“Thank you, Ygway,” Xeno said, rudely pushing the man back to the seat. “Be still, now. We wouldn’t want you to tire yourself out.”

  In reply, the young man smiled stupidly and slouched down. He took up the rest of his toy army and recommenced the mock battle for the cushioned seat opposite him.

  The crowded marketplace was now very nearly silent, save for the occasional tinny sound of discarded holy symbols dropping to the cobbles. Most present had lived through the scourging of Bane’s image from the Keep after the Time of Troubles, but this was something very different. Cyric had replaced Bane as Lord of Strife. The gods now declared heretical still held court in the heavens, still held sway over the mortal realms.

  Vrakk stood in a sea of shocked human faces, carefully taking stock of the patriarch and the addle-brained nobleman at his side. With the disappearance of Lord Chess a tenday past, the church had seized control of the city government, installing Ygway Mirrormane as Zhentil Keep’s lord. Insanity ran in the Mirrormane family, or so the rumors said. After watching Xeno and his drooling, twitching nephew in action, Vrakk would disagree. It galloped like a Tuigan pony with its tail on fire.

  “Know, too,” Xeno announced, “that all travel from the city has been suspended, unless approved by both the church and the government. These restrictions will remain in effect until Lord Cyric declares the inquisition at an end.”

  With that, the patriarch gestured to his driver. His carriage lurched ahead - only to stop a moment later as a pile of dung was cleared from its path. Vrakk shook his head; the priests hadn’t been bright enough to put the elephants at the rear of the procession.

  A swarm of church novitiates, Cyric’s holy symbol tattooed upon their foreheads, set upon the marketplace in the wake of the parade. They gathered up the discarded holy symbols, as well as any merchandise that might be ornamented with the newly contraband images. Other priests posted broadsheets repeating Xeno’s proclamation or scanned the crowd for anyone overly distraught by the announcements. Such unseemly sorrow could only come from a heretic.

  Vrakk paid the clerics little attention as he continued his patrol of the small market. The courtyard held a variety of stalls. Vendors hawked everything from dried meats to woolen blankets. It wasn’t the largest market in the city, its wares rather mundane and uninteresting, but that was precisely why the orcish general had been assigned to patrol it. For a soldier of his rank and renown, the duty was tantamount to sweeping the streets.

  “Hey, pig-snout,” someone snarled, grabbing the back of Vrakk’s coarse cloak. “You deaf as well as ugly? I said give me a hand with this heretic.”

  The orc turned slowly. The young man’s imperious tone had announced him as a priest, even before Vrakk saw his dark robes and sour, sanctimonious grimace. “Call me General,” Vrakk rumbled, slapping the insignia on his leather breastplate. “Or sir.”

  “No priest of Cyric will ever call an orc sir” the young man snapped. “And no orc should be a general in the service of a holy city like Zhentil Keep.” He yanked a woman forward by the hair and pushed her at Vrakk. “Take her into custody.”

  The woman fell to her knees, dark hair streaming around an olive-skinned face. This was no Zhentish woman, but a trader from Turmish or one of the other southern lands. In her slender hands she clasped something, desperate to keep it away from the priest. “The patriarch,” she began tearfully, “he said we have until sundown to destroy our holy symbols. Please, I am leaving this very day with a caravan to my home in Alaghon. I have permits approved by the church and the nobles. My god will not understand if I desecrate his image needlessly.”

  “She right.” Vrakk pulled the woman to her feet with one meaty, gray-green paw. “That what Mirrormane say. I not so deaf I not hear that.”

  The priest shoved a large sheet of paper right up to the orc’s snout. “The proclamation says all holy symbols not issued by Cyric’s church are to be destroyed.”

  Vrakk realized then the priest was not going to be bullied, so he let a practiced facade of doltishness slide over his features. His mouth hung open just enough to show his dark tongue, and a line of spittle drooled around the two yellowed tusks jutting up from his lower jaw. “Uh, me not read Zhentish,” he lied, fixing beady red eyes on the priest in his best vacant stare. “Can only do what Mirrormane say, and he say let ‘em alone until sundown.”

