Liar King (Tower of Babel Book 2)

by Adam Elliott

  "You have done unspeakable things to bring us to this point, and further terrors to keep your crimes from being remedied, but no longer." The Warden general paced as he spoke, his spear tapping the ground with every odd step as he snarled out his words. "I know you do not have it with you. But of you four, you three have touched it." Temujin's gaze swept over the three men of the group, excluding only Asch from his wrathful stare. "You will tell me where you have hidden it."

  "I don't even know what it is." Cayden replied with equal venom. "You killed the emissaries Duke Medeces sent to treat with you, so how the hell are we even supposed to-"

  "You know what you did!" Temujin cried, the sheer power and weight of his voice enough to send an involuntary shiver down Cayden's spine. "You can deny it all you will, but I sense it on the three of you, and the warrior woman I fought earlier as well. You've not long to live, why spend your last moments lying?" The warrior-general tipped his chin up, looming over Cayden and Shifty as the last two were forced into line. "Tell me where you have hidden the Liar King's shackles, and I will allow it to be swift."

  For several long moments, no one spoke. Then, just as Temujin's stone face twisted in fury, Shifty replied. "You know, shackles were never really my thing. If you're into silk rope and blindfolds though, boy do I know the place for you."

  Anger turned to confusion as the Warden officer stalked down the line, his powerful physique dominating in the presence of the more squat and rotund father of two. "What are you blathering about? Rope? Blindfolds. I care not for these things."

  "Ah, my mistake, my mistake." Shifty smiled with a sickening sweetness. "But if shackles are your thing, I might know a solution."

  "Go on," Temujin said impatiently.

  "Well, it just sounds to me like you're over thinking things with all this focus on domination and command. Message Avaritia, she knows the place the shackles are hidden. Just down in the sewers in front of us, in fact. You can send your army to go check if you'd-"

  "Enough with your nonsense and your lies!" Temujin growled. The back of one stone hand struck viciously across Shifty's right cheek, a blow that took the Carnivalist off his feet, and drained nearly half his remaining HP.

  "Okay, okay!" Shifty said, rolling onto his hands and knees. There was a long pause as the older man struggled for breath, then, at last, took to only a single knee as he looked into the stone face of Temujin "All I'm saying is that you don't need chains to go f-

  A sharp crack of air and a flash of light interrupted the last of what Shifty had to say, as a trio of figures appeared at rear or the line. Each was chanting as they materialized, and within moments more magical energy shaped the battlefield. Warden soldiers winked out of existence under the influence of Celia's crowd control spells, while an enormous wall of wood and iron appeared out of nothing at Roberta's command, separating the players from the Warden General.

  Most importantly, were the words from Victoria, a benediction sweeter than any prayer Cayden had ever heard.

  "...and return us home. Word of Recall!"

  ***

  "Really Shifty?" That was the best way you could come up with to work it into conversation?"

  "Hey, I'd like to see you do better." The rogue shot back at Celia, his tongue sticking out of his mouth in a decidedly childlike fashion. "Besides, it could have been worse. My backup was a Viagra joke."

  "How do you function!?" Celia cried, to the laughter of the assembled players.

  It felt good to be able to laugh, Cayden decided, even at Shifty's terrible jokes.

  Despite Celia's annoyance, Cayden thought the Carnivalist was rather clever. At the time, he'd thought Shifty was just venting his anger with his crude rebuttals, but in retrospect, he probably should have caught on the moment he'd used the name of Celia's account. No one called her Avaritia.

  He might have been a bit clumsy in his wording, but Shifty smart enough to think of Victoria, and unlike Cayden, he'd been able to come up with a plan to reach her while surrounded by the enemy.

  As the laughter began to die down, Cayden paced slowly away from his companions, walking to the edge of the forested hill to look out over the city only a few miles away.

  There was almost nothing left. In the hour since their retreat dusk had begun to settle over the city, but the sun was almost entirely obscured by the plumes of black smoke rising from the walled city. Some of the intense blaze had already managed to burn itself out, but other parts of the city, particularly the Royal Quarter, were fully ablaze. The Duke hadn't been happy when they'd all but battered down the doors of his palace to demand the services of his sorcereress, and he imagined the young royal would be positively beside himself once he learned what had been done to his city under the guise of saving it.

