by Dante King
“My two little boys at home are on their deathbeds because of Elandriel’s greed!” a woman shrieked shrilly from the back of the crowd. “If you don’t let us in, we’ll burn the whole city down!”
“Get some torches!” someone else yelled. “Let’s burn this fuckin’ place down! It’s turning into a hellhole anyway, with all the murders and disappearing people! Let’s burn the whole place down!”
Now, I realized, was the perfect time to start a chant to really whip the crowd into a rabid frenzy.
“Burn it down! Burn it down! Burn it down!” I roared, and soon everyone was chanting along with me.
Even though the guards were heavily armed and well-armored, they were greatly outnumbered and starting to look nervous. Even with the assistance of the crossbowmen and archers looking down from the walls, they wouldn’t be able to stop at a good number of the guards from being killed in a riot, and none of them looked as if they were quite ready to die today. What was more, I could see that at least some of the guards were clearly sympathetic to the beggars’ cause; Saint Suncred’s Moon was a valued tradition in the city, and a few of the guards from the lower classes likely had relatives who relied on charity for food.
As the chanting began to get more ferocious and the mood became increasingly tense, the head guard and his sergeants huddled together and shared a hushed but frantic conversation. After about a minute, the head guard climbed up onto a crate to address us.
“All right, all right, listen up!” he yelled, his voice all but drowned out by the fierce and determined chanting. “We’ll let you in to be fed, but only under escort! You’ll come in groups of three. Everyone gets their usual Saint Suncred’s loaves, buns, and fruit. Then you’ll leave the city right away. No loitering around after that! That’s the best I can offer, and it’s a good deal too. That way, nobody has to die today.”
“That’s good enough for us!” I roared back.
If there was an actual riot, security would be beefed up all over the city, and that was the last thing I wanted. Now that I had a solution to my problem, it was time to nip the riot in the bud before it exploded.
“Thank you, guards!” I yelled, to the same rhythm of the “burn it down” chant. “Thank you, guards! Thank you, guards!”
In addition to changing the mood of the crowd, the new chant was also meant to flatter the guards and get them feeling prideful and self-important. It was another way for them to let their guard down, and thus exploit a vulnerability in their defenses.
Now that I’d achieved my aim, I slipped back through to the rear of the crowd, quietly pulling Friya and Yumo-Rezu along with me.
“Why are you moving us to the back?” Yumo-Rezu whispered. “It’s going to take all day for us to get in from back here.”
“That’s the point,” I said. “The guards are going to be extremely vigilant and thorough when checking the first few sets of people they allow in, but as the day goes on, they’ll get more tired and sloppy, and less thorough. By the time they get to us, they won’t even care about checking us.”
We hung back, waiting near the rear of the crowd. The hours passed slowly, with the guards allowing in small groups of beggars and peasants. As I’d predicted, the guards started out by rigorously searching and interrogating everyone who came in, but after a couple hours, they began to grow weary of this, and started rushing people in after a few quick questions.
By the time the three of us reached the front of the crowd, the sun was clipping behind the distant mounts, and dusk was settling in. We were some of the last few beggars and peasants left. The guards all looked exhausted and apathetic, and when we came to the spear wall, they didn’t even question us. Besides, the rank magical stink coming from our clothes probably allayed any doubts or suspicions they might have had about us.
“You three filthy scumbags, move it.” The head guard wrinkled his nose at the stench coming from us. “The sun’s almost set. Once it’s dark, Saint Suncred’s Moon is over, and we’ve got no obligation to shove food in your bellies anymore. So, if you want to eat, you’d best get in and out fast! Men, get these half-wits in and out on the double!”
The guards parted their spears, then grabbed our arms and yanked us through the barrier. Cursing us for our stench and general filthiness, the tired, annoyed guards hauled us through the enormous gates and into the city.
And with that, the three of us were inside Luminescent Spires, and the downfall of Elandriel and the Blood God had begun.
