F&tGM05: For the Greater Good
by VStarTraveler
Summary: After the funeral is over, a grandfather reminisces with his granddaughter about her spunky, late grandmother and a pair of old enemies he could never defeat but to whom he'd also never truly lost. This story is my entry in the "WA Character Development Challenge."
Disclaimer:
This story is a work of fiction, written totally for fun and not for profit. This interpretation of Fafhrd, the Gray Mouser, and world of Nehwon is entirely my own. They remain the property of their respective owners. All other characters in this story and the city of Choloquio and its entities are my original creations.
Author's Note: Fans of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser here on FanFiction are encouraged to read "F&tGM02-The Princess and the Hand Glass" prior to reading this story.
Actual Story Word Count (per Microsoft Word): 7,909 words.
The flames that had lit up the face of the cliff were gone; the pyre, having collapsed in on itself, was now burning down to glowing embers. The sound of the waves crashing on the nearby rocks had taken the place of the roaring of the fire and a chilling breeze had taken that of the reflected heat. With torches standing behind them, an elderly man in fine black clothes, a young girl, eight guards, and two men tending the fire were all that remained. Everyone else had paid their condolences and been dismissed some time before to go back up the stairs carved into the rock.
"Grandfather, why did Grandmother have to die?" asked the girl, wearing a black mourning dress. She was about nine or ten years of age and had blonde hair trailing down her back.
Placing a comforting arm around the girl, the old man replied solemnly, "Everyone dies, dear."
"I know that, Grandfather, just like my mother and father, but what I mean is why did she have to die now?"
"It was her time, Dascha. You know she'd been sick for several weeks. Unfortunately, the potions the physicians were administering to her and the mystical phylacteries those quack clerics supplied only helped for a little while, if that, each time before she would get worse," said the gray-haired man with the short but matching beard. His eyes were a steely blue and very alert, and his outfit didn't completely conceal his still powerful physique.
"I will miss her greatly, Grandfather."
"As will I, dear."
One of the fire tenders signaled the man, indicating that it was time for them to go. Viewing the gathering of the deceased's cremains could be distasteful even to a hardened adult, much less a child. The man nodded his thanks, and he and the rest of the group took the cliff face stairs back up to the Guild complex overlooking the bay.
"Indeed, I will miss her," repeated the grandfather as he climbed. "And I will miss having her see what you will become. She would have been very proud of you, particularly when you start attending the Trade Guild School."
The girl nodded her head as she went up the steps holding her granddad's hand. "Grandmother told me before she got sick that she didn't want me to do that."
"I know, sweetheart, but she and all of your wonderful tutors have you very well prepared. I convinced her to change her mind shortly before she passed since she would no longer be there to coordinate your lessons. I was always quite skilled at showing her all the facts and getting her to see the greater good."
"How, Grandfather?" she asked, puzzled.
"Because I think she knew I loved her from the start, nearly 40 year ago." He paused, thinking back to that long ago time.
Moments later, he spoke quietly as they topped the stairs and headed toward the tallest tower. "Unfortunately, she'd just married the crown prince of another land, so I didn't see or hear from her for about five years after that. In fact, I didn't know for a while if I'd ever see her again."
"Will you tell me what happened?"
Grandfather nodded but said no more as the group entered the central tower and went up to their private quarters. On arriving, the guards searched the large suite before the man and the girl entered with the two remaining guards.
"All clear, Guildmaster," said the chief guard a few moments later. "Our condolences, sir. It will be rather chilly tonight, so the guildservants have started a fire for you. Let us know if you need anything."
"Thank you, Brother," said the old man, shaking his fellow guildmember's hand. "I actually have some business to attend to after Dascha goes to bed, so I'll see you shortly."
The guard sighed. "Your work is never done, sir."
With the door finally closed and silence reigning in the suite, the old man sat down on a chair in front of the fireplace. His knees hurt slightly from the long climb. The girl joined him with tall glasses of milk a few moments later.
"Now, Grandfather?"
"It's your bedtime, Dascha, but I suppose you wouldn't be able to sleep for a while, so I'll tell you what I can. Your grandmother was a princess from the so-called City of Seven Score Thousand Smokes—"
"Lankhmar?" she interjected questioningly.
"Your geography lessons serve you well, dear Granddaughter. Yes, Grandmother Tennie was a princess of that city, also known for its Black Togas, but she left it to be the wife of the crown prince of a city on the east side of the Inner Sea."
"Sarheenmar?"
