Kate Novak - Finders Stone 2 - Wyvern's Spur.pdf

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Wyvern's SpurWyvern's Spur
By Kate Novak and Jeff Grubb
Map of Immersea
Wyvernspur Family Tree
1
Homecoming
From the journal of Giogioni Wvvernspur:
The 19th of Ches, in the Year of the Shadows
Late last night I returned home from my duties as royal envoy, to find my kin
in
a greater uproar than the southern city I had left behind. Ten months of
Westgate's problems shrivel to insignificance when compared to the tragedy
that
has befallen the clan of the Wyvernspurs of Immersea.
How could the flattening of an entire neighborhood by a dragon corpse,
followed
by an earthquake and an underworld power-struggle, hope to compete with the
theft of a family heirloom no larger than a zucchini and uglier than
three-week-old sausage?
"A hunk of junk" is what Uncle Drone has always called the wyvern's spur (said
heirloom), and, considering all the trouble it has been, lam inclined to agree
with him. No doubt the family would have donated it to a church rummage
generations ago if not for the detestable prophesy that came with it.
According to family legend, the wyvern who presented it to old Paton
Wyvernspur,
way back when, promised that the family line would never die out as long as we
held on to the gruesome chunk of mummified beastie. Logically it doesn't
follow
that losing the dratted thing guarantees our demise, but we've always been a
superstitious lot, we Wyvernspurs, so there is a family conclave tonight in
Aunt
Dorath's lair at Redstone Castle. Although I have not yet unpacked from my
journeys on behalf of the crown, I am expected to attend.
Someone will need to comfort Aunt Dorath. An oldest nephew's lot is never
easy.
Giogi laid his quill pen on the writing table and left the journal open for
the
ink to dry. He didn't feel it necessary to add that his great-aunt would find
his presence comforting only insofar as it would give her something else to
criticize. He planned to leave his journal to posterity someday, and there
were
some things posterity just didn't need to know.
As far as Aunt Dorath was concerned, Giogi had dishonored the Wyvernspur
family
last year with his disgraceful—but, as Giogi would put it, dead-on—imitation
of
King Azoun IV, which had resulted in Giogi's near assassination by the cursed
sell-sword Alias of Westgate and the disruption of an entire wedding
reception.
Nor had Dorath, the matriarch of clan Wyvernspur, been impressed by her
nephew's
tale of his subsequent hair-raising encounter with a red dragon named Mist. To
her mind, any young man who could not avoid entanglements with assassins and
monsters needed to be sent far away for an extended period. Aunt Dorath had
assumed that His Majesty Azoun had exiled Giogi in disgrace for those
transgressions.
What Dorath, and most of the general population, had not known, was that King
Azoun actually had assigned Giogi a secret mission, to discover the
whereabouts
of Alias of Westgate, the king's potential assassin.
Not that I needed to be assigned, Giogi thought. I seem destined to run into
the
woman—or her relatives—wherever I roam. Yet, after Giogi had spotted her near
Westgate that summer, she seemed to have vanished from the Realms entirely.
Giogi rose from his writing desk and stretched. His fingertips brushed against
one of the overhead chandeliers. He was a very tall young man, a legacy from
both his father and his mother. Last year he'd been slender and clean-cut, but
his travels had left him gaunt and his hair in desperate need of a trim. His
sandy-brown locks straggled down his sunburned neck in back and into his muddy
brown eyes in front. His long face made his features seem less plain than they
were. He bore no resemblance, however, to the other living members of the
Wyvernspur family, who all had thin lips, hawklike noses, blue eyes, pale
skin,
and dark hair.
Taking up his goblet of mulled wine, Giogi crossed the parlor to the
fireplace,
where he warmed his fingers by the flames. It would take a day or two of
blazing
fires to chase the last of the winter chill and damp from the parlor.
Uncertain
as to his master's return, Thomas, Giogi's manservant, had decided not to
waste
wood and effort heating an empty house. Giogi shuddered to think of the effect
that ten months of such neglect had on the plush wool Calimshan carpeting, the
brilliant Sembian satin furniture coverings, and the Cormyrian duskwood
paneling. At least, it being the month of Ches, the returning spring sunshine
kept ice from forming on the leaded glass windows. It had come as quite a
shock
to Giogi, though, to find no candle burning in those windows upon his return,
neither literally nor figuratively.
The young noble wondered whether a mere fire laid in the hearth could burn off
the strange and unwelcome feeling he now sensed in his home. Everything was
familiar and in its proper place, but the townhouse felt empty. After months
spent at inns, aboard ships, and in traveling with strangers, now being alone
left Giogi disquieted. He took a long swig of wine to shake off his gloom.
