Author: Tower Curator

 

 

Hawkwood grimaced as the bandages came off. The end of his left arm looked like he had held it under a windmill’s grindstone. The healers had done what they could, turning the pulped meat into something resembling a hand. That alone was a miracle, even if he doubted he would be able to use his hand ever again.

And yet, he had to consider himself lucky.

White Company was a shadow of its former self. Even now, a full accounting of the dead was incomplete. Two thousand were dead in the mud and snow. Some had been blown apart by those rays of gold. Some had turned to gold, slaughtering their former comrades as statues. The rest had died in the rout, fleeing from the Evestani’s yannissar horsemen.

“I’m sorry, Sir,” said Abbess Beryl as she tended to his wounds. Even she couldn’t keep the grimace off her face. “I don’t know that I can do anything more. Maybe an adept or a bishop could—”

Hawkwood waved her off with his good hand, forcing a reassuring smile. “You did what you could. Go. Tend to others. I’m hardly the most injured.”

“Sorry,” she said again, bowing her head as she ducked out of his current quarters at a smaller burg.

Delightful was a smaller burg well out of the expected warpath of the Evestani army. White Company needed a chance to recover and recuperate. Delightful provided a relatively safe location to do so.

Of the two thousand still alive, the healthiest thirteen hundred had been folded into the Duke’s Grand Guard, leaving seven hundred wounded with Hawkwood. The war continued, after all, and bodies were needed. Their tactics were changing somewhat.

The Duke’s guard was pressing most anyone they could into their service. The vast majority didn’t have weapons, armor, or training. For the new tactics, that wasn’t needed. The Evestani army did slow when faced with a large force, thus the Duchy merely needed to appear large enough to pose a threat. Most of the actual soldiers were branching off, targeting the smaller detachments of the Evestani army that were spreading out in the wake of the arrowhead that was their main force.

It was a strategy that would let them help the rest of the Duchy, even if they did cede ground to the main force. They just couldn’t deal with an army ten thousand strong and the various golden magics that Evestani’s Golden Order employed. One or the other and they would have a chance. Not both.

Of course, it was a delaying tactic. Delaying the problem of having to deal with that army. It would reach Cliff eventually and unless someone worked out a way to stop them, that eventually would be sooner rather than later.

A knock at his door had Hawkwood shifting in his seat. The movement made him grimace as a thrum of pain worked its way up his left arm. At this point, amputation might be preferable to the pain that came anytime he moved. He would have to see if it dulled over time. But that was neither here nor there.

“Enter,” he called out, pulling a random report in front of him to make it appear as if he had been doing something other than brooding.

His adjutant, Neil, stepped into the room with a fresh stack of papers held out in his hands. “Good evening, Sir. How’s the arm?”

Hawkwood looked down and forced his fingers to flex, bracing to keep the pain off his face. “Getting better,” he lied. Knowing their commander had been permanently maimed would plunge the remainder of White Company’s already low morale.

He honestly wasn’t sure that White Company would exist in the next few weeks. Besides the uncertainty of the war causing complications in the future, his healthy men were with the guard now. Only those too wounded to hold a spear were in the burg. Hawkwood didn’t want to let it fall apart.

He wasn’t sure he would have a choice.

“I don’t suppose any of that is good news,” Hawkwood said, noting the distressed look on Neil’s face. Perhaps his show of strength hadn’t been as convincing as he hoped.

Neil hid his distress as he stepped forward. Using his fingers to keep the stack of parchment separated, he divided the stack into three smaller piles and placed them on the desk one at a time. “Reports on enemy movement, reports on allied movement, reports on White Company’s current state, and… a letter from Arkk,” he said as he placed a single letter to the side of the three stacks.

Hawkwood felt a flash of unfair irritation at the mention of his fellow company leader. He knew that Arkk lacked the numbers to make a difference. The magic he used, however, could have come in handy. The teleportation circles, fear totems, the scrying, the gorgon and the flame witch, and his pre-Calamity monster… Would Company Al-Mir have made a difference in defending Gleeful Burg?

Probably not. Elmshadow had fallen even with Arkk’s presence. The Golden Order’s magic was rumored to be that of a god of old. Some ancient dug-up slates of knowledge or a library of old scrolls. Theories were wild and varied but the true source mattered little. In the end, Arkk’s anathema couldn’t stand up to the magic of the gods.

Shaking his head, Hawkwood left the letter from Arkk on the desk as he picked up the report on White Company. The company was his responsibility, after all. His duty.

The report wasn’t anything out of the expected. It mostly consisted of a list of names. Some were of those who had an improvement in their condition. Too many of the names belonged to those who succumbed to their wounds.

Hawkwood placed the report back on the desk with a sigh. He honestly didn’t know what to say at this point. The whole war had been a disaster beyond even his most pessimistic expectations. Nobody had been prepared for a winter attack, nor for that golden magic.

The report on allied movements was roughly what he expected it to be. There were a few successes in the new tactics. Evestani seemed caught by surprise at their smaller detachments having to face down proper soldiers rather than whatever local guard the various villages and burgs could put together. Reading on, Hawkwood blinked.

There were… a few too many successes. Some without even the posturing for a fight that was more common than actual battles. In a few cases, it seemed like Evestani had abandoned the burgs on their own. Not to advance, but to pull back.

Switching over to the report on Evestani’s movements, he confirmed that. Evestani pulled back almost all of its smaller detachments. It was a little early to tell for certain but following the path of the smaller armies, it looked like they were retreating toward Elmshadow, holding up inside the large burg. Something had happened but the report…

His eyes snapped toward the end of the report.

Gleeful had been destroyed. The cause was unknown but the vast majority of the Evestani army had been caught within.

Hawkwood’s eyes flicked over to Arkk’s letter, suspicion welling.

The man had said that he was working on something that would change the course of the war. Could he…

Hawkwood broke the wax seal with the maze pattern and skimmed through the letter, looking for keywords. His eyes locked onto multiple mentions of Gleeful Burg. He started reading a little more around each. Finishing the letter, he leaned back in his chair.

“He did it,” Hawkwood said, closing his eyes. It took a long moment to remember what day it was.

It had been just shy of three weeks since White Company had been routed from Gleeful Burg, abandoning it to the Evestani army. Based on the date in Arkk’s letter, it had been just shy of two weeks since the entire burg had been leveled to the ground.

How long had the war gone on so far? It felt like years but… It had only been two months since the disaster at the Duke’s party. Hawkwood felt a sudden wave of exhaustion hit him. One tempered only by the contents of the letter.

“Sir?”

“He didn’t say how, but Arkk buried Gleeful Burg along with the Evestani army stationed there.” Hawkwood let out a small laugh. “He seems to be feeling some guilt about it. I empathize with his guilt over the civilians but I can’t help the feeling of elation. Those bastards near destroyed White Company. Every burg they occupy is facing starvation issues from too many people. It’s…”

Hawkwood laughed again, only to suck in a pained breath as he moved his wounded arm just a little too much.

“They’re pulling back to Elmshadow Burg. Evestani, that is. If Arkk can repeat whatever he did at Gleeful, this war might be over. It might be over now. These reports aren’t exactly fresh.”

Ever since taking up residence at Delightful Burg, the Duchy treated Hawkwood more as an afterthought than an active military commander in need of information. Which was fair enough, he supposed, even if it was irritating.

Hawkwood opened his mouth, about to ask his adjutant if there was any wine left in Delightful. At the very least, Arkk had given Evestani a black eye. Hawkwood was more than willing to celebrate that.

A tapping on his door had him pausing. It was a harsh, rigid knock. Familiar. The knock of a harpy’s talon.

“Come in,” Hawkwood said while gesturing for Neil to open the door. Harpies didn’t often remain around human settlements for the sole reason that most door latches weren’t designed with them in mind. Whatever harpy was out there likely had an escort. Neil was just in case it didn’t.

A Swiftwing with a letter already in talon held it out for Neil to accept.

“The Duke’s seal,” Neil said once the Swiftwing departed, holding out the letter for Hawkwood.

Staring at the diagonal bars on the wax, Hawkwood frowned and snapped open the wax. “Let’s see what our illustrious Duke has to say about our good fortune.”

Unfolding the parchment, he started reading with the expectations of a change in direction for the war in light of the main Evestani force’s demise. Halfway through, he stood abruptly, throwing the paper to the table with clenched teeth. There certainly was a change in direction.

“That bastard,” Hawkwood said, slamming his fist into the table.

He felt the sudden jerk of his body tenfold in his arm. Enough to make him grind out a pained groan. The pain stole some of the strength from his legs, making him topple backward. Were it not for Neil swiftly making his way around the desk and guiding his fall, Hawkwood might have ended up on the floor rather than back in the seat that had gone sliding back with his sudden stand.

“The Duke is claiming that he was in armistice talks with Evestani when tragedy struck Gleeful Burg,” Hawkwood ground out through clenched teeth. “Now he’s allying with the enemy to direct their forces at the one responsible for striking at both nations. Company Al-Mir. I’ve been summoned to Cliff to report on everything I know of them and their operations.”

“You’re…” Neil paused, frowning to himself. “You aren’t going to go. Are you?”

Hawkwood drew in a deep breath, thinking. “I don’t know if I can refuse.”

“White Company is loyal to you, Sir. Not the Duke.”

“Be that as it may, a good portion of White Company is with the Duke’s Grand Guard. I wouldn’t put it past them to make their lives miserable if I don’t show. Damn it,” he hissed. If only Arkk had managed his feat a few weeks earlier, White Company would still be mostly intact.

“I don’t believe Evestani would be content to stop here,” Hawkwood said, wishing he had a little more information. “Whatever they said to the Duke to get him to agree to an armistice or this alliance has to be temporary at best. They just want Arkk out of the way. Maybe buy themselves a reprieve while the Duchy wears itself out attacking a new target.”

“Perhaps,” Neil said slowly, “send someone in your stead. Claim injuries for your inability to travel. I can offer whatever platitudes the Duke wishes to hear while you organize and decide on the correct course of action?”

Hawkwood nodded his head. “I need time to think. Time to contact Arkk and understand the full situation. If you’re willing to buy that time for me, I will accept.”

“I’ll prepare for travel immediately,” Neil said, bowing himself out of the room.

Hawkwood looked down at the letter again, rereading the small bit where the Duke claims he successfully fended off an attack perpetuated by Arkk within Cliff City. That… couldn’t be right. Could it? The armistice talks were obviously hogwash. Why add that detail in?

“What have you gotten yourself into,” he murmured to himself.

Master Inquisitor Darius Vrox planted his cane on the last of far too many steps that led down from the Grand Old Church. Built on top of a small island jutting up from Cliff’s oceanic bay, it stood as an impressive testament to the people’s devotion to the Light. That or the undoubted slave labor that had hauled several tons of bricks over to the island when it had been built a few centuries ago.

As impressive a sight as it was, Darius didn’t particularly like it. It had always been too much. Too opulent, too large, and too many stairs to climb to reach the actual building. He liked it even less so now that he needed a cane just to be sure that he didn’t tumble down the excessively long staircase. The injuries he had sustained because of the assassins weren’t healing as well as they should.

Part of that was likely that he had left the event early in an attempt to chase down Arkk. He shouldn’t have even been on his feet at the time. Now, he was paying the price. Perhaps now and for the rest of his life. There had been no improvement in the past two months.

There was still work to be done. He couldn’t sit about.

Or, that was what he told himself. As of late, he had been finding it more and more difficult to engage with his peers. Now that the Duke had announced a formal alliance with the Evestani Sultanate to hunt down the one Darius had been advocating and defending, he doubted he would be anything more than a pariah at best.

It was through his efforts that the Abbey of the Light hadn’t sent out every inquisitorial team after Arkk immediately following the reveal of the horror from beyond the stars at the Duke’s party. The lack of action was considered a poor move in retrospect by the higher-ups of the Abbey. There were a few who still consulted with him. Douglas, his chronicler, primarily.

Passing a pair of priests, one of whom looked freshly returned from the war with his arm in a sling and the side of his face scarred like he had been dragged behind a horse, Darius gave them a polite nod of his head. The conversation between them died once they saw him. They passed without word or acknowledgment. Which was roughly what Darius expected.

Word had spread beyond the inquisitorial circle. Nobody wanted to be associated with the one who had advised against assailing Arkk.

Taking a breath, Darius moved across the bridge. Ever since the last full moon a week after his encounter with Arkk underneath the manor moat, he had been stopping at the same spot with no protections against scrying active. He hoped that Arkk would have found something after scrying on all the information Darius had provided related to the false moon in the sky fissure. Even if he hadn’t found the true culprit behind that incident, some evidence pointing anywhere else might help the both of them.

Though, at this point, Darius doubted it would matter. The Abbey of the Light was not infallible. The oracles didn’t see perfect visions. The men in charge were just that, men. Mortal and flawed. When faced with the threat of the Evestani Sultanate continuing their unstoppable march across the nation, it was easy to think they would choose to uphold the alliance, using Arkk as a scapegoat to force both armies to work together.

Darius walked toward a lone pier, the old fishing trawler having sunk half into the harbor, making this pier unusable as a dock. It was the furthest dock. At one point, there had been plans to clear the wreckage. That had fallen by the wayside and, once the non-humans moved in, the entire area fell into disrepair, left abandoned by the city’s leaders. Now, it acted as a shanty town right in the middle of Cliff, further reducing the appeal of clearing the dock.

Out here, people avoided Darius for different reasons. He was a human, which wasn’t automatically a bad thing for those living here, but he also wore relatively fine clothes. The uniform of an inquisitor was well known to the point where anyone who saw him would know that he wasn’t someone they wanted trouble with. As long as he wasn’t investigating them, they would duck their heads and avert their eyes.

Case in point, a lizardman and an orc both shifted away from him upon spotting him, diverting their path down a small alley well before he neared.

Things were changing, however. There were a few stares in the shadows. A sphinx, lounging outside one of the buildings, eyed him as he passed with curiosity rather than fear. His frequent trips through the area must have been noticed.

Reaching the pier, Darius headed to the far end. It had become routine at this point. He even knew which of the worn wooden planks to not step on. Nothing had broken under his weight thus far. A few boards were still a little suspicious.

A week after his latest encounter with Arkk, he had been down this pier with a small glowstone and all his notes on the fissure in the sky. It had been nearly a month since then. In fact…

Tonight might be the second full moon since then.

Perhaps it was time to end this charade. A month, Darius had bought Arkk. A month, Arkk had failed to deliver on his search for information related to the fissure. A month hence and Arkk, assailed by the armies of two nations, would likely fall. He well knew that the Abbey of the Light was researching as much as possible, coming up with countermeasures to the tactics and magics that Arkk employed. From the planar magic that allowed him unparalleled mobility to the clairvoyance scrying offered, the petrification of a gorgon’s gaze to the flames of Purifier Agnete.

If the Abbey was conducting such research—and coming up with results—he knew that the Golden Order would be doing the same.

The latest stunt of burying Gleeful Burg was being considered as well.

Darius planted his cane between his feet, standing on the far end of the pier. A slight breeze, reeking of that oceanic salt, brought a chill wind from north of the city. His long coat fluttered in the wind. Dots of mist over his glasses made him frown in annoyance.

There was nothing out here. He wasn’t sure what he expected. A letter pinned to the wooden piles or an incognito messenger. Maybe one of the non-humans from the shantytown delivering a note. Something to indicate that he could continue to trust in his profile of Arkk.

Pulling open the lapel of his coat, Darius carefully rubbed his glasses against the fabric, clearing away the dots.

After this, he would return to the church and….

Turning, Darius froze.

The sun dipped below the large mountain that gave Cliff its name, shrouding the shantytown and the pier in shadow. The sun had yet to set fully, letting him see, it was just a heavy shadow.

Yet that shadow was heavier still along the wood of the pier. The dots in his vision were back. Except, instead of blurry spots on his glasses, they were bright golden lights that did nothing to disperse the dark shadow around them.

An oily tendril stretched out of the shadow before reaching back in, pulling more and more tendrils out in twisting knots. They formed together, merging like an oily blob into the rough shape of a human.

“Good evening, Master Inquisitor Darius Vrox.”

“The horror from beyond the stars,” Vrox said, keeping his voice as steady as possible.

Was this it then? The betrayal of the trust Vrox had placed in the farmboy? He had sent his monster—Vezta, if he remembered correctly—to carry out his dirty work.

Darius was alone on the end of the pier. There was nowhere to run but into the water. In the frigid winter and with his bad leg, diving in might well be a death sentence for him. And there was nothing to say that the horror couldn’t follow him. There were none of his inquisitorial allies in the vicinity and he doubted he would get any assistance from the shantytown. They were more likely to join with Arkk. He well knew that many already had.

Instead of an attack, the horror adopted the facade of a petulant frown. “Horror from the [STARS]. Or of the [STARS],” she said in a tone clearly annoyed.

Darius flinched at her words, feeling like the sound carried far more than the mere words she spoke yet those words were beyond the simple understandings of a mortal mind.

“Beyond the stars makes no sense,” she continued. “There is nothing beyond the [STARS].”

Darius winced again but forced his normal smile into place. “I’ll be sure to update the Abbey’s lexicon once I return,” he said, projecting all the confidence he didn’t feel given the situation. “I presume you came for more than complaints over word choice. Be on with it, horror, or be gone.”

The horror paused, straightening her spine. If she even had a spine. Tilting her head to one side, she frowned. “My master sent me to convey his most sincere apologies.”

Darius tensed, leather gloves creaking as they gripped his cane. “Arkk didn’t come in person?”

“With the Duke’s recent edict of an alliance, he has been… busy. Preparations to make, people to kill. You know how it is, I’m sure.”

The smile slipped from Darius’ face. “Be on with it, horror. Don’t drag my death out longer—”

“You?” She cocked her head to one side again, clearly a practiced movement. One she likely picked up from being around humans. “No, no. I have no orders to kill you. As I said, I am here to convey an apology. My Master wishes to apologize for unintentionally deceiving you on your previous encounter.”

Darius blinked twice. First, in mild relief. Maybe it would have been for the best given what his life had turned into, but he had no wish to die. Second, in disappointment. “He lied.”

“Unknowingly and unintentionally. Arkk genuinely did not know about this fissure in the sky and was honest in his intentions to assist you. It was not a ruse to escape. That said, we have since discovered that we were likely responsible for the event.”

“You… How could you not know?”

“Fortress Al-Mir exists underground. It has no windows to the surface. In addition, at the time of the event, we were rather preoccupied with holding an audience with a god.”

Darius clamped his jaw shut. That… had to be a lie. “Only the Ecclesiarch—”

“Oh no. No, no. I’m sure your Ecclesiarch professes to hold tea parties with the Holy Light every weekend. We entreated with Xel’atriss, Lock and Key. Master of boundaries and borders. She is likely the one who caused the fissure to appear.”

“This is… heresy. Blasphemy. Both.”

The horror dismissed his accusation with a casual shrug of her shoulders. “My Master wishes for you to know that, while the incident was our doing, after all, neither us nor the Lock and Key wish harm on this world. Our goals involve restoration, not destruction.

“That is the end of the message I was told to deliver. Good evening, Master Inquisitor.” She dipped her head in an insincere bow and started to turn.

Darius stepped forward, cane tapping with his step. “That’s it? You come to admit more crimes and… What does he expect from this? I must inform my superiors and he must know that, so why?”

The horror canted her head once again. She stared. Thinking? It was hard to say. “Please note that the following is my suspicion and not anything that was directly conveyed to me: I believe Arkk has grown fond of you. I believe he is genuinely sorry to have placed you in an unpleasant position by asking you to continue defending him even though he was, in the end, the one at fault.”

Statement over, she bowed once again. Turning, she started walking away only for the shadows around her person to reach out with thick, oily tendrils that appeared to pull the main body down into the pier. In the blink of an eye, there was nothing but shadow and even that dispersed back toward the city.

Darius stared after the horror, unmoving for the longest time.

He…

He didn’t know what to do. Arkk, the great fool, was the cause for all the concern. Darius had suspected even after Arkk claimed ignorance but…

The man told that thing to come here and tell him with no ulterior motive? No trying to get him to report more falsehoods to his superiors? He even brought a name. Xel’atriss, Lock and Key. The name meant nothing to Darius but the Abbey’s archives were vast. If he informed his superiors of that name, it was entirely likely that they would dig up information, maybe clues as to the source of the horror and Arkk’s unlikely rise to sudden power.

And, beyond that, countermeasures to that rise to power.

Arkk had just come out here and told him. Even with the war going on. Even with the war now turning toward him and him alone.

Darius…

He needed time to think.

 

 

Arkk didn’t like leaving the fortress behind while an active threat circled his territory.

In the short time it took to gather a team, the dragonoid hadn’t managed to find even the false fortress. It just looped around overhead, continuing even as night began to fall. It was a good thing its ice-covered body glinted in the twinkling stars and moonlight or else the scrying would have been much harder. He was a little surprised that it kept up its search even as night fell. Some beastmen couldn’t see well at night, others could. He supposed dragonoids fell in the latter category.

Confident that his scrying team would alert him if it found anything that posed a real threat, Arkk had gone along with his other plan.

It was high time to get rid of the Evestani threat. They weren’t quite to his territory but they were close enough that he wasn’t at all willing to let them continue.

“Careful,” Arkk said as Eiff’an and Orjja lowered a thick wooden plank down to the ground. Lines of brass on its surface linked up with adjacent planks as the two orcs latched it in place. Stepping away from it, they hurried back to the teleportation circle to gather up the next plank.

Arkk knelt at the edge of the platform, grasping hold of a small brass nub that stuck up. Rotating it around and around caused interlocking gears to turn a larger section of the forming circle.

He looked off into the distance, narrowing his eyes as puffs of white mist clouded in front of his face with every exhale.

