by Elliott Kay
War Cloud wasn’t without his own abilities. He’d been looking for a more effective moment, but now Geoffrey had given the game away. “Dastia guide me,” he growled.
“What?” Geoffrey asked.
Golden light illuminated War Cloud’s blade for a single instant as he struck the shield one more time. Pure might and rage knocked the cleric on his ass. The power of his faith went farther, driving a thousand cracks of light through the shield before it shattered. Geoffrey cringed under the resultant shower of metal, clutching his now broken shield arm to his chest.
Geoffrey looked on in shock. “You’re a paladin?” he gasped.
War Cloud answered with a kick to Geoffrey’s face. “I’m a heretic.”
Without missing a beat, War Cloud sidestepped and reached out with one hand to touch Scars on the back. “Hold firm,” he growled. The same light flashed from his hand. In a single motion, he healed and pushed Scars back into his own fight before rushing over to the wounded.
The push helped. The healing helped more. No longer fighting pain and weakness at his back and relieved of wounds Lawrence had already inflicted, Scars rallied with a jarring swing against his enemy’s head. Lawrence staggered back, his helmet dented, but he blocked and parried well enough to ward off any exploitation of the gap. Scars pressed his attack with a rush of his shield and thrusts of his blade.
“Back!” Lawrence shouted. His voice rang out with divine power. A wave of force threw Scars several steps away. The sudden separation and the fight to stay on his feet erased his momentum. An even greater disparity of power followed. Where Scars had found renewed strength from War Cloud, Lawrence now glowed with a divine aura.
“Who made you, beast?” the paladin demanded. His attacks came in lunges, forcing Scars to sidestep and deflect. Despite the way he leaned into his offense, Lawrence moved too fast to offer a gap for a counterattack. “I see your heritage. It only leaves the question of which parent was which.”
Every blow felt mightier than the last. Scars barely held onto his sword through one swift parry. His shield tilted against his forearm under the force of another strike. The taunts came on between each attack.
“Was your mother the victim of some monster?” Lawrence pressed. “Or are you the spawn of some sick man’s perversion with a captive mongrel?”
Battering sword blows and shoving shields forced Scars to the rail of the bridge. Glittering purple darts and flaming bolts of magic flew behind Lawrence. Farther back at the other side of the bridge, Shady Tooth lost ground against Rothgar and his hammer. DigDig and Teryn lay wounded with War Cloud trying to help them both. No one would back Scars up in time.
“I’m sure your mother would thank me for ending you either way,” Lawrence ranted on.
Scars couldn’t match the paladin’s strength with his magic empowering him. He didn’t try. “You don’t know shit about them,” Scars huffed. “But I know all about you.”
Lawrence pushed in again. This time, Scars slammed the edge of his shield into the paladin’s. The resultant bounce left them both open. Rather than driving in with his blade, Scars stepped into his foe, wrapping his sword-arm around Lawrence.
He couldn’t match the paladin’s armor. He didn’t need to, either. Scars pulled his blade in around Lawrence, but he didn’t swing in hopes of finding a weak point or a gap. All he needed to hit was the haversack on the paladin’s back.
Glittering coins and jewels exploded from the backpack. Books and clothing poured onto the deck at Lawrence’s feet. Light erupted with a shower of dozens of glowstones. Common items flew everywhere, too, including lanterns, blankets, food, and a dozen ten-foot poles. A marble bust hit the concrete with an audible thump.
Pushed into the sudden pile of pricy debris, Lawrence slipped hard on silk and loose coinage. With still more loot gushing from his pack, Lawrence couldn’t recover fast enough to defend himself. Scars dropped his own sword and shield, hefting a clumsier but far more effective weapon from the mess at his feet. With a roar, Scars brought the marble bust of Olen Zuck over his head and drove it back down onto his foe.
The armor protected Lawrence well from blades and arrows. His helmet couldn’t do so much against the weight of the statue and the wrath behind it. Lawrence jerked violently under the impact. The head of the bust fared even worse, cracking and rolling free, but that only made it easier for Scars to raise the rest of the marble piece and bring it down on Lawrence again.