  The Turmish merchant took the cue, sliding unnoticed into the crowd as the young priest focused his anger on the orcish Zhentilar. “Why are you still allowed to wear a uniform?” the cleric demanded. “I thought all your kind were put to work repairing the bridges.”

  He was right; most of the orcs and even the half-orcs in the Zhentilar had been given the inglorious task of laboring on the twin bridges crossing the Tesh. Vrakk was a war hero, though. His loyal service to Lord Chess and the city had gained him an exemption from that insulting work - even though the church had pushed for a ban on all nonhumans in the Keep’s military.

  “Me too stupid to work on bridges,” Vrakk muttered, turning his back on the sputtering priest. “Gotta go check merchant permits now.”

  The orcish soldier tried his best to swallow his anger, but it burned in his throat like a ball of flaming pitch. He’d been a good soldier, a tireless defender of the Keep and the Church of Cyric. Orcish souls meant nothing to the Prince of Lies, though, and his minions had done all they could to drive them out of the city.

  As he went about the dreary task of checking the guild licenses and merchant permits in the marketplace, Vrakk found himself snarling almost as much as the priests scouring the stalls for contraband - that is, until he came upon an old man setting up a rickety puppet stage at the market’s edge.

  “Here you are, my good fellow,” the gaunt man chimed as he handed Vrakk his city permit.

  “Show been checked by priests?” Vrakk grunted.

  The puppeteer bowed broadly, swirling his mottled cloak and flourishing his broad-brimmed hat “Last time I was in this fair city,” he chirped. “Stamp’s on the back of the permit. A bit weathered, but that can’t be helped, not when I’ve spent the last annum traveling the world, you know.”

  Vrakk handed the man the tattered slip of parchment and turned away. “If you got a knuckler, he better be in with the thieves’ guild. They chop his hands off if he ain’t.”

  The man looked shocked at the suggestion he’d hire a pickpocket to work the crowd, though the practice was common enough. “Otto Marvelius has never bilked a patron of a single copper. Good, wholesome entertainment’s what I offer. Shows that would bring a smile even to one of Cyric’s priests -” he leaned close and winked conspiratorially “- and we both know how tough a crowd they can be, eh?”

  The puppeteer went about his work, whistling a bawdy tavern song popular in the less reputable ports along the Sword Coast. The striped curtains and the bright awning he rolled out over the boxlike stage drew both children and adults like some enchanted piper. Vrakk milled at the fringes of the growing crowd of urchins and commoners, watching for the almost inevitable petty crooks who’d come to prey upon them.

  “Kind people of Zhentil Keep,” Marvelius began, standing before the stage, “on this festive day, I have come to your great city to present a play both entertaining and enlightening. I have presented this pageant, known throughout the civilized world as The Rescue of the Tablets of Fate’ or ‘Cyric Wins the Day,’ to the crowned heads of Cormyr and the emperors of fabled Shou Lung.”

  With theatrical flair he unfurled a huge roll of parchment, covered with seals and elaborately wrought signatures. “These affidavits, provided by such notables as Bruenor Battlehammer of Mithril Hall, Tristan Kendrick of the Moonshaes, and King Azoun IV of Cormyr, attest to the story’s power to enthrall even the most unenlightened audience.”

  The parchment could have been signed by anyone, stated anything, since most of the people gathered before the stage couldn’t read. Vrakk smirked at the expressions of awe riding over the sea of faces; Marvelius might not hire a pickpocket, but he was certainly a flashman in his own right.

  Marvelius hung the scroll on one side of the stage then took up another, less impressive piece of parchment. “I have also had the chance to present this play in each of the various dales to your south.”

  A hiss, very much expected by the showman, slithered from the crowd. Marvelius held up a restraining hand and presented the second parchment, blotchy with spilled ink, food stains, and huge, thick Xs. “They tried their best to sign an affidavit, too, but this was all they could manage.” He waited for the chuckles to subside just a little, then added, “Good thing Elminster taught Lord Mourngrym and the rest of the, er, warriors of Shadowdale how to make Xs or the thing would be blank - and speaking of puppets, let’s get on with the show, shall we?”

