Crypt of the Moaning Diamond

Forgotten Realms

The Dungeons: Crypt of the Moaning Diamond

By Rosemary Jones

Ivy punched the camel. It backed out of her tent and stood with its big, shaggy brown head still sticking through the opening. Its large half-closed eyes stared at her, and it opened its mouth and rolled its lips back over huge yellowed teeth. Ivy hit the creature again, square on the nose, and the camel sidestepped—wide-bottomed feet on skinny legs—onto the equally wide feet of its screaming owner.

The camel’s driver took a swipe at Ivy as she emerged from her tent, swinging his open palm to slap the impudent female abusing his camel. He shouted something that Ivy decided was uncivil even if she did not know the dialect. She sighed—a sound only slightly less annoyed than the camel’s snorts. After all, she had not hurt the idiot’s mount (and the man’s bruised toes were not her fault). Ivy lacked the time for a really good fight, a beat-his-head-into-the-dung brawl, especially after spending most of the morning clearing lost dromedaries and their droppings out of her crew’s tents. One of Mumchance’s strays slipped between her legs. The mangy dog snapped at the man. The camel’s owner snarled and threatened the mutt, flipping a small dagger out of his belt to brandish at it.

Maybe there is enough time for a little fight, thought Ivy, as she moved between the stray and the Shaar mercenary foolish enough to swing a knife under her nose.

One kick from Ivy knocked the dagger into the dirt. A swing of her mailed fist caught the man under his jaw, rocking him back. A second kick landed him flat on his back in a less-than-fragrant pile left behind by his frightened camel. Gasping, his breath knocked out of him, the camel driver lay there, glaring up at her.

“Go away,” said Ivy, one booted foot resting on his dagger. “Take the camel with you.”

The camel driver glanced at the sword that Ivy had not bothered to unsheathe. Ivy cocked her hip slightly and grinned. She did not need the blade to keep him down, and—as they were fighters of the same siege force—serious maiming made little sense. The man apparently took her point of view. Rolling up in one fluid and slightly squelchy move, he picked up his dagger, grabbed his camel’s halter, and led the beast in the direction of his people’s tents. The cur just plopped its bottom in the dust and started scratching for fleas.

“You’re welcome,” said Ivy to the unconcerned mutt. “No problem at all defending your scruffy hide.”

The camels had slipped out during the night and rampaged through the camp—at least as much as a dromedary could rampage, which was more like a blundering through the tents. It was, Ivy considered, exactly what the Thultyrl deserved for hiring Shaar mercenaries to fill out his siege forces. Except, of course, the camels knew better than to shamble their way through Procampur’s neatly ordered pavilions. Instead, mercenaries like Ivy had to spend their morning shifting the smelly, spitting, four-legged, one-humped fleabags out of their gear while the Shaar drivers wailed and moaned and threatened terrible retribution to anyone who harmed their precious mounts.

Unless, of course, somebody taught them a well-deserved lesson in manners and kindness to small mongrels.

Cursing the loss of time, but not regretting the brief tussle, Ivy swatted the last stray camel out of the camp area. She almost chased off a few of the dogs panting at her heels as she searched the camp for something to eat. But a quick survey of wagging tails, moist noses, and panting tongues led her to the conclusion that every mutt was one of Mumchance’s strays, and the dwarf would never forgive her if the whole pack was not there to greet him on his return from the dig. Ivy decided that she should be just thankful that Mumchance and the other Siegebreakers had set off earlier to the dig, leaving the camels to her. If they had stayed, she was certain that the day would have ended with a camel added to the odd menagerie that the Siegebreakers seemed to augment every time they went out on a job.

As she continued to search for a breakfast that had not been trampled or tasted by camels, Ivy tripped over Kid’s pile of odds and ends. Since he almost always stole food as well as any shiny object that attracted his attention, she did a quick shuffle through his little bags and boxes. One leather pouch yielded up a quantity of stale—but still quite chewable—campaign biscuits.

Even as she crammed the first bite into her mouth, a soft cough interrupted her. Just from the tone of the cough, she knew who it was, who it had to be. Nobody coughed that decorously except Captain Sanval, the officer who escorted her every day to the Thultyrl’s tent. In the courteous tone he always used, the captain said, “The Thultyrl requires an audience with you, lady. I am to accompany you.”