Pieces of armor came loose. His sword clattered away. Even his helmet, jarred from successive impacts, now sat off-center and left him partly blinded—until Scars stepped on his dented chest plate and tore the helmet away with another roar.
A brown fist smashed into the paladin’s face. The back of his head slammed into the deck in a ripple impact. “You think you’re the first? You think I haven’t heard that shit all my life?” Scars asked. His fists came in again and again.
The divine glow was gone now. Lawrence lay in a mess of armor and blood, his head reeling with split skin and broken teeth. Scars wrenched the paladin up again, looking him in his stunned and bloodshot eyes.
“They were in love, asshole,” said Scars. “The only monster here is you.”
It was the last thing Lawrence heard before he went over the side. The splash as he hit the water demonstrated how fast the river ran, and how deep. In an instant, Lawrence and all of his heavy plate armor was gone.
A handful of random items bubbled up in the paladin’s wake, floating along the surface: a thin booklet. A scroll. A hat.
A familiar pair of boots. They promptly turned and sank once more.
“Aw, hell,” Scars sighed.
Pain slammed into Scars at his side and all over his back. He caught glittering flashes of red and blue light as he fell to his knees against the railing. His breath caught and his eyes shut tightly as he fought through the burn running through his body, knowing its source without a doubt. The wizard still stood behind her magical barrier at the foot of the bridge. Yargol could counter only so much of her magic. She’d figured out what she could still manage.
He opened his eyes in time to see an arrow and a bolt of flame fly past in retaliation. The fire scattered across the wall of blue light. The arrow did not. Mishael stepped back, weaving some other defense against Teryn’s arrows. The princess stood tall, seemingly unharmed despite the blood soaking her shirt. War Cloud knelt behind her with his hands on DigDig’s wounds as Teryn nocked and loosed another arrow to keep the enemy wizard busy. Only one other clash continued on the bridge.
The dwarf’s choice of weaponry forced him to commit to full swings to get real power, but Rothgar showed surprising versatility. He knew how to parry with both the handle and the blade. Darting in and around for another attack, Shady Tooth caught the top of the hammer in a thrust at her side rather than a swing. It wasn’t the first time he’d landed that trick. Even if she’d escaped any broken bones, she had to be hurting.
His armor deflected her every counterattack. Sparks flew when her daggers struck his helmet and shoulder plates. Rothgar presented a more compact threat than Lawrence, with tighter protection. With a wince of pain, Scars pushed himself up from the rail of the bridge. He had to help.
“Are we done yet?” she asked.
“What?” grunted Scars.
“What?” echoed the angry dwarf. His weapon rushed past her in another deadly swing.
“Are we done with this?” Shady Tooth elaborated.
“What do you…?” Scars blinked. An arrow flew between them, threatening the wizard at the foot of the bridge. A rush of fire followed. Mishael, at least, had plenty to occupy her for the moment. Scars stepped forward to join the fight as Rothgar swung in again with his hammer in a sharp but controlled sidelong move.
Shady Tooth brought knife down at the hammer in an underhand grip. The move was even riskier than her footwork, but she hooked the head of his weapon. Metal slid against metal as she tugged his hammer away, adding to the power of his swing
rather than fighting it. For once, the dwarf was overexposed. She left him fully turned around, and in a flash leaped in to wrap her legs around his waist. Her other knife came around his shoulders in the same move.
They tangled and rolled. Rothgar’s hammer did him no good at all now. Shady Tooth endured his weight and his struggles to shove her knife through the gap of his armor around his neck. His beard was not proof against knives. Rothgar screamed and struggled, but couldn’t stop the next wrenching, savage stab into the gaps of his armor. Or the next. Or the next.
He didn’t scream for long.
Scars looked on in shock, though not because of her brutality or the blood. “You could’ve done that all along? You were waiting?”
“Once my vision cleared from that flare, yeah,” she said. “You keep trying to talk or trick our way out of fights. I thought you might have another plan for that.”
“…what?” Scars blinked.
