XV. THE HIDEOUT
Outlaws had known about the place for years. How its existence was kept secret from the righteous and true but known by every scalawag and rogue that had business near the Phlan Path is a mystery. It may simply be that the righteous and true seldom had business near the Phlan Path. Before Corwyn’s pirates and Starkie the Thin’s half-orcs reached their uncomfortable agreement to split the hideout between them, it had functioned as the dungeon of several nobles held for ransom, a warehouse for smugglers of vornduir and other drugs, a den of halfling thieves, an uncomfortable brothel, and–most often, most simply, and most beautifully–a place to lay low.
But it was cold. And it was damp. And, recently, darkmantles had infested their “treasury.” Starkie the Thin–dead just one week ago–had dreaded spending another winter there. And so he signed his band up for mercenary work for a southern prince. The contract would end in late spring, just in time for better weather and the revival of trade on the shores of the Moonsea; the half-orcs would go south and come back north, the way some birds do. The parchment’s ink hadn’t dried when Starkie argued with an ogre over who had the right to plunder caravans traveling between Phlan and Melvaunt. They fought, Starkie died, and with him went every detail about the southern lord and that contract. Authority devolved to three toughs who had all but decided that the best thing they could do was kill the pirates, gain total control of the hideout, and hope their combined spoils would carry them through the winter.
Bandit and pirate had not yet come to blows, but things were tense. The first mate, a temperamental, canny scoundrel named Abel, knew they were in peril. His own plan was to wait for Corwyn and then decamp suddenly, in the dead of night, with a few good men as much booty as they could carry. But no one wanted to fight the darkmantles in the treasury cave, and they’d heard nothing from Corwyn. So when Vahaera told Abel that she and her companions were mercenaries, that Corwyn was dead, and that they wanted compensation for a bad deal, he saw his opportunity.
“All right, all right. Here’s what I can do. You want information, and you want gold. Well–we don’t know anything about that cursed ship or those slaves, and neither did Corwyn. Boarding that damned vessel ruined everything and Umberlee can have her. But there were some odds and ends we took that might point you in the right direction.” (This wasn’t true, as Abel knew: the treasury contained bolts of silk, coins, jerky, rum, and a worthless copper ring they’d taken from one of the slaves, none of which seemed likely to foster revelations.) “As for money–Well, you can take the sum your paymaster is owed from the treasure there. Two hundred and fifty gold pieces, was it? Hmm… Yes, you can take that. But leave the rest for us. All that–But only if you can deal with the darkmantles.”
“Darkmantles?” asked Vahaera.
