The crescent moon barely peaked its way from the dark clouds that hung over the city, casting a pale silver light. To Jo, the clouds resembled angry storm clouds, and she would have sworn that the city was due for at least an inch of rain. That must not have been the case, however, as the sidewalks and streets were still packed, despite the late hour.
Jo pulled tight her cloak, shielding herself from the masses around her, as she threaded her way up The High Road. She walked closer towards the stores and restaurants that lined the side of the road, away from the street itself, as she attempted to skirt around the thick foot traffic that clogged the sidewalk. Out of habit, she tapped the pommel of her rapier, satisfied that it was still clasped to her hip.
Typically, Jo avoided the main roads on her late-night jaunts, but not this time. Right before she had left, Jo had pulled Werond aside, and whispered that she planned to check out the suggestion she’d given Jo the other day. Upon asking what the best way to get to Cliffwatch Road was, Werond had responded almost immediately.
“Hassantyr’s Street…Hassantyr’s Street.” Jo mumbled as she kept her eyes up, scanning for street signs.
Up ahead, at the fifth intersection, she spotted the sign she was looking for. Jo nodded to no one and picked up her pace.
As she neared her destination, Jo had to shove her way through the crowds in order to turn right at the intersection. She took three steps down the sidewalk that lead into the North Ward, then halted, stunned.
In stark comparison to the hustle and bustle of the city behind her, the North Ward was utterly devoid of life. The sidewalks on both sides remained empty, with the road itself free of wagons and carriages. The occasional lamp provided spots of light on the sidewalk, standing every other odd foot, all the way to the end of the road, far in front of her. Despite the distance, perhaps the same length as the road Werond lived on, Jo remained the only person she could see.
“What in the Nine Hells…” She mumbled to herself; instinctively, she pulled her hood up.
As she walked further into the North Ward, the din of the city slowly fading behind her, Jo glanced up at the similar wall of buildings that stood on both sides of the road. She narrowed her eyes and began to scan both sides. Not a single shop or store stood anywhere, and as she examined each of the buildings, she realized that all of them were houses, each occupying a different construction style. A few had obviously been built with the same style as the houses in the Castle Ward, but with far better materials and with a plethora of minute differences that forced them to stand out from one another. Others appeared as cottages, sticking out like a sore thumb, with beautiful white oak walls and brick shingles, not unlike the ones on Werond’s house. And yet others gave the appearance as though a giant had ripped them from a castle, massive stone towers that stood multiple stories tall with smaller towers branching from them, like tridents pointed to the sky. And beyond them…
Jo rolled her eyes and tore her attention away from the gaudy homes. Obviously, each had been built to stand grander than their neighbors, ostentatiously showing off the wealth of whoever resided within – a mindset that she would never understand.
As she approached the first intersection, the road splitting with Whaelgond Way, Jo realized with a start that, while the roads remained clear of pedestrians, so too were they clear of a guard presence. Though she had just arrived in the North Ward, Jo hadn’t seen a single guard posted anywhere along the street.
She frowned, pulling her cloak tighter around her body. One would think that, with a neighborhood as wealthy as the North Ward, a plethora of guards would be present, even in the dead hours of the night.
Jo halted at the edge of the sidewalk once she reached the intersection and pointedly looked both ways down Whaelgond Way. Not a soul – pedestrian or guard – was present along either way, the lamps that dotted the sidewalk offering their light to nothing but the darkness of the city.
A shiver ran down her spine, but Jo pushed the sensation away; she stepped off the sidewalk and crossed over.
Something was off about the ward. It was as though she’d stepped into another city, or perhaps another world. So shocked at the emptiness of it, the deafening silence tugging uncomfortably at her, Jo had half the mind to turn back to Werond’s and give up. Yet it was that very sensation that pushed her on towards her destination.
“Well,” she mumbled to herself, staring up at an impressive brick tower, jutting into the air like a bloody dagger. “that and that we have nothing else besides this.”
If it weren’t for the information Werond had provided her – information that Jo had kept to herself – they would still be groping about in the dark. Now, at the very least, she had a place to begin looking, which was more than she and Cruck’aa had come up with, despite their best efforts.
Jo’s eyes narrowed as she crossed the next intersection without stopping.
Despite that, the information Werond had provided still caused Jo to pause. She had blurted out the North Ward far too quickly for her liking. As if she knew just where to look...
