Chapter 9 - Part 8

“It’s about time,” Delegado snapped, barging through the door after Chubat opened it. The surly half-orc let the heavy artifact down on the thick rug and straightened up, rubbing his back in an exaggerated fashion. “You kept us waiting for two hours!”

“One and a-half,” Pienna corrected him gently. “And it was unavoidable.” She blew a kiss at Feather, and the hawk flapped off of Delegado’s shoulder and onto the small chandelier in the room. She had hoped Feather would come sit with her, he was a darling bird despite his association with the brash and rude half-orc, but Missy was lying next to the table that she sat by. The great panther rolled over lazily to stare at the half-orc, then it looked up at he hawk. No doubt Missy thought Feather to be a tasty snack. “Yes I am well, Delegado, thank you for asking. Please put the key on the rug.”

“Oh, sarcasm from the great Pienna,” he said. He put the large artifact down as she directed. “It’s here, pay up.”

Pienna sighed, trying not to get frustrated. She was tired, dangerously so. Dealing with the prophecies were always draining, but something more nagged at her. She felt far older than she was. Delegado, as usual, was being short with her because he hated Chubat. “You owe Lyle an apology,” Pienna told the half-orc. “I understand that while you thought him an enemy at first, you treated him rather shabbily afterwards.”

The half-orc stared at her with disbelief, and behind him faithful Chubat rested a hand on his axe. “No,” the half-orc said. “You either pay or you don’t, and I’ll let my House do the collections. I’m not your monkey.”

Pure willpower kept her from screaming. Delegado’s mercenary tendencies made him totally misread her. Again. “I was not setting a condition,” she told him. The circlet of liveoak that rested upon her brown and gray curls caught the light from a stained glass window and seemed to glow. It was a focus, rather than a proper magical item, but many who saw it thought that it was some powerful device of the woodlands and therefore tended to back down from a conflict with her. “I was giving you advice. If you recall, when we first met, I warned you about your tendency to be unnecessarily rude, and how it would continue to bring fights your way that you didn’t need. I will pay you as soon as I magically ensure that this is the real key, and not a fake. The Kundarak funds will be transferred whether you learn to behave as a normal person or not.”

Delegado considered this, pursing his lips. She could see that her words were having an effect. “Alright,” he said finally. “You’ve got a point.” He turned back to Lyle. “Hey, I was worried you were another Dragon Below cultist or a dolgrim. I had to kill a lot of them to get that key, and a bunch of them chased me through the forest. I kind of took my stress out on you, and then I got more ticked by your stupid Ashbound propaganda.”

“It’s okay, forget it,” Lyle said, trying to stave off that last phrase. He winced when the word ‘Ashbound’ came out, glancing over at Pienna.

She shook her head. “Young man, the Ashbound are fervent in their beliefs, but they are wrong. Nonetheless if you like their ideas, that does not make you my enemy.”

“S-sure,” the boy said, swallowing. “Um, he’s here so I should – I mean I’ll just, I mean – ”

“You can go,” Chubat growled. Lyle dropped the empty saddlebag he had been carrying and bolted down the stairs.

“Chubat gets to act as rude as ever I see,” Delegado said, settling down onto a cushioned chair. “Funny how his behavior never gets a rebuke from you.” Missy growled slightly. “Or your kitty. So what was unavoidable? You were busy communing with the stars?”

“In a fashion, yes,” she told him. “I was sleeping. I needed a mid-morning nap to recover from several rituals that had to be performed past midnight.”

“Something I need to know about?” Delegado asked, leaning forward. Above them, Feather shifted his weight, reflecting his master’s mood.

“Something you want to get paid for?” Chubat asked.

“Chubat, I am sure you are aware that both of Delegado’s parents hail from tribes who follow Gatekeeper tradition,” she told him. Her eyes stared very intently at the half-orc. “Do you wish to be drawn into this, Delegado? More is rising that only the ancient evils. The world stands on the precipice.”

“Can’t you ever say just yes or no?” Delegado asked her.

“Can’t you just name your price?” the dwarf said, taking out a stone and smoothing his axe blade.

“Are you still talking?” Delegado asked him. “You really have to let me know. I need all the assistance possible to pretend to pay attention.”

Pienna slapped her hand on the table and everyone, including the two animals, jumped. “Will you two stop it?”

Chubat and Delegado looked at each other, and then looked away.

“Delegado,” Pienna said, her voice serious. “I want you to take this seriously. There is a need for confidence here, a need for secrecy, do you understand me?”

“Yeah, yeah, I get the idea,” the half-orc said. “Now what’s this super-secret issue that –” Delegado stopped as he caught a footstep in a nearby room. “Who’s that?” he asked.

“None of your business,” she told him firmly.

“Hm, not a human child, doesn’t have the sound,” he said, narrowing his eyes. “Not a goblin or a gnome. So it’s either a kobold or a halfling, judging by the sound. Is it a kobold?” Pienna could easily tell that despite his taking Gatekeeper issues seriously, the half-orc was not going to pass up a chance to needle her. If nothing else Delegado enjoyed getting a rise out of Chubat by doing so.

