Moon Doors of Silverymoon

IV: Haunted Hatches

By Ed Greenwood

Trunstral lives elsewhere in the city, leaving stewardship of his rental-rooms mansion to a fearsome, much-scarred and hulking -- just under 7 feet tall, with shoulders a good 3 feet across -- retired adventurer named Gorith Harsimmur (LN male human Fighter 7/Ranger 17), who inhabits a simple apartment just inside the sentinel-adorned front door of Trunstral's Resthouse.

For folk of Silverymoon interested in having a moon door installed, Narmathros the Artificer (CG male human Sorcerer 2/Expert 6), whose home and shop stand side-by-side on Windhammer Lane, is widely regarded as the best local maker of moon doors (and concealer of secret doors and spyholes). His firm of skilled carpenters, limners, and plasterers are always busy remodeling interiors all over Silverymoon. Unless a client is prepared to wait at least a month, their services can be very expensive (patrons in a hurry are charged double or triple rates to hire Amnor Narmathros and his workers "away from" whoever's next in their bookings).

Lilleth Lalantra (CN female human Expert 4) is the only other Silvaeren crafter considered to approach the skills of Narmathros. She's a shy, quiet, beautiful lone carpenter who specializes in small moon doors, such as specimens the size of two fingertips that permit access to a keyhole, a hidden stored key, pay-slot, or message-drop. Customers who seek to take advantage of Lilleth -- and some have been foolish enough to try -- are warned that the snakeskin shoulder-cloak she wears isn't mere adornment: it's the customary draped-around-her resting position of a flying snake (see Races of Faerûn), one Reeme by name. Reeme is a loyal companion more than a pet, and she springs to protect Lilleth if the human seems helpless or threatened, or when she calls for aid. Lilleth works slowly, but makes far less mess than most workers, cleaning up as she goes, and she is known for the intricate, tiny detailing of her finishings.

For those desiring simpler, cruder moon doors (simple "cut-and-hinge jobs" creating obvious mini-doors in the lower panels of larger doors), Silverymoon holds a dozen folk who do swift, serviceable work. At least one is thought to be a Harper agent, and several (through sentences laid upon them by Alustriel) must report in detail all the work they do to certain courtiers of Silverymoon -- so would-be clients should be aware that ordering a moon door can rarely be kept a secret matter.

Many older Silvaeren remember dramatic or amusing events involving moon doors. One concerns the Company of the Shattered Sword, a now-defunct adventuring band of Cormyr who came to Silverymoon to trace "long-hidden treasures" they'd found records of in the cellars of a one-time noble manor in Suzail. The Company readily found the mansion described in the records, but secretive and very hostile sorcerers who called themselves "The Sphere in Hand" occupied it. Hired guard attacks, released monsters, and deadly spells answered the company's every attempt to gain admittance to the premises or bargain with the sorcerers of the Sphere.

On daring scouting forays, company rogues noticed a moon door in a side entrance of the mansion and conceived the scheme of setting an apparent fire therein (by hurling a smoke-pot through a window after dark) as a distraction, while sending one rogue, magically diminished in size, in through the moon door to seek a chamber detailed in the records.

When this gambit was attempted, the reduced Company rogue was severely injured passing through the moon door: It was enspelled to cast dispel magic on any active spell passing through it. Returning to normal size, the rogue shattered the door but suffered many broken bones doing so. Company members rushing out of the night to rescue him were set upon by snakes catapulted at their faces out of an array of concealed moon doors. Sphere sorcerers opened hitherto concealed moon doors in other doors and window fanlights of their mansion to issue forth in wraithform to see who was attacking -- and a company mage sent deadly lightning-bursts (a spell of her own devising) in through all of the moon doors, causing much bloodshed.

Another tale involves a sequence of moon doors all over the city enspelled to act as a series of portals -- on certain moon-governed nights of the year only -- allowing those who know how to use them to "jump" rapidly from place to place.

About the Author

Ed Greenwood is the man who unleashed the Forgotten Realms on an unsuspecting world. He works in libraries, writes fantasy, sf, horror, mystery, and even romance stories (sometimes all in the same novel), but he is still happiest churning out Realmslore, Realmslore, and more Realmslore. There are still a few rooms in his house with space left to pile up papers in . . .