Archemi Online Chronicles Boxset

by James Osiris Baldwin

  Resigned, I nodded, and let him take point.

  We entered into the cold room beyond in a single file. It was brightly lit, with five or six lamps illuminating the mutilated body of a muscular, light-haired man on the slab. Another Royal Guard stood watch in the corner of the room, keeping an eye on the animated conversation between the man I assumed was His Majesty Andrik Corvinus the Third and ‘the Dakhari’. Whatever I might have noticed about Andrik vanished into a film of white noise as my world focused on the woman.

  She was tall and athletic, with dark, coppery skin that gleamed gold under the torchlight. She was stripped down to bloodied gloves, buckskin leggings that hugged every curve, and a faded rose halter top that was snug enough to be practical, but low-cut enough to be intensely distracting. Her short, flyaway hair burned with all the colors of fire. She knew I was looking at her, because she stared back at me with defiant golden eyes, as fierce and beautiful as an eagle’s. She radiated confidence, competence, and power… power that made her seem more royal than the man who strode toward us from the other side of the slab. She was gorgeous. Not only that, she was Starborn. She had a blue player halo like mine.

  “Aha! If it isn’t the Devil of Yorca, and he has brought me Petko Matthias! And just in time, too!” The Volod’s sharp voice cut through my trance. I swallowed and tore my gaze away, fixing a polite grimace to my face and turning to face him.

  “Your Highness, we have brought you a most worthy candidate to assist in the hunt for the Slayer of Taltos,” Kirov said, bowing and gesturing across to me. “May I introduce you to Dragozin Hector of Tungaant: Starborn warrior of the Nine, chosen emissary of Matir, and the holy guardian of the Queen Dragon Karalti, first of her clan.”

  Andrik Corvinus was younger than expected: a sharp, roguish, handsome man with eerie white-gray eyes and elegantly styled, short black hair that gleamed with health. The King was dressed entirely in black and red. He wore a black Byzantine tunic with crimson trim, a pectoral collar of glistening rubies, and rings that flashed with dark jewels. He pulled a scarf down from over his nose as Kirov talked, revealing a sly, thin-lipped mouth. When Kirov said the d-word, the King’s eyes widened. Then he looked down and behind me, and his eyes widened more.

  “Magnificent,” he whispered, stepping away from the body. “How marvelous. A dragon, here, in my capital!”

  Karalti, nearly invisible in the dark and half-hidden by my leg, bobbed her head and trilled a small, friendly chirp.

  Andrik looked me up and down, hands on hips, then nodded. “Who would have thought that Khors would answer our prayers so directly. And where are you from? The Western Continent, if I’m not mistaken?”

  “You’re not, Your Majesty,” I replied. “I’m from Tungaant.”

  Andrik smiled a wry, challenging little smile. “A Tuun? Well, honored guardian, I wish the circumstances of our introduction were better. Were it not for these infernal murders, the nation of Vlachia would be offering you and your dragon a far more gracious welcome.”

  “No worries, Your Majesty.” I shifted from foot to foot. All the olde-world formality was getting uncomfortable.

  “And you, Father. You’re looking well,” Andrik opened his hands to Father Matthias as the priest bowed. “I am heartbroken to be here, and to be witness to the loss of Brother Orban and all the others.”

  “As am I. It is good to see you again, Your Majesty,” Matthias said carefully. He bent a knee and leaned in toward Andrik’s hand, but the Volod pulled it away before he could get his face near it.

  “Please, do not kiss my ring today. We’ve been poking around down here in this cadaver for half an hour already, and I have all manner of vileness under my nails,” Andrik grinned, a little awkwardly.

  Matthias bowed from the neck, getting back to his feet.

  “We thought that Dragozin Hector would be of great benefit to the investigation, Your Majesty,” Kirov said, laying a friendly hand on my shoulder. “I have offered him provisional sanctuary, dependent on your approval, of course…”

  “Sanctuary?” The Volod regarded us curiously. “What for?”

  I steeled myself, drawing in a deep breath, and held my hand out for Karalti to approach. I heard her claws clicking on the damp stone, and she brushed her head up from under my palm. “The dragons of Ilia are laboring under slavery. My dragon’s mother entrusted me with her egg, and asked me to flee with her and see her somewhere where she could be free. The Mata Argis of Ilia have been pursuing us ever since, and thus, we share this moment.”

