The pilgrim turned, saw his purse in Jak's hand, and patted at his empty vest pocket. He seemed too shocked to speak.
Jak jogged up to him and pressed the purse into his hand.
"My mother always said to keep your coin purse in your underlinens. Along with the rest of your jewels. That's sound advice."
Leaving a speechless pilgrim in his wake, Jak sauntered back to rejoin Cale and Magadon, neither of whom could help but smile.
"Now that, my friends-"
Jak looked past them and froze in mid stride.
Alarmed, Cale whirled, but he saw nothing other than the sea of faces and heads. He started to turn back to Jak, but then saw what Jak had seen.
"Dark and empty," he swore. He could not believe his eyes.
"It cannot be," Jak said behind him.
Sephris Dwendon, Chosen of Oghma and likely madman, walked slowly through the crowd toward the low, stalwart walls of the Sanctum of the Scroll, Oghma's temple. A group of somber priests surrounded him, forming a protective circle and keeping passersby from getting too close. All of the Oghmanyte bodyguards wore white shirts, white trousers, and black vests adorned with embroidered characters from a variety of alphabets-the typical outerwear of priests of Oghma. Each also wore a crimson harlequin mask over their eyes and an iron mace at their belts. They eyed the crowd warily but did not seem to notice Cale's and Jak's stares.
Sephris wore a simple red robe and worn shoes. He carried a book in the crook of his elbow. The loremaster's distant gaze carried sadness, and he did not seem to see those around him.
Cale did not remember Sephris being so tall. The loremaster stood half-a-head taller than any of the bodyguards, almost as tall as Cale.
"What is it?" Magadon asked, stepping beside him.
"That man should be dead," Cale said, and nodded at Sephris.
"Which? The tall one with the Oghmanytes?"
Cale nodded.
Jak stepped beside them and added, "The slaadi killed him, gutted him. We saw his body."
"Then he could be a slaad," Magadon said, eyeing Sephris coldly. "Shapechanged to resemble your man. Remember Nestor?"
Cale remembered. Nestor had been a comrade of Magadon's. One of the slaadi had killed him and taken his form.
"I remember," Cale said. "But we just saw both slaadi hours ago. You two killed the third. This . . . this would have required several tendays to put in place."
"They can teleport from place to place quickly, Erevis," Magadon said. "They could have been moving between Skullport, the Sojourner's lair, and here. Or there could be another slaad that we haven't yet seen. We should be certain."
Cale nodded. Magadon was right.
"If he is a slaad," Cale said. "Then we kill him on the street. We'll deal with the Scepters afterward."
To his surprise, Magadon and Jak both nodded, faces grim.
Cale put his hand to the velvet mask in his pocket and whispered the words to a spell that allowed him to see dweomers.
Once cast, the spell was indiscriminate in its application. Many trinkets, weapons, rings, and robes of passersby lit up as they walked through Cale's field of vision. He ignored them and picked his way through the press toward Sephris, with Magadon and Jak beside him. The three circled wide and fell in beside and slightly behind the loremaster and his bodyguard priests.
The maces of the bodyguards all shone a soft red, and two wore magical belts that glowed, but Sephris's body did not show an aura in Cale's sight, as it would if he were a shapechanged slaad. Only a single ring on his right hand radiated an aura.
"He's no slaad," Cale said.
Jak blew out a soft whistle. "Then they must have brought him back. He was dead and they brought him back. Dark."
Cale said nothing but his skin went gooseflesh. Not because Sephris had been returned from the dead, but because too many things seemed to be happening at just the right time, in just the right place. Had they not stopped to take a meal and re-equip, they would not have seen Sephris at all. Cale found it increasingly difficult to deny the presence of Fate in events. He felt as though he were being propelled toward something, something important, something he might not like.
"Perhaps I should have thrown a copper into Tymora's plate, after all," he muttered.
"What did you say?" Jak asked.
"Nothing. Speaking to myself."
Like Sephris sometimes did, he thought, and he did not like where those thoughts started to lead.
Any idea of asking Elaena and the temple of Denier for assistance vanished. If Fate had determined that Cale would happen upon Sephris, then Cale would consult him.
* * * * *
Riven despised Selgaunt's Dock District, always had. The alleys all stank of fish, puke, and urine, and with rare exceptions, the food served in the ramshackle inns along the waterfront smelled only mildly better. The whores were all too cheap and the sailors all too drunk. The place was a cesspit of human weakness.
Beside him, Azriim, still in the flesh of a half-drow, walked along as though he might step in something unpleasant at any moment. Despite the slaad's efforts, his otherwise shiny black boots had picked up a coat of road muck. Riven took satisfaction in the slaad's unhappiness about that.
Dolgan, once more in his guise as a bald, muscular, Cormyrean axman, stumped along beside Azriim. Unlike Azriim, with the prominent gray streak that cut through his hair, Dolgan's new form showed no telltale sign that he had been partially transformed into a gray slaad.
"We should not be walking the docks undisguised," Riven said. "Cale may have returned to the city."
Cale had magically transported himself somewhere with Fleet and Magadon. Selgaunt seemed as probable a destination as any.
"Why would he?" Dolgan said. "This place is a hole."
Riven thought the dolt's words ironic, considering he had worn vomit on his clothes as though it were a badge of honor. But he kept his thoughts to himself and said, "He would return because he's got nowhere else to go."
"Let's count on him being here, then, shall we?" said Azriim as he surveyed the piers. "If he shows, grand. And if not, then not."
Riven grunted noncommittally. He still had not made up his own mind what he would do when the First of the Shadowlord showed. He had laid the groundwork to make Cale think him a possible ally. Riven was not yet certain that was his best play.
"What type of ship are we seeking?" he asked, eyeing the wharfs.
Ships thronged the bay and a forest of masts dotted the sky-schooners, carracks, longships, barges, frigates, caravels-and most of them flew a pennon denoting their country or city of origin. Dock hands shouted, cursed, and sang as they furled and unfurled sails, loaded and unloaded crates of cargo. The fat harbormaster and his agents prowled the piers, assessing cargo taxes, recording the names of berthed ships and their captains. Gulls squawked in the air above. Deckhands on a nearby caravel took shots at the birds with a sling. They missed every time.
"Something in particular," Azriim answered.
Riven spit and said, "You won't find one with silk sheets and a feather bed."