Adventure of Verner 1

The civic archive doors close behind Verner and Erin as evening gathers over Waterdeep. Their sealed escort order, route ledger, and copied testimony travel beneath their cloaks toward the northern road.

They reach the abandoned toll road before dusk fully settles. The ledger’s first patrol marker should stand beside a leaning milepost, but only a square of disturbed earth remains.

Fresh hoofprints cut through the damp roadside, two riders heading north. A torn strip of watch-blue wax clings to a thornbush, its seal broken and edges still clean.

Erin crouches beside the prints without touching them, Echo secured at her hip. Behind them, Waterdeep’s evening bells fade while the road narrows between dark hedges.

Verner kneels beside the roadside and studies the hoofprints without disturbing them. Two horses passed north at a steady pace, one bearing a heavier rider or burden.

The impressions are fresh enough to retain the sharp edges of the shoes. One mount favors its left hind leg, leaving a shallower mark where the road turns toward the hills.

He examines the torn watch-blue wax caught on the thornbush. The seal was broken cleanly, not weathered away, and its imprint matches the civic watch order’s authority.

A smear of dark road mud crosses the wax, while a small fleck of pale mortar clings beneath it. The riders came from the wayhouse direction, then continued north.

Beyond the hedges, the two tracks remain visible beneath the fading light, bending toward a low ridge where the abandoned toll road enters the northern hills.