"Right again! In fact, it was on that voyage that I first met her. I was older, and supposedly wiser, but I stupidly fell head over heels in love with her, though it was to no avail. Hers was purely a political marriage arranged by her father, and she was determined to do right by her family and her new husband, even when it meant that she would never be happy. Unfortunately, it was much worse than that; she ended up being treated quite poorly, suffering much abuse from the evil man. It got worse still after her dear old father was replaced as Overlord of Lankhmar, and the new Overlord married his daughter to the Prince of Ilthmar, Sarheenmar's southern neighbor and great rival. The vile prince, Rodrack, became king of Sarheenmar for a time, but, with her no longer holding any diplomatic importance and being something of a feisty lass—"
The little girl laughed as she nodded at the apt description of her grandmother.
"—he replaced her, exiling her to the very lowest position in his harem, so she became a prisoner in her own home."
"She told me she had been married once before you, but she wouldn't tell me what happened," said Dascha. Already sad over her grandmother's loss, she was pained further to learn what the woman had experienced.
"I expect not. It always made her extremely upset about how he treated her and his other wives. Knowing a bit of my background and having no one else to whom to turn, or so I thought, she was finally able to sneak out a message to me regarding her plight. It took quite some time but it eventually reached me through our guild network while I was in Tisilinilit on business—"
"In the Eastern Lands?"
"Yes, but still far from our dear Choloquio and farther still from her homeland."
"What did you do, Grandfather?"
"What would any man who thought he was madly in love with a princess do? Go to her rescue, of course! I got my men together along with the best wizard I could hire in Tisilinilit, and we jumped on our Guild ship and headed downriver." He smiled as he recalled the memory. "I had a very good crew with me on that trip, one of the best."
Looking back at his granddaughter, he continued, "Unfortunately, I didn't realize it at the time but I had competition. You see, your grandmother, ever the intelligent woman that she was, knew not whether her message would ever be delivered to me, so she actually dispatched two messages. The second one went to a scrawny little man and his giant friend in the City of the Black Toga. I wish I could tell you how they came to arrive in Sarheenmar, but I really can't. Perhaps only they could tell the whole story…"
~F&tGM~
Almost 35 years earlier in a back corner of the Silver Eel Tavern in Lankhmar:
It was late and the flicker of the candlelight cast dark shadows across the craggy features of the man's face. Hunched forward with his mug held close, he seemed nervous, his eyes repeatedly darting over people in the room. His voice, when he said anything at all, was so low that it was almost impossible to hear his words over the boisterous sounds of other patrons.
"So who gave you this supposed message?" asked the blond giant seated at the round table to the man's left. He clearly doubted the messenger and the message he'd just delivered.
"A scullery maid from the palace. She'd slipped away to the docks to find someone to deliver the message. She ran into me, a poor, down-on-my-luck sailor, and had to trust me since she was out of time."
"What do you mean?"
"Scullery maids aren't supposed to leave the palace. She was already going to have to be friendly with the guards at the gate to get back in, if you get my drift, but if she didn't get back before the gate closed, she would be flogged, or worse, for being absent. She gave me the message and some coins to cover my expenses and provide this poor, unfortunate soul at least a tiny bit of recompense for all the efforts it would take to locate you and deliver the message." The man, having completed his mission, took a sip of his ale as his eyes continued their ceaseless dartings.
The little man to the sailor's right had sat silently since hearing the message, but he finally spoke. "Did this scullery maid tell you anything else? Even something seemingly inane might be important. Anything at all?"
The weathered man pondered for a moment before nodding. "Now that you mention it, it didn't make any sense to me, but she said something about how the princess really loved having her mirror fixed."
The small man let out an audible sigh before sliding his hand across the table toward the messenger. When he pulled it slightly away, three gold coins remained in front of the sailor, whose eyes widened at the payment before he discreetly swept them into his hand and away from any potentially prying eyes.
"Thank you, kind sir!"
Leaning in close to him, the little man said, "No, not kind. I expect you to say nothing to anyone about this. If word about it escapes from your lips, I will get back to you, wherever you might be, for far, far more than the value of those coins."
~F&tGM~
After the sailor left, Fafhrd asked, "What do you think, Mouser? Is it real?"
The little man looked at his large barbarian friend and nodded slowly. "Yeah, it is."
"You seem certain."
Mouser nodded. "I am."
Fafhrd knew that it had taken his friend quite some time to get over the pretty princess, but Mouser had never wanted to talk about her following her marriage to the Sarheenmarian prince about five years earlier, just after they had rescued her. He asked, "What do you want to do? Brave all odds to storm the castle and rescue her again or leave her there to rot?"
Mouser hung his forehead on his hand, staring intently at the table. Obviously torn over the situation, he finally wondered out loud, "So…how do you get into a heavily guarded fortress?"
"Unless one has some powerful magical assistance, which, I might add, we're sadly lacking in this case, the basic options are over the walls, under the walls, or through the walls." Fafhrd counted off from one to three with his fingers as he said them. "Number three's typically the easiest if you can walk in the gate; picks, shovels, trebuchets, and mangonels tend to be a little too labor intensive for my taste."
