by Jamie Davis
"My father was the boldest of the nobles in my country, fighting on against the emperor's forces even after the capital fell. In the end, it made no difference. We were all caught, hiding out in the mountains. We had no more food or places to shelter. The soldiers killed my father, mother, and older brother right in front of me. Then they took myself and my younger brother and sister as slaves."
"Do you know where they are?" Hal asked. He couldn't imagine what that must have been like for a young child to witness.
"No, we were branded as slaves and sold to separate masters a week later and I haven’t seen them since. I imagine them sometimes, escaped like I am and living a quiet, peaceful life somewhere safe."
"Don't you wish for that kind of life, too?" Hal asked.
"I don't have time for peace and quiet, Hal. I will not rest until I bring down the Emperor by my own hands. Before he dies, I will make sure he knows who defeated him and why."
"Is that why you fight against the Wardens here in Tandon?"
"If we can show how one city can rise up and overthrow the Emperor's wardens, then other city's will follow suit," Kay said. "The Emperor and his generals have made a mistake. They have extended their borders farther than their vaunted armies can cover. They've conquered too much, too fast. Now we will use that weakness against them."
"My experience is that people don't like to go against the grain like that, Kay. Most just want to keep their heads down and live their lives without any trouble with Emperors, Wardens, or Dukes."
"We must inspire them to resist, Hal. We must provide the example they’ll follow to rise up. You started that when you killed the Harbor Warden. If we can kill the others or force them to flee, the people will return the land to their rightful leaders. The Duke will have to step up and lead, even if his family is being held hostage against his loyalty."
"Where are they being held?" Hal asked. "It seems to me if you want the Duke on your side, you need to help him in return first."
"They are hidden somewhere only the Wardens know of," Kay said. "It is a closely guarded secret. We'd have to take one of the Wardens alive to find out where it was. Now that one of their number is dead, the others are going to be extra cautious regarding their safety."
"Maybe that's where we concentrate next."
"What?" Kay asked. "Try and kidnap a Warden and torture the location of the Duke's family out of them?"
"Not right away, of course," Hal said. "We'd have to be a lot better organized and powerful to pull that off, but I think it could be done. I think I only need to level up six or seven more times and then I'll be strong enough to take on someone like a warden and their guards."
"You say the strangest things, Hal Dix," Kay said. "What in the world does 'level up' mean?"
"Uh, nothing really, it's just a saying from where I come from. It means getting better at something. Like improving your fighting skills and such."
"That I understand. My father just started teaching me the sword when we were captured. He thought I was old enough to learn. I don't know nearly as much as I'd like to know." Kay walked over to the shuttered window, opened the slats and stared out into the night. "I'll learn anything, do anything, become anything if it means I accomplish my goal."
Kay turned and faced Hal. "What about you, Hal? You talk about your family almost as if you may never return to them. At least you know where they are."
"Knowing where they are and knowing how to get back there is something completely different," Hal explained. "I don't know how I got here to Tandon, so how could I know how to get home? All I know is, I woke up on the street in an alley near the harbor.”
"So you came here by boat, then. Surely you remember the long voyage."
Hal shook his head. "You don't understand, Kay. I don't expect you to believe this, but I think I was brought here by some sort of magic. Ripped from my happy home and dumped here in the middle of Tandon."
"Of course I believe in magic, Hal. Everyone does. There are numerous practitioners around the city for small and common spells. There aren't that many great mages left, of course. There are a few I know of who could do something like you describe. They are all in hiding these days, though. Whenever one of them is captured, the Emperor has them either put to death or forced to join his armies," Kay said. "It is rumored that only four or five of the great mages remain free. No one knows for sure, since no one has seen any of them in years. It's assumed they've all retreated to their hidden strongholds to remain out of the Emperor's clutches."
"So, if I can find the right mage to help me, they might be able to return me to my home?"
"I suppose so; we'd have to figure out a way to entice one of them to come out of hiding. It would have to be something pretty big."