  The laughter and rough clapping filled the time it took Marvelius to position himself behind the stage. By now Vrakk was almost mesmerized, watching the old man play the crowd. The Zhentish hated the dalesmen, especially Mourngrym and the men from Shadowdale, with a passion unrivaled. By insulting the nobleman and the old sage who advised him, Marvelius was certain to win over his audience - and more than a few coppers when his helper passed the collection box after the show.

  A puppet of a raven-haired woman, with bone-white skin and strange scarlet eyes, appeared on the stage. Her blue-white robe and the farcical wand in her hand identified her as Midnight, the earthly avatar of Mystra. “Oh my,” she said. “I wonder where the Tablets of Fate are hidden. Do you know where they are?” Her exaggeratedly shrill voice - provided by Marvelius’s unseen assistant - made more than one child cover his ears with his hands.

  Midnight leaned toward the audience. “Well, if none of you know, I’ll bet I can guess who has them. Oh, Kelemvor? Where is my brave knight?”

  The puppet depicting Kelemvor was as well-known as Mystra’s: a hulking body supported a head divided equally into two faces. One side was human, with coarse features, all bristling sideburn and drooping mustache. The other was feline, a panther’s head with a mouthful of sharp white teeth. The children shrieked in delighted fear as Kelemvor appeared behind Midnight, his panther face to the audience.

  As Midnight turned, Kelemvor switched faces. “Here I be, my love,” he answered, his words slurred drunkenly and dripping with stupidity.

  “Do you have the tablets?” Midnight asked. “We must get them to Mount Waterdeep and return them to Lord Ao.”

  “Well, why would we want to do that?” Kelemvor replied, scratching his head. He dropped out of sight then returned with two nondescript squares meant to represent the sacred artifacts. “They’d make nice tables or even a good couple of chairs.” He tried to sit on them.

  Midnight hit him soundly with her wand. “Dolt. When we give these back to Lord Ao, he’ll make us gods.” The puppets froze and trembled in surprise at this news, just long enough for the audience to have their fill of shouting and hissing. “And then we can give all the people we like lots of power.”

  “Like the Zhentish?” Kelemvor asked foolishly.

  The crowd cheered, but Midnight silenced them. “Of course not. We like the dalesmen, especially that handsome Lord Mourngrym. If we get to the mountain first, well become gods and help them take over the world!”

  The chorus of boos was silenced by the appearance of a handsome, hawk-nosed Cyric - puppet at the edge of the stage. “This will not do!” he shouted to the audience, brandishing his rose-hued sword above the heads of the children huddled close to watch the play.

  As Midnight and Kelemvor trudged along toward Waterdeep, Cyric crept behind them, keeping to the fringes of the stage. The two occasionally paused on their mock quest to beat each other or embrace frantically. Then Cyric would sneak in, getting closer and closer to stealing the Tablets of Fate. Something different caused the thief to be captured each time - and each time he tricked the foolish duo into letting him go.

  The old prig’s good at his job. I’ll say that much for him,” came a whispered voice at Vrakk’s ear.

  “Go ‘way,” the orc rumbled, not bothering to look at Ivlisar.

  The body snatcher snorted in mock outrage. “Fine way to treat a chum, this is. Just because I haven’t seen you in a tenday… Well, that can’t be helped now, can it? Circumstances beyond our control and all that.”

  Vrakk tried to look casual as he walked around the periphery of the audience, but the elf stuck to his side. The orc didn’t need to see Ivlisar to know he’d been drinking; the body snatcher’s breath sent the stench of cheap gin into the air with each syllable.

  “It took me days to find you.”

  “Wasted time,” Vrakk grumbled.

  “I’m leaving the city.”

  “So?”

  Ivlisar stepped in front of the orc, his shoulders squared in something akin to military fashion. His rail-thin frame was hidden beneath a triple layer of overcoats, with a gray cloak wrapped around his shoulders. He moved almost as stiffly as the puppets battling violently across the stage, though his face was very much animated by shock and anger.

  “Don’t you care about my connections?” the elf asked, flushing red to the tips of his pointed ears. “You need me, you know.”

  Nervously Vrakk scanned the crowd. No priest nearby, though the grimacing novitiate who’d insulted him earlier was watching the puppet show close to the stage. “We find another merchant. Bye.”