Mouser frowned at the attempted joke. "Sure, walking through the gate's always best, but to do that and have any hope of getting out, you need an invitation." He huffed in frustration.
Fafhrd nodded slowly. "I think we just might be able to arrange that. We'd need a ship to do it though."
"Darn, just when I need them, I'm all out of trebuchets and ships," groused Mouser. "What about…" The little man suddenly got a strange look on his face.
Fafhrd's eyebrows went up questioningly. "You have something?"
"Possibly. When we rescued the princess, remember how they cheated us on the reward? And the credit? Well, that still burns me up. While Daddy Karstak's gone, maybe it's time to collect the rest of our reward, wouldn't you say?"
~F&tGM~
A number of thefts and strange break-ins occurred in Lankhmar over the next few weeks.
First, there were several burglaries where the major items taken were fine clothes of nobles or the very rich. Curiously, the clothes taken would only fit very, very large or very small men. Coins and jewelry were taken in some cases, too, as were a pair of large but exquisite black boots.
At the Lankhmar Library, the chief librarian was distressed when several very valuable documents disappeared from the library's diplomatic collection. Even more curious, the documents were returned to the library by a mute street urchin about two weeks later. Then again, maybe that wasn't so curious since they were, after all, library documents.
A print shop on Craft Street wasn't so lucky. The owner absorbed the loss of several rolls of vellum and reams of fine parchment, along with a number of bottles of ink and dozens of high quality quills.
An oil merchant, a leather shop, and an ivory dealer on Carter Street were also hit. The ivory dealer had perhaps the most unusual of these cases, awaking one morning to find a number of walrus tusks missing. However, he was happy that the more valuable pieces from tropical climes that sat in the adjacent case remained untouched.
Finally, a local smelting shop experienced perhaps the most unusual break-in of all where the intruder took a lead ingot and used the shop equipment to apparently cast, based on the broken and discarded mold, some type of circular medallion. Stranger still, a gold film was found in one of the shallow melting pots. The owner was able to melt the film and collect the residual gold, thereby just making up for his loss of lead if not for the mess in his shop.
~F&tGM~
It was twenty-one nights after the meeting with the sailor before everything was prepared and the darkness of the new moon covered Lankhmar. That ended up not mattering too much since clouds from an approaching storm soon took its place. Security on the docks was also fairly lax as the raindrops began to fall; the guards expected no trouble so staying dry was their top priority.
That wasn't the case with Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. The two men swam into the navy yard from upriver and found that their target was still where they'd seen it earlier in the day. That was when the problems started. Mouser's tinderbox had gotten wet during the swim, so firing the sail house had to be done with flint and steel rather than the slow fuse as originally planned. They had to go back into the water and swim to the cutter, hoping that the fire they'd planned as a diversion wouldn't be noticed for a while to give them the time needed to prepare the boat for launch.
Fortunately, they had just enough time to reach the sailboat before the flames billowed forth, drawing the attention of a guard, and soon thereafter, everyone else in the navy yard. By the time the dock workers and sailors had the fire under control, the shallow boat had slipped out of the naval harbor, across the chain blocking the entry, or exit, of larger ships, into the River Hlal's slow current. It wasn't long before they raised sail and were on their way to the planned pickup point near the Great Salt Marsh.
The two men quickly collected the supplies they'd stashed there and were on their way before dawn, heading toward islands in the northern part of the Inner Sea.
A few days later, modifications to the boat were complete and the men sailed northeast to Kleg Nar, where they resupplied and took on three sailors as crew. The next day, the little ship sailed to the southeast toward Sarheenmar.
~F&tGM~
It was the day of the Rabbit in the month of the Goat when a cutter boat flying a strange flag entered the harbor at Sarheenmar. A clerk backed up by four armed guards approached even as the boat neared the dock. They stood by as two of the crewmen looped hawsers over the bollards on the dock and then tied off the mooring lines.
"Ahoy, strange boat, who's in charge here? What's your business and what's your cargo?"
A small bearded man wearing a blue sailor's tunic with gray pants stepped forward. "Good day, gentlemen. I am Captain Kreig of Ool Hrusp of the Eight Cities and this is my ship—"
A couple of the clerk's guard's laughed at the little vessel being called a ship, but the captain continued without acknowledging them, "—the Gossamer Goshawk. My cargo was delivered in Kvarch Nar, but I was approached by this northern gentleman who is an emissary of King Hrogen of the North. His original ship was badly damaged in a pirate attack, so he hired my ship as official transport under the Northern flag to deliver him to Sarheenmar, where I hope to take on goods for my return journey."
"Good gods, he's big!" muttered the clerk on seeing the Northerner. "It's a wonder he couldn't take on the pirates all by himself."
