by Rachel Aaron
The warrior looked bad. The fight with the lich had left him even more beaten up than his duel with James, but the real problem was the ghostfire that was rapidly consuming his body. Once it spread to the lifelines of his magic, there’d be no getting it out. He’d be bound to serve the Once King forever. James was scrambling to think of how to stop it when Arbati’s eyes flickered open.
“You really will have to kill me now,” he whispered through clenched fangs. “I will not serve the enemy.”
“You aren’t gone yet,” James said angrily, standing up. “Hold tight. I’ll be right back.”
Leaving the warrior writhing on the floor, James ran across the dais to the tanks the lich had appeared from when they’d first entered. Behind them was a large desk covered in what was clearly the lich’s personal papers. Everything was written in ancient elvish, but otherwise, it looked like any other cluttered desk James had ever seen. Fortunately, he’d killed and looted this lich a hundred times back in the game, and he knew exactly where all the good stuff was. Sure enough, when he opened the bottom-right desk drawer, there was a stone box inside, its lid sealed by an enchanted golden lock.
Cradling the box carefully, James ran back to the sad heap of crushed bones and grabbed the lich’s robe, riffling through the pockets to find the golden key that matched the box’s lock. The whole process couldn’t have taken more than forty-five seconds, but by the time he fitted the key in and got the box open, the ghostfire had completely covered Arbati’s body, making the head warrior convulse and scream as the blue-white flames began to eat into the magic that gave him life.
As fast as he could, James grabbed one of the four pan-elixirs inside the lich’s box and dropped to his knees beside Arbati. When he grabbed the warrior, the ghostfire jumped to him, scorching his flesh with fire that was burning hot and searing cold at the same time. Far worse than the pain, though, was the rage. There was anger in the ghostfire that was very different from the numbing, almost sorrowful cold of the Eclipsed Steel Staff. That difference felt significant, but James didn’t have time to explore it. He was too busy cramming the pan-elixir into Arbati’s mouth, tilting the warrior’s head up so he wouldn’t choke on the rainbow-colored liquid inside.
The warrior sputtered as the elixir splashed into his mouth. The cure-all shone with prismatic light as it ran down his throat, then all the white fire on the warrior’s body snuffed out in an instant, leaving him whole and gasping on the floor.
The shock lasted only for a heartbeat before Arbati’s hand shot up and grabbed James by the collar.
“What happened to you back there?” he roared. “Why did you throw yourself at the lich like that?”
Choking, James slapped his hands against Arbati’s until the warrior let go. “It’s the new staff,” he gasped when Arbati let him breathe again. “I think it’s made from some kind of cursed metal that has a connection to the Once King.”
“Then you should stop using it,” Arbati said at once, glaring at James’s dropped staff with a hiss. “That thing almost got us killed!”
James dropped his eyes. “It wasn’t all the staff,” he said quietly, rubbing the back of his neck. “It spoke to me, yeah, but it didn’t take me over or force me to act. It just…got into my head. I’m the one who actually screwed up.” He bent lower. “I’m sorry, Arbati. Deep down, I guess I really am just a coward who causes trouble for—ow!”
James jumped back, rubbing the back of his head where Arbati had cuffed him. “What was that for?”
“For telling lies,” the warrior said, lifting his chin. “I’ve fought at your side for a night and day, and I have seen no sign of cowardice. Quite the opposite. You’ve stood with bravery many times when a smarter man would have run.” He shook his head. “You have many, many flaws, James Anderson, but being a coward is not one.”
James gaped at him, touched. “Thank you.”
“You should be apologizing for telling such a blatant lie to my face,” the warrior said, fur bristling. “But that cursed weapon of yours is clearly a tool of our enemy. You must swear on your honor to get rid of it at the first opportunity.”
Just the memory of the cool, smooth voice whispering through his thoughts was enough to make James shudder. “I’m sorry,” he said, nodding rapidly. “The first opportunity I get, it’s gone.” The moment he figured out how to unbind it from his magic, he was pitching the hunk of black metal into a volcano.