Jo shook her head, dismissing the thought.
She shouldn’t suspect Werond like that. Afterall, her knowledge of the city was far more extensive than Jo’s. Her suggestions may have been rooted in information that everyone in the city might have known but wasn’t immediately clear for outsiders. Werond could have simply guessed a place to look based on that alone. And having no other options, Jo didn’t mind taking the suggestion. More than likely, it wouldn’t be of any value anyways.
When Jo had passed the last intersection and arrived at the end of Hassantyr’s Street, finally arriving at Cliffwatch Road, the street split into a T-section in front of yet another wall of homes, branching off to the north and south. The thick walls of the city towered behind them, jutting out from the circular guardhouse tower near the edge of the houses. The width of the tower told Jo that at least a company of guards were housed within it, perhaps more. The city walls continued from it, up towards the north, but did not extend to the south, and as Jo dragged her gaze away from the guardhouse, she understood why.
Up ahead, on the left side of the road, the ground fell away to a sheer drop down the plateau that the city was perched on. Without having to peak over the iron guard railing at the edge of the sidewalk, Jo knew the drop to be around several hundred feet – tall enough that a wall wasn’t necessary. Not even Harshnag, at his full height, could scale the cliff easily. This led to a breathtaking view of the lands outside Waterdeep, and had Jo not been in a hurry, she could have stared for hours. From the light of the moon, the grass fields extended in all directions until they crashed into the rocky base of the Sword Mountains, situated hundreds of miles to the north-west; if Jo craned her neck, she could just barely make out the Trade Way from behind the city, and the grass fields where they had first entered from, before they were cut off by the curve of the homes situated close to the edge.
Jo halted slightly in front of the guardhouse and pursed her lips. She glanced to the right at the row of businesses – instantly recognizable by the signs hanging above each wooden door – and wondered how a restaurant or general-goods store afforded the cost of such a view. Rent would have been astronomical.
Despite how high those prices might have been, there remained a large number of businesses that extended the entire length of the road; from her standpoint, Cliffwatch Road seemed just as long as Hassanty’s Street, which meant that the amount of places Jo would have to investigate was legion.
Jo reached up and rested her lips against her fist, holding up her arm with the other hand.
She hadn’t a clue where to start; what did a building that housed an illegal tunnel look like? Any one of them, from the run-down inn ahead and to the right of her, all the way to the odd-looking herbal store near the edge of the street, could have housed the tunnel. It wasn’t like there were guidelines for that kind of thing.
“Even if we searched five buildings a night” Jo mumbled. “it would still take a week to go through all of them. How’d we even search them though? We’re not the guard, we can’t just walk in and inspect the places. Even if we did, word would spread and all the owners would get paranoid, and the last thing we need –”
Something wooden crashed to the ground.
Jo leapt into the air as the sound carried through the ward; she rushed forward and flattened herself against the wall of the ruined inn, heart pounding.
As she admonished herself for the overly paranoid reaction, two voices, quiet, yet still audible, echoed the crash. They came from the other side of the inn.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Jo’s eyes went wide as her heart sped up; they were the first signs of life she’d encountered thus far.
She bent her knees slightly and listened to the voices; they sounded as though they were in an argument, and a heated one at that, though she couldn’t make out the individual words.
Jo swallowed. There was a possibility that it was a coincidence, that she had just happened to run into the only other people out that night as she prowled the streets. That she was being paranoid due to the emptiness of the ward. That, even though she was going to check, it would turn out to be nothing.
With careful, deliberate steps, Jo crept over to the side of the inn, making sure to duck under the boarded-up windows, just in case. She gave a small berth around the front door, despite it too being boarded up. She glanced up at the sign that hung over the door, noting the name – the Cliffwatch Inn.
As she approached the corner of the building, the voices became somewhat clearer; two men, still in their argument. Jo crouched down and poked her head around the edge of the inn. She almost gasped.
Through the darkness of the alleyway, a covered wagon – not unlike the ones used on the caravan – stood ready to move, horses hitched to the front. A small set of stairs jutted out of the brick inn wall next to the carriage, with a stack of wooden crates lined up alongside it. A short man, grey tunic stained with sweat, his black pants tucked into a pair of large boots, stood on the steps by the door, hands on his hips. Another man, taller and leaner, wearing the same outfit with almost identical sweat stains, stood behind the wagon, struggling to lift a crate into the bed.
