by Red Culver
Miss!
What the hell?
The blow landed, but it didn’t actually do any damage, explained Flik quickly. Don’t sweat it, boss. Just try again. Quickly!
The creature lurched towards me, its flapping tongue dripping slime. I stepped back and bumped into Cerissa, and suddenly the thing was on me.
Attack Roll: 14
AC: 10
Hit!
Its tongue darted out and stuck me in the neck. Hot poison flooded my veins.
This must be what happened to Cerissa, I thought. My body grew heavier and heavier, as though pressed under a series of lead blankets.
Physical Saving Throw: 16 + 4 = 20
Success!
I gave the monster a feeble shove as the sensation of crushing weight faded. All my limbs were still working— but I wasn’t about to take that chance again. I had to kill this thing, and quick, but my paltry +1 attack bonus wasn’t cutting it.
Grab the sword! Flik shouted in my head. You’re a Duelist, remember?
"Shit, yeah!" I said out loud. As the creature lurched toward me again, I backpedaled around Cerissa’s frozen form. Her right hand held her sword out in a protective gesture. I spent a few seconds scrabbling at her fingers, trying to peel them from the hilt of the sword, but it was no good.
"She’s frozen solid!" I said. "Any other bright ideas, daemon?"
Uh, said Flik. Not really. I’d say it’s been an honor, boss, but… you know.
The creature leapt at me, slashing with its claws. They raked across my chest, tearing jagged holes in my T-shirt, but somehow avoided breaking the skin.
Attack Roll: 7
AC: 10
Miss!
I was skating through on sheer luck. If a single roll of the cosmic dice had gone differently, I’d be dead right now. I needed to take control of the situation, and quick, or I’d die here in a black basement of an alien graveyard. I’d never see Mom again.
My retreat had brought me all the way around Cerissa, the creature following. My foot bumped against something and I pulled it back from a stab of heat. My torch! Maybe I could use it as a proper weapon…
I snatched it up with my left hand. Immediately I saw the neon words:
Torch equipped!
Attack Bonus: +2 (Duelist)
Damage: 1d4 (fire)
That was a little more like it. The monster came at me, lashing its tongue hungrily. It was the perfect opening, and I jabbed the torch forward…
Attack Roll: 20 + 2 = 22
…and rammed it straight down the thing’s throat.
Critical hit! Maximum damage!
Damage Total: 8
I let the torch go as the creature crumbled at my feet, burning from the inside. It hadn’t even had time for a death scream. I let out a long breath, feeling the adrenaline pump through my body.
Not that I’m complaining, but how did I do eight damage? I asked Flik. The Rules said a torch can only do four.
Must’ve been vulnerable to fire, poor thing, said the daemon. I was about to ask him to elaborate when I heard Cerissa’s voice.
"Al… Alex? That you?"
"It’s me," I said. I turned to see Cerissa slowly blinking and moving her fingers one by one. Relief flooded through me as I realized her paralysis wasn't permanent. "I’m here."
"Why…? How?" She turned her head cautiously from side to side.
"I’m sorry," I said. "For calling you a whore. And then for following you. What happened?"
"You saved me?" she asked. Her eyes widened slightly at the smoldering corpse at our feet. "Did you kill that ghoul?"
"Yeah, I torched it. I think this is yours, by the way." I handed her the dagger, which she slipped back into its sheath. She looked me up and down with a long, appraising stare.
"Here." She handed me her sword. "The dagger is special, but you can probably make better use of this than I can. I don’t know why I even carry it."
Short sword equipped!
Attack Bonus: +1
Damage: 1d6
"Thanks," I said. I felt better with a proper sword in hand. "Now, what exactly are we doing here?"
"We?" Her eyebrows went up. "Okay, then. We are goin' deeper. Two more levels, as it happens. C'mon."
"Why?" I asked.
"You’ll see!"
Two mercifully uneventful levels later, we stood at a heavy oak door banded with iron.
"Okay," said Cerissa. "There's probably gonna be more guardians in here. Another ghoul, or skeletons maybe. So be ready for anything."