The tall man, who approached from the back of the boat, sported a green velvet doublet covered by a rich cloak of white fur. His pants were black, as were his exquisite almost knee-high boots and the broad belt at his waist. The hilt of an apparently large sword projected over his right shoulder adjacent to a head of longish blond hair with a reddish cast. His thick but relatively short and well-groomed beard matched his hair.
However, it was the circular gold medallion on the man's chest that caught the clerk's attention. The medallion had strange patterns and words, and it was suspended by a broad blue ribbon that went around the big man's neck.
Striding forward, the big man stopped in front of the clerk. "I am Ambassador Fafnor, Royal Emissary of King Hrogen of the North. I have come to speak with King Rodrack the Great of the land of Sarheenmar regarding a trade agreement between our two great lands. I am expected."
When the clerk gave him a strange look, Fafnor asked, "Has King Hrogen's introduction not arrived here in Sarheenmar? We grew worried when we received no reply from your land, despite the amount of time that has passed since its dispatch."
The dock agent shook his head unknowingly. "I'm not familiar with anything like that arriving, but you can check at the palace to be sure."
Ambassador Fafnor sighed as he nodded. "I feared that inquiry might not have arrived. Piracy has gotten bad south of the Bones in the western sea, as evidenced by the attack on my own ship. My king is planning to soon send a fleet to destroy the pirate menace to allow for the free flow of shipping with our trading partners in the Inner Sea, but that does nothing for us now."
"Understandably so," replied the dock agent. "I can do nothing—"
Fafhrd, now enjoying his guise as Ambassador Fafnor, interrupted to say, "Of course my ship is a diplomatic vessel, so it will be left alone. I will require an escort to the castle, along with any port entry documents required as proof of our docking and my ship's presence in your harbor. It has already been a long day so I appreciate your expediting of this effort."
Realizing that continued discussion with the strange northern diplomat would likely only make more work for him and his men, the dock agent nodded. "Of course, Mr. Ambassador. The documents will be available momentarily and one of my men will escort you to the palace."
"Excellent. Manse, my personal secretary, is down below in his cabin. He'll be accompanying me."
"Of course."
With the activity on the deck, no one had noticed Captain Kreig go below. The little captain removed the wig and scratchy beard as soon as he entered his cabin, and then removed his blue naval top. A small, clean-shaven man dressed in a gray outfit and carrying a leather satchel emerged from down below moments later, and the tall ambassador, his very small personal assistant, and a single guard were soon on the way to the palace. The three sailors followed behind carrying the men's mountain of baggage.
~F&tGM~
On reaching the checkpoint outside the palace, Ambassador Fafnor waved their escort forward to present the docking certificate that showed a royal vessel carrying the representative of the King of the North had arrived. Fafhrd then stepped forward and said, "I am Ambassador Fafnor. My credentials." He handed them to the clerk. "My personal assistant and I require ambassadorial quarters so we may prepare to present the sealed copy of my credentials from my king's hand to yours, along with King Hrogen's small gift to King Rodrack."
The clerk at the receiving checkpoint looked confused. "I'm sorry, Ambassador Fafnor, but we weren't expecting your arrival and have no ambassadorial quarters available, your Eminence."
Fafnor rolled his eyes and then studied his fingernails for a moment. Looking back at the clerk with a glare, he said, "And your name is? Vilhelm? Good! Manse, record that. We want to be sure King Rodrack is aware of the type of greeting given his royal guests."
The clerk's eyes were wide. "Wait! The usual ambassadorial quarters are currently booked with other guests, but I do see another suite that can be made available for your use."
"Very good," said Fafhrd, as he waved his hand for Mouser to close the book. "What are the plans for today? Will we be able to present my credentials and the gift for the king this afternoon or this evening?"
~F&tGM~
Secure in assigned private quarters within the palace, Fafhrd groaned, "This isn't bad, but you'd think they'd have larger accommodations for a royal ambassador."
With a wineglass in his hand, Mouser laughed as he plopped down on an overstuffed sofa. "And I was thinking that a broom closet would be big enough." He propped his feet up on the arm and took a sip of the wine. "All this with this wine included is much, much better than a closet."
"True enough," said Fafhrd as he came over and sat down on the adjacent chair. He opened the satchel and spread out some parchments on the table in front of them. "They said the royal processional begins an hour before sunset and will be a serious affair..."
~F&tGM~
Present day Choloquio:
"I became aware of my competition on the twelfth day of my stay in Sarheenmar," said the elderly man to his granddaughter, "when the herald at the evening processional announced 'Ambassador Fafnor of the Northern Kingdom.' You see, the court processional was very elegant, with everyone, including the ambassador, wearing their best finery."
"It must have been quite beautiful," said little Dascha. "Did you like it there?"
