Tymora's Luck - Kate Novak [46]
Mirt nodded slowly. "It's a theory espoused by some sages."
"Could Waterdeep be in the same danger?" the masked figure asked.
Mirt slid a few beads across his abacus. His fingers were quick and sure. "I don't think so," he said finally, but his tone was not certain.
"Suppose similar things happened again tomorrow?" the masked figure asked. "Suppose that much money came in all week?"
Mirt gave a low whistle. He slid all the beads on the abacus to one side with a violent sweep of his hand. Then," he said, "we'd be in a lot of trouble."
Act Two Scene 4
Joel, Jas, and Emilo stepped through Selune's gate onto a wind-blasted mountainside. The party's first priority became shelter. The wind blew stinging particles of dirt into their face and made walking difficult. They huddled on the leeward side of a large boulder and surveyed their surroundings.
The Blood Tor was no simple conical peak, but a complex series of steep boulder-strewn faces, sloping, but-tresslike ridges, and cliff-walled ravines. The adventurers couldn't even see the pinnacle from their current position because their view was blocked by steep faces above them. Downwind, the slope grew progressively steeper, until it was almost a cliff wall. Upwind, the slope was steep but manageable. If they walked into the wind, they would come to another face that rose to a ridge. The ridge climbed until it ran into another mountain face at a considerably higher altitude some distance away. There was no evidence of any caves.
Joel pulled out the finder's stone and tried imagining a cave opening in the side of the mountain. Whether the stone was reacting to his mental image or just trying to keep him from heading into danger, Joel had no way of knowing, but it issued a weak beam of light in the direction of the higher mountain face off in the distance.
"We're going to have to walk into the wind," Joel said.
"What?" Jas shouted.
Joel repeated his words, shouting to be heard over the roar of the wind.
Jas nodded. Her wings, Joel noted, had altered once more. Now they were bat-shaped, but their color was bright scarlet with golden flecks. Ignoring the transformation, as she always did, Jas opened one of the backpacks Winnie had supplied for them and rummaged around until she found several kerchiefs made of some lightweight fabric. They wrapped the kerchiefs around their faces, shouldered their backpacks, and stepped out into the furious wind.
There was no trail that Joel could perceive, and the slope was treacherous. Rocks gave way beneath their feet and slid and rattled down the mountainside. Far, far below, the waves of a blood-red sea pounded at the mountainside and shot upward in frothy spumes. Overhead, the sky was completely overcast. Black clouds flickered with sheet lightning. It was unclear what illuminated Beshaba's realm, but it was bright enough on the mountainside for their shadows to pool at their feet. Nothing grew on the wind-blasted slope but the red and black lichen that covered the gray rocks all around. They traveled in silence, unable to make themselves heard over the wind.
Time was hard to judge, but it had to be at least an hour before they made it to a notch in the ridge. The climb had exhausted them, and the roar of the wind left them dazed. They passed through the notch. On the other side of the ridge, the slope was less steep, dropping gradually into a great sheltered bowl where a few stunted trees grew. A ledge just wide enough to serve as a trail traveled along the ridge on the sheltered side. There, out of the wind, it seemed almost quiet, and they rested and made a general inventory of the equipment Winnie had packed in the backpacks.
Jas pulled out a padded flask of water and took a few sips. As she handed the flask to Emilo, something large and dark leapt through the notch in the ridge. The creature, a great black stag with red eyes, bounded sure-footedly down the slope. Its rack might have gored an elephant with ease.