  “Unsurprising. Backwards country… it only recently went through a bloody revolution that replaced the king with some soldier rabble and their pet merchants.” The Volod nodded sharply, then looked back down to the body. “Yes… I think a man of your ability would benefit this investigation. But I will make the same offer to you that I have to this lovely woman: I am offering a reward of ten thousand olbia and a royal favor to whomever brings me the Slayer’s head. However, before I am willing to sign the bounty contract, I must have compelling evidence of the Slayer’s purpose. In the interim, I will compensate by extending full hospitality to the hunters seeking to bring this madman to bay… and hospitality includes provisional sanctuary for you and your dragon.”

  The red-haired woman was looking less impressed by the minute.

  I nodded at the Volod’s words, and my HUD flashed a quest update alert:

  Quest Update: The Slayer of Taltos

  Priests of Khors, the draconic god of Fire and Craftsmanship, are being murdered in the Vlachian capital of Taltos. After accepting the invitation of Sir Kirov and Father Petko Matthias, you have met the Volod (King) of Vlachia, Andrik Corvinus, who has offered you provisional sanctuary on the understanding that you will investigate the Slayer and return to him with a report on the Slayer’s motives.

  Reward: 10,000 gold Olbia, Royal favor, EXP (Progressive), +500 Fame in Vlachia, Faction relations go from Neutral to Good.

  Special: While you are undertaking this quest, you have Hospitality in the nation of Vlachia. The capacity of foreign actors to pursue and attack you is greatly reduced. You are able to undertake quests and side quests in Vlachia without attracting attention.

  Special: Failure Conditions – Fail to bring evidence to Volod Andrik Corvinus at the Vulkan Keep within 3 days.

  There was an option to accept the conditions of the quest. I confirmed it with an affirmative thought, and the title blinked green before vanishing.

  “Excellent. I shall give you my mark, so that the guards of the city know you are in my employ.” The Volod stared at me for a moment, and then the mark added to my HUD as a new status – it looked like a stylized raven wearing a crown with five points. Karalti got the same mark.

  Once that was done, Andrik inclined his head to us with a stiff little smile, then turned his piercing gaze to Father Matthias. “Now, Father, if you would come to examine the body-”

  “There’s no point in examining the body more than we already have,” the woman interjected. Her voice was exactly what I’d imagined it: a smooth contralto, dark as burned honey. She had a thick accent that I couldn’t immediately place. “Which is what I was getting to, when we were disturbed. Any evidence there might have been was obliterated when the city guard trampled all over the scene of the murder.”

  Her blunt words effectively shut down the niceties, to my relief. Andrik scowled, turning back to her. “What were we supposed to do then, Suri? Leave him there in the commons for all and sundry to gawk at?”

  Suri. I repeated the name inside my head as her player name tag appeared. I had mixed feelings when I saw it. On the one hand, I’d been hungering for contact with people who could give me insight into what was happening in the outside world. On the other, the worst experiences I’d had in this game had been with other players.

  “Have the Captain of the Guard put up curtains around the body and call your investigator.” Scowling, Suri motioned to Orban’s corpse. “When your guardsmen picked him
up and carried him out, they destroyed all the forensic evidence that might have helped us nail the murderer. Fingerprints, bootprints, all of it. So with all due respect, Your Majesty, next time this happens, you need to order them to preserve the scene, then call me in before anyone touches it. You wanted to know why we weren’t getting anywhere? That’s why.”

  Forensics? I blinked. Jeez. She sounds like a cop.

  The Volod scowled back at her. “How are fingerprints supposed to help with anything?”

  “Every person’s fingerprints are unique.” I dared to step up beside her at the slab, Karalti trailing behind, and looked over the corpse. “And if the murderer forgot to wear gloves, you can find their prints and match them to suspects.”

  Suri’s head snapped around as I approached, flashing me the kind of look I was used to getting from Cutthroat. “Exactly.”

  Faced by two Starborn saying the same thing, the Volod’s hostility turned to visible curiosity. He rubbed his thumb across his jaw.