"Big," Hal said. "You mean like a city overthrowing the Emperor's Wardens?"
"I suppose so," Kay mused. "We'd have to make quite a spectacle of it to make sure they heard about what we were doing. Then, maybe, one of them would come here and see what was going on."
"Kay, if that’s true, it looks like you've got a partner in your quest to get the Emperor, at least in the short term here in Tandon. If that's what it will take to draw one of the great mages out of hiding, then that's what I'll do."
"Hal, I'd be happy to have you at my side. You’ve proven lucky and resourceful when it’s mattered the most. I couldn’t ask for a better companion."
Hal thought about the last few days overall and the rattling slot machine in his head when he pressed his luck. It made him smile.
"You know what, Kay, I am. I'm a lot luckier here in Fantasma than I've ever been at home. Let's hope that luck holds for both of us."
“I’ll drink to that, Hal,” Kay said. He hoisted a mug of ale, from the tray of food they were sharing in their room. Hal did the same, leaning forward to touch their mugs before taking a sip.
Hal thought about what they’d decided in that moment. He might finally have a plan to get him home. Once they got back to the Gilded Cage tomorrow, Hal could start to try and figure out which wizards or mages could help him return back to his home and how to get their attention.
The whole conversation was still on Hal's mind as he fell asleep later that evening. Kay took the first watch shift, so he turned in expecting to be awakened when it was his turn. He drifted off to sleep once again to the sounds of Kay honing the blades of his short swords.
------
HAL WOKE UP WITH A START. A hand was over his mouth, and Kay's voice sounded in his ear.
"Hal, stay silent. There are people outside the door."
Hal nodded and the hand was removed from his mouth.
"Do you know how many there are?" Hal whispered.
Kay shook his head.
Hal rolled out of bed, silently landing on the floor and checking his throwing knives and daggers. He got an idea as the latch softly rattled when someone on the other side tested it to see if it was locked.
Picking up his backpack and cloak, he laid them on the bed and quickly covered them with the blanket. It sort of looked like a person. Kay gave him a puzzled look and Hal gave him a quick pantomime of someone sleeping, pointing at the lump under the covers.
"Oh," Kay mouthed at him. He repeated Hal's trick with his bed, too, then crouched down in the corner behind the headboard.
Hal nodded and hid behind his bed as well, drawing a throwing knife in each hand. The rattling slot machine started in his head. He hoped it was a sign of good luck coming.
The attack didn't take long to start. Once the intruders discovered they couldn't get in easily, the attackers decided a brute force approach was worth trying. The door crashed inward with two of the four would-be thieves falling to the floor after throwing themselves at the barrier. The two behind them each had crossbows leveled, and they took a step forward, aimed at the lumps on the bed and fired. “Thump, thump.”
The two crossbow bolts landed, impaling the hidden backpacks. That was the signal for Hal and Kay.
Hal
stood and threw the two knives in a single flowing motion. He was rewarded with a gurgling shout as one of the crossbowmen fell backward with a knife in his throat.
250 EXPERIENCE POINTS.
THE SECOND KNIFE had missed its target, but the slot machine still rolled on in his head, so he rapidly followed the initial attack with four more thrown knives in rapid succession, all aimed at the second crossbowman. He was in the process of dropping his crossbow while reaching for his sword. Hal's first two knives took him in the shoulder and chest. The third glanced off his helmet. The fourth flew true and the second crossbowman dropped with a blade in his throat. The slot machine stopped.
250 EXPERIENCE POINTS.
THE INITIAL TWO attackers had climbed back to their feet. One sported a mace with ugly ridges along the metal ball mounted on the end of the wooden haft. He charged to meet Kay's advance. The other drew a longsword and ran at Hal.
Drawing his two daggers, Hal moved to keep the bed between himself and his opponent. The problem with that was that his short weapons couldn't reach over the bed at the bandit. The bright side was it was too far for the bandit to do much either.
