Tiep remembered a riot in Berdusk. He didn't remember it coherently-he couldn't have been more than six at the time-but what he did remember was vivid. First, everyone had raced toward the market with sticks and rocks and torches. Then he recalled people screaming, horses crashing through the crowd, and flashing steel as everyone tried to get away from the market. He'd seen his first corpse that day: a woman who'd fallen and been trampled during the retreat.
When he thought about it now, Tiep supposed the riot had been about the cost of food and the fear of starvation. His grown self understood that riots had underlying causes; usually the cost of one thing or the fear of something else. And riots had flash points, they didn't just happen-though that was the way he remembered the Berdusk riot. One moment, he must have been doing something he couldn't remember, and the next he'd been running with his mates, a cobblestone in each hand and a howl in his heart.
He remembered that the riot had been exhilarating, until he saw the corpse.
She'd been the baker's daughter and Tiep had never known her name, but she'd given out bread crusts from the back door of her father's shop and sometimes let him and his mates warm themselves by the oven in winter. The baker had shut his shop after the riot. He hadn't really had much choice in the matter. The mob had burnt it clear down. Tiep remembered going cold and hungry more often after that-hardly a surprise to his grown self, but at six, he hadn't made the connection between the High Sun riot and winter's discomfort.
He'd been a child then, and children didn't string events together. He'd run to the market. He'd run away from it. The baker's daughter gave him food. The baker's daughter was a corpse. The baker's shop was gone. He'd gone hungry and cold. There were no connections, no causes, no reason not to riot with the mob.
The goblins were like the child he'd been-maybe that was why he despised them so. They ran toward Dru when they saw him carrying a dead 'demon' on his shoulders. They ran away when they found out that the 'demon' was someone they'd known as 'Grouze.' They pushed and shoved and hurt one another-mostly the real goblin children-when they ran.
Ghistpok, the fat, old goblin they called their chief, couldn't control them. His house withstood the mob because the Zhentarim had built it, and say what you would about the Zhentarim, they knew how to build a stone wall. A handful of the flimsy goblin hovels got trampled.
When the goblins who'd been tending the hearth and stew pot caught sight of the mob headed their way, they threw up their hands and ran. Bad enough that Tiep and his friends had to sacrifice Hopper to get on Ghistpok's good side, but watching the rampaging goblins overturn the pot in their hysteria was more than Tiep could bear to watch. He wanted badly to unsheathe his sword and kill a few, in the old gelding's name.
Ghistpok's tribe didn't deserve to live; they didn't have enough sense. The hearth fire would have spread through the camp if it hadn't been raining again. The swordswingers the Beast Lord put together underground were smarter than all of Ghistpok's goblins put together. Which said a lot about the bugs Lady Mantis cooked up back in Weathercote.
Then Druhallen did something with his voice and made himself sound like a thousand men all shouting from the top of the quarry.
'Stop your running. Stop your screaming. Come back to the old headquarters.'
The goblins stopped. Every one of them understood plain language; they'd just been pretending that they didn't. They hung their ugly orange and red heads and looked ashamed as they filed back to the clearing in front of the stone house. Ghistpok climbed up to what remained of the Zhentarim roof; that was a sight from below that Tiep hoped never to see again.
'Listen to me.' Dru's voice boomed through the quarry. 'We went into Dekanter to find the truth about the demons, and we did find it. We've brought it where you can see it and judge for yourselves.'
Tiep was impressed. He'd hadn't guessed that Druhallen could charm so many minds. Galimer had assured him Dru didn't cast any sort of charm spell; charms and enchantments were Galimer's specialty-because so few of them were cast on the fly.
That was Dru, letting everyone think there was something he couldn't do so Galimer could seem to be the expert. Wizards were sneaky folk, and Druhallen was one of the sneakiest because he seemed so straightforward.
