they can locate him. It took more than half a bag of gold to persuade them to do the work."
"I gived ye a whole bag to pay for the task," Bruenor remarked dryly.
"Even with my ruby pendant, it took more than half a bag of gold to persuade them to do the work," Regis clarified.
Bruenor just put his head down and shook it. "Well, that means ye got nearly half a bag o' me gold for safe-keeping, Rumblebelly," he took care to state openly, and before witnesses.
"Did the wizards say anything about the fate of Sea Sprite?" Catti-brie asked. "Do they know if she's still afloat?"
"They said they've seen nothing to indicate anything different," Regis answered. "They have contacts among the docks, including many pirates. If Sea Sprite went down anywhere near Luskan the celebration would be immediate and surely loud."
It wasn't much of a confirmation, really, but the other three took the words with great hope.
"Which brings us back to Morik," Drizzt said. "If the pirate Kree is trying to strike first to chase off Deudermont and Wulfgar, then perhaps Morik became a target."
"What connection would Deudermont hold with that rogue?" Catti-brie asked, a perfectly logical question and one that had Drizzt obviously stumped.
"Perhaps Morik is in league with Sheila Kree," Regis reasoned. "An informant?"
Drizzt was shaking his head before the halfling ever finished. From his brief meeting with Morik, he did not think that the man would do such a thing. Though, he had to admit, Morik was a man whose loyalties didn't seem hard to buy.
"What do we know of Kree?" the drow asked.
"We know she ain't nowhere near to here," Bruenor answered impatiently. "And we know that we're wasting time here, that bein' the case!"
"True enough," Catti-brie agreed.
"But the season is deepening up north," Regis put in. "Perhaps we should begin our search to the south."
"All signs are that Sheila Kree is put in up north," Drizzt was quick to answer. "The rumors we have heard, from Morik and from Josi Puddles, place her somewhere up there."
"Lotta coast between here and the Sea o' Moving Ice," Bruenor put in.
"So we should wait?" Regis quickly followed.
"So we should get moving!" Bruenor retorted just as quickly, and since both Drizzt and Catti-brie agreed with the dwarfs reasoning the four friends departed Luskan later that same day, only hours after Morik and Bellany had left the city. But the latter, moving with the enhancements of many magical spells, and knowing where they were going, were soon enough far, far away.
Chapter 16 UNEXPECTED FRIENDSHIP
s usual, Wulfgar was the first one to debark Sea Sprite when the schooner glided into dock at one of Waterdeep's many long wharves. There was little spring in the barbarian's step this day, despite his excitement at the prospect of seeing Delly and Colson again. Deudermont's last real discussion with him, more than a tenday before, had put many things into perspective for Wulfgar, had forced him to look into a mirror. He did not like the reflection.
He knew Captain Deudermont was his friend, an honest friend and one who had spared his life despite evidence that he, along with Morik, had tried to murder the man. Deudermont had believed in Wulfgar when no others would. He'd rescued Wulfgar from Prisoner's Carnival without even a question, begging confirmation that Wulfgar had not been involved in any plot to kill . Deudermont had welcomed Wulfgar aboard Sea Sprite and had altered the course-of his pirate-hunting schooner many times in an effort to find the elusive Sheila Kree. Even with the anger bubbling within him from the image in the mirror Deudermont pointedly held up before his eyes on the return journey to their home port, Wulfgar could not dispute the honesty embodied in that image.
Deudermont had told him the truth of who he had become, with as much tact as was possible.
Wulfgar couldn't ignore that truth now. He knew his days sailing with Sea Sprite were at their end, at least for the season. If Sea Sprite was going south, as was her usual winter route - and in truth, the only available winter route - then there was little chance of encountering Kree. And if the ship wasn't going to find Kree, then what point would there be in having Wulfgar aboard, especially if the barbarian warrior and his impulsive tactics were a detriment to the crew?
That was the crux of it, Wulfgar knew. That was the truth in the mirror. Never before had the proud