"Beautiful, yes. Like? Not particularly. Since the king had seen a version of my face, I was in disguise to avoid having him recognize me, which, in hindsight, was a good thing since the ambassador might have recognized me, too."
"Who was the ambassador?"
Her grandfather laughed. "When they announced him, I didn't know the name, but I recognized the face of the giant man and knew that he was as much a royal ambassador as I was a monkey from the jungles of Klesh. His frowning little assistant wasn't even announced, but I also placed him, even though I'd never seen him before."
"How, Grandfather?"
"The big man had killed two of my men right before my very eyes on a mission several years earlier, and I was told by the survivors that his little friend Mouser had killed or at least been partially responsible for the deaths of nine more of my Brothers."
"Oh, Grandfather! They must have been horrible people!"
"Perhaps, though Grandmother Tennie, while she wouldn't tell me details or even their names, held them in the highest regard. This, I must admit, has affected my perception of them, at least somewhat, over the years."
"What did you do?"
"I watched as the big man presented his sealed credentials to the king, who had his clerk open and read it, and then compare it to the 'ambassador's' travel document. The big man also gave the king the gift of a box of matching walrus tusks. The clerk nodded and the king certified him as an accepted official and an honored guest." Laughing, the old man added, "He dismissed him about that quickly, too, barely glancing at the ivory.
"I had the opportunity to approach the big man after dinner to confirm my earlier identification of him, but as I did, I thought I saw recognition in his eyes, too. He'd never seen me before except for my eyes and this little scar that he had given me on my cheek."
"What scar, Grandfather?"
"Mostly hidden under the beard, my girl," he said as he pointed to the edge that slipped just above the gray hair.
She looked at it closely, having never realized what it was. "Did you speak with him?"
"No, not then. I wanted first to be sure why they were there..."
~F&tGM~
Those years ago in Sarheenmar:
Using what they'd observed so far, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser set at the table mapping the palace, trying to find the best way into the harem to see Altennia and a way to get out once they'd rescued her. When they were done, Mouser said, "I'm going to see if we can get in the way we discussed. See you in a little while." Donning his equipment, he slipped out on the little balcony and over the rail.
The climb that followed wasn't easy, but it wasn't nearly as hard as some of the others he'd made over the years. After scanning the area as well as he could, he slipped over the rail into the king's harem's quarters. According to the king's own braggadocio, twenty women shared the space, including the current queen who'd sat by his side during the evening reception. Mouser wondered if anyone else had noticed how she sat a step lower than him and with a continual look of almost fearful subservience throughout the entire affair.
It had been five years since Mouser had rescued and then had a very sweet but ever-so-brief affair with the young Princess Altennia of Lankhmar. She'd been forced by her father to marry the king of Sarheenmar for diplomatic purposes just before her 21st birthday, but her message was that the marriage had not gone well and that she was now held as prisoner for the king's cruel use within the harem. From what Mouser had seen at the reception, being queen didn't seem to be that much better.
The sound of several women giggling quietly as they walked caused Mouser to freeze behind a large potted plant. He heard a brief snippet of the women's whispering as they briefly stopped nearby; while they might be prisoners in effect, their discussion, and mutual agreement, of their prisonkeeper's inadequacies were rather bawdy and surprisingly inappropriate. On hearing that bit of their discussion, it was all Mouser could do to keep from laughing.
As they moved on, their talk made Mouser once again think of his own situation. Now, as much as he'd once cared for Altennia, he really wasn't sure he still did. He also wasn't sure if he wanted to be saddled with the responsibility of being tied to and taking care of a princess for the rest of his life. Yes, he decided that responsibility was an important sticking point that he would have to consider further. However, he couldn't allow her to remain in these conditions forever, which is what had brought him to this point in the first place.
As he took the opportunity to move further into the suite's rooms, using available cover to slip from hiding place to hiding place, he made note of the interior layout and all of the important features. He'd finally located the sleeping quarters when the midnight bell tolled; he debated trying to get in to speak with Altennia, but realized that any of the other women who saw him might expose his presence and ruin their plan, so in the end, he quietly made his way back out and returned, sight unseen, to his little suite.
~F&tGM~
When he returned, Fafhrd was sitting in the chair holding a bottle of wine and was apparently in deep thought. He stirred to look over Mouser's new findings and asked a few questions to fill in the gaps. When they were done, Fafhrd said, "We need to go tomorrow night. I think there's big trouble here in the castle."
Mouser, taking a swill from his own newly opened bottle, asked, "Why the rush?"
Fafhrd looked at his friend and said, "The man who tried to kidnap Altennia is here. I saw him tonight."
Mouser was incredulous. "Are you talking about the man you fought? You never really saw him, other than his eyes. Why do you think he's here?"
