by Hugo Huesca
Tulip finished freeing him from the web strands and helped him take hold of the small leather riding chair on her abdomen. Klek found himself upside-down, holding on by the strength of his legs and the straps he grabbed at with two hands. Don’t look down, he reminded himself. Tulip had told him she was agile enough to catch him with her web if he fell, but it was not a possibility he was willing to test. He hurried to tie the straps around his waist, then secured his legs using a complicated system of metal belts and buckles.
“Vampires are difficult to kill,” Tulip said while Klek worked. “There’s a chance it may have fought the Heroes. He may know a thing or two about them.”
Klek nodded. Find someone who has seen them up close was another of the tasks that Lord Edward had set for them. At first mention, it had sounded easy. Lavy and Alder had survived a Heroic attack, hadn’t they?
After weeks of searching, Klek found out just how lucky Alder and Lavy had been.
Although some minions survived a dungeon raid, they were all non-combatants: skilled workers, servants, apprentices, slaves, maybe prisoners from enemy Dungeon Lords. If they weren’t in the path that the Heroes followed to the Seat Room, there was a chance they could escape the eventual collapse of the dungeon. Evading the Inquisitors that would arrive in the area shortly thereafter was another story.
These Inquisitors had chosen to bring the vampire to Undercity instead of breaking the coffin down and exposing the creature inside to sunlight.
“We need to tell Lord Edward about this,” Klek said aloud. “And fast. Hopefully before the coffin arrives inside the city.”
“Anything for a chance to leave this death-trap,” Tulip said. “Grab on tight, snack. It’d be a shame if you fell down and your splatter alerted everyone to my presence. And keep your eyes closed—I’ve no use for a dizzy rider.”
Klek grimaced, then grabbed a hold of Tulip’s horn and a fistful of leather straps just as the spider darted across the stonework and skittered down the wall toward the empty, dark tunnels of the dungeon. After a while, Klek judged they were close enough to the ground he could risk a look without losing his nerve. He took a quick peek and saw an unending line of broken, bloodied bodies left in the Heroes’ wake. There were humans and elves and dwarfs and gnomes piled atop each other, kaftar with charred fur, giant blowflies torn to pieces, a naga spread across the full length of the corridor, minotaurs with black tongues out, frozen in a paroxysm of pain. In death, there was no difference between sapient creatures, monsters, and beast. They all ended up being just meat. Klek’s stomach churned.
“I told you not to look, snack,” Tulip chided him as he heaved and tried not to puke.
You’ve advanced a Dungeon Mission! Infiltrate the ruins of Jiraz’ dungeon.
Description: A group of Heroes has defeated a neighboring Dungeon Lord, and the Inquisition is active in the ruins.
Win Condition: Escape the ruins and inform the Haunt of your findings.
Reward: Experience, Recruitment chance (Vampire Lieutenant), Increased faction standing.
Bonus: Succeed without being discovered.
Defeat condition: You are detected, captured, or killed.
5
Chapter Five
The Guild
Ed’s drones helped him and Alder get ready for the trip to Undercity in under two minutes. They brought four of the few horses the Haunt’s stables fielded, along with all the provisions and assorted goods they used in their deals with the Thieves Guild. They also brought four cloth bundles set in pairs across two of the horses.
Alder glanced at them, and then did a double take when he saw one bundle shift awkwardly. “Ed, are those people in there?” the Bard asked.
“Yes,” Ed said. “I was going to tell you about it. We’ll finish a small side-quest while we’re out in the city. They are the prisoners we kept from Nicolai’s attack. I finally figured out a way to deal with them.”
The bundle shook again, more frantically, as the young man inside found meaning in Ed’s words, but the prisoners were up to their necks in horned spider paralyzing venom, and their attempts at freeing themselves were sporadic and far too feeble to ever succeed.
Alder gave him a worried look. “So… what are we going to do with them, exactly?”
“Well. I figured we should just let the sea do our dirty work for us,” Ed said, and winked at the Bard. The bundles’ shaking increased.
