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Timas sat down at the end of the bar. The tavern was small and sooty, a poorly-lit room with several tables occupied by furtive men with an occasional woman scattered about. When he had arrived in Londoun, he had carefully checked around, talking to the right people on the street to find out who he needed to contact before "working" in Londoun. The Thieves' Guild in most cities frowned upon freelancers moving into their turf, and Timas knew better than to cross a Guild.
After a few false leads, Timas finally found someone who knew what he was talking about. The man told Timas to go to the "Salty Anchor Tavern". Timas thought it sounded like a good place to find thieves, since they occasionally needed to make a quick escape from the city. With a name like "The Salty Anchor", it was bound to be right on the riverfront, near where the River Llwelyn emptied into the Vasmar.
Timas was surprised when he finally found The Salty Anchor. It was in a somewhat rundown section of the city (which Timas expected), at least a mile from the shore (which surprised Timas). The interior fit his expectations -- dark with an almost palpable undercurrent of danger.
True to its name, The Salty Anchor had a ship's anchor attached to the wall behind the bar. Large white blocks -- Timas assumed it was salt -- were stuck to the anchor, as if the anchor had been dropped into brine that had slowly evaporated. To either side of the anchor were shelves holding various spirits. On the right side of the anchor, next to the liquor cabinet, were two kegs. One of the kegs had not been tapped.
Behind the bar of The Salty Anchor worked a heavyset man in a sweat-stained shirt. He hammered the tap into the keg, then picked up a carved wooden statue of an odd-looking man squatting.
Timas looked at the barkeeper, then decided to ask a question. "Why is this place called 'The Salty Anchor'? We're over a mile from shore, and the Vasmar is a freshwater sea. How did all the salt crystals get on that anchor?"
The barkeeper set the statue on a shelf above the freshly-tapped keg, then carefully tilted the keg forward. He filled a mug with a little of the brew, then sipped the nutty brown beer. Satisfied, he put the mug in a wash sink and started cleaning it.
Without looking at Timas, he finally answered. "Glain Rankeillor used to be a merchant captain. He sailed the Vasmar, trading goods all across the sea. When I started to work for him, I asked him the same questions. It wasn't until I had worked for him for two years that he answered me.
"I had taken the night's coin to him after closing one night. There was a storm raging, as if the Nine Hells had escaped and were going to punish Londoun. Captain Rankeillor was drunk when I arrived, and he started talking."
The barkeep stopped and looked at Timas. He walked over to the young thief and lowered his voice. "The captain talked in a quiet growl. He said, 'Lad, thirty years ago and more, I sailed the seas, trading with everyone. Metal goods from the dwarves of Clemendeev. Furs from Kieta. Sail cloths from the Javik. Wines from the Fronchans. If someone sold it, I shipped it. Until the last trip from the Javik Wastes.'"
Captain Glain Rankeillor stood on the poopdeck of his ship, the Rising Wave. Barely thirty, Glain was one of the younger captains sailing the Vasmar. He had been a quick study, mastering both the skills of sailing the sea and the skills of making money. His tall frame commanded respect from his men, and his generosity sharing the profits sealed their loyalty.
On the main deck in front of him, his men continued to hoist boxes with the crane, lowering them into the hold in preparation for leaving the Javik port village of Skielund.
The cry of a gull somewhere overhead was shrill, giving a brief respite to the continual dull roar of waves breaking on the shore and the grunts of men working.
Glain looked up, squinting to spot the gull in the bright blue sky above. Spotting the white bird circling over his ship, he watched it for a moment before letting his eyes drift back to land. Steep, thickly-forested mountains formed a wall just a mile from shore. Even in the summer, some of the peaks had white blotches of snow on them. This late in the year, the tops of all of them were white. The mountains quickly gave way to gentle, rock-strewn hills better suited for herds of cattle than crops. These hills ended at the rocky beaches of the Vasmar.
The rugged shores along the Javik Range were legend for its danger to careless captains. Skielund was one of the few ports that did not have sharp rocks waiting just beneath the waterline. Some of the Javik claimed that their ancestors had moved the rocks away to allow "Southlander" traders to visit the northern lands. Glain didn't believe that particular story, not entirely, at least. Then again, Javik ships had shallow drafts; they weren't as vulnerable to the underwater rocks as the deep draft ships of the south.