Chapter Eighteen
Even though the guards were weary and apathetic at the end of the day, the three who accompanied us into the city kept a close eye on us, and their weapons were at the ready in their hands. I knew we would have to move fast when the right time to strike came. We needed to hit them hard and melt into the shadows before anyone else realized anything was amiss.
“Where are you goblin nutsacks taking us, eh?” I growled in my commoner’s rasp.
“The back of the food market, scum,” one guard muttered. “Where else would we be taking you?”
“I know that, ya prick, but I don’t usually go this way is all,” I said. “I don’t trust you lot; bunch of lyin’ whore’s assholes, the lot of ya!”
“By the Lord of Light you stink,” another guard said. “And if you don’t shut your mouth and stop complaining about the route we’re taking, we’ll give you three dog turds a good dunking in the moat when we kick you out! You need a good fucking bath or three!”
“Take me my usual way and I’ll shut up.” I stopped and defiantly folded my arms across my chest. “I’m a creature of habit, I am! I don’t like this way!”
“For the Lord’s sake,” the third guard said, exasperated. “Let’s just take this filthy hunchback by whatever route he wants. It’s pointless trying to argue with a dirty animal like him. We’ll end up at the same place anyway, and I just want to pack up and go home for the evening.”
“All right, all right,” the first guard grumbled. “Okay, you reeking wretch, have it your way. Which of Luminescent Spires’ glorious roads do you insist on taking to the food market?”
“That way.” I raised a shaking hand and pointed to a dark alley that led to the rear of a jumble of taverns and brothels.
“Just the kind of rank alley you and your ilk usually sleep in, eh?” the second guard said. “Fine, we’ll go that way; just hurry up and shut your toothless trap, okay?”
“Thank you most kindly, good sir,” I said. The guard couldn’t see the sinister smile that came across my face from within the inky darkness of my hood.
We walked into the alley, and I waited to get a few paces into the dark gloom before I struck. A sudden, savage elbow strike to the jaw was enough to instantly drop the guard to my right. Before his body had even hit the ground, I sprang up in a spinning typhoon kick. My boot whipped in a blurred arc of speed and brute power, smashing into the side of the front guard’s head and knocking him out cold.
“What the—” the third guard started to say.
Before he could raise his weapon or shout out a cry and raise the alarm, I landed from my airborne typhoon kick, rolled forward, and smashed a vicious punch into his junk. The blow to his cock and balls vanquished whatever fight he might have had in him. All the air from his lungs was expelled in a loud gasp. He dropped his spear and fell to his knees, retching like a fish drowning in air as he clutched at his crotch. I backflipped up onto my feet, then delivered a swift and powerful knee to his chin that snapped his head back and sent him into the dreamless sleep of unconsciousness.
“Impressive,” Friya commented.
“Damn, it felt good to do that again.” I dusted off my hands. “It’s been too long since I used unarmed techniques. Come on, let’s get out of here before these three clowns wake up.”
“Can we get rid of these awful rags too?” Yumo-Rezu asked. “I can’t believe I’ve gone the whole day inhaling this revolting stench and somehow not puked. I don’t know how much longer I can keep it up; ev
ery time I catch a whiff of them my stomach turns.”
“You’ll have to put up with the reek for a few minutes longer, I’m afraid,” I said. “If we dump the rags here, they’ll know we were enemies in disguise. As it stands, without any evidence, they’ll just assume some crazy beggar jumped them because he wanted to stay inside the city walls for the night. Given the famine in the countryside, it’s a reasonable enough explanation. Now quick, follow me.”
I took off at a quick job, dashing nimbly through the network of back alleys. I’d only been in Luminescent Spires once, many years ago, but I never forgot the layout of a place once I had explored it. It was a skill that had come in very handy during my days as a crypt diver, when I had to navigate impossibly complex and dangerous labyrinths and mazes.
After a few minutes of fast-paced racing through alleys, scrambling over walls and barrels, and ducking under abandoned carts, not to mention scampering across a rooftop or two, I dropped down from a high wall between two ramshackle, squalid whorehouses into a narrow alley filled with thick mist.
