Spinner of Lies

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

THE CITY OF AIRSPUR, AKANUL

20 LEAFFALL, THE YEAR OF THE AGELESS ONE (1479 DR)

Chant Morven watched waves break on the ship’s prow and collapse behind the speeding vessel. An hour out of the Bay of Airspur and already the Akanul coast was a haze across the southern horizon of the Sea of Fallen Stars.

The pawnbroker squinted, for the dozenth time, at the elaborate wooden sculpture below the bowsprit. The figure’s shimmering green scales did nothing for its modesty, though he supposed any ship called Green Siren deserved just such a fantastic figurehead.

But a painted and lightly enchanted piece of wood couldn’t hold a candle to the very much alive and angry queen standing at the ship’s prow. The queen’s stained leather armor and cape weren’t royal finery, but they bespoke martial competence and elegance in one go. The cape flared in the wind of the ship’s passage, cracking with occasional tiny lightning sparks. The ship’s captain stood near the queen, playing with his pipe and yelling occasional directions to his crew.

Leaning along the rail, Jaul and Riltana traded off-color jokes. Riltana obviously had a far larger wealth of material to draw upon than poor Jaul. As for Demascus, he alternated between staring out at the sea and frowning at Arathane’s profile. Chant shook his head. If he’d been the recipient of the regent of Akanul’s recrimination, he’d do more than frown. He’d cry.

When the queen had appeared at Demascus’s home, she’d been seething. Chant imagined she’d had to restrain herself from slapping the deva when he finished his ritual and emerged from his chamber. She made an acid comment about how she hoped Demascus’s sleep had been restful, because the Four Stewards were drawing up war declaration documents against Tymanther for lack of any alternate intelligence on the mining disruption! Ouch.

The deva didn’t offer any excuses about pursuing vampires, about the Demonweb, or about a ghost of a past victim doing who knew what with a necromantic artifact. He’d merely said, “Now that the storm is blown over, the ship I chartered can take us out to the mine.”

Electricity rolled down the queen like water. “I’m going with you.”

“That would-” began Demascus.

“Because otherwise, how will I know you’ll actually go to the island? You might get distracted by a big fish or a boat race on the way.”

Chant saw Riltana wince. The queen wasn’t the master of colorful invectives like the thief, but Arathane’s barbs dug deeper.

Demascus’s eyes narrowed. “Fine. We can use another sword.”

Spear, not sword, thought Chant as he looked at the queen’s armament. But he’d learned a long time ago that wry observations are not always appreciated in the spirit in which they’re offered.

Thankfully, Jaul remained too awestruck by the ruler’s presence to offer up any witty repartee of his own. He was like Chant that way, but less practiced with the tact. So they raced across the sea, sails straining and resentments simmering. Onward to an uncharted place Arathane called Ithimir Isle.

Captain Thoster cleared his throat. “Anything in particular I should be on the lookout for, Your Royal Highness?”

The queen sighed. “Be ready for anything. Every force we’ve sent to investigate has failed to return.”

The captain grunted, as if in surprise. He looked at Demascus. “Did you mention that? I think I’d have remembered if you mentioned that. We may need to renegotiate terms.”

“Captain,” said Arathane, “I’m not unreasonable. Trust me that you’ll be justly rewarded for your aid. But now is not the time. Ithimir Isle is before us.”

She pointed starboard. Chant and everyone else looked to the right of the prow, straining to locate what the queen indicated.

“I don’t see anything,” complained Jaul.

Neither did Chant, but he held his tongue.

“No?” said the Queen. She hummed a few off-key notes, then said, “How about now?”

“I … Yes!” said Jaul.

Chant heard gasps spring up across the deck. A stretch of water peeled away, revealing a stone spur striated with a craze of chalky lines. The spur emerged from the sea at an angle, as if leaning. Chant guessed it wasn’t a natural island. More like some foreign chunk of bedrock cast into the sky that fell back to the world far from its origin. If so, it hadn’t happened long enough ago for the pounding waves to break the shear lines of the spur into a coast.