Fafhrd nodded slowly. "It's almost certainly him. The light was dim on those stairs where we fought, but I'll never forget his eyes. It looked like he had the scar, too, but I couldn't be sure about that with his beard. If he's here, he'll have some of his men here, too, and that can only mean trouble."
The Gray Mouser sighed but didn't question his friend further. "Then we move up our schedule to tomorrow night like you said and pull this off before we run into him."
Fafhrd nodded. "I think that's best. The likelihood of him being here and it being a coincidence seems exceedingly small."
Mouser nodded, but his mind wasn't on the man. Instead, he thought of the princess and responsibility; his decision on what to do would have to come sooner rather than later.
~F&tGM~
With the Sarheenmarian trade representative stating that they could not even think of beginning the negotiations for over two weeks, Mouser and Fafhrd spent most of the next day in their little suite avoiding potentially prying eyes while preparing for their planned evening excursion. The exception was the regular evening processional and dinner, where they deliberately kept their distance from the scarred, steely eyed man. They slipped out of the ballroom shortly after dinner, just before the dancing commenced.
After retiring to their suite, the ambassador began his evening exercise by walking inside the palace. He took a rest by the armory near the midpoint of each circuit, but his walks must have been at least somewhat effective. Each time he returned to the suite to refresh himself, his clothes appeared to hang more loosely on his immense frame than they had on his departure.
It was close to midnight when Fafhrd returned for the last time. He tamped out the pipe he'd smoked on his last circuit, and then stripped out of his baggy outfit and the six empty wineskins it concealed before dressing in something more appropriate for what was to come.
"Is everything in place?" asked Mouser, still torn by what he was about to do.
"Yes, it should be starting soon."
"Okay, I'm off and will see you shortly." With that, Mouser stepped out on the little balcony like he had the evening before and was gone again.
~F&tGM~
It was about ten minutes later when Mouser slipped over the harem balcony rail and into the suite. Using what he learned the night before, he discreetly made his way to Altennia's room. Closing the door behind him, he saw her lying asleep on the bed, her hair spread out around her head like a halo. His heart raced on seeing her like this for the first time in five years. All of his old desires and his recent conflicting concerns weighed heavily on him. He did still care for her, but was that enough? Could he always take care of her? His nagging doubts persisted.
A bell and shouting from the palace courtyard abruptly drew him back to reality.
"Fire! Fire!"
As the young woman started to stir, Mouser placed his hand over her mouth and put a finger to his lips. Her eyes opened in fear but widened in surprise as she recognized him. She threw her arms around him as he released her, and she exclaimed at little more than a whisper, "My Mouser! You came!" He was soon being smothered in her sweet kisses that he had always recalled so fondly.
Noises outside the room indicated that the other women of the harem were rushing out to their balcony. "What's happening?" she asked.
"If I have my guess, I'd say that's the armory going up in smoke," he replied, thinking of the 24 skins of oil that Fafhrd had poured down into the space. "We don't have much time..."
~F&tGM~
Moments later, Fafhrd, disguised as a Sarheenmarian officer, came down the hall and ordered the guards outside the harem to go help with the fire. "I'll be on guard here to protect the harem." With the guards gone, he slipped through the door into the space.
Mouser wasn't there when he arrived, but Fafhrd heard many women several rooms away on the balcony watching the fire. Not knowing if there might be other guards in the rooms, he moved to the side and peeked down the hall where Mouser had believed Altennia's room to be.
The click behind him alerted him to the danger. He turned with Graywand and Heartseeker drawn to see five men, including the bearded man with the scar, entering the suite. One man in a strange robe moved over to a flat surface of wall, while the others spread out in front of him with weapons drawn.
"Mr. 'Ambassador?'" said the leader with a laugh. "We finally meet again, I see." Turning to his men, he added, "Men, he is responsible for the death of at least two of our Brothers. Deal with him."
Fafhrd knew he would have no chance facing three, or more, skilled swordsmen at once, so he immediately shot right to try to reduce the odds. Surprised by his aggression, his target reacted too slowly; Fafhrd used Graywand to move the man's sword out of position, allowing Heartseeker to live up to its name. As the man started to slump to the floor, Fafhrd pushed him in front of the other two while he retreated to an open door in order to cut down on the chance of the others encircling him.
Steel on steel sounded as Fafhrd hoped Mouser would hear and arrive soon.
~F&tGM~
The sound of swordplay came from ahead as Mouser and Altennia ran down the corridor.
"Stay here," he told her.
Stopping in the archway, he saw Fafhrd, on the other side of the large entry room, fighting two men while a third man was behind them and off to the side. Strangely, another appeared to be painting a wall. Reaching into his pouch, he pulled out his sling and gave it a few quick whips around before letting it fly. There was a sickening POP as the man on Fafhrd's left suddenly pitched forward and lay still. The bearded man started to turn toward him so Mouser drew his weapons and stepped into the room to engage when a scream came from behind him.