Gleeful Burg had managed to get their fires under control in the six days since his assault. The Evestani occupiers had sent out scouting forces to every village within a day’s ride, likely searching for more food. Ilya’s efforts at evacuating all the surrounding villages and hauling their food stores, livestock, and anything else of value back to the fortress had paid off. Evestani found nothing. Their resupply caravans weren’t arriving thanks to Kia and Claire’s strike teams.

They weren’t in an all-out panic just yet. They must have had some food supplies outside the burg’s warehouses. Likely food brought with the army. Even with that staving off hunger, for the time being, they were getting a bit more frantic about searching nearby villages. They had to be running low.

Arkk adjusted the brass knob, altering the angle and distance as the orcs placed the final plank in its slot. The maximum distance he could set was barely enough. Since that avatar seemed to be able to detect anathema like the teleportation circle, he had appeared at the furthest distance possible.

The orcs brought in glowstones and placed them on the wooden planks where people normally stood to power the assembled ritual circle. Glowing magic spread out through the brass but a small modification made by Zullie and the blacksmiths kept the ritual circle from activating before he was ready.

Arkk made a few final corrections, double-checking his work with a crystal ball set to view the entire burg from far overhead. White mist inside the ball partially obscured most of the central keep and its surroundings. It was the same tactic they had used near Elmshadow to hide their camp from scrying. Unfortunately for them, while good at hiding some low-to-the-ground tents, it couldn’t hide the tall keep all that well.

Arkk let out a long breath, creating a stream of misty air.

This was it.

There were civilians in the city. Regular citizens of the Duchy. The Evestani army wasn’t leaving them alone. They were acting like raiders and pillagers, taking whatever they wanted from the people who were unable to stop them. They weren’t the target of this. Nonetheless, Arkk held no doubts that they would suffer because of what he was doing. They would have suffered anyway.

He planted his hand on the fresh modifications to the ritual circle.

How did one fight an army with only a few hundred employees?

By not playing fair.

Arkk pulsed magic through the ritual circle. The four glowstones dimmed just a hair. He adjusted the brass knob, just a little to one side, and pulsed his magic again. Then adjusted the knob and pulsed. In the span of a few seconds, he repeated the action a dozen times, draining the glowstones down to a barely visible dim glow.

“Swap!” Arkk called out when he felt his next attempt at pulsing the ritual circle fail.

Orjja and Eiff’an hurried forward, exchanging the expended glowstones with fresh, brightly lit ones.

As they worked, Arkk focused on the crystal ball.

The first boulder dropped a few seconds after he finished, slamming down against an invisible barrier around the keep. It broke apart, crumbling to pieces just as a second boulder hammered down. A third and fourth quickly followed. Then a fifth and sixth. More and more. Each impact following the first made that barrier flicker. Some bits of rock and stone fell through, even while most of the crumbling boulders slid off toward the middle of the city.

Even at the distance he was at, the absolute maximum range the boulder drop ritual circle allowed, he could hear the delayed impacts. They sounded like distant thunderclaps rolling over the hills.

Arkk had been on the other side of this very ritual circle at Elmshadow, working with several others to power the defenses of that burg. He knew the strain and stress that even a single boulder caused. He almost felt bad for the poor spellcasters who had likely been chatting idly in their defensive ritual circle right up until that first impact.

Now, they would be scrambling. People would be rushing to wake all the reserve spellcasters, getting them to move into the ritual circle as soon as one collapsed.

When Arkk had been defending Elmshadow, Evestani had only launched one boulder every few minutes and then only for a short while before their spellcasters had to rest.

As soon as Orjja and Eiff’an moved clear of the ritual circle, Arkk started up again. Another dozen house-sized boulders manifested high over Gleeful Burg, letting the force of gravity carry them straight down.

Before the second of the newest volley could slam into that shield, a blinding ray of gold, wide and large, went straight into the air.

That wave of boulders never made it down. Nothing impacted. Just as the rays of gold obliterated streaks of land, they took out the falling rocks as well. And yet, despite that, Arkk had to laugh. “Swap!” he said.

From his experiences in both Elmshadow and Gleeful, Arkk didn’t think the avatar could use that strong blast of magic in rapid succession. After blasting away an entire street, the avatar had swapped to thin, narrow beams rather than the wide blasts.

And Arkk still had a whole crate of glowstones.

From their perspective, it must be like he had found hundreds of high-level spellcasters, all operating multiple ritual circles.

Another dozen boulders started toward the keep in short order. The first hit the barrier, causing it to flicker. The second shattered it.

Ten more boulders fell, pelting the keep to rubble. Arkk didn’t stop there. As soon as the orcs moved new glowstones in place, he carried on, directing another dozen in the area around the keep. Most of the soldiers were concentrated just outside the keep’s inner walls. Some, however, were stationed at the burg’s outer walls. From earlier scrying, Arkk felt he had a fairly good idea of where most troops stayed at night.

None of his identified targets were spared. With the barrier down, he didn’t have to waste half a dozen boulders on a single target.

In less than thirty minutes after teleporting in and getting everything set up, the majority of Gleeful Burg was little more than a pile of rocks. Arkk tried to avoid the areas where he knew the civilians of the city had been relegated. At the same time, he spared not a single thought of mercy toward the Evestani.

He doubted he got the entire army. It was likely he wouldn’t even know how much damage he had done until days later after Evestani dug out any survivors. He still felt that he had done some damage. The largest concentration of their army in the Duchy was, hopefully, no more. Hopefully, Hawkwood and the Duke’s Grand Guard would be able to move in and begin reclaiming burgs and territory.

As the last of the glowstones faded, Arkk stood up, fingers tingling from how hard his heart pounded in his chest. “Pack it up,” he said, crushing his fingers in his grip.

Stepping through the door to the library, Arkk found Zullie seated at one of the large desks. She was shifted to one side of her chair, arm fully on the table from her elbow to her chest, with her head resting against her knuckles while her glasses sat off to one side. She didn’t move as he entered the room. Her eyes didn’t even open.

Hale sat a desk away, nose in a book. Arkk recognized it as one Zullie had recommended to him. A treatise on magical theory for ritual construction. It was thanks to that book that he had been able to craft a few of the specialized circles he had used. She looked up upon his arrival.

Noticing that Zullie hadn’t moved, Hale sighed. “She came in about five minutes after you left, opened her book, and immediately fell asleep.”

Acknowledging Hale with a nod, Arkk cleared his throat. Then cleared it a little louder. “Zullie,” he tried, keeping his voice soft. He didn’t want to startle her but he did have a few things to discuss. “Zullie.”

The witch’s entire body jerked. Her head fell off her knuckles, dropping to her chest before she caught herself. She pressed herself back in her seat with both hands flat on the desk. Arkk caught a brief moment of alarm in her eyes before registering the situation around her.

Heaving out a sigh, Zullie closed her eyes again. For a moment, Arkk thought she was going to go back to sleep. With another shake of her head, she looked up to him.

“You’re back.”

“Are you alright?”

“Of course.” Zullie picked up her glasses, straightening them on her nose. “How was it?”

Arkk pressed his lips together. Back at the fortress, far from Gleeful Burg and the possibility of the golden-eyed avatar blasting him off the face of the world, an unpleasant nausea had settled in.

There had been between eight and ten thousand people in the Evestani army. Anywhere from one to five thousand citizens of the Duchy depending on how many fled, how many were killed, and how many welcomed their new masters with open arms. Arkk still didn’t know how much damage he had done. Yet…

“Gleeful Burg has been buried under a layer of rubble.”

“Oh.” Zullie yawned. “Good. The glowstones performed as I expected then?”

“Each group of four got about twelve usages out of the ritual circle, give or take. There were—”

“Only twelve?” Zullie said with a frown. She blinked twice, looking down at the book open on the desk. Shoving it aside, she grabbed a parchment and quickly scrawled out a few notes. “You should have gotten sixteen to eighteen boulders out of each group.”

Arkk just shrugged. He didn’t particularly feel up to arguing at the moment. The ritual circle had failed after twelve most every time. Only once had he gotten thirteen. Given that he hadn’t designed or even sketched out the ritual circle—it had been premade—he didn’t think he could be at any fault for the discrepancy.

Frown turning to a scowl, Zullie returned to the parchment. She tested out the equations in a few different ways, substituting a variable here or there to try to figure out what went wrong. Hale scooted over, peering over her shoulder with obvious interest. Arkk would normally have been the same. Now, he just felt too drained.

“Can the glowstones be refilled with magic?” Arkk asked, interrupting her calculations.

“Yes,” she said slowly. “But I’m not going to.”

“Is there danger in refilling them too many times?” he asked, suddenly a little more concerned.

“Oh yeah. A major danger that I won’t get any research done,” Zullie said, scratching out a few notes on the parchment. “Not going to lie, Arkk, I like being here. There’s always something interesting to research. But I did not sign up to babysit a bunch of rocks. And they do need babysitting. Leave them too long in those charging circles and they’ll crack. Or worse, explode.”

Arkk let his shoulders drop as the mild tension bled out. “Then get someone else to do it.”

“Who?” Zullie said. She turned her head, looking at Hale for a moment before shaking her head in the negative. “The only ones qualified are me and maybe Savren. For near two weeks, I’ve done nothing but stare at a bunch of rocks and I’m tired of it. Looking into how to fill them was good. Doing so is not. Give me something fun to work on again. Let’s go back to the old magic. Staring at rocks left me lots of time to think and I think I’ve worked out a few options for spells based on the three we know work—”

“Stop, stop. I am interested in old magic. But unless you’re about to say you’ve come up with a spell that can replace that bombardment ritual, we still need those glowstones. Even if you have,” he continued, not letting her get an argument in, “having someone else able to launch dozens of boulders at once would be even better. If Evestani rallies whoever is left at Gleeful and joins up with one of the other detachments of their army, we might need to do this again.”

Arkk hoped not. Just doing it once felt like it had taken a lot out of him. Not magically. Emotionally.

If they had to do it again, he would do it differently. While the army was on the move or camped out in the wilderness between burgs. In retrospect, he should have left them their food so that they would continue and he could have hit them later. But… the situation had just felt so… dire. Like if he had waited, Evestani would have reached Fortress Al-Mir.

Maybe they would have. But… Fortress Al-Mir, with its enchanted walls and maze-like layout, would have afforded him the time to figure out a better solution.

Throwing the doubt from his mind with a shake of his head—what was done was done—Arkk looked to Zullie. “You turned away everyone who showed up with an interest in magic. I know you think they would be useless for research purposes but can you not take on a few assistants? Go find some of them and teach them how to work the glowstone ritual. Then we can talk about old magics.”

Zullie bit down on her lip, slowly looking over to Hale.

The young girl’s eyes widened almost comically. She shook her head back and forth. “I… uh… Arkk has me working on other things.”

“Do I?” Arkk asked, mildly bemused.

“You wanted me to fix that inquisitor.”

Arkk opened his mouth, paused, then clamped it shut again. Hale’s face went entirely impassive and unreadable. Which, thanks to knowing her for years, Arkk could read easily. On anyone else, it would be a knowing smile.

Pressing his lips together, Arkk sighed. Although tempted to leave Hale to Zullie’s mercies, he looked to the witch and said, “Find someone other than Hale.”

Zullie groaned. “What do you mean, fix the inquisitor? I already healed her as good as she’s going to get.”

“That’s a good point. Both of us should go and watch what Hale is doing when she asks Astra if she can fix her hand.”

Hale flinched at the emphasis on getting permission but nodded her head.

Zullie just stared at Hale, suspicious.

“You’ll see when we do it,” Arkk said, cutting off Zullie’s impending question. “Helping her might be the most immediately pressing matter at the moment.”

Getting those glowstones charged back up would be important but given how long it took, losing a little time now wouldn’t matter in the long run. Meanwhile, Sylvara Astra was both injured and actively in pain. And she might be able to help with their dragonoid problem, which Arkk imagined would be something she would more willingly do if he healed her.

He was tired. Exhausted. He wanted to go to his room and lie down, rest a little before the next big emergency.

Helping Astra wouldn’t just help her, however. If Hale proved her method of using the spell was safe and viable, she could help others as well. Several had been injured in Gleeful and would surely be grateful to receive additional aid beyond what minor healing they had already gotten. Beyond his employees, there were plenty among the refugees who were injured.

And then… there was the fact that Flesh Weaving wasn’t designed to heal at all, but designed to mold the body into something beyond. He could easily picture Dakka and some of the other orcs asking Hale for some extra muscle mass, height… extra arms? Eyes on the backs of their heads? Arkk wasn’t sure what all the possibilities were.

Arkk peeked in on Astra, checking on the prison. She was still awake. That was a good sign. Hopefully, she would remain so.

“I’ll see if she is feeling up to it. If she is, we’ll observe Hale’s work. If not, I want you to train others in the glowstone rituals. Come up with a few names while I’m gone.”

Before Zullie could argue, Arkk teleported down to the lower prison levels, raised his hand, and knocked on the inquisitrix’s door.

 

 

“There is a problem.”

Arkk let out a small sigh, looking up from his desk to find Ilya wearing a grim expression. “Of course there is. Did Evestani manage to get a shipment of supplies in? Did they figure out the teleportation rituals and are using that to either attack or resupply? Or maybe the protectors have decided they’ve suffered our presence in the Underworld long enough…”

The grim look on Ilya’s face shifted to one of consternation as she folded her arms. “If you would calm down for a moment, I could tell you and you could stop panicking over nothing.”

“Right. Sorry, I…” Arkk shook his head, leaning back in his chair. “Sorry. You were saying?”

“The scrying team, during one of their periodic sweeps over the Cursed Forest, noticed a dragonoid flying overhead. They noted it as an anomaly but it wasn’t doing anything and there is nothing on the surface that would be visible from the air, so they didn’t report it right away. That changed when, an hour later, it was still there, now circling in what looks like a search pattern.”

Standing, Arkk said, “We’re moving to the scrying room.”

He didn’t give Ilya a chance to protest, teleporting both of them instantly.

Dragonoids were humanoid dragons. Beastmen dragons, essentially. They were rare, mostly because they wound up hunted down whenever they showed themselves. According to stories he had heard and what he had learned himself since becoming a mercenary captain, dragonoids, when spotted, were immediately targeted by the greater Kingdom of Chernlock with all kinds of bounties going out on them. Otherwise, villages and even whole burgs tended to go up in smoke.

They didn’t like humans, demihumans, or other beastmen. Just dragons and other dragonoids. Near as Arkk could tell from a few scattered testimonies and reports, they blamed the other races for the decline of dragons. Given that it was the Calamity that caused the decline of magic and magical species, Arkk doubted anyone but the traitor gods were at fault.

Unfortunately, this was something he had to deal with. Especially because Sylvara Astra’s stated mission at Elmshadow Burg had been to hunt down a dragonoid suspected of working with Evestani.

The Master Inquisitrix was currently unconscious in a medical prison on the lower levels of Fortress Al-Mir. Zullie, as the most adept in wielding the Flesh Weaving spell, had done the best she could to fix up the damage caused by that golden-eyed avatar. Even with that, nobody was sure if the inquisitor would wake again.

The scrying room of Fortress Al-Mir was a small room with dim violet glowstones embedded in a maze-like ceiling. It was a recent construction, one made only after the war had started when he realized that they needed people watching outside the fortress at all hours of the day. He only had two crystal balls, both left over from the original fortress, and had eight people assigned in shifts, trained to look through them. Non-combatants, beastmen mostly, recruited from the refugees who nonetheless wanted to help with the war effort.

Ilya, though slightly jarred at the sudden location change, recovered quickly enough and waved Arkk over to a half-flopkin, Harvey. The beastman sat next to a tall pedestal topped with one of the crystal balls, long bunny-like ears lying flat down the back of his head.

“Is the dragonoid still there?” Ilya asked.

The flopkin nodded as he adjusted the view in the crystal ball. “It started circling over the north end of the forest, near Smilesville. So far, it hasn’t attacked the burg, nor can we find any trail of destruction that might indicate where it came from.”

Arkk leaned close to look into the crystal ball. An act that startled the poor flopkin. He hadn’t noticed Arkk’s appearance in the room.

“Arkk, eyes,” Ilya hissed, making Arkk blink.

On Arkk’s second blink, a faint red glow vanished from the surroundings. “Sorry,” he said.

Inside the crystal ball, a winged humanoid drifted about. For a moment, Arkk thought she was entirely cloaked in a thick white wool. Like a flying sheep. A closer look revealed that suspicion false. The white gleamed in the sunlight. Hard facets caught and reflected light. A slight misting trailing behind the moving dragonoid reminded Arkk a great deal of the effects of the ice marble, constantly outputting an aura of cold. In this case, rather than an aura of cold, it was probably ice shavings from the dragonoid, falling into a mist-like cloud in its wake.

Arkk couldn’t tell exactly how big the dragonoid was. It was high over the Cursed Forest, making it difficult to see its size relative to anything on the ground. That said, its wings were massive in comparison to its body. If Arkk assumed that its body was average for a human, one roughly his size, its wings would have stretched from one end of the canteen to the other. At least three body lengths per wing.

If it was larger than a human… it could possibly reach from one end of the temple room to the other.

“An hour ago, I thought it was just flying through the area,” Harvey said. “Something to keep an eye on but not to worry about. Now…”

“Search pattern,” Arkk said, repeating Ilya’s words from earlier. “It is too much of a coincidence. That dragonoid is looking for us.”

“If there isn’t anything visible from the surface, can we ignore it?”

“That isn’t quite true,” Arkk said, holding his chin in one hand as he peered at the icy dragonoid. “There are the hidden entrances near the burgs and then there is the entrance to the false fortress.”

“The hidden entrances are hidden, aren’t they?”

Arkk shrugged. Reaching out, he let a touch of his magic brush against the crystal ball. The image within fizzled as he took control, readjusting the viewpoint to the hidden entrance outside Stone Hearth Burg, Arkk stared at it from the overhead view. It was an old-looking shack. “We’ve had to build them up since I have people actively visiting the burgs to collect letters and other information,” he said. “They don’t really look different than a farmer’s tool shed, but that might be enough to catch our guest’s notice.”

“So, plan?”

“For now, keep watch on it every so often. Let me know if it does anything unusual. I’ll have the lesser servants drag some shrubberies over the few trap doors we have.” He looked over to Ilya. “Have John stop by the Stone Hearth garrison and see if they have any more information on dragonoids, how to take them down, and whether or not this particular one has had any reports about it.”

Dragonoids were powerful. Although the Calamity had rendered them sterile, they retained their personal magics. Much like gorgon, they had innate powers. Guessing based on this one’s appearance, Arkk guessed that they were dealing with some kind of ice dragonoid. Agnete might work against it but, at the same time, she was particularly vulnerable to the ice marble. If she found herself at a similar disadvantage against this dragonoid… Well, he had to hope that lightning or petrification would work.

Master Inquisitrix Astra had likely intended to use her purifier to counter the dragonoid. The Jailor of the Void’s avatar was dead now, nullifying that possibility.

Perhaps she had alternate solutions? There was an old village adage about putting eggs in one basket, though he wasn’t sure that a prestigious inquisitor would have heard that one.

“Keep up the good work,” Arkk said, patting the flopkin on the shoulder. With that, he teleported down to the medical prison.

Hale, watched over by a pair of gorgon guards, stood hunched over the Master Inquisitrix. She muttered under her breath, moving her hands in a circular motion that Arkk associated with the Flesh Weaving spell, though not quite right.

The two gorgon, Vissh and Jann, stirred at his sudden arrival. They quickly settled back down without a word once they realized who he was. Arkk didn’t say anything either, simply watching Hale work.

It was… strange. Hale twisted and pulled at the stump of the inquisitor’s dismembered arm, stretching it out into something resembling but not quite matching her other, intact arm. She wasn’t just mending flesh, knitting it back together, but instead created flesh. Arkk could see the muscles coiling together, tighter and thicker than a human arm should be. Bone cracked, spaced apart, and fresh material filled in the gaps, elongating it. Fresh skin rolled over the top, though even that was wrong and different. Thicker than normal. From all the injuries he had seen on his employees, Arkk would have likened it to orc skin rather than human skin.

The whole process was probably not very pleasant for Astra. It was a good thing the woman was unconscious.

Hale cut off the spell when the arm was roughly the same length as Astra’s other arm, sealing it off just before where the hand would be. Hale stumbled back, sweating profusely from her brow. She moved to wipe her forehead on the sleeve of her white tunic, only to catch sight of Arkk.

Her eyes widened. Taking a trepidatious step backward, she bumped into Astra’s cot and shot a quick glance at the woman like she was wondering if it wasn’t too late to undo what she had just done.

“How did you do that?” Arkk asked, stepping forward to inspect the fresh arm.

Zullie was far more adept than Arkk was at the spell and even she hadn’t managed to regrow an entire arm. Minor differences aside—it felt more like holding Dakka’s arm than a human’s—if it worked… There were several in his employ and among the refugees who were suffering from large injuries that Flesh Weaving hadn’t been able to help to this extent.

“You and Zullie don’t use the spell right,” Hale said in a near whisper, as if worried that she would be in trouble.

She was in trouble. Not for making the arm but for working on an unconscious person without even his say-so.

“The book explained how to use it but I think you ignored that part,” Hale said, touching the tips of her fingers together. “And Zullie either doesn’t want to catch your ire… or she finds the spell less interesting than other spells in the book.”

Arkk shot Hale a look, watching her wilt. “How do you know what the book says? Zullie wasn’t supposed to let you read it.”

“She didn’t!” Hale said, stepping forward. Her twin ponytails swung side to side as she shook her head. “Zullie didn’t do anything wrong. I read the book before she was even here, back the night the orcs attacked.”

“You said you didn’t know how to read.”