“…saying to pick it up better.” Grumbled the short man from his spot by the door. “Else someone’s gonna hear –”
“Oh, would you shut your blasted mouth?!” The taller man shot up from his crouch. “There ain’t no good way to grab these fucking things! Besides, ain’t like I did it on purpose!”
“It don’t fucking matter!” The short man replied. “Made a damn loud noise and we’ll get the whole fucking city guard on us!”
“There ain’t no guards to hear us, ya fucking dip! Boss made sure of that!”
“That ain’t the point!” The shorter man, now red in the face, jabbed his palm with an index finger. “We need to do this as quickly, and quietly, as possible, and you’re fucking it up!”
“Ain’t no one gonna check on what the fuck we’re doing!” The taller man pointed sharply at his companion. “That explanation right there is why you ain’t got no place being on this fucking job!”
The shorter man’s hands balled into fists, and he jumped down from the stairs, tearing into the crate loader. As their argument, now louder than before, descended into insults about crate lifting techniques and the honor of one’s mother, Jo pulled her head back and bit her knuckle.
She couldn’t believe it.
“’Look for men putting stuff in covered carriages’.” Jo mumbled, eyes wide. “I mean, it’s a wagon, not a carriage but…Werond, what in the Nine Hells…”
Any doubts that Jo had about the situation had flown from her mind; the fact that she’d found exactly what Werond had told her to look for on the very road that Werond told her to go down said more than enough.
What she wasn’t sure about, however, was the guard situation. Normally, something like this would be impossible with the heavy guard presence around the city. But the North Ward was completely empty, and the men knew that – at least, it sounded as though they did. How had it been accomplished then? The only thing that came to her mind were bribes, but to bribe an entire force of guards to empty from an entire district seemed –
From the alleyway, barely audible over the argument, Jo heard the door open. She poked an eye around the corner just in time to see a third man stick his scarred and bald head out of the cracked door.
“Hey!” His voice was sharp and hushed. “I’m not paying either of you to argue!” He spat to the side. “Get the rest of the crates in and get the fuck out of here before Davis blows a vein!”
Davis? Jo thought. She rolled the name around in her mind, memorizing it.
Before the loaders could argue, the man pulled the door shut, much softer than Jo imagined he would.
The short man shook his head and began to make his way towards the driver’s bench of the wagon, grumbling something. His partner, also grumbling, resumed loading the crates into the back.
Jo jerked away from the corner and crept back along the wall of the inn; she glanced at the door, despite that fact that it was boarded up. She crouched done and rested her arms on her legs, waiting for the wagon to roll onto the street.
Her mind was a whirlwind of thoughts, all centered on Werond.
It was obvious to Jo that Werond knew about this meeting, and perhaps other meetings like this as well. But how did she know that the Thieves Guild would have men loading what Jo assumed to be contraband? Werond wasn’t just a teamster, that much was obvious at this point. But unless she had ties directly to the Thieves Guild, she shouldn’t have been able to give Jo vague enough information to lead right to a pickup like this.
Jo frowned.
Having connections to the Guild struck Jo as unrealistic. After all, the Thieves Guild was a ruthless organization, and Jo had heard all too much of some of the more unsavory actions committed by them, all to make a little bit of gold. Someone like Werond, with what she had seen so far, wouldn’t get caught up in all that. She wouldn’t have the stomach for it.
A horse whinny broke through the silence. Inside the alleyway, one of the men cursed.
Instinctively, Jo flattened herself against the sidewalk, and laid out to her full length, covering herself with her cloak.
After a moment, the wagon slowly rolled out of the alleyway and turned right onto the road; in slightly better light, Jo realized that fabric was wrapped around the wheels of the wagon, along with the horse’s hoofs, rendering both eerily quiet. From her spot on the sidewalk, Jo could barely make out the shorter man, now driving, while the taller man sat in the back, feet dangling off the edge. His head seemed to be on a swivel as he scanned the road behind them.
Cursing quietly, Jo waited until the wagon rounded the corner off Cliffwatch Road onto a different road before she shoved herself up and hurried after it. With one of them acting as a lookout, she’d have to stay a good distance away to remain undetected.