“You knew you heard halfling feet when you asked the question,” came a reedy voice.

Pienna got up quickly, going over to the small form that stood in the doorway. “Drorin, you should rest,” she told him. Pienna could not help but feel pity for the small creature whose visions drove it across the continent. Besides, she did not know if she trusted Delegado enough with this secret yet.

“A permanent rest is coming soon,” the halfling told her, his body shaking. “Those who fear me because they fear the great ones who contacted me have allied with the blood that has no love for you, Pienna. I do not know what that means, but I have seen it.”

“And I thought this town had no entertainment,” she heard the half-orc mutter.

Pienna hugged the small halfling, noting the tiny scars on his skull. Drorin had taken to shaving his head, but his hands shook all the time. She quickly cast a spell that closed the angry red lines. “Drorin, I will protect you as best I can. You must not fear. Please calm down. Would you like some tea?”

“I want to see his face,” the halfling said, walking around the table to stare at the disdainful face of the half-orc. “Delegado d’Tharashk, who bears the mark of the prophecy on his skin.”

“Have we met?” Delegado asked. She could tell Delegado did not take the halfling seriously.

“Delegado who decides to be neither charitable nor selfish, who in his own mind is comfortably away from moral judgements,” Drorin continued. Delegado was nonplussed. “He is truly neither good nor evil, he follows no star, no theology, no philosophy. Neither anarchy nor axioms stir his soul.”

“This little twitch the lifestyle writer for the Korranberg Chronicle?” the half-orc snorted.

“Oh he thinks of good as better than evil, for he has less personal trouble with those who try to be good,” Drorin continued. “But his heart is cold and closed, hurt once and then twice. Tough to the elements, unafraid of blade, arrow, spell, or mind-power, the pain in his soul is the only thing he feels.” Delegado looked wary now. “In the night, he cannot sleep. He hates his thoughts, for he has no purpose to his life. He is loyal to his House, to his missions, but he feels no passion anymore. He does not think of her, whose real face he always found the most beautiful. But he does, even as he does not.”

“What is this galig?” Delegado roared, jumping up from the chair and backing away from the halfling as though he was a venomous serpent. Feather screeched, and Missy rolled to her feet with a growl. Chubat’s hand went to his axe. Pienna waved both the panther and the dwarf down.

“He is afraid that he no longer cares to live,” Drorin continued. “He is shocked at the casual cruelty that comes so easily to him now. He fears it means he cannot control the pain. He only feels alive when his adrenaline is pumping, and despite all the accolades his house can shower on him, he feels no accomplishment. Because he could not save her.”

“Shut him up!” Delegado hissed.

“He would have let the Riedrans claim him if not for his friendship with Meddin.” The halfling’s voice was a relentless march. “He was surprised at the young monks that he killed, wondering why it came so easily. He ran from the warforged for he saw it had more soul in him than he did.” The halfling’s voice dropped to a whisper. “She is still alive, Delegado. She turned to her true form as they do when they die, but it was a bluff. She was faking being dead. She was captured, and taken to a cell, but she hoped that you would come for her. She did not hope for you forever.”

Delegado blinked, and then gave a shaky laugh. “Nice act, you work with the Phialarn entertainers? Or you’ve been digging in my skull with that Riedran mind magic?” He fooled no one with his show of uncaring, least of all Pienna.

“You do not want to believe me,” the halfling told him. “But my words are true, even if I do not always understand them. Why do you think your House Triumvirate refused the Cannith contract on my aunt? They recognized the truth of my words. Why do you think that the firebrands of the Brelish Parliament changed their minds and stood behind Boranel’s olive branch to the Eldeen Reaches? They recognized the truth of my words. Why do you think that Sister Pienna waits here? She recognized the power of my words. The son of a human woman and an alien mind has chosen this time to leave his self-imposed exile in the icy peaks. The young woman whose ambitions lead her to ally with someone her family created has begun to replace her natural body. The last of the Balanced Palm approaches, and the traitor may save us all. I know these words to be true, but I do not know what they mean.” The halfling swayed and turned to Pienna. “Two who you do not expect will be here before the sun passes the middle of the sky. Dispose of the key before them. You need no divinations, it is the real thing.”

With that he collapsed, and Pienna caught him, cradling his head. “Chubat, he is burning up!” she called. The dwarf hurried to the closet by the end of the table and brought a cold pitcher of water out. Pienna soaked a towel in the water and laid it across Drorin’s head. The poor thing was twitching.

“This is the worst he has ever been,” the dwarf told her seriously.

Pienna nodded, and cast a spell into the halfling. It was one of the most curative magical forces in nature’s arsenal. It lifted away even the worst of diseases. Red fever, black spots, and plagues that tore through cities all fell before this magic. But it only settled the halfling down, pushing the fever back to slight levels, never finishing it entirely. “Take him back to bed,” she said after the casting was done. Chubat nodded and lifted the halfling easily, walking him to the next room.

