The Lost Library of Cormanthyr

4

Baylee caught Jaeleen's shoulder and yanked her back as the shaggy creature rose from the pile of skeletons. The ranger pulled the woman with him as he retreated across the chamber. His torch and Jaeleen's lamp threw uncertain light across the thing that pursued them.

It stood over sk feet tall and had been a big man in life. It was emaciated now, even for one of its kind. The grayish skin stretched tight over the bone structure, making the face appear blocky and misshapen. Wild hair alternately curled tight to the scalp and jutted out in unruly tufts. Dark circles shuttered the narrow eyes fired by unreasoning hunger. A long, thick tongue flicked out from between crooked, elongated teeth. The dry mouth cracked as it opened, and the sound of the tongue passing over the thirst-bloated lips rasped through the chamber. Clothing hung from the creature in shreds, scarcely covering the pallid body.

What is it? Xuxa called. Her telepathic ability didn't allow her to see through his eyes.

A ghoul, Baylee replied as he looked around the scattered bones for a weapon he could use. Ghouls were very dangerous, and fighting one in such close quarters was not a good plan.

The creature moved slowly, its joints and sinews snapping and popping with the effort. Evidently it had been in the well for a long time, probably drawn by the scent of decay. Once in, it had been unable to scale the walls and get back out.

Jaeleen brought her hand crossbow up and fired a bolt into the ghoul's face.

The bolt thudded into the ghoul's cheek with the sound of a knife splitting into an over-ripe melon. Stuck there, the bolt shoved its way between the creature's jaw, wedging it open and exposing the sharp teeth inside through the gaping flap of skin. There was little blood. Baylee guessed that the creature had been near the end of its unnatural life at the time they had entered the well.

The wound also unleashed a noxious odor.

The ghoul roared with rage, struggling to get the cry out of its parched lips and past the embedded bolt. Pausing, swaying uncertainly, it reached up and ripped the feathered shaft free. It threw the bolt aside and charged.

Jaeleen worked to reload her weapon.

Baylee breathed a quick prayer to Mielikki, the Lady of the I Forest, and tossed his torch to the ground. The Lady must have! been smiling, because the torch remained lit, adding to the! uncertain illumination Jaeleen provided as she jerked her lamp l around in her efforts to reload the hand crossbow.

Drawing into a defensive stance, Baylee reached into his boot for his dagger. The blade came free in his hand. Despite the warring perspectives offered by the two light sources in the J dark chamber, he concentrated on the weaker illumination provided by the torch. At least it was steady. Torch light flickered across the ghoul as it lunged at him.

The blackened talons jutting from its fingers ripped at Baylee's midsection. Dodging, the ranger almost got away. The talons sliced through his deerskin shirt. Baylee stepped quickly to one side, intending to kick the ghoul's exposed leg and hopefully smash the joint to cripple the creature. Instead, his support foot slid across a pile of bones, throwing him off-balance. Before he could recover, the ghoul smashed him with a backhand blow.

Baylee flew across the room, throbbing waves of pain filling his head. His vision blurred as he slid across the rough-hewn chamber floor in a crumpled heap. A brief paralysis touched his limbs, numbing them, but it quickly retreated. Blood salted his mouth, and the warm ooze of liquid trickled down his chin.

Get up, Baylee! Xuxa yelled, swooping gracefully down the shaft.

The ranger shook his head, trying to clear his double vision. The ghoul roared with savage glee and threw its head back to take a deep whiff. The scent of fresh blood sent it into a frenzy.

Shoving himself to his feet, Baylee narrowly avoided the creature's lunge. He bounced off a wall, too far away for the torch to show his surroundings. Bones clattered beneath his feet.

The ghoul struggled as well. The bones and loose rocks provided treacherous footing. It's baleful gaze lingered on Baylee, hot eyes boring into the ranger's. The narrow tongue flicked out of its mouth again, and drool flecked its lower face. It took a step toward him.

Suddenly, a heartbeat of activity shot across the ghoul's face, snapping its head back. Xuxa expertly skimmed away from the nearby wall, heeling with a lot of trouble in the still air trapped in the chamber.

Baylee! Get moving! The azmyth bat wheeled around, taking another dive at the ghoul.

This time the creature was ready for her. The black taloned nails scraped through the air scant inches behind Xuxa. It snuffled in anticipation, tracking the rapid wing beats.

Baylee spotted the dropped knife resting beside the smashed remains of what appeared to be an elven woman, judging from the dress and the shape of the broken skull. Ignoring the pain in his head, he crossed the floor and picked the knife up.

Instantly the ghoul turned and was on him.

Baylee ducked beneath the outstretched hands. Keeping his feet planted, he rocked a shoulder into the creature's thighs. With the ghoul's emaciated skin worn so thin from hunger, his shoulder felt like it had collided with solid bone. He shoved with all his strength, putting his back into the effort.