Ivy took another bite of the sour biscuit and wondered if he had arrived just in time to see her stealing from Kid’s gear, or if he had been standing there long enough to see her roll the

Shaar through the camel dung. While contemplating that last thought and avoiding Sanval s patient gaze, she stirred Kid’s cache with a toe. Most of it looked worthless: odd scraps, lengths of rope, the purple leather pouch (containing the biscuits she had purloined), and a number of small utensils. There was nothing in Kid’s trove that could not be explained or would attract an angry owner seeking to reclaim his property, decided Ivy, but she resolved to remind Kid again that this was a Procampur-controlled camp, and Procampur’s officers took a very dim view of thieves.

Sanval coughed again. As usual, no emotion showed on his handsome face. He never had any expression, other than polite and attentive interest. The captain looked almost exactly like his fellow officers, so much so that Ivy wondered if the Thultyrl had some clay mold that he used to stamp out row after row of stalwart, polite young men. Like all the other Procampur officials, Sanval wore the cleanest gear that Ivy had ever seen: every cord matched, every buckle gleamed. Even his boot heels were polished. The dust and the stink of the siege camp never seemed to touch him.

Today, although the sun was beating down hard enough to make even a Shaar sweat, Sanval wore his complete armor: from the shining greaves on his long legs to a brilliantly polished breastplate beneath his square shoulders, right up to a well-buffed helmet sitting absolutely straight on the top of his head. Once, and only once, Ivy had seen Sanval pull off his perfectly shined helmet. Then one little black curl had stood straight up on the back of his head, defiantly out of place from the rest of his clipped and well-brushed wavy black locks. Ivy had rather liked that freestanding curl.

When they had first met, Ivy guessed that Sanval was one of those that Procampur citizens would call “born under the silver rooP—a nobleman in service to his Thultyrl as a

matter of duty rather than financial necessity. Besides all the wonderfully well-polished and obviously expensive armor, the full list of his names was much too long for anyone except a noble. Common people made do with one or two names. But Sanval had recited a dozen sonorous sobriquets including, unless she had misunderstood, the rather unlikely name of Hyacinth. After a tongue-twisting moment of trying to repeat back all his names, Ivy had suggested that she just call him Sanval. He had mentioned that “Captain Sanval” would be more proper.

Other than the long list of personal names and the fact that he had brought three horses to the siege, Ivy had been unable to pry any personal information out of the discreet captain, despite her best and most congenial efforts at quizzing him. It wasn’t easy asking questions of a man who insisted on walking either three paces in front of you (if you were going to the Thultyrl’s tent) or three paces behind you (if you were going away from the Thultyrl’s tent), but Ivy tried. After a short time (the duration of one walk up the hill to the Thultyrl’s tent), Ivy gave up on being congenial and switched to the more familiar and comfortable tactic of being annoying. After all, just because none of her armor matched—or had ever been shined until it reflected sunlight like a silver mirror—did not mean that she lacked pride.

“I am eating my breakfast,” she said to the silent captain. “It took some time this morning to clear the camels out of here.”

Sanval’s smooth brown brow creased, very slightly. Ivy waited. She kept waiting. In silence. Two could play that game.

“The animals,” said Sanval finally, when it became evident that Ivy was not going to say anything else or even move until he responded, “did not come into our area.”

“Of course not,” drawled Ivy in a perfect imitation of his even tones. She had been a gifted mimic since childhood and

matching the clipped, even cadences of the Procampur accent was a simple trick for her. “That would have been rude. Even camels have manners around Procampur.”

One corner of Sanval’s perfect lips almost quirked upward. The possible smile disappeared too quickly for her to be certain, and Ivy decided that it was just a trick of light and shadow playing across those finely chiseled features. The gods only knew what it would take to make the man bend, even for a moment, and indulge in a little camp gossip.

Sanval apologized again for interrupting her breakfast but insisted courteously that she make herself ready to meet with the Thultyrl.

“I can wait while you wash, but we must not take too long,” said Sanval, with a slight bow. Ivy knew that his quick glance had not missed a single spot of dust on her face, the grime on the mismatched armor that she wore, or the new patch on her unpolished boots. Ivy knew she looked every inch a grubby, uncouth mercenary, and—if she were forced to admit it—she rather enjoyed the dirt. It was certainly easier to maintain than the well-scrubbed look favored by the Procampur officers, especially when living in the middle of a siege camp in the last and hottest month of summer.