"Anything," I confirmed.
She pushed the door open, and I saw something I wasn't ready for.
The shattered remains of countless skeletons lay scattered across the floor of the chamber beyond. In the center of the wreckage was Mordred, dusted with bone powder from his cowboy boots to his black hair. He looked up, his eyes wide.
"You!" he shouted. "How? No matter. I have the amulet and you don't, you little bastard." He stuck his hands out. One was already drawing arcane shapes in the air. From the other hung a small black-and-silver amulet on a leather thong. Before I could react, he disappeared.
Did he go back into the Silver Ways? I asked Flik.
Not from here, the daemon said. No onramp nearby. You can't just hop on anywhere.
Then what?
"Teleport," said Cerissa, as though she'd read my mind.
I was gonna say that, said Flik.
"How powerful is this guy?" Cerissa continued. "That's some spell."
"No clue," I said. "I only met him yesterday when he tried to blast me."
"Seriously?" said Cerissa.
"Should I know him?" I turned to face her fully, my arms crossed.
"Well, I just assumed… you know." She gestured vaguely at me.
"Assumed what?" I was more confused than annoyed, but there was at least a little annoyed in there.
"Well, he was Will Swift's right hand man. So I figured you and he had beef."
"That's the second time you've mentioned Will Swift," I said. "Who is that?"
Her mouth hung open for a second. "You ain't serious."
"Let's pretend I am."
"You— you—" she stammered. "You look just like him!"
"Who is he?!" I threw my arms up in frustration.
"Isn't he your father?"
CHAPTER SIX
The Roguelock
AS WE MADE our exhausted way back to the Red Donkey, Cerissa and I talked. For real this time, not the smooth lies of our time on the wagon. As I’d guessed, she was a thief. So was Mordred, though I’d figured that out as well from the fact that he we’d caught him stealing from a tomb.
And apparently, so was my dad.
Will Swift— I should have guessed. A nice pseudonym for one William McLeod of Galveston, Texas. According to Cerissa, he’d shown up in the city of Gate some eighteen years ago and quickly set himself up as head of a powerful thieves’ guild. Mordred was his second, a black magician who supported Swift on all his adventures. They would disappear together on long journeys to foreign lands, then return laden with riches and amazing artifacts. It all sounded awfully familiar.
“Is he around? Does he ever come back?” I asked Cerissa with a dry mouth.
“Nah.” She shook her head. “He’s just a legend now, been that way for ten years or so. Mordred, too, 'til now.”
I was a kid again, hearing the hum of a car coming up our long dirt drive and thinking surely, surely this time it would be Dad, only to see the mailman's white truck. I tried to push down my disappointment.
“How do you know all this?” I asked finally. “Are you part of the guild?”
Cerissa sighed. “No. Guild fell apart a few years after they disappeared, once folk realized they weren’t comin' back. But my mom was a member.”
I was surprised to see we were in front of the Red Donkey. It was a lovely morning, warm, clear, and totally inappropriate for the storm raging inside me. Cerissa headed for the door, but I put out an a
rm to stop her.
“One more question,” I said. “When you helped me out yesterday— was that just because I look like Will Swift? You figured out I was his son, thought that might give you some advantage?”
Cerissa stared into my eyes for a long time. Hers were huge and purple, an enchanting sign of her elven heritage. Finally her mouth quirked up in one corner and she gave me a tiny shrug.
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s get drunk.” Cerissa nodded.
Twelve mugs of strong niflung ale later, Cerissa and I staggered up to her room. It took her a few tries to get the key to turn, and when it finally did we fell to the threadbare carpet in a laughing pile. Cerissa stood and stumbled to the bed as I spread out on the floor.
“We go’ get th’ amulet,” Cerissa slurred from the bed.
“How come?” I asked, rolling onto my back.
“S’worth a lot… a lot… a lot of money.” She giggled.
“How much?” I rolled onto my stomach, but that was worse. I tried to flip over again but only made it halfway. It sure was comfortable here on the rug.
