The Diamond (4 page)

snorted. “In case you haven’t noticed, Father, I’ve changed over the past month, too. I’ve traveled

farther than you have in your whole life; I’ve been where there are no shadows at midday

because the sun is right overhead. I’ve fought dopplegangers and squid lords, creatures that make

your brand of evil as squalid as it is chronic. I’ve drunk with pirates and crossed swords with

tanar’ri, and returned to tell of it. You said it yourself: I’m a hero. Why would a hero ever join

you?”

Lasker’s mouth set. “So, you’ve saved all Waterdeep from a plague of monsters and conjured

armies. Congratulations.” He sketched a mock bow. “What has it gotten you? The dungeons,

serving common guard duty! Where’s your estate? Your riches? Your influence? You saved all

Waterdeep but own none of it!” The merchant waved a dismissive hand.

“With me,” he said, the light in his eyes again, “you’ll have all those things. Come back to the

family. All it’ll take is a public apology, asking to be received back.”

“What?” Noph asked, astonished.

“You publicly humiliated the house of Nesher,” his father explained, “and you will publicly remove

that humiliation.”

“I wouldn’t join you,” Noph said slowly, “even if you apologized to me—and not only to me, but to

all of Waterdeep!”

As the young hero’s last few shouted words echoed around them, his father’s face grew sour. “My

son, the great, self-righteous hero!” He sighed contemptuously, and then asked, “What good is it

to be a hero if you lack any plan to make the public pay you benefits for your heroism? Eh?”

Noph shook his head. How could a man—and not just any man; his father!—be this base?

Wasn’t—

“If I might ejaculate something between you—” a voice rumbled from nearby.

Noph had thought this end of the dungeon was empty. He looked through the open doorway at

the cell across the corridor. Jostling at its bars were the unlovely faces of the Brothers Boarskyr.

Noph sighed. “Father, I believe your partners in cri—politics—have something to add.”

“Thank you positively, young Hastacough,” Becil Boarskyr bellowed, clearing his throat.

“Kastonoph.”

“Right, Kastratoff. Listen well to your father’s patronizing speech. Your sire’s only trying to become

a sire with a capital’s’, if you know what I’m hinting at around the bush. That would make you a

sire with a lowly V at first, but soon enough, once your sire kicks off, he’ll leave it in your

posterior.”

“Posterity,” Lasker attempted a correction.

“How’s about I have a look at your sword?” Bullard asked.

“This is a private conversation,” Noph said flatly.

“Not to fiddle about with another man’s privates,” replied Becil, “but our enterprise has got its

smarmy speaker (that’s your progenital pater, there beside you), and two liberaltarian spenddrifts

(that’s ours truly), and now all we need is a hero’s face to kiss the babies and shake the hands of

men and ply his silvered tongue in every passing lady’s behalf—”

“Arrgh! It’s useless!” Lasker screamed, tossing his hands into the air and stalking away down the

corridor.

Noph smiled at the two idiots. “I never thought I’d say this to you, but

thanks.”

Bullard nodded. “I never thought I’d say this, neither, but how’s about a look at your sword?”

The younger and elder scions of House Nesher had scarce turned a corner in search of a cell

when there was a great rush of black wool and imperious gestures along the passage. The

whirlwind resolved itself into Khelben the Blackstaff even before the armsmen got their weapons

out. A raised magely eyebrow sent the few drawn weapons hastily back into their sheaths.

“Gather round, all of you,” he said. “Aye, those in the jakes, too.”

The dungeon was suddenly alive with shuffling feet and nervously attentive armsmen crowding

around the mage.

Khelben looked around. “Is that all of you, at last? Good. The spells I’m about to cast on you are

complex and costly; I don’t want to have to repeat a single one of them.”

A final guard rushed up to join the group, hands darting beneath his belt where shirttails flapped.