Hal waited until the bandit swung at his head, overbalancing his reach over the bed. Hal dropped one of the daggers and reached out, grabbing the extended wrist and yanking the man towards him. The bandit gave a yelp of surprise that ended in an abbreviated scream when he landed face first on the bed and Hal buried the blade of the other dagger in his back.
250 EXPERIENCE POINTS.
HAL QUICKLY RETRIEVED his second dagger from the floor, turned and swiftly stabbed the final guard in the back while Kay preoccupied him.
CRITICAL HIT!
250 experience points.
Level up!
"WE'D BETTER GET out of here, Kay, before anyone else decides we might be easy pickings for a robbery. Maybe we played it too coy by always staying in our room. It must have looked like we were hiding something," Hal said as he grabbed his dagger from the back of the guard on the bed.
"You're probably right on both counts," Kay said. He picked up his backpack and cloak from the bed as Hal did the same. Hal broke off the crossbow bolt sticking out from the pack and then shrugged into the straps, settling it on his back. He pulled the cloak around him then went and retrieved his throwing knives before following Kay down to the inn's common room.
They met the innkeeper coming up the stairs with a wooden club in one hand and a lamp in the other.
"Gentlemen, what was all the commotion?" the man asked standing on the landing in his nightshirt.
"Someone tried to take something that didn't belong to them," Kay said, passing by the man. "They'll not be bothering anyone further."
"Here's something for the cleanup," Hal said, flipping a pair of silver coins through the air to the innkeeper. Despite his surprise, he quickly tucked the cudgel under one arm and caught the coins from the air without missing a beat.
Hal followed Kay through the dark common room and out the front door. They'd be returning to Selena's a little earlier than expected. It was no longer safe to remain here. Hal used the time walking back through the deserted nighttime streets to use his new attribute points to add to his luck. He used his skill point to purchase the find/remove traps skill. He looked over the stats menu and was pretty happy with how things were shaping up. He had more than held his own in that last fight and if he kept leveling up this quickly, he would keep getting stronger and more formidable with each passing encounter.
NAME: Hal Dix
Class: Rogue
Level: 5
ATTRIBUTES:
Brawn: 10 -- +1
Wisdom: 8
Luck: 20 -- +6
Speed: 12 -- +2
Looks: 8
Health: 40/40
SKILLS: Taunt, Dark vision, Acrobatic dodge - 2, Hide in shadows, Sneak Attack - 2, Open locks - 2, Find/remove traps.
Experience: 2,600/4,800
14
HAL AND KAY were not prepared for what they encountered when they got back to the Gilded Cage. The front door hung off the hinges, a body in the street turned out to be one of the bouncers. Bert's sightless eyes stared up at the cloudless sky. A quick glance down showed his throat had been slit from ear to ear.
Hal drew a dagger; Kay already had his sword in hand.
"What the hell happened here?" Hal asked.
Kay shook his head and stepped inside and gasped.
Hal followed and wished he had not. Selena hung from the second-floor banister. She was naked and had horrible wounds all over her body. He hoped she was dead when those wounds were inflicted. He suspected she was not. Merely thinking about it made Hal turn and retch, emptying his stomach in the corner.
"Help me cut her down," Kay said.
"Kay, I'm sorry, I know she meant a lot to you."
"You have no idea, Hal. Help me cut her down from there."
Kay went up to the second floor while Hal supported her legs from below. Her body was stiff with rigor mortis, and it was easy to help hold her weight while Kay untied the rope and lowered her down to Hal.
Hal took the woman's body and laid her down on a sofa nearby. The drapes had been torn down when the building was ransacked. Hal picked up one of the fabric panels and laid it over Selena to provide her some limited dignity in death.
"Who did this? Why?" Kay asked.
"It was the Wardens," a man's voice said from the doorway.
Both Hal and Kay spun around, surprised. There was a hooded figure shrouded in a black cloak with a gold embroidered crest over the left side of the chest.
