Chapter 7

Further Instructions

Curled up in a ball in one of Mook's overstuffed chairs with a blanket wrapped around her, she watched the gentle rise and fall of Mook's chest as she slept. She'd kept vigil over her since the Guild healers brought her back to her suite of rooms. She said it was to protect her, but really the remaining members of Mook's crew had that handled, guarding her suite of rooms with complete and deadly seriousness.

She said that, but she knew why she was doing it. She needed to be by Mook and make sure she was going to be okay. After nearly losing her, seeing her on the brink of something… something even worse than death, she needed to be there when she woke up. She needed that security, she needed her Mook because things had gotten too crazy. Magic, swords, vampires and all that blood last night, maybe that was usual for some people, but not for her.

She needed Mook, but Mook was still asleep, still recovering. The older woman's face was still haggard and pale but at least the black veins and pain from last night were gone. But she was alive, thank all the gods. She was going to get better, a gift she owed to two Order knights, to Aleria of Candlekeep and even more so, Anomen Delryn.

It felt strange to be in their debt, for a woman like herself to be beholden to a bunch of Order knights of all people. But she did owe them, that was for certain. They saved Mook when they had no reason to. Smiling softly at Mook and resting her chin on her hand, she wrestled with that concept. Maybe there had been more calculation in saving Mook, she was high in the organization, they needed to work with them, and any such good will would certainly help. The thing is, that isn't the reason they did it. She was honest enough to admit it, because an analyst who didn't wasn't much good. They did it because they believed they should.

Well, at least Aleria had. She could have left her there, done nothing or offered some platitudes. But she helped when she didn't need to. She helped a woman who might have been or could still be an enemy. And while she understood it, she didn't. Didn't exactly seem right.

At least Delryn made more sense. He would have been happy to stay in his 'Bastion of Righteousness' or whatever he called his happy place. He traded his power for a reward. For Aleria's approval and for her own… rather rash promises. Scratching the back of her head, she grimaced. She'd been desperate and promised the world. Now she had to deliver. She wondered what he'd demand in payment.

If he was anything more like his father than he seemed, it might not be too pleasant. But in all honesty, a few hours of unpleasantness was worth Mook's life. Maybe it was sentimental and sappy, but she loved Mook. She took care of her when she was little, protected her. How could she do less?

A loud and insistent knock at the door thankfully cut off that line of thought. Uncurling from her chair, she tossed off the blanket and wrapped her hand around her crossbow's handle. Readying it but not raising it, she shifted to the partial cover of the overstuffed chair and called out somewhat crankily, "Hey! Mook's not supposed to be disturbed."

The door opened and Isin, one of Mook's most trusted lieutenants, stuck his head in. "I know. But the Shadowmaster's here."

"Oh," Sime gasped, uncocking the hand crossbow and slipping it back into its holster. She straightened and smoothed down the front of her armor. She pushed her hair back, the usually fragrant, free-flowing tresses now a sooty, smelly mess. She hadn't had a chance to bathe since the battle and now with the Shadowmaster about to walk in, she seriously regretted it. Tying the mass back, she wiped at her face to try and make herself look mildly presentable. With more confidence than she felt, she said, "Well, of course, we shouldn't keep the Shadowmaster waiting."

Isin nodded and opened the door, allowing Aran Linvail, the Shadowmaster, to step into the room. As per his reputation, the man was impeccably dressed, from his soft velvet vest to the spotless suede boots to elegant black belt with the equally elegant sword hanging from it. As he turned his head and nodded in greeting, Sime found herself growing even more self conscious. Those boots clashed with hers, still stained with muck and blood and his perfectly coiffed hair stood in stark contrast to the sweat-stained mess atop her head. She was honest enough to admit her vanity, and coming up against the Shadowmaster looking more like one of the street cutpurses than a top intelligence agent turned in her stomach like a hot blade.

The Shadowmaster nodded in greeting. "Good morning Sime."

"Good morning Shadowmaster," Sime replied as brightly as she could.

His head tilted slightly to the side as his eyes wandered to the bed and its sleeping occupant. "She is resting and will make a full recovery?"

"Yes sir." Sime said straightening and studying the Shadowmaster's face. There was the slightest hint of softness around the eyes, of sadness? Did they have something? Had there been something? Mook always seemed rather familiar in referring to the Shadowmaster, but she'd assumed it was the intimacy of the seniority, not intimacy of another sort. She'd have to try and pry that out of Mook, but it wouldn't be easy for she was notoriously tight lipped about her past. "The healers say she'll be weak for a while but will make a full recovery in a few days."

"Excellent. Mook is too valuable to our operations to lose," The Shadowmaster said, a hardness in his voice betraying the intensity of his feelings. Interesting. As she filed that tidbit away, the Shadowmaster ran his pale blue eyes up and down her form. "A rough night, I see."