“I didn’t. But you had Zullie teach me after.”

“And you remembered the words enough to… retroactively understand them? Is that what you’re saying?”

Hale looked down and shrugged. “They just kind of stuck in my mind. Especially after Zullie taught me the spell, I just… knew.”

Arkk drummed his fingers on his arm, frowning down at Hale. “Have you tried other things from that book?”

Hale shook her head back and forth.

“Good. Don’t. There are a lot of bad things in that book,” Arkk said, voice firm enough that Hale flinched. Letting out a small sigh, he bent down and patted Hale on the shoulder. “And I understand that you’re just trying to help, Hale, but you can’t just go give a human an orc arm.” He paused, considered, then added, “Not without permission.”

“You told me to see if I could help at all. I did. That’s what the spell is for. It doesn’t want to heal. It wants to make things stronger. Better.”

“It doesn’t want anything,” Arkk said.

Hale stomped a foot against the ground. “Then why can’t you do that?” she said, pointing to the regrown arm.

Arkk didn’t have a good answer for that. He knew the spell wasn’t a healing spell, even if it could be used like one. The spell wanting to do something was ridiculous. However, the spell had been designed to do something else. To someone a little less experienced in magic, perhaps that felt like wanting.

Just what was Zullie teaching the impressionable girl?

As for the spell… he would have to reread that book again. At least the section related to Flesh Weaving. A little refresher on what the spell was designed to do might make it fight him less when healing. Or… Well, Ilya had yet to regain a full range of motion because of her mangled stomach. She was walking around and carrying out administrative duties well enough but putting her in any kind of a fight wouldn’t end well. But if she could be…

No. No way would Ilya agree to have her body molded into that of an orc’s. Or anything else.

A raspy voice broke Arkk out of his thoughts. “Noisy.”

Arkk blinked. Hale hopped back, startled. Astra stirred on the cot, though she didn’t move much beyond her eyes. Those red eyes glared out, lacking focus as she tried to turn her head. She didn’t make it very far before her face twisted in a pained grimace and she squeezed her eyes shut.

“I’m alive?”

“You sound disappointed,” Arkk said.

“You would be too if you were in half as much pain.”

“Sorry. We’ve done what we could.” He glanced toward Hale, frowning again. “Maybe a bit more than we should have. But that gold ray—”

“How long?”

“You’ve been in and out of unconsciousness for the last five days,” Arkk said, teleporting a waterskin to him. This wasn’t the first time he had this conversation with the inquisitor. She usually had a few moments of lucidity each day.

Astra tried to force herself up. Unlike the last few times, she managed thanks to her new arm. “Water,” she said, voice still rasping.

She reached out to grasp the offered waterskin, only to freeze. She reached out with her new arm… which lacked a hand. Staring at it, she slumped against the wall. Arkk moved forward and caught her before she could fall off the cot.

“I… can fix that. I think,” Hale whispered. “I just needed a rest.”

“We’ll talk later,” Arkk said before teleporting Hale and her gorgon bodyguards away, leaving him alone with Astra. Looking at the woman, he took her only hand and planted it around the neck of the waterskin. “You’ve been awake a few times,” he said. “Do you remember anything?”

Astra didn’t respond right away. She tipped the waterskin back, using her new arm to help hold it up. Arkk watched, trying not to look surprised at how naturally she moved the bulky arm. It was like she had been born with it. Right up until it slipped from the end of her stump. She lost her grip with her hand.

Arkk teleported it away before it fell.

Astra coughed twice, more in surprise than anything, and slowly shook her head. “Flashes. Fire. Golden light. Pain,” she said with a grimace, eyes searching the room. “This feels familiar.”

“You’ve woken a few times. Sometimes even long enough to eat.”

“I see.”

“I came here to try to wake you again,” Arkk said. “And I’m sorry for jumping right into questions but a problem has arisen and I’d like to know some answers before you lapse again. Do you remember hunting a dragonoid?”

“Is that really the most pressing issue?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. But it is an issue and you’re the only one with answers. Every other problem has people working on it.”

Astra pressed her lips together, closing her eyes. She waited long enough to answer that Arkk worried she had passed out again. Just as he was about to try to jostle her, she breathed out. “A suspected dragonoid was spotted coming down from the North Sea, freezing a trail of ocean water in its wake. This was just after the war started. Normally, mercenary companies would be hired to handle it. With the war, my task force was dispatched instead. Purifier Tybalt was to detain the dragonoid.”

“He is dead, in case you’ve forgotten.”

“I haven’t. Good riddance. He was always engaging in unauthorized use of his abilities.”

Arkk pressed his lips together, wondering what might have turned out differently if the inquisitors had gotten rid of Tybalt earlier. If not for Tybalt, Elmshadow might not have fallen. Likely wishful thinking. Those golden rays had done more damage than Tybalt had.

“Anything else on the dragonoid,” Arkk asked, hoping for something.

“Given the direction it came from, it was first suspected to be a scout for the Evestani army. No idea how they would have convinced it. There were no reports of it attacking villages. That doesn’t mean it didn’t, just that the war caused enough chaos for a few reports to go missing. Based on its known flights and words from the oracles, it was searching for something.”

“I wonder what,” Arkk said, tone flat.

Him. Or Fortress Al-Mir. One or the other.

“Beyond that,” Astra continued, “I don’t know much. We never caught up with it before…”

“Elmshadow.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t suppose you have a plan for getting rid of it without your purifier?”

She opened her eyes, strands of silver-blue hair hanging over her face. “Yours not up to the task?”

“Just trying to examine every possibility,” Arkk said, leading to Astra chuckling but not saying anything else.

That wasn’t nearly as much information as Arkk was hoping for. It was searching for him. The why was less certain. Was it working with the Golden Order? Or something else? Dragonoids, theoretically, would want the Calamity undone to restore their ability to procreate along with whatever other abilities had been stripped from them. Yet they were not known to be friendly toward humans and he, despite the occasional glowing eyes, was human.

Get rid of it? Approach it?

This was his territory. He could move about at will. Just as he had done with Inquisitor Vrox at Langleey, he could confront the creature and, if things proved hostile, get away in an instant. But then the dragonoid would know he was here and, unless Agnete could fight it or it was vulnerable to his lightning bolts, he didn’t have a great plan for getting rid of it.

He was about to ask a few more questions when he felt an urgent tug over the employee link. The distance away was familiar. Someone in the Underworld. He followed it back to Zullie. After a quick check on all the guards over there—none were panicking or engaging in combat—he let out a small sigh. The last thing he needed now was for the Protectors to try to fight.

If it wasn’t an attack on their little outpost, then Zullie must have finished her task.

Sure enough, she stood next to a crate of brightly glowing glowstones. All large, head-sized rocks that had been charged up with all the ambient magic over in the Underworld.

They were ready.

Arkk made sure that Astra was steady where she sat against the wall before he stood. With a wave of his hand, he pulled a small tray of bread and beans from the kitchens. “Try to eat something,” he said, setting the tray on the cot next to Astra. “And maybe try to stay awake. You’re safe here, though please understand that I can’t just let you wander at will.”

Astra looked down at her own legs. Or rather, her sole remaining leg. Hale hadn’t fixed that issue.

“Funny,” Astra said.

“I’ll check on you again shortly,” he said, teleporting straight to the portal room.

It was time to change his plan ever so slightly. To play a little less fair. If that golden avatar thought its magic was strong… Well, it hadn’t seen anything yet.

 

 

“On behalf of all of Company Al-Mir, I would like to thank you all for coming to pay tribute to our fallen brothers-in-arms.”

In the six and a half months that Fortress Al-Mir had been in operation under Arkk, there had only been one death. Kazz’ak, one of the original orcs, perished while fighting the slavers at Moonshine Burg. According to Rekk’ar, his death came about due to his own stupidity in treating the slavers as farmers subject to a raid rather than fellow raiders.

Arkk wasn’t completely sure that the explanation was true. He doubted Rekk’ar would downplay any failures he perceived in Arkk. Yet Arkk still felt that something he could have done to prevent the death. More training, for instance.

Now, Company Al-Mir lost four more.

“The actions we take are never easy. Company Al-Mir, since its inception, has stood for the people. We defended Darkwood Burg from malicious monsters.”

Farr’an. One of the original orcs. He had gone with Arkk to Darkwood Burg when they had been looking for Gretchen, the viscount’s daughter. He had fought the other Keeper of the Heart’s minions alongside Arkk. Arkk wouldn’t say that he knew him all that well. The orc was familiar enough that it twinged at his heart.

“We helped those who had nowhere else to live in safety and security, offering a home and shelter.”

Vezz. An orange-scaled gorgon—one of the few who had voted to kill Arkk back in the Silver City mines. Not that Arkk held that against them now. If any of the gorgon harbored resentment from his invasion of their one-time home, they didn’t show it. Vezz had been slightly more abrasive than others, disliking most non-gorgons, and yet he still volunteered for the mission in Gleeful Burg.

“We removed bandits and slavers who were terrorizing the small villages of the Duchy.”

Yatt’el. Another of the original group of orcs. This one hurt a little more. He hadn’t died in direct combat. While Arkk couldn’t claim to fully understand orcish culture, he did know that a warrior’s death was something respected. Dead was dead, in Arkk’s opinion, but not everyone saw it that way. Yatt’el had died in what was effectively an accident. He had the bad luck to have taken the full brunt of the flames from the bomb.

“Many of you decided to join us because of these virtuous acts. Helping those who couldn’t help themselves.”

Finally, Luc. Losing those who had been with Arkk for months hurt but losing someone new was a different sensation entirely. Luc was a beastman of an unknown type—he had feathers for hair but human hands and no wings—who had joined along with the majority of recruits before the Duke’s party. Losing someone so new felt like a betrayal. Arkk had a responsibility. It was his job and duty to see his employees safe at the end of every mission.

“And then the war began.”

He had failed.

Arkk stood at the center of a newly constructed room. One he had designed himself over the last three days. A fairly simple room. White stone walls with several columns standing in rows. The far wall held a simple blank slate. It wasn’t a large slate, though there was room for expansion if necessary.

He hoped it wouldn’t be.

“None of us expected it. None of us wanted it. And yet, when the call came for those willing to take on a dangerous mission to stymie the relentless advance of killers and raiders disguised as a nation’s army, you all stepped forward.”

Pressing his hand to the wall, Arkk engaged the only bit of magical architecture that he had included within this room. It wasn’t anything as fancy as popping an entire home out of the ground. Simple lettering carved itself into the slate.

“The act of willingly entering into a dangerous environment, knowing its danger well in advance, is by its very nature an act of heroic self-sacrifice for the sake of others. It is here where we honor those who paid a far greater sacrifice.”

The Cenotaph. An empty mausoleum dedicated toward those who had fallen. None of those who had died in Gleeful had their bodies recovered. Kazz’ak, though buried far in the east of the Duchy, had his name on the wall of the fallen as well.

About half of the permanent residents of Fortress Al-Mir stood inside the room with their faces grim, respectful, or simply neutral. There were no tears. Kia had spoken of Farr’an, stating that the warrior had saved the rest of her team with his sacrifice. Joanne had similar things to say about Luc and Vezz. Nobody else had all that much to say.

“Company Al-Mir has been made lesser in their absence. It will be felt in our halls, our minds, our hearts.”

These weren’t grieving widows or mournful children. All those who had a choice in signing up knew that this was a mercenary company. There was danger. With the war, it was impossible to keep everyone safe. Losses were expected.

“But I will not be one to lie down and accept our losses with a hung head. These men fought for something. Whether that be for a better duchy, honor, or distant family. Their sacrifice bought time. That time has been and will be used. It will not be in vain.”

Not everyone could come. It was important that the crystal balls not be left unattended and the Underworld needed its constant posting of guards to make sure the Protector didn’t slip through the portal. Some had simply declined to attend. If the rest of the gorgon were mourning, he couldn’t see it. Orjja, the orc closest to Farr’an, was in her quarters, obviously morose about losing her friend. Most of the rest of the orcs didn’t seem to care all that much. Their raiding origins and the way their previous chieftain acted meant they weren’t all that friendly with one another in general.

“Company Al-Mir will strike back tenfold for their sakes and when we do, Evestani will cower. Today, however, we stop and take a moment to honor our dead,” Arkk said, finishing the speech that he had prepared. The words felt… hollow. Vapid and vacant. Like even he was doing this because he thought it was expected of him.

He had no real idea how to handle a situation like this. How did Hawkwood handle it? The man had lost a significant chunk of White Company. Hundreds so far. Did he have a memorial for each? Doubtful.

In fact, Arkk doubted Hawkwood had done anything similar thus far. He probably wouldn’t until the war was over and done with. They would then have some large event commemorating everyone who died throughout the war. Assuming Hawkwood survived. If he didn’t… Well, wouldn’t be his problem, would it?

Something like this… it wasn’t for the dead. Unless some necromancer invaded the fortress, they were dead and gone. Nothing would bring them back as they were.

A speech like this, a cenotaph, the gathering. It was for the living. Those who continued to serve Company Al-Mir needed reassurance that they wouldn’t just be tossed aside like a chunk of rotten meat. Their mission wasn’t futile. They wouldn’t be forgotten.

The curt, respectful nod from Joanne as she left the room assured Arkk of that more than anything else.

Arkk remained where he was, standing at the head of the room with a stony face as the last few in the room departed. Ilya, who stood to the side of the room during his speech, approached. She didn’t speak. Her elbow bumped into his and her knuckles brushed against his hand.

That was enough to get him to look to his side.

Ilya offered a wan smile. “You alright?”

“Fine. I took a knock or two. Got some scrapes and cuts. Between Flesh Weaving and Vezta’s ministrations, I’m as healed up as can be.”

Turning her smile to a small frown, Ilya said, “That isn’t what I meant.”

“I know.” Arkk drew in a breath and let it out, trying to force out his emotions at the same time. “I thought that maybe, with all our fancy magic and resources, we might get through a war without any real casualties.”

“Idealistic thinking has its place. But this is war.”

Arkk couldn’t help but snort. “No kidding.” He shook his head. “I think I need to take a walk around the fortress. Not teleport directly to who I need to speak with, just walk and see and be seen. Take in the general temperament of the employees.”

“That is probably not a bad idea. It might even be good to make it a regular thing. To walk around like a normal person, that is.” If Ilya’s earlier smile had been strained, the one she adopted now was positively brittle. “Not that I think all the changes are bad things but… you have changed since… inheriting this place. All that fancy magic might have gone to your head a bit.”

“I’m glad you’re back. And not just because you help keep my head level,” Arkk said, flashing a smile of his own that he didn’t quite feel. “Is there anything I need to be aware of before going on a walk?”

Ilya shook her head. “The Underworld seems quite still. Eerie, if you ask me. One of the Protector things got a little closer but stopped and turned back when the guards readied weapons.”

“Maybe it wanted to talk?”

“Careful of that idealistic thinking,” Ilya chided. “Evestani sent out a small detachment to one of the neighboring villages.”

“As expected. I presume they found nothing?”

Ilya nodded. “It was one that we had already evacuated.”

“Good. Let’s keep a step ahead of them while we can.” Arkk cracked his neck back and forth. Standing for the entire memorial had put a small kink in his back. “I think it would be good to stop in on the refugees during my walk. They aren’t official employees but they live here for now.”

“Probably not a bad idea. Though…” Ilya waved a hand toward his eyes. “Might want to tone down the glow. Employees seeing that is bad enough. You’ll frighten anyone else.”

Arkk blinked, drew in a breath, and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, the color of Ilya’s face changed ever so slightly, lacking a red hue that he hadn’t even noticed. “I’ll try to keep that in mind.”

“Good. Do you want me to go with you on your walk?”

“I always want you at my side,” Arkk said, snaking an arm around her waist and pulling her closer.

Ilya didn’t protest, though she did roll her eyes. “Your tone implies a ‘but’.”

“But…” Arkk dropped his arms to his sides. “I think I want to be seen on my own for the time being. I don’t want to give the impression that someone is forcing me to be one of you normal people,” he said, making sure the teasing was apparent in his tone.

Besides that… Even though it had been three days, something about the memorial just made it a little more real that he had lost people. He felt like being left alone to his thoughts for at least a little while.

“Fair enough,” Ilya said, walking off. “I’ll head back to the scrying team and keep an eye on things for you. I’ll let you know if something crops up.”

Arkk watched her go, eyes drawn to the swishing of her hair. He waited a long few moments, letting her get further away. He was headed in the same direction, after all. Walking out now, following after her, would just make things awkward after having already said their goodbyes.

Though, as he waited, he looked down at himself. With a thought, Arkk teleported to his private chambers and removed his clothes, switching the finest black threads he had for a casual earthy green tunic. Although nicer than most anything he had worn before Fortress Al-Mir simply on account of having been made by the lesser servant who acted as a tailor, it was much more akin to something he would have worn back in the village.

He stayed in his room for a long while, deciding to let everyone who had been at the memorial settle into wherever they were going to be afterward. Some had duties to attend to. Others were free for the time being. Arkk occupied his time reading over troop movement reports on his desk. The largest concentration of Evestani was positioned at Gleeful at the moment but they weren’t the only invading force, just the spearhead.

If he let himself, he would have spent the entire day hunched over his desk. Forcing himself to stop, Arkk headed out for a walk on his own two feet.

He casually meandered, venturing through the library where a fairy was scowling over one of Zullie’s books on magical theory. For those who hadn’t been able to wield magic before contracting with Al-Mir, even a single lightning bolt was exhausting. She was trying to figure out why and maybe find a few other spells that she could cast. Arkk wished her luck and asked to be informed if she figured out good spells. Anything that could increase the abilities of those who could use magic would be invaluable in combat.

The smithy was a flurry of activity. Both contracted employees and uncontracted refugees hammered away at the anvils, repairing armor damaged in Gleeful as well as building new armor for anyone who, as of yet, had none. A lot of refugees were plenty pleased to help out in the war effort in any way they could. Most every village had at least one blacksmith, so with all the villages he had evacuated, they had a fairly sizable workforce sweating away in the warm chambers.

Agnete worked as well. Not just as fuel in the furnace, but working on her own project.

Her work wasn’t armor. She was making thin tubes with more tubes able to slide inside them.

Upon asking about the project, she paused, stared off toward the main forge, and shrugged. “Ever since we opened the portal, I’ve been having odd dreams. I decided to try to make something from the dream.”

“Dreams?”

“Nothing bad. At least, I don’t think so. It feels good, even. Something I can do to right some wrongs.”

“So… what is it?” Arkk asked, looking at the pile of wheels.

“I’d rather not get hopes up,” she said, speaking softly as she continued filing away. “If it works, I’ll let you know. It might be nothing more than a dream.”

“If you need any help…”

“Some of the smiths are helping me in their spare time, teaching me techniques and the like. I’ll let you know if I need anything.”

“Very well,” Arkk said, clasping his hands behind his back. Before leaving the smithy, he chatted with Perr’ok and a few of the refugees, making sure that they had everything they needed as well. A few requested a larger smithy, if possible. Enough skilled people were working now that it was starting to get crowded.

One thing Fortress Al-Mir was not lacking was space. The lesser servants in the gold mine were having to go farther and deeper lately. He might have to figure out alternate or additional sources of income before long. An expansion to the smithy still sounded like a worthwhile expenditure.

Fortress Al-Mir had several areas that were usually in a state of activity. Training rooms, the canteen, and the fight pits were perpetually bustling. Arkk visited each, chatting with his employees about various things they might need or how they were handling themselves. He tried to not focus on just those close advisors of his—he saw them every day.

The orcs, recruited thieves, and even some of Katja’s men who weren’t proper employees had set up various gambling games in the area around the fight pits. Dakka, Arkk knew, was a frequent visitor and victor of both the pits as well as the occasional round of cards.

They weren’t quite so busy today. A contingent of guards were stationed over in the underworld and most of those who had gone to Gleeful were still resting up after their ordeals there. The pits were completely empty, though Arkk did find Dakka and Raff’el seated with a pair of Katja’s men at one of the card tables.

Every single person at the table was cheating in some way or another. Observing the game for a few moments, Arkk was fairly certain that his orcs had allied against the two bandits. He kept noticing subtle cues passed back and forth.

He then noticed the bandits doing the same thing when one turned to sneeze, passing a card to one another in the process. If the look shared between Dakka and Raff’el was anything to go by, they noticed. But they weren’t calling them out on it.

What was it? A game of who could cheat better?

“Mind if I sit in for a hand or two?”

Dakka jolted, almost knocking over her drink as she stood to salute. Arkk did not miss the card slipping to Raff’el as she did so. “Boss? Didn’t know you knew how to play.”

“I don’t,” he said, pulling up a chair. They had games in Langleey Village. Nothing like this, however. “Go on, finish your hand then deal me in.”

“Uh…” Raff’el shot a pointed look at the two bandits. “Not sure this is the kind of game you want to get into.”

Arkk reached into an empty pocket, pulling several gold pieces from the treasury straight to his hand. He stacked them up on the table. “Come now, I can handle it. I’m a quick study.”

“Let him!” One of the two bandits said, eying the gold. Arkk didn’t know either by name. Just one of the few dozen people Katja had brought over from Porcupine Hill.

“We’ll go easy,” the other said.

The group finished up their hand, explaining the rules to Arkk at the same time. It was a kind of matching game where certain cards were worth more than other cards. You could make matches through drawing from the stack or off other players via a trade or the discard pile. It was important to not accidentally give away anything more valuable than you were getting. A complication when one didn’t know exactly what cards someone else might have. The game ended when someone knocked, indicating they thought they had the highest value hand at the table, at which point every other player would have one more turn before it was time to lay the cards down.

“So,” one of the bandits asked as Arkk got dealt his first hand. “Any idea how long this war thing is going to last? Not going to lie, I’ve been missing the sun.”

