Page 20 of Paladin's Hope

Piper followed Galen into the parlor. The wallpaper was in slightly better shape here, but not by much, and the furniture had blankets thrown over it to hide the state of the upholstery. The two humans sat on a long sofa, with Earstripe sitting upright between them, his ears tense. He still hadn’t spoken. Piper wondered what he was thinking.

“So you say there’s suspicious goings-on?” asked Thomas, leaning forward. “What sort? It’s not arson, is it?”

“No, not arson.” Galen launched into his prepared speech. Thomas listened with apparent interest, making small noises of alarm.

“Well,” he said finally, “that is all quite terrible. But I’m afraid I can’t help you. I don’t see anyone regularly except my housekeeper and the boy who delivers supplies. And clerks if I can get them.” He sighed. “They never stay long, I’m afraid. I can’t pay much and this isn’t exactly a social whirl out here in the countryside.”

Missus Hardy came in with a tray of tea and set it down. She moved with short, halting steps and her face never changed. She left again without asking if they needed anything else. The teacups were mismatched and there was a large chip out of the teapot that made Thomas’s pouring rather haphazard.

“Why are you concerned about arson in particular?” asked Earstripe, in his most careful diction.

Thomas was so startled he nearly dropped the teapot. “I beg your pardon!” he gasped, mopping up the tea. “I didn’t expect—that is—oh dear. I’m sorry! You startled me.”

He didn’t realize Earstripe could talk, thought Piper. He has either been out here since before the gnoles arrived in Archenhold or came from somewhere else. I wonder which one it is, or if these people truly have so little contact with gnoles that they don’t know anything about them.

“Arson,” repeated Earstripe, cutting through the man’s babbled apologies.

“Oh. Yes. Well.” Thomas gestured toward the house again. “It’s a firetrap, obviously. Of course, the roof leaks, so we’ve plenty of buckets of water around in case that happens, but…” He trailed off, his eyes moving to Piper. “You said you were a doctor?”

“Of sorts, yes,” said Piper, hoping that he wasn’t going to have to advise the man about his piles or something equally messy.

The man’s eyes lit up with sudden excitement and he bobbed his head, looking even more like an owl than usual. “An educated man, though? You know about the ancients, yes?”

“A little,” said Piper, surprised at the conversational shift. “I’ve seen plenty of things that people claimed belonged to the ancients, and a few that actually did.” Galen said to try and get these people talking, so here goes… “There’s a door in a passageway in the city that I’ve inspected closely, but it’s sealed tight. Made of the same material as a wonder engine, though.”

“Yes. Yes! Let me show you!” Thomas jumped to his feet. “Follow me.”

He led the trio to the kitchen, where Missus Hardy was bending over the hearth, to a set of stairs leading down. “This is so exciting! I never get to show anyone my discovery.”

Piper and Galen traded looks. Earstripe looked at both of them and muttered something under his breath about humans.

The stairs led, not surprisingly, to a cellar. It was dark and the stones were slick with moisture, as one might expect this close to the river. Earstripe’s nose worked furiously. Galen peered into the shadows, possibly looking for attackers.

Thomas picked up an oil lantern at the base of the stairs and fiddled with the knobs until it brightened. “Here, it’s easier if one of you takes this…” Piper, fully aware that he was the least useful one in a fight, took the lamp. I suppose if this strange man turns on us, I can at least throw burning oil on him…

He had no idea what to think about Thomas. The man was clearly a bit peculiar, but there was a large distance between “peculiar” and “murdering people and dumping their bodies in the river.” And if you lived alone in a gigantic crumbling house with a grim housekeeper for company, you might get a bit peculiar too.

Missus Hardy the housekeeper still troubled him. Who told guests to go away? Was she trying to warn them or scare them off?

Thomas finished adjusting a second lantern and strode off, head held high. “Ignore the mess,” he said, over his shoulder. “There used to be a very nice wine cellar down here, but my grandfather’s creditors ransacked the place about fifty years ago. I haven’t had time to put it right.”

“Well, it’s only been fifty years…” murmured Galen.

They threaded around smashed shelves and jumbled furniture. The oil lamps illuminated dark openings in the stone walls but shed no light on the rooms beyond.

“Large down here,” said Galen.

“Oh, yes.” Thomas laughed, although it came out as more of a titter. “Yes, indeed.”

Piper did not care for tittering. It was almost always a bad sign. If you got a murder victim on the slab and one of the family was a titterer, nine times out of ten, they were the ones who’d put the knife in. He’d told the Temple of the Rat that once, and Bishop Beartongue—who had only been a Deacon in those days—had rolled her eyes and said that he was not allowed to pre-judge people because he didn’t like their laugh. Though in fairness, she did apologize once we turned up his collection of teeth.

Still. Presumably plenty of people also tittered in the absence of a dead body. Piper just wouldn’t have run across them. Your sample is skewed, that’s all.

“A gnole smells the river.”

“Oh yes.” Thomas waved toward one of the distant walls. “There’s a water stair over there. Used by smugglers back in Grandfather’s day. That’s how he lost all his money, you understand. He was a very bad smuggler, I’m afraid. Paid a fortune for what was supposed to be brandy and then it turned out to be pickled eels. He sold the eels and made enough money to run away to Delta, but he never set foot in Archenhold again.”

Dead bodies could have been dumped by the water stair. Of course, the manor’s also right on the damn river, so it’s not like access is a concern.

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