Once I arrived, nearly exhausted now, I slid to the ground. I knocked on the door. When there was no response, I knocked again, pounding now.

“Master Greal?” I shouted. Still nothing.

“Master Greal, it is Loremaster Jaon.” I continued my pounding, stopping only to confirm that the door was locked.

“I must ask you about the rose window I purchased from you!” My pounding fist accompanied each word like a drumbeat in some southern jungle ritual.

“I need to ask you about Loremaster High Tessen!” Completely expired, I collapsed against the door. “Tell me,” I moaned. “Tell me what we were really worshiping in that abbey!”

As I rode back to my parish, I knew that someone had seen me. There had been eyes on me the whole time that I had spent pounding on that door. And as I had sat there, exhausted in the damp soil in front of Greal’s home, the autumn leaves blowing around me like dead memories that may very well have been lies, someone watched. No one in that entire town had come when I called out. No one answered their door, but I knew that I was being watched. Even now.

How many of them were there, that had taken part in the foul rites that I could only imagine must have taken place in front of that rose window? Had those rituals gone on even when I had been there? Could I have been so naпve? Could-no, I would not think of it anymore. It was too hard, and too painful, and there were still things that needed doing back in my own church.

Which brings me to right now.

Jam writing this the day after I went to the site of the old abbey. I have not yet slept nor eaten. When I came back, I had hoped against hope that Pheslan would be here, and that somehow I would have been wrong. But I was not wrong, and he was not here. I dressed myself in the vestments of my order-white shirt and pants, and the kantlara, a black vest with gold brocade. My kantlara had been made for me by my grandmother, who had also been a lore-master. I prepared my holy symbol and brought out the staff that I kept by the door for emergencies-the staff with its ends shod in iron and made for fighting. I prepared to make my move, and take my stand against the evil that I myself had brought to my parish.

But I waited. What if I was wrong, as I had thought before? What if I let those things through? I somehow told myself that it could not be. An evil thing, like the rose window, must be destroyed. Only good could come from destroying it. Perhaps it could even free Pheslan from whatever held him. If indeed he still lived.

I spent the rest of yesterday at the bottom of the ladder, which I had never moved from its spot below the window. I looked up, but all day long, I saw only the blue-green stained glass. No movement, no shadows, nothing. Somehow, my indecision still prevented me from climbing to even the first rung.

So after so many hours of arguing with myself, pushed farther past exhaustion than I have ever been, I began writing this manuscript on the nightstand in my bedchamber.

On these few sheets of parchment, penned throughout the night, I have put my story. Now, as I finish, I prepare myself to climb that ladder. I will smash the rose window, and destroy every last shard. If I am right, and the evil is over, I will return here to this manuscript and throw these pages into the fire so that none shall ever learn of these horrible events. But if I am wrong, you are reading this now. If that is the case perhaps you-whoever you are-will know what can be done and right my wrongs.

I am ready.

The Club Rules

“I didn’t do it,” the butler said blandly.

The dozen people lining the entry hail of the Stalwart’s Club remained unmoved, dauntingly so. Their hard, silent stares revealed that they had already convicted the servant, if only in their minds. Even so, the emotions displayed on those faces were oddly muted-displeasure rather than anger, annoyance instead of outrage. It was hardly what one would expect from a crowd confronting the man accused of murdering one of their own. The butler, though, was not surprised. The Stalwarts could be a bloodless lot, especially when the matter before them was anything less esoteric than the smithing techniques of long-extinct dwarf clans or the proper table wine to serve with blackened Sword Coast devilfish.

“I don’t think they believe you, Uther,” said the burly guardsman who had a firm grip on the butler’s arm. “I don’t neither.”

“Either,” the accused man corrected. At the guardsman’s blank look, Uther explained, “‘Don’t neither’ is a double negative.”

“That sort of talk only proves you’re smart enough to do a crime like this,” the guardsman said, tightening his grip. “You already look the part.”

The latter comment was as pointless as the supposed restraining hold the soldier had on the servant. A misfired spell had left Uther with a visage that could only be described as demonic. His skin had been blasted to leathery toughness and a sooty crimson hue. Small but noticeable fangs protruded over his dark lips. The pair of twisted horns atop his head were not only impressive, but as sharp as any assassin’s blade. His physique was equally daunting. Had he wished it, Uther could have shaken off the guard with the merest shrug and shattered the manacles around his wrists with one flex.

“There’s only one thing that’!! save you now,” the guardsman noted as he led Uther through the door. “A good attorney.”

“A clever oxymoron,” Uther said, narrowing his slitted yellow eyes. The resulting expression was an odd mixture of humor and anger. “And they say the city watch attracts only dullards.”

The small knot of children always loitering before the Stalwarts Club broke into a chorus of taunts when Uther stepped outside. He regularly chased the urchins away, as they were wont to pick the pockets of any clubman drunk enough or foolish enough to give them the opportunity. For their part, the children harassed the butler whenever the chance arose, tying sticks to their heads as mock horns and feigning horror at his grim features. But the conflict had long ago become a game between the ragged children and the servant. So when they saw the manacles on Uther’s wrists, they swallowed their quips and gawked in forlorn silence.

One of the boys, a puny but bold child near the back of the knot, hefted a loose piece of paving stone and mentally targeted the soldier’s skull, which was unprotected by a helmet or even hair. He cocked his arm back to throw, but a gentle hand stayed the assault. The boy yelped in surprise. Few men were stealthy enough to sneak up on the streetwise group and not alert any of them.

Artus Cimber, however, had once roamed the same hopeless alleys and burrowed for safety in the same abandoned hovels those urchins now called home. His years as a world traveler had honed the survival skills he’d gained there-and tempered them with a bit of wisdom besides.

“That’ll only make things worse,” Artus said. He took the would-be missile from the boy’s fingers and let it drop.

The clatter of stone on stone drew an angry look from the guardsman. “What’s going-?” When he saw the man standing among the children, he cut his words short and shook his head. “Cimber. Still hanging about in the gutter, I see. Shouldn’t you find some friends your own age?”

“I keep making them, Orsini, but you keep arresting them.” As Artus started across the muddy, cobbled way, he asked facetiously, “What’s he supposed to have done, let the wrong opera cape get wrinkled in the cloak room?”