Escape from Undermountain - Mark Anthony [8]
Her eyes wide with shock, the rogue sank to the floor. There she writhed in soundless agony as she slowly died. Just as the insect had on the end of the Device. With a fey smile, Darien whispered, "Do forgive me."
He spun on a boot heel and strode through the silent common room toward the tavern's door. The rabble made no move to stop him. They didn't dare. And it did not matter that his disguise had been revealed. He had already gotten everything he needed.
"So you have managed to land yourself in prison, Artek Ar'talen," he murmured to himself. "Well, that is a small enough problem. For me, if not for you."
Laughing softly, Lord Darien Thal stepped out into the balmy spring night.
1
Heir to Darkness
What a fool he had been to think that he could truly change.
With your fingers, trace every crack and crevice in the walls of your prison cell. A dampness may signify weakened mortar, a puff of air an opening beyond. Notice how insects and other vermin come and go. Their paths may lead you to freedom, my son.
He had thought it would be such an easy thing, like shedding an old cloak to don one of new cloth. After all, he didn't choose this course for his life. Since childhood, he had simply known nothing else. For a time it had seemed enough, though not because of the gold coins pilfered from velvet-lined purses, or the rings slipped from slender noble fingers, or the jewels spirited from guarded stone vaults. Money had always been the least of the rewards of his nightly work. Far more intoxicating had been the thrill. It flowed through his body like fine wine as he stole through darkened windows, crept down shadowed streets, or strode boldly across brilliant candlelit ballrooms toward his next unwitting quarry.
Dissatisfaction had come upon him so gradually that for a long time he had scarcely noticed it. Even after the thrill of the hunt had dulled into boredom, habit had propelled him onward. It wasn't until he was nearly captured that he understood how reckless he had become.
One moonlit night he had strolled along the silent avenues of Waterdeep's City of the Dead, wearing the expensive silken robes he had just lifted from a recently deceased nobleman. Only when the hue and cry sounded on the air did he realize that he had not even bothered to conceal himself as he walked. Struck by sudden terror, he had cowered in the embrace of a decomposing corpse in a half-filled grave as the City Watch ran past. He had escaped them, for the moment. Yet he knew it was only a matter of time before he grew so careless that even he could not elude the Watch when the alarm sounded.
The truth was, part of him wanted to get caught. He was weary-weary of scheming, of running, of watching dread flare in the eyes of others when they recognized who it was that stood before them. That night, in the bottom of the muddy grave, wrapped in the rain-soaked garb of a dead man, he finally made a choice. From that moment on, he was a thief no longer.
Now to the floor. Press your ear right against the stones. Then rap sharply with some hard object-a spoon, a pebble, even your bare knuckles if you have nothing left. Move a half-pace to one side, then rap again. Listen well as you do. A change in sound may indicate a space below. And a way out.
He had not considered that nobody would believe him. But it made perfect sense, naturally. He had robbed the citizens of Waterdeep for years. What cause did they have to trust him? When the rumor spread across the city that he had given up his thieving ways, another rumor raced hot on its heels: it was all an elaborate ruse to lure the nobility into a false sense of security. They would leave their wealth unguarded, and Artek could thereby relieve them of it all the easier. Finally, he had realized there was only one way to make the people of Waterdeep understand that he had truly changed. He had to show them.
His chance arrived unexpectedly. He was gloomily pacing the night-darkened streets