“Where’s it from?” said Chant.

The queen glanced back at him. “Very perceptive, Morven. Indeed, Ithimir is not a formation native to the Sea of Fallen Stars. Or even Toril. It came from Abeir, in the aftermath of the Year of Blue Fire.”

“Ah.” Of course. Chant nodded. Like the genasi three generations ago. The people of Akanul had become part of Faerun’s economic and social fabric only since their arrival. And so, apparently, had Ithimir Isle-the economic fabric, anyway. However, a mysterious force of drow lusted after the same mineral hidden inside the stone spur that Akanul so valued.

Chant supposed that, given half a chance, he wouldn’t mind becoming a broker for such a valued substance himself. In truth, it hardly seemed fair, from a purely mercantile point of view, anyhow, that the state had claimed the entire mine, thus precluding all the potential profits to middlemen from arambarium sale and distribution.

Once they finished here, perhaps he’d see if he could somehow ease his way into the operation. After all, he was on a first-name basis with the queen herself. Well, almost.

A small port protruded from one sheer side of the isle, supported by dark pillars. A single extended pier was heavy with shadow. No activity stirred the port. A half-scuttled ship listed to one side of the pier.

“Lay anchor!” commanded the captain. The dull clunk of running sea chain chipped the air.

“What, here?” said Arathane. “We’re still a half mile off.”

“You think I’m daft enough to risk this ship by putting into a port that’s already eaten at least two other expeditions? This ain’t my first ship, Your Royal Highness. I lost the first, and it made me careful. I don’t want to be out the coin to build Green Siren III. We’ll send you over in a skiff, and remain safely anchored here. Or maybe even farther back, now that you got me thinking about it.” The captain walked down the deck and called for his crew to make the skiff ready.

“Is the queen coming with us over to the island?” Jaul whispered to Chant and Riltana.

Chant frowned. Us? He didn’t want his son going over to the island for the same reason the captain didn’t want to tie up there. But he bit back that sentiment. Voicing it would only anger the touchy young man.

“Looks like it,” Riltana said. “And her two bodyguards.”

Right. The two genasi who’d accompanied the queen were elite peacemakers, though they wore unadorned leather instead of their usual elaborately detailed armor hung with medals and stamped with the Akanul’s royal coat of arms. Their strength combined with the queen’s power, not to mention the talents of Demascus, Riltana, and himself, weren’t inconsequential. And Jaul was probably passing fair with his daggers, if push came to shove.

A ringing clang drew their eyes to starboard. The skiff bumped over the deck railing and dropped into the swell. “Easy, you motherless biters!” yelled Thoster to his crew. The landing party clambered down the rope ladder one at a time and settled into the skiff. Then it pulled away from the slowly bobbing Green Siren.

Thoster waved from the deck, hat in his hands to form a flopping semaphore flag. “Good luck! You’ve got three days before I write you all off as shark bait!”

Spray from the sweeping oars chilled Chant’s face. The tang of sea salt and iodine burned his nose.

The skiff approached the pier. No one spoke; everyone’s attention was riveted on the shore. The pawnbroker squinted. The dimness seemed even thicker now, almost like something tangible.

“Something’s not right about those shadows,” he said.

“They’re not shadows,” Demascus said. “They’re spiderwebs.”

The rowers ceased their efforts.

“Son of a piss-pickled leech,” said Riltana.

“Can anybody see the spiders that wove them?” Arathane asked.

Demascus shook his head. “But I bet that’s what closed down the port. A swarm of crawlers unleashed by our drow adversary, Chenraya.”

“I’ve always said you were a canny fellow,” said Riltana. “Certainly none of us could have come up with such an astounding conclusion.”

Chant couldn’t help chuckling as some of the tension on the boat dissipated. But not all-whatever had spun all those webs was either very large or made up of way too many individual spinners.