On the mantlepiece lay the most interesting souvenir of his travels: a large
yellow crystal. Giogi had found it in the grass outside Westgate, and he was
sure there was something special about the stone besides its beauty and
financial value. The crystal shone in the dark like a great firefly, and Giogi
felt quite comforted whenever he held it. He considered showing it to his
Uncle
Drone, but he decided against the idea, afraid that the old wizard would tell
him the stone was dangerous and take it away.
Giogi polished off his drink and placed the empty silver goblet on the
mantlepiece, then picked up the yellow crystal. Cradling it in both hands, he
flopped back into his favorite stuffed chair and propped his feet up on a
cushioned footstool. He turned the crystal over in his hands, watching the
firelight sparkle in each facet.
The crystal was roughly egg-shaped but far larger than any bird egg—smaller,
though, than a wyvern's egg. It was the color of the finest mead and faintly
warm to the touch. Where the facets met, the edges were not sharp but beveled
smooth. Giogi held the stone at arm's length, closed one eye, and tried to
divine if it held some secret within its depths, but he could make out only
the
firelight shining through it and his own reflection broken by the facets.
"Now, what would be the best way to display you?" he asked the crystal. There
was no sense in having a case made for it, he realized. Taking it out every
time
he wanted to handle it would be a bother, but it was too large to wear from a
neck chain. On the road, he had kept it tucked in the top of his boot, where
most adventurers kept their daggers.
The boots would have to suffice this evening, he decided at last. Although he
didn't plan to show it to Uncle Drone and the rest of his family, he very much
wanted to show the stone to his pals at the Immer Inn. With any luck, Aunt
Dorath would dismiss him from the family gathering early enough for him to
slip
back into town before closing hour.
That matter resolved, Giogi bounced back to his feet and wandered from the
parlor to his home's entrance. With the stone tucked awkwardly in his belt, he
rummaged through the hall closet under the stairs. He'd left his boots in the
front of the closet, but they had somehow vanished. He rustled about the
cloaks
and capes hanging from their separate hooks, and kicked through a number of
shoes that littered the floor. Then he began pulling from the closet all
manner
of walking sticks, abandoned clothing, and curies—which were gifts from
relatives, and so could not be thrown away, but which were too ugly to place
anywhere but in the relative darkness of the closet.
Finally, having moved half the closet's interior into the hall, the young
noble
gave up and let out a bellow.
"Thomas!" he shouted toward the back hallway. "Where are my boots?"
Alerted by the sound of chests, shoes, and walking sticks being thumped about,
Thomas had already decided to investigate the racket and had put aside the
silver tureen he'd been polishing. He was just coming out from the kitchen as
Giogi called his name. Beneath the archway separating the front hall from what
Giogi termed "Servant Land," the gentleman's gentleman paused.
Thomas looked askance at the closet's contents strewn about the hallway and
tried not to blanch. He wasn't more than three years Giogi's senior, but many
more years of responsibility had given him an aged, wiser-than-thou look. It
was
a look that the servant used now on his employer.
"Is there something that Sir requires?" Thomas asked evenly.
"I can't find my boots," Giogi declared. "I know I left them in here."
From the chaos before him, Thomas drew out a pair of recently polished black
boots with narrow heels and sharp, pointed toes. "Here you are, sir," he said
without a trace of annoyance.
"Not those things. I won't wear them ever again. They pinch my feet. Take them
away and burn them. I want the boots I bought in Westgate. The knee-high,
brown-suede dodders with wide brims. They're the most comfortable boots in the
Realms."
Thomas raised a single eyebrow. "Comfortable they may be, sir, but they are
hardly a gentleman's boot."
"Tish! I'm a gentleman, and they're my boots, ergo, argumentum ab
auctoritate,"
came Giogi's riposte. "Et cetera," he added.
"I thought, sir, now that your travels are through, that you would wish to
dispense with the accoutrements of your journey. I have already retired the
boots."
"Well, bring them out of retirement, and please hurry. I need to leave for
Redstone."
"I understood that your Aunt Dorath was not expecting you until after supper."
"That's right, and since I thought I would walk to Redstone and would like to
arrive on time, I need to leave now." Giogi sat on the hall bench and kicked
off
his silk slippers, anticipating that Thomas would produce his boots out of
thin
air.
Thomas surveyed his master with disbelief. "Walk, sir?"
"Yes. You know, one foot in front of the other," Giogi explained patiently.
"But what about your own supper, sir?"
"Supper? Oh, sorry, Thomas. Write supper off. After that magnificent lunch and
all those wonderful raisin cakes at tea, I'm completely full up. Couldn't eat
another thing. Thanks anyway."
Thomas's look of incredulity turned to one of concern. "Are you feeling all
right, sir?"
"Splendid, except that my feet are getting cold," Giogi said with a grin.
Without another word, Thomas spun about and disappeared through the archway
into
Servant Land.
