The City of Splendors_ A Waterdeep Novel - Ed Greenwood [23]
Like a storm wind or Mount Waterdeep, Varandros Dyre loomed up fierce and unyielding. Just now, he'd lifted his snout sharply to gaze down the crowded street, toward the distant scaffolding that was their destination.
"What boar-buttock-brained idiot braced that mess?" he snapped, rounding on them as if his two apprentices were personally responsible for the sloppy lashings. Without waiting for replies, he whirled around and set off at a speed that forced them to trot to keep up.
"Baraezym!" he growled, over his shoulder. "Tell Jivin what's wrong with that scaffolding!"
The older apprentice peered. "Uh, broken boards… loose lashings." He frowned. "It looks almost as if it fell down, or came close to, then got dragged back up into place with ropes and braced with a few boards. Everything's…"
Baraezym flung up both hands, as if his fingers could snatch the words he wanted from empty air. He succeeded only in knocking a hat off the head of a hurrying sailor on his right and unintentionally slapping the cheek of a heavily cloaked woman on his left.
The sailor cursed as he leaned and snatched his hat out of the air before it could fall and be lost. The woman spun around to lessen the force of Baraezym's blow and said huskily, "Hey, there! I charge good coin for that, y'know!"
Baraezym's stammered apologies were lost in his own hurried pursuit of his master, and in Dyre's fiercely approving, "Exactly! Yon work's sagged and been hauled back into place, rather than rebuilt properly! Oh, heads are going to roll!"
The master of Dyre's Fine Walls and Dwellings stopped dead in mid-stride, so suddenly that Jivin nearly slammed into him. The Shark was staring up, but barely had time to gape before broken boards came tumbling down through the air. Trailing a startled shout, a workman plunged after them.
From high above Redcloak Lane the man fell, mallet tumbling, and disappeared behind the crowd filling the street with their hand-carts and shoulder-perched baskets.
The crash and clatter was surprisingly loud, and heads turned all over Redcloak Lane. Varandros Dyre was already racing through the gawkers, spitting a stream of unfinished, crowded-atop-each-other curses. When he fetched up against a close-harnessed team of three mules, it was the mules that were brought to a rocking halt.
Their carter spat a curse at Dyre as the builder shoved his way past, but Dyre's roared reply was so fierce that the man recoiled. Baraezym and Jivin gave the startled man apologetic grins as they hastened after their master.
They burst free of the press of bodies to find Dyre in the midst of a ring of workers, grimly promising a groaning man at their feet his healing would be paid for, every last shard and dragon of it. The man smiled, nodded, and promptly slipped into senselessness.
Varandros Dyre looked up with a black storm brewing in his eyes. He gave the grizzle-bearded carpenter a glare that should have spat lightning.
"D'you call that scaffolding, Marlus? For once I trust you to raise woodworks alone, just once, and you-"
"'Twas nobles again!" a worker burst out. "Young louts with bright cloaks and blades! Playing at being swordsmen! They had our works that side right down, an' chased us with swords and tried to burn the place down, too! This side just slumped 'n' hung, and we spent so much time getting the other up again…"
Dyre's eyes never left those of the carpenter. "Is this true?" he asked quietly.
Marlus nodded, his own anger red and clear on his face. "Every word! Glue ruined, boards broken, everything thrown down, and they laughed at us and tried to sword us, like we were little goblins running about for their amusement!"
Jivin waited almost eagerly for the explosion. The Shark was, he thought, more terrifying when he was calm and quiet.
"And the Watch? Did they happen along, perchance?"
"They did," Marlus said heavily, "and broke it up. If they hadn't, we'd never have got the fires out."
"And they took our happy noble lads where?"
"Nowhere," another worker said sourly. "They let