Yumo-Rezu and Friya jumped down into the mist behind me. Once they were in the alley, I whispered to them to stop.
“What’s the matter?” Friya whispered back. “Are there guards nearby?”
“No, and this is the last place in Luminescent Spires that anyone would find a guard—a living one, at least. Friya and Yumo-Rezu, welcome to Cutthroat Alley.”
“Cutthroat Alley?” Yumo-Rezu asked. “What sort of awful hellhole is this with a name like that?”
Timed perfectly to provide an answer to this question, a circle of dark figures materialized from the thick mist around us, appearing like phantoms that had taken sudden physical form. They were dressed in black, wore hooded cloaks, and were armed with crossbows,
Yumo-Rezu and Friya gasped; they’d been standing mere yards away from these people, yet had had no idea they were there. I, on the other hand, had not only known, I’d been expecting them.
“That’s no natural beggar stink,” one dark figure rasped, aiming his crossbow at my face. “If you’ve come in disguise thinking to get the drop on us, we’ve got bad news for you … very bad news.”
Friya growled out a wordless threat behind me, ready to transform into a ferocious werewolf in the blink of an eye. Yumo-Rezu’s hand surreptitiously slid inside her rags and curled around her dagger. A fight, however, was not going to be necessary; the right words could end this conflict before anything could break out, so I uttered them.
“The dark hand rules the night, and silent shadows are the terror of all living men.”
The dark figures immediately lowered their crossbows, for nobody but a member of their brotherhood would know these words. “Welcome to Luminescent Spires, brother,” said the figure in front of me, all traces of menace and aggression gone from his voice. “Our blades are at your service, as yours is in ours, should it be required.”
“Who are these people?” Friya asked warily.
“Fellow assassins,” I answered. “I may have stopped actively working as an assassin a long time ago, but once you join the Assassins Guild, you’re in it for life.” I then addressed the assassins who had surrounded us. “Thank you for your welcome to this unholy city, brothers … and sisters?”
They threw off their hoods. In the misty gloom, I saw that they were all men, ranging in age from early twenties to late fifties.
“Ah, all brothers, I see,” I said.
“What is your shadow name, brother?” the oldest of them asked me.
“I am Jang al-Ghazul,” I answered, speaking a name I hadn’t uttered out loud for a very long time. Everyone who joined the Assassin’s Guild was given a name in the language of the Desert People that was used exclusively for the guild.
A ripple of excited whispers immediately arose in the group of assassins. My assassin name had quite a reputation attached to it.
“The legendary Jang al-Ghazul!” the man gasped. “I am Rhuz al-Shein, brother, and we are most honored to have you in our presence! But tell us, brother, why have you come to this forsaken place? Death stalks these streets readily enough; no one needs our services anymore.”
“And that’s exactly why I’ve come here. I have quite a story to tell, but for now, we need to get off the streets and into a safe house for the night. The guards are scouring the city for us. And uh, we need to get rid of these disgusting rags too, of course.”
“Follow us, brother,” Rhuz said. “We’ll take care of everything. First though, let’s get rid of those vile rags.”
We took off our disguises, which the women were most relieved to do, given the nauseating stench of the filthy material. Two of the assassins pried open a nearby sewer cover, and we dropped the rags into the sewer, saying goodbye to our temporary identity as beggars. I had to chuckle; I’d made Elandriel’s prophecy come true, and little did he know that it was a prophecy that would end up bringing about his downfall.
Then, moving as swiftly and agilely as cats and as silently as ghosts, the assassins raced off down the alley. I shared a quick glance with Friya and Yumo-Rezu, who both seemed suitably impressed.
“Not bad, are they?” I said with a smile.
Both women gave silent nods before we followed after the assassins. With the two beauties beside me, we scrambled over walls, up and down ropes, tiptoed across rooftops, jumped across canals, scurried through tunnels, and zigzagged through a complex network of dark alleys. It was only after we reached an innocuous looking cottage that we stopped. The cottage was fronted by a neatly tended garden and a pretty porch lined with potted plants. It looked as if a sweet old lady lived here.