Khelben gave him a glare, and then turned his head to favor all of the other armsmen with it. “Any

of you been under a stoneskin spell before?” There were a few nods. “‘Tis pretty simple; makes

your skin as tough as stone. It’ll turn arrows, daggers, swords, and the like. It should keep you

from hurting each other down here tonight. I’m casting it now.”

In the silence that followed, the armsmen stared at a small pebble rolling hypnotically between

Khelben’s fingers as the wizard shaped gestures in the air. With a sudden pop and a hiss, the

stone collapsed into gray ash, and tracers of smoke whirled out from the mage’s fingers to smite

each guard between the eyes.

The silence held until Khelben spoke again. “This second enchantment will enable you to fight as a

unit, for once.” Khelben made two quick gestures, uttering a word that sounded both old and

cruel. “You’ll share an only slightly unpleasant dream, but in the end, you get to be heroes.”

Twenty-some guards stared back at him in silent confusion.

Khelben saw their expressions, shrugged, and made another gesture. “You needn’t be upset by

any of this. In fact, you’ll forget all about our little conversation—and that I was even here. I’m

completely invisible to you until highsun tomorrow. You can’t even remember my name until then.

If you see me before that time, you see nothing at all. Understand?”

Helmed heads nodded in unison, and Khelben smiled grimly. “Back to work!” he barked. “You’ve a

pair of condemned men to guard!”

Midnight was fast approaching, yet still no Lord Mage. Noph sat alone on a bench well down the

passage from the cells. Only five hours remained before sunrise and a double execution. Where

was the Blackstaff?

For that matter, what good would his warding magics be now? If Entreri and Trandon hadn’t tried

to escape yet, they wouldn’t.

“‘Ware!” a Watchman shouted. Noph blinked. A gangly, redheaded armsman stood outside

Entreri’s cell, struggling to free his sword from its scabbard. “The assassin’s loose! He’s picked the

lock with his fingerbones!”

Boots pounded on flagstones. Noph joined the general rush. Armored shoulders and helmed heads

jostled in the passage ahead. Blades slid and rang from their sheaths, glinting in the lantern light.

Noph shouldered forward through the press of guards, peering to see what was happening by the

cells.

The redheaded guard’s sword grated out at last, aided by a muttered curse. Its owner promptly

lunged at the cell door, thrusting the blade between its bars to the hilt. If Entreri were there, he’d

be skewered. The guard’s hand, arm, and shoulder—suddenly thinner than they should

be—followed his sword through the window. Steel clanged on stone. The guard hissed in pain and

snatched his arm back into view. The sword was no longer in it.

“He bit me,” the armsman growled, clutching his wrist.

“Now he’s got a blade, dolt!” someone shouted. The hurrying guards reached the cell door, and

stopped suddenly, those in front shrinking back from something Noph couldn’t see. He charged on

into his packed fellows. There were stumbles, grunts, and the skirl of metal-clad elbows and

knuckles on unyielding stone. Struggling to keep his footing, Noph peered ahead.

A strange fight was in progress. The gangly guard ducked as if a sword swept the air above his

head, but Noph saw no blade nor attacker. Springing desperately aside, the red-haired armsman

barreled into two other guards, and all three sprawled along the passage wall.

A lithe guard leapt over this pile of armsmen to the cell door, his sword dancing in intricate thrusts

and parries before him. “Clever with a blade, Entreri?” the guard taunted. “Aren’t you more

familiar with dagger thrusts into kidneys from behind?” He lunged twice more before dodging

away from an unseen blow.

Something massive and invisible slammed into the guard’s head with a sickeningly damp crack. He

toppled like a piece of lumber, stiff and uncaring.

“Watch that door!” someone shouted. “He’s killed a man with a door!”

“Watch that sword!” another guard snarled.

“Watch that bony hand!”

“Back! Back! Give me room to fight!” bellowed a hulking guard at the head of the crowd. He

swung a spiky mace once, twice, and then with a roar he charged, seeming to think he was

backing someone up against the wall. Noph could see no one. The giant swung his mace, growling,

and then yelped and stumbled back, trampling two men behind him.

