One of the drunkards down in the darkest end corner roused enough to ask, "Awha? Whut's befalling, hey?"

"Some nobles've lost their ways and come prancing past, and the hammerhands an' the sealegs of the Goblet have gone out to teach the young highnoses a thing or two."

A gap-toothed old sailor elbowed his friend awake, and made for the door. "This oughta be good. Got anything left to bet with, Suldyn?"

The tingling warning behind Mrelder's eyes became a red throbbing. He sprang up excitedly. Piergeiron was heading right toward them!

His father's door stood open. Golskyn had just returned from another mysterious errand, and was standing behind his desk still wearing his overcloak.

"I've ordered the chains," Lord Unity was telling Hoth, "but they tell me it'll be at least a tenday before the first links are ready. For all the talk of coin and competition ruling Waterdeep, they don't seem to work all that fast."

Hoth nodded. "Should I buy the cages?"

Golskyn nodded. "Ironbar, and large enough to hold two horses, nose to tail. We'll be wanting large beasts, not treecats."

"Any preferences?"

"Thuldaar, but only if he has some in stock. Buy from anyone who has ready stock-in the barns nigh South Gate, nowhere else. Take Daethur's wagon, and store them in the north warehouse. Don't have them delivered here; this street has far too many curious eyes as it is."

Hoth bowed deeply, turned, and strode out, ignoring Mrelder.

Golskyn did, too, until his son said insistently, "My spells tell me Piergeiron's very close by and heading right toward us."

Lord Unity looked up sharply. "You're sure?"

As Mrelder nodded, sudden shouts, crashes, and the ring of swords striking swords erupted in the street below.

Father and son rushed to the windows together and peered down at a chaos of yelling, brawling men, overturned handcarts, and running Watch officers. Folk were peering out of windows up and down the street, and spilling out of doorways to watch and cheer.

At the heart of the fray, four well-dressed young men sporting glittering cloaks were beset by seemingly dozens of ragged sailors-and were plying their war-steel like desperate men, which is just what they were. If the Watch didn't arrive quickly, that gaudy quartet was doomed.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Swords flashed and clanged, men shouted and screamed, and Watch officers converged from all directions. Beyond them, far down the street, a small knot of armored men were striding purposefully toward the fray.

"There!" Mrelder said excitedly, pointing. A head taller than those around him, magnificent in bright helm and armor, the Open Lord of Waterdeep paused for a moment to peer ahead and frown, trying to see just who was fighting whom and why.

"I see him," Golskyn replied. "This can only work to our benefit."

As he spoke, one of the bright-cloaked men struck aside a sailor's cutlass and ran the man through. A breath later, another of the fancy-cloaks vanished under a swarm of punching, kicking laborers.

Watchmen blew horns, shouted, and waded into the fighting, taking blows from fists and improvised clubs. Piergeiron snapped an order and trotted forward, pulling gauntlets from his belt and drawing them on as he plunged into the battle.

Mrelder cursed softly. He had the right spell ready; he should have used it when Piergeiron stopped to survey the fight! Now, he might never A sailor took the red-cloaked man's slender steel through his gut and reeled, his scream fading into wet coughing as he sank to the cobbles to die. Another sailor punched someone else right back through the curtained window of a rental carriage whose runners had long since fled, then jerked open the door and dived in at his victim. The carriage swayed, received the enthusiastic charges of several more sailors anxious to join in the fun, rocked violently… and slowly crashed over onto its side amid screams and splinterings.

Piergeiron had to leap for his life as the falling coach loomed over him. He slammed right into a handcart. It crashed over onto a wounded sailor with the Open Lord riding it. The paladin wallowed atop the cart-cage, trying to get his balance, his bodyguard still far behind him…

Now! Mrelder spread his hands, vaguely aware that his father was no longer watching at the windows beside him. He hissed out his spell, gaze intent on Piergeiron. A sailor was charging the armored Lord, whose best route away would be The Open Lord found his footing and met the sailor with a raised arm that blocked the man's wild swing and an uppercut that started near his knees and ended up over his head, with the sailor flung away senseless.

So great was the force of Piergeiron's blow that the paladin staggered sideways on the slippery cobbles toward a nearby shop-front.

Just as Mrelder had hoped.

Pointing at the shop's signboard -"Ye Happy Harlot" it proclaimed to the world, in shabby, peeling paint on wood carved into the shape of a buxom reclining woman-he carefully said the last, triggering word of his spell.

Rusted chains flew apart. The faded Harlot happily plummeted to the street below, crashing down on Piergeiron's helmed head and shoulders, driving the Open Lord of Waterdeep to the cobbles in a crumpled instant.

Golskyn was suddenly back at the window, a lit candle in his hand. "Hold this," he ordered.

As Mrelder took the little candle-lamp, the Lord of the Amalgamation raised the first of three egg-shaped bundles of clay he'd fetched. It bristled with wicks, sprouting in all directions like a potato gone to seed. Golskyn held these into the flame, one after another, until wisps of thick smoke curled up. Then he opened the window, tossed out the egg, and calmly drew the sash down against the sudden billowing of smoke.

Without pause the priest moved to the next window, lit his second smoke-egg, and hurled it. He did the same for the third before pinching out the candle and waving Mrelder impatiently toward the door.

"But Father, how'll we see?"

Golskyn tapped his eyepatch. "I will see for us both. You will listen for my orders."

They hastened out and down to the street together.

Mirt's old, flopping seaboots flapped as he strode along, humming to himself. Sune and Sharess, if he wasn't but a few indolent days away from turning entirely to jelly! If 'twasn't for these little sallies forth to see Durnan about which warehouse to buy and what cargo to sell, he'd have long ago Been felled by his own failing heart and some unlooked-for tumble, thanks to the unpredictable cruelty of Faerun, which was whirling around his head now, smashing wind out of him, and dashing him to the hard cobbles in a bewildering instant Mirt rolled over and up, blinking. He'd just been literally run over by a trio of running, battling men. Their swords sang and struck sparks from each other and the nearby walls as they fought on, faces twisted with anger and effort.

Well, Blood of the Whale, if young sailors and Dock Ward louts thought they could trample and ignore the Old Wolf himself Mirt rose like an enraged and puffing walrus, drew his curved saber and favorite dagger, and lumbered after the trio, who were reeling back out of the alley into the street they'd evidently come from… which seemed rather noisy and crowded, come to think of it.

Mirt frowned. The cobbles were crowded with dying, groaning, hacking-at-each-other men-and billowing smoke, too! Through those spreading clouds, the street seemed to be a veritable slaughterhouse of a battlefield! Ye gods and little fishes!