Last night, after the storm died and Dru huddled up with his magic box, he hadn't said anything about being prepared to charm the goblins, but he was. Had he memorized the spell last night because he'd guessed that the goblins would be unruly? Had Dru been carrying the reagents around all summer, the way he'd been carrying around the reagents for his Candlekeep scrying spell?
And they complained about Tiep keeping secrets!
The charm began to wear off. Ghistpok was among the first to recover. The goblin chief wasn't pleased to see his tribe listening to Druhallen. He waved his arms and hopped from one foot to the other while shouting goblin words. Tiep held his breath and prayed that Tymora or some other god would give the fat goblin a little shove toward embarrassment if not oblivion, but the gods had done enough for one day. Ghistpok commanded his tribe's attention, finished his tirade, and clambered uneventfully down from the roof.
Dru picked up the swordswinger's corpse-which Tiep hadn't noticed on the ground while Ghistpok was ranting-and carried it into the stone house. Ghistpok and five or six male goblins followed Dru. That left maybe forty or fifty goblins, including children, standing around in the rain. It took a while, but eventually a few of the females went off to reconstruct the soaked, scattered hearth.
He watched the females wrestle the huge stew pot onto an iron tripod and empty smaller pots of rainwater into it. Then, while one of them struggled to coax fire out of the sopping embers, the rest gathered the meat that had spilled out when the stew pot overturned. Without hesitation, they tossed the chunks back into the pot.
Tiep was suddenly cold. His knees trembled and the ground wobbled beneath his feet. He would have fallen, but the thought of landing in the mud was so horrifying that it kept his legs moving until he was off the mounds and standing on the quarry stone. Gasping and sobbing, he doubled over, clutching his gut. It had been hours since Tiep had eaten. There was nothing left in his stomach and that only made the retching worse.
His throat was raw before Tiep had regained control over his body and thoughts. The stairway to the High Trail beckoned through the late afternoon shadows, but so did the eastward gorge leading out of the Dekanter quarry. For the first time Tiep noticed a pair of Zhentarim-built houses just inside the gorge. Their roofs were gone, and soot stained the gaping holes that had been their windows and doorways. As shelters, neither would be better than standing out in the open, but once Tiep noticed them and the charred remnants of a wooden gate between them he forgot about the rain.
Druhallen will not listen to reason, Amarandaris had told him the night before they left Parnast. I've told him not to leave Parnast, but if he does-if he slips away and you go with him, then you will be my eyes in Dekanter. Watch him. Watch everything he does; remember everything he says, especially when he casts that spell he got from Candlekeep. But more than that, keep your eyes open for an iron box as long as your arm and half as high. Men died protecting that box. Look for it beneath the walls of the gatehouse. Leave it where you see it, if you see it, but when you get to Yarthrain, pay a visit to a man called Horace, the cooper behind the Black Buck Inn. Tell him everything-give it to him in writing, if you can. A reward will be waiting for you when you get to Scornubel.
The best part of everything Amarandaris had said was that the odds were against the Zhentarim showing up here in Dekanter. The bad part was that Tiep couldn't tell Druhallen not to worry. The worst part, until now, was that he hadn't seen anything that might have been a gatehouse.
With renewed strength and purpose, Tiep strode to the gorge and across the threshold of the northern gatehouse. The interior had been burnt and looted months ago. Charred wood was rotting fast. In the dim light Tiep couldn't easily tell the difference between roof-beams and furniture. There was nothing that looked like an iron box, but plenty of rubbish lay heaped up against the walls. He kicked the nearest pile.
'No talk. Go away.'
Tiep leapt straight up when he heard words coming from the rubbish behind him. His heart had stopped and restarted at violent speed before a shred of intelligence let him know he'd heard that voice before.
'Sheemzher?'
'Go away.'
One trash heap was more blue and green than sooty black.
'What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be back with your brothers and sisters, getting ready for the big feast and celebration?'
'Sheemzher not eat. Sheemzher not celebrate. Not talk. Go away.'
