Ghostwalker - Erik Scott De Bie [27]
The Ghostly Lady's thin lips turned up in a bittersweet smile. "I am sorry, Walker," she said. "I did not mean to remind you-"
"It is nothing," he said, interrupting her. There was pain in his voice, pain in the suppression, but Gylther'yel said nothing.
The two were silent for a long moment. The sun dipped fully below the horizon and darkness cast its shade over Faerun.
"Night falls," Walker said. "The third night. Time to return to my task."
* * * * *
"Old green Drake, jolly as the day is long," rang the chorus, hollered at the top of Derst's lungs as he danced upon the table.
"Raids a town, not for food but mead!" Bars responded in his deep bellow. He tried, unsuccessfully, to push Derst off the table, but the roguish knight danced out of the way.
"Carries his booty along-" Arm-in-arm, their voices joined in a raucous disharmony for the last lines of the chorus. "A little drink is all he needs!"
The Whistling Stag was filled with laughter. The knights sang, voices slurred with plenty of the same honey-brew of their refrain, and danced-poorly. The ditty used an old Iluskan folk melody but Amnian words pilfered from Derst's favorite bard of that southern kingdom. The crowd loved it. Bars and Derst, arms locked and feet flying, twirled awkwardly amidst a sea of smiles.
Over at the bar, Arya was careful not to allow her hood to slip and reveal her identity. As it was, she gave a small smile and raised her tankard of weak ale in tribute to the dancing fools.
The two were never more amiable than when they were deep in their cups. All their biting wit and competition vanished, to be replaced with jest and good-hearted friendship. Arya wondered if the two ever clearly remembered their sodden revels, and if they would be embarrassed that their seeming rivalry ended with only a mug or dozen of mead, ale, or elverquisst. Especially elverquisst.
Arya found herself wanting to join them, as a noble lady did not often have the chance to engage in such pursuits-Regent Alusair of Cormyr a notable exception-but she had other plans.
She had retired early, feigning weariness, and emerged without armor or sword, clad in woodsman's garb. In plain, earthen tones, Arya would not leave the sort of impression the daughter of Lord Rom Venkyr of Everlund in blue and silver would strike. Perhaps on this, the third evening, she could finally find some answers to the questions that had brought her to Quaervarr.
Finishing her ale, Arya waited until Bars and Derst were finished with their merry tune about the drunken wyrm. Then, while the crowd clapped and cheered the two staggering singers on, she set two copper coins on the bar and made her exit unobtrusively.
Arya stepped out into the night and pulled her cloak tightly around her slim frame. Her breath crystallized before her face. While the snow that had dusted Quaervarr the previous night was gone, the air was not warmer for it. The street was deserted, and Arya felt a familiar emptiness creeping up on her, as it always did when she was alone, but she pushed it away as best she could and made her way to the other local tavern, the Red Bear.
Unlike the Whistling Stag, renowned throughout the Silver Marches for its fine brew and finer company and visited by almost every adventurer in the north once or thrice, the Red Bear catered solely to Quaervarr locals. The ale was of a lower quality and the conversations were correspondingly less lively. Still, it was an excellent meeting place for hunters, trappers, and frontiersmen of all kinds, providing a common ground where they could come after a day's work and compare tales over tankards of Keeper Brohlm's finest. The old, hardened patrons were the most likely to know about life in the Moonwood.
Thus, they were the most likely to have heard word of the missing couriers.
Arya stepped into the smoky bar, stooping to avoid knocking her head against low-hanging, mildew-stained rafters. With a tiny gasp, she managed to catch herself before she stumbled down the steps into the tavern.
" 'Ware, lass," a gray-bearded man said at