Archemi Online Chronicles Boxset

by James Osiris Baldwin

  The priest bristled again. “To what end?”

  “There might be some way the killer is listening in to your conversations,” I said. “A painting with the eyes cut out or something. And if they’re using your office to spy on priests and monks here...”

  “You could be in danger,” Suri finished.

  “This is... I...” Father Toth looked at us, briefly at a loss for words. “I... suppose that’s possible, but the temple guards watch the doors night and day. The windows are barred.”

  “Well, Matthias said he thought your killer might be a ghost,” I replied. “Let’s go find out if he can walk through walls.”

  Toth waited anxiously by the door while we went in and searched. Karalti trotted after me with her bone clamped tightly between her jaws, sticking her head in around me as I peered behind tapestries and paintings. By the way that Suri searched, I felt more confident that she had been either a cop, a soldier, or both before her upload to Archemi. She was brutally thorough, looking in spots most people would miss. Under carpets, inside drawers, and to the High Priest’s dismay, through his papers and then underneath the drawers, which she pulled out one at a time to check.

  “I don’t think there’s really any reason to disarrange my entire study,” the priest objected. He clutched the doorframe while he watched us work.

  “You’d be amazed where people can hide themselves or listening devices.” I swept the room, zooming in on objects of interest, bookshelves, vases. The high priest’s study had a collection of beautiful weapons and forge tools displayed in glass-fronted cases. My HUD highlighted them with glowing blue rings.

  “Best place for a listening device is on the inside or underside of things,” Suri mentioned from across the room. “Drawers, inside electrical outlets, windowsills.”

  “A listening device?” Toth looked even more taken aback. “Is such a thing possible?”

  That was something I wondered myself, but given that Archemi had airships, firearms, and steampunk cars, I was betting the combination of magic and technology meant it was feasible. “Smell anything, Karalti?”

  The little dragon turned her wedge-shaped head from side to side, tail lashing with curiosity. “Smell fire! Aaaannd…big man over there? Annnd… OOH!”

  Two things happened all at once. There was a glimmer of gold light and movement in the corner of my eye; Karalti dropped her bone and then dashed off in a flash of black scales, obscuring my view of the scuttling thing.

  “Ratty! Rattyratty-OWW!” Her mental voice was shrill with delight as she gracelessly slid across the marble floor and crunched face-first into the base of one of the High Priest’s ornate wooden bookshelves. As she scrambled to recover, chomping wildly into the crevice underneath the shelves, it began to tip forward.

  I didn’t even think. I sprinted to her and put myself between her and the bookshelves as they crashed down on top of us.

  [You have taken 25 bludgeoning damage!]

  [You have taken 12 damage!]

  [You are Bleeding!]

  [You have earned a new Feat: ‘When furniture attacks!’]

  Medieval books don’t have soft paper covers: they’re made of wood covered by leather. I took a couple of hits to my face as they tumbled out. Straining, blood running into my eyes, I pushed the shelves upright and put my back against them. Nearly 50 HP down the drain for that little stunt. It was easy to see how one of the priests had been beaten to death with a book.

  “You alright over there?” Suri called.

  “Karalti! What the hell?” I wiped my arm across my face so I could see. “What have I told you about chasing rats and not looking where you’re going?”

  “But I got it!” My dragon reared up with the ‘ratty’ in her mouth. “Weird ratty though. Too stabby.”

  “That’s not a bloody rat,” Suri said.

  She was right. The thing struggling in Karalti’s jaws wasn’t an animal at all.

  It was a machine.

  Chapter 9

  The clockwork bug Karalti held in her mouth looked something like a tarantula with a round speaker device embedded in its back. It was about the size of a large mouse, writhing and kicking with eight needle-sharp legs. Karalti pranced up with it, and was about to offer it to me when it managed to jam one of its feet into her tongue. She squealed and tossed it down onto the floor, where it clattered onto its back, kicking its little brass legs. My HUD flagged it as [Masterwork Arachnoid Artifact].

  “What the hell...?” Suri said. She and Father Toth converged on us, arriving just as the robot flipped itself over and tried to make a run for it. I stomped down and trapped it against the floor with my boot. Despite its size, it was tough; I had to put a good part of my weight on it before the damn thing stopped struggling - and even then, it continued to paddle its feet in the air, whirring and clicking like an irritated insect.

