The City of Splendors_ A Waterdeep Novel - Ed Greenwood [74]
He waved at the busy street outside, where carters were calling their wares amid rumbling wagons and hurrying folk. "Many dream of great wealth, even when they know it's forever beyond their grasp. Some slave their days away grumbling or resigned to their lot, but a great many here have the fire and ambition I've always seen in you, Father-though not your wits or perception."
"How so?"
"They seek an edge, an advantage over others, some first step or hold on power that'll bring them a shade closer to making their dreams real. Waterdeep holds a lot of doers, not just dreamers."
Golskyn nodded. "And this means…?"
His father actually seemed to be taking his words seriously! Desperate not to put a word wrong, Mrelder took a deep breath and burst out, "Folk so eager for riches offer themselves, often without realizing they're doing so. They leap at chances, for fear of missing the trail to riches. They never want to refuse or turn away from what could be their way to power. They all like to think they're cleverer than their fellows, but time and again someone crafts a new swindle, and jack after lass falls for it: They can't resist."
Golskyn sipped his cider. "So if we say and do the right things, we can 'use' a large number of these coin-hungry schemers. To what end?"
"I'm not certain. Yet this unrest, the anger against the Lords and the nobles, these snarls in the taverns over the falling buildings… all can be turned to our advantage. The city's more restless than I've ever seen it before."
His father turned an amused eye Mrelder's way, and the sorcerer hastily amended, "Not that I've seen all that many years passing in Waterdeep, I'll grant, but graybearded Waterdhavians are saying it in the streets and alehouses, and goodwives in the shops agree with them."
"So this city is, as they say, ripe for the plucking," Golskyn murmured. "Whereas any hothead can set men to swords out and shouting in the streets, superior beings can control, or at least steer what unfolds, to achieve intended ends."
"Exactly," Mrelder agreed, a little too enthusiastically.
Golskyn was suddenly facing him, his uncovered eye as cold and hard as ever. "And so, my son of such wisdom and keen perception, what plans have you thought through to take advantage of this rare opportunity?"
Mrelder swallowed, aware that he was on dangerous ground. He said cautiously, "The grafts, Father, are valuable. If we can master them, they improve us."
Golskyn's smile was wintry. "And?"
"Yet they are by definition limited to we who already believe in Amalgamation, who revere you for your vision and try to enact your desires."
The priest waved impatiently at Mrelder to continue.
"More can be accomplished by improving others-if, through these improvements, we achieve a measure of control over those persons we… augment."
Golskyn nodded. "We gain tools, whether they know their servitude or not, and thus increase our reach and power. Continue."
Mrelder took his first sip of cider, more to look away from his father's piercing gaze than to slake any thirst. "Perhaps," he told his tankard carefully, "it's this control that's most useful to us, not the improvements themselves. I say nothing against the gods, mind, or the rightfulness of augmenting ourselves as they guide us to; I speak now only of others, non-believers. Nor am I necessarily saying such persons should remain non-believers… only that control itself is valuable and that there are other ways to achieve control than through-"
"Cutting useful bits from beasts most would deem 'monsters'?" Golskyn's tone was cold. "So you look no higher than an alley-thug who seeks to gather a gang around him and so feel powerful? Tell me, O wise young one: What sense is there in controlling fools and weaklings?"
"They can go places and do things that augmented men cannot. If I'd gained and mastered that sahuagin arm, I wouldn't have been allowed anywhere near Lord Piergeiron. I'd have been wrestled down and carried off for his guardwizard to mind-ream!"
"Until you prove yourself before the