Usual place. Tonight near midnight. Important. Riven.

Cale stared at the words without understanding their meaning. His exchange with Thazienne still preoccupied his mind. He replayed it again and again. His face still stung from where she had slapped him. His heart still stung from what he had done.

It took a few moments for the import of the letter to register.

Riven wanted a meet at the Black Stag. Why? Though the Zhents were in the midst of an internal religious war—Cale knew that the Scepters were pulling Zhent corpses from the bay almost daily; mostly Cyricists—Riven had left the Network months before. He would not be involved in that. What then?

He shook his head. He could not reason clearly. His mind seemed unable to focus on anything but Thazienne ... the look of shock on her face when he had put his hands on her, the sound of her voice when she had called him a killer.

Tired to his bones, Cale refolded the letter and placed it in a pocket—a letter written by one killer to another. He looked around, at the door through which Tazi had exited his room, at the door through which she had exited his life.

There's nothing more for me here, he thought.

Whatever Riven wanted, there was only one way to find out. And it could not be worse than being in Stormweather Towers.

He threw on his cloak and walked out the door. At least he had somewhere to go.

CHAPTER 4

THE BLACK STAG

Cale exited Stormweather Towers through one of the manse's less-trafficked side doors. With the family at table and most of the staff occupied with dinner preparations, he managed to exit the house unseen by anyone. That was just as well. He had already said his goodbyes.

He walked a flagstone path through one of the manse's many gardens to the small gatehouse in the wall facing Rauncel's Ride. The two house guards on duty there, Velorn and Del, seemed surprised to see him. He reassured them that all was well, explained that he wanted to leave quietly, and bade them farewell. They understood. They opened the narrow wrought iron gate and reminded him to keep his blade sharp—an old military farewell.

When he reached the street, he did not look back. He dared not. He feared he would lose his resolve.

A brisk spring breeze blew from the direction of Selgaunt Bay. Even at a distance, Cale could taste the subtle salt tang in the air. The sun had nearly set and the city's linkboys had already done their work. Rauncel's Ride glowed orange in the light of the tall, charcoal-burning street torches. Carriages and pedestrians peppered the street, going about their evening business. No one paid him any heed, just another evening traveler about his affairs. He fell into step among them and wandered the streets until well into the night. Only after he had walked for hours did he realize that he had forgotten to take the sphere from the parlor. Dark! His parting with Thazienne had left him distracted.

He told himself that it didn't matter. He didn't need a token to remind him of Thamalon. He would always remember the Old Owl.

From Temple Avenue, the bells of the House of Song and the gongs of the Palace of Holy Festivals sounded eleven bells. Time to move. He headed south for the Stag.

Fewer and fewer torches lit the streets as Cale moved into the rental warehouse district. There, adventurers, cutthroats, and seedy merchants ruled the packed-earth avenues. Prostitutes stood on corners, opportunistic muggers and pickpockets lingered at alley mouths, and purveyors of drugs went quietly about their illicit business. As much coin moved through Selgaunt's underground economy as through the coffers of the legitimate trading costers, and everyone knew it. The late Hulorn and his Scepters had made no effort to stop the trade in drugs and flesh so long as the associated violence was kept largely out of sight. In Sembia, the economy of vice was respected nearly as much as trade in Chultan spices. Business is business was the canon of the Selgauntan trader, whether pimp or coppersmith.

Passersby traveled in the safety of pairs and trios.

Hired muscle sometimes accompanied the wealthy. The poor traveled without bodyguards but had little worth stealing. Out of professional habit, Cale kept an alert eye on everything and everyone around him, though not out of fear. He was not the prey, but the predator. The thieves and pimps must have recognized that, because none challenged him, and few held his gaze for long.

Ahead, he saw the Stag, a ramshackle two-story building at the corner of two narrow avenues. The wooden structure leaned noticeably, as though itself as drunk as its patrons. The open shutters, their black paint long since flaked away to near nothingness, hung crookedly from the window frames. Smoke, laughter and a fairly steady stream of profanity boiled out of the windows and into the spring air.

On the street outside the Stag, a thin stream of traffic filed past: carts, horses, carriages, pedestrians. Cale lingered for a time, in the darkness of an unoccupied alley, observing. Though he felt a strange connection to Riven—perhaps only empathy for another of Mask's pawns—he was not foolish enough to trust the assassin fully. Riven could have decided to try an ambush for his own reasons. After waiting for a time, Cale saw nothing that gave him cause for alarm. He exited the alley and walked for the Stag's front door.

He pushed it open and stepped inside. As usual, the Stag stank of sweat, smoke, and stale vomit. Blueleaf, an herbal incense, burned in a tin dish behind the bar but did little to obviate the smell. The haze of smoke hovering near the ceiling stung his eyes.

A crowd thronged the Stag, as thick as the dock market at noon—typical for the time of year. Adventurers of every stripe streamed into Sembia in the early spring, all of them looking to make quick coin, convinced that riches lay in their future. Most ended up taking work as mere caravan guards, just to keep enough ravens in their pockets to buy a few days of food and lodging. But Tymora always smiled on a lucky few. Those managed to make a fortune and a name. Bards later sang ballads of their victories, and more and more returned each spring, certain they would find similar success.

The Heartlands suffered no shortage of fools, Cale thought.

While he stood in the Stag's doorway, appraising eyes took him in, apparently saw nothing of interest, and looked away. Conversation hummed.

The Stag's owner coated the planked floor in wood chips to ease the clean-up of the inevitable blood and puke that accompanied the influx of adventurers. The serving girls hired on for the season weaved through the crowd with tankards and platters held high.

Cale pushed his way in and scanned the tables for Riven. Because Cale stood a head taller than most of the patrons, he spotted the assassin at once. Riven sat alone at a small table in a dark corner near the bar. As usual, Riven wore his scarlet cloak, his twin sabers, and an unhappy scowl. Though the Stag was overflowing with sellswords, no one lingered within arms' reach of Riven. Even adventurers, an imprudent lot in general, could see the promise of violence in Riven's one good eye.

The assassin noticed Cale too. He raised his tankard to draw Cale's attention. Cale nodded and began to pick his way through the crowd.

A man stepped from the crowd to Cale's right and bumped him—hard. In one motion, Cale's hand first found his coin purse—he still had it—then moved for his blade. He stopped himself just before he reached the hilt.

"Mind your manners, dolt," said the man.

The half-elf—the half-drow, Cale corrected himself, to judge from the long pale hair, narrow cheeks, and dusky complexion—had an unusual accent that Cale could not quite place. The fool stared a challenge into Cale's face. Though dressed in the expensive silk finery of a noble fop, the half-drow's features had a hardness Cale did not miss. His reckless smile and mismatched eyes, one the palest blue, one a deep brown or black, gave him an unbalanced look. His slim hands hovered near the steel that hung from his belt. Cale took in the hilt with a glance: well worn from much use.