“C’we talk ‘bout this tomorrow?” Cerissa said.
“Good enough,” I said. I get it, dad, I thought. Dungeoneering is hard work. Much easier to let someone else do that part… and then… and then…
“And then we steal it,” said Cerissa. We sat in the common room of the Red Donkey, watching a lunch crowd gather as we nursed mugs of bitter black coffee. My head was pounding and Cerissa looked about as good as I felt, her red hair tied in a greasy bun and black shadows beneath her big eyes.
“You make it sound so simple,” I said. She took her time sipping her coffee before she replied.
“Well, Deceiver’s in the details.”
“You’re the expert,” I sighed. “So what do we do first? It seems like we need more information.”
“Bullseye,” said Cerissa. “We need to know what Mordred is plannin' to do with the amulet, where he’ll be, all that. That’ll give us some idea how we can lift it. I’ve got a few contacts who might've heard something.”
“Back up,” I said. “I get that this thing is valuable, but why? What exactly is it? Why does Mordred want it?”
“Ah.” Cerissa looked at the table. “It’s a roguelock.”
Knowledge Skill Throw: 13 + 2 = 15
Failure!
I sighed. “Roguelock?”
“You’ve heard of honor among thieves? Roguelock makes it real.” She drummed her fingers on the table. “Basically, a gang of rogues makes a blood pact never to go backstabbin’ each other. They pick an item that binds up the magic of the pact, like a contract. So when Will Swift and Mordred started their guild, them and their lieutenants made a roguelock pact, and they used that amulet.”
“How does it help Mordred now? The guild is dissolved, right?”
“Yeah. But you gotta remember that before Mordred and your dad showed up, there was no thieves' guild in Gate. So I figure his plan is to get the band back together. Reunite the underground with him on top. Problem is, he’s been gone for ten years. Most thieves in Gate couldn't pick him out of a lineup. But if he’s got the roguelock…” Cerissa spread her hands.
“He can prove he’s the boss,” I finished.
“Yep. Not to mention, there's a reason thieves like the spell. Whoever wears the roguelock can move quick and quiet thanks to its magic.”
“So it's enchanted. But really, he needs everyone to see him wearing it,” I said. It made sense: by flashing the roguelock around the criminal underground, Mordred could kill a few birds at once. He’d prove he was who he said he was, he’d invoke his connection to the legendary Will Swift, and he’d force the newer thieves to remember their history. Hell, he had probably proven some kind of point just by filching the thing from a monster-ridden tomb. I forgot about my hangover as my mind churned. “So he has to do something public, at least as far as the underground goes. A show of strength that all the thieves will see.”
Cerissa’s coffee mug froze halfway to her lips. “I think you’re onto somethin’.”
“But there's no central authority anymore, no HQ he can just walk into and declare himself boss. Is there any sort of big event coming up? A gathering of thieves or something?”
“Matter of fact, there is.” Cerissa’s eyes were wide. She still held her mug half-lifted and totally forgotten. “The Aventura Museum of Foreign Lands is openin' a new collection next week. Big shindig, everybody’ll be there. It’s perfect.”
I blinked. “A museum opening? Why is that perfect? It sounds kind of stuffy.”
“You never wondered how they get all that art and treasure? You think folks are just donatin' ancient relics on the daily?” A smile crept across Cerissa’s face. “The Aventura is probably the single biggest buyer of stolen goods in Borealis. Only from faraway places, mind you. The new stuff is all from the Citadel— that’s the niflung home island— and I guarantee you most of it was lifted by local boys.”
“So all of Gate’s thieves will be at the opening.”
“The ones that matter, yeah. Actin’ all respectable, hobnobbin’ with the quality. And you’ve seen how Mordred dressed, those ridiculous dragonskin boots. He’s a man who likes his dramatics. I bet you anything he’ll make a grand entrance with the roguelock around his neck.”
“Okay! Okay.” An electric thrill ran through my body. Was this how it was every day for Dad? “Now we’re getting somewhere. Sounds like our next move is to check out this museum.”