Kay regained his composure first and bowed.
"Your Grace."
"Who is this, how does he know?" Hal asked.
"It's the Duke, Hal."
Hal stared at Kay and then at the hooded figure. The man reached up and let his hood down.
"I sometimes came here and spent time with Selena," the Duke said. "We'd spend the night talking about my wife and children as hostages and other problems in the city. I’d hoped she might someday find out where they were held. I came tonight and found this."
"Who did this?" Hal asked.
"Who else has the power to do something like this in Tandon?" The Duke said. "It was the Wardens. Their men were seen entering the building and hauling the girls out to the street to be branded as slaves right there in front of everyone."
"They were sold into slavery?" Kay said. "What were the charges? On whose authority was this done?"
"They were angry about something and seemed to think Selena and her girls had something to do with it," the Duke said. "All the males inside were killed where they were found. All the women, except for Selena, were branded and taken to the slave pens by the docks."
"The warehouse job and fire," Hal said. "They must have connected the dots to Selena when one of their pet merchants was hit by burglars while he was out being entertained here."
"That was you two?" The Duke asked. "Well then, that sounds about right. I assume that was the job Selena sent you to Colin's shop for."
"How do you know about that?" Kay asked.
"Colin is an old adventuring comrade of mine. He and I talk quite frequently. He, Selena, and I all hoped to someday be free of the Wardens."
"I see," Hal said.
"It's our fault," Kay said.
"Bullshit," the Duke said. "Selena knew what the risks were when she agreed to finance you both."
"I thought it was a harmless job when we agreed to it," Kay said. "We hit the merchant, get the money and leave. It was a simple equation. Selena would get her money, Ilsa would get her dowry back, and Hal and I would get some silver and gold."
"Kay, this means that those bandits that hit our room tonight at the inn were probably more than just some entrepreneurial street toughs," Hal said. "I'll bet they were sent by the Wardens. You saw what they did to Selena. She must have told them something about us. We should be glad they only sent four guys after us."
"They proba
bly weren't sure where we were," Kay said. "We didn't tell Selena which inn we were staying at so they had to divide their men up and hit each one looking for two random guys who were together."
"That means they'll be expecting their hit team to check in," Hal said, pulling Kay towards the door. "When they don't, they're going to come looking for them, and eventually us. We have to get away from here. They'll expect us to come looking for Selena. That's why they left her hanging there like that."
"We can't leave, Hal. We have to bury her. She deserves that."
"I'll take care of that, boys," the Duke said. "I’ll see to the arrangements. The Wardens won't touch me, not yet at least. They need my supposed position of power to lend legitimacy to their control of the city. They can't risk interrupting the monthly tribute to the Emperor."
"Come on, Kay. The Duke here will take care of her. We have to go." Hal started pulling Kay towards the front door.
"Don't go out the front," the Duke said. "Too many eyes are watching. Sneak out the back and make sure no one knows which way you're headed. Get out of the city. Go and start fresh somewhere else."
"I'm not leaving," Kay said. "I'm going to make them all pay. I'll make sure each of them knows killing Selena was a mistake."
"I'm not saying you're wrong, Kay," Hal said. "Let's get out of here and find a place to hide. Then we can plan what to do next."
“Whatever you do, you need to do it soon," the Duke said. “I don't think they know who you are exactly or they'd have town cryers out giving out descriptions, looking for you. Try and keep it that way for as long as you can."
There was a commotion out in front of the house. It sounded like a carriage or wagon pulled up.
"Go, that must be the Wardens' men returning," the Duke said. "I'll see to Selena. Out the back, now, and don't dally."
Hal and Kay took off down the back hallway for the kitchen. There were bodies scattered throughout the building. Cookie's body lay face down in front of the oven in the kitchen. The stable boys' bodies were scattered around the courtyard and the back gate was open and swinging slowly in the night breeze.