If Sanval had been an aristocrat out of Waterdeep, he might have sneered at her obvious lack of fortune and armor polish. But Sanval was from Procampur. Courteous Procampur officers never sneered. He just stood there, making no fuss at all, while she twisted up her sweat-soaked blonde braid and jammed it under her favorite leather cap.

Ivy located her armored gloves and thrust them through her belt. With her bare hands, she dug through Kid’s leather pouch and removed as many biscuits as she could. Ivy stuffed them into the top of her tunic, securing them behind her breastplate. Satisfied that she could eat some breakfast later, she rubbed the

crumbs off her mouth with her grimy sleeve.

“All done, and I’m as ready and as clean as I am going to be,” she said, figuring that this time she would get a response from him. Although she had not been certain about the smile earlier, she had definitely seen him wince when she deliberately smeared extra biscuit crumbs down her front. The crumbs, Ivy reasoned, would shake off in the walk up the hill, or she could brush herself down before she entered the Thultyrl’s tent. Annoying Sanval was one thing; revolting the ruler who was going to pay her a lot of gold to end an unprofitable siege was another.

Sanval turned to lead her to the Thultyrl’s tent, starting out at the regulation three paces in front of her. Ivy quickened her step so she was even with him. They were almost the same height, and her legs were as long as his. She could easily match him stride for stride. He quickened his pace so that he was again three steps in front of her. She wondered if she should push him into a jog this morning, just to see him sweat.

Mumchance’s mutts decided that Ivy and Sanval were playing a new game. A little brown-and-white shaggy one barked and leaped for Sanval’s ankles, apparently intent on slowing him down for Ivy. Sanval neatly sidestepped the dog without even looking. Not even a spot of drool from its lolling tongue touched his highly polished toes. Ivy was impressed. The rest of the mutts came boiling out of whatever patch of shadow they had been panting in and ran toward them. Sanval came to a complete and rock-solid halt. He and the entire pack of dogs looked back at Ivy. She shrugged. This time, Sanval waited until she did what he wanted.

Ivy snapped a Dwarvish command at the dogs. The motley troop dropped to the ground with drooping tails. A yellow cur, a three-legged dog Mumchance had brought back yesterday, whined piteously. Ivy dug a biscuit out of her tunic. She broke

off a piece and threw it to the yellow dog. The rest of the mongrels whined too. She pulled out the rest of the biscuits and tossed them to the dogs. So much for breakfast—she hoped that the rest of her company had thought to bring food to the dig site.

“Your dogs seem … hmm… better behaved today,” said Sanval. He was right. None of them had jumped up on him today. Ivy knew that the dogs appalled him, but she could never get the polite captain to yell at them, swear, or even grumble. So she had stopped saying “jump” in the Dwarvish dialect that Mumchance used for training his mutts and that Sanval didn’t speak.

So the dogs had failed to annoy him today. He had not reacted to her usual grimy state, no matter how much it contrasted with his own shiny image. And it really was too hot to try to make him trot through the Procampur tents—probably the only person who would end up sweating would be her. Ivy considered other options to tease some human response out of Sanval. Restraint like his, in Ivy’s experience of war camps, was not only uncommon, it was positively uncanny. She suspected that it might even be unhealthy.

But it was typical of a citizen of Procampur, a city so regimented by manners and so enamored of its laws that they had banned the thieves’ guild and, even more surprisingly, made the ban stick, keeping the guild permanently out of the city. Like the highly polished officer now leading her through the camp, Procampans made civility seem ordinary and the picking of pockets the height of bad manners.

Such things weren’t natural. Take this war, thought Ivy, which had started because Procampur’s ruler decided to honor his treaties. Now, most kingdoms and city-states had treaties with one another, but rarely bothered to read them, let alone act upon them. But Procampur had a treaty with Tsurlagol that

they would protect the city from outside invasion or, if invaders managed to take control of Tsurlagol, free the city. When the inevitable happened, and Fottergrim’s ramshackle army of ores and hobgoblins (and a few humans and half-breeds who should have known better) captured Tsurlagol, Procampur’s ruler decided to go to war. Unfortunately, the orderly city had only an orderly army—just enough to serve its own needs, but not nearly enough to defeat the forces encamped in Tsurlagol.