City of the Dead (23 page)

“Door to the lower rooms is over there,” said the cook, gesturing to a little door set by the corner of the chimney. “Watch yourself on the stairs. They are steep. Take a candle with you, for those rooms are dark as well as mighty dank.”

Picking up a tallow candle in a tin holder as the cook indicated,

Sophraea lit the wick from a taper. She then proceeded down the dismal stairs leading to Stunk’s lowest basement.

The stairs were steep, each step twice the height of a normal stair. Hooking her basket on the crook of her elbow, she held up the candleholder with that hand and pressed her other hand against the stone wall. There was nothing like a railing. One step at a time, she inched her way down. She felt as if the least misstep could leave her a broken heap on the floor below.

Once she reached the bottom, Sophraea discovered that a rich man’s basement could be just as full of cluttered jumble as anyone else’s. At the very base of the stairs, someone had stacked a few crates and some broken bits of chairs. Cobwebs lightly festooned the pile.

But farther into the cavernous room carved under the warm kitchen, empty barrels and discarded pallets leaned together like drunken ores. Something squeaked when Sophraea’s pale candlelight fell upon it. A skinny tail whipped around “a cracked wooden tub and disappeared under a pile of boards.

Sophraea frowned. Stunk could easily afford rat catchers. Undaunted, she pressed forward, resolutely ignoring the scrabbling sound of small claws burrowing away from her. Her steps sounded hollow as she crossed the wooden floor and, with some dismay, she realized that there must be another chamber under this one. Some Waterdeep mansions might have as many as three or four underground floors, dug down into the city’s own deep layers.

Where the brocade shoe might be found, she had no idea. However, the night that the phantom lady had danced across the floor of Dead End House, she remembered a pale trail of glowing footprints had been left behind. Perhaps a similar sign of ghostly invasion could be found here.

Raising the candle high above her head, Sophraea peered into

the far dark corners of the room. Off to one side, she thought she saw something glint, the faintest twinkle of gold.

Sophraea rushed across the room. A large stack of lumber was heaped against the wall. Between the cobwebbed sticks and broken slats from old crates, she could make out the glimmer of something gold. Setting down her basket and candle, she began pulling the wood aside.

Behind her, a heavy tread sounded on the stair leading up to the kitchen. “Well met!” cried a man. “What are you doing there?”

She froze. Had he come by the women in the kitchen? Had they told on her? No, he must have seen her go into the kitchen. When he followed and found her gone, he’d guessed she was in the basement. But why follow her at all?

Heavy boots banged down the steep staircase, and then she saw who it was.

Stunk’s hairy doorjack stood at the bottom of the steps. His eyes widened and he threw his head back to take a large sniff of air. “You’re that wizard’s elf girl,” he said.

Sophraea bobbed a quick curtsy. He stood directly in her path, no way around him if she wanted to flee back up the stairs. “I’m here with the wizard,” she agreed pleasantly while bending down to take a firm grip on the basket’s handle. “Setting protections for the house.”

“You’re poking and prying,” answered the servant moving toward her. “Stunk wouldn’t like that. He doesn’t like elves much, either.”

He was a good bit taller than she was and heavy with muscle along his shoulders and barrel chest.

“Stunk knows I’m here,” she said, sidestepping a bit so the candle wasn’t directly behind her. No need to be any clearer a target than she was.

The doorjack stalked forward, head outthrust. Even in the dim candlelight, Sophraea could see how his bristly beard extended

down his neck to disappear under his collar. Little tufts of coarse black hair even sprouted from his ears.

“I see a moon elf,” growled the doorjack. “But I smell something else. Something human. Something young. Something scared.”

“I am not scared!” Sophraea exclaimed, backing into the shadows. She raised up the basket, which was reassuringly heavy with the broken bricks inside.

The doorjack chuckled. “What are you going to do with the poof of velvet?” he snarled. “Tickle me to death, elf-not-elf girl?”

For a moment, Sophraea was confused. Then she realized no matter what he smelled, the hairy man could only see Gustin’s illusion. She clutched the basket more tightly, ready to swing it.

