Elminster
Speaks
(Part #31)
The
Sage of Shadowdale has something to say about pretty much everything.
Despite having outlets in Dragon Magazine, Dungeon
Adventures, and Polyhedron Newszine, the Old Mage still
has more to say about Faerûn. Not wanting to anger an archmage, we decided
it would be best to give him a regular column from which to discuss the
finer points.
Listen
well, young one...
The
Wizard Then to Now
The
Whistling Wizard, Continued
(Fair/Cheap)
The repairs
Storm paid for were well underway at the Wizard when Anthalus Droon showed
up a tenday later, declared himself the new owner (flanked by the Bron
and a number of distinguished Zhent visitors casually displaying much
ready weaponry), and confiscated the funds Avlar hadn't spent yet. (That's
why the common room furniture is so old and mismatched. New replacements
were never bought.)
Droon
then spent a season mismanaging the Wizard into the ground -- a tenure
marked by such brilliant decisions as to save on firewood in winter by
letting the inn grow cold and commanding the staff to dress warmly (though
it was soon painfully clear that guests would go to other inns and pay
a little more for the privilege of freedom from chilblains) and taking
chambermaids from their cleaning duties to send them out hunting in the
forest to provide free food for the inn kitchen. The wolves got one maid,
and the others caught nothing. Eventually Droon was forced to hire foresters
from Shadowdale to set traps, which the hapless maids were set to making
the rounds of. Needless to say, the few travelers who braved the nigh-impassable
winter roads from Sembia with sledges of valuables were less than enamored
of weasel stew and rabbit soup so thin it was hardly more than boiled
water. (When there's a lot of snow, the prevailing winds often cause it
to drift the Hillsfar road into impassibility, so trade bound for the
Moonsea goes west through Mistledale, and then up the trail along the
Ashaba to Shadowdale, and thence through Voonlar.)
Droon
openly hated the Wizard, Voonlar, and the cold, often cursing them all
and retiring to his rooms to drain flagons of mulled wine heated over
his own fire. (His was the only fire at the Wizard outside of the cookhouse
that was kept alight all the time.) This behavior is why most locals surmise
he was under orders to remain at the inn.
When
Sembian factors (family business agents) began to arrive in Voonlar in
the spring on their way north to the Moonsea cities to receive overwinter
reports on investments and to deliver the latest orders from their masters,
Droon courted them. Eventually he found one willing to take back an investment
proposal, which is how Harauna Beltzund came to be Droon's major creditor
and eventual owner of the Wizard. (She never saw a copper piece out of
Droon, who used the barest minimum of her investment to keep the inn running
and pocketed the rest.)
The chambermaids
still have the traps, by the way, and they have used them to discourage
Zhent thieves and spies who've shown an interest in entering the Wizard
from time to time bent on dishonest purposes.
Despite
Harper vigilance and such precautions, local rumor insists various guests
regularly hide messages or small packets of valuables in hiding places
under the floors or inside the walls of certain guest rooms at the Wizard.
These packages are reputedly collected by the Bron's deputies, by Cyricist
priests, or by lay temple staff late at night in visits to the inn that
don't involve announcing themselves or paying for a night's accommodation.
This has happened -- to the alarm of paying guests who sleep lightly and
have come awake to find someone creeping around in their room -- often
enough to keep such rumors current in Voonlar. For that reason, Harauna
treats anyone she finds skulking around the inn late at night very
frostily.
Read
the previous Elminster Speaks
column or go to the Forgotten
Realms main news page
for more articles and news about the Forgotten Realms game
setting.
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