Glain watched one of the Javik stride up the gangplank onto his ship. Like most Javik, this one was just barely taller than Glain, with long blond hair. He wore deep brown leather pants and a vest that had been boiled in waxes to harden it. A short sword, popular with the Javik, hung from his hip like a long knife. Propped on his right shoulder was a child wrapped in light-colored cloths.
The Javik spotted Glain and smiled. He crossed the deck and climbed up the steep stairwell to the poop deck.
Glain returned the smile. "Olaf! Decide to travel south with me after all?"
A chill wind blew from the mountains north of shore. Olaf laughed as Glain shivered involuntarily. "Hah! Why would I travel south and miss the best part of the year? When else do I get to rest?"
Glain nodded, still smiling. "Rest? Yet you wonder why I have such a fine vessel and rich jewels." He waved his hand, showing a ring with a large red gem. The stone caught the sunlight and glinted. "A trader can't rest for half of the year, my friend."
"A Southlander trader, maybe not. A Javik knows how to enjoy things other than coin. A winter with my wife and new son, while you sail the sea with no one but your men."
"The sea is wife enough for me, Olaf. She sings to me when I'm ill. She cheers me when I'm sad. She will embrace me when I die."
"Perhaps so, Glain, but does she keep you warm at night?"
Glain shook his head. "This is your son? Showing him what a large Southlander ship looks like?"
"Aye. Perhaps, when he is of age, my boy Aaron Longarm will be a Raider. How better to know how soft the Southlander ships are than while he still wears his swaddling."
"What, Olaf? You do not wish for Aaron to follow in your footsteps and become a wealthy merchant?"
"So he must deal with the soft-skinned Southlanders all his days?" Olaf's smile faded. "Glain, why don't you stay here for the winter? Become a hardy man instead of a soft Southlander."
"I've worked for years to get this ship. I can't keep it here over the winter. My men would mutiny, and there aren't going to be any more ships coming through this area before spring. If I let them take the ship, the gods only know when I would see it again. Not enough of them would wait all winter to return here for me."
"As you say, then." Olaf looked at the activity on the main deck. The cargo hold cover was already in place. "It looks like the swords are loaded already. I still do not understand why you wanted so many weapons this trip."
"The King declared that rapiers were becoming too long. Some of them were four feet and more in length. So, the city guard started measuring rapiers and cutting the blades down to length."
"So?"
"A rapier is a thrusting weapon. It's blade does not cut. Without a tip, it is a worthless steel rod. Some of the subjects in Londoun rediscovered the cutting swords, and the latest trend is to carry short-bladed swords. Javik swords are perfect."
"Hmmm. Southlanders are a strange creature." He looked at Glain. "Still, the fruits you trade me for the swords are tasty. They will make for wonderful meals over the winter. Remember to bring more when you sail north again, Glain."
"I will, my friend."
"I must be off. Your men are ready to make sail."
"Fare well, Olaf. I will see you in the spring."
"Fare thee well, Glain."
The Javik trotted easily down the stairs to the main deck and left the ship, pausing on the dock to turn around and raise an empty hand over his head. Captain Rankeillor returned the gesture, one the Javiks used in parting to wish one another "that the sun may rise above you again."
His crew had already prepared the Rising Wave for sail. The chill wind blowing down from the snow-capped mountains and the ominous clouds to the southeast at sea motivated the men to make ready with haste. Soon the Rising Wave moved out to sea, its mainsail taut from the wind.
Glain watched the skies ahead of the ship, billowing white clouds gradually stretching ahead of the ship as if to block the way. The clouds also stretched to the east, forming a scattered wall of graying clouds around a third of the sky.
Glain walked back to the tillerman. He regarded at the burly man for a moment. "Vikk, I do not like those clouds. They bear poor weather. Perhaps we should sail west of them?"
Vikk nodded and shifted his position on the deck, pulling the tiller towards him. The bow of the Rising Wave slowly turned to the right, until the spar pointed once more at blue skies, instead of the dark gray of storm clouds.
The sailing continued smoothly for a couple of days as the Rising Wave passed to the west of the brewing storm. Glain overheard several of the crew speaking in hushed tones about the strangeness of the storm, for it never seemed to move, but it continued to block travel to the east. Worse yet, the storm seemed to be close on hand, but the winds always blew to the south, as if the storm didn't have winds of its own.