“Good,” Arbati said, then for the first time, he smiled. Not a cruel grin or a bloodthirsty smirk, but an actual, joyous smile. James was still staring at it in shock when the muscular jubatus clapped him on the shoulder hard enough to make him stagger. “We won!”
An even bigger smile spread over James’s face. “You’re right,” he said, looking at the black glass shards that were all that remained of the orb. “We did it. We won!”
Maybe it was relief, or maybe they’d both had too much tonight, but that statement sent both James and Arbati collapsing into a heap. They lay on the dusty stone, laughing until their sides ached and their faces were wet with tears from the pure joy of having survived. They were still on the floor when a peal of thunder rumbled through the ground beneath them.
“The gnolls!” James said, sitting up in a rush. “They’re still fighting!”
He and Arbati shot to their feet and ran for the door. When they reached the stairway where they’d dropped the portcullis, James heard the clash of steel and the twang of bowstrings. Rushing down the stairs, James almost slammed into the iron grid of the lowered portcullis. This turned out to be a good thing because beyond the dark grid was a raging battle.
The long hallway was a graveyard of shattered skeletons and dented armor, but the remains of the undead were far outnumbered by the bodies of injured and dead gnolls. At the opposite end of the long hallway, back by the stairs where they’d collapsed the ceiling to cut off the rest of the bosses, a desperate knot of hyena Naturalists were standing with their backs to the shattered stone, facing off against a huge pack of armored undead.
“We have to get in there!” Arbati said, throwing his shoulder against the portcullis. James grabbed the bars and heaved as well, but the gate wouldn’t budge thanks to the gear mechanism they’d jammed earlier. Arbati was trying to cut the entire thing in half with his sword when James smacked himself on the forehead.
“I’m being so dumb,” he said, face heating. “Watch this.”
During the whole battle through the dungeon, he’d avoided using magic as much as possible to save himself for the lich at the end. But that fight hadn’t used nearly as much mana as he’d anticipated thanks to the constant counterspells, which had only dispersed his magic, not wasted it. This meant he was still close to full, and since now was the time to use it or lose it, James decided to use it all.
Careful not to pull too deeply off his cursed staff, James lifted his hands in a dramatic arc and began casting his favorite spell in the entire game. It was so large that the casting motion was practically a dance. Flowing back and forth, he hooked huge streamers of life, water, and air magic in his arms, filling the hallway with vibrant golden light as bright-green vines grew from the cracks in the stone to form a magical circle around him. Golden flowers burst from the stone floor, and glowing leaves floated down from the ceiling, making Arbati jump in alarm. Grinning, James continued to build the power, spending his mana indiscriminately to pull in the thick ropes of energy until he felt high on magic.
When the euphoria was at its peak and his head was swimming with the intense feeling of being more alive than he’d ever been before, James let the spell go. The rush of magic that followed was so heady and glorious, he couldn’t help but yell out the spell’s name.
“Verdant Glory!”
Hundreds of bright-green roots shot out from the circle at his feet, snaking through the portcullis to carpet the walls and floor of the hallway the gnolls were fighting in. Glorious, emerald light banished the dark as James, Arbati, and every gnoll within l
ine-of-sight were suffused with healing magics. Poisons and wounds were washed away in an instant. Severed limbs picked themselves up and moved to merge with their owners. Armor and weapons were not repaired, but all the injured gnolls on the ground suddenly shot to their feet, barking with joy as the wave of resplendent life washed over them.
In an instant, the remaining undead went from winning to being grossly outnumbered. Howling with renewed fury, the gnolls swarmed over them, hacking the skeletal knights to pieces. When the last one went down, yips and bays of victory filled the tunnel, echoing off the stones as the magical greenery finally vanished.
Mana spent, James sank to his knees. He was so tired but so happy in this moment. Twisting around, he gave Arbati a thumbs-up, but the head warrior was staring slack-jawed, looking at James as though he’d never seen him before.