He was probably asking only as a distraction. Arkk felt no need to ignore the question. “Evestani is pushed in deep. Rooting them out at this point is not going to be simple.”

Arkk played a few hands normally, just getting a feel for things. The two bandits were clearly trying to bait out increases in the bet from him while Dakka and Raff’el looked like they were trying to help him out through discards or trades without actually involving him in their cheating. It was a nice sentiment that they would do so with money on the line, but entirely unnecessary.

Talk continued throughout the games. For every word on a mundane topic, three were exchanged on the topic of the war.

It quickly became apparent that the bandits were focusing their attentions more on Dakka and Raff’el, not viewing him as any kind of threat as they tried to block or steal the various discards that the two orcs made. Which, to be fair, wouldn’t be a challenge at all under normal circumstances.

These weren’t normal circumstances. This was Fortress Al-Mir and Arkk was the undisputed master of the fortress.

“Hypothetically speaking,” Arkk said in as conversational a tone as he could manage at the end of one hand, “what is the highest value hand possible?”

“Three emperors, three kings, and a wildcard to make four emperors,” Dakka said. “But the odds of that are so low…” She trailed off, narrowing her eyes.

She was right to be suspicious. Especially because the hand was literally impossible with the way things currently were. Dakka had an emperor card under the leather vambrace she wore on her left arm. One of the bandits had another hidden under a fold of his jacket. Arkk could see everything in the fortress. He owned everything in the fortress.

He waited for a few more hands to pass, letting the comment fade somewhat into people’s memories.

Then, on the next hand’s shuffle, Arkk did a little shuffling of his own. Swap a card here. Swap a card there. Like he could move people, crystal balls, and gold coins, he moved cards. He let one round go by to get some extra bets in, drawing and discarding a queen—which was quickly nabbed up by one of the bandits, much to Dakka’s consternation—before he slid in his heap of gold coins, knocking on the table in the process.

“Got something good there?” one of the bandits asked with an easy chuckle.

“I think so,” Arkk said, looking down at his hand with a small smile.

The two bandits looked at each other. One shrugged and gave the other a nudge. Surprisingly enough, that wasn’t cover for passing a card around. It was a genuine nudge.

One of them folded his cards. The other met his stack of coins with the pile in front of him. Raff’el looked like he was about to push in his stack as well, only for Dakka to shake her head. Both folded.

“I think,” Arkk said, laying down three kings, three emperors, and a wild card. “I think I am done playing fair.”

 

 

Lightning crackled in the air, hopping from one soldier to the next. In a second, the bright flash faded and twelve men clattered to the ground. Arkk didn’t spare them a second glance. He beckoned, waving at his employees.

Claire, along with an injured orc and a gorgon, hurried across a gap between buildings.

The dark elf clutched a hand to her arm, stymieing the flow of blood from a wound. Jorr’or looked like he could barely walk, being dragged along more than anything. While Vissh didn’t look too injured, Arkk could feel a level of pain in the link coming from the gorgon.

Yet there was no judgment in their eyes. No accusations about how he could have shown up earlier or sent more support. Claire gave him a thankful nod of her head as she headed into the older house he had emerged from. After they helped Jorr’or onto the teleportation circle, Claire hopped on next and vanished. The gorgon quickly followed.

Arkk didn’t join them. With a muttered incantation, he summoned up a lesser servant. It ate through the evidence of the teleportation circle as Arkk hurried out of the small home.

Claire’s group, albeit unknowingly, had been traveling a mere street over from Kia’s half of the strike team. He had provided Claire with an alternate escape but Kia was still heading toward one of the original escape points. Vezta provided another alternate teleportation point, closer to where Kia’s team was headed, but the servant had gone to reinforce Joanne’s group.

Arkk rushed through the streets, stepping over bodies. Not all the dead were his and Company Al-Mir’s doing. Some were regular citizens of Gleeful Burg who either hadn’t escaped before Evestani moved in or simply decided to stay. They were just left in the streets to rot and feed the rats.

It was a warning.

Evestani hadn’t put everyone to the sword. Not in this nor any other occupied burg. At least not yet. As far as Arkk could tell, as long as they didn’t cause trouble, the Evestani left most citizens alive.

They did displace a lot of them. The entire keep and its surrounding buildings had been cleared out. The outer wall of the burg and all the people who lived along its perimeter had been relocated as well, cramming the people in small groupings throughout the city.

What he was doing now would get more killed. Even if Evestani continued to leave them alive, the food was gone. They would starve. But… Arkk had a feeling that they would have starved anyway. The army needed supplies and it was doubtful that they would share with the civilians.

It was possible they would kill the citizens after this. A retaliation. A message. Don’t mess with us or we’ll kill everyone. Arkk… had to believe that they were already dead. Better this way than Evestani marching forward to do the same to other burgs and villages.

He had to believe that.

“Electro Deus,” Arkk intoned, blasting a crossbowman off a roof before he could loose a bolt at Kia’s group.

The other dark elf had a larger force at her side. One more gorgon, Vezz, and six orcs.

Two had already died. One in the initial blast, one later on during the escape.

Innately aware of where his minions were, Arkk waded into battle with no hesitation. He didn’t have to take even a split second to decide whether a target was one of his or not. Soldiers fell, crossbowmen seized and misfired, and a spellcaster turned to stone—though that last one was Vezz’s doing.

The tide turned with Arkk’s appearance.

Kia jammed her sword through the stomach of someone who should have been wearing armor. She wrenched it out the side of his body with a flourish, sending blood across the muddy street in an arc. Hakk’ar bashed a helmet in with a heavy hammer. A glob of caustic venom sailed through the air, splattering across someone’s arm, forcing them to drop their sword.

They could likely have taken care of everything on their own. Kia and Claire’s group were made up of experienced raiders. Arkk’s intervention just facilitated a faster and safer resolution.

After looking over the street with narrowed eyes, Kia hurried over to Arkk. “Claire—” she started, only for Arkk to hold up a hand.

“Already back at the fortress,” Arkk said, not stopping as he hurried across the street to one of the abandoned homes. The door was locked. Or jammed. A long spell blasted the door off its hinges. “Inside quickly,” he said, waving a hand to draw Kia’s entire group over to him. “You’ve done well. Hale is waiting to tend to any injuries on the other side of the ritual circle.”

One by one, the orcs and gorgon stepped through the teleportation point. Kia stayed behind, watching each to ensure they got through. As soon as Zojja made it through the portal, she looked at Arkk.

“We lost Yatt’el and Farr’an.”

“I know,” Arkk said, voice hard.

“Yatt’el went up in flames with the warehouse. Farr’an covered for us, blocking a path while we fought through another group. I watched him fall. He took out three armored soldiers on his own before succumbing.”

Arkk just nodded his head, not trusting himself to speak. Those two weren’t the only two who died tonight. They were the only two who had likely died because of him. If he hadn’t made those bombs so volatile, the crossbowman wouldn’t have been able to detonate it. The entire group could have stayed together, fought better. Yatt’el wouldn’t have been incinerated.

Kia, somehow, managed a smile. Or… perhaps it was that she didn’t feel all that much at their loss. Since their joining, Arkk had felt that Kia and Claire were… a little off. Emotionally. They were a little too hungry for a fight and the latter rarely spoke. Even though Kia was leagues more personable than Claire, Arkk was fairly sure it was an act.

In a war like this, Arkk didn’t much care. As long as they were loyal to him and weren’t harming anyone at Fortress Al-Mir. They could spill as much blood in battle as they wanted.

Kia didn’t say anything else. She hopped onto the teleportation circle and vanished.

Arkk didn’t move for a long moment, standing in the dark, abandoned home. The only light came from the roaring orange flames consuming the city. He scanned through everyone still in the city. Agnete and Lexa. Joanne and her group. Vezta. Dakka was out along with her team and now Kia and Claire’s team were safe.

Agnete and Lexa were still headed toward their target. Theirs was the only one not aflame.

Was it worth it to continue? Would they be in danger if they did? Should he pull them back now, before they wound up in over their heads? Three teams had successfully burned their assigned warehouses already and lesser servants had consumed a few of the smaller stores in all the chaos.

They weren’t in trouble now. The city was alert. He couldn’t scry on the keep but he did not doubt that whoever was in charge had noticed what they were targeting. With three storehouses down, there was only one main target left.

The real question was whether or not Agnete and Lexa could handle themselves. All Agnete needed was a glimpse of the storehouse and it would go up in flames. Lexa, with her stealth-based magic, could get them out.

They could do it. That was why he had sent only the two of them.

The lesser servant from the previous ritual circle made it to the abandoned building, curling around Arkk’s legs as it headed toward the ritual circle. It would be ready to consume it as soon as he left. And he needed to go.

While Vezta was assisting, Joanne’s group needed more help.

He stepped toward the ritual circle only to feel a tingle on his arms. A strange sensation of his hair standing on end. Some deep well of power formed elsewhere in the city and it was…

Arkk’s eyes widened.

It was just like at Elmshadow.

He dove backward, throwing himself out of the abandoned home and into the muddy street, hands over the top of his head.

The sound went dead. The distant roars of flames fell silent. Shouts and clattering armor went still. The general noise of wind and settling buildings stopped in its tracks as the entire world held its breath.

A ray of gold filled his vision. It wasn’t hot. No heat burned at his back.

The sound came rushing back in a deafening cacophony. As if every sound that stopped during that brief pause had to make up for the time lost. Arkk grit his teeth, forcing himself up and out of the mud.

The abandoned house was gone. As were its neighbors. And their neighbors. An entire row of the street had turned into a shallow trough.

Gritting his teeth, Arkk threw himself to his feet.

Vezta was assisting Joanne’s group. They were practically on the other side of the burg. She hadn’t noticed the golden beam or his situation. Once she returned to the scrying team, she would immediately provide an escape. Arkk didn’t know how long that would take. Joanne’s team was bogged down heavily at the moment.

The scrying team would alert others to his situation. They lacked the ability to rapidly craft teleportation circles so they would use one of the preexisting ones to send reinforcements through.

Arkk pivoted, scanning the newly changed layout of the city around him. He knew the map. He had scried the burg enough on his own to know it well enough. He knew where the concentrations of Evestani forces were holed up, which routes they would likely take to reach the towering infernos, and which areas might be safer.

He took a few steps, breaking into a run. There were no soldiers around in the immediate area but after that golden light, some would surely—

“Leaving so soon?”

“Electro Deus,” Arkk snarled, throwing his arm toward the voice before even turning his head.

Blinding, overpowered lightning split the air with a sharp, deafening crack. The violet bolt of lightning crackled through the air.

A flash of golden light deflected it, sending it off into one of the remaining buildings on the other side of the street. The wood and stone blasted to pieces. Bits rained down onto the muddy street.

“You caught me off guard with that before. Never again.”

A child stood along the edge of the trough. A middling teen girl who couldn’t be any older than Hale. She stood in a casual pose with an easy smile on her face. The glowing gold tattoos around her shaved head and matching eyes were more than enough to keep Arkk fully on guard.

He wasn’t Agnete. He didn’t have a way of avoiding that golden ray. When told of the problem, Zullie hadn’t managed to come up with anything beyond ‘don’t get hit’.

“I thought I smelled anathemic magics around here,” she continued, looking off to where the abandoned building had been standing a few minutes before. “Naughty, naughty. You do realize that pokes little holes in reality, right? They leak all sorts of unpleasant magics and take forever to heal back up.”

Lightning crackled between Arkk’s fingertips, just waiting for him to sling it off toward the child once again. That deflection had him wary. It was too similar to Chronicler Greesom’s defensive magic. Arkk’s employees had wound up injuring themselves more than the inquisitors during that encounter. Neither Greesom nor this child had reflected his lighting at him directly but both cast it off to the side.

“You’ll forgive me if I don’t take your word for it,” Arkk said. If the child wanted to talk, talking would buy him time to think. “Seeing as we’re enemies and all.”

A dozen other spells flicked through Arkk’s mind. Nothing offensive. Anything that directly struck the child could turn against him. The child wasn’t invulnerable. Assuming it was the same being from the Duke’s party and Elmshadow, Vezta had killed the ones at the party and he had blown the arm off the one at Elmshadow.

Judging by the tattoos, Arkk had no doubt it was the same person. Just possessing… a child.

A flash of anger coursed through Arkk at the thought. He didn’t like the idea of possession in general. While he had possessed both Vezta and Zullie, they had both offered prior consent. The latter for research purposes and the former simply because she viewed it as a kind of honor.

Had this child agreed to be a puppet? What about the one from Elmshadow? Arkk had taken that child’s arm. Had the golden-eyed being released the child, discarding the boy as soon as he lost some of his use?

Arkk forced his jaw loose. He was getting distracted by his own anger. That wasn’t productive for the immediate situation.

Returning his thoughts to spells, he considered. Something like the Road of Stability he had used at the Duke’s party… something that enhanced its user. Those kinds of spells would work.

But the incantations were long. Long enough that someone who did not need to speak words would be able to fling off a ray of golden light at him well before he could finish speaking.

Arkk needed a moment. A slight chance. A distraction. And if he had a distraction, wouldn’t a lightning bolt to the skull be a better option?

It was a child. It didn’t deserve…

Arkk clenched his teeth.

He had to decide quickly. A distraction was on its way.

Arkk kept the lightning curling around his fingers. Constantly funneling magic into the spell to keep it going without having to repeat the incantation. Every instant would be important.

The golden-eyed being had said something during his thoughts, something he hadn’t quite registered in his anger. Unable to reply to it, Arkk had to keep the conversation going. Just a bit longer. “You’re the one from the Duke’s party? The assassins?” Arkk asked.

The girl raised an eyebrow. “You…” She paused. “You can’t be this ignorant. You haven’t figured out what I am yet?”

“You’re an avatar of the Heart of Gold.”

“Oh good. I had a genuine fear that [Servant]/[sliver]/[STAR]-[slave] hadn’t bothered to tell you anything.”

Vezta. He was talking about Vezta.

“Awfully considerate of you to worry over me. And here I thought you wanted to obliterate me,” Arkk said with a casual wave to the trough that had cut through the burg.

“You are, ultimately, inconsequential. You are a mortal. You will die eventually. You’re just an obstacle on the path to [her].” The child chuckled. A very… uncanny chuckle. It was not the kind of laugh a normal child would give, but rather someone far older. More jaded than a child should be. “I should be thanking you. We knew there was one more unaccounted for. By dragging her out into the light, we can finally—”

A spiraling column of flames erupted into the skies, filling the night with a bright red-orange light. Even from the distance he was at, Arkk could feel the heat wash over him, warming him from the otherwise chill winter air. The familiar sensation of Agnete’s fire spread across the clouds.

He had told her to make it big and showy. More in the hopes of cowing the army, maybe even burning the whole of the keep down.

The child tensed, on guard. But her guard was focused on the flames in the distance, not on Arkk.

The lightning had been dancing between his fingertips, curling around his arm, fueled by minutes of constantly pouring magic into the spell to keep it going… Arkk barely twitched his fingers and the lightning was gone. It careened through the air in the blink of an eye, slamming into the child with the force of a hundred of his most powerful bolts. The resulting thunderclap boomed over the burg, stronger and louder than any Arkk had heard before.

He fell backward from the shockwave, landing in the mud, entirely unable to see thanks to the spots in his eyes. Arkk blinked his eyes several times, trying to clear the seared bolt of lightning only to remember that he didn’t need eyes to see himself. Like at the Silver City mines, Arkk focused on himself with the link from the fortress.

It didn’t offer a good field of view. Just a top-down perspective like he was scrying on himself from a point directly overhead. It was enough to get him on his feet and oriented in the direction he needed to go. He didn’t know what happened to the golden-eyed being or the possessed child. They were too far from him for his current perspective to see.

The fact that he wasn’t dead from a ray of golden light was telling.

Hopefully, it had been quick.

Arkk started running. He assumed that most guards would be focused on the inferno at the keep. That didn’t mean he wanted to stick around in this Evestani-infested town even a moment longer.

He made it a street over from the teleportation circle before he started to feel that build-up of tingling magic on his arms once again. Gritting his teeth, he veered off from his current course, throwing himself between two buildings.

Another ray of golden light crashed through the city, taking with it another narrow slice of land, buildings, streets, and everything in between. It was smaller than the previous ray, not enveloping the entire street. That just meant that debris came crashing down as the buildings collapsed, forcing him to duck and dodge as he dashed through an alley.

“Electro Deus,” Arkk muttered, panting heavily. He didn’t fling a bolt of lightning straight away. Aside from knowing the direction the beam had come from, he didn’t have a target. Instead, he just funneled magic into the spell once again, hoping that overcharging it like before might let it penetrate whatever defenses the golden-eyed being could come up with.

A much narrower beam of gold light tore through the building Arkk had his back against. Not even as thick as Arkk’s arm. It swept a few paces, slicing a small hole into the building. The cut wood behind Arkk cracked and broke, falling and collapsing into itself. The building opposite Arkk suffered the same fate.

He ducked down, crouching low as part of the wall fell.

Another thin beam of light did the same to the buildings on the opposite side of the fresh chasm.

He was… mostly certain that he had made that thing upset.

Blinking his eyes a few more times helped his vision return. It wasn’t perfect but it was enough to see by. With a grimace, he peered around the side of what was left of the building.

The golden-eyed being had taken on a new form. An older boy stood at the far end of the road. Late teens. Maybe even in his twenties. He had the same tattoos around his shaved skull but, this boy looked… in poor condition. Welts, cuts, and other marks marred his body. Like he had been strapped to a pole and whipped. The tattoos around his head looked raw and had streaks of red all around his shaved head. They had been bleeding recently.

The boy, looking off after the most recent beam of light, whipped his head toward Arkk as soon as Arkk revealed himself.

He raised an arm, golden light forming at the tips of his fingers.

Arkk slung his lightning bolt. It wasn’t as charged as the previous one and that came through in the dampened crack and less blinding light. Nevertheless, it forced the boy to swipe his hand, deflecting the lightning off to the side.

He immediately lowered that hand and raised his other, forming another light at his fingertips.

Arkk sucked in a breath, wincing in prescient knowledge of his own bisection. He threw another lightning bolt. This one weak in the wake of the previous, not having been even mildly charged up.

The boy didn’t even dodge, seizing slightly upon it striking him but otherwise ignoring its effects as he continued to build that golden glow at the end of his fingertips.

A crossbow bolt slammed through the boy’s extended arm, sending the beam of gold off into the skies.

Arkk didn’t question his good fortune even as the boy snapped his head toward where the bolt had come from. Instead, he repeated the incantation, “Electro Deus,” and threw out a fresh bolt at the golden-eyed boy.

It struck at the exact moment another blast of golden light fired at the source of the crossbow shot.

A scream echoed off the half-toppled walls of the buildings around Arkk.

The boy went into a seizure, crumpling as black smoke wafted from his form.

Dead? Not? Arkk didn’t move to find out. His eyes were drawn to the scream.

A woman. Not one of his minions. At first, Arkk didn’t recognize her, figuring she must have just been a civilian who had picked up a fallen guard’s crossbow. She wore tattered clothes and had a grime-covered face. One of her legs, along with half her side, sat in the mud apart from the rest of her, cut off by that last golden beam. She was missing an arm as well, but bandages around the stump meant she had lost it well in the past.

It was her grimace-set face, brimming with determination like she could pull through having been cut in half, that clicked in the back of Arkk’s mind.

Master Inquisitrix Sylvara Astra.

His first instinct was to leave her. Abandon her. She was, likely, an enemy.

But she had saved his life.

Swearing under his breath, quickly checking every relevant employee of Fortress Al-Mir, Arkk made the decision. He sprinted across the open terrain, down and back up the shallow trough that the large golden beam had cut. The golden-eyed being hadn’t gotten up. Arkk assumed he was dead or injured enough to not matter for at least a few minutes. There was probably another tattooed child waiting in the wings but, for at least a moment, he was safe from golden rays of light.

He swore the Flesh Weaving spell under his breath.

The Inquisitrix was missing a leg, part of her hip, and her forearm. Her shoulder and chest were still intact, as were the vital organs contained within. She had probably lost something important along with her hip but Arkk didn’t have the time to do any in-depth repair. He swept his hand over her fresh wounds, sealing them shut and little else.

She didn’t speak upon his approach or while he was healing her, leaving her face locked in that determined grimace. Her eyes glared daggers at him like she resented being saved.

“Leave me,” she said without unclenching her teeth. “Just promise you’ll kill that bastard. The real one.”

“I can promise that. But you aren’t being left behind.”

The second he finished speaking, a teleportation ritual carved itself into the ground at his side. Vezta appeared within.

She didn’t have a comment. She didn’t ask what he wanted. As if she could read his mind, she reached out with long tendrils and grasped hold of the inquisitrix. Arkk summoned a lesser servant in the short time it took them to disappear before hopping on the teleportation circle himself.

The lesser servant was likely unnecessary. Just before he vanished, he could feel the hairs on his arms rising on end once again.

The lesser servant blipped out of existence in a blast of golden light.

 

 

“Gleeful Burg has four primary storehouses and several smaller, secondary storehouses. Two of the main storehouses are within the inner keep walls. Evestani has set up anti-scrying warding within the walls of the keep.” Arkk took a breath, looking around at his assembled team. “Unfortunately, that means it is too risky to teleport inside.”

Arkk had yet to see evidence but Vezta was quite confident that teleportation rituals could be warded against. Generally in such a way that the one trying to teleport would end up more of a mess to clean up than a person. If anyone had access to that kind of magic, it would be an avatar of the Heart of Gold who seemed a little more in tune with the god than either of the other two avatars Arkk had seen.

“The smaller storehouses are already being taken care of. I have lesser servants poised to consume everything within on my signal.”

