The Inquisitives [4] The Darkwood Mask (21 page)

“Not as well as it ought to be,” he said, then raised an eyebrow as he looked her over. “I’ve never seen you look so radiant before, Midwife.”

“Flattery will not lower my fee,” she answered with a pout. “This appointment was made on short notice, Tallis.”

Tallis held out his hands defensively. He’d meant his words.

“I’d planned to stay the morning at my engagement, but the urgency of one of my favorite clients lured me back this early. Business first. I’m certain your reasons—
and
your gold—are worth it?”

“I am sorry,” he said and blew out a sigh. “The circumstances aren’t optimal for me, either.”

The halfling’s teasing vanished. She slid from her seat and walked directly in front on him, looking up at him with professional scrutiny. Even at half his size, the Midwife’s manner was imposing. Tallis always felt sleightly uncomfortable in her presence. She was a mage of considerable power. Not for the first time, he wondered if she’d studied in the Tower of the Twelve. If she had any blood connections to either House Jorasco or House Ghallanda—the dragonmarked houses of healing and hospitality—she never said. Not that she, of all people, would ever reveal her true identity to anyone.

“You’re alone,” she stated simply, “and my friends suggest that you’re not just fetching papers for another stray who needs to disappear. This is about the dead Brelish, right?”

Stray
. The Midwife’s term for those who were wanted by the law, bounty hunters, or the murder-minded. Tallis had come to the Midwife many times to secure new identification papers for unfortunates who needed to disappear … usually the innocent servants or enemies of those he’d killed or financially ruined.

The Midwife had earned her epithet for just this reason.
She ushered births into the world, not of new lives but of new identities. The halfling employed natural skill and tailored magic to create flawless identification papers that held up to intense scrutiny. Tallis knew of not a single instance in which her false papers were discovered for the counterfeits they were. He believed she could convincingly recreate identification papers for Kaius III.

The Midwife’s services were not cheap. Given the amount of gold he alone had poured into her coffers, along with her numerous other anonymous clients, Tallis knew she had to be one of Korth’s wealthiest citizens. He may have been a favored client of hers, but even Tallis didn’t know her real name. He doubted her own gang knew her story.

“Yes,” he admitted. “I’m the stray. If I just run from this, I’ll always be looking behind me. Hyran, Thauram, and Host knows who else are really after me this time.”

“Oh, yes. Your name has
always
been synonymous with legality in this town,” she said with a smile.

“Point taken. But I’ve got nothing to do with the Brelish ambassador—”

“Pshhh!” The halfling waved her hand dismissively. “If you want to go carving up foreign dignitaries, by all means do so. I’m sure you’d have good reasons for something like that. You always do, Tallis. Just don’t bring your mess to me, and that means not telling me about it. You came to me to give you some reprieve, and so I shall.”

Tallis ground his teeth together in frustration. For some reason, he wanted her to know he was innocent of this, but the Midwife’s neutrality in her clients’ affairs kept her in business and away from the scrutiny of the Justice Ministry. Her very existence was a rumor, nothing more. Those foolish few who had dared to implicate her in their crimes found that her gang of loyal rogues operated well outside of these underground chambers and were capable of delivering sound retribution.

The Midwife walked a slow circle around him now, muttering to herself as she did. Tallis felt her eyes appraising him and
wondered if she was using wizardry to assess him. “I’ve known you for a long time, half-elf. I never thought I’d have the pleasure of rebirthing
you.”

“I hope it’ll be all you ever dreamed.”

The halfling stopped her pacing. “The papers will be easy, of course, but you’ll need more than documents to blend in this time.”

Tallis spread out his hands. “What can I do?”

The Midwife called out over her shoulder. “Dorv, switch with your brother. Our client needs a new face.”

The halfling turned back to Tallis. She gestured to one of her servants, who stepped forward to offer Tallis a platter of vedbread and a wheel of cheese. “Make yourself comfortable, Tallis, and let’s talk about your fee.”

Soneste woke just after dawn, wondering if it was too much to hope that she not make any more embarrassing mistakes that day.

“Mistress,” a voice boomed when she climbed from her bed, startling her.

“Host!” she swore, reaching for her boot—which she wasn’t wearing. Then she shook her head. “You need to give us sleepers some time to adjust.”

Soneste hadn’t minded Aegis’s presence in her room at the Seventh Watch. He may have been an artificial creature composed of metal, wood, and stone, but he was Brelish. She had a few warforged acquaintances back in Sharn, and most of them were good company. She trusted this one faster than most, or it may have been pity for the loss of the family he’d lived to serve.

Warforged didn’t need to sleep—nor did they drink, eat, or even breathe. Magic from the Cannith forges that birthed them also sustained them entirely. When Aegis had offered to guard her, she accepted readily. She couldn’t be too careful in this city, especially since the criminal she was hunting had proved himself an efficient killer.

“I apologize,” he said.

“I’m sorry. It’s my fault,” she said. “I’m quite used to sleeping alone. What’s on your mind?”

“I’ve been thinking. This Tallis may have saved me.”

Soneste wiped her eyes and looked at the warforged. “How so?”

“He disabled me on the balcony, but he chose not kill me. If he had not disabled me, wouldn’t the assassin have killed me? I do not know. If I’d defeated Tallis, perhaps I could have stopped the assassin myself.”

Soneste recalled the wounds of the victims. “I think he may have saved you.”

“Or not,” Aegis said, sounding harsher. “At least I would have died with honor, defending my master and his family. I should not have survived.”