Hoping to calm his crew, Glain announced that he had decided they would sail for Londoun instead of Caelioradh. They had already traveled far enough to the west to bypass Caledonia entirely, and Londoun was the next major port along the southern coast of the Vasmar.
It was late on the afternoon of the fourth day that Captain Rankeillor's first mate, a grizzled man who answered only to "Mate", approached the captain.
"Cap'n. I know ye haven't many sea miles under your legs, but you should heed my advice."
"Of course, Mate." Glain had grown used to the man's frequent bits of advice. Most of it Glain had already learned, but occasionally Mate would deliver a tidbit that Glain had never considered.
"Good, Cap'n. There be some parts of the sea that man should never sail."
"Oh?"
"The Great Whirlpool," Mate referred to sea tales from the distant Brythomar of a whirlpool that moved around the Brythomar; it was supposedly a malevolent force that attacked ships. "The Eastern Tammar," where ships simply disappeared. "The Center of the Vasmar."
"Really, Mate? The Center of the Vasmar?"
"Aye. It is an evil place, and men who cross it be forever changed. Not for the better, mind you, laddy."
"Why have I never heard such a thing before?"
Mate lowered his voice. "Laddy, you know sailors are a cautious lot. Speaking of a place like that is sure to gain its attention."
"'Gain its attention'? Listen to yourself, Mate. Speaking like an old hen."
"Look at those clouds." Mate nodded towards the storms to the east. "Those be no natural clouds. We have sailed west of our route. The Vasmar is pushing us towards its center."
"Are you telling me tales? Are you telling me that the sea is pushing us towards this cursed place?"
"I only tell you what I see, cap'n. Mark me now, tho'. Things will happen, and you will know me as true. We should go farther west and avoid the Center of the Vasmar."
"If we go farther west, we will take longer getting back to Londoun. I want to get these swords sold as soon as possible. Who knows when the King will decide swords are getting too short?"
Mate shook his head sadly and walked away, mumbling to himself.
Captain Rankeillor watched him walk, then looked at the clouds to the east of the Rising Wave. They boiled turbulently, a cauldron of violent weather that looked dangerous even at this distance. Flashes of lightning lit portions of the clouds, adding to the ominous threat. Still, there were no winds blowing out from the clouds. Glain scratched his head absently, then walked down the ladder to his cabin below the poopdeck.
His cabin was spacious for such a small ship, stretching a full fifteen feet from front to rear. The rear bulkhead of the room had several large windows, each with heavy storm shutters, that let light in from outside. His bed was placed beneath the windows, its head against the rear bulkhead so Glain could watch the stars while trying to sleep.
Captain Rankeillor instead went to the outer bulkhead near the door. The cabinet there held dozens of large, rolled scrolls. Glain withdrew one of them from the cabinet and unrolled it on a nearby table that occupied much of the front half of his cabin. The chart was an overview of the Vasmar, showing the major ports surrounding the vast inland sea. Glain instead looked at the center of the sea. The anonymous cartographer had drawn a fanciful city of strangely-shaped, nauseatingly green buildings surrounded by minute grotesque merfolk of similar colors. Rankeillor snorted as he looked at the drawing.
"Is this where you get your stories?" he asked aloud to no one. He rolled the chart up and put it away in the cabinet.
It was late the following morning that the wind died. What had been one moment a steady breeze became instead a silent calm. The mainsail hung limply from the mast. Many of the crew busied themselves with other tasks, recoiling ropes on the deck or painting the railings.
Captain Rankeillor walked across the deck, nominally inspecting the work the crew was doing. He was more interested in gauging the mood of his men. All of them were quiet, as if it were a calm before a storm.
Glain noticed Vikk standing at the tiller. The captain walked towards the tillerman, trying not to look concerned. Vikk stood at the wooden pole as if the very act of being in position to steer the ship could somehow convince the winds to return. Glain climbed the steep stairwell/ladder to the poopdeck and walked next to the railing, until he was behind the tiller.
Vikk stood next to it, hands on the long wooden shaft and face forward.
Glain walked along the opposite side of the tiller until he stood next to Vikk, the wooden steering pole between the two like a railing.
"Clear skies ahead, eh, Vikk?"
"Clear skies all around, cap'n. The storm is gone."
Glain realized with a start that Vikk was right. The malevolent clouds that had been their continual companion for the last several days had disappeared. The entire sky was a too-bright blue.