  “It still can’t hurt for me to examine him,” Matthias said gently. “And in any case, I must give him his funeral rites before he is burned.”

  “Was he working alone, or with a group of priests?” I asked.

  “Brother Orban was not a priest, rytier. He was a Forge Brother, serving as a craftsman for the poor and needy.” Matthias gently corrected me.

  “He was working as a smithy in the catfolk ghetto,” Andrik replied. He was struggling not to stare at Karalti. “He may have had contact with any number of commoners there. I don’t know if Meewfolk have fingerprints.”

  “They do. Not that it matters now.” Suri gestured impatiently at the body. “Who was he with? You never answered me when I asked before.”

  Andrik’s mouth sloped to one side. “Alone. As I understand it, this was some sort of test for him. You would have to speak with the High Forgemaster himself to get the details of the assignment...”

  “Then that’s where I’m going. Cheers.” And with a curt nod, Suri turned and strode toward the door.

  “Wait.” The Volod and I both said at the same time.

  The woman turned back around in the doorway.

  “Why are you going to see His Grace? Why not go to the ghetto?” The Volod spoke before I did. “The Catfolk there surely did this.”

  “No. They didn’t.” Suri cocked her head to the side.

  The Volod gave a testy little sigh. “And how do you know this?”

  The woman grimaced. “You told me nothin’ was stolen from his workshop, right?”

  “Yes, but-”

  “And you enacted the laws that prohibit Meewfolk from owning or carrying weapons, didn’t you?”

  “Yes-”

  “Do you see any claw marks on him?”

  “No, but-”

  “Do you see any shiv marks? Bruises that look like they were left by hands with feline finger pads? And do you really think a Meewfolk mob would leave his gold earrings in?”

  I glanced down at the body, struggling not to smile or laugh as the King of Vlachia wilted under the glare of Suri’s reason.

  “That’s what I thought,” Suri replied. “Now, by your leave, I’m gonna go to the Seminary and talk to his High Forgeness.”

  “Mind if we tag along?” I asked her, patting Karalti to indicate the other half of ‘we’.

  “Actually, yeah. I do.” Suri flashed me a ferocious glare, and stalked off through the door like an atomic bomb on legs. She paused to collect her gear, then kept going.

  Chasing Suri upstairs gave me a magnificent view of her ass, but it made communication difficult. I hissed to her as we clattered up the steps. She turned near the top, glaring down at us as we caught up.

  “Lemme guess,” she said, eyes narrowed. “You want to party up with me.”

  “I’m pretty sure the only kind of party you’re into is the Donner party.” I tucked my spear under my arm, and re-equipped my brainbucket [Militia Helmet]. “I’ll put a raincheck on that, thanks. My name’s Hector.”

  “I heard, in case you forgot I was in the room ten seconds ago.” Suri grinned mirthlessly, flashing a mouth full of sharp white teeth. She’d re-equipped her armor and weapons: a coat of mail with plate armor for her arms and legs, a pair of axes, and a huge scimitar-like sword nearly as long as she was tall. “Well, Hector, you’re a good judge of character. This is my bounty, and no, I don’t want to share it. This city has plenty of quests. Go find your own.”

  “Uh-oh, Karalti! Someone just told me to forfeit my story quest.” I held up both hands and rolled my eyes. “I’ll be right on that ma’am, just as soon as you go fuck yourself.”

  Karalti threw her head back and emitted a sound disturbingly close to a human laugh.

  I’d pegged Suri as the sort of woman to respect people who were capable of giving and taking shit, and the gambit paid off. She smirked. “Well, that won’t be happening any time soon. But seriously, bugger off, mate.”

  Mate. That was the word that finally tipped me off, and that made her accent – filtered through the fictional Afro-Arabic accent of a Dakhari woman – suddenly click with me. “Wait. You’re Australian?”

  Suri had been about to stalk off again, but she froze in the doorway, her back tense. Then she slowly turned back to face us.

  Yeah, ouch. She was Australian. That was awkward.

  America and Australia had been on opposite sides of the Total War.