“Come here!” snapped the doorjack and he lunged, one hairy hand outstretched. Sophraea leaped away but the man’s black nails caught the edge of her cloak and pulled her back.

“Let go. My master is working for Stunk,” she said. And then, remembering the quiet power of Stunk’s wife in the hall, she added, “I have Lady Ruellyn’s approval and protection!”

The doorjack ignored her protests.

“I know that scent,” he muttered, hauling her closer and closer, like a wriggling fish hooked on a line.

She tried to swing the basket, but her cloak entangled her arm and she was off balance. Her feet slipped on the dusty floor as he dragged her toward him.

The basket barely grazed his ribs. He gave a grunt and a yank.

Sophraea twisted around, trying to get more solid footing, but the doorjack was stronger than her. She couldn’t pull away. He stretched out one hand and fastened on her arm, pulling so violently that she stumbled. The rough floor scraped her open hands when she tried to catch herself.

The doorjack continued to pull at her, trying to force her down upon the floor. Sophraea twisted, let the loose cape slip around

her shoulders, and scrambled to her feet. He held on. The collar cut against her throat. Furious, Sophraea spun toward him and lashed out with one foot. He dodged her kick but the cape slid between his fingers. She was able to back up another step away from him.

“I’ll get you!” he growled. He shifted, trying to get a better grip. She pulled one arm free and plunged her hand into the basket. Her fingers clamped around a half brick. Hauling it out, she thrust the brick with all her might at the man’s hairy face. It crushed his long nose with a loud snap. The doorjack let go with a wild howl.

Sophraea dropped to the floor and rolled away. Once clear of the villainous servant, she sprang to her feet. She knew he was much stronger, but so were her brothers. Through the years she had learned that her small size let her dodge more quickly than a large man. As long as she could stay out of his grasp, she had a chance. Her best defense was to stay beyond his reach.

He staggered back and forth, both hands clapped over the center of his face, blood flowing in a glittering ribbon down his chin. “You broke it,” he burbled through the mess. “You’re mine!”

While he was distracted, she raced past him and jumped up to the second stair. He heard her. His head snapped up arid he struggled to stand, his knees bent, one hand over his face and the other braced on the floor. For a terrible moment they both wete motionless, staring at each other. She thought about running up the stairs, but they were steep, double height, impossible for her to do anything other than climb carefully. Knowing that, she hesitated, two steps up, facing him, unwilling to turn her back on him and chance the stairs.

That was a mistake, she realized a moment later, as he sprang forward, leaping more like an animal than a man, covering the distance twice as fast as she expected.

Terrified, she stumbled backward up a step. In her head, she heard Leaplow’s advice, “Whatever you do, don’t let a man pin you. Hit him, keep hitting him, don’t quit!”

She swung the basket high and brought it down like a club on the top of the doorjack’s head. His feet slid on the tread and he landed on the floor at the bottom of the steps. From where she stood on the stairs, for once in her life, she was taller than her opponent. She took advantage of that fact. Sophraea thumped the heavy basket against his skull again and again.

With a yelp, the doorjack smashed into the floor of the basement. He didn’t move.

For a long moment, Sophraea just stood there, breathing heavily, her fingers clutched tightly around the basket’s handle. He still didn’t move.

She edged back down the stairs, crept forward and tentatively put out a hand to see if he was dead or alive. The doorjack groaned and she jumped. But he didn’t open his eyes, just whimpered a little and curled upon his side.

Sophraea circled cautiously around the unconscious man. She rerurned to the candle. With many glances back over her shoulder, she reached into the pile of lumber.

But the glint of gold was nothing more than the edge of a broken picture frame. The shoe was not there.

The doorjack groaned again. A quick search of the debris turned up several stout cords that had once been used to tie up sacks of flour. Sophraea lashed the man’s hands and feet together, using the best knots her brothers had taught her. All she needed was a little time to find Gustin and get out of this house. With some regret for the destruction of a favorite garment, she tore the muslin flounce off her petticoat and gagged the doorjack.

Sophraea hurried back to the stairs. She looked up. The door at the top was firmly closed. She listened for a minute or two, but

could hear nothing of the activity in the kitchen. With luck, nobody had heard her skirmish in the basement.