“That tactic won’t work on the larger storehouses?” Dakka asked, standing at the head of one of the four groups.

Dakka led a team of black-armored orcs. The ones she had been working with and training with the most. Since opening the portal, they had been guarding the other side. Now, he needed them here. Some of the fresher recruits were keeping an eye on the Underworld as Arkk had deemed it slightly less of a hostile posting.

The Protectors were still watching the portal but none had moved within a certain range of it, giving it plenty of space.

Four gorgon joined Dakka’s group, providing long-range support and the ability to petrify anyone too troublesome to deal with directly.

“The larger storehouses are under heavy guard. Lesser servants are weak to the point where one would lose a one-on-one fight against a goblin. Burrowing up from underneath the storehouses might be able to do a bit of damage but they would be discovered and the guard would be doubled. We need to do this in one decisive strike.”

“Question,” Kia said, raising a hand. “While I appreciate the trust you have in our skills…” She paused to motion back to the supply caravan strike team. They were team two in this operation. “I’m not quite sure how we’re going to destroy a warehouse full of food with swords.”

“You won’t,” Arkk said. Reaching under the table he stood in front of, he hefted up a large clay jar. It stood about as high as his knees and weighed as much as a young pig. “Agnete, Zullie, and I whipped this up over the last three days. It is… a bomb, effectively.”

More than one of those watching took a respectful step backward.

“This one is empty,” Arkk said with a small smile. “Real ones contain an alchemical solution known as liquid fire, a ritual array scribed into the walls and lid, and a glowstone to power the array. Do not try to open them,” he said, emphasizing the words as much as possible. A small metal clamp around the rim kept the lid on but it was always best to make sure they knew. “Not unless you can survive an inferno raging around you that most common magics can’t extinguish.”

Despite his assurances that the jar was empty, the entire group looked like they very much wished this little speech was taking place in a much larger room.

“They work by rotating the lid until the arrow notch lines up with the notch in the rim of the jar. At that point, you have five minutes to get away before everything goes up in flames. They cannot be turned off once activated—by design—and they will go off if the jars are cracked or otherwise destroyed. However, they are fairly hardy. You’ll find it hard to accidentally break them. Probably avoid dropping them,” Arkk added.

“Oh good,” Joanne said. She was one of the former members of the Order of the Claymore and the current leader of the third task force. “Try not to drop the bomb while wandering into the stronghold of an army.”

“Ideally, none of you will actively engage in combat of any kind. You sneak in, you plant the jars, and you get back to the teleport points before anyone knows you were there.”

“Ideally,” Joanne said, sounding like she was trying to hold back a more scathing statement. “I was with the Claymores for five years. Spent about seven years before that in various smaller companies. I’ve seen how badly things go to shit in ideal scenarios. So what’s the realistic outcome here?”

Arkk pressed his lips together, looking around the room. Several of the newer recruits behind Joanne nodded their heads. A lot of them weren’t all that happy with the Duke situation. He could almost see their second thoughts about sticking around. Then again, even Dakka was looking a little nervous.

With good reason. An army of nearly ten thousand stood inside Gleeful Burg. If something went wrong…

When something went wrong…

“Realistically, I’m expecting at least two of the storehouses to survive unscathed. Your lives take priority. If you encounter unexpected resistance or even an odd complication that looks difficult to resolve, you are to abort at once and escape to the nearest teleport point.” Arkk turned back to the large map hanging on the wall. One sketched from scrying on the burg. He pointed out the eight violet circles spread across the city. “We’ve identified several possible ingress points, which will also serve as your egress points. Memorize them, please.”

“I gotta question too,” Lexa said, holding her hand in the air. Her fingertips barely made it up to anyone else’s chest. Her group wasn’t so much a group as it was just her and Agnete. A stealth expert and… well, Agnete. They were headed to the deepest, largest storehouse. “You keep saying ‘you’. Are you not coming this time?”

“No. Vesta and I will be staying behind. I was getting to that—”

Joanne clearly didn’t like that. “The strongest spellcaster and the monster aren’t supporting us?”

“I didn’t say that,” Arkk said, holding up a hand to forestall any further complaints. “When you all joined Company Al-Mir, you may recall that you entered into a magical contract. One that allows me to detect when you’re in trouble. I will be using that extensively and actively during this operation. Vezta can scribe a ritual circle as complicated as a teleportation circle in an instant as long as she knows the location. Together, we should be able to reinforce or extract any group that needs help.” He paused, looking around. The explanation mollified most of the worried looks. “Obviously, we cannot be everywhere at once. Try to avoid needing our help if at all possible.

“If you need an escape and cannot get to one of the indicated points,” Arkk said, pointing at the map. “Find a place to hide. We’ll get you out. There are a lot of abandoned or otherwise uninhabited buildings in the burg. If you cannot find a place to hide, we’ll likely ambush whoever has you pinned and fight until you can extract yourselves or find a place to lie low, at which point we go back to the main teleport junction outside the city and reexamine the needs of the situation.”

Arkk clasped his hands behind his back, moving back and forth in front of the groups. “Some of you have a lot of experience in mercenary companies. I respect that. However, if you’re new and haven’t fought with Company Al-Mir before, know that we do things a little differently. Teleportation and scrying,” he said, popping a crystal ball into his hand as he held it out, “change the game. We appear suddenly, hit hard, and get out. Minimal danger to us. Maximum damage to the opponent. This operation is no different.”

“It has been an effective tactic on those supply caravans,” Kia said with a grin. In the three days that Arkk had been planning this operation, her strike team had taken out another two caravans. “Wish we had even one of those back in Raven’s Claw.”

“Uh…” Lexa shifted from foot to foot. “You said you can’t teleport into the keep.”

“Correct,” Arkk said. He looked from Lexa and Agnete to Dakka’s group. “Your two groups won’t have direct support while inside the keep. Dakka, your group will be in charge of storehouse three.” He pointed at the map. “It is right on the keep wall. You will be tunneling up from underneath with a lesser servant, planting the bomb, and then escaping as quickly as you can. Minimal time inside the keep.”

Dakka’s lips curled, baring her tusks. It wasn’t a hostile look directed at Arkk, more of just a reaction to the dangerous assignment. “Understood,” she said.

There was a possibility that the stone of the keep would be warded like that of the Duke’s manor. Arkk hoped not. Otherwise, Dakka’s group would be on a rather short excursion. He didn’t have a backup plan for getting around that kind of warding without Agnete to burn the enchantments away.

“Lexa, Agnete. You two are taking warehouse four. The one deep inside the keep. It’s also the largest storehouse, making it the highest priority target.”

“Just us,” Lexa said with a grimace even as Agnete simply nodded her head.

“You won’t need to carry bombs with Agnete. A small team, especially one with your abilities, is better than sending in a full force. With your magic, Lexa, you’ll be able to slip away a whole lot easier if things go wrong. But yes, you won’t have support for the majority of your part of the operation.”

Lexa twisted her little mouth into a frown before her eyes gleamed. “I want double pay for coming back alive.”

“Double?” Arkk said, tapping a finger on his chin as if thinking it over. “Well, if you insist—”

“I do.”

“I had been considering triple pay for everyone. But I can do double for you instead.”

“Wait… no—”

“Joanne. Your team has warehouse two. It sits right on the river that runs through the burg. Tunneling into it may prove problematic because of that. Not wanting to alert the enemy, I haven’t tested just yet. You’ll either be going in through teleport point one or six, depending on whether or not it can be tunneled into.”

“Can’t your monsters just eat the ground and dump it all into the river?” the mercenary asked.

“I did consider that. The river has a frozen layer of ice covering it, unfortunately, thick enough that unless I tunnel through that, all the stores will just sit on top ready for reclamation. I’ll have better information as we near the operation time, so make plans for either point. Or, if you have better ideas, let me know.” Arkk turned to the last group. “Kia, Claire. Your strike team will be taking warehouse one. Its location isn’t particularly tricky but it is heavily guarded. Expect a fight.”

Arkk took in a breath, looking over the assembled groups. “The scrying team is available to answer questions on enemy forces and city layout if you need more information. Memorize the map and, especially, the teleport points. Come up with plans that suit your teams’ skills. You have until tomorrow evening at sundown.” He paused, sending the crystal ball back to the scrying room. “Come to me if you have more questions. If you think certain people will be useful to your groups and they aren’t required for essential operations elsewhere, come to me with those requests as well.

“With Kia and Claire’s strikes on their supply lines, this should lock the Evestani army in place and keep them from traipsing about the Duchy at will. It will be dangerous. But it will save a whole lot of people.” Especially with Olatt’an and Ilya evacuating nearby villages. “It also buys time. Zullie is working on a solution for the army and a weakened army will be much easier to deal with.”

He looked around one last time, pausing long enough for any additional questions. When nobody spoke up, he nodded his head. “Let’s show these invaders why it was a mistake to set foot into the Duchy.”

Claire drew back her bow, held it for a beat of her heart, and let the string go. The light twang of the bowstring paled in comparison to the gurgling cry of a storehouse guard. The guard next to him turned, opening his mouth to shout. His entire form turned to gray stone, silencing his alarm before it could begin. The momentum of his turn kept the statue moving. It wobbled and fell, shattering against the ground.

Grin spreading across her face, Claire loosed another arrow. It jammed straight through the gap between another man’s hauberk and helmet, puncturing his throat as he turned to see what the commotion was about.

Kia and one of the orcs—Claire hadn’t memorized their names—ambushed another pair of soldiers who stood around the outside of the storehouse on the opposite corner. Their fight was a little noisier, not as smooth as Claire’s, but the orcs had strength to spare. The orc, using a pick-like weapon, jammed it straight through a guard’s helmet while Kia carved a man’s head from his shoulders. Another orc and gorgon were fighting behind Kia. The initial arrow had been their signal to go.

It was… a little disappointing. Their ambush had been too successful. Too easy. Even if someone had shouted, it was entirely probable that nobody would have come to investigate. A massive inferno licked at the clouds on the other side of the burg. One of the other teams had either burned their target or dropped their clay pot.

Either way, with everyone staring off in the distance and soldiers leaving their posts to rush toward it, their job had been disappointing.

The moment that thought crossed Claire’s mind, a massive rumble shook the ground. Another billowing inferno stretched to the sky, this one much closer. Inside the burg’s keep, which probably meant the orc’s team. Theirs was supposed to be the easiest of the four, even if they had to get into the keep to get it done.

Either way, a grin spread across Claire’s face as her ears twitched. She nocked another arrow. One towering inferno at a storehouse was an accident. Two? That was a pattern. People would investigate and…

Claire loosed an arrow just as a pair of boots rounded the corner of the storehouse.

The guard rounding the corner was just a bit taller than she expected. The arrow struck him square in the chest, knocking him back a step but not puncturing through his plate armor. While he stumbled back, another guard stepped around the corner with a crossbow already raised.

The gorgon at her side slithered in front of her, taking the bolt against the metal pauldron on its shoulder. The gorgon reared back and spat a globule of caustic venom. Claire could hear it sizzling through the air before it landed straight on the guard’s helmet. Some of it must have splashed through his eyeholes. He promptly started screeching, dropping his crossbow to claw at his helmet.

Claire eyed the gorgon with mild envy even as she leaned around it, loosing another arrow into the first guard properly this time.

“Incoming!” Kia shouted from behind.

Glancing back, Claire frowned. Two orcs were carrying one of the heavy pots between them as Kia, an orc, and another gorgon defended. Claire loosed an arrow over her partner’s shoulder. It might have grazed her ear but it slammed straight into the eye socket of a man with a golden tabard. Kia didn’t even look back, immediately taking the unexpected opportunity to bring her sword down on a pike before it could hit her orc companion.

“Our sside,” the gorgon next to Claire said, making her whip her head back around.

Three guards had learned from their fallen comrades. They rounded the corner with shields raised. Pikes poked out from between the shields, leveled at Claire and her gorgon. The one in the center lowered his shield just enough to catch a glimpse.

That was enough to turn him to stone. He fell forward, tripping the man on his right as he shattered. The short stumble provided all the opportunity Claire needed to unleash another arrow.

She wanted to ask the gorgon if it could turn the petrified pieces back to normal… just to see what it looked like.

The gorgon slithered after the arrow Claire unleashed, contorting its flexible body around the one steady pike to wrap the guard in a crushing embrace. Metal deformed as the embrace tightened. The guard within tried to scream but quickly focused on just trying to breathe. An endeavor he wasn’t quite successful with. The gorgon released the crumpled armor and broken limbs, letting it clatter to the ground as it returned to Claire’s side.

“We need to go, now!” Kia shouted from the opposite side of the storehouse. “They’re trickling in but we’ll get overwhelmed once more real— No!”

The two orcs who had been carrying the clay pot into the storehouse stepped outside. A soldier at the far end of the street, nowhere close to Kia or Claire, raised his crossbow at the same time. Claire nocked and loosed, but not before the man pulled the trigger. The bolt sailed toward the orcs. One got a shield up and the other dove toward Claire. The bolt careened past both.

Claire’s sharp ears heard the distinct sound of a clay pot shattering inside the warehouse.

Eyes widening, she threw herself to the ground. Heat and fire erupted from the mouth of the warehouse. A shockwave rippled over her, knocking the gorgon back further. The shockwave passed but the air still rushed overhead. The heat felt like being in the same room as that flame witch.

Raising her head, Claire scowled. A constant stream of fire rushed down the streets, igniting homes and houses in its way. She could see people—regular people, not guards or soldiers—fleeing from the buildings. Citizens of Gleeful Burg? Or noncombatants from Evestani?

A child collapsed further down the road, flames licking at the back of his clothes.

Claire didn’t even blink. Arkk would have known about them. He had been the one scrying on the city. If they were civilians, they were just necessary sacrifices to ensure the Evestani army stopped here.

Her attentions were drawn to the orc that had dived out of the way. His back was on fire even as he crawled forward, away from the rushing flames of the storehouse.

“Petrify him,” Claire said as the gorgon got back to its… feet? It didn’t have feet.

The gorgon stared, not arguing. A moment later, the orc stilled. The flames burned a few moments longer, perhaps taking out his gambeson, before they died out as well. There was no way she would be able to carry a stone orc. She doubted the gorgon could either, not even if they worked together. Kia and her part of the team were cut off. Hopefully still alive but on the other side of the flames.

“We need to find our own escape,” Claire said, looking around, remembering the map. “Unpetrify him. He’ll have to walk on his own. If he can’t, we’ll offer the Light’s mercy.”

The gorgon visibly bristled at the idea of killing their own companion. The way it stiffened irritated Claire. She would expect the same in turn. Better than being caught and put through torture to find out what they knew. Snapping her fingers, she caught the gorgon’s attention.

“No time,” she said, waving a hand to the burning warehouse. “If the whole burg didn’t know we were here before, they do now. I bet we have less than two minutes before we’re overwhelmed to the point that not even Arkk can help.”

That Arkk wasn’t here now was somewhat telling. Either someone else needed help more—Kia or maybe one of the other teams—or he thought they could get out on their own. Or he had been taken out while helping someone else.

Whatever the case, that got the gorgon moving. It promptly unpetrified the orc. To the credit of the orc, he didn’t start screaming or otherwise panicking. And he was awake. The gorgon helped him to his feet, looping its lanky body under his shoulders to help support him.

Claire was already walking. There were two egress points close to this storehouse. One was cut off by the wall of flames. Kia would likely head toward that one. Claire wasn’t sure for how long the fire would burn and wasn’t willing to risk sitting around in the hopes that they would die off before the army had them surrounded.

Bow nocked but not drawn, she moved ahead of the two, keeping her eyes and ears on alert for any sign of danger.

All the while, she grinned.

The thrill of being completely surrounded. The uncertainty of their possible escape. The notion that they would be deemed expendable and left behind. This was what she lived for.

Just when she had been thinking those strike missions against supply caravans had been getting boring, Arkk went and threw her into this.

She couldn’t have asked for a better excursion.

 

 

 

Arkk stared at the burning wreckage, searching for any sign of movement among the myriad bodies strewn about.

Decades of travel carved out a small road between the trees, leaving a relatively clear, if narrow pathway between Elmshadow Burg and Harmony Burg. Trees loomed large, hanging over the path, providing some shelter from falling snow leaving the trail useable in the winter.

Evestani had been using it to resupply their army.

The Evestani soldiers in charge of guarding the transport hadn’t been worth the armor wasted on them. Five orcs, two gorgon, two dark elves, and a certain knife-wielding gremlin had handily dispatched the supply caravan’s guards. Arkk hadn’t even stepped in. The two dark elves were in charge today. He was present only to observe Kia and Claire’s handling of the situation.

Thus far, he was relatively pleased. Claire could stand to tone down how much she toyed with enemies who got in her way but Arkk couldn’t deny the effectiveness of their tactics.

Most of the supply caravan would be going back to Fortress Al-Mir. The dried and preserved army rations weren’t good but could still find use anytime they had to make excursions. The armor and weaponry could supply new recruits without consuming blacksmith hours. The dozen horses they captured would need a place to stay within the fortress but would certainly help in any future operations.

Lesser servants could eat anything that couldn’t be used, converting it to gold for later use.

“A hungry army is a desperate army,” Olatt’an said, trudging across the forest pathway toward him. He wasn’t part of the operation either. Like Arkk, he was here to observe how the team handled themselves. “Hitting one of these won’t do much. They’ll strain their rations a bit and tighten their belts, but they’ll live.”

“Hit a few more,” Arkk said, following along with his line of thought, “and they’ll start searching for alternate means of feeding themselves.”

“I bet they hit smaller villages. So far, in the interest of advancing across the Duchy as fast as possible, they’ve mostly ignored anything that wasn’t a large Burg that they could use as a foothold.” He turned to Arkk, flashing a toothless grin. “Unless those small villages have someone like you and Vezta defending them, an army will march over whatever pitiful defense they have. A village storehouse won’t have enough but it will feed the army until they march to the next village.”

Olatt’an, former raider that he was, counted as the foremost expert on such matters within Fortress Al-Mir. Arkk didn’t doubt a word he said. Nevertheless… “We’ll have Kia and Claire hit as many as they can. They’ll have to expand their search for other routes. Once is an accident but as soon as two caravans go missing on the same path, they’ll look for alternates.”

“Throwing villages to the wolves?” Olatt’an asked, quirking an eyebrow.

“Callous as it is to admit, they won’t be marching across the Duchy if they’re acting like raiders,” Arkk said, lips drawn tight. “I have a plan for dealing with the larger army. Or at least diminishing the threat they pose. It won’t be ready until Zullie finishes charging up those high-quality glowstones she stole from the academy. They take a lot longer than the smaller test ones we had been using, so I’m not sure when she will finish.”

“Well, until that plan is ready, I might have a better solution to the Evestani raider problem.” Olatt’an paused, the old orc waiting until Arkk raised an eyebrow. “We beat them to it. Scry to find where they’re headed then clear out the storehouses before they get there.”

“That… could work,” Arkk said slowly, mulling it over. “I presume we would offer the villagers safety at the fortress.”

Olatt’an shrugged. “That’s your business.”

It was a good thing he had been expanding the fortress since Inquisitor Vrox’s attack. He had been doing it for control over the territory but it would work just as well to house more refugees. Depending on how many villages they had to step in to help, he might still have to expand more and more.

“Get back to the fortress,” Arkk said, “and get to the scrying team. Have them check on the Evestani army’s current position and begin making note of the nearest villages. Depending on how close they are, we might evacuate them immediately. I want a minimum of two days marching time between the army and their nearest possible target.”

“Think they’ll be happy to come along after you let them know how much the Duke hates you?”

Arkk couldn’t help his grimace.

They had lost a few people over that. A few of the humans who had joined up in Cliff. Not all of them but enough to be notable. None of the demihumans or beastmen wanted out. Still, even though Company Al-Mir had grown, four missing didn’t go unnoticed. Worse, they knew about the teleportation circles and, if they were smart, could infer weaknesses and use cases. It was some small consolation that none of the recruits knew where the fortress was.

Most of the refugees from out near Moonshine Burg hadn’t exactly been happy either but none complained. It wasn’t like they had anywhere else to go.

Katja just laughed.

“For the villages we wish to evacuate, we’ll just have to impress upon them how thoroughly the Evestani will kill them. I hope they chose the more pragmatic choice.”

“And if they don’t?” Olatt’an asked, strong arms moving over his chest. “We just leave them and their food for the Evestani to take?”

Arkk shot the old orc a look. “We aren’t becoming raiders ourselves, if that is what you’re implying.”

Olatt’an held up his hands, shrugging. “I suppose one or two small villages won’t make a difference either way. But if they all reject your offer.”

“We’ll deal with that if it happens. I imagine the threat of certain death will convince most.”

“Fair enough. I’ll head back now then. Get the scryers working.”

Arkk dismissed him with a wave of his hand. Olatt’an trudged back through the forest toward the ritual circle that had brought them here. As he headed out, the two leaders of the expedition approached Arkk.

Claire barely spoke at the best of times. Her short brown hair bobbed with her movements, unkempt and uncared for as if she hacked it off at her shoulders with a rusty blade whenever it got too long, eying Arkk with her icy blue eyes. She paused before fully reaching Arkk, cleaning off her sword on the gambeson of a downed soldier.

Kia was the true leader of the group on account of her actually talking but she and Claire came as a unit. It was both of them or neither of them. The older dark elf had a mass of piercings in her ears, each gleaming in what little sun that managed to get through the branches of the forest.

“Area secure with only minor injuries sustained,” she said with a personable smile despite the slowly drying blood marring her face and blonde hair. “About three-quarters of the supplies survived and have been secured. The orcs are taking the wagons to the teleportation circle now.”

“Good,” Arkk said, clasping his hands together behind his back. “Have the wounded… Zullie is busy. Have them visit Hale. Minor injuries would be good for her to practice on.”