"Perhaps it realized it couldn't catch us?" Glain asked jovially.
The tillerman remained glum. "Perhaps."
"Carry on, Vikk."
"Aye, cap'n."
Glain nodded and walked to the front of the poopdeck. He noticed Mate on the forecastle, next to the large wheel used to raise and lower the anchor. Mate noticed the captain looking and gestured to Glain.
The captain nodded and climbed down the steps to the main deck. He crossed the main deck to the forward ladder. He climbed up to the forecastle and approached the first mate.
"Cap'n," Mate said in a hushed tone. "I warned ye."
Lowering his voice, Rankeillor scowled at his first mate. "You warned me of what? This 'Center of the Vasmar' story? I saw where you got the story. The charts in my cabin show a city in the middle of the Vasmar. Do you really believe those superstitions?"
"It's no a superstition. I heard others speak of the city."
"You heard them telling tales."
Mate grabbed the captain's sleeve and dragged him towards the railing. As he did so, he hissed, "It's no tales. Look!"
Glain looked out over the calm sea. "It's a becalmed sea," he said glibly. "I've seen many of them in my day, and you can not tell me you've not seen more."
"No. Look at the water!"
Rankeillor did so. He stared at the gently lapping waves as they splashed harmlessly off the hull of the Rising Wave. It was then that he noticed the difference.
The deep blue of the fresh-water Vasmar had changed. The water beneath the ship, and as far as Rankeillor could see, was deep green.
Mate nodded as a look of astonishment crossed Glain's face. "Aye, cap'n," he continued to whisper. "Green water. In the middle of the Vasmar that is as blue as sapphire."
Glain's voice lowered to a whisper. "What does it mean, Mate?"
"It means no good, cap'n. Something will happen, something bad, if the winds do no return."
Glain spent the rest of the day looking busy, much like his crew. There was little of the usual camaraderie of sailors, and what little talking there was always was done in hushed tones, as if the sailors were subconsciously hoping that whatever spirits had brought them to this place would overlook the ship and her crew. By nightfall, nothing had changed: the men were still sullen and quiet, the sea was calm, and the winds were nowhere to be found.
Captain Rankeillor awakened from a fitful sleep. The open window above him was a dark portal, with only distant, cold stars to provide light. Glain tossed in his bed, pushing the linen covers down to expose his bare chest. Some muffled noises from on deck echoed into his chambers, followed closely by the unmistakeable metallic rattling of the anchor chain unwinding from its wheel into the sea.
At that noise, Rankeillor jumped from his bed, throwing the covers aside. He grabbed a shirt from the back of a nearby chair, the ghostly white eerie in the near dark. He quickly crossed his room, bare feet making only dull thumps as he rushed towards the door to the main deck.
Shouts greeted the captain as he flung the door to his chamber open. Several of his crew stood near the middle of the main deck, clustered around the main mast, staring forwards.
Glain rushed across the deck and grabbed the first man by the shirt sleeve, spinning him around to face the captain.
"What gives, man?" Glain growled.
The man -- the ship's erstwhile cook, as it turned out -- simply pointed forward.
Disgusted, Glain pushed him roughly aside to look forward.
On the raised foredeck, Glain saw the large, horizontal wheel of the anchor winch. The tell-tale dark gray of the chain was not wrapped around it. The anchor had been lowered fully into the deep sea. On the top of the wheel was a large lantern -- the type usually used in a crowded harbor so anchored ships would be visible to anyone navigating at night. It shone brightly in the dark night as it burned the light oils in its reservoir.
Movement near the port side of the forecastle drew Glain's attention away from the lantern. A man threw a double fistful of something over the railing. It splashed into the calm sea as the man turned around.
Glain recognized Vikk the tillerman as he faced the rear of the ship. Vikk kneeled next to a large red-stained pile of linens. He picked up a double fistful of red meat and turned to throw it overboard.
While Vikk was turned away, the captain looked again at the linens on the forecastle. It was then that he saw Mate's face, eyes wide in terror, dull with death, at one end of the pile. Glain doubled over as he gagged, coughing and fighting the bile welling within his throat.
Staggering forward, Glain climbed the stairs to the forecastle. Vikk had turned again to the disembowled body at his feet, tearing entrails from Mate's viciously-opened midsection. Vikk held a long, bloody dagger in one hand, pieces of flesh still clinging wetly to the blade.
