Sir Windriver drew the alcove curtains firmly shut. "Glah! I'm not so eager to see more brazen young ladies that I have to watch all of Cormyr's most corpulent being; carried off to bed. Sometimes I wonder how this kingdord staggers along from one day to the next, with the likes of Blester leading the converse at court. Bah-enough of id You lured me here, Andemel, with talk of something that would interest me greatly. I trust 'twas more than thd pleasure of seeing Elminster in a fine enspelled gown!"
Master Graeven settled himself back among the cushions of the most comfortable seat and crossed his silver toed boots atop the gleaming polish of a handy side tabled don't recall having to lure you all that hard, Sir Wind-river... but aye, there is something of import I wanti to share with you. Something I've just acquired, called 'Godsfrown Shield.' "
"A 'Godsfrown Shield? Explain!"
Andemel reached for an oyster. "If you should have valuable cargo stolen, wagon and all, or have a ware house burn with all that is in it, the gods frown on you no? So Baeaisin takes a stiff fifty golden lions and undertakes to intercede with the gods for a month, or a tenday or whatever you agree upon. If the wagon goes missing or the building burns, he gives you several thousands gold pieces to replace your loss. He is your shield, you 'Godsfrown Shield.' If all is well-and he has agents who watch very carefully over your wagon or warehouse, to keep all well-he keeps the fifty lions."
Sir Sabrast frowned. "Hmmm... a theft on his part, it seems at first-but no guards come all too expensive-especially when one must pay them more than a rival slips them, to avoid betrayals. Shields are always expensive- and if it fails, this one comes expensive to Baenisin."
Andemel nodded. "Exactly. Wherefore, I've purchased a shield on my shop that lasts un-"
The alcove curtains were thrust open, and a face that bore die latest stylish wisps of mustache and beard, adorned with tiny golden rings, peered in. "Ah!" it exclaimed in delighted recognition, a scant second before a servant summered unnecessarily, "Master Raurild Sarpath!"
Raurild turned and made an unmistakable gesture of dismissal to the servant, one that involved the transfer of a golden lion, then strode into the alcove, pulling the curtains firmly shut behind him. "Andemel! You're alive, by the gods! A thousand thanks to Tymora for that! I've just heard about the fire in your shop yestereve and I-"
Master Andemel Graeven peered nervously into the shadow corners of the alcove, seeking spy holes with eyeballs gleaming in them... and thankfully finding none. "Hush!" he said urgently. "By Oghma, let the record be straight: the fire was not yestereve, but this night. About an hour from now."
Sir Sabrast Windriver filled the momentary silence with a chuckle and poured himself more wine. Ruby, of course.
"Raurild, this is late out for you... your good wife grant permission for once?"
Master Raurild Sarpath grimaced. "Yes, as it happens. 'Possibly good for business, so long as I drank but little,' she said-so here I am."
"Your wife decides whether or not you can go out to a revel?" Andemel asked incredulously.
"Aye, quite so," Raurild told him. "In marriage, I leave all of the small decisions to my wife-in fact, she insists on it. The larger matters are mine to deal with."
Sir Sabrast Windriver crooked one eyebrow. " 'Larger matters? Such as?"
Raurild smiled thinly. "I don't know. We've been wed (. only sixteen summers; no larger matters have come up yet."
Sabrast and Andemel exploded in mirth. When he was recovered enough, the knight poured another glass of ft wine and held it out to Raurild, just as the alcove curtains parted again-and a sudden stillness descended upon the cozy scene. A quiet that bespoke tension. The four grim and fully armored Purple Dragons who held the curtains open might have had something to do with, the sudden change of atmosphere. Two officers raised glowing maces, flanking the slender, oily-haired figure off Suzail's most senior tax collector. Those court weapons! could paralyze or turn aside other spells, and they were borne only by the most able and high-ranking soldiers of the realm. Precept Immult Murauvyn wore the thinnest! of crooked smiles.
"Ah, Sir Sabrast Windriver," Murauvyn said softly, "what a pleasure finally to look upon your face. A hard man to catch up with in all sprawling Suzail. They warned! me, and I certainly found it to be so. Yet we meet at last. I bear a fond greeting from the Crown-and the request that you surrender unto me die thirty-six thousand lions in last year's unpaid taxes that you, Sir Sabrast, owe to the Royal Treasury of Cormyr!"
Feeling the sudden weight of interested gazes upon him-those of Andemel and Raurild foremost-Sir Sabras Windriver grew a whit pale. "I seem to have failed to carry such funds about with me," he observed smooth! "It's these new form-fitting tunics... they leave precious little space for thousands of coins, y'see..."
Precept Murauvyn interrupted witheringly. "Sir Sabrast Windriver, my agents have failed to find you with coins enough in your tunic at your villa on Turnhelm Street, you stables on Sarangar Lane, your city manor in Ambel Row, your business offices on Waervar Street, your little romatic hideaway on Westchapel Way, the cottage that so sumptuously houses your mistress on Brightstar Street-"
"Ahem," remarked Sir Sabrast Windriver, hastily.