Kia nodded her head, sending her ponytail flipping back and forth. “If there is nothing else, I would like a bath,” she said, which earned a nod from Claire.

“Were there any issues working together with your team? Any tactical holes that you would like filled?” Arkk grimaced the moment the words left his mouth. He thanked the stars that Lexa wasn’t within earshot.

If either of the dark elves noticed or cared about his phrasing, they didn’t show it. Kia hummed, touching a dark fingernail to her chin. “The gorgon were a little sluggish—I think it’s the cold—but that wasn’t much of a problem. They petrified who I identified as the most troublesome opponents without issue.”

“Good. I expect you two to train with this team. Once I’ve got eyes on another supply caravan, you’ll be hitting it just like this.” With a wave of his hand and a muttered incantation, Arkk summoned a lesser servant.

Neither dark elf reacted to the unsightly monster appearing in their midst.

“You’ll be taking along one of these in future operations as well. I’ll make sure one waits in storeroom three for your team at all times. They won’t fight but they’ll eat all evidence left behind and destroy the ritual circles after you leave.”

“Stop by storeroom three for the slime monster before future operations,” Kia said, nodding her head. “Understood.”

“Excellent. Get your team back to the fortress.”

Kia saluted like she had been in a mercenary company for about thirty years. Which she had. Raven’s Claw company. Claire merely dipped her head in a barely-there acknowledgment.

Leaving them to their task, Arkk headed back first.

Of the four harpies rescued from the Duke’s manor, none were interested in joining Company Al-Mir. None were even interested in remaining at the fortress. Something about having been kept underground for far too long as it was and not wanting to spend another moment in yet another dungeon. Arkk offered a fistful of gold just for one of them to do a quick fly around in the Underworld and report back on their findings.

None had taken him up on the offer.

Arkk had taken them out to a random point via teleportation circle and let them go free. As much as he might want aerial scouts, he wasn’t going to force them into it.

He turned next to the fairies they had rescued. Unfortunately, he had learned that fairies did not so much as fly as they hovered. They didn’t mimic the swift, gliding flight that made harpies the ideal method of long-distance communication. Fairy flight needed the ground to push off. Once they got too high, they just couldn’t go any higher.

It would be little different than sending out a squad of orcs.

One fairy wanted to leave with the harpies. Two fairies joined up with him.

Given the supposed historical prowess for magic that fairies were said to possess, he had been interested in seeing whether the contract with Fortress Al-Mir revitalized that. The two fairies had been overjoyed, filled with awe and wonder, at their newfound ability to sling lightning bolts. Arkk found himself disappointed that, much like orcs or humans or any other who lacked the ability to cast magic on their own, the fairies wound up exhausted after a single spell, requiring several hours to get back in action.

The other rescues from the Duke’s manor weren’t all that notable. Most weren’t fighters and didn’t want to join the mercenary company. A few did join. Another gremlin, a few elves and one dark elf, a few orcs, and a handful of beastmen of varying species.

Arkk sat at his desk, poring over Company Al-Mir’s roster. Who would be best where? Some needed training. Who was best to do the training? Was it best to split up the demihumans and beastmen? Demihumans and humans could all benefit from a single instructor but beastmen often used their claws or even teeth as weapons in addition to daggers and swords—sometimes they were not able to hold weapons with the differences in hands.

Who could be cleared for guard duty in the Underworld? Who might be better used in the scrying team rotation? Which were magically adept enough to learn spells like Flesh Weaving? Did the strike team need additional members?

Did the food production need to be expanded again? Various wings of the fortress needed expanding. Some, such as the executive quarters, needed reorganization. There had been a minor altercation between some of the original raider orcs and some of the new hires. Did that need addressing or would they work out their issues on their own? Dakka advised toward the latter but…

There was much work to be done. Constantly.

Ilya was back and that was a great help. She, along with Katt’am, were managing all aspects of the refugees and other guests of Fortress Al-Mir, ensuring they had space, clothing, food, and other necessities. And ensuring no conflicts broke out.

Although she wasn’t part of Fortress Al-Mir, Alya had taken to assisting her daughter with the refugees. Arkk was somewhat surprised that elder elf hadn’t demanded to be released back into Cliff. Then again, with the Duke having thrown her into the dungeons, she was probably well aware that her time living there had passed. Whatever the case, Arkk was perfectly happy to have her off in the refugee section of the fortress. It was segmented heavily from the rest of the fortress and thus, he hardly ever crossed paths with the elf.

A light knock on his door had him setting his pen down. He didn’t need to use the link of the fortress to check on who stood on the other side. The light notes of the tapping had become quite familiar.

“Enter,” he called out.

Vezta stepped inside, demure and poised as always. “Message for you, Sir,” she said holding up a letter. With a movement of her fingers, she splayed out the letter to reveal a few more. “Several, in fact. John brought them back from Smilesville Burg.”

“Anything important?”

“One bearing the emblem of White Company. The Duke’s signet stamps another. The third looks like something from the Abbey of the Light,” she said, tone turning to distaste with that last admission.

Frowning, Arkk took the one with the Duke’s signet first, breaking the wax seal with a flick of his fingers. He unfolded the papers and quickly skimmed the text.

“A demand to appear before the Duke for trial and execution,” Arkk said, tossing it into the fire before he even finished reading.

“Trial and execution? Sounds as if there is little need for a trial.”

“Quite,” Arkk said, taking the letter from the Abbey. He expected it to be much the same as the first.

Sure enough, they were demanding absolution in a temple, containment of Vezta, and, following that, submission to the laws of the land under the Duke. Trial and execution, given the first letter. Shaking his head, Arkk almost threw it into the flames as well, only to pause as he noticed the signatory at the bottom.

Master Inquisitor Darius Vrox.

Arkk let out a small, depressed sigh. Had Vrox ended up agreeing with the rest of the Abbey? Arkk couldn’t really blame the man. Especially now that he knew the incident that had them up in arms was his fault. Still, he had hoped…

Skimming the letter again, Arkk’s train of thought stalled. “The word ‘trust’ appears eight times in a rather short letter,” he said slowly. “If I’ve decided to repent, I can turn myself in on the broken pier by the next full moon?”

“The next full moon is in two days.”

“When I met him in the tunnel, I told him to have all his suppositions and theories on the broken sky ready and for him to turn off his scrying protections so that we can read it. But we didn’t specify a location. I assumed we would be able to find him but…” Arkk placed the letter down on his desk. “Join the scrying team at nightfall every night until the full moon starts to wane. Check the broken pier in Cliff City for Vrox.”

“Is there a point?” Vezta asked, cocking her head to one side. “We already know what caused the disturbance.”

“Vrox can detect scrying, as evidenced by him waving at us before activating his protections the first time. He’ll know if we ignore him and I would prefer if he at least believes that we’re taking the threat to heart.”

“The Abbey are puppets of the Holy Light. They will be our enemies regardless of your relation with the inquisitor.”

“Having a man on the inside, helping us as much as he can, is valuable enough.”

“I see. Very well, Master,” Vezta said with a slight bow. “Perhaps we can find a suitable scapegoat to appease them for the time being.” Her lips curled back into a fairly vicious grin. “Wouldn’t it be amusing if we could somehow implicate the Golden Order in the incident?”

Arkk hummed, moving around his desk to dig out a fresh paper and a bottle of ink. “They don’t like each other already. From my understanding, the Abbey of the Light detests the Golden Order and vice-versa. It was one of the reasons for the previous war with Evestani. A whole war for just the two churches vying for dominance in the region. Which is a little odd given that the church in Langleey Village has the sigils of all three of the traitor gods on it.”

“Not so odd. I imagine they were united immediately after the Calamity, after their successful coup over the rest of the [PANTHEON]. But, in the years since, they may not have seen eye-to-eye. Resentment brewed. Disagreements turned hostile. They cannot act against one another directly so they use their pawns.”

Arkk only half-listened to Vezta as he scrawled out a short letter back to Vrox. One that essentially confirmed that he saw the location and, while he wouldn’t be able to show himself in person, he trusted that Vrox would do what he felt was necessary.

“Honestly,” he said as he finished up, “I think it would have saved the rest of us a lot of trouble if the gods just slugged it out between one another. Why drag everyone into it?”

“Not a wise action. The shattered sky—the shattered [STARS]—came about because of a disagreement in the [PANTHEON]. Or so I’ve gathered. It was well before my time. If they fought directly, there might not be a world left to fight over. They act through intermediaries specifically to avoid destroying more of reality.”

Arkk folded up the letter and poured a dribble of violet wax onto the surface, sealing it with the impossibly complex maze and compass rose that was Company Al-Mir’s insignia. “Alright, in that case, I take it back.” He paused, mind thrumming over possibilities. “If we were to somehow destroy all religion and evidence of them—likely an impossible task, but I’m just curious—what would the traitor gods do? They wouldn’t have anyone to carry out their will. Would they take action directly? Or would they just fade into irrelevance?”

Vezta shook her head, accepting the letter from Arkk. “Even if we were to do so, a mortal would eventually be born who aligned enough with one of them to become an avatar. At that point, they would begin to spread their influence again.”

“So they wouldn’t destroy the world. No, ‘if I can’t have it then no one can’?”

Vezta let out a small sigh. “Arkk. I don’t pretend to know the minds of incomprehensible beings. Anything is possible. And with the lengths that they went to in their betrayal of the rest, perhaps your scenario is more likely than my own.”

“I see. Well, I doubt it matters. Destroying knowledge of them to the point where there would be zero worshippers seems impossible without destroying the world anyway,” he said, shaking his head. “Have John get that on a Swiftwing back to Vrox… But hold a moment while I check Hawkwood’s letter.”

As Vezta nodded, Arkk broke the seal on the final letter. His eyes trailed down the page. Every line made the palms of his hands a little colder. Clammy.

“Golden magic broke the line Hawkwood and the Duke’s Grand Guard had been holding at Gleeful Burg. White Company in particular lost a full half of its army while the Grand Guard routed after a third perished.”

“Gleeful Burg?”

“Not as large as Elmshadow but it is one of the few large burgs left between Evestani and Cliff… Or Evestani and us.”

“So our strikes against their supplies?”

“Too little, too late. And now they’ve surely got their hands on Gleeful’s storehouses. Hawkwood burned Elmshadow’s before the retreat but was unable to do so at Gleeful.” Arkk clenched his hand into a fist, staring at the letter. Reading and rereading it.

He drew in a breath and let it out slowly.

“If their pattern holds, they will spend a short time further securing the burg as their new forward operating base. They’ll launch minor attacks on smaller burgs in the area, both to gather food and to keep the defending armies on the back foot. With Hawkwood’s losses…”

He clenched his teeth, turning to the map on the wall of his office. Angry gold marks indicating the advance of Evestani covered more than half of it already. Zullie wasn’t ready to deal with the army. They needed those supply line strikes to slow down their advance enough to buy time to charge those glowstones. Otherwise, his plan would fail…

They needed more time.

As long as Evestani had food, they wouldn’t stop.

He had to get rid of their food. If not en route… then at the source.

“Get me Agnete.”

 

 

Arkk sat at the meeting table, fingers clasped together in front of his mouth while he looked around the room over the tops of his knuckles. It was a typical meeting. Vezta stood just behind him and Ilya had taken her usual seat to his right. They were joined by Zullie and Savren, Olatt’an and Rekk’ar, Khan, Lexa, and Alma—the latter being a new addition representing the majority of the beastmen.

Of the usual crew, Agnete was missing. She was recovering from the exposure to Vrox’s ice marble in her quarters.

Alya stood tall on the opposite side of the table from Arkk. She had been offered a seat but had chosen to stand instead. Like accepting the chair would be a sign of condoning this place.

Arkk took his eyes off Alya for a moment, looking at Ilya. “Is all that true?”

“I saw it with my own eyes. It was like the canyons out near Moonshine, except high in the sky, with jagged edges and stars shining down despite being in the middle of the day. And that…” Ilya shuddered. “I think it was an eye. I swear it stared directly at me.”

Arkk turned to his other side, raising an eyebrow at Vezta.

The servant shook her head. “There should be no reasonable way for anyone of this world to interact with the [STARS]. Even the [PANTHEON], even Xel’atriss has been unable to meaningfully interact with the realm above.”

Alya flinched at the use of the [CONSTRUCTED LANGUAGE].

Arkk ignored the matriarch, turning back to Ilya as the younger elf began to speak again.

“I don’t think it was that. Like Mom said, the eye was massive. Larger than the moon. Those stars you described after possessing Vezta were tiny—or, at least, distant.”

“Possessing?” Alya all but whispered, eyes widening as she looked between Arkk and Vezta.

Arkk continued to ignore her, looking from Vezta to Zullie. “Could it have been Xel’atriss? Poking through?”

“It wasn’t designed to do anything like that,” Zullie said, sharing a look with Savren.

“Our ceremony, commandeered by a celestial, could create whatever causes it craved.”

Vezta nodded along with Savren’s words. “A god intervened in our ritual. The effects could have been anything.”

Arkk turned back to Ilya. “Seven days ago?”

“Yep,” Ilya said with a wan, I-told-you-so smile. “It was you, wasn’t it.”

Arkk closed his eyes and sighed. “I think I lied to Inquisitor Vrox,” he said, earning a small chuckle from Zullie. “Alright. How credible is his suggestion that the one who… broke the sky will end the world?”

“Xel’atriss, Lock and Key, may not be the most personable of the [PANTHEON],” Vezta said, sounding genuinely offended. “She would never seek harm. The Eternal Silence, the Red Horse, or the Laughing Prince, perhaps. Not Xel’atriss.”

“And you don’t intend to end the world,” Ilya said. She paused and looked to Arkk with a slight frown. “Right?”

“Of course I— Why do you sound so suspicious?”

Ilya reached over, nudging Arkk in the ribs with her elbow. “Teasing,” she said, silver eyes glinting with humor. That humor didn’t stick around for long. “Some of what my mother had to say does concern me, however.”

“Hold that thought for now,” Arkk said. “We’re not quite done with this apocalypse talk.” He turned back to Vezta, Savren, and Zullie. “The gods might be perfect and infallible,” he said, not quite sure if he believed that or not. He didn’t have enough experience. At least three of them seemed fairly fallible though, the three traitor gods. “We aren’t. How likely is it that we accidentally bring about the end of the world? That we already have by opening that portal.”

Zullie, Savren, and Vezta all looked at one another. Throughout the rest of the room, other glances went around. Rekk’ar leaned back in his chair, arms crossed over his chest. Lexa drummed her fingers on the table in a nervous tick. No one spoke. No one had an answer.

Alma flattened her ears against her head, sighing. “Why am I even here? I’m not a spellcaster or a cleric. I don’t have anything to contribute.”

The brilles over Khan’s eyes shifted, letting him look over to the shorter werecat. “Jusst ssleep,” he said as the odd scales around his eyes closed once again. “They’ll let you know when they want ssomething.”

Arkk gave the two a flat look, which Khan ignored but made Alma’s ears flatten down further. They were here to keep their respective groups informed of the goings on of the fortress. But Alma wasn’t wrong. This was a meeting for those magically inclined. Inviting everyone to every meeting was probably unnecessary.

Shaking his head, he looked back to the casters. “The main concern that I can see is the level of ambient magic in the Underworld.”

“We don’t know for certain whether the ambient magic is why that world is the way it is,” Zullie said. She motioned to herself and Savren. “We’re spell and ritual researchers, not a part of the magienvironmental corps. I can give you a few names of those at the academy who might be more knowledgeable about that kind of stuff. Doubt they’d be willing to join though.”

“Until we do get some experts, we’ll assume for now,” Arkk said. “We need to watch the portal, see if any magic is leaking over. If it isn’t, or it is at such a tiny rate that it will be a thousand years before it affects this world, we don’t need to worry about it in the short term.”

“And if it is something of immediate concern?”

Arkk pressed his lips together. “Let’s just find out if it is, first.”

Zullie nodded her head and looked at Savren. “I’m sure we can come up with some way to measure the effects of the portal on this world. We can set up a few monitoring wards. One right next to the portal, another further away. Maybe more dotted around the Duchy to see any far-reaching effects.”

“Make it happen.”

Rekk’ar leaned forward again, resting a fist on the table. “This doesn’t solve the issue of the armies bearing down on us. Again, we’re focused too much on your little portals and not enough on the people trying to kill us all.”

Arkk interlaced his fingers, staring at Rekk’ar as his mind churned.

“Our situation is worse now,” Rekk’ar continued, taking the attention as an invitation to speak his mind. “If your friend inquisitor was right, the Abbey is going to try to get the Duke to stand down and turn his blades on you. After burning down his manor, he might even be happy to do it.”

“Suggestions?” Arkk asked.

Rekk’ar thumped his fist against the table. Not angrily. It was a rhythmic, pensive thumping as he considered. As he thought, Arkk turned to the rest of the room.

“Kill ’em all first,” Lexa said with a casual shrug. “You already invaded the Duke’s manor. Just go back and finish the job.”

Alya sucked in a breath, eyes wide at the gremlin’s suggestion. “You would lop off the head of our armies in the middle of war?”

“They aren’t our armies,” Lexa shot back, glaring up at the tall elf. “Like the orc said, might not be a war if they join up with the enemy. I admit, I’m not a big war person. Just a humble thief.” She pulled out a dagger from somewhere inside her jacket and started trimming one of her fingernails with it. “But when a few thieves have a little turf war, taking out the leaders is a perfectly valid tactic. Force the rest of the group into your own.”

“I doubt the Duke’s Grand Guard would be all that happy to join us after killing the Duke,” Ilya said with no small amount of sarcasm in her tone.

“What about the Evestani?” Olatt’an asked. As everyone’s heads turned to him, he sat up straighter, looking less like the lax old orc and more like a proper warrior. “I imagine the Duke is furiously consulting with the entire academy and the inquisitors to make sure you can’t attack his manor in the same way again. But the Evestani likely lacks such foresight or protections. Can we tear their throats out? Maybe absorb their armies if they were forced into it.”

“The golden-eyed boy is a concern,” Arkk said with a frown. “As long as that thing is driving the army forward, I doubt they’ll stop even if we somehow manage to blow up the entirety of Evestani’s leaders.”

“The Heart of Gold’s avatar,” Vezta said, “is likely the cause for this war. At the party, you may recall that it saw me and had a reaction to me. While it was clearly planning the war in advance, now that it knows for sure, I doubt it will stop unless we kill it or it destroys us.”

“It’s already demonstrated an ability to possess others at a distance. Unless we figure out where it truly is, killing it permanently might be impossible.”

Rekk’ar let out a low chuckle, shaking his head slowly. “All this talk of gods and leaders and avatars. You all are missing the forest for the trees. You don’t need to kill an unkillable avatar to stop the army.” He splayed out his hand on the table, five fingers sliding forward slowly. Bringing over his other hand, he slid a single finger toward the five. He clenched that one finger into his fist and the five, slowly advancing fingers came to a stop. “An army, even a magically enhanced one, marches on its stomach. If the stomachs are empty, the march stops.

“Every burg they’ve captured acts as a storehouse and a waystation, but the army hasn’t spent time reinforcing or defending those points with their hasty advance.”

“Destroy or capture the supplies and they’ll have nothing,” Arkk said, nodding his head.

“And with Evestani’s army starving to death, the Duchy can clean them up. Unless they join forces, in which case we destroy the Duchy’s supply lines. Our magic lets us move with impunity. We can strike anywhere, any time.”

Arkk nodded his head. That was a much better plan than standing around in Elmshadow waiting for an assault of thousands. Supply caravans would be defended, of that Arkk had no doubt, but Company Al-Mir had ample experience in fighting down moderate groups of armed opponents.

“Draw up plans,” Arkk said, looking between Rekk’ar and Olatt’an. “Get into contact with Hawkwood—preferably before word of the Duke’s incident reaches him—and find out the best places to strike. He’ll know better than us. We can scry locations and send out strike teams.” He waited a moment, looking around the group. “Any other pressing matters? No? Zullie, Savren, get on those rituals. Rekk’ar, Olatt’an, get planning for attacks. Everyone else is dismissed except Ilya and Alya.”

Arkk watched the room disperse. The two orcs walked out, quietly talking to one another. Lexa hopped up and headed out with them, trying to interject in their conversation. Khan uncoiled from his stone and slithered out, barely opening his eyes in the process. Alma practically fled.

No. She did flee.

She was generally well regarded among the beastmen, having been known to most before Arkk’s recruitment in Cliff City. Unfortunately, she had the assertiveness of a skittish flopkin. It wasn’t just this meeting. Every meeting since he had decided to include her had gone something like this. Which was probably Arkk’s fault for threatening her with Vezta upon their first meeting. Even now, she wouldn’t so much as glance in Vezta’s direction if she could help it.

He would probably need to find someone else to fill that position. Perhaps someone from the manor’s dungeons?

He needed to deal with that too. Some—most, probably—would join with the refugees in the far wing of the fortress. Some would join up. Kelsey, the ox beastman, was interviewing them at the moment, checking in on each. Arkk still needed to personally see to at least those who wanted to join Company Al-Mir.

And then he needed to gather everyone except the essential guards for an announcement.

He had done it. The Duke was his enemy. Officially. Even if the Duke kept his focus on Evestani for the moment, Company Al-Mir were sure to be branded outlaws. Responsible for those under his banner, Arkk couldn’t leave them ignorant. Some would surely desert. It was some small comfort that the fortress was underground. Nobody would be able to point out where he was located if he dropped them off via teleport rituals near Cliff City.

The false fortress was still in place and open to the surface. Arkk hadn’t touched it since the inquisitors romped through it. If he were Vrox—or Sylvara or any other inquisitor—Arkk’s first step would be to return and see if there were any clues left behind that might let them find him. Assuming they didn’t know that he hadn’t left in the first place.