  “By Khors’ breath,” Father Toth said. “That’s an artifact. Mercurion work. It must be.”

  “A Mercurion made this?” I moved my foot so that I was standing on the legs instead of the body. The machine immediately began to struggle, lashing its body from side to side. “Is there a way to turn it off?”

  “You would have to know its command words.” The priest squatted on his heels, absently taking out a pair of tongs from his smithy’s apron. “Let me see if there’s a maker’s mark.”

  I waited until the priest seized the bug around the edge of its carapace before lifting my foot. He held it up as it flailed, squinting at it as he turned it around and around. “Hmm… fascinating. And marvelous. I’ve only seen work of this quality a few times. There is no maker’s mark on it, which I suppose is to be expected for a spying device. But this craftsmanship… it’s superb.”

  Suri grimaced. “You’re right. This is a Mercurion automaton. It has to be. One of those little buggers costs at least a hundred gold on the black market, too.”

  “I’ve never met a Mercurion,” I said. Now that I had a good look at it, I could see that not only was the brass and silver thing tough as hell, it was a work of art. Tiny gears and levers whirled inside its abdomen. The brass was etched with elegant arcane designs. “This would be controlled by an Artificer or a Mage, right? I know next to nothing about magic.”

  “Yeah, an Artificer,” Suri replied. “But look at the materials. Brass, silver, diamonds, bluecrystal mana... that shit’s expensive. Whoever commissioned this has to be rolling in gold. I take it this doesn’t belong to the Church?”

  “It most certainly does not,” Toth replied. “The Temple serves the people by producing staples needed to live a good life. Ploughshares, carriage parts, rebar, construction parts. Swords and armor. We are not Artificers. If we need magic or magitech, we outsource to the Mercurions or a very few human craftsmen.”

  I tapped the round disk on the machine’s back. It made a small, tinny, hollow sound. “That’s a speaker. Someone’s been listening to your conversations.”

  “Given that its got legs, it might not have just been listening in this room,” Suri said. “This thing could move anywhere around in the building.”

  A nasty thought occurred to me then. I pointed at a big glass jar full of what looked like cut tobacco and mimed dropping the bug into it and screwing the lid closed.

  “Of course, of course. Let me... Hmmm...” The priest bustled over to his desk and dumped the contents into an empty metal vase, then brought the jar back. Suri dropped the spider in, and it began to scuttle around inside. We got the lid on just as it jumped.It hit the lid and began to crawl around again.

  “The other priests,” I said urgently, once I knew it was no longer recording us. “Has anyone come to you since Orban died? To confess their sins, or whatever?”

  He nodded, swallowing. “Yes, though they did not discuss any sins they may have committed. There have been two: Brother Moricz and Father Erik. They came with separate concerns. But they’re under heavy guard-”

  “What did they talk about?” Suri demanded.

/>   Father Toth hesitated. “I am oath-bound to keep their confidence.”

  “Where are they? Where can we find them?” I asked.

  “Brother Moricz lives in the seminary. He’s an instructor there. Father Erik teaches young orphans how to craft, so that they might have skills after they leave the orphanage and not turn to thievery or suchlike.”

  Suri set her jaw and rolled her shoulders. “Those are in opposite directions. Let’s split up.”

  “I can ride Cutthroat. I’ll take Erik,” I said. “We should party up so we can-”

  “I don’t ‘party up’ with anyone.” Suri shook her head, her scarlet hair flying out from her face, and stalked out the door.

  Quest Update: The Slayer of Taltos

  There are two priests of Khors at risk of being struck down by the Slayer: a seminary tutor in the Temple District, and a crafts instructor who teaches at the orphanage near the Skyport. You must reach the orphanage, quickly!

  [A new location has been marked on your map!]

  Father Toth blinked in confusion. “I thought she was your fellow investigator?”

  I sighed, dismissing the quest update. “Long story. Come on, Karalti.”

