The Ring of Winter - James Lowder [70]
"Yes, Theron Silvermace. He-Crackpots?" Artus stammered. "You founded the society, didn't you?"
"I let them use my name," Rayburton said. "Biggest mistake of my life. I never was one for clubs-just an excuse for back-slapping and group inertia. Rather talk about the past than go out and look for it. And the society's still going you say? Amazing." He lifted the book from the floor. "How do you know me? A portrait?"
"A statue," Artus corrected. "In the main library."
"And how did you get in here?" Rayburton asked. He crossed his arms and leaned back against the table.
Artus had the uncomfortable feeling of being back in the House of Oghma, held captive in the prefect's study because of some transgression. "Through a tunnel," he said. "It led into the ruined part of the library…"
Lugg struggled to the top of a nearby table. He spoke neither Tabaxi nor Old Cormyrian, but he could make himself known quite clearly in the trade tongue known as Common. "Look," he said, "if you two are going to yap all day, we want to know where the kitchens are."
From the floor at Artus's feet, Byrt added his approval. "A meal really is in order. Lugg gets rather cross if he's not fed regularly. Not that he isn't cross at other times. You know, bites when tugged and all that."
"In a moment," Artus said as he studied Rayburton's hands. They were wrinkled and beginning to spot with age. Ink stains covered the fingers of his right hand, the sure mark of a scholar or scribe, but there was no ring to be seen.
Artus stepped forward and grabbed Rayburton's shoulders. "The Ring of Winter," he said, his eyes gone wild, "You have it. That's how you made it snow. It kept you alive all these years."
With one solid shove, Rayburton freed himself. "I don't have the ring." For the first time, anger showed on his kindly face. "If that's what you're here for, you'll go back to the society empty-handed."
Artus felt the world fall away under his feet. Before he knew it, he was sitting on the floor next to Byrt. The little gray wombat looked him in the face, worry in his vague blue eyes.
"But you must have the ring," Artus whispered. "You're still alive. It makes the wearer immortal…"
Rayburton kneeled beside the younger explorer. "The ring didn't keep me alive," he said. "It was the magic in this place. Mezro has quite a lot of wonderful things in it."
"Mezro?" Artus managed to gasp. "I discovered the lost city of Mezro?"
Rayburton's gentle laughter filled the library. "It's hardly lost to the people who have lived here for four thousand years," he noted. "But if you want to put it that way, the Mezroans probably won't mind. I said the same thing when I stumbled across the place, and they haven't thrown me out yet."
He looked into Artus's glassy eyes and mentally catalogued the cuts and bruises on his arms and face. "You've had a time of it, eh?" Helping the younger man to his feet, Rayburton added, "The thing for you now is rest, and maybe a surgeon's attention. After that, we can talk about how you managed to 'discover' Mezro."
Ten
From The Eternal Life of Mezro by King Osaw I, called "the Wise" by his beloved subjects: ruler of all Mezro, negus negusti, and bara of Ubtao. Translated to Cormyrian by Lord Dhalmass Rayburton, advisor to the king.
There is no exaggeration in the bold claim that Ubtao founded Mezro. The great god of the Tabaxi built the core of the city himself, the temple and amphitheater rising first from the chaos of the jungle. Mezro was to be the place where all the people of Chult could learn how to pass through the maze of life, how best to reach the heart of all and discover the true nature of the world. It became that. Yet Mezro also became a place where thieves and charlatans preyed upon pilgrims, where men and women and children came to beg Ubtao's help with the most insignificant