“My point, dear Riltana,” said Demascus with a hint of a smile, “is that we’ve already gathered valuable intelligence for Akanul. Have you ever heard of dragonborn using webbing as weapons? Tymanther is the least likely culprit here. The Four Stewards are on the wrong track.”

“Keep rowing,” commanded the queen. “We need to make certain. If it turns out Tymanther is secretly allied with these drow, I’d willingly give up my crown if I came so close to the truth and then turned away.” They closed the remaining distance. The two genasi crew tied up the skiff midway along the pier. The webs obscuring the long jetty lay like drifted, translucent snow. Demascus disembarked first, followed by the queen’s peacemakers.

“No immediate danger, your Highness,” said one. “Come on up.”

Chant watched Demascus to see if he agreed. The deva was studying the pier and the port structures beyond it. His silence apparently meant he agreed with the bodyguard’s assessment.

The pawnbroker pulled himself up the gritty rungs. Only the two rowers stayed in the skiff-they’d already opened a chest filled with biscuits and a bag of wine.

Chant contemplated their repast. “You fellows should probably untie and push off a dozen yards. Something could come nosing through the webs while we’re gone. Spiders big enough to spin this much web probably couldn’t swim out to you.”

The rowers traded glances, then moved to untie the mooring lines.

Demascus took point as their landing party trooped down the pier, wending between mounds of webbing. The structures around the port were carved into the bare rock of the isle. All the windows and doors were clogged with gray strands like sickly scabs, except for one cavity on the side of the largest structure. The opening was wide enough to fit four or five carriages simultaneously, despite the sides being coated in webbing.

“That’s the main depot,” said Queen Arathane. “Obviously the webs are new since I was here two years ago.”

“Yeah, we figured,” murmured Riltana.

“It reminds me of the Demonweb,” Jaul said.

Chant agreed. The weave of gray strands masked the original shape of the mine depot entrance, giving it the semblance of an open mouth. They moved closer.

Daylight filtered into the wider space inside. Smashed crates and overturned ore carts lay in abandoned heaps on the floor. Dozens of cocoons hung from web lines suspended from the ceiling.

Jaul gasped. Chant saw it at the same time-a hand protruded from one cocoon, and a desiccated earthsoul face peered out from another, its eyes fixed in an eternal stare by sticky strands. Chant drew his crossbow without conscious thought. But the sensation of hundreds of tiny spiders running up his spine didn’t abate.

“The miners,” said Arathane. “Cut them down!”

The peacemakers entered the structure.

“Careful!” said Demascus. “We’re probably being watched.” His eyes glittered. He casually spun his swords as he studied the corners of the room. Chant took a half step back in case one of rune blades got away from the deva.

“I don’t see anyone,” countered Riltana, though she’d adopted a slinking, catlike posture, ready to bolt. Chant didn’t blame her. He wished he was back in the skiff sharing biscuits. But he didn’t want to appear scared in front of his son. A stupid reaction, he knew, but there it was.

Arathane’s bodyguards cut down several web masses without drawing any response from hidden observers. Chant realized he was clenching his teeth. He opened and closed his mouth several times, massaging his jaw.

“Should we help?” asked Jaul.

“Yeah. Let’s see if we can do anything for these folks,” said Chant. He squatted down next to one of the cocoons. He set aside his crossbow and swallowed. He really, really didn’t want to touch it but … Jaul passed him one of his red knives, and Chant cut at the webbing. The body proved to be … far past saving. He couldn’t tell if it was a man or woman, only that the body had been sucked dry as a mummy’s husk. A faint smell, like lavender and musk, curled up from the corpse. Chant’s stomach heaved. He stood up suddenly and turned away.

“Nope,” said Jaul, taking his knife back. “No helping him.” The young man scratched his chin and looked around at the other cocoons.

The pawnbroker frowned at his son’s lack of reaction. It was a body-they were surrounded by dead people-killed by some kind of web-spinning horror. Didn’t he understand the same thing could happen to them?

