two other men, similarly … damp. It was hot, to be sure, but even the tieflings in their heavy cloaks didn’t sweat so much. Brin tried not to stare and failed.
The last man in the line, a lanky sort of fellow, turned and looked Brin directly in the eye. His own eyes were colorless. Eerie. They gave Brin the sense he was staring into the space between the stars somehow … like a hole between worlds …
Tam grabbed ahold of Brin’s shoulder again, and Brin blinked. The effect was gone.
The man turned away, and the procession passed on, up the crossroad toward a row of houses, leaning precariously over the sluggish river. They disappeared into the third one, a bluish monstrosity that looked as if it were being held together only by luck and a whim of the Weave. But like the man’s eyes, there was something strange about the building. Something wrong.
“Stay away from there,” Tam said too lightly, “would you?”
“Do I look a fool?” Brin asked. He looked back at Tam. “What were they?”
“I don’t know,” Tam said, heading again into the shattered quarter. “Based on what I’ve seen in this city, I don’t believe I wish to know.”
Brin hurried after him. “You can’t riddle me with questions and then turn around and drop vagaries like that. What do you mean?”
“When a city gets as old as Neverwinter, old powers entrench themselves in all the gaps and crannies.” He slowed, scanning the broken buildings and piles of rubble that replaced the rebuilt structures. “And when a city this old
“What’s worse than Netherese?”
“That’s what I’m here to find out.”
Brin watched him a moment. “Are you really a Harper?”
“I couldn’t tell you if I were. Are you really a holy champion?”
Brin scowled and didn’t answer.
A few blocks on, a patch of ruins had been cleared, leaving behind a large, more-or-less flat plot of land, waiting to be built upon. Tam paced it out and found the approximate center.
From his pack, Tam took out four sticks of incense, smelling of sandalwood and vinestars and shimmering faintly silver.
“Here,” he handed them to Brin. “Put them in the corners of the square.” As Brin went around the plot and pressed them into the corners, Tam followed, murmuring prayers to Selune and lighting the incense in smooth, ceremonious gestures. Then, he sat down, cross-legged at the center of the space and beckoned Brin to join him.
“Do you know this ritual?” he asked. Brin shook his head. “That’s all right. You’ve assisted before with other rituals? It’s not much different. Just call down what power you can from Torm and add it to mine. I want this one to last as long as possible.”
“Will they mix?” Brin said sitting down across from him. “Torm and Selune?”
“Of course.” Tam shrugged. “Might change the look of the place a little, but nothing dramatic. Close your eyes.”
Brin tried to clear his mind, to focus solely on the scent of the incense, the sound of the blade on the whetstone, the weight of duty … and not the concern that the men from the eerie house were something worse or that Constancia might catch him and drag him back to
An hour passed. Brin did not notice. Only that suddenly, the incense burned away and the sun was no longer hot on his back. He opened his eyes.
Instead of an empty space, the cleared land now held a temple made of marble and trimmed with silver foil. He and Tam sat in the middle of the temple, rows of backed benches facing an altar below a skylight that would let in the light of the full moon when it rose that night. Over the altar, a statue of a woman with long white hair and a patient smile stood guard, framed by seven silver stars.
“Is that what she looks like?” Brin asked, standing.
“Yes,” said Tam, coming carefully to his feet, “and no. I’ve not seen her face, but the ritual creates the statue, so in a sense, she decides. Does it look like someone …” He turned and trailed off.
It was missing some of the more obvious features. But if you added horns, the swell along the brown, the solid eyes …
The statue of Selune looked suspiciously like the tiefling twins. Tam studied the statue, his brow furrowed.
“What does it mean?” Brin asked. “Is it a warning?”
Tam pursed his lips. “It means something’s brewing. Where are you staying?”
“The House of Knowledge.”
“I suggest you head on back there,” Tam said, still frowning at the statue, “and start thinking about where you’re going to go next.”
CHAPTER TEN
Neverwinter 13 Kythorn, the Year of the Dark Circle (1478 DR)
Farideh was a problem. An unknown.
No, Rohini thought, watching the girl as she scrubbed heavy sample jars. Not so unknown. The coincidences laid atop each other, too thick to be ignored: Lorcan’s warlock in Neverwinter. Lorcan’s warlock, who traveled with a dragonborn who thought she was his daughter.