She shook out her skirts, gathered up her basket, and started up the stairs, only to turn around and go back down.

She scooped the half brick off the floor and dropped it into the basket. Gustin was right after all. You never knew when a good solid brick might come in handy.

Then Sophraea fled up the staircase to the warm kitchen above.

The cook, the laundress, and the other maids were still gathered around the table, gossiping amid a growing pile of peeled vegetables and folded linen.

“Did you finish your job, dearie?” asked the plump cook.

“Oh yes,” answered Sophraea, edging around the table toward the stairs leading to the upper rooms.

“Thought I saw that Furkin go down the stairs to help you,” said the cook, continuing to peel with quick strokes of her knife and not looking up.

Sophraea froze in place.

“Good thing you didn’t stay down there with him,” the cook continued. “He’s not a nice man.”

The other women were also intent on their work, none of them looking up but all nodding in agreement with the cook.

“He was quite polite to me,” Sophraea lied, coming closer to the table. “In fact, he offered to stay down there and keep the rats away from our charms.”

The cook raised one eyebrow at this statement. “Well, that was kind of him,” she said with no inflection in her voice. “We’ll just leave him alone then, down in the basement, to keep the rats away.”

The other women chuckled and nodded.

“Go on,” said the cook, shoving a chair toward her with one foot.

“Catch your breath before you go back upstairs. You’re panting so hard they’re sure to ask questions. A suspicious lot, those guards of Stunk’s.”

Sophraea collapsed into a chair and picked up a knife. She pulled a bowl toward herself and began to chop vegetables with the rest of them. “You are kind,” she said to the table at large.

The plump cook shrugged. “Some of the master’s men are better than others. And some deserve a lesson or two.”

“But won’t you get into trouble? If Furkin stays in the basement too long?” Sophraea asked. These women had been nothing but nice to her and she didn’t want to bring trouble down on their heads.

One thin and elderly maid shook her head. “Stunk rules his men with a hard hand. But we serve his lady wife and answer to her.”

“And she dislikes Furkin as much as any of us,” piped up the pot girl from her corner by the sink, a mere child of thirteen with her hands sunk into the soapy bucket of dirty dishes. She earned several stern looks from the other women: Abashed, the pot girl went back to her scrubbing.

“So you think your wizard can chase the ghosts away?” asked the laundress, rising above that brief incident.

“We’ve promised Lady Ruellyn to do the best we can,” Sophraea answered. Then, looking around the table at the honest faces of the women gathered there, she decided to tell the truth. “It would help if we could find a certain shoe. A gold brocade dancing slipper, very old-fashioned in style.”

The women waved away any knowledge of dancing slippers. “Now,” said one thin maid, “Lady Ruellyn has dozens of slippers, but none of gold brocade that I remember.”

“My old mistress used to have little dancing shoes witha painted heel, but hers were silver lace and not gold brocade,” said another one. “She kept them in a box, with sprigs of herbs stuffed down in the toes to keep them fresh. She never wore them. But my old girl

showed me the shoes once and said that they were her first dancing slippers and she meant to be buried in them. Poor thing, I’m sure the family forgot after she passed away.”

The rest of the women murmured an agreement and slipped into discussions of past employers. Sophraea soon realized that all of the women had worked for noble families elsewhere in Waterdeep until their elderly employers had fallen upon hard times.

Each woman told tales of how their elderly and aristocratic employers had eventually sold the family homes to Stunk, after the fat man had bought everything else of value from them.

“He makes the old ones loans,” whispered one maid whose own hair was more gray than black. “And tells them that they can pay him back bit by bit. But it’s never enough some how, and they start selling off pieces of furniture to make the payment, and then the paintings off the walls, and then the jewels that their granny’s granny got for her wedding ever so long ago. And, quicker than you think, there’s just nothing left to pay Stunk. And then he comes by, all smiles and flattery, telling them not to worry, he’ll take the whole property off their hands, they won’t have to worry about paying us servants anymore, and he’ll set them up some place nice to live out their last days.”