  Not for the first time, Cayden wondered if he'd made the right decision. They could have left the city to the Wardens, who probably would have passed through it without a care once it was no longer a threat. It wasn't like the Wardens were going to loot the place.

  How many homes had they lost? How many people, both Human and Elan were there? People like Sarah, who no longer had a place to call their own. It could be rebuilt, he knew, and by almost all military standards it was an outstanding victory. Thousands of Warden troops dead for a few hundred of their own, but even still, it felt bittersweet.

  "You okay?" Cayden turned to find Silver on her approach, a wary smile upon her pursed lips.

  "You're worrying about me for the second time in one day. Do you know something I don't?"

  "I know that you're being a jerk right now." She laughed, tucking a few strands of loose hair behind her ear before she continued. "Look upon my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!"

  "Not where my mind would have gone." Cayden replied.

  "No?"

  "No. Ozymandias is all about hubris and decay. This..." He waved a hand in the direction of the still flaming wreckage they had left behind. "I am become Gigabyte, destroyer of systems."

  "I am like, ninety percent sure that isn't how that quote goes."

  "Only if you are a philistine. Reboot is a classic." Cayden laughed softly, then turned away from the scene of destruction. "Is everyone ready to go?"

  Silver glanced back over her shoulder before replying. "I think we should give them a few more minutes at least. The Wardens aren't going anywhere until the morning, and it looks like everyone could use some time to breathe and get rid of some stress."

  "You're probably right." He conceded.

  "Always am." Silver grinned. "Humble too."

  The two stood in silence for several minutes then, watching the fire across from them as the sky dimmed and the stars appeared above them. A ribbon of green and blue trailed across the sky, the colors too vibrant to have ever appeared on earth. The horror and the majesty of Babel in a single image.

  "That was a brave thing you did." She said at last.

  "Why thank y-"

  "Stupid." Silver cut him off. "But brave."

  Cayden glanced in her direction. "You don't think we should have?"

  "I didn't say that." The girl laughed again, rubbing her eyes as a waft of smoke stung them. "I probably would have too. Guess we're both stupid."

  "Yeah." Cayden chuckled along with her. "I guess we are."

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Day 12 - Morning

  Resources – F – 640 -20, Z – 780 +10, M – 275 +5, I – 680 +20, P +40, R +20

  "Hey." Sarah's soft voice was reproduced by his headset like a whisper in his ear. Gone was the usual vim and verve of the blue-haired girl, color seemingly drained from her cheeks.

  "Hey." He replied in the same quiet tone, unsure of precisely what to say or to ask, despite being the one who requested the video call.

  As expected, Sarah had respawned in Sunè barely an hour after her 'death' in Islo, but in the day that had passed, that had been the only information the girl had been willing to provide. His calls had been unanswered; his messages received no reply. It was only when
he threatened to expend some of their limited resources to teleport to Sunè that she finally relented, and accepted his call.

  She hadn't taken her loss well, that much he could plainly see. The displayed reflection of the ordinarily immaculate girl was instead ragged, her hair untouched, her eyes sunken. Though she stared straight into the mirror to give him his video feed, her own eyes were offset slightly to the left, unwilling, or perhaps unable, to look at the image of him being streamed onto her glasses.

  "Look-" They both said at once, the jinx barely enough to force her to crack a smile. Each jostled for a few moments, trying to let the other go first before at last Cayden took the initiative. "I'm sorry for being so pushy. I just... we needed to talk."

  "I know," Sarah said quietly. Her throat bobbed as she swallowed hard, nostrils flaring as she took a deep breath before continuing. "I screwed up."

  "You did," Cayden admitted even as the kinder side of him railed against the honesty. "But we all screw up sometimes, and in the end, no blood, no report."