“Wizard!” thundered a new voice. Yargol strode forward, leaning on his staff, speaking louder than he could possibly shout naturally. “You stand alone. Your cleric still lives. We only want to leave. Do you wish to keep fighting?”
At the foot of the bridge, Mishael glared at Yargol from behind her barrier of purple light. Her robes bore the stains of her wounded shoulder, but whether by potion or magic or sheer force of will, she still stood. As if to emphasize Yargol’s point, Geoffrey groaned and blearily raised one hand to his head.
Still seated behind her armored, bloodied foe, Shady Tooth gestured to their magician. “This is what I mean,” she explained to Scars.
“You will walk away?” Mishael called.
“Turns out we all still can walk,” said War Cloud, tugging DigDig to his feet. Blood still soaked his armor, but his wound was healed. Teryn stepped forward, too, another arrow nocked and ready to fly.
“Not now with the trash talk,” said Scars.
“When else is a good time?”
“Yargol can block only so many fireballs!” Teryn hissed.
“That’s all we want,” Yargol called back to Mishael.
“Except I’m keeping this sword,” Teryn muttered, holding Kiana’s blade low.
“Fine,” Yargol grunted under his breath.
“Then we have a deal, monsters,” said Mishael. “Walk away, and we’ll do the same. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” said Scars. He held her gaze, waiting for her to take the first step back.
The rustle of coins broke the silence. DigDig knelt at the pile of gold and treasures at the center of the bridge, scooping loot into his backpack. War Cloud glanced over once, shrugged, and moved to Geoffrey to strip the unconscious cleric of his bags. Teryn joined DigDig at the pile to stuff her pockets.
Shady Tooth looked to the pile with raised eyebrows, then turned to the dwarven corpse at her feet. Without a word, she loosened the straps on his backpack.
“Oh, come on!” Mishael complained. “We looted all that treasure fair and square! You’re just gonna steal all our loot right in front of us?”
War Cloud shrugged. “Well, yeah.”
Epilogue
The climb out of the cave presented a swarm of problems all at once: frigid cascading water, slippery rocks, and the jarring switch from glowstones and shadows to daylight. Scars watched DigDig and Shady Tooth lead the way, envying their dexterity and confidence. He had no intention of trying to match their speed when the rope came down from above. His ego could endure a little envy.
Teryn ascended the rope with some skill. Shady Tooth pulled Yargol up on her own as soon as he grasped the line, leaving Scars and War Cloud at the bottom. He threw a knowing look to his companion. “You’re next,” said Scars.
“That’s some bullshit,” said War Cloud, though almost casual about it. “How do you figure I’m next?”
“I’m the leader. That makes me the last one out.”
The bitter end of the rope landed on the cave floor with a whack. War Cloud frowned. “That doesn’t sound like the kind of leadership I’m used to.”
“You’ve been working in a shit job for the last few years.”
“Fair enough,” said War Cloud. “At least we got paid in the end.” He grabbed the rope and started climbing, taking more time than the others but ascending with steady strength. A sack fat with coins bounced at his hip.
Alone in the cave, Scars turned his attention back down their path.
No one came.
He only heard the call of his own name from above once War Cloud was clear. In a repeat of his escape from Zuck’s chambers, Scars found himself doing little of the climbing once he’d gotten a firm grip on the rope. His companions pulled him up.
He emerged from the hole soaking wet, dragged out onto a bed of mud and rocks amid pools of water. The break into the caves below turned out to be only one small channel of runoff from a larger stream on the surface. Trees cut down on the rush of daylight into his eyes, though he still blinked hard with the adjustment.
Shady Tooth and War Cloud left DigDig to coil up his rope. Teryn knelt at one of the streams to refill her waterskin. Yargol stood at DigDig’s side, watching Scars as if waiting for something. Trudging out of the stream, Scars looked from one companion to the next with a scowl. “How are you all dry already?”
Yargol reached out with both hands and clapped. The water soaking Scars from head to toe flew away from him all at once, instantly drying him down to the waterline at his ankles.
“Did you see something down there?” asked Shady Tooth. “Hear something? You were looking back.”
