Realms of Valen - Dragon in the Dark (War of the Gods Book 1)

by Rickk Berry III

  "I tend to be in many matters." the kyrian replied with a little smile. She was dressed comfortably in plain, but flattering, leather pants that hugged her strong thighs and ended just above her knees. A blue, sleeveless tunic that had a bit of a low neckline adorned the woman's torso. The view gave Nadia another moment's pause. Sae-Mirra was an exotic beauty to be sure and her clothing, though simple, brought attention to her lean form. She wore twin blades at her hips, rather long daggers that were nearly as long as the short sword that hung from Nadia's belt.

  Before Nadia could make any sort of reply, Kaidia entered the room from a side doorway. The elder sibling, clad in leather pants, boots, and a tunic, paused as she glanced up and saw Nadia.

  "Well well... look what the cat dragged into my house," she said with a smirk.

  "I did not drag anything into your house, Miss Kaidia," Sae-Mirra said with a huff, though Kaidia could hear the wise ass tone hidden beneath the faux indignation.

  Kaidia didn't really get to respond to that because she found herself being squeezed quite tightly in Nadia's embrace. The two had hardly seen each other since Kai had left home after the battle with Adathir. The elder sibling returned the embrace with one of her own, then pulled away and headed for the doorway she'd come out of a couple of minutes prior.

  "Come, sister. Let's catch up. It's been ages, it seems," she said with a smile. Then she glanced toward the cat girl. "Sae, bring us some wine. Three glasses, if you'd like," she requested.

  "Of course, Miss Kaidia," came Sae-Mirra's reply.

  * * *

  Two bottles of wine, three glasses, and a platter of cheeses and strips of meat sat on the table where the three women sat. One bottle was almost empty and the other had yet to be opened. The glasses were all about half full and the platter was about two thirds full yet. The table was actually a permanent fixture. Its original intended use was for bodies to lay on as they were embalmed, but Kai used it for a sitting room table. The whole tomb had been repurposed and modified. The shelves carved out of the walls with the intent to hold the bodies of the dead, had become just regular shelves, now. They held scrolls, books, and various trinkets. A fireplace had been carved out in both the main room, this sitting room, and several others, according to Kai. Chimneys for the smoke to waft up through had been bored out too, by means of magic. The two sisters had talked about the modified tomb that served as Kai's home for quite a bit. The conversation mostly consisted of Nadia asking questions and her older sister answering them. Sae listened quietly and sipped from her glass of wine.

  "Dwarven doors for your armory?"

  "And treasury."

  "Where'd you get dwarven doors?"

  "I know a dwarf merchant. He hired me as a guard while he traveled for a time. Nice fellow, really. He got me what I needed. The doors are highly secure and even if someone managed to open the locking mechanism without a key, which is doubtful, the doors won't open for anyone but me."

  "You sealed them with magic?"

  "Yes. Magic that recognizes me and shocks anyone else. Just ask Sae." Kaidia gestured to the cat girl with a wry smirk.

  "Shut up," Sae-Mirra said whilst blushing, shifting in her chair, and looking off to the side.

  "You tried to get in one of them?" Nadia asked with an arched brow.

  "No, I leaned on it," Sae replied with a huff. The siblings burst into a fit of laughter. Sae grumbled as the sisters laughed at her misfortune, but when something made her ears twitch, she hissed at them both.

  "Quiet, you two!" the kyrian snapped in a hushed tone. Kai, having known Sae for long enough to realize the seriousness in the woman's voice, went quiet. Nadia simply followed her sister's example. Together, the three listened. Sae could hear much better than either of her human companions though.

  "Three sets of footsteps. All attempting to be light... two heavier than the third. I would hazard to say... two humans and an elf or one of my kind," Sae said quietly.

  "Well, Sae, go and greet our guests," Kai said with a little smile.

  "Gladly," Sae responded with a smirk of her own while quietly standing.