"Stop! Don't fight each other!" A tearful Altennia came running in and stopped between Mouser and the bearded man. "Von! I didn't know if the message would reach either of you, so I sent for you both. I never dreamed you'd both come to rescue me, and especially not at the same time!"
"Him? Rescue you?" asked Von, the bearded man, as Fafhrd and the other man separated warily. It was then that sounds came from the corridor outside the harem suite. Looking at Mouser, he asked, "How do you plan to get her out of the castle? In fact, how do you plan to get her out of this very room?"
There was knocking at the door. "Open up! Open in the name of the king!"
Von continued, "Mouser, is it? What can you give her? Nothing, correct? You need to let her go for her own good, and let her go with me. I can get her out of here safely, and can take care of her and provide for her like she's used to, like a princess deserves, like she deserves. If you try to force your way out with her, you'll probably get her, and possibly all three of you killed."
Mouser was furious, but the man's words were having an effect. His doubts were increasing by the second.
Turning to Altennia, Von said, "Princess, I've loved you since we first met. If you'll come with me and be my wife, I'll love you and take care of you as long as we both live."
Altennia hesitated, looking from the bearded man to Mouser, unsure of what to do.
Mouser was crushed to see her pause as she wondered, but the knocking at the door had changed to battering, telling him that there wasn't much time. Looking at Von, he asked, "You can get her out safely?"
"Yes," said Von, nodding to the man in the robe.
As much as it hurt, Mouser made the choice for her. "Altennia, I once cared a great deal about you, but that was long ago. If you believe this man, go with him and be happy. Don't ever send for me again."
Her eyes filled with tears, she stepped up close to him and whispered, "I love you, Mouser."
"No. Perhaps you did once, but not anymore. Goodbye, Altennia."
The door rattled again as the men outside battered it.
Von turned to the wizard by the wall. "Ready?" When the wizard nodded, he said, "Do it."
The wizard gave a command and the rectangle he had painted on the wall started to shimmer. The man turned to Fafhrd and repeated the salute with the flat of his sword that he had given him years before. "Big man, you have fought well once again. Until next time."
He turned and took Altennia's hand and stepped into the shimmering light on the wall. The other man did the same with the wizard going last. The shimmering ended and the rectangle was gone as Fafhrd ripped off his wig, beard, and Sarheenmarian uniform and threw them into the fireplace. They flamed up and the front door shattered just moments later.
~F&tGM~
Present day Choloquio:
As they finished their glasses of milk before the fireplace, the Grandfather noticed that the girl's governess was standing off to the side, awaiting her charge. Therefore, he concluded, "We stepped out another portal that my wizard had painted on a similar wall in a well-guarded room in an inn adjacent to the palace. Putting the princess in a large pole basket, we carried her to the docks and my ship was on its way just minutes after our arrival. I returned to Choloquio, where Altennia and I soon married." With a look of sadness, he added, "We spent many very happy years together."
Dascha hugged her granddad. "Do you know what happened to Mouser and the big man?"
"My agent in the palace later told me that Mouser and 'Ambassador Fafnor' were standing over my two slain men, and they explained their presence by saying that they heard a scream and rushed in to help protect the harem. They claimed to have seen two or three other invaders, but with the fighting, they didn't know what happened to them or where they went. Since Altennia was the only wife missing, the King celebrated only losing his troublemaker. He thanked the two men for helping protect the rest of his wives and gave them a reward.
"They were back in the main hall as honored guests at the King's table the very next morning. They spent the next month eating great amounts of the King's food, drinking greatly from his finer wine reserves, and making regular, and quite numerous, late night excursions into the courtesans' quarters. This was all-the-while negotiating what was said to be one of the more comprehensive trade treaties ever produced in Sarheenmar.
"My agents have told me many other stories of the derring-do of a big man and his little friend Mouser over the years since, but I let the matter drop at your grandmother's insistence. I never knew the big one's real name and your grandmother refused to tell me that or even confirm that the little one was called Mouser, though the big one had called him that years before. She said they were her dear friends and she didn't want me getting involved with them further."
"She must have trusted them a lot to have sent for them, too."
"Yes, I think so. I really don't know if they would ever have been able to rescue your grandmother by themselves, but on the other hand, I'm not completely sure if my men and I would have been as successful without the distraction they provided either."
"What happened to the king?" asked Dascha.
Grandfather laughed. "Well, he never benefited from the treaty, if the other kingdom actually ever existed in the first place. He was deposed by his people less than a year later."
"For what he did to Grandmother Tennie, I'm very glad, Grandfather," she said with a cruel smile not really befitting a child. Lightening up, she added, "I'm glad I get to start school in a few days, too. I want to do well so Grandmother would be proud of me if she were still alive."
