by J. R. Ford
One footfall. Heather spun, just in time to thrust a woman lunging out of the stairwell. The spear punched into the assailant’s chest up to the prongs, and she collapsed to the floor, dragging the spear with her. Kim reached for her sword, lightning quick, but Ana quicker. Thunder crashed, then Kim spasmed and bled on the floor.
That single instant ended. Heather sank to her knees, shaking with silent sobs. Ana wiped her glowing sword on Kim’s trousers. Guilherme hadn’t moved an inch, but tears streamed down his face.
Slowly, Kim stopped shaking. Blood streamed into the cracks between floorboards. I took the first aid kit from my bag and knelt by her. Ana had gashed the outside of her right arm, not deep, but messy. I cut away the sleeve with my dagger and wrapped the wound in gauze. “Render aid: +1.”
“Min…” she whispered, looking at her skewered friend.
Heather was shuddering before the corpse. I put a hand on her shoulder. What was I supposed to do? She didn’t look up.
Ana took Guilherme under the chin and made him look at her. “You’ll stay here and help your friend recover. If you try anything, or if we ever see you in the company of Edwin Casper, you’re 5 points.”
He nodded consent. Ana released him, and he rushed to Kim’s side.
Everyone stared into silence’s mirror that evening, even the barkeeper, who was still smirking and polishing his glass. We barred our door.
12
Dawn stretched through the shutters. Nothing cures insomnia like exhaustion — I hadn’t had a sleepless night all game. Maybe I should take up hiking in real life. Hah.
I sat up on the straw pallet and looked at the bed. Heather still slept, but Ana met my gaze. We rose quietly.
When I enabled my feed, I had 500 viewers. Did I know that many people? Were my family among them? I took great care not to trip over my own feet, though it was only a matter of time before I embarrassed myself somehow, unless I vowed silence and never moved. But then everyone would just think I was lazy.
Not the worst truth for the world to know about me.
No sign of the apprentices, in their room or downstairs. The death stain had been cleaned. The innkeeper gave us bread, dried meat, and water when we asked.
I chewed at the jerky and washed away the saltiness. “Think she’ll be okay?” I asked.
Ana nodded. “This is our fault.”
“I know.”
“She’ll recover. It was bound to happen sooner or later.”
“No thanks to us.”
We chewed our jerky. The bread was pretty good, but no comparison to the legendary loaf. And I still had to get my hands on some burek, or maybe ćevapi. I missed Mom’s cooking.
“I wouldn’t do anything differently,” Ana said. “We can’t let Edwin trample us.”
“The way he’s trampling half the city?”
“Protecting ourselves comes first.”
“And protecting Heather.”
We both knew how good a job we were doing so far. We had an entire guild on our heels, and if Edwin got his hands on the Storm’s Breath before us, we wouldn’t stand a chance against him. Heather could get killed over our poor decisions.
I tore the bread in two and stuffed the meat in between. “Discretion is the better part of valor,” I said.
“I won’t flee.”
“Even if that puts us in danger?”
“On the day we met, you stood next to me, even though it put you in danger. You even said you saved those Lancers on your first day. You can’t tell me to run away now.” She smiled at me. “It’s all just a game, right? If I can’t stick to my principles here, what kind of woman would I be?”
“Is that what matters most to you?”
“I have to be true to myself. You and Heather can go, if you want. I’ll find you once I have the Storm’s Breath.”
It seemed unfair to Heather to leave her with me. “That’s some choice you’re giving us. We wouldn’t last three days without you.”
“You would.”
“I wouldn’t have lasted a single afternoon in Bluehearth.”
“Well, don’t go back there. Go to Frostbank, or the Sunlands. No way will Edwin find you halfway across the map.”
Was this the out I’d longed for yesterday? A fresh start sounded like just what I needed. And with inevitable failure on the horizon…but I’m a hypocrite.
“I won’t leave you,” I said.
“Knowing the situation that puts Heather in?”
I washed down the last of the sandwich. “She has her own decision to make. I suspect she’s been putting a lot of thought into it.”