  "Go with her, sister," the mercenary directed softly, taking a sip of her wine, and pulling the full wine bottle closer. Nadia nodded, stood up, and followed the kyrian girl into the main room that Nadia had originally entered. The cat girl stopped in the middle of the room, hands at her sides, and waited. Nadia stood a bit off to her side, eyes on the entrance to the tunnel that led up to the front doors. Three figures emerged from the tunnel and stepped into the light of the main room. All three were garbed in black outfits like a thief might wear. Loose fitting, soft cloth, faces covered. Each was armed only with a dagger. A fact easily discerned when each of them drew their daggers upon seeing Sae and Nadia.

  "Greetings. You are trespassing in the home of Miss Kaidia Valengaard. I am her servant, Sae-Mirra of the Clan Riix. I request politely that you leave before I am forced to take action," the feline woman said with a polite smile on her face, bright eyes staying on the foremost member of the trio though she was addressing them all.

  "Neither one of them is the target. She must be elsewhere in the house. You two take care of these, I'm sure there will be a bonus. I'll search for Kaidia," said the leader in an oddly refined voice. Not what one would expect from your usual assassin for hire. Nadia found this curious, as did the cat girl, but neither had time to ponder it. The two black-clad assassins behind the leader charged at Sae and Nadia. Both women dropped back a step, the kyrian drawing her daggers as the young woman drew her short sword.

  Sae dodged the first swipe of her opponent's dagger with an easy grace that might have made Nadia jealous if she wasn't busy jerking backward to avoid a slash aimed at her face. The kyrian whirled around quicker than her human opponent could match. Just as the would-be assassin turned, Sae thrust one of her daggers upward, burying the blade into the soft flesh under the assailant's chin, between the jaw bones. The blade shoved straight up in a split moment, going up through the man's mouth into his skull, and out the top of his head. The top inch or so of the blade showed, covered in blood. Blood gurgled out and wet the mask that covered much of his face. Sae jerked the blade free and let her opponent's corpse crumple to the floor. The kyrian looked over in time to see Nadia run the remaining assassin through with her short sword. The young woman just as quickly jerked the blade back out and let her opponent, a woman, slump to the floor and gasp her dying breath.

  Both Sae and Nadia looked up when they heard a sickening thunk from the next room over. The third assassin, the leader, came stumbling out. He was holding his head and fell down to his knees. Kaidia came out behind him, carrying the unopened bottle of wine. The warrior waited until the man turned to look at her then struck him across the face with the bottle, another hollow thunk sounding out along with the man's grunt. He fell to the ground, still somewhat aware of himself. Kaidia took a moment to walk around him before she raised her boot and brought it down on his skull with a sickeningly wet crunch. She hadn't even drawn her sword.

  "Well now. Let's search them and see what we can find," Kaidia said with a little smile as she kicked the man's body to roll him over. Each woman searched their respective kills. Sae and Nadia came up with nothing, but Kaidia stood up holding a medallion and a folded piece of paper. She looked the medallion over. It was silver with strange runes on both sides that she didn't recognize. After a few moments of examination, Kai tucked it into her pocket. She proceeded to unfold the paper and found that it was a letter. Upon reading it, the warrior scowled.

  "What is it?" Sae asked as she stood up from her fruitless search.

  "An assassination order," Kai replied.

  "On you, I assume," Nadia guessed.

  "Correct, sister. However, that isn't the most disturbing part," Kai said.

  "Then what is?" the younger woman asked.

  "The assassination was ordered by the High Priest of the Temple of Adathir," the elder sibling returned.

  "Wait... Adat
hir? That's the warlord you killed a few years ago, right?" Nadia questioned.

  "Yes," came the curt reply.

  "A temple? He's not a god. Hell, he's dead!" Nadia exclaimed.

  "Stranger things have occurred," Sae said with a faint smile.