"Yes sir. We were attacked by a large force, including..." She straightened a little further, the insanity of the situation causing her to tense. "Vampires, sir. If you hadn't secured Aleria and her compatriot's aid..."

"Mook and her people would be dead, the warehouse taken and the core of our dock operations assaulted," the Shadowmaster finished, turning his attention back to Sime.

"More than likely, sir."

"Thankfully, that did not happen. I prefer to not spend my evenings fighting off mercenaries and the undead. It's very tiring." The Shadowmaster smiled thinly at his own joke. "Instead, thanks to Aleria's company, Mook's people and your own efforts, not only did that not happen but the shipment made it in safely."

"Thank you sir," Sime replied.

"I understand that Mook was wounded in the affray, but Aleria and her companions did not further elaborate on the cause or nature of her wounds. None of her remaining people could provide much detail either. I was hoping perhaps you could provide further detail?"

There was nothing about that question that was a request. That was a very polite demand for information, she could see it in his eyes, a tightening around them and a subtle hardening of their icy blue depths. But far more interesting was the fact that Aleria and her company hadn't mentioned how far they'd gone to save Mook. They'd passed up an excellent change to curry favor and work the relationship, especially considering the newly discovered depth of the attachment between Aran Linvail and Mook.

Still, the request had been made, and so she needed to fill it. The question was to what extent. He could be testing her, seeing if she would fully disclose what she knew. Better to err on the side of full disclosure as there was little reason to not do so. Tugging at the hem of her cuirass, she nodded in the affirmative. "One of the leaders of the assault attacked Mook. He bit her and did... something to her. I do not know what, but apparently there is something to the danger of vampire bites. Before it could finish, Lady Aleria cut the thing down. She was weakened... dying." She heard her voice quiver as the memories came flooding back. Mook, so cold, so weak. The black veins and the white eyes. "She and Sir Anomen saved her."

"How?"

"I..." She grimaced. "I am not entirely sure. Apparently it involved divine power from their respective gods, but I am no practical theologian, sir."

He pursed his lips and nodded. "Likely a Restoration prayer of some sort. Delryn must be held in some respect by Helm." He smiled. "Somehow, this does not surprise me. Helmites long ago cornered the market on humorless and Cor's son seems the perfect model." He studied her for a moment, his eyes searching hers. "It is interesting that they did so, your thoughts on why?"

She knew she would have to field this question as soon as she told him the truth. However, she didn't much relish giving the answer. Obligation was something she hated, having others know it even more so. Especially when such an obligation could imply weakness or vulnerability. "Because sir, I asked them to."

"I see. At what cost?"

"The cost will be borne entirely by myself sir. The Guild has no liabilities or concerns in it."

"As the Guildmaster," he said very precisely, his face stern. "I make those determinations. Especially when the agent in question works as closely with me as you do."

She swallowed hard. "The obligation is entirely … personal, sir."

One well sculpted eyebrow arched marginally and the sternness modulating slightly. "I see. I would suggest discharging any such personal obligations quickly. I do not want them interfering with our operations, Sime."

"Of course, sir," she said with a hurried nod.

"And speaking of interference with our operations, I do not like having to come to one of my agents to get a report. Especially after having dealt with the party in question. Knowing what they did could have been very valuable, but I was deprived of this information."

She blanched and swallowed hard as the Shadowmaster pinned to her the spot with his eyes. "In fact, I find this failure rather galling, Sime. Darkshadow promised me great things from you, even if you were rather young and inexperienced."

"I … I am sorry sir. It's just Mook … Mook, you see, she was hurt. I had to watch over her, make sure she was okay," she stammered, the words pouring out of her like a broken cistern. "I... needed to make sure she was okay..."

The Shadowmaster held up a hand and her jaw snapped shut with a click. "I understand that Sime. I know how close you are to Mook, which is why I will make an exception this time."

She flushed brightly, anger and embarrassment warring in her. "I understand, sir."

"Good," he said with a nod. "We must all work to husband the Guild through such difficult times. Even more so than usual, we must remember that personal is not the same as important."

The rebuke stung, but not as much as the look on his face as he said it. The mask slipped just enough to see how much he believed it. And that knowledge chilled her to the core. Nodding quickly and emphatically, she managed. "I'll … I'll remember that Shadowmaster."

"It is Aran, Sime. We are colleagues." The genteel smile had returned. "Now, I believe Darkshadow has need of you. Meet him in his office. And you need not worry about Mook, I will keep watch over her."

"Than.. thank you, sir."

"I would suggest a bath as well, before meeting with him. You know how fastidious he is."

"Of course."

"Good." He smiled and nodded in dismissal.