She jogged after the wagon, taking care so that her bootsteps wouldn’t echo. As Jo approached the corner turning onto the road – Tarsar’s Street – she flattened herself against the wall of another home and poked her head around the corner. The wagon was still there, horses moving at a trot. As it reached the halfway point of the street, Jo stepped out from around the corner, following with her head down, taking care to stay away from the lights.
A plethora of alleyways and smaller streets branched off the road she was on, offering her a multitude of places to hide. Yet the wagon had the same advantage as she did, and if she weren’t watching, the driver could easily turn onto a smaller street, disappearing from sight. Thus, Jo prayed that the darkness and ample distance would be enough to obscure her from the man in the back.
She cursed again as the wagon reached the T-section ahead, turning left this time. The moment it disappeared, Jo broke into a jog to catch up. Though she wanted to sprint, she was sure her bootsteps would be heard through the empty ward.
When she reached the intersection, Jo flattened herself against one of the homes on the edge, an ugly looking cottage, and peaked around the corner.
The wagon was gone.
“Gods –” Jo stuffed a fist into her mouth before she yelled.
Shoving off from the wall, she ran out into the T-section and down the left path, which split into another T-section. She frantically looked down both ways, head on a swivel. The street to the left was a straight shot, with no other paths leading away. The one on the right curved gently up, the rows of homes obscuring her view of the entire street.
Jo jogged down the right side, confident that if the carriage had turned left, she’d have seen it in the distance. And as she did, she caught sight of one of the wagon wheels as it disappeared down the road.
Grinning, Jo jogged to catch up, moving towards the sidewalk as she did.
As she got around the bend, flattening herself against another house, she realized that where she was looked familiar. A quick glance at the street signs confirmed that she was back on Suldown street, only on the other end.
She grimaced; what she wouldn’t give to have Cruck’aa here now.
Jo tore her gaze away from the signs and squinted ahead; before she’d realized, the wagon had picked up speed and was already half down the street. Up ahead, the lights from the High Road gleamed bright as they bled onto the road.
Jo swore and picked up her pace; the moment the wagon merged onto the road ahead, she knew she’d lose it and Jo was too far behind to catch up.
By the time she reached where the wagon had been, the driver urged the horses onto The High Road, merging with the flowing traffic with the ease.
Jo broke out into a sprint, throwing caution to the wind. If she could just get a glimpse of the wagon, she could potentially follow it. She just had to get there before it was swallowed by the traffic.
Breathing hard, she slowed her footsteps and staggered to a halt at the intersection; the traffic on the High Road was still heavy, the sidewalks still packed and the cobblestone road surging with carriage and wagon traffic that flowed both ways.
But nowhere did Jo see the wagon; her heart sank.
She shoved through the crowds and stood on the edge of the sidewalk, scanning both ways down the road, hoping against hope that she might spot the wagon. Try as she did, however, the congestion of wagons and carriages blocked her view, preventing her from seeing which way the wagon had gone – or if the wagon was still on the road in the first place.
“Fuck!” Jo yelled, frustration seizing her. The people behind her shot Jo a few glares, but she ignored them as she turned on her heel and marched back the way she came. A wide berth was made for her.
As Jo stepped back onto Suldown street, she leaned against the side of a building, and rubbed her forehead. Behind her, the lights and cacophony of the city, normally easy to tune out, seemed deafening.
She knew that she shouldn’t be frustrated. There wasn’t much she could have done to keep up and remain unseen, and she had done her best to follow in the first place. Despite losing the wagon, however, they now had a starting point, a place where they could investigate – the inside of the Cliffwatch Inn, and potentially, a man named Davis.
Jo straightened up and crossed her arms; she tucked her chin against her chest.
The sooner she’d discussed this with the others, the better. With the Brightswords Festival coming up, she doubted anything would be done now, much to Cruck’aa’s chagrin. But if they could formulate a plan, they could act on it the moment the festival ended. Perhaps having something solid this time would shift Pavel and Serena into action; Jo knew they weren’t actively ignoring their job, but they weren’t doing anything towards it either.
That only left Werond.
Jo leaned her head back and closed her eyes.
She had already decided halfway down Suldown Street that she wasn’t going to bring up how she got the information. Werond was hiding something, but for all intents and purposes, she’d done nothing that made Jo feel as though she was against them. If anything, she trusted Werond just as much as she trusted the others. But Cruck’aa wouldn’t see it like that; should he find out what Werond had given Jo…
There would be no telling what he’d do.