  "Sae is right. Stranger things have happened in this world. I find that those without the ability to think for themselves are always after a new god, martyr, or both, to do their thinking for them and powerful mortals with mystery about them are perfect candidates for godhood," Kai said with a hint of disdain in her voice.

  "And since no one really knew who Adathir was or where he came from... he's ideal," Nadia thought aloud.

  "Precisely, little sister. We need to get to the bottom of this," Kai responded as she folded up the assassination order and tucked it into her belt for the time being.

  "What do you mean?"

  "We need to find where these idiots came from."

  "How?"

  "I have some contacts who could tell me."

  "Where?"

  "Not here, unfortunately."

  "Again, where?"

  "The mountain city of Mehroth and the Temple of the Gods in Sarkos."

  "You going to a temple for information seems strange, Kai."

  "Yes, I know. But I know the head priestess there."

  "You? How? And who is it?"

  "Yes, me. I've known her for a few years. My very first mercenary job was slaying a few weak demons in a small village near that temple. They didn't have any paladins around at the time so they hired the work out. I got the job and while I did kill all the demons, the town was destroyed before I got there. The only survivor was a little boy. I took him to the Temple and they took him in. Xerith, who was just an acolyte at the time, was the one who met me at the gates and took him. Once I got paid, she saw me out and we talked. Since then she's become head priestess and I go to her whenever I need information of a religious variety."

  "Would she know about some small cult devoted to a dead warlord?"

  "If anyone does, it would be her."

  "I see. Who do you know in Mehroth?"

  "A mercenary by the name of Rykar Vaikos."

  "What use would another mercenary be?"

  "He's well traveled and leads his own mercenary company. He served under me when I was Mercenary General of the king's army. Best officer I had by far. He might have heard something as well and Mehroth is on the way to the temple in Sarkos so I might as well stop in and see how he's been doing."

  "Right, well, when do we leave?"

  "In the morning."

  "Alright."

  Kaidia turned to Sae-Mirra, who'd been watching the two sisters and listening to the whole conversation with perked ears.

  "Would you mind cleaning up?" she asked as she gestured to the bodies.

  "Of course. In the incinerator they go," the kyrian said with smile.

  "Thank you, kitten," the warrior replied. She got a mew in return and then she turned to walk off, gesturing for her sister to follow.

  "You have an incinerator? That's dwarven technology!" Nadia exclaimed as she followed her sister out of the room.

  "Yep," was Kai's only reply.

  * * *

  Kaidia placed her palm against the silvery metal doors of her armory, right where the two doors came together. A shimmer ran across the door akin to light reflecting off the surface of a lake. The mercenary closed her eyes and a few moments later, there was the sound of multiple locking mechanisms moving and clicking behind the door. With a push, the doors swung inward, revealing a rather large room that housed enough weapons and armor to outfit a small town's militia.

  "Sweet goblin crap on stick in summer!" Nadia exclaimed as she gazed around the room. Kaidia chuckled as she strode in, eyeing various things. She had a bit of pride wrapped up in her collection. There were stands with suits of armor on them and plaques with swords, shields, and axes on them. The shelves that would've held bodies, had this been a proper tomb, now held bits and pieces of everything from armor to weapons to pieces of jewelry that Nadia assumed were enchanted with various magicks that were suited for combat.

  "Find something you like, little sister. A few weapons, some armor. You'll need to be better equipped for this trip than you are now," Kai said with a little smile. Nadia didn't need to be told twice. She immediately went to browsing through weapons and armor, picking various swords and axes up, testing the balance and weight of the weapons. The younger sibling stopped when she spied a suit of armor tucked away in the back, left hand corner of the room. It looked oddly familiar. She stepped over to it and eyed it up and down. It was somewhere between plate and scale armor. The smallish plates of metal that made up the majority of the suit were too big to properly be called scales and too small to really be considered plate armor. The cuirass, arms, legs, and even spaulders were made of overlapping plates. The braces and greaves were solid metal. As she looked it over, Nadia took note of the hole in the left shoulder of the cuirass and the dark stains on the metal below that puncture.