  “This place isn’t safe for dwarves or elves anymore,” Ivlisar rambled. “Just ask poor Hodur. And the church has no love of orcs. Why, I’m betting it’ll soon be heresy to be born anything other than human. And those inquisitors - I hear Cyric’s teaching ‘em to read minds.” He’d lost control now, the pent up fear making his voice much louder than discretion would have advised. “Then you won’t have to say anything against the church. You’ll only need to-“

  The orc slapped a hand over Ivlisar’s thin-lipped mouth. “Shut up,” he hissed. Some of the adults nearby had turned to look at the body snatcher, their attention drawn from the puppet show by his ranting.

  “Stupid drunk,” Vrakk shouted, shoving the elf to the cobbles. “Go sleep it off.”

  “Heresy!” someone cried.

  Vrakk looked up, ready to be confronted with the accusing fingers of the crowd around him. But it wasn’t Ivlisar who’d drawn the ire of Cyric’s faithful.

  “That’s not the way the story goes,” the sour-faced novitiate shouted toward the stage. “Cyric didn’t need to steal the Tablets of Fate! You make our god out to be nothing more than a common thief!”

  The old showman peered over the top of the stage, along with the woman who apprenticed with him. “B - But the church,” Marvelius stammered. “The patriarch approved this last year. He said the story happened this way. Look, I’ll be glad to change-“

  It was far too late for apologies or retractions. Three inquisitors appeared, one to either side of the stage, one behind it. The gold-armored knights of Cyric shattered the rickety wooden box, shredding the brightly dyed curtains and awning. The crowd scattered then, screaming, and it was all Vrakk could do to keep them from trampling each other and the surrounding merchant stalls. Had the parents not hustled their children away at the first shouts of heresy, the scene would have been much more chaotic.

  Otto Marvelius remained a flashman until the end, trying to hide the fear in his voice as he said, “There’s been a misunderstanding of local custom. Nothing more than that. We’ll rectify any damage done and tithe a substantial sum to the church to – to – to pay for proper shows. They can be put on in this very marketplace…”

  The puppeteer was still trying to smooth things over when one of the inquisitors drove a fist through his chest.

  Marvelius’s apprentice took the attack not nearly so well. She screamed and curled up into a tight ball, no doubt hoping with all her heart she’d wake up at any moment and find this ghastliness a horrible dream. It wasn’t to be; the remaining armored destroyers of heterodoxy pulled her messily into two gory halves.

  Then, after stomping all three puppets into shards, the inquisitors disappeared.

  Panic clouded Ivlisar’s eyes as he clung to Vrakk. “Please, I’m going to leave the city.”

  “I don’t care!” the orc shouted. He tried to pry the body snatcher from one arm, doing his best to slow the frenzied crowd with the other.

  “Get me a pass.”

  Vrakk stopped struggling, standing still at the center of the rushing mob. People crashed into his steel-muscled frame, but they found him as rooted as a thousand-year-old oak. Twice, Ivlisar was dragged a few steps away by the throng. Both times the elf struggled back, his pleading eyes locked on the orc’s gray-green face.

  Then the mob was past, and the two stood face to face.

  “I need a pass,” Ivlisar repeated. “I’ve no legal trade, so the city won’t grant me one. You have to do this for me. Fzoul might be able-“

  “Never say his name out loud,” Vrakk said.

  “I’ll say more than that.” Nervously Ivlisar twisted his long fingers into the hem of his cloak.

  “Don’t,” Vrakk warned simply.

  “If you don’t get me a pass-“

  The body snatcher never finished the threat. Vrakk buried his sword deep in the elf’s chest. Not the cleanest kill the orc had ever made, but certainly one of the quickest.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” the sour-faced priest shouted as he came upon Vrakk cleaning his sword on the elf’s corpse.

  “He curse church, so I kill him,” the orc murmured. “Save gold knights trip back here.”

  “What did he say?”

  A thousand glorious insults flew into Vrakk’s mind, but the blood-slicked cobbles reined in his tongue before he could speak. Whatever slight he attributed to the dead man would be his heresy alone.

  The orc pressed one nostril closed with a warty finger then blew the contents of the other noisily onto the ground. “Uh, me no remember.”