  "I nearly got you killed. Nearly got all of you-"

  "Horseshoes and hand grenades." Cayden shrugged a little. "We didn't have to chase you, so the only person you nearly got killed was yourself. And in the end, we destroyed the enemy caster, which we probably wouldn't have managed any other way. We gambled, and we won."

  "That doesn't-"

  "No, it doesn't make it alright." He agreed. "But I'm also not your officer or your leader. I'm your friend. I'm not calling to scold you."

  The girl on the other end of the call quivered, one hand moment momentarily distorting his vision of her as she adjusted her glasses long enough to wipe away a tear. "Thank you."

  "My pleasure darlin'."

  "Cayden. Your rural is showing."

  "I suppose it is." He chuckled. "You know if there had been any other way-"

  Sarah held up a hand to forestall any further words. "Cayden, its fine. I get what you did. I'm just sorry about the way I reacted. The Dizzy Sheep was just... it was important to me."

  "Because of Symbal?" He asked warily.

  "Among other things, yeah." Sarah sighed briefly, then studied the image of him on her display. "How much have you figured out?"

  "Only a little," Cayden admitted. "That you used to be involved in PvP for one thing."

  She winced. "So the bad part then."

  "I figured. But didn't want to assume." He replied, choosing his words carefully and studying Sarah closely as he did. "If you'd been a duelist, or involved in any sort of arena, I probably would have been able to find your name when I searched for it, even if it was a while back. Which leaves..."

  A few breaths passed before Sarah finally saved him the discomfort of saying it. "Player Killing."

  "Why?"

  "Because I was a screwed up kid." Sarah murmured. "The game was brand new, and it was better than having my stepdad hit me for the hundredth time, so I ran away. I made some new friends, built a party, and at first, it was fun. Just a real-life game, right?"

  "Three of us died getting to level twelve. Other parties were beating us up the tower, and I kept pushing for us to try and take on things we weren't ready for. We didn't have the gear or the money." Color and shame flooded Sarah's face as she spoke. "The first time was this level 30 solo player, Katya. Sebastian, my party leader, had been trying to get her to join us all week, probably because he thought she was cute."

  "And she said no?" Cayden asked.

  "With more colorful words, yeah. Seb didn't like that. He took a swing at her, and once she started beating him, we all piled on her." Another tear briefly interrupted the tale. "She had more money, and better gear than the five of us put together. And it had been so easy."

  "How many?"

  "I honestly don't know. At least a dozen."

  "How can you not know?" His voice was incredulous, just one step below a yell as Sarah shrunk away on the other end of the video feed.

  "You think I was myself during all this?" She asked with a mixture of indignation and embarrassment. "A young girl with a bunch of older guys in Babel, with no supervision? I was high more than I was sober."

  "And that is your-"

  "No!" Sarah cut him off. "It isn't an excuse. I'm a terrible person. Is that what you want to hear?"

  Cayden said nothing, his mouth opening and closing a few times as he searched for any sort of proper reply. What could he say to an admission like that? Player killers were a small, but dangerous fact of life in Babel, but when he thought of them, he thought of lunatics covered in bones or creepy silence of the lambs types. Not her.

  "You don't have to deny it. I know I am." Sarah said, her voice just barely above a sob. "I know what I did."

  Unsure of what else to say, of how to comfort her, Cayden instead pressed her story. "Why did you stop?"

  "I'd like to say I grew a conscience. But in truth, we just got sloppy." Sarah looked down, no longer meeting his digital gaze, or letting him see her reflection as she spoke. "Sebastian picked someone with friends in high places, and they came after us with everything they had. I managed to get away though sheer dumb luck, and I hid on the second floor."

  "And Symbal?"

  "They couldn't attack me in town, but they still made my life a living hell. I couldn't find a place to sleep, to buy food. Symbal was the only one who knew what I was, who was still willing to give me a place to stay, and something to do with myself, even if I had to hide who I am to do it."

  Cayden cocked his head to one side, about to inquire further as realization struck him. "Your name isn't Sarah. It's Desdaemona."

  "Funny how you can miss something as simple as hearing your own name." She smiled. "But really, I prefer Des."