  We jogged out of the room, but when I rounded the edge of the door, I was confused to not see anyone outside other than guards, priests, and congregation. I grimaced. I swiped my HUD over and summoned the ‘Known Players’ list to message her. When I bought it up, there was no ‘Suri’ listed there. The only names were the players I’d met at the Eyrie of St. Grigori: Violetta, Baldr, and Lucien, who were grayed out because I’d blocked them as soon as I’d left Ilia. Two others I’d met before taking the Trial of Marantha, Nethres and Casper, were also listed and were online. But no Suri.

  “Suri?” I queried her name in the database.

  [No such player found.]

  I felt a twinge in my gut: my intuition, warning me of something. I tried a different spelling, but got the same system message. Had she blocked me already? But no… that couldn’t be it. I’d seen her player’s corona in the High Priest’s office just a second ago.

  “Ugh.” I scratched my head and sighed. “Why do I even care, Karalti?”

  “You told me you wanted her on our side, but that’s gonna take longer than one day. Grumpy lady is smart and brave.” Karalti bobbed her head. “And bouncy.”

  That made me chuckle, but I was still annoyed. At Suri, at myself, at the murders. I picked up my pace and hustled for the outside courtyard, whistling for Cutthroat. The hookwing appeared, and before she could give me any shit, we climbed onto her back. I pulled her around, and kicked her into a run, following the glowing marker on my mini-map. Between the quest update and the fact that the listening device had been discovered, I had a feeling our murderer was going to strike soon, and strike hard.

  The orphanage was down near the Skyport: a three-story wooden manor house with an attached warehouse I assumed was a workshop or school. Both the house and warehouse had definitely seen better days. We pulled up with a screech at the front doors, and I vaulted off Cutthroat’s back to the wet cobblestones. The doors were guarded by two men in the chainmail-and-plate uniform of the city guard, and they pulled their swords, scowling with suspicion.

  “Halt! Who-”

  “High Forgemaster Toth sent me. Father Erik is in danger,” I said, holding my hands up. “Has anyone else come in in the last thirty minutes or so?”

  “What? No.” The guard on the left, an exceptionally thin man, shook his head. “Father Erik has a guard posted in his quarters. I see you work for the Volod, but…

  “We’re not supposed to let in anyone with weapons due to there being children inside. Captain’s orders,” the other one said. “Hand over your steel, and you may enter.”

  “The Slayer is in there!” I snarled. “I work for the Volod, and we need to get inside! Let me pass!”

  “We can’t-”

  Karalti marched forward past me. She threw her head back and emitted a shrill roar, splattering droplets of flaming spittle everywhere. “Bad men! Out the way!”

  Both guards jumped out of the way with cries of terror, brushing frantically at the burning spots on their armor.

  “That’s my girl,” I muttered, and barged in past them.

  The inside of the building reminded me of a school. Kids’ drawings covered sheets of curling, yellowed parchment on the walls and the side of the wooden staircase. I fought the urge to barrel to the top of the stairs at full speed. Instead I stealthed it, dropping to a crouch and using one hand to guide my way across the old wooden floor. Karalti dropped down as well, and we silently followed the quest icon to a room behind a pair of double doors. I listened at the keyhole. Instead of the normal sounds I’d expect of a teacher’s bedroom at this time of night: throat–clearing, the rustle of papers, the scratch of a quill, chit-chat between Father Erik and his bodyguard–there was nothing except the swish of fabric, and a soft metallic clinking.

  “Claws and teeth only. No fire,” I thought to Karalti, tightening my grip on the Spear. “The building’s made of wood and there are children in the rooms below us. If you breathe fire here, you’ll kill them all.”

  “Oki.” Her telepathic voice was a whisper. “On count of three?”

  “Yeah. One, two...three.” On three, I kicked the door and charged in.

  And then nearly stopped cold, because holy shit.

  Father Erik and the guard were both dead. The guard lay on his face, a crossbow bolt protruding from his eye. Father Erik was naked, kneeling on his bed, and kept upright by an intricate net of ropes with hooks that stretched his skin out from his body. Standing over him was a tall, lean figure in a hooded cloak. His face was covered with a flat steel mask that burned blue with magical sigils.

  Before I could even open my mouth, the Slayer of Taltos dropped what he was doing, spun in a flurry of black cloak, and dashed for the window.

  Chapter 10

  “Hold it right there, asshole!” I barked, sprinting after him.