The door slammed shut, leaving Arkk with a pair of elves and one ancient monster.

“So,” he said, looking from Ilya to Alya and back.

Getting back to the fortress had taken some time with how many people they had to move through each teleport circle. Arkk had already done some casual catching up. Ilya was… not exactly healed completely. The Flesh Weaving had done a number on her, though it saved her life, and left her with a tension in most of her stomach and chest that just wouldn’t go away.

He would have to send her to Zullie later. The witch was more skilled with the spell than Arkk was. She might be able to repair or at least alleviate the problem.

“You ventured into the Cursed Forest,” Alya said, tone barely concealing her anger. “Ilya told me. You found…” Her silver eyes flicked over to where Vezta had stood during the meeting.

Arkk couldn’t help narrowing his eyes at the judgment in her voice. “You took me in when my parents died. Thank you for that. But that was fifteen years ago. You have no right to come back and—”

“Arkk—” Ilya started.

Her mother cut her off. “Levi took me as tribute,” she hissed. “Paraded me around in front of anyone he wanted to impress like I was a piece of fine artwork.”

Arkk rolled his eyes, not sure if she was complaining or just complimenting herself. “Yes, you sure looked upset at the party. Vizier. Be honest now, how much trouble would it have been to leave him if you wanted?”

“It isn’t that simple,” she said, shaking her head. “I couldn’t leave. I had responsibilities. Levi began confiding in me early on and grew to trust my opinions. I tempered his worst traits, pulled strings behind the scenes, encouraged meetings between the Duchy and Evestani and even the Tetrarchy.”

Arkk stood, slamming his palms against the table. “When you were off playing politics, did you even once think of us? Of Ilya? I remember, after you were taken, we cried ourselves to sleep for weeks.”

“Arkk…” Ilya said, resting a hand on his arm.

“I lost my parents. And then I lost you. And Ilya…” Arkk clenched his teeth together. “I remember being curled up in bed with Ilya one night. We promised that one day… One day, we would go to the capital city, break into the Duke’s dungeons, and rescue you from his cruelty.” Arkk let out a low, sardonic laugh. “Guess I fulfilled that promise, didn’t I?”

Alya crossed her arms, face stony. “With the aid of abominations and anathema magic.”

“Not even a thank you? It isn’t too late to put you back, you know. We could teleport you right onto the Duke’s drawbridge and I’m sure you’d be back in your cushy cell in minutes.”

“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” Ilya said, pulling Arkk back from the table. She grabbed hold of his shoulders and wrapped him in a tight embrace. “It’s alright,” she whispered into his ear. For a long moment, Arkk just stood, leaning into Ilya’s arms. It relaxed him more than he could say.

Everything had been so stressful lately. The war and the portal and the golden-eyed child and…

“Thanks,” he whispered back, feeling all that stress melt away. It wouldn’t last forever. Even now, as he pulled out of the hug, he could feel it returning. Still, that moment of reprieve was worth both their weights in gold.

“Mom and I talked,” Ilya said, running her fingers through her silver hair. “I… We still have things to work out. But she does have information on… this place.”

Arkk couldn’t help but roll his eyes. “Anathema, abominations, apocalypse, and horrors from beyond the stars. Yes, yes. I’ve heard it all from Master Inquisitor Vrox. As you heard in the meeting, I’m taking the possibility of apocalypse quite seriously. But most of everything is nonsense spoken from a position of ignorance.”

“Position of ignorance?” Alya said, judgment back in her tone in full force. “You, being led astray by that creature makes you more ignorant than most.”

“Oh yes, because you know anything more than the one doing it all,” Arkk said with a sneer. “That unnatural moon in the broken sky? I’m pretty sure that was the literal god I was speaking with at the time. I had a nice sit-down and cup of tea with a being larger than this plane. I think I’m more qualified than most to know what I’m talking about.

“You, on the other hand, are running off… What? Thousand-year-old prophecies?” Arkk said, shaking his head. “Prophecies likely handed out by the ones responsible for the sorry state of the world.”

“Sorry state?”

“Fairies can’t use magic when they used to be one of the most magical beings alive. Dragons and their relatives can’t procreate. Dwarves and hundreds of other magic-dependent species have gone extinct. Magic itself is likely dying and…” Arkk stopped himself and looked to Ilya. “Ilya knows what we’re working toward. If she hasn’t told you yet, she’s welcome to. I, however, am not particularly interested in what you have to say nor am I interested in explaining myself to you any further. I have administrative duties to attend to.

“Ilya can show you to the canteen and I have prepared a room for you next to the rooms Yavin and Nyala are staying in. A proper room, not a dungeon cell. There is a tailor if you need additions to your wardrobe and…” Arkk shook his head, stopping himself before he explained everything away. “Ilya knows where everything is.”

“What are you going to do?” Ilya asked.

“Meet with those we rescued from the Duke’s manor. Let people know that the Duke hates us. Then…” Arkk looked to Ilya, raising an eyebrow. “How would you like to see an entirely new world?”

Ilya sucked in a breath. “I gathered from the meeting but… you got it working?”

“The world isn’t quite what we hoped, but it is different.”

Pressing her lips together, Ilya glanced at her mother. Although she got a disapproving look in return, she still turned back to Arkk with a nod of her head.

“Excellent. I’ll come find you once I’m finished.”

 

 

“You have two options,” Arkk said, addressing the assorted demihumans and beastmen. And two humans. “You go with me or you stay and hope the Duke is in a good mood. After I burned down his ballroom and half the rest of the manor, I doubt he is in that good of a mood.”

He stood in the so-called menagerie with Vezta at his side while Agnete worked her magic at the far end of the corridor. The hall had no appreciable differences from that of the dungeon. It was a cramped corridor with doors on either side leading to small, cell-like rooms, each with a bucket and a mat of straw. The doors locked from the outside and…

Well, if it wasn’t meant to be a prison, it certainly wasn’t a very good attempt.

“I know none of you know me and that might make the decision difficult. Know that you’ll, at the very least be treated like people rather than cattle.” He paused for effect, looking over the crowd of people. It wasn’t the best place for giving a speech. Too narrow, too long. He wasn’t even sure if people toward the stairwell could even hear him properly. “If you wish to take that chance, remain here. Otherwise… I imagine you will find greater leniency if you sit quietly in one of the dungeon cells.”

Arkk waited a moment.

Not one of those present moved toward the door. That, he felt, was telling.

He did, however, note more than a few shooting glances toward the tall elf standing well away from him. Alya hadn’t yet had a chance to yell at him for whatever she thought he had done. The second Vezta walked back into the dungeon, Alya had clammed up. Even now, she was staring at the servant with a look of horror on her face. Arkk was fairly certain that the only reason she hadn’t fled was Ilya at her side, holding tight to her arm.

Well, Ilya and the fact that the way out of the dungeons had been sealed. Arkk guessed that the Duke was barricading the place until he felt he had enough men on the other side to take on Agnete. Or the assistance of the Abbey.

He wasn’t going to get the chance to try.

The heat at Arkk’s back faded, leading to him turning. “Enchantments removed,” Agnete said as she stepped away from the far wall, voice unusually breathy. She was enjoying flexing her powers, although this time, she was being far more careful.

In the ballroom earlier, she had burned through the stone all on her own with no aid from Vezta or a lesser servant. Here and now, she had to keep things toned down to avoid incinerating everyone in the cramped hallway.

“Good. I know it isn’t your forte… if you could cool the wall down as much as possible, that would help speed things up. The lesser servant is eating the stone properly from the other side, but the heat…”

Agnete turned back to the wall. Once made of large brickwork, it was now little more than molten slag. The entire corridor felt like sitting next to an open bonfire on an already hot and windless summer day. Once again, Arkk was regretting leaving the marble behind. Not because he needed to use it against Agnete. Simply because having it in his pocket would keep the sweat from running down the side of his face.

He couldn’t imagine how the two werecats in the room were feeling. Then again, perhaps their thick fur helped insulate them from the heat.

Closing her soot-covered eyes, Agnete drew in a deep breath just like she had done at the war council. The heat in the room immediately took a dip and the glow from the mushy brickwork faded. The scars lining Agnete’s face took on the glow in its place and the heat around her jumped. Overall, the temperature wasn’t quite as bad as before.

More than that, the lesser servant was somewhat less hesitant to eat through the stone. It could handle a bit of heat. Just not literal lava.

“We’re burrowing a tunnel into the dungeons,” Arkk explained as the lesser servant ate around a few warm spots, letting them cool while still making progress. “Once outside the manor’s wards, we will be using a ritual circle to transport everyone well out of the city. It is quite a simple process. You step into the ritual circle and one of us activates it. You’ll reappear elsewhere. We need to go quickly. I’ve no doubt the Duke is furiously scratching his head, trying to come up with ways to make all our lives more miserable.”

As he finished speaking, the smooth, near-glassy surface of the former brickwork cracked and broke. As soon as it started crumbling, Arkk directed the lesser servant away. It scurried back down the tunnel and the burrowed inside the ground. No need to frighten anyone any further.

Alya might just have a heart attack.

“Vezta, take the lead. Get through the portal and make enough room on the other side for this group.”

“Understood,” she said, bowing before turning and descending the melted slope of stone into the darkness. Her burning suns remained visible even as the rest of her ended up cloaked in shadow.

“Agnete, head up the rear. Unless someone decides to stay behind, feel free to leave a… parting gift.”

Without a word, Agnete nodded her head. Despite the cramped space, everyone found a way to give the purifier plenty of room as she strode through. No one wanted to touch someone who had just melted through solid brickwork. Especially not when her feet were leaving bright red marks in her wake.

“Everyone else, come quickly and mind your footing. The tunnel will slope downward in about a hundred paces and slope back upward a short distance beyond that.” He turned, looked to Ilya, and held out a hand.

Although she took hold of his offered hand, she pursed her lips in a way Arkk was quite familiar with, having seen the same reaction more times than he could count. A mixture of disappointment, exasperation, and just a pinch of relief. The disappointment faded as she laced her fingers with his, only to return in force when she practically had to drag her mother forward. At least it wasn’t directed at him now.

“Not quite the rescue you were hoping for?” Arkk asked as they stepped into the tunnel. An uttered spell, learned from Zullie, brought a mote of light to his fingertips, letting him lead the way.

He didn’t bother checking to see if the rest of the captives were following. If they didn’t want to come, that was their problem. Arkk wasn’t going to force them.

“Not exactly,” she whispered back. “To be honest, I didn’t expect to see you for weeks at least. The last report I heard was that you were fighting alongside Hawkwood.”

“How did you go from getting war reports to being locked up?” Arkk looked to his side, frowning while trying to keep a sneer off his face. “And the Grand Vizier as well.”

“Arkk,” Ilya admonished.

“I don’t…” Alya started, sounding… confused. Lost? Uncertain. “I don’t even know where to begin. The things Ilya has told me. And then the sky…”

Arkk raised an eyebrow. “Sky?”

Ilya took a breath and let it out in a clipped sigh. “Long story short, when the sky broke, we decided to go to the Fortress. I’ve been sitting on my ass long enough. I’m healed enough,” she said quickly, like she thought he might tell her to go take a seat and rest up some more. “We barely made it five steps when Woldair noticed our intent to leave. He took it a bit personally,” Ilya said with a glare at her mother.

“And locked you up,” Arkk finished.

“The Duke hasn’t been happy with her since the party. Maybe even before that.”

“Levi has been under great stress,” Alya started, only for Ilya to let go of Arkk’s hand and whirl on her.

“Don’t even defend him. He threw us in the dungeons!”

“Not a defense,” Alya said, sorrow lining her features. “Just an explanation. He saw what we were doing as a betrayal.”

“Betrayal? You, maybe. I’m not some trusted servant or retainer. He had no right—”

“You were here at my request. For healing.”

“That doesn’t mean he could throw me into prison,” Ilya snapped back “Throw me out of the manor, sure.”

“He saw you as an extension of me. Knowing that Arkk was in possession of a dangerous artifact in the Cursed Forest, he likely—and correctly—concluded that you would know something.”

“Why would he know…” Ilya trailed off, eyes narrowing in hostile danger. “You told him. You told him what I told you, didn’t you? I can’t even… believe you.”

“Don’t judge me, daughter. You don’t know what I went through—”

“Oh yeah. How tragic, living the high life. Probably jumped at the opportunity to ditch our miserable little village.”

Alya clutched a hand to her chest. “You weren’t alive when the last war ended thirty years ago. You don’t know what it was like. A religious war of fanatics against fanatics. The Abbey of the Light and the Golden Order using the common people as pawns to try to wipe each other out. I saw an opportunity to help prevent another war from rising and I took it at cost.”

“Well good job with that!” Ilya snapped.

Arkk wisely kept his mouth shut during their argument. He had left Ilya in her mother’s care weeks ago and yet it was clear that they still had a few things to work out. Not that Arkk blamed Ilya for that. He more than agreed with her. Alya up and leaving without so much as sending a letter back home had him clenching his fists.

Thankfully, neither spoke again, both fuming after their argument.

He let things cool down for a moment before, as neutrally as possible, asking, “What happened to the sky? It broke?”

Both elves whipped their heads to him. For a moment, he thought he was going to get both shouting at him. Instead, their silver eyes held nothing but confusion.

“You don’t know?” Ilya asked first.

“Know… what? Last I saw, the sky was… the sky? Didn’t notice anything off about it.” He tried an easy chuckle, hoping to defuse some of the remaining tension. “Don’t see much sky in Fortress Al-Mir,” he said as a joke.

“I thought for sure it was something you had done,” Ilya said with genuine confusion. “Undoing the Calamity or something.”

“We did do the ritual, but…” He trailed off, frowning as he felt a link wink out of existence. “Hold the thought. The lesser servant just died.”

Ilya tensed, looking around the tunnel. Her fingers twitched like she wished she had her bow. “How? Where?”

“I don’t know how, I wasn’t paying attention to it. It died too quickly for it to throw out a warning over the link. But it was going to collapse the tunnel behind us so that none of the Duke’s men would follow.”

“Great. We’re being followed?”

“Agnete is fine,” he said, checking up on the purifier through the link. “Nothing is attacking her yet. Vezta is already through the teleportation circle, widening the cavern at the other end for our group. You’re the only one who knows how they work. Get everyone through. I’ll head back and help hold off any attackers with Agnete.”

“Will she even need help? An enclosed space like this…”

“Better safe than sorry.” Arkk leaned in, pulling Ilya into another hug. “We’ll talk back at the fortress. Sorry for leaving you behind. I won’t do it again.”

“You better not.”

Arkk fell back, letting Ilya and Alya go on ahead. Turning, he squeezed past the train of captives. There were around fifty in total. Maybe just shy of that number. “Follow the elves,” he said as he made his way back. “The shorter of the two knows where to go.”

They didn’t part ways for Arkk quite as well as they had made way for Agnete back in the dungeons. To be fair, they tried. Just because he wasn’t offloading a furnace of heat didn’t mean they wanted to get too close to the guy with glowing eyes. It was just that the tunnel wasn’t meant for groups of people. It had been constructed to quickly escape the Duke’s manor, not to live in.

When he got to the rear, Agnete turned to him with a single raised eyebrow.

“The lesser servant was killed just as it started collapsing the tunnel. We might have incoming.”

“Died from flames?” she asked. “I did set the entire menagerie aflame as we were departing.”

“I suppose that is possible. It may have even been crushed—although, that would be odd. I’ve collapsed a lot of tunnels and no other lesser servant died in the process.”

“Better prepared than unprepared,” she said, raising an arm. The flames barely contained within the scars on her skin surged forth and flooded the tunnel behind the group.

Arkk shied away, raising an arm to shield his face. Even though Agnete was several paces behind the last of the group, he still heard a yelp of surprise. Some urgent whispers followed and, with no small amount of shoving, the group hurried on. Or at least compressed.

There was nothing a normal fire would burn inside the tunnel. No wood or tallow. Just rock and stone. That didn’t stop Agnete’s flames. They burned everything. The stone, the dirt, even the moisture in the air that had likely seeped through from the moat around the Duke’s manor.

The fact that he could feel the humidity dry up meant that this tunnel probably wasn’t as safe as it should be. It was a good thing they wouldn’t have to use it again.

If they did need to get into the manor through tunnels again, he would start fresh. And likely deeper in the ground.

Agnete let the flames around her die out while keeping the tunnel alight. They were at the lowest point in the tunnel right now, directly beneath the moat. Arkk had to hope that the structural integrity would hold for ten more minutes.

“If there are pursuers,” Agnete said, “they’ll have a hard time reaching us—”

A rush of cold air blew through the narrow tunnel, coating the walls in frost. The flames snuffed out in an instant and the heat died. Agnete sucked in a sharp breath, hands clamping to her arms as she wrapped herself up like she was trying to ward off the cold. She opened her mouth, trying to speak, but her voice caught in her throat.

The cold sent a shiver up Arkk’s spine but didn’t incapacitate him as it did Agnete. He narrowed his eyes, looking into the dark of the tunnel. With the slope, he couldn’t see far. He didn’t need to see the source. He had seen this before.

He had used this before.

“Inquisitors,” Arkk said with a scowl.

Agnete managed to nod her head.

“Go. Hurry. I can’t have you dropping into the fetal position now.”

Her voice croaked as she forced words out of her throat. “I can fight—”

“Against one of those ice marbles?”

Her jaw clamped shut. The burning light in the scars on her skin and even the embers in her eyes were dimmer than usual. Dimmer than Arkk could remember having seen before.

“Go,” he said again. “I’m not helpless. Slave Natum.”

With the uttered incantation, a trio of lesser servants popped into the tunnel. They immediately burrowed into the floor. With the moat overhead, it was too risky to try to collapse the tunnel. An accident here could see everyone in the tunnel drowned or simply crushed by the water.

Agnete backed up, leaving Arkk alone. She couldn’t go far with the crowd and narrow tunnel but she was at least less likely to get caught up by the chill from one of those ice marbles.

As the lesser servants worked to dig deeper, Arkk pulled out the metal rod and quickly inscribed a ritual circle on the wall and another on the floor.

Blue-white light gained prominence at the other end of the sloped tunnel. Arkk finished the second ritual circle just as the black boot came into view, followed quickly by a cane tapping against the ground.

“Master Inquisitor,” Arkk called as the man came into full view. “Been a while. How’ve you been?”

Darius Vrox came to a stop at the lowest point of the tunnel. In one hand, he held onto a cane. A different model than the one Arkk had seen him with previously. This time, it was smooth black wood—maybe even from from Darkwood Burg—topped with a silver handle and a light blue glowstone. Its appearance had Arkk wary; the staff used in Zullie’s demonstration of her projectile shield had looked quite similar, if a little rougher.

In his other hand, an icy blue marble hovered just above his palm. Despite Arkk’s best attempts, he had never managed to make his float like that. It would have been nice given that contact with skin was rather painful.

The man was alone, thankfully. Arkk wasn’t sure that he would have been able to handle Chronicler Greesom if the man had used that attack-reflecting shield.

“Arkk,” Vrox said, no hint of his usual smile on his face or in his tone. “What do you think you’re doing, betraying the trust I had in you like this?”

“When we last parted, I gave you a message to pass on to someone important to me. Imagine my surprise when I find the Duke has thrown her into the dungeons.”

A flash of irritation crossed Vrox’s face. That had been news to him. He quickly schooled his expression. “Then you should have come to me. We could have figured something out.”

“I’ll be honest, the option did not so much as cross my mind.” He gave a casual shrug, trying to avoid showing the tension he felt all up his back. “Besides, I wouldn’t suffer Ilya’s imprisonment a second longer. Meetings and negotiations would have taken far too long. And I doubt the Duke would have released her anyway.”

“You…” Vrox clenched his teeth. “You don’t get to walk away from this, Arkk.”

“Oh? Try me.” Arkk forced a smile of his own. “When you head back with your tail between your legs, you can tell the Duke to go thank the Evestani. Were it not for this war, he would not have survived our encounter.”

“You can tell him yourself. Submit, Arkk. You don’t win here.”

Arkk slammed his hand against the wall, flooding the ritual circle with magic. A deep violet glow spread around the hastily carved ring.

The ground shuddered under Vrox’s feet. Were it not for his cane, he might have fallen.

“Do you know what is directly above us?” Arkk asked. “Why this tunnel slopes so deep into the ground?”

Vrox glared from behind his glasses as he took on a wary stance. His eyes roamed from the magic circle on the wall to the ceiling of the tunnel. Arkk could see the exact moment Vrox realized what he was implying. The man’s eyes widened and he even took a full step backward.

“You wouldn’t.”

“You’ve seen me teleport without aid before, Vrox. I did it right in front of your face in Langleey then again when we fought in my old headquarters. Right in the middle of combat. This tunnel exists to escape from the wards around the Duke’s manor and, guess what? I’m on the far side of the moat here.” Arkk swept his foot forward, placing it in the other ritual circle he had drawn.

Another violet circle lit up brighter than the one on the wall. With it, another tremble rocked the ground underneath Vrox’s feet. Even though the ground shook, he shot a fearful look at the tunnel’s ceiling.

“I can escape a torrent of water. How do you think you’ll fare?”

The ice marble bobbed up and down above Vrox’s upturned hand. He was probably wondering if he could freeze all that water at once. Arkk… wasn’t sure. He hadn’t exactly undertaken many experiments with his marble.

Perhaps he should. It was a tool more useful than just as a restraining device for Agnete.

He quickly checked on Ilya and Agnete, the only two employees he had in this tunnel. The former was at the ritual circle and was already helping people teleport through. Transporting large amounts of people was exhausting work and it showed on her face, nevertheless, she kept up a determination worthy of praise as she teleported one person after another. Her mother watched at her side with disapproval riddled over her features. Agnete, at the back of the group and looking better now that she was away from the cold, could help him measure how many more people had to go through the circle.