“What the Khyber was that?” Delegado demanded angrily. “And don’t lie! You think I haven’t had someone try to con me before?”

Pienna sighed, feeling very, very old. “Hush,” she told him. “His words when he enters the trance are true, I know that, but it is killing him. I wonder if he drew the dragon to him somehow, despite how it doubtless believes that it picked Drorin out of the crowd.”

“Dragons don’t come to Khorvaire,” Delegado said, trying to regain his composure. “He probably was having one of his fits and he saw a dinosaur.”

“Your ability to infuriate through irreverence is uncanny,” Pienna told the half-orc. “But your skepticism is a veil over fear. Now be quiet.” She drew out the rage and anger that nature had for unnatural things, and poured her hands over the great byeshk key. The wrath of nature found the flaw in the metal of the great key, and the entire structure cracked wide open. After a moment the crack birthed smaller cracks, and the giant key shuddered, turning into a cascade of dust and fragments. “There,” she sighed. “The lock cannot be opened now.”

“If you would have done that downstairs I wouldn’t have had to drag it up here,” Delegado grumbled. She gave him a look. “What?”

“It had to be a certain number of feet above sea level,” she told him.

“Are you making that up?” the bounty hunter demanded. “And are you next going to tell me that half-orc hands have to clean it up? Because I won’t!”
Chubat came back in the room, shaking his head. “He’s not long for this world, Pienna,” the dwarf said. “Another week of these visions of his and he will die.”

“Boo and hoo and lay a flower on his grave,” Delegado said. Pienna stared at him, truly shocked. “No, don’t ask me to feel bad for the con artist!”

“He really got to you, didn’t he?” Chubat asked. “Who’s this girl that you failed?”

“Your mother!” Delegado snapped. “Can I get paid now, please? I’m tired of hanging around here.”

Pienna sighed and looked at him angrily. “Just when I think you may gain some maturity, you prove me wrong,” she said. She produced a thin key and opened a locked drawer in a box that rested under the table. Out came a letter stamped with the Kundarak seal. “I’m signing it ‘to bearer’,” she told him. “Don’t drop it.”

Delegado took it from her and examined it carefully. “Thanks,” he said. “Pleasure doing business with you.” He tucked the letter into a hidden pocket. “Chubat, it was a distinct non-pleasure, as usual.” The half-orc clicked his tongue, and Feather flew to his shoulder. “If you want the best agent in Tharashk, you know where to go,” he said as he opened the door.

With no further flourishes, the half-orc went down the hallway and then the stairs. Chubat watched him go silently, and then closed the door. “I have never understood why you cultivate him,” he grumbled.

“Old friend,” she sighed. “You heard the prophecy two months ago. Delegado is tied up in this.”

“Yes, but on which side?” Chubat asked, taking out a tiny chisel and a stone carving that he had been working on. “And you were always trying to make him more palatable, even before you ever heard of the prophecy or met that poor soul in the other room.” Chubat sat on a chair and continued his work on the carving. It was slowly coming to resemble a fish jumping in a river. “I always wondered why you didn’t let me kill him when I met him.”

“Because he wasn’t guilty,” she answered simply. “And if you recall he helped catch the murderer.”

“Of course he did,” snorted the dwarf. “Orc blood helped him, one murderer finding another.”

Pienna shook her head. Chubat would forever be a bigot, no matter how hard she tried. “Regardless of your feelings, you heard Drorin’s words. You know why I specifically requested Delegado from the Tharashk arranger. As much as he is good at what he does, another could have found the key, or better a group to fight off the many dolgrims that had stolen it. But Drorin said that there is hope for the world if Delegado is in Merylsward when Sypheros begins.”

“And so he is here,” Chubat said, his thick fingers creating detail so fine that Pienna could not see it from across the room. “Who is the aunt that the halfling spoke of?”

“A woman I met several years ago,” Pienna said. “She assisted me in that matter in Cyre some months back. I regret that she has since died.”

“My condolences,” Chubat said.

“She died as she lived, in a quiet act of noble self-sacrifice,” Pienna said. “I wish I had kept in touch with her since Cyre, but other matters called me. I gave her charge of a very important person.”

“One day you’re going to have to tell me the whole story,” Chubat said, producing a tiny brush to fix something on the fish’s eye.

“I made an oath to my cousin that I would not,” she said. “I keep my oaths Chubat, you taught me the importance of that.”

Chubat made the sigh that always meant he was dropping a subject out of respect despite the fact that he thought she was wrong. “Well, by now the half-orc has figured out that there is no other drinking establishment in this town but this one. I’ll go down to the common room for lunch and to keep an eye on things. Drorin said you would have two unexpected visitors.”

“Thank you,” she said. He put his carvings away and left, gently closing the door. He did not lock it, for none but a fool would disturb the serenity of a Gatekeeper elder.

Pienna scratched Missy behind the ears, and the big panther rumbled happily. She wondered what would be next. Last night Drorin had spent a half-hour screaming about fire, and she pondered on what that could mean.