Dewdrops glistened. The air was wet and fresh on our faces. Ana soldiered forward, each stride overflowing with determination, enough to spill onto me and drive me on. Heather shuffled behind, her mood still grim.
She hadn’t said a word since the night she’d stabbed that Enlightened kid, and killing a woman yesterday probably didn’t help. Did she see the same silent mirrors I did? What did she see in her reflection?
She’d rescued me from silence before, but I didn’t know what to say. Brushing her off with “It’s not real,” would belittle her.
I don’t know much about people, but I know there is no faster way to hostility than by dismissing someone’s feelings. I kept my mouth shut and made a mental note: I’d retain friends better if I kept quiet more often. Hopefully future solitude would train me better than past solitude had.
I soldiered on, my body mimicking Ana’s by virtue of an unspoken command, my mind a pit of tar.
The dirt road led us north. I hadn’t realized how close the mountains were. Cliffs of gray basalt rose above the trees. Geometric stone pillars plummeted to the earth in petrified cascade, rippling over one another. I held my breath, as if in anticipation of that wave crashing over us.
No splash. I shaded my eyes with one hand. Square holes had been quarried out of the stone, just visible above the treetops.
We heard the river before we saw it, and we didn’t hear it until it was close. It rushed by, hidden at the bottom of a gorge thick with trees.
A blocky stone bridge stretched over it, garrisoned by three yellow-robed apprentices, two looking each way and a third lying down. We were close enough to see the bow in the lap of the one who spotted us.
“Crap,” Ana said, and leapt behind a tree. Heather and I tumbled into the underbrush near her. I rolled behind a boulder, vines and sharp rocks scratching my skin. An arrow whizzed past.
Heather bumped into me in her crawl. We huddled close to the rock. “Are bows really that bad?” I asked.
Ana joined us. “If the archer’s any good. Even odds he kills one of us before we close in, and then he has his buddies.”
“Yup, you’re right again,” I said. Peeking out, all three had bows ready, though they weren’t moving from their post. “Now tell us, what do we do?”
“That road’s a no-go. Which leaves one direction.” She barreled past us, further into the brush and trees. Of course I chased after. The archers, fortunately, did not, happy to chill on their bridge.
“The ones we encountered at the inn were scouts,” Ana said. “Those were the guards. That guild has some logistics.”
“Horses?” I asked.
The scrub was thicker than anything we’d plowed through the previous day, but ahead, there was a patch bright in sunlight. Stone waves loomed over us from the far side of the meadow, pockmarked with square holes. The river whispered over stone to our right.
Heather and Ana wandered off to explore the clearing. Trees formed a thick tangle around the edge, but there didn’t seem to be anything unusual. Until I heard a noise.
“Psst!” The noise someone makes when they want to get your attention without the teacher noticing. I turned and did a double take.
“Farrukh!” I said. His beard had grown thick. Grime streaked his face, hair, mantle, and tunic beneath — his gray newbie trousers had turned nearly black. He held his black bow with an arrow nocked.
He put one finger on his lips and motioned me over. Fear tickled my spine. I called to Ana and Heather as quietly as I could. When they turned, I raised a finger to my lips, then went to Farrukh.
“Good to see you,” I said. “What’s going on?”
Farrukh opened his mouth but whatever he said drowned under a shout from Ana. I whirled.
A massive shape plummeted toward her. She dove away, and huge wings opened with a gust of air which blasted dirt into my face and sent the trees murmuring. It glided past, turned in a tight circle, and rushed straight for me.
Bowstring twanged. My sword seemed pitiful. My legs wouldn’t move. Fur and fangs hurtled toward me.
Heather screamed, then she stood before me, bracing her spear butt against the earth. The point caught the monster in its breast, pressing in all the way to the prongs, pushing it up and away. The monster twisted over our heads and glided into a hole in the cliffs. Heather panted, her hands white vice grips on her spear. Ana rushed over.
“Thanks,” I gasped.
Farrukh jogged through the meadow, trying to get a better view into the hole. He had his poleax out. “Back to its nest,” he declared. “What bad timing. Still, it’s good to see you too. Salaam.”