  Chapter 7

  I’d never actually spoken to an Australian before, short of screaming ‘DIE, YOU ROO-FUCKING SCUM!” while we rained machine gun fire down on each other in the jungles of the Crescent Front. I’d been born and conscripted in the UNAC. Australia had been part of the Pacific Alliance. We’d killed each other a lot.

  “I’d like to establish something before we go any further, alright? I really don’t care if you were Australian. I don’t hate you, the Alliance, or anyone except the fuckwads that started the War.” I held my hands up in mock-surrender. “Yes, I was an Imperial Stormtrooper. No, I didn’t want to do it. I was a conscript. All I wanted to do was ride my motorcycle, play old video games, and eat a lot of pizza. If you like one or more of those three things, we’ll probably get along just fine.”

  Suri’s expression soured more with every word that tumbled out of my mouth. She folded her arms and thrust her chest and jaw forward. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  “Which one? The bikes, the games, or the pies?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “The war.”

  “You know… the War. Twenty years of global conflict, nuclear winter in the Middle East, billions dead from an apocalyptic plague?” I gestured up and ‘out’, as if toward the Real World.

  “Out there in the sky?” Suri snorted. “Alright. So not only are you a pest, you’re a nutcase, which makes you exactly the kind of person I do not want hanging around.”

  I peered at her owlishly. “Do you… not remember the war in which you probably died? The one where you learned concepts like ‘forensics’ and ‘pizza’?”

  She sighed. “In case the dark skin, red hair combo wasn’t enough to clue you in, I’m shallatu. Fireblooded, from Dakhdir. Last twenty-year-long war we fought there was close to a thousand years ago. Now, sod off.”

  “All jokes aside, I really can’t.” I laughed. There didn’t seem to be any point in forcing a reality check on her, so I gestured to Karalti. “This dragon doesn’t pay for her own groceries, so to be frank with you, I don’t give a shit where you’re from or what you want. My little scaly princess needs food, shelter, and safety, and Andrik’s going to give us that.”

  On cue, Karalti deployed her ultimate weapon: cuteness. She looked up at the woman with great big puppy eyes, her crests held flat to her skull. Not even Suri’s resolve could withstand the pathos of a quivering baby dragon. She pressed her lips together, glowering back down at her, but I could almost hear her ovaries swell.

  “Fine,” she growled, turning on her heel. “Just try to stay out of my wa
y.”

  We set off again. As soon as Suri wasn’t looking, Karalti dropped the cute act and stalked after her, her tail lashing stiffly. “She’s mean. I want to burn her like how I did with the bad mask man.”

  “No, Tidbit.”

  “But burning bad people is fun! And she called me a pet.”

  “No fire,” I said. “No setting anyone on fire. I want to get to know this lady better.”

  The hatchling harrumphed. “You’re only saying that because her chest is bouncy.”

  Dammit. I’d forgotten Karalti could sense my... “interest.” I blushed despite myself. “Okay, yes, but it’s not just that, okay?”

  “What is it, then?”

  “She’s a Starborn, like me,” I replied. “But… I don’t think she remembers who she is. Or maybe even what she is. She’s clearly Australian, which in and of itself is really weird. They were our enemies… I don’t know why there’s a Pacific Alliance citizen in Archemi. Like, how the fuck did she upload in? This an American game.”

  “Oh.” The real world metagame stuff flew over Karalti’s head, as it usually did. “So is she good or bad?”

  “I don’t think she’s bad… or at least, I hope she isn’t. She’s probably just grumpy.”

  “So grumpy people can be good?”

  “Sometimes. I have a feeling this lady’s grumpy because she’s seen some bad shit.”

  “Oh.” Karalti pensively dropped her head. “You mean she’s done a lot of bad things?”

  “Maybe,” I said. “Or had bad things done to her.”

  We emerged into the fresh night air outside, and I gratefully drew a deep breath.

  “The High Forgemaster lives in the monastery on the other side of this college,” Suri remarked, stretching her arms back in a way that was both alarming and distracting. It wasn’t just the boobs. Suri was built like an MMA fighter. Her biceps were bigger than mine.

  “That’s a long hike. Want a ride?” I asked.

  She gave me the side-eye. “Cheers, mate, but I’ll walk.”