“Fire! Fire! He’ll burn us all!”

“Water! Bring water!”

“Not water, for an oil fire! Bring sand!”

“Damned lanterns! What was wrong with good old torches, I’d like to know?”

Ahead of Noph, the guards were jammed solidly, metal shoulders shrieking against each other.

Those in front flung up their hands before their eyes as if shielding themselves from blinding light,

yet the passage stood as dim as before. There was no smoke, heat, or light—no fire.

Noph struggled to squeeze through the packed ranks, hauling on shoulders and crying, “Way!

Make way!”

“Let him through,” one guard cried. “He’s got sand!”

“Hurry, Noph!” another called. “Entreri’s almost got the sorcerer’s cell open!”

Noph at last won free of the press of bodies, stumbling out into the clear area before the cells.

“What’re you doing? You’ll burn alive!” came a shout from behind him.

Noph ignored it, striding straight to Entreri’s cell. Its door was closed and locked, and within the

assassin still lay unconscious on the straw. Noph peered through the window of Trandon’s cell. The

sorcerer stood just inside the bars, gazing quizzically out at him.

Noph turned to the other guards. “What’s the matter with all of you?”

“Get out of there, Noph—save yourself! They can’t get past us all!”

“You’re right,” Noph replied, bewildered. “They’re still in their—”

A new commotion erupted. The three nearest guards, in the front rank, swung their swords at

empty air, faces tense and blades whistling. Steel fangs sliced and thrust, but met no enemy

metal. The three battling guards grunted with effort, shouting, “Back to your cell, assassin!”

“You can’t defeat all three of us!”

“If you want out of this dungeon, you’ll have to kill me fir—Aughh! Cruel stroke!” The speaker’s

sword clattered to the stones. Clapping a hand to his neck, he crashed heavily into the wall. “Oh,

unkind cut,” he gasped, and slowly brought his fingers back to gaze at them in magnificent pathos.

They were none too clean, Noph saw, but bare.

“Blood so bright,” the guard groaned. “My blood! To be shed, if shed it I must, in bright meadows,

not in a dungeon drear. Ahhh, I am slain

Oh, to die so deep and dark

“

As the ‘slain’ man declaimed, his two fellows fought all the harder. Sweat streamed down their

faces as they plied their blades, but Noph could still see and hear no foe. He went to them, taking

care to stay out of sword range. “Who are you fighting?”

“Stab him from behind, Noph!”

“Stab who from behind?”

“We’ve got him trapped between us!”

“I see no one,” Noph told them. “You’re battling some sort of illusion.”

“

Oh, the dusky shore,” the guard against the wall moaned. “Swept by winds of sorrow,

heedless beneath the feet of those who pass, forgotten by the living. I come to you now,

Kelemvor, Lord of the Dead, borne upon the dark tides of mine own lifeblood

“

“You’re not dying,” Noph said in disgust. “You’re not even hurt!”

“Slay him, Noph! Strike now, while his sword is bound by mine!”

“Too late! ‘Ware the fell mage!”

“Thunder and lightning!”

“Fireballs—they burst so bright! ‘Ware more magic!”

“How can we stand against this?”

“Gods take your wits!” Noph shouted. “Nobody’s attacking you!”

“

at least they’ll say of me: he died defending great Waterdeep. Died fighting valiantly, brought

low by the vicious blade of a dastardly man. The bards will sing, down the years, of my

all-too-rapid end

“

At last the jammed armsmen were on the move. Those at the rear retreated, white-faced and

flinching. Those in the middle flailed about, tumbling with each imagined blast of arcane fire or

sorcerous lightning.

Those in the fore slumped down in faints or succumbed to illusory injuries. Noph stood in the

center of the supposed conflagration, and shook his head in amazement. At his feet a guard

gasped, “I’m coming, Mamma, at last. This is it.”

Noph stalked to Trandon’s cell. The tall mage stood within, innocent amusement on his features.