The ghoul left its feet and slammed back against the chamber wall. Baylee set himself barely in time to avoid the slashing nails as the ghoul bounded back from the wall. He looped out his empty hand and caught the loose fabric of the tunic the creature wore. Yanking and using the ghoul's momentum as well as leverage, the ranger brought his opponent slamming into the ground.

Placing a knee in the creature's back and pinning it, Baylee slammed home the point of his dagger into the base of the ghoul's skull. The blade grated against bone and undead flesh. The ranger twisted, severing the creature's spinal column. All the limbs went dead at once, though the ghoul continued to cry out in rage.

Baylee stood on trembling legs. He wiped his mouth and blood streaked his arm. He glanced at the azmyth bat hanging from the ceiling. Thank you, Xuxa.

The bat chuckled warmly, then dropped and flapped its wings, flying back up out of the well.

Jaeleen looked pale as she walked toward the ranger. She held| her lamp high. "Is it dead?"

"Dead or dying," Baylee growled. Every shadow stubbornly clinging to the inside of the chamber looked suspicious now. He picked his torch up from the ground. "Help me gather some of the clothing that still covers these hapless souls."

In a few moments, with Baylee doing the bulk of the work because Jaeleen was busily stripping whatever jewelry and coin purses she found among the dead, they had a pile of clothing in the center of the chamber. The ranger tossed the stub of his small torch into the clothing, then lit another.

The clothing burned quickly, throwing out heat that made the chamber suddenly sweltering and filling the air with eye-burning and throat-searing smoke. They worked quickly, without talking.

Baylee tried to keep track of what prizes the woman gathered, but found himself unable to. Her hands moved as quickly and skillfully as any thief s. And the items she procured disappeared, he noticed, not only into the bag she carried, but into her clothing as well. Baylee soon saw that her clothing was littered with concealed pockets he'd never known about.

The ranger's own searchings were more limited. The object he sought wasn't jewelry or made of gold or silver or precious gems. In truth, he was surprised at how much remained to be claimed among the victims.

It was a sacrificial well, Xuxa intruded into his thoughts from above, and Vaprak is a jealous and vicious god. He would have known if the trollkin stripped their victims of their wealth and claimed it as their own. It probably only took Vaprak killing a semi-loyal follower or two before his displeasure was made clear and the others fell in line with his demands.

Going through the accumulated bones took more time than Baylee had at first guessed. From the mention in the herbalist's book, he had come expecting to find a number of victims. The section in the book had been written before Lord Woodbrand had broken the hold the trollkin had on the land. The ranger had figured some families of the deceased would have exhumed the bodies for proper burial.

Perhaps there were other magicks at work, Xuxa said. It is possible that not even Lord Woodbrand knew of the well. Not all of the trollkin were as devout as the ones who built and maintained the well.

True. When we get back to Waymoot, I'm going to mention the location of this well to some of the town criers, and to Woodbrand himself. Finished with the current pile of bodies, Baylee started back among the ones Jaeleen had gone through.

The woman straightened, rubbing her back as if it ached. Dust stained her face, but Baylee found even that alluring.

"I've already gone through those," Jaeleen stated. Her eyes covetously roved over the bodies Baylee had examined. "You won't find anything of worth there."

"I look for different things than you," Baylee replied.

"What? A scroll with a treatise on philosophy? A map concerning trade routes that have long been discarded for one reason or another? The pathetic scribblings of some farmer who learned to compose his thoughts and put them down in ink?" Jaeleen snorted her disbelief. 'Treasure are items you can trade. Gold, silver, gems, maybe an occasional magic item that you don't have a use for yourself, those are treasures."

It hurt Baylee to hear the woman speak so. When he had been younger, still protectively under Fannt Golsway's wing, to listen to her talk of the places she'd been, the things she'd seen, had seemed the pinnacle of achievement any young man with adventuring on his mind could hope for. He'd heard the tales of others, men with the same drive as Jaeleen, but Jaeleen had been hardly more than a girl then. Already in those days she'd seen more than he thought he ever would, and she'd done so many incredible things. Her education was self-made and very thorough. Golsway himself had said she could teach archeology at any of a number of universities. Except that Jaeleen never got past the greed that so tainted the profession.

"There are many lessons to be learned that are contained in the objects you ridicule so easily," he said.

You are wasting your breath, Baylee. She has only deaf ears for the perspective you offer.

Jaeleen pounced on a silver necklace with a trio of very nice emeralds Baylee had passed up. He'd only taken a few coins, some coppers and some silvers to tide him over on his journey to the Glass Eye Concourse in the coming tendays, in case he wanted to lie in a bed for a change and eat something another person had prepared.

"By Tymora's bountiful breast," Jaeleen exclaimed, "how could you have missed this?"

"I didn't," Baylee assured her. His heart beat rapidly as he spied an embossed leather pouch. He pulled it up from the tangle of bones and opened it.

"You left this here?"

"Yes."