“What was that?” he cried at last.
“Verdant Glory,” James said, brushing the last of the glowing flower petals from his clothing as he stood up. “It’s my big raid heal and cleanse. Really fun to use, I gotta say. Too bad it takes my entire mana pool to cast.”
Arbati’s eyes didn’t get any smaller. “I’ve never seen a player do that before.”
“Well, to be fair, I don’t know why you would have,” James said. “Players low enough to need the Windy Lake quests don’t have spells this big yet, and geared level eighties can one-shot anything in the zone just by swinging their weapons around. No one PVPs here, either, so I can’t think of a time when you would have had an opportunity to see a max-level player go all out before now.”
He finished with a shrug, but Arbati looked more upset than ever.
“Are the Four Clans really that weak?”
The question had a very un-Arbati-like tremble to it, and James suddenly felt sorry for all the non-player characters who were now having to deal with the consequences of FFO rewriting their world. “The clans are mostly level twenty and below,” he answered honestly. “Only you and Gray Fang are higher.”
Arbati kicked the portcullis in anger. “Even the gnolls are stronger than us now!” he snarled. “How could this have happened? We stood proud before your game ruined everything!”
Despite the cursing of “his game,” James didn’t take offense. It sucked to suddenly have your entire existence shoved onto a number scale then discover that you were at the bottom. But just because the jubatus clans had gotten the short end of the level stick didn’t mean they were defenseless.
“I can help,” James said, offering his hand to Arbati. “I don’t know if it’s possible to level up anymore, but my home country was really warlike. We’ve invested a lot of our intelligence and creativity into finding new ways to fight each other. We even make games about tactics and strategy so that we can wage bloodless wars against each other for fun. I’ve played a lot of them, which means I know battle tactics that I’m pretty sure no one in this world has experienced yet. If I teach this knowledge to the Four Clans, you’ll have tricks no one else here knows. Even if you are lower level, that’s a hell of an edge.”
This promise earned him an eager grin from the head warrior. “I’m glad you’re applying to join the clans!” Arbati said, clapping him on the shoulder. “You will tell us all your secrets, and when we get back, you will teach me how to fight like you do!”
The thought of having to spar for real with the much-stronger warrior made James wince. Fortunately for him, he hid it quickly. “I’d love to. First, though, we have to get out of here.”
****
James and Arbati were back by the winch, pondering how to open the wrecked portcullis, when ten large stone hands rose from the earth to smash the metal gate straight into the ceiling. Moments later, a wave of gnolls began rushing up the stairs. James and Arbati had to step back into the lich’s chamber to make room as the shoulder-high army, led by Thunder Paw, flooded inside.
When they saw the shattered body of the lich and the smashed orb, they began to howl with joy. The gnolls tossed down their weapons and their hacked-up, arrow-riddled doors then grabbed each other in huge hugs, laughing and braying in their new freedom. There was one sour face among the jubilant crowd, and James held his breath as Thunder Paw approached with the utmost of seriousness.
“Chieftain James.”
“Yes, Thunder Paw?”
The old gnoll tilted his head back, peering into James’s face with his one eye. “Have Me followed you well?”
James nodded. “You’ve followed me incredibly well.”
Thunder Paw nodded back. “It your turn to follow Me then.”
James gulped. He’d known this was coming. He just hoped it wouldn’t hurt too much. He didn’t have the mana for another heal.
“What are you two talking about?” Arbati asked suspiciously.
“Just back up, please, Arbati,” James said. “This is between Thunder Paw and me.”
When the cat-warrior stepped back, James picked up his staff from where he’d set it down and clutched it in his hands. The celebration around them cut off as he straightened up and turned to face the snaggletoothed Naturalist with a determined glare.
“Chief James Anderson!” Thunder Paw cried, his hideous collar pulsing as it translated the barks. “Crisis is over, so Me will not tolerate a jubatus ruling us anymore! Me, Thunder Paw, Speaker of Storms, challenge you for the right to lead Grand Pack!” The hunched, one-eyed gnoll twirled his new staff with a flourish, and the gnolls quickly scampered back, clearing an empty circle around them to make room for the fight.