As Vikk threw the fistfuls of entrails over the railing, Glain became uncomfortably aware that he was facing an armed man while carrying no weapons of his own.
Fighting back another surge of nausea as Vikk cut more flesh from Mate's abdomen, Captain Rankeillor spoke. "Vikk." The tillerman ignored him, tossing more of Mate's intestines overboard. "Vikk!"
Vikk stopped, absently wiping his face with the back of one bloodied hand, leaving a smear of red across his cheek. He smiled, the rictus of a madman. "Aye, cap'n?"
Glain glanced quickly at the dagger in Vikk's fist. The tillerman made no threatening moves, and Glain wasn't sure if Vikk was even aware of the blade.
"Vikk, what in the Nine Hells are you doing?"
"Captain, they're here for us."
"Who is here?" Glain looked around the ship. All he could see in any direction was a glassy sea and cold stars. "No one is here."
"Captain, we must pick them up and feed them."
Vikk kneeled again next to the corpse. Glain watched in horrified fascination as the tillerman again started cutting entrails.
"Why did you do this to Mate? You murdered him Vikk!"
Vikk looked up, meeting Glain's gaze for the first time. "He knew." The way Vikk said it made Glain utter a silent prayer for ignorance to the gods.
His voice now a hoarse whisper, Glain asked, "Knew what?"
"Of the city, of course." Vikk stood again to toss another bloody pile overboard.
"The city on the maps?"
"No." Vikk turned and kneeled again. "The city in the sea. They want that knowledge. I am feeding it to them."
With another nauseating rip, Vikk stood again with a handful of Mate's innards. He turned and dropped it over the side of the ship.
As Vikk turned back towards the body, Glain leaped across it, grabbing Vikk's wrist with both hands. Letting his body's momentum carry him forward, Glain drove the wrist into the railing of the forecastle with a crunching smash. The force was enough to cause Vikk to drop the dagger -- over the side of the ship, to Glain's relief.
Vikk struggled to free himself from the captain's grip, screaming incoherently as he twisted about, unmindful of the unnatural angle that his hand dangled from his arm.
Freed of Rankeillor's grip, Vikk kneeled again by Mate's body. He pulled at a loose section of intestines with his good hand as he tucked the other one against his own abdomen.
Looking back to the main deck, Captain Rankeillor saw the six men still standing there, transfixed. "For the sake of the gods! Help me stop him!" the captain shouted. None moved.
Glain turned again to face Vikk. Vikk was dragging a section of entrails, still attached to the body, towards the railing.
With a wordless shout, Glain rushed Vikk again. He pushed the large tillerman towards the railing.
Vikk fell over board, his blood-slicked hands unable to grab onto anything before he tumbled into the sea. Vikk splashed into the water noisily and thrashed for several seconds.
"They're coming for me! But I'm not ready! I have more to feed them. Mate knew. I knew. You know, captain! But they aren't going..." his shouts were cut off by noisy bubbling as Vikk slipped under the surface.
Captain Rankeillor leaned against the railing, his forearms cradling his head, as he panted. After the splashing overboard stopped, he slowly raised his head to look into the sea.
The sea below the Rising Wave was glowing, a deep green. The surface was glassy calm, allowing Glain to see into the Vasmar as if he were looking through a window. What he saw on the other side of that window was enough to pray for a merciful death.
Below the surface -- how far, Glain could not guess, but it was not far enough -- stretched an assorted jumble of immense stones. Why Glain thought "city" when he saw it he would never be able to say, but city it was.
The city stretched as far as he could see, buildings of alien geometry arranged in an order beyond comprehension, some placed tightly against several others, while other buildings were alone, with no neighbors for dozens of paces.
The buildings themselves seemed to range from flat square mounds to spike-topped towers to round structures that looked more like a gigantic ball than an inhabitable structure. Still other buildings had no description that could fit words.
Glain continued to stare, eyes unwilling to obey his demands to avert, even when he realized he saw movement around many of the buildings.
It was movement closer to the surface that finally drew Glain's eyes from the city below. Vikk sank towards the city, arms and legs still slowly moving in unseen currents. Glain thought he saw Vikk gesturing to him, urging the captain to join his tillerman in the watery city below.