Undercity’s harbor swayed with the current. The floating wooden platforms which extended all the way from the beach to the merchant ships were the Ivalian way of dealing with the effect that having two moons had on the sea currents. Ed stood right below a small trading ship called the Strenuous, with Oscor the dwarven smuggler next to him, and Karmich the Thief on his other side. Alder was a few strides behind, watching how the fishermen hauled Ed’s cargo into the ship.
“You know,” the Bard said loudly, as to be heard over the chatter of the harbor and the yells of the sailors as they worked. “When you said we were letting the sea do our job, I thought you meant something else.”
They’d smuggled the captured prisoners all the way into the harbor with some help from Oscor’s band. The bundles had gone to the bottom of a rug-maker’s cart, and after a generous bribe to the guards convinced them to not look very hard at the cart’s inventory, the merchant reached the harbor just in time.
“I figured the prisoners would think the same thing,” Ed called back. “A bit of fear serves them right for trying to kill us, don’t you agree?”
“So, what will happen to them, Master Edward?” asked Karmich pleasantly, while he munched on a sweet-roll he’d stolen from a bakery down the street.
“They get another chance at life, I suppose,” Ed explained. “The Strenuous is headed all the way to Plekth, taking the long route to buy and sell spices in every port. Our rebel friends will become part of the crew and work to earn their living. Once they reach Plekth, they’ll be free to go or remain as crew-members of the Strenuous if they so desire—just as long as they don’t return to Starevos, I don’t care what they do. But I gave a letter to the captain for him to give the rebels when they reach Plekth. If they want to stay a while in the Old Continent, maybe our mutual friend won’t mind taking them in as apprentices for her guild.”
It had been hard to decide what to do with the prisoners. The Haunt couldn’t just release them in Starevos, since they knew where the dungeon was located, but Ed wasn’t comfortable with the idea of killing them. He’d finally landed on a compromise he was satisfied with. Sure, being forced away from their home country into a sailor’s hard life wouldn’t feel that way for them, but it was the best Ed could do.
Karmich considered his words. “She’ll have to forgive them for almost killing her first. But knowing Kat, she has forgotten about their part in that adventure already. After all, she’s terrible at holding grudges.”
“Just what I was thinking,” Ed said. Thinking of Katalyn gave him a pang of nostalgia in his chest, a feeling that was both pleasant and painful at the same time. The free-spirited Thief-turned-Rogue was a true adventurer, a woman born to chase after danger and adventure with nothing more than her wits and a confident smile. Although Ed and she had been together only for a short time, he still wasn’t able to look at the sea without it reminding him of her.
Oscor bent his stout body over the edge of the platform, plugged one of his nostrils, and blew hard out of the other. “All right, enough with the sea. Water is meant to make strong booze, not to stand and gawk at.” He tugged at his beard with one dirty hand. Behind them, Alder made a gagging noise barely muffled by his sleeve. “Time to talk shop, Master Mercenary.”
The moment was gone. Ed gave the distant horizon one last look, then shook his head to clear his mind and nodded. “Let’s talk shop then, Master Oscor. How about some drinks?”
The Galleon’s Folly’s cramped frame shook so hard from the carousing inside that a foreigner stuck there might have believed the earth was shakin
g. Inside, locals mixed with sailors in bouts of drinking competitions, boasting matches, and randomly sparked bouts of fist-fighting that ended as soon as they started, usually with the fighters forgetting all about it and scrambling to the bar for more social lubrication.
Ed’s private table was set in the far corner of the tavern, giving him a straight view of the entrance and easy access to the secret back exit. Nearby, a bunch of local whores chatted up a group of sailors who, by the way they “discreetly” elbowed the others on the ribs, thought they were the ones getting lucky tonight. From what Ed knew of the Galleon’s Folly locals, though, by the end of the night, the whores would walk out of some dark alley with their purses full, having done little to none of the job that made their profession famous. The sailors would probably scramble back to their ships in the morning, with one hell of a headache and more than a few bruises.
