The City of Splendors_ A Waterdeep Novel - Ed Greenwood [63]
"You," Piergeiron replied slowly, "are a lad no longer, but well on your way to being a graybearded sage."
He strode to where he could snatch up his helm and did so, smiling at its gleaming curves. "I've always preferred honest battle-steel, even with its heat and discomfort, to walking about in whatever foppish nonsense is currently in fashion."
Mrelder nodded. "Folk know you in your armor, and it's probably best if you're seen and recognized all over the city. I heard more than a little unhappy talk in Dock Ward this morn that you were dead or gone from Waterdeep, and tax collectors were inventing their own orders and charges in your name." He spread his hands. "We of Candlekeep have a proverb: If a thing is said often enough, fools aplenty will believe it to be true."
The First Lord and his wizard exchanged a quick glance. "Graybeard indeed," murmured Piergeiron.
* * * * *
Tarthus drew his cloak around himself. The wind on the high balcony was, as usual, as cold as a knife blade. Piergeiron had stopped looking at the new badge on his helm at last, and was gazing out over the city. The wizard kept silent, waiting for what he knew would come.
"Well, Tarthus?"
"Some things the lad kept from you. I doubt his meeting with his father went as well as he wanted you to believe."
Piergeiron sighed. "Hardly unusual, I'm afraid, and tells us nothing sinister about young Mrelder. So they're saying I'm dead again, are they?"
Tarthus had been the Open Lord's spell-guard for a long time, but he was still a senior Watchful Order member and kept himself well informed. "Though it seemed a rather heavy-handed urging on the lad's part, he spoke truth. They are saying you're dead down on the docks, and of course, that all manner of villains and impostors are signing your name to decrees and running the city just as they see fit."
Piergeiron's smile was wintry. "Who would these villains and impostors be?"
"We of the Castle. Every last belted noble in every last mansion and crypt in the city. The secret cabal of wizards who've ruled Waterdeep these past three eons. Dragons using spells to take the faces of humans. A legion comprised solely of Elminster's bastard offspring. Take thy pick."
The Open Lord of Waterdeep sighed and clapped his war-helm onto his head. "None of those, thanks. Let's go find my armor, and you can check it for sinister spells, too."
"Of course, Lord," the wizard replied calmly. "Someone may have cast some since I last checked it, yestermorn."
* * * * *
The door thudded sullenly against the wall of Varandros Dyre's new meeting chamber, and a sleepy-eyed Karrak Lhamphur lurched into the room.
"You're late," Jarago Whaelshod growled. "My working day begins three bells before dawn, not one."
"Work a little harder, so as to enjoy the successes I have," Karrak Lhamphur flung back, "and you can sleep in just as late as I do!"
Whaelshod grumbled wordlessly, turned his heavy-lidded gaze to their host, and barked, "Well? We had to wait until this sluggard got here for what, exactly?"
Varandros Dyre looked less than bright-eyed himself this morning. "Two buildings collapsed last night," he said grimly.
Lhamphur frowned. "You're blaming those on the Lords and nobles? I doubt they even know what holds buildings up, let alone what makes them fall down! That's why they hire the likes of us, no?"
"They didn't hire me to dig tunnels that aren't on my maps," Dyre snapped back, "and how else d'you think the collapses occurred? Both buildings fell into something."
"Like a pit that shouldn't have been there," Hasmur Ghaunt put in nervously.
Dorn Imdrael drank the last of his steaming broth and waved his tankard. "Thanks for this, Var. It's hard for a man to think on an empty stomach."
Turning to Whaelshod and Lhamphur, he pointedly eyed their still full mugs and asked quietly, "Who else could pay for a tunnel