"-the cottage of your second mistress on Undelmring Street-"
"Ahem, hem, hem," Sir Sabrast Windriver added, more vigorously. "Now, just a-"
“-your country estate at Gray Oaks, your yacht moored at Moonever, your hunting lodge at Mouth o' Gargoyles-and oh, yes, the cottage of your third mistress, in Waymoot. The port rolls in Suzail record sixteen sailings of vessels owned by you so far this season, and twenty returns; at least two of the ships that were unloaded at the docks to your enrichment shared a name and charter but were quite dissimilar in size and age. Fellow agents of the Crown report that the ledger of landings in Marsember that records the particulars of your fleet is mysteriously missing. They have thus far failed personally to examine any of the offloaded cargoes, which would, of course, add taxation to the amount I've just mentioned-to say nothing of any personal transactions you may have accomplished that may also be of interest to us. I speak now merely of the face value of annual land taxes on the properties I've just named, though one of my colleagues reports that you own at least two score houses in this city and some hundred or so upland farms. How is it-with so much land that you could readily sell enough to meet almost any royal demand for monies-that you seem to habitually forget to render unto Azoun what is, undeniably, Azoun's?"
Andemel and Raurild, whose eyebrows had risen at this astonishing catalogue of wealth, looked with interest at their colleague, wondering what Sir Sabrast would say or do now. Without thinking, in an instinctive move to distance themselves from financial embarrassment and Crown suspicion, they'd stepped a pace or two away from him, so that the master of Windriver House now stood alone in a little cleared spot of gaudy Thayan carpet.
Taking one slow stride to where he could lean against one of the recently relocated pillars, Sir Sabrast Windriver managed a smile.
"Actually, Murauvyn," he replied calmly, "you appear unaware of my fourth, fifth, and sixth mistresses, my Olde Lace and Glitterswash chain of souvenir shops throughout Sembia, and the current needs and dispositions of my large family. My eldest son, Falorian, is hard at work founding his own shipping line out of Selgaunt, my middle son Arastor is fast becoming the largest builder in stone in Westgate, and my youngest, Bralzaer, has founded a mercenary company in Impiltur, Bralzaer's Bold Basilisks. I have six daughters, all of whom are in Sembia going through three or four new gowns each a day, trying to snare wealthy Sembian husbands. My sickly wife-of whom I'm sure you've heard-is busily trying every medicine that can be suggested by man or halfling, searching for a cure for... living, it seems. Do you have any idea how many golden lions they can all spend in a day?"
He smiled archly and added, "If I don't give any of them so much as one worn copper coin, why should I give anything to you?"
Into the tense silence that followed, Raurild couldn't help but snort as he tried to smother his mirth. The tax collector gave him a cold look before bending an even more icy gaze upon the unrepentant knight.
"Sir Sabrast," Precept Immult Murauvyn said in cold, precise tones, "your treatment of your family is not the concern of the Crown. Your failure to render tax monies, however, is. In fact, it has become a concern so grave that the Royal Magician of Cormyr has gone so far as to grant me permission to seize whatever of your properties I choose, to meet the outstanding debt-after you have rendered menial labor on the royal roads of the kingdom for a month, as any penniless debtor must. You act the part of the destitute man all too well and drive us to treat you as one."
Sir Sabrast stepped away from the pillar, casually moving one hand to cover the rings he wore on the other, and asked softly, "And if I refuse to submit to your demands upon my properties and person?"
The other pillar in the alcove suddenly twisted and blurred. Glowing maces swept up, and Purple Dragoas reached for their weapons on all sides. They paused as the pillar resolved itself into the unmistakable figure of Vangerdahast, the Royal Magician of Cormyr.
"Sabrast Windriver," the old and pudgy mage said calmly, "be aware that daring to cast any spell or commit any acts of violence at this time will earn you a year or so of additional service as a toad... in the palace dung-Middens."
Even as Vangerdahast spoke, the pillar Sabrast had been leaning against became a whirling chaos. An instant later it snapped into the shape of a beautiful maid who was almost wearing a gown of leaping flames.
Purple Dragons gasped and swallowed as those flames died away, shrinking to nothing, to reveal a body that was covered with a shapely tattoo of the Royal Arms of Cormyr. The painted maid blew Andemel a kiss, flickered, and was suddenly a bearded, hawk-nosed old man in plain gray robes.
"Elminster!" several armsmen gasped in startled recognition.
"Just another pillar of the palace," the Mage of Shadowdale told them dryly. "Well met, Vangy, loyal armsmen, and good merchants of Cormyr. Is this a private party?"
Vangerdahast glared at him with a look as sharp as a drawn sword. "Elminster," he asked in a dangerously soft voice, "what are you doing here?"
"Paying Sabrast's tax debt-with handsome interest, ye'll note-and advising ye, in a friendly manner, to reconsider thy rightful demand for his performance of hard labor."
Precept Murauvyn opened his mouth to say something, licked his lips, and looked at Vangerdaliast.
The Court Wizard asked softly, "And just why would you do this?"
The bust of Azoun in the corner was suddenly surrounded by a vivid amber radiance that drew every eye. It J winked, twisted into the shape of a harp for a fleeting J instant, and then slumped into a gleaming, slithering heap.i of gold coins and glass-topped coffers full of gems.
"Rogue he may be, but I-as well as many unwitting folk of Cormyr-are indebted to this knight of thine for j certain supportive actions he hath rendered."
A clearly furious Vangerdahast snapped, "And if I refuse to accept your payment? What then?'
"Well, then," Elminster replied mildly, "I'll be forced to end my protection over certain treasures here in the palace -... and, I'm afraid, they'll revert to their true forms."
"Elminster," Vangerdahast snarled, "are you threatening me?"
The Mage of Shadowdale looked shocked. "By the gentle mercies of Holy Mystra, no," he purred. "Just volunteering some more friendly advice-about consequences, this time. Some of those treasures, ye see, will no doubt I angry when they awaken."
"Angry? Awaken? Elminster, you've placed monsters in the midst of our palace?"
"Nay-am I to blame, if various kings of Cormyr have , an eye for valuables others fail to nail firmly down, and] bring them home?"