Without a further word, she headed for the door. As she pulled it open, she watched the Shadowmaster settle himself into one of the other chairs of the room. With the Shadowmaster watching over Mook, she'd be safe.

The question was, was she?

------

Detouring to her apartment to quickly scrub her face and for fresher clothes and a quickly snatched loaf of sesame bread, she wound her way to Darkshadow's office. She always wondered if he'd gotten his moniker from skulking in the shadows as a career choice or his near passionate distaste for sunlight or perhaps some youthful indiscretion that just stuck. No one seemed to know, mainly because her boss wasn't really one for personal chit chat or coffee klatches. Which ever one did drive the name, she thought as she descended the third set of stairs deeper underground, his office certainly fit.

While the Shadowmaster's office was wide and well appointed, designed to demonstrate power and opulence, the Guild's chief spy's office reflected an entirely different aesthetic. Buried even further underground, one had to traverse a maze of oppressively tight corridors, windy stairs and past heavy security doors before even reaching it. The office itself was small and tight, dominated by the locked bookcases looming along the walls and the neatly stacked desk in its center.

In fact, the furniture struck a more dramatic pose than its occupant. Rhuar Darkshadow was a thin, unremarkable man with tightly clipped sandy brown hair and a soft mouth and gray eyes. He always wore simple clothes, today favoring one of his seemingly endless collection of gray tunics. To all appearances he was no more dangerous than a dockside accountant.

Pity the fool that made that mistake. They didn't often make it twice, on account of catching a serious case of dead.

He had his nose buried in a sheaf of looseleaf as she was announced. His assistant, Kaire, motioned her to one of the two wooden chairs in front of the desk and quickly bowed out. As she settled into the least rickety of the two ancient wicker chairs, he surprisingly looked up from his reading, shoving the pages rather roughly into a satchel.

The change in routine surprised her. Darkshadow's mantra was 'All things in their time and place'. An odd mantra for a spy until one understood that he wanted things that way and was rather emphatic about enforcing that order. So that sudden change in his operating plan focused her attention.

Looking up, he focused those bland gray eyes on her, studying her as if he could simply read her as another page. There was something to it; the man did have a disturbing knack for reading people and telling when they were lying. Even Bayle tended towards honesty around Darkshadow. Of course, she'd figured out the second reason he did it. His implacable, flat stare and its accompanying silence discomfited even the most confident, giving him a definite advantage.

The effect usually had little effect on her, having enough experience with even worse kinds of stares. This morning, this wasn't the case, because the stare was different. It was harder, more piercing. Darkshadow was leaning forward, his elbows propped on his desk. Deep circles ringed his eyes, dark enough to be visible even under this light. All that unsettled her, but with no other recourse, she waited as patiently as she could.

His first words were short and preemptory. "Your report on last night please."

She nodded quickly, noting the tension in his request. Wasting no time on pleasantries, she delved into the events of the previous evening, laying out all the critical components of the planning, the attack, the presence of the undead and Aleria and Anomen saving Mook's life. She kept it short and concise, spelling out the details he wanted. He asked follow up questions, probing for further information, different angles to fit the puzzle together. His questions began to focus on what operational knowledge had been given up and then some very incisive queries regarding her obligation to one Anomen Delryn of the Order of the Radiant Heart.

The thinness of the spymaster's lips indicated his opinion of that, and if she read people so poorly as to miss that, the tone of his voice spoke volumes. "So, our security is breached in multiple arenas, as I feared. Our opponents possess critical information organization wide. It is well that the Shadowmaster solicited our new allies, as I have no doubt that without them, last night's attack would have succeeded. And if my other suppositions are correct…" Darkshadow grimaced, his usually placid face tight with anger.

"Of course, with their involvement, we now have further compromises. Not that the warehouse would not have had to been abandoned after the attack, but now the Order has compromised our security further."

"Sir, if I may, they deduced the presence of the tunnel mainly on their own," Sime hurriedly interjected. "And they saw nothing in regards to it."

"Their capabilities in deduction do not ease my concerns, they in fact only exacerbate it," Darkshadow said snappishly. He leaned in further, his eyes boring into her. "Especially considering one of my chief agents is now compromised by them."

"Compromised?" she fired back.

"Your obligation to Delryn gives them significant leverage over us and our department. While Mook is an exceptionally valuable asset and I am relieved that we retained the services of one of the Guild's more cunning and loyal members, I do lament the potential loss of another valuable asset."