Arkk had to delay a little longer.

“Back away, Vrox. I don’t actually wish to kill you,” Arkk said, honestly. Maybe it was a bit strange but Arkk didn’t see Vrox as a proper enemy. Not like the one who fired off those rays of gold. “Turn around and make your report. We got away despite your best attempts.”

Vrox clenched his teeth. The step forward was a surprise.

Was he calling Arkk’s bluff?

Arkk hoped not. The bluff was all he had.

Neither ritual circle did anything. There hadn’t been any time to scribe out a true circle. They were just enough to glow.

The ground shaking was thanks to the lesser servants directly beneath Vrox.

But instead of raising his weapon in an attack, Vrox’s fingers just tightened around his cane. “The sky,” he said with all the seriousness of a man delivering news of a deceased soldier to a widow. “Was that you?”

Arkk blinked. “That is the second time someone has asked me that question. I genuinely have no idea what you’re talking about. The sky… broke? Or something? I haven’t noticed anything like that.”

“Impossible.”

“Ever since you invaded my fortress, I’ve been having to do a lot of construction,” Arkk said. Might as well use the chance to further that lie he had crafted. “Our current home is underground as the one you invaded was. Not a lot of opportunity for cloud watching while underground.”

Vrox stared for a long moment. Even from the distance they were at, Arkk could still see his eyes daring back and forth as if he could spot Arkk’s lie. But Arkk hadn’t lied about anything.

“You don’t know,” Vrox said, speaking as if the answer surprised him even though he was the one who said it. “You genuinely don’t know. That’s…” He clenched his teeth. “The rest of the Abbey is under the impression that you and your horror from beyond the stars are at fault. They’re considering betraying the Duchy and the greater Kingdom of Chernlock, throwing in with the Golden Order to exterminate you. This stunt you’ve pulled will not endear them to you any further.”

Arkk blinked. Then blinked again. “That… How could they do that? What of all the priests and abbesses providing healing and miracle support to the army?”

“Recalled. Assuming the pontiff cannot convince the Duke to align with Evestani and hunt you down as well.”

Arkk swore under his breath. “Wh… Convince them not to!”

“I’ve presented my testimony and analysis of your character. I already spoke in your defense—you aren’t the type to harm the everyman, thus you wouldn’t be trying to bring about the apocalypse.”

“Apocalypse? What happened?”

“The sky broke,” Vrox said, turning his head upward as if he could see through the stone and water. “And if you truly are not the culprit, the real villain will be free to act with impunity while two religious orders and their respective countries assail you.”

“I… damn.”

“Damn. Yeah. That’s putting it lightly.”

Arkk tossed a glare. “And what do you suggest? You aren’t telling me this for fun.”

“Submit,” Vrox said. He gestured around the tunnel with his cane. “With this disaster, my testimony of your character will be called into question and thus remove one of the last voices against turning the full might of the Abbey against you. If you come into custody, it may be our only option to allow the Abbey to continue searching for the true culprit.”

“Or they’ll stop searching entirely, thinking that they already have the culprit in hand.” Arkk shook his head. “And they would likely force me to hand over Vezta. I won’t.”

“Arkk, see reason—”

Arkk placed his free hand on the wall opposite from the already glowing ritual circle. There was nothing inscribed there. There hadn’t been time before Vrox appeared. That didn’t stop the sudden tension in Vrox’s shoulders as he stared at Arkk’s hand.

“Turn around and leave,” Arkk said. “I would rather not kill you.”

“Arkk… Please. I am limited in my options.”

“Do what you must. Follow the Abbey’s edicts if you have to. But…” Arkk hummed. “If you want to help, find a place on your own and drop your scrying protections. Let’s say nightfall on the next full moon. Have a paper written out with all your suspicions and theories on who this culprit might be or just what happened. Then I can search on my own.”

“To what end? That won’t stop the Abbey’s decision on you.”

“If I deliver the culprit to your hands, the true culprit, that exonerates me, does it not? I have resources you don’t. I can search with freedom. Vezta might even know something that could help locate this culprit.”

“That won’t satisfy them in the short term.” Vrox paused then frowned.

“Then I’ll just have to search quickly.”

Vrox swallowed, drew in a deep breath, and closed his eyes. “This is a dangerous game.”

“No more dangerous than your options. But less dangerous to me personally.”

Vrox opened his eyes and lifted his cane. Arkk tensed, only to frown as Vrox simply turned around. The inquisitor didn’t speak. He simply walked away.

Arkk waited a long moment until the last of that blue light faded around the curved tunnel. Only then did he remove his hands and foot from the ritual circles he had drawn.

He turned and sprinted down the thankfully emptied tunnel, heading for the ritual circle.

The lesser servants immediately started eating into the walls and ceiling at that lowest point of the tunnel. He couldn’t risk Vrox changing his mind. Agnete, with a flame providing light, stood alongside Ilya and Alya around the teleportation circle. The only three left in the tunnel.

“Go!” Arkk shouted. “Quickly. Alya first!”

“Arkk, I—”

Something broke behind him. Two of the three lesser servants died. This time, having been paying attention, he knew it was because of the water.

“No time,” Arkk shouted back as the sound of rushing water and crumbling stone threatened to drown out his voice.

And drown him.

Agnete, quick on the ball, snuffed out the flame and practically threw Alya into the ritual circle. She vanished the second she was fully inside it.

“Vezta pulled her out of the endpoint,” Arkk shouted. Vezta had been doing that for each of the people, making sure none were in the way of any follow-up teleports. “Go!”

Agnete didn’t hesitate, stepping into the teleport circle next. She vanished and Ilya took her place, quickly vanishing as well.

Arkk jumped onto the ritual circle, activating it the second he saw Ilya step out on the other end.

An ankle-deep slurry of water spread out into the newly expanded waystation chamber, flooding over the other ritual circles in the room. One circle would lead near the academy, another near the Cliff’s Edge stayover. Arkk had half a mind to destroy both, just in case. But not until Zullie made it back from her academy run.

With all the commotion at the Duke’s manor, she should have an easy time of it.

“Everything going alright?” Vezta asked, tilting her head as she looked at the thin layer of water on the floor.

“Get everyone back to the fortress,” Arkk said, slowly turning to Alya and Ilya. “Then we’re going to talk about this sky thing.”

 

 

The Duke’s throne room had recovered in the weeks since the attack on the party.

Arkk wasn’t sure if he was surprised or not. Even with all the death and destruction ravaging the Duchy as a result of the war, the Duke still found the time, resources, and manpower to remove all evidence of the attack. The floor gleamed with fresh polish. The tiles and brickwork which had been destroyed in the explosions had either been repaired or replaced. Even the chandeliers were back up, though the glowstones were perhaps not quite as bright as they had been.

If the meeting taking place had looked anything like the party Arkk had attended, he would have been tempted to take several steps back and let Agnete sweep her flames through the entire hall.

Instead, it looked as if he had intruded upon a war council. A massive table had been set out, filling much of the floor space of the throne room. People lined its sides. Though many chairs had fallen and the people had backed away upon Arkk’s entrance, they hadn’t yet fled from the room. At least, most of them hadn’t.

Some, the more militaristic of the gathering, had even drawn weapons, though they hadn’t advanced into the inferno.

Arkk could think of several reasons why the council would be held here instead of at the garrison. Aside from the Duke’s vanity, much like the Abbey’s churches the manor could not be scried upon, its walls were reinforced to the point where even servants couldn’t eat through them, and it did serve as the heart of the Duchy.

Much as he might wish to lop off the head of the Duchy, it wasn’t a wise idea at the moment. Not in the middle of a war. He had to grit his teeth and bear with it. In the future… Well, they knew they could get inside. Perhaps the inquisitors would come up with countermeasures for Agnete. Perhaps not. That was something to worry about in the future.

For now, they stopped advancing into the room, leaving a short space between them and the table. Arkk motioned to his side.

Agnete did not obey immediately. From speaking with the former purifier, he well knew that flames affected her. In the company of the inquisitors, she had exceedingly little control and frequently lashed out at Vrox and anyone else nearby. Especially when they tried to dampen her flames. Since employing her—contracting her to the [HEART]—that side effect of her abilities hadn’t affected her quite so much. Arkk wasn’t sure if it was a mechanic of the betrayal mechanism that wouldn’t let anyone attack him without first breaking that link or if it was that the [HEART] stemmed from the same source as her powers. The [PANTHEON].

Closing her eyes, Agnete drew in a deep breath. With it, she took in much of the ambient heat.

Which Arkk appreciated. He was sweating buckets and not just because they were barging their way into the Duke’s manor.

“Duke Woldair,” Arkk called out the moment he felt he would be able to speak without choking on the heat. “Release the captive in your dungeons and I’ll leave peacefully.”

The Duke, back at the far end of the room near his throne, shrugged off a pair of guards who were trying to escort him away. “I remember you,” he said, pointing a finger. “The so-called rising star of the mercenary companies. Company… Mirror… something.”

“Take us to the dungeons.”

“Oh, you want to see the dungeons, do you? Guards!”

There weren’t many guards in the room. The main entrance to the throne room was still blocked off by flames. A few reinforcements had been slowly funneling into the room from side doors. A few of the braver guards advanced.

Agnete snapped her fingers. The dimming flames erupted and orange fire billowed out from her like waves of the ocean crashing against Cliff’s shores. Guards went tumbling back, scurrying away. A few dropped their weapons in the path of the flames. The metal turned to slag even as Agnete clasped her hand into a fist, pulling back the fire.

Arkk’s ears picked up the start of an incantation. “Electro Deus,” he said before even spotting the caster. A lazy flick of his wrist sent one of the war council into convulsions. He barely put any power into it. Today’s objective was not to kill the leaders of the war.

Lightning still crackling between his fingertips, he pointed at the Duke—who wisely shied away behind one of his bodyguards.

“One of my employees was here as an honored guest. And now you’ve thrown them into your dungeons. Release them. I won’t ask again,” Arkk said, projecting as much authority as possible into his voice.

This would have been so much easier if they could have just burrowed into the lowest points of the manor. Not knowing what might be on the other side, Arkk hadn’t been willing to risk it. Having seen the explosive entrance they made into the ballroom, he felt entirely justified with that decision. While he could have guaranteed that they wouldn’t have blown up Ilya’s cell, he didn’t know how many other cells were filled or… potentially worse, where the wine cellar was. Flames and alcohol didn’t mix well.

Looking around, Arkk wondered how much of the manor would survive this little incursion. There wasn’t much smoke as a result of the flames burning magic more than wood or anything else. Nonetheless, he could see cracks forming in the brickwork from the heat. Some areas, mostly the floor underneath Agnete’s bare feet, had turned molten.

If they cooperated fast enough, there would still be time to get a caster to sweep through the place with a water spell. The longer they waited…

The longer they waited, the more likely reinforcements would arrive from the garrison.

Arkk had no desire to fight through an army today.

“Vezta,” he started, only for one of the war council to shout at the Duke.

“Levi! That is a purifier. Your men can’t stand against her,” he said. An older man with thin glasses and a fine suit. Not a military man. He had shoulder-length ‘page boy’ hair that curled lightly at the ends, though his hair had clearly seen better days in his youth. A merchant? Some other advisor. He stepped away from the line of advisors, hand gripping the hem of his suit. “I’ll take them. If they extinguish their fires.”

The Duke leveled a thunderous glare at the man, which was really all Arkk needed to trust him. Slowly, he lowered his arm. With a nod of his head to Agnete, she closed her eyes. This time, she drew in a great breath of air, as if filling her lungs beyond their normal capacity.

The flames around her shrank to embers. They didn’t completely vanish. A tapestry hanging from one wall still burned and the molten footprints trailing into the room didn’t go anywhere. The heat lingered as well. Still, the situation at least looked better.

However, when Agnete opened her eyes, they were glowing almost as much as Arkk’s did. The same was true for the scars along her face and arms. She had somehow managed enough control to keep her uniform from completely burning away, even though her boots had not survived.

The Duke’s fingers clenched into tight fists. “I’ll have your head for this, Joyce.”

“Better my head than everyone’s,” the newly dubbed Joyce said, straightening his back. “The people cannot afford to lose our council at this stage.”

“You—”

“If you wish to keep your head, Duke Woldair,” Arkk said, “you won’t interfere.” Turning to the older man, he said, “Lead us.”

The man took a breath and stepped further away from the rest of the war council. He motioned with a hand to one of the doors on the side wall.

Arkk looked to Agnete. For a moment, he thought of having her stay behind and keep an eye on the council. If they tried anything, she would be ready to handle it. But then he decided against it. If she were with them, they could blast through the dungeon and into the tunnel, removing any need to trek back through the manor.

It was also safer to not split up.

The door brought them to a hallway. Not the servant’s corridor that Arkk had gotten himself lost in the last time he was at the manor, just a regular hallway. They moved in silence. Nobody else came across them. Presumably, any guard would have rushed to the throne room while any servant would have run in the opposite direction.

Joyce stopped at an unassuming door and grasped the handle. “This leads to the dungeons and the menagerie,” he said with a small note of distaste in his tone.

Arkk wasn’t sure if it was directed at him or not, so he just nodded his head.

The handle rattled under his grip but the door didn’t open. Joyce swore under his breath. “One of the guards will have a key—”

“Doesn’t matter,” Arkk said, taking a few steps backward. “Agnete.”

The former purifier stepped forward and planted a hand on the metal around the handle. The brass first blackened and then began to glow red. It steadily brightened until it started dripping. Slamming her shoulder into the door, it swung open.

“Neat trick,” Joyce said with a scowl.

“I’m just full of them.” Arkk stepped into the opening. Average-quality glowstones adorned the ceiling, lighting the way down a spiraling flight of stairs. It was a tight spiral with a ceiling lower than would be comfortable for anyone too tall. “What is the menagerie?”

“Servant quarters for the non-human staff.”

Arkk pressed his lips together, thinking back to the entertainment at the Duke’s party. Most hadn’t looked all that happy to be there. Were they paid? Arkk remembered Ilya’s initial observations of the Duke’s manor just after they first came to Cliff. A harpy had tried to escape the grounds and had been magically stopped. He doubted they were treated all that well.

Would they want to leave? Seek employment elsewhere?

Arkk couldn’t deny that, after seeing the Underworld, having a harpy on his payroll sounded great. Someone who could fly overhead, scouting both for more of those Protector creatures as well as any additional settlements in the area. Or just any landmark in general. He hadn’t quite realized how much he had come to rely upon scrying until he couldn’t do it anymore.

“Are the staff in their quarters at the moment?”

Joyce looked back over his shoulder with a frown, looking Arkk up and down. “I’m not quite sure what information you’re fishing for but you requested an escort to the dungeons. I am here to prevent needless death, not assist you.”

“And yet, if you return to the Duke, it doesn’t seem like you’ll be keeping your head.”

“As I said to him, better one than all given the war.” He stretched his back, cracking his neck. “I’m an old man. Fought in the last war. Spent the intervening years as a knight errant. In light of a few prominent deaths, the Great Marshall reached out to me to see if I had any insight. Unfortunately, Evestani have drastically changed their tactics and strategies. I’m the least useful member of that council.”

“So you lay down your life for the rest of them. Taking the risk for others in my hands but inevitability in the Duke’s.”

“Unless I misjudged you at the party, I didn’t think you would kill me.”

“We met at the party?” Arkk asked, frowning in thought. “I’m sorry, I met a hundred people that night and then the attack kind of blotted the rest of the night from my mind.”

He chuckled. “Hawkwood introduced us. Thank you for saving his life.”

“Hawkwood is a friend and mentor.”

“Mhm… Though perhaps I did misjudge you. Attacking the center of the Duchy like this? Even if the Duke spares me, I’ll be forced through a hundred droll meetings on you in addition to Evestani.”

“I personally believe the Duke is a blight on the Duchy. Moreso now. One of my companions was injured in the attack on the party and I left her here for medical care. Imagine my disappointment when I found out she had been thrown into the dungeon.”

Joyce hummed again, sounding a little more thoughtful this time. He didn’t say anything else before they reached the bottom of the stairs.

“Left door, dungeons. Right door, menagerie.”

Arkk frowned. “Is it just a coincidence that they’re located next to each other?”

Joyce just shrugged. “I brought you here. Good luck,” he said, turning back to the stairs.

“I can get you out of here,” Arkk said. “You can either come with me or go back to your errant wanderings. You don’t have to submit yourself to Woldair’s mercies.”

The man just shook his head and continued ascending the stairs. He did pause after a few steps, turning back. “I imagine you won’t have very long alone. The Duke is surely gathering up the entire guard contingent and all the spellcasters he can scrape together.”

“Thanks for the warning.” Even if it wasn’t strictly necessary. Arkk had already guessed that this reprieve was only temporary.

Joyce disappeared up the spiral, leaving Arkk with Agnete and Vezta.

“Agnete. Open the doors. Vezta, go see if anyone is home in the… menagerie. Make a soft sell to anyone present. Push a little harder on harpies or anyone else capable of flight.”

“Understood, Master,” Vezta said with a bow as Agnete started melting the locks.

“Don’t take too long. I want us gone in… ten minutes. We’ll go through the dungeon floor and meet up with the tunnel that way. I’ve already got the lesser servant in position—it’s close, somewhere underneath the menagerie floor.”

Agnete shoved open the door to the dungeon with her shoulder just as she had done with the stairwell door. She turned to the other door only for Vezta to form a maw of razor teeth at the end of her arm. The door gave her a brief pause but turned to splinters under the rotating teeth.

“Reinforced stone. Regular doors,” Vezta said with a shrug before stepping inside.

Letting her carry out her task, Arkk stepped into the dungeon with Agnete at his back. He almost expected a guard of some sort. instead, he just found a long, poorly lit corridor with several heavy doors on either side. A small window of bars on each door let him peek inside.

The first door on the left held a small fairy. The waifish demihuman sat on the floor of her cell, arms hugging her bent knees. A dark elf sat in the cell on the right, an eyepatch hiding one eye. He looked like he had seen his fair share of fights. Another dark elf sat in the next cell on the left. The next on the right was empty.

Arkk scowled as he passed more doors, peeking into each. Why were there so many held here? Criminals should be held at the garrison. The average thief or even murderer wouldn’t be here. Arkk doubted assassins would be either. Most likely, these were people who had simply offended the Duke.

“Open all the doors,” Arkk said, nodding to Agnete. “All the occupied ones, anyway.”

“Can’t say I expected anything else,” Agnete said with a faint smile touching her black lips.

Some part of this likely resonated with the former purifier. She hadn’t been held in a literal prison but with that ice marble held over her head every moment of her life, she might as well have been. If some of these people were violent murderers held here for some reason… well, he would deal with that later. It might be somewhat hypocritical to turn anyone away with how many criminals he was sheltering.

As Agnete started popping open cells, Arkk moved down the corridor, peeking into each and every cell. He knew exactly where Ilya was thanks to the employee link but he still wanted to check.

Sure enough, by the time he reached Ilya’s cell toward the end of the dungeon corridor, he had only passed a single human. Everyone else was either a demihuman or beastman.

Even though he had already confirmed through the employee link that Ilya was fine, Arkk couldn’t help the relief he felt upon seeing her sitting in her cell, resting on a pile of moldy straw in the opposite corner from the bucket. She had her eyes closed but a few quick knocks on the door had her on her feet in an instant.

She glared at the barred window in the door for just a moment. Her eyes widened. “Arkk?”

“You sound so surprised. Didn’t think I would come for you?”

“I only pulled on the link an hour ago.” She leaned close to the door. “How did you convince the Duke to release me so fast?” Pausing as a frown touched her lips, Ilya’s tone took on a note of admonishment. “Your eyes are glowing.”

“Yeah. Turns out a few sets of glowing eyes can be pretty convincing. Stand back,” he said, even as he moved out of the way.

Agnete stepped forward and placed her hand against the door’s handle. Not having cooled down between each door let her heat the metal nearly instantly. As soon as it was soft enough, she shoved her shoulder into it, popping the door open.

Ilya gave Arkk a raised eyebrow as she moved back to the now-open door.

“What?”

“I take it convincing the Duke involved a lot of fire.”

“A bit,” Arkk said, pulling Ilya into a tight hug. One she didn’t pull away from. “I’m sorry I left you here for so long. The war has been… hectic.”

“Not just the war,” she said, hands on his back. “I saw it. The sky.”

Arkk broke the hug first, pulling back. “Sky?”

“The… that wasn’t you?”

Arkk gave a confused shake of his head. Before Ilya could say anything, he held up a finger. “You’re going to have to hold that thought. My job convincing the Duke might not have been as thorough as I would have liked. We need to get out of here before they start dumping poison down the stairwell. Or however they plan to deal with us.”

“Wait! My mother.”

Arkk clenched his teeth into a tight grimace. “We don’t really have time to run around the manor—”

“She’s not in the manor,” Ilya said, stepping out into the hall. She looked one way and then the other. “Oh. You’re freeing everyone.”

“Is that bad?”

“No, it’s…”

She trailed off, looking to the door Agnete had just popped open.

Alya stepped through, wearing a fine dress that had clearly seen better days. The tall elf still managed to affect an ethereal grace that Ilya hadn’t quite managed. Her silver eyes trailed after Agnete.

The purifier ignored her, moving on to the last few doors.

Alya’s head turned toward Arkk. Those silver eyes landed on him and widened. Likely at the bright red glow in his eyes. She sucked in a breath that was more of a hiss than a regular breath. “You…” Alya stepped forward, tall and imposing but lacking any real means to threaten him. She still reached out a hand that turned into a shaking, clenched fist.

“What have you done, Arkk?”