"Fool." The necklace disappeared into one of Jaeleen's hidden pockets. "Do you know how much Algan One-Thumb will give you for something like this down in Suzail?"

Baylee looked into the pouch and found a thick sheaf of papers inside. He glanced swiftly through them, finding they were only a collection of letters. Evidently one of the victims of the trollkin had been a mail carrier. He stuffed the parchments back into the pouch and slung it over his shoulder. "Do you remember how Algan became known as 'One-Thumb?' He was a butcher who always tilted the scales in his own favor when no one was looking. Till someone did look, and removed that thumb for him."

"He has a fat purse."

"And a way of keeping it that way," Baylee agreed. Algan was known among the explorers and adventurers who brought back whatever booty they could from their expeditions. The moneylender was even good for an occasional loan to some who were willing to ferret out the truth of a rumor he'd chanced upon.

"I know how to deal with him," Jaeleen replied. "He doesn't dare short-change me. I always bring him quality merchandise, and there are others I could deal with."

Though none with a faster purse, Xuxa said. That's why Jaeleen will always deal with Algan's kind, and take quick money over good money.

Jaeleen continued her searching, crying out in small, surprised yelps that Baylee knew were designed to needle him. He ignored them, concentrating on the prizes he turned up. The elven quill and ink pot looked more like refuse than treasure, but the style to his trained eye identified it as being little more than a hundred years or so past the fall of Myth Drannor. He put it into his bag of holding. With luck and a proper diviner, he could get a sense of who had owned it and perhaps fit another piece of the historical tapestry of the area together.

He added a gray coral mariner's good luck charm that looked like a hunk of broken rock no bigger than his thumb. It took closer inspection to see the symbol of Selune, the circle of seven stars surrounding two feminine eyes, carved into the coral. It was a delicate piece of work, worn by time and by rubbing so that the carving was barely visible. He judged it to be of Turmish origin, and a few characters-probably a prayer-on the back of the rock confirmed that it was from the Vilhon Reach, off the Sea of Fallen Stars. There was no apparent reason why a mariner would be in the area. The mystery intrigued him, and perhaps a historian would be able to place the time period by the writing on the back.

Only a little while later, he found what he came looking for.

The book was small, hardly bigger than his unfolded hand, surely no wider, not even as thick as his forefinger. Baylee took it from the waterproof pack strapped to the back of a skeleton. The foodstuffs in the pack had long since ruined, though pots with wax seals somehow remained miraculously intact amid the packed clothing. He took them from the pack and set them gingerly aside. Probably they contained wines or mendicants, but all of them would have long ago gone bad. Accidentally breaking them open in the enclosed space of the chamber would have been a foul experience.

Baylee rocked back on his haunches, put his torch aside, and held the book in both hands. He ran a finger down the straight spine, noting that the title was inked there, not put there in gilt or stitched. In its day, even though books were prizes, it would not have caused most people to take a second look.

Which was exactly its purpose, Xuxa said.

Yes, Baylee responded. He turned so that the torch light fell better across the pages when he opened the book. The smell of the parchment pages and the ink was strong, letting him know the book had never seen much use and had been well protected in the pack. The other items were not so well kept by comparison.

It was warded, Xuxa confirmed. You have found the prize you came seeking.

Maybe, Baylee said. If there is a secret page spell placed upon this volume as the old herbalist's book recorded. And if that magicked page really contains the agreement by two Cormyrean nobles with the Zhentarim to arrange King Azoun's assassination in Way-moot, there could be some political upheaval when the news is released.

Jaeleen crossed the room, her pouch bulging. "What have you got?" With the excessive heat in the chamber, her hair had become damp and stringy.

"A book." Baylee held it up to her, surrendering it easily so she wouldn't assign any real worth to it.

She took the book and read the title from the spine. "Seeds, Cuttings, and Transplants: A Gardener's Tome for All Seasons." She passed the book back. "This is worth something?"

'To an herbalist," he said, "yes." Or to a ranger or druid, and Jaeleen was neither. Baylee wrapped the book in protective leathers, then shoved it into the bag of holding.

"I've never even heard of the author."

Baylee knew that despite her greedy nature, Jaeleen was well-read. That had been the only chance he'd taken in letting her see the book. "You've never read any of Iwann's herbologies?"

"Why would I read something like that?"

Baylee had only read the single volume he'd found that mentioned the book in the sacrificial well, but there had been a monograph on the man. "To learn."

"About plants? I've got more discriminating tastes than that. Are you done here?"

Baylee stood and nodded.

'Then let's be off," Jaeleen said, "before those damned ores decide to gather again." She looked around the chamber. "And staying down among the dead when they no longer have anything of worth is more than I can stand." She grabbed the rope and started up with sinewy grace.

The words stung, but as Baylee watched Jaeleen climb the rope above him, watched how the fabric of her breeches tightened over her hips, he minded less. Jaeleen had a good side; a person just needed to know where to look for it. He smiled, and started up the rope. He'd found his prize, and the night was still young.