“We need to see what’s down in the mine,” Demascus said. He looked at Arathane. She nodded.

Oh great, thought Chant. Wasn’t this evidence enough that hurling an army at Tymanther’s capital of Djerad Thymar would be exactly the wrong move?

“I’m guessing freakishly large spiders,” Riltana said. “Fist! I hate spiders!”

Arathane directed one peacemaker to finish cutting down the corpses. The remaining bodyguard took up position a pace behind the queen.

“Which one should we try first?” said Riltana. She pointed to three distinct mine heads poking up from the depot floor. Each was an elevator shaft terminus and was surmounted by a big iron wheel around which wound slender but presumably strong cord. Chant imagined each cord was attached to a platform that could be raised or lowered to deep levels of the mine. He noticed Jaul casually walking past each shaft terminus in turn, nodding as he examined the mechanisms.

“Arathane?” said Demascus.

The queen shook her head. “I never came farther than-”

“I bet I know which one we should try first,” said Jaul. The bodyguard stiffened at the queen being interrupted, but Arathane didn’t seem to notice.

“You do?” Chant blurted.

“Sure,” said Jaul. He returned to the first wheel and said, “This one.”

“Why that one?” said Demascus.

“See those?” He gestured to a long parchment attached to a post, filled with scribbled notes. Each mine head contained a similar posting. “Maintenance logs. If miners kept good accounts on each shaft, the log will tell us how much maintenance each elevator had. The more they’re used, the more strain on the wheel, the more danger to the miners, and so on. Which means the one with the most grease on the wheels, the least rust on the lines, and so on, got the most maintenance, and probably was used most.”

Chant blinked. How did Jaul know that? His son usually wasn’t one for brilliant displays of logic. On the other hand, the habit of thinking things through was something the pawnbroker had always worked to instill in his son.

Jaul pointed. “And this one gets three times as much maintenance as the other two.”

“All of which means …?” said Riltana

“That this shaft leads to the richest seam of arambarium, probably.” A smug smile lit his face. “So anyone trying to steal the mineral would-”

“Infiltrate the portion of the mine where it was most concentrated. The part of the mine served by that elevator,” finished Demascus.

Chant nodded. That actually … made sense. Pride filled him. He’d secretly been afraid that Jaul’s only aspiration was to serve as thug under Master Raneger. But the boy obviously had a mind of his own, and a sharp one at that. Which meant, eventually, he’d see that Ranenger wasn’t someone worthy of admiration.

“Assuming, of course, the drow are as smart as you,” said Riltana. “And aren’t somewhere below pursuing dust in a played-out seam.”

“The drow have been here more than long enough to discover the richest vein,” said Arathane. “We’ll try the one Jaul suggested first.”

They all crowded around the wheel, the dark cord of which dangled into darkness. Three levers protruded from an iron box mounted next to the wheel. The middle one was probably a brake. So the other two …

“Where’s the platform?” said Riltana.

Chant pulled a lever before anyone could tell him not to. Something clunked; probably a counterweight shifting. The wheel lurched into motion. It gradually wound more and more of its dangling cord onto its spool, creaking and squealing in protest.

“It needs more grease,” said Demascus.

The platform emerged into the light, still some way below the lip of the shaft. It was an iron-reinforced square of hardwood, complete with railing, suspended from each corner. Three creatures slouched along the platform’s railing. They were white-haired elves with skin the color of coal from the waist up. But their legs and lower bodies were giant spiders!

“Fist!” cursed Riltana, stumbling back from the shaft lip.

Chant recognized them from the bestiary in his pawnshop. “Driders!”

The largest of the three spit something into the air-

everything went black. Chant couldn’t move his hands or feet. Sounds were muffled. And when he felt himself falling, something sticky held his mouth closed! He came down hard on something. It knocked the breath out of him, but at least the immediate impact meant he wasn’t plummeting down the shaft.