The Aventura Museum of Foreign Lands was one of Gate’s architectural crown jewels. As we walked its bright, airy marble halls, admiring beautiful artifacts from all over Borealis, I discovered that I was also getting a much-needed geography lesson.
The museum’s floor plan was inspired by the layout of Borealis itself. The world consisted of countless islands arrayed in concentric rings. At the heart of it all was Aventura, the large island where we were now. The city of Gate sat roughly in the center of Aventura, surrounded by low, rolling fields and small forests.
The first ring around Aventura was called the Home Islands. There were four, and each was home to a different one of Borealis’s races. The elven isle of Aquitana was one of these, as was the niflung homeland called the Citadel. The masska, the cat people, didn’t have their own island; instead they roamed the ocean in caravans of colorful ships. Humans didn't rate an island either. They seemed to just be everywhere.
The second circle, farther out than the Home Islands, was called the Inner Ring. There were eight major islands in the Inner Ring, and they all sounded pretty dangerous. Beyond even those was the Outer Ring, an apparently hellish group where nobody ventured.
The Aventura Museum was a circular building with a large central hall representing Aventura itself. Four surrounding rooms each housed artifacts from one of the Home Islands. Another circular hall held collections from both the Inner and Outer Rings, from which it was far less likely for adventurers to return. The only break in the circle was a wide, tree-lined promenade that ran from the street directly to the main doors, which opened into the central hall. From above, the building looked like a circle with a rectangular chip cut from it, or a fat, filled-in letter C.
As we wandered from room to room, I was struck by just how tightly everything was locked down. Rather than windows, the light in each chamber came from thick glass roofs supported by metal bars. Extremely exposed, and no way in short of smashing the glass. We saw a few service entrances in the outermost hall, heavy doors of greenish bronze, but even in the middle of the day they were watched on both sides by attentive guards who eyed us as we pretended to examine the museum's treasures. Security would certainly be far more intense during the reception.
"I think the only way in is through the front door," I said eventually. Cerissa nodded her agreement.
"We need more about their security arrangements," she said. "C'mon."
She led me through the hall dedicated to Aquitana, which was dominated by two r
ows of slender stone sarcophagi decorated with silver and jade in floral patterns. One of them stood open, revealing an interior lined in dully gleaming gray.
"What's that?" I asked as we passed.
"Lead," said Cerissa. "The ancient elves thought it stopped their souls from leavin' their bodies after death."
"Is that a good thing?" I asked. She stopped and looked at me.
"Elves are immortal," she said. "Death ain't natural to us. If an elf dies, something has already gone real wrong. So the idea of your spirit leaving your body..." She gave a little mock shudder. "No thanks."
"So does it work? The lead, I mean." She was walking again, and I scampered to catch up.
"Dunno," she replied. "I've never died. Lead does block magic, though, usually."
We'd made it back to the central hall, dedicated to the local cultures of Aventura. Rows of battered shields in faded colors lined the circular walls, and tall blue and white banners flanked the doors. Most of the floor space was taken up by ranks of gleaming armor, razor-edged polearms in long stands, and swords in glass cases, but in the very center stood the massive skeleton of what appeared to be a dragon.
At the front of the room, near the doors that led to the promenade and street, was a small guard station. Little more than a glass box, it stood surreptitiously along the wall, but commanded a view of both the doors and the Aventura hall itself. A few guards in the same blue-and-white livery Captain Donner wore sat chatting inside.
"Watch this," said Cerissa. "And keep your mouth shut." Before I could respond, she straightened her back, stuck her chin out, and strode to the guard station.
"No, no, no!" she said stormily. "This won't do! This won't do at all!" The guards looked up in surprise as she went on, "Wholly inadequate! My master will be furious!"
One of the guards, with a silver badge pinned to his chest, stood and began patting the air in a futile soothing motion. "Ma'am, please, slow down. What exactly is the problem?"
Cerissa waved wildly around, taking in the doors, the guards, the displays. "This! All of this! You call this security?"