“We’ll have answers soon, I promise you.” Soneste glanced at the dent of his metal head. “I’m going to take you to a magewright shop to get some repairs today. I have an errand to run myself, but we’ll need to ditch Jotrem first.”

“Very good, Mistress.”

“You can call me by my name, Aegis.”

Recovering her rapier was Soneste’s priority in the first hours of the morning. The weapon was magewrought, a perfectly balanced blade of Brelish steel she’d saved up to buy. She wasn’t about to lose the sword. It was bad enough that Tallis had stolen the crysteel blade—its personal value was greater by far, a gift from Veshtalan.

Soneste searched among the fences who worked the Community Ward, threatening the hand of the Justice Ministry upon those she questioned. An enchanted rapier would have been pawned quickly into Korth’s black market to avoid evidence of theft. She thought she’d found the trail, but it remained ever out of reach. Given time, she knew she could track the rapier down herself, but she felt she was wasting time not searching for Tallis.

Swallowing her pride, Soneste settled for help. She walked into the city’s House Tharashk enclave, fully expecting expedience
and a good deal. She cited employment in Thuranne d’Velderan’s agency—drawing disapproving looks at the half-orc’s family name—and found cooperation in the form of a sleight discount. Evidently, the Karrnath branch of House Tharashk didn’t care much for the Velderan family or its retainers.

Nevertheless, a human heir employed the Mark of Finding to locate Soneste’s missing rapier. With a pair of Tharashk mercenaries accompanying them both and Aegis clomping along behind, it didn’t take her long to convince the knave who had her rapier that it was in his “best interest” to give it up for free.

The entire episode hadn’t been a complete detour, for it had yielded a new lead. While searching among the rogues of Korth’s underground she learned the existence of the Midnight Market, a secretive bazaar that set up only night each week. On Zol.

Tonight.

“Drink this.” Ranec unstoppered a small vial of black liquid and held it out to Tallis. While he’d worked on Tallis, applying skills both alchemical and mundane, the changeling had worn his own face. Tallis had never quite grown accustomed to the pallid skin and vague features of changelings, so he tried not to stare.

When he swallowed the thick solution, Tallis felt an uncomfortable strain on his muscles throughout his body then a fierce itch along his scalp. He winced. “Can I scratch?”

“Best to wait,” Ranec said, and sure enough, within a few seconds he felt normal again—although his hair had flowed down over his eyes.

“Come, see. I think you will agree that the change is sufficient.”

The changeling led Tallis from the stool to a full-length mirror where he stared in wonderment upon his own reflection. His hair, once almost shoulder length, had grown longer—was
still
growing as he watched—until it fell to his shoulder blades, curling sleightly as it did.

“Aundairian ladies love this philter the best,” the changeling said with a smile. Ranec’s face reshaped to resemble a human’s now that his work was complete. He bound Tallis’s hair into a tail with a thin leather cord.

Although his face was still his own, Tallis’s features had been altered in subtle ways. His brows were sleightly arched, his silver-gray eyes had shifted to green, and even his ears appeared to have a sharper point. His face was perfectly clean shaven.

“Now, these affectations will disappear over the course of a few days,” the changeling explained, “so do whatever it is you need to do, sooner than later.”

Next Ranec gestured to a bench, where a fine coat of forest green with silver buttons was folded neatly with a shiny brooch resting atop it. When Tallis tried the coat on, both men looked into the mirror at his image. The changeling smiled again, and Tallis noted the single silver-capped tooth. He felt like he was trying on fine suits at ir’Alanso’s Clothier. It made him vaguely uncomfortable.

Finally, Ranec produced a matching tri-cornered hat and placed it on Tallis’s head. “These garments and the signet brooch are accounted for in the Midwife’s fee.”

“Thanks, Ranec. You’re really good at this.”

The changeling gave a half bow.

Soon after, the Midwife emerged from another room, now dressed in the work clothes Tallis was accustomed to seeing. Her attire included a many-pocketed apron and a pair of thick lenses which she’d tucked up into her hair.

The Midwife held out a slim metallic case. She flipped it open to display new identification papers within. “Ranec, add a portrait to this,” she said, handing the case over to him.

She turned to Tallis as the changeling produced a set of colored inks. “You are now Findel d’Lyrandar, an upstanding member of the Windwrights Guild. It’s just one of the names
I put into circulation some time ago, so there will already be a record of you active in this city.”

Tallis nodded. “Where am I supposed to be from?”

The Midwife gave him a funny look. “I know you can’t convincingly pull off an accent, so you’re still from Karrnath. However, you spent some time in Cyre during the months of tenuous peace between the two nations. You lost your immediate family on the Day of Mourning—convenient, eh?—and are now based out of Rekkenmark. You come to Korth all the time, for pleasure as much as business. Maybe you have a lover who works somewhere in the Temple Ward?”

Was that a veiled reference to Lenrik? No, she couldn’t know about him. Even if she did, she wouldn’t care. Information to the Midwife was armor and weaponry, to be used only when necessary. She’d get along well in Zilargo, Tallis had always thought.

“Lyrandar. Windwrights Guild. Pious sweetheart. Yes, sounds like me.” Tallis smiled. “Do I possess a dragonmark?” He pulled up one sleeve, on the chance that Ranec had somehow applied a false tattoo without his knowledge.

“No. Believe me, you don’t want
that
much attention. Your father did, however, and you’ve just hoped to live up to the prestige he once commanded within the house. Don’t try to fool anyone for too long, Findel, especially real members of House Lyrandar. The papers will show your reader precisely what they expect to see and nothing more. Don’t linger. Just show it and move on.”