Other things swam towards Vikk. At first glance, Glain would have sword they were merfolk -- the upper half of a human attached to a gigantic fish's body. A second glance dispelled the first impression.
The tail was more like that of a snake, tapering to a point instead of a fin. The body was almost human, at least from a distance. The arms were spindly, with long, sharp-tipped fingers. The head was too round, and had no distinguishable hair.
One of the things closed with Vikk. Its too-sharp fingers darted out, stabbing into Vikk's midsection and tearing loose chunks of flesh. Glain coughed as he felt another surge of bile.
Somehow the thing heard him. It looked up to the surface, large red eyes glowing with a hellish hatred as its mouth parted open, showing jagged teeth stretching from one side of the head to the other. Glain and the thing locked gazes for an eternity of seconds before it turned back to tearing Vikk's entrails from Vikk's body.
Glain forced his eyes away from the thing, looking again at the city below. The top of one large building shifted briefly. Glain shook his head and looked again at it. He was sure the top of the building was sliding to one side. Glain's heart was ready to explode when he saw fingers pushing through the crack in the building's roof, fingers as large as the Rising Wave was long.
Pushing himself away from the railing, Glain grabbed one of the long spokes of the anchor wheel. He pushed frantically, ignoring the sticky-slippery deck beneath him as he started raising the anchor.
"Raise the sails!" he screamed to his men. "If you want to see the sun rise another time, play out the sails! And help me with his anchor!"
His men finally recovered from their stunned catatonia. Two of them scrambled up rope ladders to deploy the sails, while two more rushed up the steps to the forecastle, carefully leaping over the bloody heap that was Mate, to help raise the anchor.
In answer to Glain's prayers, a wind picked up. It quickly started howling, the scream of frustration of an entity beyond this world. The eldritch silence of the sea gave way to the loud cracks and whips of the sails billowing and the groans of the wooden ship once again underway.
Glain slowly became aware of one of his men shaking his shoulder.
"Captain," the man said in a strained voice. "The anchor is up. You can stop pushing. It's up."
Captain Rankeillor cautiously released the pressure on the wheel. He stood and looked. The anchor chain was once again wrapped around the wheel, and the bulky anchor hung at the side of the bow.
"Captain," the crewman said again. "What do we do about Mate?"
Glain looked at the bloodied corpse. "We'll wrap him now. If the winds keep up for this day and the evening ahead, we will give him a proper burial then. I am not going to let them have the rest of him."
The crewman nodded, his face pale in the glow of the large lantern.
Glain walked to the railing once again. He looked at the anchor hanging from its chain. Large white crystals hung from the anchor, regularly-shaped protrusions jutting from all over it. Glain leaned over and broke one of the crystals free. He held it close and rubbed his fingers on it.
The cook walked up to the captain. Seeing the large crystal, the cook furrowed his head. "Salt?"
Glain cautiously licked the crystal. He nodded his head as he handed it to the cook.
"But, captain... There is no salt in the Vasmar."
"Perhaps there is, cook. Perhaps it is all here, in the center."
The barkeep straightened while he continued to watch Timas.
Timas leaned forward. "But, what happened then?"
The barkeep shrugged. "The Rising Wave made it back to Londoun. The crew left the ship -- who would sail after such an accursed voyage? Captain Rankeillor sold the ship but kept the anchor. He swore never to return to the sea, for he knew that he would wind up back at the center.
"He bought this tavern with the money he had made, and put the anchor on the wall. He hires men to run the tavern, because he never wants to be near this anchor again."
Timas nodded. He looked again at the anchor, with its numerous crystals of salt still attached.
"So," the barkeep asked, his voice back to normal. "Are you going to order anything, or are you just looking for free stories?"
"I'll have a beer," Timas nodded towards the two kegs.
"What kind ya want?"
"Any kind is fine with me."
The barkeep leaned towards the thief once more, his voice lowered conspiratorily. "Not around here, it ain't. You seem to be a smart boy. I'll teach you something that may help you out. Only order beer from the keg with a statue over it. The, uh, regulars, like to do that to discourage anyone else from staying here too much."
Timas looked at the two kegs. "Right. I'll take a beer from the right keg."
The barkeep smiled and clapped Timas's shoulder. "Smart boy." He turned to pick up a clean pewter mug.
Back to the Dark Mysteries Campaign side stories.
Original Draft 07 July 2001
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