  The Slayer didn’t hold anything. He dove through the window with inhuman agility and confidence, leaped across the alley below and onto the next roof. Without slowing, he hit the tiles with a crunch. Broken ceramic skittered to the street three stories below, and he kept running.

  Pulse thundering in my ears, I vaulted the windowsill and triggered my core Lancer ability, Jump. Dark power gathered in my legs and then snapped out. I bounded after him like a cricket. Karalti was right behind me, flinging herself into the sky with powerful beats of her wings.

  “Flank him!” I sailed through the air and landed behind the fleeing murderer, scattering loose tiles beneath my boots. He jumped to the next roof, swung around a metal chimney, and fired something at me: a crossbow no bigger than a Beretta Model 12. I dodged reflexively, already partially off the ground. Just as well. The bolt slammed into the roof and blew a hole in it, sending shards of brick flying into the air.

  Explosive rounds. Wonderful.

  The awkward mid-air correction threw me off course, and instead of landing on the level part of the roof, I hit the slope of it and slid down in a wave of broken tiles. I sprung up desperately at the edge of the gutter, jumping again before I fell to the street below.

  That last minute effort propelled me across the gap, and I triggered my new Spider Climb ability just before I hit the waist-high wall of the balcony on the opposite side. Power surged through my limbs, crystallizing as I slammed into the wall with a crunch.

  “Ow, ow, ow!” Snarling, I scrambled up like a gecko, vaulted over, then ran along the balcony as the killer’s cloak flickered in and out of view above. The obstacles of the city ahead of us seemed to present no challenge to this guy at all. Like some sort of parkour prodigy, he hurdled and pivoted, vaulted and slid through it with eerie precision. Meanwhile, I blundered like a drunk rhino through tables and potted plants, getting on top of one and jumping to the next, wash, rinse, and repeat, until we reached the main road. He turned left acro
ss the roofs along the strip. I had nowhere to go but up.

  “Follow him, girl! Be careful!” I urged as I got onto a balustrade, bunched my legs, and Jumped.

  “Oki!” I heard Karalti’s chaaaaaa and saw a burst of white light above. “I got him!”

  I sailed up through the air and managed to grab the edge of the gutter at the height of my flailing arc. I scrambled up in time to see the killer trying to shoot Karalti as she flew rings around him. Her napalm fire was bubbling and flaring on the rooftop. He fired at her, missed, and dodged the next stream of flame, even managing to twirl the edges of his cloak away from it as he fled. My world narrowed down to that retreating back.

  He fled to an adjoining belltower with an open door at roof level: a tall, narrow building where Karalti and I would be less effective.I was gaining on him by the time he vanished through the doorway. For a moment as I followed him through, I really wished I had a gun. He was sprinting up the spiral staircase inside the tower, taking the stairs two or three at a time. I spotted the motion of his cloak in the darkness and ducked as another explosive crossbow bolt shot out with a bright flash,like a tracer round. It slammed into the wall and bounced. The explosion cracked up and down the hollow center of the tower.

  “Fly up from the outside! Cut him off at the top!” I called to Karalti as she tried to follow behind me through the door.

  She reversed course as I ran up behind the murderer, sweat pouring down my face. I burst up onto the deck of the bell tower. The wind whistled over the railing, the heavy bell still and silent. Karalti spiraled up, beating her wings to hover in mid-air to my left.

  “Can’t smell him,” she said. “Bad man has no smell!”

  “No smell?” I leveled my spear and advanced cautiously, ears prickling as I turned each corner and tried to see down to the roof below.

  Like a ghost, the man slid out of the shadows behind me in a wave of rippling black fabric. I saw him in my peripheral vision, and he froze momentarily in surprise as I met his backstabbing blade with the haft of the Spear of Nine Spheres. It hit him in the gut with a dull ‘thud’, as if I’d rammed it into the side of a log instead of human flesh. It apparently still hurt, because he doubled over, his glowing sword skidding off in a shower of blue-white sparks, and the ozone smell of mana seared my sinuses as I sent it skittering away with a foot and carried the kick around. He blocked the strike with one arm, almost absently. There was no crunch of breaking bone. It was like hitting a mannequin made of hard rubber.