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by several people who had been calmly attempting to eat despite the fracas.
"Hey! What do you know?" said Shal, looking down at her hands. "Being strong
has some advantages after all!"
"You all right, Shal?" asked Tarl, pausing after fending off still another
brawler with a well-placed kick.
"So the name is Shal, is it?" Ren shouted as he pushed one of the warriors
toward a boisterous knot of fighters that had formed near the center of the
room. "Do you have any relatives in Waterdeep?"
"No," called Shal above the din. "Why do you ask?"
At this point, five fighters advanced toward the trio. Two well-armed women
rushed toward Tarl like charg-ing bulls, and two good-sized men began to
pummel Ren with their fists. The fifth fighter planted himself squarely in
front of Shal and began to wind up for a punch to her midsection. Shal had
never been in a fist-fight before. Instinctively she threw her arms up to
pro-tect her face and tensed every muscle in her body. His blow to her firm
stomach didn't even phase her. Slack-jawed, the man looked up at Shal, his
face turning green. She looked down at him, formed a fist just like her
at-tacker's but larger, and slammed a hard uppercut into the man's chin. He
staggered back and crashed to the floor well beyond where her first victim had
landed.
Meanwhile, Ren and Tarl had dispatched their attack-ers just in time to see
the results of Shal's punch.
"Whoa there, girl!" Tarl called out, panting. "You should be pro-tecting us!"
Tarl stole a moment to glance at
Ren, and Shal and the two men broke into smiles and turned as one to face
whatever riffraff might still be of a mind to tackle them, but there were no
takers. Most of the crowd were occupied with brawls of their own. The few
people who'd been paying attention were frozen by the remark-able prowess of
the three fighters, who fought as if they'd been battling together for years.
"We'd better get out of here," grunted Ren to his new companions. "The Watch
Guard will be here any minute. They sentence people for brawling now in
'Civilized' Phlan."
Quickly the three worked their way to the inn's big double doors and pushed
through. Before they even had a chance to step into the street, they were
blocked by seven members of the Watch Guard. The guards wasted no time
expertly slipping the loops of their man-catchers around the necks of the
three. The strange
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implements were basically nothing more than nooses on long poles, designed to
keep captives a safe distance from their cap-tors. A quick jerk of the
torturous implements by the guards sent the three to their knees, choking,
effectively eliminating any thoughts of resistance. Another prac-ticed jerk,
and they were standing again.
"Take them before the council," instructed the group's leader. "We'll get the
rest of this rabble cleaned up in short order."
"Even man-catchers have their weaknesses," Tarl whis-pered to Ren.
Ren shook his head. "Don't try anything, friend. The sentence for fighting
here is mild compared to the one for resisting the Watch Guard. It isn't worth
it."
"You've got that right," one of the guards said as he prodded them along.
"Now, shut up and get a move on. The night's council representative is waiting
for you."
* * * * *
Porphyrys Cadorna loved night council duty. As Tenth Councilman, he seldom had
a chance to demonstrate his wisdom; there were always nine others whose views
su-perseded his. But during night duty, he was judge and jury for whatever
citizens were dragged into the council chambers. Cadorna dreamed of the
advancements he would earn as the wisdom of his judgments became known to the
rest of the council and the voting repre-sentatives of Phlan. Naturally he
would make certain that his decisions were widely known.
Porphyrys was the last living member of the noble Ca-dornas, a family
respected for its wealth and power until the time of the Dragon Run. The
Cadorna Textile House was among many businesses and landmarks destroyed by the
onslaught of dragons that leveled Phlan fifty years ago, and its ruins
remained just outside the civilized por-tion of the city, under the control of
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