“Ah, life’s good when business is blooming,” Oscor said, pouring himself another glass of ale. He relaxed his back and patted his quickly engorging belly. Not all dwarves were barely functioning alcoholics, but not all dwarves were Oscor.
“I’ll toast to that,” Karmich said, eyeing the whores. He was probably calculating how many Vyfaras were in those sailors’ pockets and wondering how to get a cut off the profits for himself.
Next to Ed, Alder smiled and nursed a cup of warm cider. Neither of them were drinking tonight. “So, how’s the Guild dealing with the local… ah, administration, these days?”
“Same old, same old,” Karmich said. “For the people in the know, there’s always an angry man of justice with a big hammer looking down on the little guys trying to make a living. Whether the hammer is steel or silver makes no difference. We make do, just as always.” He took a long swig of his tzuika and grimaced at its strength.
Ed rubbed his chin. It was true that life went on as usual inside Undercity, despite the implicit threat of the Militant Church, who kept a close eye on the comings and goings of the city. So far, the Inquisition had remained pretty much away from the daily lives of its inhabitants—their mission was to deal with the Dark, not with petty theft and smuggling. Technically, the only threat that Ed ought to fear, at least when talking about his business in the city, was from the King’s tax officers. But he also knew that although the status-quo had a tendency to reassert itself, it also had weak points which could explode with catastrophic consequences if pressured.
What could happen if the Inquisition put their fingers on one of those?
“I’m glad you and yours are happy with our friendship, Karmich,” Ed said aloud, to change the subject and to get to the point of the meeting. “But I reckon the only thing better than making a pile of money is making an even bigger pile. Perhaps it's time to get our little alliance to the next level.”
Karmich finished his tzuika and bent forward, smiling. “Is that so, friend Edward? Please, tell me more.”
“In fact, Oscor here is the one best suited to explain what we have in mind.”
Oscor nodded. “A while ago, Master Edward and I had a long chat about my birthplace, back in the steel-topped Manslan Peaks. We talked about the songs the miners sang while heading into the bowels of the earth first thing in the morning, about the lazuli vaults where my ancestors are buried, and about the beautiful dwarven women with their braided beards as varied in color as opals. One particular thing caught our friend’s imagination, though, when I told him the way our miners transport themselves and their cargo back to the surface. It’s funny the things humans latch on. I’d rather talk of dwarven women and their jeweled hair for days on end, but to each their own.” The dwarf shrugged, then went on, “Master Ed was quite taken with the concept of mining carts and the simple rail mechanisms we use to quickly move them from one end of a tunnel to the other. He had me describe in detail the inner workings of one and was so insistent that I was forced to draw him a Hogbus-be-damned sketch on a napkin. A few days later, his kaftar met with me for our weekly stock exchange, and they claimed Ed was now building a working prototype of one of our dwarven carts. A week after that, and the kaftar claimed they’d made the trip in a fraction of the time it usually took, thanks to Ed’s machine.”
“That’s the kind of story that would get even the best Bard thrown out of a tavern for making too bold a claim,” Karmich said. “But knowing just how resourceful our adventurer friends are, I’m inclined to believe it. I just wonder, what does that have to do with the Guild?”
“Think about it,” Ed said. “Before, moving the stock from our headquarters to Undercity was a dangerous odyssey. Our kaftar friends, the Haga’Anashi clan, had to risk discovery by the King’s officers with every trip—and that was before the Inquisition began patrolling the woods. All it took was a single day with bad luck and it would compromise our operation. Hell, even the time was an issue. Reaching Undercity took the Haga’Anashi most of the day, and they were never able to move as many barrels as we’d have liked to because the weight was prohibitive. We had bottlenecked our production. A single tunnel with one cart changed all that. Now the trip is safer than ever and at a fraction of the time.”
He paused to allow his listeners to process his words, just like Alder had taught him to. “Imagine ten tunnels like that,” Ed said after a bit. “I know that the Guild has more charters all over Starevos, and there are even rumors of a charter in Galtia itself—”
“Completely unfounded,” Karmich said with a wink.