  "Kai? Isn't this... Ashlin's armor?" Nadia asked tentatively. Kaidia looked up from an intricately decorated elven shield that was resting atop a chest on the floor. She couldn't remember where she'd gotten that shield.

  "Yes. That is Ashlin's armor," Kai replied evenly.

  "But, you left it behind on the battlefield. All you took was her sword," the younger sibling stated in mild confusion while gesturing toward said sword, which hung on a weapon rack beside the armor.

  "Father was kind enough to gather up Ash's armor and send it to me," Kaidia answered the unasked question.

  "Oh, well, that was kind of him," Nadia said with a nod.

  "In some ways, yes."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Every time I see it, I remember her - her touch, her taste, the feel of her in my arms - in some ways, having that armor here is a torturing reminder of what I have lost."

  "Oh. Sorry."

  "Don't be, sister."

  Kai just smiled to Nadia then and went back to trying to remember where that damned elven shield had come from.

  * * *

  After finding a one-handed war axe that was a suitable replacement for one she'd broken a couple of months ago, Nadia went on the hunt for any armor that she might like. She didn't think she would find anything to replace what she had. While her armor appeared to be simple leather armor, what one couldn't immediately see was that her armor was dual layered and in between the two layers were metal plates. The plates were held in place by internal straps and the tightness with which the two layers were bound together. Nadia didn't have bracers though, so that is for what she began searching.

  The younger mercenary glanced over shelves and rummaged through chests until she found a pair of leather bracers that bore sophisticated, intricate designs stamped into the leather. She tried them on to make sure they'd fit her correctly and was pleased to find that they did. She took them off and glanced around the room to find that she was alone. Nadia slipped her new axe into a loop on her belt where her previous axe had hung, grabbed up her new bracers, and headed out of the room.

  When she got to the doorway she noticed that the doors across the hall, that were the same dwarven make as those on the armory, were standing open. A short hallway that turned sharply left was beyond said doors. Figuring her sister must be in there Nadia walked across the hall and entered the other set of doors. She turned the corner only to find that the hallway went on, and then turned sharply right. A warm glow emanated from beyond the second corner. She followed the hall and turned again. Nadia's jaw went slack.

  The room that opened up at the end of the hallway was brightly lit by torches and filled with chests of various sizes and shapes, filled with gold coins, silver coins, steel coins, jewels of varying colors and shapes, and there were some weapons laying about that looked to be forged of gold and silver with jeweled hilts. A king's ransom was in the room. On the shelves were various scrolls and books that Nadi
a guessed must be rather valuable. On other shelves rested gold and silver bars, along with bars of other metals. Some the young woman could name, others she could not. Iron, steel, and bronze were there, but there were some that were black, others that were a strange red color, but were obviously a metal of some sort.

  Standing amidst all of the riches was Kaidia, peering about, filling a leather pouch with various coins and some jewels. They would need coin for expenses Nadia assumed in her gold induced haze. Kaidia glanced up at Nadia and gave a soft laugh.

  "Quit staring and fill this," the older sibling said as she tossed another leather pouch toward Nadia. The younger woman dropped her new bracers, caught the pouch, shut her mouth to keep any stray flies from swooping in, and stepped further into the room. She started out with steel coins, tossing two or three at a time into the pouch in her other hand.

  "How the hell did you get all of this?"

  "Most of it is from when I was the Merc General of the King's army."

  "What about the rest?"

  "Payment for jobs, loot from various places I explored, things I just picked up along the way. Many of the books are spell books or rare books that you can't find anymore. The scrolls are mostly magic scrolls. Some are deeds to plots of land, homes, and one is to a tavern in Jurgousa."

  "Jurgousa?"

  "A port city way to the south. I won it gambling with the previous owner - a dwarf. You know how they get with too much mead in them. He still runs the place and acts as the owner, but I get regular payments."