“How’ve you been?” I asked.
“Alive,” he said. “Been tracking that beast all yesterday.”
“You mean you knew it was coming?” Ana asked. Her voice was the lid on a simmering pot. I felt more than heard the rumble of heat beneath.
Farrukh’s eyebrows knit together. “I tried to warn you. Good job injuring it,” he added, to Heather. “Probably saved Pavel’s life.” He clapped her on the shoulder, and she recoiled. Then he unstrung his bow and slipped it into his buckskin case strapped to his back.
“You’re not afraid of it coming back?” I asked.
He shook his head. “They’re ambush predators. Besides, they can regenerate. It’ll want to nest.” He picked up a wooden bucket of entrails, previously obscured by the brush, and hung it below his bow. I could smell the gore from ten paces.
“Going for the points?” I asked.
“I bought a cantrip that lets me brew trollbats’ regenerative fluids into Health Potions. I’m trying to stock up before I need one.”
Health Potions! Sounded almost too good to be true. “Where did you get the cash? The apothecary in Bluehearth wanted 100 gold!”
“A hermit apothecary gave me a quest to gather some monster bits and agreed to exchange one of his recipes. I was happy to oblige. Strange stuff, though. As soon as I read the recipe, the paper disappeared, and now I can look it up under the ‘Spells’ tab. Says it’s a ‘Visceral cantrip.’”
“How exactly did you plan on killing it?” Ana called.
“Lure it with the chum and shoot it though the wing while it was feeding. It’s worked before, I just hadn’t counted on you.”
“If you’ve killed one before, does that mean you have Health Potions?” I asked. “We could buy some. We’ve taken some beatings.”
The slash still tugging at my shoulder, the stinging electric welt on my forearm, the numerous punishments to my chest and ribs, the slices from fermid claws on my legs, the flash burns on my shin…could one potion make all my aches go away?
But then I remembered Ana’s condition. Her foot seemed not to pain her too badly, but she’d eaten two strokes from the whip and some acid besides. And we were all, including myself, safer if she were healthy rather than me.
“I have the ingredients in my bag,” Farrukh said, “but I will not sell you a potion. Only give you one as a favor between friends.” He smiled, the expression rustling his beard.
It seemed giving away his boon would be rude. “My friends could use some too.”
“After brewing one for you, I’ll only have an emergency dose left.”
I could feel Ana about to boil over. I cut her off. “What if we help you hunt that bat thing?” I looked at Ana and Heather, then realized what I’d said. There I went, volunteering Heather for more danger she had no business being a part of.
“Be aware of what you sign up for,” Farrukh said. “These beasts nest in the abandoned quarries of the basalt cliffs.” The quarry entrance was about thirty feet up. His expression was grim. “We’ll have to enter the cliff to hunt it down. I’d never chase it alone, but with all of us…what do your companions say?”
Ana scowled. “Up to you, Heather.” A polite way of saying, “If it were up to me, no.” I could see some reason behind continuing our own way. Through every delay, Edwin closed in on the Storm’s Breath. But we’d reached where river met cliff. Would we have to chance the archers?
All eyes returned to Heather. “Hunt.”
13
Farrukh took a set of half-overgrown stairs down to a dock on the river. I went with.
He knelt to fill his canteen. “Ana and Heather — are they lotto, or buy-in?”
“Both buy-in,” I said.
He nodded, as if he’d expected that answer. He opened a jar containing a couple of pungent bat organs and squelched some red liquid from one in with the river water.
When we returned to the meadow, Ana and Heather were chewing on jerky sandwiches. Ana handed me one then walked over to where Farrukh was sprinkling herbs into the potion.
Should I do something? Those two had gotten off on the wrong foot. Ana had blamed him for not warning us, and not selling her a Health Potion didn’t help. But I wanted them to like each other.
Too late. Ana stomped back, gnashing at her sandwich. “What’s his problem?” she asked, the words muffled by the food.
“What did he do?”
