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Gracklstugh, like Menzoberranzan, was a cavern city Unlike the real sant castles of noble families The air had an acrid reek, and the clahout the cavern - the roaring of fires, theof iron on iron, and the rush of polluted streaes Unlike Menzoberranzan, lightless except for the delicate faerie fire applied to dec-orate drow palaces, Gracklstugh gloith reflected firelight and the occa-sional harsh glare of white-hot ularly unlovely place, an affront to any highborn drow Halisstra thought the place see less than the Hells&039; own foundry
At its eastern end, the great cavern of the city sloped down sharply to join the ih was a subterranean port - though few a the Underdark races used ays such as the Darklake in their commerce Consequently the wharves and lakeside ware-houses of the duergar city constituted one of its poorest and erousdistricts Coalhewerstone quay occupied by a handful of ships of the sas and step lively," the dwarf snapped "The less ye&039;re seen t&039;be about the streets, the better Spider-kissers in the City of Blades be well-advised to step soft and quick, if ye take ned,No killing! It will not be tolerated here
The scout shouldered his pack and followed the dwarf down the quay, wrapping hispii around hilanced up at Jeggred and said, "You won&039;t like it here, half-de helpless to dis how I red blew out his breath and drew his own long cloak over his whitethe best he could to hunch over and make himself in-conspicuous The rest of the party followed after, threading their way through the dilapidated streets of the city&039;s dock quarter to a fortresslike inn a few blocks fron lettered in both Dwarvish and Under-co itself consisted of an encircling stone wall, guarding a nu block-houses The coate, which stood beside a pen holding huge, foul-s prospect," muttered Pharaun "Still, I suppose it&039;s better than a rock on a cavern floor"
Valas conferred briefly with Coalhewer, then turned to the rest of the dark elves and said quietly, "Coalhewer and I will arrange safe passage out of the city and look into provisioning It&039;ll likely involve some bribes to obtain proper licenses and such, which will take ti here for at least a full day, perhaps two"
"Can we spare the time?" Ryld asked
"That would be up to Mistress Quenthel," Valas said, "but weof our journey We accoto death after a tenday or two in the wilds of the Underdark"
Quenthel studied the cheerless duergar inn, and hts, and leave early on the day after toer, but I am hesitant to trust our fortunes to the continued hospitality of the duergar Events are "
She looked at the scout, and at Coalheho stood a short distance off, watching the street with ar in on the dark elves&039; conversation
Is this place safe? she signed Will the dwarf betray us?
Safe enough, the scout replied Keep Jeggred out of sight The rest of you should be fine, as long as you avoid confrontations He flicked his eyes at Coalhewer and added, The dwarf understands that ill pay well for his services, but if he should coht kill him rather than pay him, he will un-doubtedly find a way to have us all arrested He knoe&039;re so more than s us here as long as he&039;s paid
A loose end to be tied up? Ryld asked
Too dangerous now, Valas signed I will keep a close eye on hi as we&039;re here
"Take Ryld with you, just in case," Quenthelsaid
Ryld nodded and tugged at his pack, adjusting it to ride better be-tween his shoulder blades
"Ready when you are," he said
"I can&039;t say I won&039;t welcome the company, if trouble comes," Valas replied "Well, let&039;s not keep Master Coalheaiting If you don&039;t hear back froet out of the city by the quickestalong a step behind him They collected Coalhewer and made their way deeper into the city
"It&039;s that boundless good cheer we find endearing in you, Valas," Pha-raun remarked to the scout&039;s back "Well, I too have errands to run I ents in this grim place, and re-plenish ," Quenthel said She glanced over at Halisstra and Danifae "Well, aren&039;t you co as we&039;re here, I think I will see to providing Danifae eapons and armor We&039;ll be back when she is suitably equipped"
"I thought you didn&039;t care to allow your battle captive to fight for you," Quenthel said, her eyes narrowing in calculation
"I have decided that Danifae is so as she&039;s un-ared for no good reason"
Halisstra could almost feel the depth of Quenthel&039;s suspicion, and the Baenre silently stroked the hilt of her whip as she studied the Ched Nasadan and her handht Halisstra Let her wonder what hold I have over Dan-ifae that I feel confident arht improve her assesset yourselves into trouble," Quenthel said "I won&039;t hesitate to set out without either of you if the circured andboth the Ched Nasadan and the Eryndlyrr frohts
Halisstra couldn&039;trepress a sred slinking behind her She exchanged looks with Danifae, and the two set off into the duergar city
Though Coalhewer had insisted that the city was open to folk of all races, provided they brought gold, Halisstra could not convince herself that a pair of dark elves were truly safe in Gracklstugh The short, stocky gray dwarves crowding the streets went about their business with a sullen purposefulness that Halisstra didn&039;t like at all They didn&039;t laugh, or primp and preen, or even trade veiled threats with one another Instead, they glared angrily at passersby of any race, including their own, and stohtly on the hafts of axes and hah their broad belts Only after Halisstra and Danifae had passed half a dozen folk of other races in the streets did she begin to relax