Sime swallowed hard. If Darkshadow truly believed her compromised, no longer loyal, life could become exceptionally dangerous. Or even more likely, very nasty, very brutish and not nearly short enough. That fear however, took a back seat to anger, that she couldn't control such an obligation, and even use it to their advantage. Especially with such a brash and insecure lordling like Delryn. That anger burning through, she surged forward in her seat and threw the implication back. "I am compromised? For offering a trade of services with that petty lordling? You know what he'll want and damn him, he'll get that. If that is enough to compromise someone, you might want to have Bayle and all his people liquidated." She snorted derisively, her temper still burning. "And plus, have you not thought what benefits could be gleaned? You don't think I could control him, wrap him around my finger and make him dance to my tune? I was trained from birth by Jocana the Fair, the prize of Markan the Terrible. If you think some pathetic, overbred Amnian noble is a match for me, then to the Hells with you. Sir."

Darkshadow sat back in his chair, his hand curved around his chin. He took a deep breath. "My apologies Sime. I had to test you. We are now beset by enemies, all hounding us. Loyalties are fading, weakening and our strength is bleeding away. If I truly thought you disloyal, you would not have gotten this far."

The surprise of an apology broke the storm raging in her heart, and now cut off from the heat, she slumped back in her chair. "I understand sir."

"Good. Very good." He nodded, the gesture closing that file. "On to your next assignment. As you've likely deduced, we are still suffering defections amongst our numbers. These defections must stop. I have been stepping up our efforts to root out the defectors and to try to determine the location of the opposition."

He smiled thinly. "We have had a break in these efforts."

"Yes?" she asked, anger stirring again inside her. These people had nearly cost her Mook and she wanted a piece of them.

"Indeed. We had a bit of luck. You are aware of Rhinna, yes?"

"A dust devil, that one. Fickle, blowing which ever way the wind goes and following heat like a whore follows coin."

"An apt if… colorful description of her. More so than we suspected. Last night, she made the mistake of trying to recruit one of my better agents. He brought her to me. With some … pointed... questioning, she revealed that there is a meeting with representatives of the opposition tomorrow evening. It is in the Five Flagons, tomorrow night after 3 bells."

"Excellent. I assume we will be out in force?"

"No." Darkshadow grimaced distastefully, his hand lifting a small ivory handled knife from the blotter of his desk. He ran the tip of his thumb on side of the blade. "Unfortunately. We know who amongst our number is arranging it, two gentlemen named Jaylos and Caehan. Apparently they are eager to move on to richer business opportunities. Rhinna had decided to stay behind as an organizer, but informed them that a few of 'the ladies' would be joining them."

"I see. But why aren't we planning to hit them there?" she asked, confused.

"Because the Shadowmaster has decided to use our new comrades."

"They aren't experienced in tradecraft though!"

"I am aware. You are to be present to liaise with them."

"But why aren't we doing this?"

"Frankly, because of the names of some of Rhinna's recruits, the Shadowmaster is loathe to trust this mission to any one who he does not trust. And there are few enough in that circle, few more who would be believable as recruits. So, once more, we will need their assistance. Especially Aleria and Jaheira, as Rhinna's recruits were all women."

"Aleria and Jaheira?" Sime laughed incredulously. "Sir, if there are two less likely Guild members in the whole city, it's those two!"

"This is why the Shadowmaster has put the entire department at your disposal to make them look like they do belong."

"This will not be easy."

"No. It will not." He paused and grimaced. "And there is an additional complication."

"Of course. There always is."

"One of the women named by Rhinna escaped our net. If she is still free before the meeting, the meeting could be blown and we will lose this chance to extract one of their members and perhaps the location of our opposition." He grimaced and deftly reversed the knife in his hand, pressing the point into the blotter. "We cannot afford to lose this chance. We cannot. So, I also need you to run this woman down."

"Why me?" she asked, eyebrow arching. She'd been given a tall order, extra difficulties on top of it were not welcome. "Why not Argan or Diolo?"

"Because you are one of my best. Because I can trust you." He leaned forward. "And because of one other critical quality. You know the quarry intimately."

She swallowed hard, a cold pit forming in her stomach. "Who is it, sir?"

"An old partner of yours. Sareena. She has gone to ground, Sime and she needs to be found."

"I... I see," she said, swallowing hard.

"Indeed. We need her found and found quickly. We cannot allow this opportunity to slip through our fingers, Sime. Bring her in if you can. If not, she must be silenced."

She nodded quickly, jerkily. Sareena was a friend, a good friend. Apparently a now very dangerous friend. "Silenced sir? Are we sure that is necessary? What if... what if she's not involved?"

"We are under siege, Sime," Darkshadow said quickly, harshly. We are bleeding strength and will every day. We have a chance to strike back, Sime, and I will not endanger that for anything. Do you understand?"

"Of course, sir," she said with calmness that she did not feel. "I understand and I will not fail you."

He looked at her, his jaw taut and his eyes boring into her for a seeming eternity. Finally he nodded, sighing slightly. "I know, Sime. I know." He patted one of the stacks of paper and smiled banally, his usual calm veneer firmly back in place. "Now, please, be about your duties."