“I’d been in that dungeon long enough to think I might never get out again,” Scars confessed. He shook his head. “Thought I’d see Zuck come out of the darkness. Or that undead dwarf. Or Chatter. Or those adventurers. Someone.”
Shady Tooth’s face darkened. “We should’ve finished them off.”
“The wizard would surely have outmatched me,” said Yargol. “My call was more a bluff than a threat.”
“There were still six of us against her and the cleric, and that guy was still on his ass and drooling. DigDig had recovered.”
“Another wound like that would have been beyond my abilities,” said War Cloud.
“I can only assume the elf can swim just fine,” added Teryn. “She’d probably have been back in the fight before long.”
“We might have beaten them in the end. We also might have lost someone along the way,” said Scars. “None of you are worth that. At least we’ll never see two of them again.”
Shady Tooth folded her arms across her chest, accepting the decision, and then stopped to look at Teryn. “What?”
“What, what?” Teryn blinked.
“What are you doing with your face? Your mouth was all scrunched up to one side. I don’t know human face stuff.”
“Human face stuff…?”
“What does that mean?” Shady Tooth pressed.
“It means she has something too awkward to say,” said War Cloud.
“Then say it anyway,” said Shady Tooth.
Teryn sighed. “Even if we’ve seen the last of them, who’s to say they’re the only adventuring group after me? They had a lot of power. Their gear was expensive. They were interested enough in finding me to come all the way here and fight through that dungeon, so the reward must be serious by now. Who else might have the same ambitions? Who else might work with the survivors?”
Scars grimaced. “I’ll admit I hadn’t thought of that.”
Shady Tooth’s face darkened further. She released a frustrated, grumbling breath. “We should have finished them off.”
“It’s done. We’re not going back in there after them, anyway,” said War Cloud.
“So what now?” asked DigDig. “Where do we go from here?”
At that, Teryn looked up with a question, but held her tongue. Scars read it all in her eyes. He didn’t need her to ask. The rest of the crew stood with sagging shoulders and listless postures. They also breathed easier, even in the s
unlight.
The sun hung low in the west, though not yet touching the horizon. Clouds decorated the sky in small patches, suggesting a clear night without rain. He wasn’t entirely sure where they were, but the sun and the view suggested they were somewhere in the hills along the north side of the mountains.
Scars put off Teryn’s unspoken question with a nod. “Let’s find someplace to make camp.”
* * *
“I had just turned seventeen when the Electors chose my father to succeed the queen on the throne. Even before then, when he was the duke over the east, he never listened to my arguments about the harm he did. I started working against him instead. At first it was simple things, all done quietly: passing along whatever I heard within the palace, swiping gold to help the poor and the others my father hurt. It wasn’t immense, but he’d be surprised if he learned how much of his own money went to his victims. I even hunted in the noble preserves and gave all my game to commoners who didn’t have that privilege. Everyone laughed that off as soft-hearted nonsense, but it kept some people fed.
“His cruelty grew as soon as he took the throne. I worked harder. I took bigger risks. Some worked out. Others didn’t go so well. I spoke out, too, which only got me alienated and shut out. The people I’d tried to help told me to lie low and wait for my moment. That went on for a few months. Then came the decree of exile to push the orcs and goblin folk from the southlands, repudiating the Peace of Clear Skies.
“I couldn’t lie low after that. Some told me I should keep on as I had, working from within. I couldn’t. I won’t stand by and wring my hands and make carefully inoffensive critiques in public while my father hurts people. Nothing about this is necessary or good. It’s raw cruelty and greed. I won’t be a part of that.”
“So what happened with this prince?” asked War Cloud. “How did that go down?”
“It was only days after he ordered the orcs and goblins out. I was out of the castle, trying to push back. I used my name and authority to disrupt his soldiers and push back against the mobs. I couldn’t stop the expulsion, but I bought time for goblin folk to gather their things and get out of the capital with something more than the shirts on their backs. Some wanted to fight, and in truth so did I, but bloodshed in the streets would’ve only led to a worse nightmare. Making a fuss to slow things down was the best I could do. Eventually, the king sent several of his trusted thugs to find me. They all but dragged me back to the castle.