Elminster in hell - Ed Greenwood [65]
Mirt and Asper chuckled. "Yes, it grows strong, with your helm off," Asper said. "Let's go to Blackstaff Tower and talk with Laeral, then, or we've reached a trail's end."
Mirt nodded. "Aye, indeed. Put on that helm again, and we'll get you a bath if nothing else."
Aleena smiled. "How did you know, so quickly?"
Mirt shrugged. "The way you sat. The way you waved to the guard. The way you didn't look offended beforehand at the dirty joke you would've known I'd be making as I greeted you-all that on top of what Torgent said."
"Torgent?"
"One of the palace guards. He's on Shyrrhr's tunnel gate, tonight. If you need a friend or protector in the palace, Lady, you could find no better than he. Look for an old man with a white mustache. He said you'd said little and kept to your armor these past days; he knew something was amiss and as good as told me that it wasn't Piergeiron inside the armor. Folk can tell, lass. Folk can always tell." He shrugged. "Besides, if I'd been wrong, your sire owes me a turn or two. 'Tis not my habit to leap upon every lady I meet, you know."
"Lately?" Asper asked him, eyebrow raised. "Is there not a tunnel from here to Blackstaff Tower that we might use?"
“Aye," said Mirt and Aleena together and chuckled. "Come," said the fat moneylender, striding toward a pillar. "This way."
Aleena frowned. "Here? But it's down-"
Mirt grinned at her. "Trust me, Lady." He said. "There're ways and ways, in this place. You'd want to miss a chance at giving that surly grim-chin outside the door a fright, no? When he finds you gone, it'll give him a short breath or two!"
Shaking her head, Aleena joined them. "Father warned me about you, once. But I had no idea-"
"They never do," Mirt purred, as stones parted to open a narrow, secret way. "Mind your heads, ladies…"
A hungry mouse in a corner of the room had time to draw only three breaths after the secret door closed and before a midair flickering filled the chamber.
Cold flames raced outward and around. Out of them leaped a masked figure, blade ready in hand. The room was dark and empty. After a quick and silent look around, it shrugged and stepped within the flames once more. The fire and light dwindled to nothing, and darkness returned.
The mouse scurried out in case the strange visitor had left something edible, but there was nothing. Not like the old days. Tilings were never like the old days, the mouse reflected, slowly and dimly. Perhaps that was the way of the world.
Lord of the pit, wizard, where is the devil-damned magic?
[silence, mindworm burrowing grimly on through vaulted darkness]
"Through here," Mirt wheezed, trotting bent over low. "The way opens out-"
"So it does! All the more danger for someone who's a lord of Waterdeep, but Faerun is a dangerous place!"
The voice was cheerful and unexpected, very close to Mirt's ear. The Old Wolf was faster than he looked. He had his sword raised and ready, in just the right spot, and he ducked back with a snarl.
His would-be slayer hissed out a curse. Slender steel sang out in a vicious thrust that skewered only air.
Mirt's stouter blade lashed in over it, biting hard into leather and flesh beneath. The man sobbed at the sudden pain. Mirt brought his sword back trailing a dark ribbon of blood and batted his attacker's sword down.
They strained, steel against steel. Mirt used his free hand, candle and all, to deliver a punch to where the wound must be. His foe groaned and shuddered, reeling back. For the first time, Mirt dared to scuttle out of the passage into the room.
Asper snapped his name, tense and low, from behind Aleena.
Mirt growled, "Still alive-and dancing with a masked man, for a change."
"My turn," Asper replied. "You killed the last ruthless slayer who attacked us, remember?"
"Huh," Mirt grunted in reply. He swung steel with all his strength to parry another deadly thrust. The blow struck the slender