With a low, muffled rumble, the secret door opened. Sunlight flooded the corridor as a four-by-four stone sank into the ground, revealing a tall, thick, cleanly trimmed hedgerow. Azoun squinted at the sudden burst of light and quickly moved into the concealing shrubbery. He fumbled for the hidden release on the outside of the castle for only a moment, then the door slid shut to the sound of stone faintly rubbing against stone.
"Wait a minute, Cuthbert," someone muttered in a deep voice from a few yards away. "I just heard something moving in them bushes next to the wall."
Azoun crouched down and held his breath. Though the secret door was mechanical, magic kept it relatively silent. Still, the king couldn't hide the sounds of his movement in the hedgerow. A sword poked through the evergreens just above his head.
"There's nothing in there," another voice, probably belonging to Cuthbert, said. "And if it was something, it'd more likely turn out to be a rat than a man. Castles attract scavengers like that. Why, I once saw a rat the size of-"
"You've told me that story fifty times if you've told it to me once. Anyway, I'm just doing my job," the deep-voiced man told his companion. He thrust his sword into the bushes again. "I've got a duty to the king, and I intend on doing my best to fulfill it."
Azoun smiled at the sincerity he heard in the guard's voice. It was a welcome change from Sergeant Connor's thinly veiled threats. I'll have to find out who that soldier is and have him commended, Azoun noted to himself. Perhaps I'll even promote him into Connor's job inside the tower.
After a few moments of silence and a few halfhearted sword thrusts into the hedges, the guards moved off. Azoun listened to their footsteps on the gravel path as they walked away. The king also heard one of the guards ask, "I suppose you're going to sign on for that crusade the king's mounting?" The other guard either nodded a reply or had moved too far away, for Azoun never heard his response.
As quietly as he could, the king took off his cape and tunic and unloaded the satchel. Inside the pack was a thin, unlined cloak and a worn, colorless tunic. The livery of a court messenger was fine for getting Azoun out of the keep with few problems, but the king knew that he'd never get honest answers from the townsfolk if he was seen as a member of court.
And honest answers were what Azoun wanted more than anything in the days after the assassination attempt. Of course, Vangerdahast hadn't found it surprising that one of the king's own subjects would try to kill him because of the crusade he proposed. To Azoun, however, the whole affair was mind-boggling.
The Cormyrian king had never doubted that it was his duty to gather the western forces under his banner and stop Yamun Khahan and his barbarians before they had a chance to destroy any western cities. The monarch knew that he had a responsibility to protect Faerun and his own kingdom. He was prepared to sacrifice a great deal-even his life, if necessary-to be certain that the horde never reached the heavily populated areas around the Inner Sea. Perhaps foolishly, Azoun assumed that his people would understand the war's necessity, even share his vision of the West united against the invaders. And he'd dismissed the rumblings from the guilds, for the merchants always complained about any venture that would increase taxes.
The assassination attempt had shown the monarch how wrong he had been to do so. Now Azoun wanted to know if the Trappers' Guild itself had sponsored the attack. And if the guild did foster the attempt on his life, the king wanted to see firsthand how many of his subjects were in unrest. He realized that any strong popular revolt while he was away on crusade might be difficult to quell. Filfaeril was certainly capable of leading the loyalist forces, but the king didn't want to make such a dangerous possibility more likely by ignoring it.
"Reports can't reveal half of what I'll discover myself," Azoun whispered as he stuffed the royal livery into the satchel and hid the bag in the bushes. Then, as quietly as possible, the king pushed his way through the hedgerow.
"Hey, you!" someone yelled. "Get out of those bushes. You'll not be using the Royal Gardens for a chamber pot!"
Azoun blushed and turned to see the royal gardener, a thin, choleric man, shaking a rake at him. So much for stealth, the king thought. Holding his hands before him, Azoun said, "Sincere apologies, my good man. I dropped a coin, and it rolled into the hedge."
People were beginning to stop and stare at the irate gardener and the red-faced old man at whom he was yelling. The Royal Gardens were open to the public during the day, but usually few commoners strolled around the northeast corner of the keep; the rest of the gardens were far more attractive. Still, there were enough people gathering to make Azoun nervous. If the guards should come back, he might be taken in for questioning. The king shuddered in embarrassment at the thought of explaining to the captain of the guard why he was skulking in the bushes, dressed as a down-and-out merchant.
"My apologies, sirrah," Azoun called as he pulled his cloak around his shoulders and walked briskly toward the path that lead out of the gardens.
"And don't come back!" the gardener yelled, tossing his rake to the ground. A few of the half-dozen people gathered nearby laughed, but most just shook their heads and went about their business.
Azoun was soon outside the Royal Gardens, standing on the dirt road that wound through the houses of Suzail's noble families. Unlike the other streets in the city, this one was devoid of garbage. The nobles paid commoners to keep it that way, just as they paid the men to fill the deep, muddy ruts that formed in the dirt street during rainy weather. In all, it was probably the nicest stretch of road in all of Cormyr, and the ancient, landed families-like the Wyvernspurs-didn't allow just anyone to wander down it.
That made the presence of a crowd of average citizens, following what appeared to Azoun at first glance to be a traveling priest, that much more of a mystery. Twenty people, most dressed in dirty, threadbare clothing, walked at the cleric's heels. The men and women at the rear of the crowd all leaned forward as they moved, straining to hear the priest's words. The gathering soon stopped, however, and the cleric raised his hands high above his head.
"Friends, I come to you with a message from Lady Tymora, the Goddess of Luck, the patron of adventurers and warriors," the cleric said as Azoun moved toward the crowd. When the king got close to the rest of the audience, he reached down and put his hand around the small cloth sack that hung at his belt. Cutpurses and pickpockets often worked crowds like this one, and Azoun knew better than to leave his silver unprotected.
The cleric smiled warmly and continued. "I've gathered you here so that you can see what good fortune may bring." He pointed to the beautiful, three-story facade of Wyvernspur House. "These people have been graced."
A murmur of approval ran through the crowd.
The cleric spun around and pointed at his audience. "Are they better people than you?" he asked, raising his voice slightly. "Are they more worthy people than you?"
"No!" someone yelled.
"Of course not," a man close to Azoun hollered in a deep, rumbling voice.
"They don't even work for what they have," a woman cried. Another murmur ran through the crowd, this one tinged with anger.
"But there you are wrong!" the priest said, pointing at the woman who had spoken last. Again his voice grew a little louder. "The people who live along this street, even the royals who live in the grand palace-" The cleric threw his hands into the air, gesturing toward the castle that stood at the other side of the gardens as if he'd just seen it. "They've all paid for what they own. Do you know how?"