"Dear, your grandmother would always be proud of you no matter what. Now, go with Lizetta and change clothes for bed. I'll see you in the morning."
Grandfather kissed her on the forehead before nodding to the governess. Then, knowing that guild business was never done, he took off down downstairs to his office with his guards trailing behind him. As he walked, he was ever vigilant regarding his surroundings, but this time he was thinking of something else.
~F&tGM~
A few weeks earlier in Choloquio:
"Von, I don't want her attending your Trade Guild School and I don't want her joining the Guild."
"Tennie, with her background, she has the opportunity to be the best Trade Guild agent since our Kristov, her late father."
"Probably so, Von, but please don't insult my intelligence. I figured out what your so-called Trade Guild really is soon after you rescued me and brought me here."
His eyes widened in mild surprise. "If you did, then why didn't you ever say anything? Why didn't you object when Kristov attended the School?"
"I was raised as a princess, Von." She took on an exaggerated voice and quoted, "A princess' role in life is to be supportive of her husband. What her husband says is what goes. When you said our son would attend the Trade Guild School, you were extremely proud of him; I knew that was what you really wanted for him, so I didn't object."
"Then why do you object now for Dascha?"
"Von, you see her as the savior of your guild and the opportunity to make more money and gain more power than you've been able to make from a single one of your representatives since our son and daughter-in-law went down on that ship, but I see her only as our grandchild."
"That's true, but don't you dare think that I don't love her, too. Still you didn't answer the question. If you didn't object about Kristov, why do you now object for Dascha if you know your role as a princess is to support your husband in whatever he does?"
"Because now I am not a young princess content to believe in silly customs any more, but rather, a somewhat wiser middle-aged grandmother who loves her only grandchild dearly and who would not, for all the money in the world, allow something to happen to her. And I'm not going to let her attend that school; I love you with all my heart, Von, but I promise I will resist you on this with all of my being until my dying breath."
~F&tGM~
Present day Choloquio:
On returning from his office to his private quarters in the Guild Palace, Von locked the door to his living room. At the cupboard, he carefully removed an inner panel and pulled out a medium-size brown bottle. It had about two or three fingers of murky liquid remaining in the bottom of the bottle, so he gingerly removed the stopper to avoid splashing any on himself and then poured the remainder of the poison in the fire. The embers cracked and popped as the mixture hit them, and the last bits of liquid sizzled briefly before all signs of it disappeared. Stepping to his balcony, he leaned back and threw the bottle over the cliff and out into the bay. He stood looking out into the night for several minutes.
With the unpleasant tasks out of the way and all evidence of his horrible deed destroyed, the elderly man relocked the balcony door and poured himself a drink from his private stock before sitting back down in his big chair near the fire to contemplate.
He hated to let his beloved wife go like this, but she'd been quite unreasonable and could not for the life of her see the big picture. In the end, that had cost the woman her very life and Von his happiness but it was, he knew, for the greater good.
Yes, it had to be done. No one's life, even Tennie's, and no one's happiness, even his own, was more valuable than the welfare of his guild and it had been that way for hundreds of years. Students were taught that from the beginning of their schooling, though, admittedly, in such a way that many didn't understand it for quite some time. In fact, some did not understand the true nature of the Guild School or the Guild itself until they had been enrolled for several years.
Perhaps Dascha would. With the excellent education she'd already received and all of her natural talents, his granddaughter would probably be one of the best students his school had seen since his son, who in turn was probably the best since he himself had graduated over 60 years before. He hoped that he would live long enough to see her complete the work and then carry out enough assignments that he could turn the organization directly over to her. While her grandmother had been a princess, little Dascha, in her guise as head of the so-called Choloquio Trade Guild, would someday be Queen, much like he, her Grandfather Vondahgzhio before her, had actually been King of the Assassins Guild.
The End
~F&tGM~
Author's Note: Thanks for reading my story. Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser have a long history but this is still a fledgling fandom here on FanFiction so your feedback in the form of reviews, comments, follows, or favorites will be greatly appreciated. I hope to have F&tGM03 ready for publication in a few more months.
It is revealed in Leiber's story, "The Cloud of Hate" in Swords in the Mist that new Overlord Glipkerio [Kistomerces] was marrying his daughter, Innesgay, to the Prince of Ilthmar. That would place this story shortly after that and before "Lean Times in Lankhmar."
Leiber spent a good bit of time with the Thieves Guild in his stories, but never (to my knowledge) mentioned an Assassins Guild. Therefore, as presented in my fanfiction stories, the Assassins Guild participates in assassination-for-hire but also in a wide variety of related activities like royal overthrows, kidnapping, blackmail, extortion, and complicated and nefarious schemes of generally illegal and sometimes illicit nature using highly skilled and trained operatives all while doing so behind the seemingly legitimate front of the Choloquio Trade Guild.