“I just tried to properly introduce myself. I figure if we’re going along with him for a while, we should get to know each other. And he just brushed me off!”
I shrugged. Farrukh came over. He made some hand gestures above the canteen, fingers moving slow and precise to form arcane shapes, and the liquid began to glow shimmering red. It smelled disgusting.
“Take it fast as you can, it tastes awful.”
I began chugging. Awful was an understatement. The stuff burned worse than rakija. I had to force down a cough as it scoured my throat and gut. Ten excruciating seconds later, I lowered the canteen and wiped my mouth. I took a deep breath through my nose, but the stench sent me into a coughing fit.
But even as I gagged, I could feel the potion coursing through my body. I rolled up my sleeve, and where an angry red burn-welt had been moments ago, only a faint scar remained.
A notification popped up: “Drink your first potion: +10.”
“Thank you,” I gasped.
“It accelerates your natural healing processes,” Farrukh said. “It won’t grow limbs back, at least that’s what the apothecary said. I haven’t had to try.”
Heather spoke up. “Have you heard anything about the Storm’s Breath?”
Farrukh shook his head.
“How about Vedanth Durg?” I asked.
“I’ve heard it’s guarded by a fire giant. If the Storm’s Breath is there…nah, too risky to try alone.”
Great. In addition to Edwin, we’d have to fight a fire giant.
“We’re after it,” Heather said.
“Hm.”
We approached the looming cliffs, which appeared poised to crash over us at any second. Sharp-angled pillars curved out of the ground, tumbling up and over one another. Farrukh took the rope but set down his pack, bucket, and personal armory. “Think you can bring these up for me?”
“Do we really need the bucket?” Ana asked, waving her hand before her nose. “They’ll smell us coming.”
Farrukh frowned but said nothing.
Ana scooped up his pack, Heather his weapons. Still carrying our tent, I couldn’t carry anything more.
Farrukh got a running start and launched up the cliff face. One extended hand caught the rim of a pillar and, kicking with his legs, he clambered up. He swarmed over them, jumping from pillar to pillar, grabbing the edg
es of ones above, and crawling up cracks. Within a minute, he’d reached the opening.
Fear surged. What if the monster was up there, waiting for him?
No beast from the darkness. Farrukh tied his rope and lowered it. I gave it a tug, then began the climb.
The ascent was tough going. Because the cliffs hung over us, I couldn’t brace with my legs as I climbed. At the top, Farrukh grabbed my burning forearm and hauled me up.
A wide staircase descended into darkness, without twists or deviations. Each stair was about ten feet square and a foot high. The walls, floor, and ceiling were perfectly smooth, with a pattern as if the geometric cascade had been shorn by an impossibly sharp blade.
Ana began climbing. Heather, after seeing my difficulties with the rope, decided to try her luck with the cliff itself. She scrambled up, encumbered by Farrukh’s weapons along with her own spear. Around the time Farrukh and I helped Ana over the ledge, Heather had gotten stuck, nowhere to ascend. We wiggled the rope and it rippled into her outstretched hand. She made it the hard way, in the end.
The cavern yawned, square and dark. Ana struck tinder alight and fed the smoldering strands to the lantern wick. The light seemed pitiful against that gaping blackness. Farrukh used the tinder to ignite a torch, and black smoke sputtered. I took it, freeing Farrukh to string his bow and nock an arrow.
“Get in, kill it, and get out,” Farrukh muttered.
Ana led the way, holding the lantern high in her left hand and the Lightning Blade in her right. My hands were superglued to the rapier and torch. Even Farrukh beside me had stiffened.
Heather breathed behind us, deep and deliberate. I don’t know why she’d agreed to help in the hunt, whether the decision was made out of spite, or obligation, or merely because it was a decision she could make.
Our padding footsteps kept silence at bay. The torch and lantern light shone on Ana’s auburn ponytail, tangled and dirty and still so beautiful that sadness panged my heart. A shriek evicted me from my rapture.
My blood curdled. No beast in sight, we plowed on. The light barely pierced the blanket of darkness around us.