“I will never let you have it!” James announced, slamming his own staff into the stone floor with an echoing tak. “Come at me, then, if you wish to die!”
It was really hard not to cringe at that last line. He sounded like a bad action-movie villain, but the gnolls were eating it up. The whole room was barking and howling as a tough-looking warrior gnoll pulled a bandage off his arm and walked into the empty space between James and Thunder Paw. After a look at each of them, the gnoll threw the cloth high into the air and dove for the sidelines, wiggling back into the crowd.
The moment the bloodstained cloth fluttered to the ground, James yelled and charged, holding his staff like a club. He ran slowly and dramatically, giving Thunder Paw time to wind up a suitably impressive-looking—but not actually painful—spell. The old Naturalist didn’t seem to be on the same page, though. He gathered up a massive staff full of lightning and let fly, hitting James with a flash that left him blinded.
The blast threw James back ten feet. His muscles were locked from all the electricity, so he didn’t even land on his feet, crashing hard into the line of gnolls behind him. The impact knocked the breath right out of him. By the time he got it back, Thunder Paw was on top of him with a dagger pressed into his throat. For a second, James felt real panic, then he remembered his role.
“I yield! I yield!” he cried, raising his legitimately shaking hands.
The old gnoll nodded and hopped off him. James rolled back to his feet with a wobble then dropped down again to kneel before Thunder Paw. “All hail Thunder Paw, Chief of Chiefs!”
There were several moments of silence, and James began to sweat, terrified that the others weren’t going to accept this farce of a fight they’d just put on. But then the gnoll army burst into cheering and partying again, hoisting Thunder Paw onto their hunched backs as they marched around the room.
He let them carry him around for a few moments, then the new Chief of Chiefs got everyone’s attention with another crack of lightning. Ears ringing, James just watched as Thunder Paw stuck his fingers into his collar to separate it from his throat. The moment the black metal was no longer touching his skin, the device stopped translating, leaving Thunder Paw free to give what James could only assume was a stirring speech in the gnolls’ language without letting the jubatus listen in. When he finished, the gnolls let out a roar that shook the canyon, and the army burst back into motion, picking up their weapons and getting into groups as they marched toward the
tall blue teleportation crystal in the far back corner of the lich’s chamber.
As the gnolls were teleporting to the front of the dungeon, Thunder Paw resettled his collar and came over to James and Arbati. “We must go defeat the undead who were cut off by the cave-in earlier. You with us?”
James shook his head. “You don’t need me. Now that the orb is broken, all the monsters from this lab are one-skulls, including the bosses. You guys should have no problem taking them down.”
Thunder Paw nodded. “What will you do, then?”
James pointed back toward the stairs. “With the hallway to this place caved in, the teleportation crystal is a one-way trip. It’ll be a long time, if ever, before someone comes to this room again, so I need to investigate a few things before I leave. But wait!” He ran over to the dais steps and grabbed the lich’s lock-box with the three remaining pan-elixirs inside. “Here,” he said, handing the box to Thunder Paw. “These are yours, as promised. Go cure your grandson.”
Thunder Paw almost dropped the box as his old paws started shaking. When James reached out to help, the old gnoll pulled him into a hug.
“Thank you, James.”
The translation collar issued the words flatly, as always, but the wetness in Thunder Paw’s one eye said it all.
“My pleasure,” James replied, patting the Naturalist on the back. “My pleasure.”
Chapter 15
Tina
“Where’d you get the food?”
Tina blew out a long breath, choosing her next words very carefully. “These supplies are payment,” she said, holding up the scroll she’d signed with Commander Garrond for everyone to see. “As guild master of the new Roughneck Mercenaries, I’ve taken a job to kill Grel’Darm for the Order.”
Zen didn’t look surprised by that at all, but everyone else erupted.