Giogi twisted sideways on the bench to keep his stockinged feet off the chilly
floorboards. He ran a finger along the smooth parquetry worked into the wooden
bench's high back. One of his earliest childhood memories was of his father
explaining to him the picture in the bench. It depicted the moment the family
had gotten its patronymic, "way back," as his father used to say, "in the days
before we knew which spoon to use for the soup course." In the design, Paton
Wyvernspur, the family founder, stood before a great female wyvern. Two tiny
hatchling wyverns played at the monster's feet, and behind her lay the corpse
of
her mate. Bandits had killed her mate and stolen her eggs from her nest, but
Paton had tracked down and vanquished the thieves and restored the young
wyverns
to their mother. In gratitude, the female wyvern had sliced off her mate's
right
spur and conferred it upon Giogi's forefather with the promise that his family
line would never dwindle while the spur remained in the family's possession.
Later, when he was older and had learned that wyverns weren't considered very
nice beasts, Giogi often wondered why Paton had helped the female wyvern. By
that time, though, Giogi's father and mother were both dead, and Giogi
couldn't
bring himself to ask Aunt Dorath or Uncle Drone. He sensed instinctively that
it
would be branded a question only a fool such as himself would ask.
He wasn't fool enough to part with the bench, though. It had been a wedding
gift
from his mother to his father, and while the other Wyvernspurs scorned the
wealthy carpenter's daughter that Cole Wyvernspur had wed, they all coveted
the
bench. The carpentry was solid, and the parquetry picture positively hypnotic.
Aunt Dorath had suggested a number of times that the bench ought to sit in the
hall of Redstone, the family manor, and last year, before his marriage to
Gaylyn
Dimswart, Giogi's second Cousin Frefford had hinted it would make a lovely
wedding gift, but Giogi declined to part with it.
Bored by inactivity, Giogi bounced to his stocking feet and began tossing back
into the closet all the things he'd tossed out.
Thomas appeared in the archway, holding out the knee-high, brown-suede
dodders,
which, by his master's own declaration, were the most comfortable pair in the
Realms. "Please, sir," the servant requested, "don't trouble yourself with
putting those things away. I'll be happy to do it."
Giogi halted in midtoss of a lone wool mitten. Something in Thomas's tone
revealed the servant's anxiety. Giogi noticed that the inside of the closet
was
now as untidy as the outside. "Sorry, Thomas," he apologized meekly.
"That's quite all right, sir," Thomas said, setting the boots beside the
bench.
"Ah, my boots! Excellent!" Giogi sat back down on the bench and pulled the
right
boot on, then slipped the stone into the brim.
"Are you certain, sir, you wouldn't rather ride?" Thomas asked.
Giogi, one foot still unshod, looked up at his manservant. "It may surprise
you
to know, Thomas, that when I was on my mission for the crown, I often walked
great distances." Giogi did not feel it necessary to add that he had walked
great distances whenever forced to because some scurrilous cove had stolen his
horse or some equally evil beast had devoured his mount.
"Indeed, sir. I did not mean to suggest you weren't up to the task. I just
thought that after your strenuous journey you might prefer the luxury of
riding.
If not in the carriage, I can saddle Daisyeye."
"No, thank you, Thomas," Giogi said, finally pulling on the other boot.
"Daisyeye deserves a good, long rest, and I really want to walk." He rose,
whipped his cloak about him with a flourish, and stomped to the front door.
"Don't bother to wait up for me," he suggested. "I expect I'll be quite late.
Good night," he called out before he plunged outside.
In town, everything was brown; the buildings, the grass, the muddy roads, the
wooden carts, even the horses and oxen, were shades of umber and tan.
Townhouses
blocked out the late afternoon sun and cast long chocolate shadows on the
earth.
Women shouted out the windows at dirt-caked children in the streets. It was as
if the gods had run out of other colors by the time they reached that part of
Immersea, left it etched in one shade, then hadn't bothered to mix new paint
to
fill in the color.
Giogi walked east, away from the center of town, then turned south onto a
trail
that led from town to the Wyvernspur estate. A low wall surrounded the land,
and
the lanky noble swung his legs over it easily and entered another world, one
that the gods had colored. Stalks of winter rye glittered like jade in the
setting sunlight; purple-specked crocuses sparkled with gemlike raindrops; a
great flock of wild geese honked overhead in the deepening blue sky. Giogi
felt
his spirits rise and shook off the gloom that had gripped him in his own
house.
He struck out along the path through the fields. As the town founders, the
Wyvernspurs held title to nearly all the land south of town. Most of the land
was set aside for hunting and riding. The highest hill was dedicated to the
goddess Selune, and the temple at its peak was left to the administration of
her
priestess, ancient Mother Lleddew. The Wyvernspurs resisted, however,
cultivating much of the land, felling many trees, or clearing many fields for

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