Halisstra paused in a spot between tering smelters and looked around
"There I know little Dwarvish, but I think those signs advertise weaponsmiths"
They turned down the street, which was littlerese a town square of sorts, an open place surrounded by low, fortlike buildings ofdozens of weapons and suits of ar," Halisstra said She ducked through the low door and stepped inside, Danifae behind her
The place was filled with martial accoutrements of all sorts, much of it dwarven, but a nu-work, kuo-toan arreat pale fish, and black ar busied the a suit of half-plate armor at a workbench to one side of the door They fixed suspicious stares on Halisstra and Dani-fae when the dark elves walked in, and kept a wary eye on them as the priestess and her handmaid examined the merchandise
"Mistress Melarn," Danifae called
Halisstra turned to find the girl gazing up at a well-made suit of drow chain mail, worked with the e buckler hung near the side it The head of the weapon was fashioned in the shape of a de-, spikelike horns Halisstra carefully muttered the words of a spell of detection, and sly so, but certainly as good as or better than anything she&039;d hoped to find in the city
"What can you tell us of these drow arar halted their work The two ht have been twins; Halis-stra could hardly tell them apart
"Trophy," one of thead sold &039;eot &039;em"
"They&039;re enchanted," said the other dwarf "Won&039;t be cheap Not at all cheap"
Halisstra moved over to the counter, and fished a sh its contents, and picked out several fine eray dwarf stood and approached to study the emeralds
He scowled and said, "More than that A lot ed to carry away much from her House before it fell, and she sireed, not if she had other options open to her
"Danifae, have another look at the mail," she said over her shoulder "Make sure it&039;s what you want"
Danifae read her intent perfectly The girl picked up theout its balance As Halisstra had hoped, the second dwarf beca a dark elf handle merchandise so valuable He set down his work andsure he stood between Danifae and the door Danifae ian to offer a variety of co the strength of the enchant the fellow in conversation
"It&039;ll take five tiar at the counter told Halisstra "And they&039;ll have to be good stones, too"
"Very well, then," Halisstra said
She shrugged a leather case fro it carefully, she withdrew her lyre, a s with ree
"As you can see, it&039;s an exquisite piece of work," she said
She picked it up and stru abae&039;qeshel song The dwarf gaped at her, then recoiled in horror when he realized she was casting a spell Before he could call out a warning, theon there?" the duergar watching Danifae deht," Halisstra whispered across the counter "You don&039;t want the lyre"
"It&039;s fine," the first dwarf said "She&039;s offering the lyre, but we don&039;t want it"
"Of course not," the second muttered "Do you see any instruments in here?"
He returned his attention to Danifae, who asked him about the best way to care for mail in dauiled, "we&039;re a little far apart at the ain You&039;re going to sell us the ar over Will you take the emeralds as a down payment? I will come back in a couple of days with a very handsome sum to square my account"
"The stones&039;ll do as a down payment," the merchant allowed, "but my partner won&039;t be happy with that He&039;ll think you don&039;t mean to come back"
"Let him think I&039;ve paid in full, then, and he won&039;t trouble you" Halisstra said
She thought for a moment more, then leaned forward and held the felloith her eye
"You know," she said softly, "if so were to happen to your part-ner, the entire business would be yours to run as you see fit, wouldn&039;t it? You could keepall of the profits,couldn&039;t you?"
An avaricious gleaht," he said "I don&039;t knohy it didn&039;t occur to me before!"
"Patience," Halisstra advised "Anytime today would be fine Oh, and I would appreciate it if you didn&039;t mention to anyone else that my friend and I had done business with you Let&039;s just keep this between the two of us"
Ni various payments and tokens to indicate that Reethk Vaszune had entered into an arrangerach Dyrr with certain spell reagents and coht be required to talk his way out of the city The details of the true arrangeed he carried in no place except his own mind The Anointed Blade of the Jaezred Chaulssin ell satisfied with his work of the past few days While he did not strictly need Agrach Dyrr for what he had in mind, the accommodation he&039;d reached with the an-cient master of the House would make the task ahead of him much easier
Nimor slipped fro out into the Dark Does surrounding the great city quite well in the past few months, and he quickly found a dark, quiet spot unobserved by any of the city&039;s defenders The Anointed Blade stretched out his hand toward the blank stone of the passage wall The Ring of Shadows gleamed on his left hand, a small circle of inky darkness that seemed more like a tiny hole in the world than a piece of orna made available to him the ability to walk paths in the Plane of Shadow and so freed him from many of the constraints that travel on foot would otherwise place on him