“Pa!” He recognized Jaul’s shout.

“Hey, watch it!” yelled Riltana.

“They’re coming!” came an unfamiliar voice. The bodyguard?

Sharkbite! Chant realized what his problem was-he’d been webbed by the damn drider. He had to get free! He thrashed for all he was worth, as screams, clangs, and the sound of metal through flesh whirred around him.

A buzzing, accented voice spoke. “Leave the primordial mother lode to us, and we’ll vanish again and trouble your upworld existence no further. Continue to disturb us, and Lolth shall send her swarming, many-legged assassins to your bedchambers.”

A resonant snap echoed across the depot, followed by the sound of a wheel whirring faster and faster. Several long moments passed, then a tremendous crash, attenuated as if the sound had traveled far. Perhaps as far as the bottom of a lift shaft? Someone must have cut the cord holding the platform!

Someone asked Chant, “You all right?”

Was that Riltana’s voice? Something cold pressed against the side of his face. He flinched.

“Easy, I’m cutting you loose. Don’t jump, leech-son, or you’ll lose an ear.”

Definitely Riltana.

A moment later, he was mostly free of the entangling strands, and he rubbed his hands and eyes. As he’d guessed, the ascending wheel spun freely, with no cord. Demascus stood next to the mechanism with his swords in hand. The driders had been dropped to the bottom of the shaft, hopefully to their collective deaths.

Chant cleared his throat. “Any way to seal this shaft? If those driders aren’t dead, they’ll just climb back up the sides-they’re spiders.”

Jaul took four steps over to a lever with a red handle. “I bet this releases the capstone,” he said, and yanked it. A minor tremor shook the floor. A hollow boom preceded a billowing cloud of rock dust up the shaft. Jaul coughed and nodded. “It’d take an excavation team a day to clear that rubble.”

“Nice work,” the queen told Jaul. She peeled webbing from her torso with a free hand. Her other arm was webbed to her side.

Jaul beamed. Chant looked around. Demascus and Riltana were web free. And the bodyguard … was simply gone.

“You’ve got your proof, Your Highness,” said Riltana. “This is a drow incursion. We should head back to Airspur, tell the Four Stewards the real deal, and do whatever a monarch does when dark elves are discovered sneaking around her queendom. Oh yeah, and write that letter on my behalf to your favorite niece …”

The queen nodded thoughtfully, but not in agreement. “What did those creatures mean about finding the mother lode? The ‘primordial’ mother lode?”

“Simple enough,” said Chant. “They’re after the largest, oldest concentration of arambarium. If you let them remove it, they’ll leave Akanul for good.”

“For good,” said the queen, stretching the last word out. “Are drow known for dealing in truth?”

The pawnbroker shrugged. “Well, what? You want to go down after them? Driders are nothing to mess around with-they’re champions of the race. The dark elves think driders are manifestations of Lolth’s will! If a drider threatens you in Lolth’s name, you better pay attention.”

“I recall these creatures,” said Demascus. “And from what I can remember … driders answer to drow priestesses. The ones we just encountered are probably on Chenraya Xorlarrin’s leash, not Lolth’s.”

Chant opened his mouth to tell the deva he was an idiot to consider anything but heading back to the Green Siren, but paused when the queen’s hand went up.

“I’m not willing to cede the realm’s largest concentration of arambarium to drow looters. Nor are we powerless to stop them.” She snapped her fingers. An answering peal of thunder shook the mine depot’s roof. Demascus grinned in delight.

Chant shook his head. Yep. Idiots. “But the shaft down to the deposit is destroyed, thanks to Jaul.”

“Well …” said Jaul. “We could go down one of these secondary shafts. Then make our way through side tunnels to the main face. It’d take longer, but we’d get there eventually.”

His son was too smart for his own good. “When did you become such an expert on mines?” demanded Chant.

Jaul shrugged. “You’re not the only one who likes to read, Pa.