“My group could lay a system of tunnels that reaches most of Starevos in a couple years. If you help us with the expense, we can even protect those tunnels from incursions, as well as keep them hidden from the Militant Church. The sea may be guarded by the Heiligian fleet, and the Inquisition’s griffins may patrol the sky, but the underground is mine. I won’t deal in pixie dust or slaves, but there’s a market for untaxed silk, spice, tobacco, and of course tzuika and ale. For a fee, you could use the tunnels to move your stock all over Starevos. No other Guild would even come close to competing with your prices. Summoning circles are expensive and unreliable, and Portals are even worse.”
Unless you happened to be a Dungeon Lord with access to a ruby vein, of course. Ed lacked materials to set up a Portal network—even a single Portal was out of his reach for the moment—but even if he did, a Portal only allowed for a certain amount of mass to be transported through in a day before it ran out of energy.
The tunnels were the best possible solution. His drones had no limit—that he knew of—to how much earth they could chew. They could only work a certain distance away from him or a dungeon Seat, though, which was the reason he’d need a couple years to set up the network. His plan was to create many hidden, smaller dungeons using Scrambling Towers all over the country and have each of those protect a part of the tunnel system.
It’d take a solid amount of minions to man those dungeons, but Ed had an entire Spider Empire backing him up. He was sure he could figure things out.
“How promising,” said Karmich. He turned back and raised a finger to Max, the bartender. “If what you’re saying is true, and I’ve little doubt it is, Grand Master Bavus himself will want to know about it as soon as possible. There’s good business to be had in those tunnels. Although…” He scratched the side of his nose and looked at the ceiling with feigned carelessness. “Our Grand Master may consider it… as someone who doesn’t know Master Alder and yourself as well as I do… strange that you’re able to just lay out the infrastructure of an almost country-wide digging operation in a couple years, instead of multiple decades. And the expense! Kingdoms could go bankrupt just by thinking of doing what you’re proposing, Master Edward. Not that we don’t trust you, of course. It’s just that I’d like to offer Bavus a good reason not to jump to conclusions.”
Ed smiled with just as much feigned disinterest as Karmich while matching the Thief’s posture. It was a neat Charm trick that Alder had taught him. “See, I understand how that may appear suspicious. But our… corporation just hired a specialist spe
llcaster… ah, a Geomancer from… Plekth. Yes.” Next to him, Alder winced and smacked his own forehead. Ed ignored it. Not everyone had Bluff as a main skill. “This Geomancer developed a magical breakthrough, allowing us to lay out the tunnels quickly and with little expense. So there’s no need to worry about it.” He even waved his hand like Alder sometimes did while powering through a weak part of a tale, as if trying to draw attention away from it. Ed hoped it was part of a Charm talent he had yet to learn.
Both Oscor and Karmich beamed and nodded repeatedly to show their agreement. “So a Wizard did it,” said Karmich. “Makes perfect sense. Perfect sense, Master Edward. I’m sure Grand Master Bavus will be satisfied with this reasonable explanation. No need to even speak further of it. Wetlands, forget I even brought it up!”
A cute waitress with a knife strapped to her thigh brought the Thief his drink. He smiled at her and gestured for her to come sit on his lap. She smiled back and pointed at her knife. Karmich let the matter drop.
“Good to know we squared that up,” Ed said. He had expected something like that. The Thieves Guild and Oscor’s smuggling operation knew there was some… strangeness going on with Ed and Alder. It was impossible to hide things like their relationship with the Haga’Anashi kaftar or how they hid their operation so well from the tax officers. It added up. But the beautiful thing about dealing with Thieves, smugglers, and others of their ilk was that as long as there was some clear profit to be had from maintaining their relationship with mysterious adventurer Edward Wright—and a very risky element to thinking too hard about what exactly he was—then they’d pretty much be willing to overlook anything as long as Ed could come up with the right excuse.