Rhuz al-Shein knocked on the door in a complex pattern. After a while, an elderly woman opened the door, wearing a charming smile of pure innocence on her wrinkled face. As soon as she saw us, though, the smile vanished, and a much harder look entered her eyes. She stepped aside, and in the language of the Desert People, she invited us in.
We entered the cottage. After closing and locking the door behind her, the old woman swept aside a large rug on the floor, revealing a hidden trapdoor. Rhuz opened it and dropped down into the black void, and one by one his fellow assassins dropped silently into the hole behind him. I went after them, and Yumo-Rezu and Friya dropped in behind me. When we were all in, the old woman closed the trapdoor above us.
Torches flickered to life all around us, ignited as if by magic, and the writhing orange flames revealed a huge underground basement, much larger than the size of the cottage itself. Despite the torches burning on the walls, the room remained thick with inky shadows, and there were more areas of darkness than there were of light.
In the areas of the room that were illuminated by the torchlight, I could see all manner of assassin’s weapons mounted on the walls and standing at the ready in weapons racks. Various types of armor were at the ready on wooden dummies. There were also large wardrobes full of all sorts of disguises, and chests crammed with any kind of equipment an assassin might need, from grappling hooks and rope ladders to lockpicking tools and flash bombs imported from Yeng. There were also a number of small, private chambers where traveling assassins could sleep, and a small kitchen area—which could be used both for the preparation of food and various lethal poisons.
We sat down in a circle in the center of the chamber, and I told the assassins the story of everything that had happened thus far. I kept it as brief as possible, but it still took a good few hours to detail my rise from necromancer to god, and my journey from Brakith, the Wastes, and Yeng. I explained to them our need to break into the deepest vaults of Luminescent Spires so that we might obtain the Dragon Heart and the Tear of Light.
“We knew that something bigger than the usual banal evil was at work here,” Rhuz said, shaking his head slowly and sighing, “but we had no idea it was this monstrous. We will do everything in our power to get you into those vaults and help you defeat Elandriel and the Blood God, brother Jang al-Ghazul. We will go out now, in fact, and cal
l together every assassin in Luminescent Spires. We will all meet back here in the hour before dawn to discuss a strategy. In the meantime, brother, you and your women should rest and refuel yourselves. There is plenty of food in the pantry there, and although our chambers are simple, the bedrolls are clean and comfortable.”
“Thank you, brother Rhuz,” I said.
He gave me a subtle bow, then he and the other assassins melted into the shadows as fluidly and silently as they had emerged from within the alley.
“Even though we disposed of those vile rags an hour ago,” Yumo-Rezu said, wrinkling her nose, “I swear I can still smell that stench clinging to my hair and skin. I won’t feel clean until I’ve had a bath.”
“You’re in luck then,” I said. “Assassins are fastidious about cleanliness; we have to be, to quickly wash off blood or makeup from disguises, or any other evidence of our illicit activities. Every assassin’s den in Prand has a bath chamber. Have a look around; there’ll be one here.”
“I think I’ll join her,” Friya said. “My extra-sensitive werewolf nose is also picking up lingering traces of that awful stink … even though I know it’s gone.”
The two women left me alone in the chamber. I figured that now that I had a few hours to myself, this would be the perfect time to pay a visit to the rest of my party, who had to have reached Brakith by now. All I needed was for Anna-Lucielle to find the actor and jab him with the enchanted bone fragment I’d created, and I could get inside his body and mind control him exactly like I would one of my zombies.
To see how far they’d come, I first had to take a peek through the eyes of my very first undead harpy. I sat in the middle of the chamber, closed my eyes, and launched my spirit into Talon’s body, spectrally flying across half the continent of Prand in less than a second. When I opened my eyes again, I found myself in Talon’s body, observing the world through her senses of perception.