  "How long have you've been there...?"

  "A year and a half," Des replied. "It was the closest thing to a good home I've ever had."

  "And I burned it to the ground." Cayden winced.

  "You did." The slightest hint of a wry smile emerged on her face as she looked back to the mirror once again. "But I can think of worse reasons to have done so."

  "So what do we do now?" He asked after a brief hesitation.

  "I'm going to join some refugees making their way to Bastion," Des replied. "I've got another five and a half days on my death timer. After that, I am yours to command."

  "I meant after this?" Cayden said. "Once this event is over. And about the others."

  "I'll tell them once this is all over." She promised. "And when it is all over if you'll have me, I'd like to join you?"

  "Why?"

  "Because if I can help you get that wish, then maybe you can help me fix the mistakes I've made."

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  "Welcome Home, Field Marshall."

  "Valserys," Cayden replied. For a moment he said nothing more before emotion got the better of him. "You have got to stop sitting to the side of the door. This is like, the third time you've nearly given me a heart attack."

  The officer regarded him coolly at first, though a half smile eventually snuck in below that absurdly colored mustache. "Perhaps Sir should try expecting my presence."

  "How can I? You're like the Spanish Inquisition." He waved away any requests to expand on the idiom and instead continued speaking. "Command: Quick Item seven."

  His steps carried him further into the room as the miniature War Frame materialized into the palm of his hand. Silver, Michael, and Asch were all quick on his heels, and before long the table once again dominated the center of the Strategy room, the room's occupants arrayed in a semicircle around one side.

  The map had changed significantly since he'd last looked upon it. The once proud city of Islo was now little more than burnt out wreckage surrounded by powerful walls, while a long of crimson banners and marching miniatures streamed out from where it had once been.

  "So, we've lost Islo," Cayden said, starting with the obvious.

  "I wouldn't say we've lost it." Silver smirked.

  "Really?" Cayden ask
ed.

  "Really." Silver replied, unwilling to back off the reference despite his tone.

  "Islo is gone." He rephrased after losing the brief battle of wills. "And with it, a huge number of Warden troops. The best estimate we have from the Goon scouts we have in the field suggest we've knocked out as much as a third of their army." Cayden allowed his friends a brief moment of self-congratulations before he continued. "The real question is, what do we do next?"

  "The bridges, wasn't it?" Michael asked.

  "That appears to be their next destination," Valserys confirmed, indicating the two bridges that crossed the Ryks river at the roughly halfway point between Bastion and the ruins of Islo.

  "The real question isn't if the Wardens are going to the bridges, it is if they are worth defending," Asch said.

  Cayden tapped the tip of his nose. "She's got it in one. With the Islo and other player forces added to our own, the combined army is greatly expanded." He brushed at the side of the War Frame, manipulating its surface to call up a new menu. "Once all units are back to full strength we'll have about Sixteen-hundred infantry men and two hundred Cavalry."

  "But there are some problems with that," Valserys added.

  "There are." Cayden agreed. "Right now we don't have enough Field Supply Limit for all of our forces."

  "Which means what, exactly?" Michael asked.

  "It means that if we deploy them all in the field at once, we start getting charged extreme upkeep costs in terms of Food, Production and Grand Zenni," Cayden replied. "We have enough to field about half the army right now, but anything over a thousand at one time is going to cost us."

  Michael crossed his arms. "So that should be our priority for construction. Shouldn't it?"

  "It would be if we didn't also bring home a little over nine thousand civilians." Silver said as she rubbed the bridge of her nose with thumb and forefinger. "We have housing for not even half that many, and now that Islo isn't providing us with any Food, we've only got enough to feed all our mouths for about twelve days."

  "We can feed them all for the time being," Cayden assured the others as a ripple of worry ran around the table. "The increased population allows us to work another three tiles around the city, which should alleviate that worry once we get some farms up and running, but housing is going to be our number one priority. Over-population is giving us the same sort of negatives we get from having too many soldiers under arms, and unlike the soldiers, we can't alleviate the problem by having them sit around and do nothing."