Hannah realized it was time to talk to their villain.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Karl dropped the bottle of ale by his side and let out a rumbling belch loud enough to make Sal raise his head, ready to fight whatever treacherous monster was approaching. "Take ‘er easy, ol’ guy," Karl said, giving him a rub on the neck. “It's just nature gettin’ the best of me."
"Speaking of things getting the best of you, how's your shoulder, rearick?" Aysa laughed.
Karl put his palm against his shoulder and felt a tiny biting sting from where she had hit him with a steak knife. "It's nothin’, kid. But I'll grant ye, that was one helluva throw. Especially for a drunk-ass Baseeki like yerself."
“Wait until your drunk wears off. It will scream at you tomorrow morning.” Aysa stood and steadied herself. "Some of us have extreme self-control even when we drink. It's one of my special talents."
Karl snorted. "Bullshit. Ye couldn't brush yer teeth right now if ye needed to. Even if ye had two good hands."
"I could do almost anything right now," the girl slurred. “Blindfolded.”
"Sure. Whatever. Wonder if ye could find another bottle or two of ale."
Aysa ignored his call for more booze. "For instance, I could certainly kick your ass right now."
Karl waved her off. The last thing he wanted to do when he was half in the bag was mess around with the one-handed warrior.
"Or I could fix the Unlawful right now."
"Like hell, ye could. Ye can hardly see straight."
Aysa closed one eye and squinted the other. "Pretty straight. Like this, at least. Let's go. I’ll prove it."
Karl exhaled and looked toward the residences. He certainly didn’t want to go all the way back there to retrieve the mechanism they’d bought in town. One look at his feather bed and he’d be going nowhere except Sleepville, and fast.
It was like the girl could read his mind. She patted her backpack and smiled. “I’ve got all I need right here, old man. Didn’t let it leave my sight.”
Karl had a feeling she wasn't going to let this one go. "I'll take ye up on that bet. Ye fix that machine, and I'll take a week's worth of yer chores on our voyage out of this place."
"And if I don't?" Aysa asked.
"When you don't, ye need to take a vow of silence for a week. Not one bloody word." Karl grinned at his friend. "What do ye think?"
"No words for a week? Not a problem."
“I've never heard ye be quiet fer a minute, let alone an hour," Karl said.
"Not a problem, because I’m gonna nail this. Let's go."
There was a little more than a mile to where they had parked the Unlawful up in the clouds, and Sal got them there in a few minutes. That was Aysa’s idea. She loved riding the dragon, and even more, she loved how uncomfortable it made Karl. The rearick held onto the dragon’s neck, while Aysa sat behind him whooping and hollering all the way. Her head spun, the buzz from the ale mixing with the exhilaration of flight.
"Can't wait till that damn trap of yers is shut," Karl grumbled under his breath. Aysa laughed harder. She knew he only half-meant it.
When they hit the ground, Aysa pulled the black remote out of her bag and pressed the button. She could hear the gentle whir of the core kicking energy into the ship’s engines from where they stood.
As the ship powered down, the hum of the engine was replaced by a different sound. Loud shouts echoed in chorus from the hills above them.
"Looks like we've got company," Karl shouted as he raised his hammer to the ready.
"Now, this is a party," Aysa said. Her shield was already strapped to her arm, and she had a set of bolas in hand. She recognized the attackers within seconds. “Bloody pirates. I barely got a chance to fight them last time.”
“Well, it’s yer lucky night. Looks like they been lyin’ in wait for us.” He pointed his hammer toward a small group, maybe twenty, sprinting down the hill toward them.
“Bad idea.” Aysa laughed as she tossed her first pair of bolas. The weapon wrapped around a charging man’s ankles, and as he collapsed to the dirt, two others tripped over him. She grabbed another pair from her belt and began swinging them over her head as she ran toward the force.
Two versus twenty would have been a tough fight even for warriors of Karl and Aysa’s caliber, but they weren’t fighting alone. Aysa blocked spears with her shield and Karl shattered them with his hammer, but Sal did most of the work. To their credit, the pirates didn’t run in terror at the sight of the dragon, but courage meant very little against his claws and teeth and tail. Whatever semblance of order they had attacked in was torn to shreds by Sal’s persistence dive-bombs.
Aysa cracked one of the pirates’ skulls open with her bolas. “They didn’t think this through very well.”
Karl took out another’s legs. “Aye. We’ll finish with these in minutes and still have time to fix—”
Before he could finish, a loud roar filled the valley.
“This ship!” Aysa shouted. She turned around and saw the Unlawful begin to rise. She pulled the black remote from her pocket and jammed the button, but the device refused to listen.
“A diversion,” Karl shouted as he knocked a spear aside, his voice suddenly more sober than it had sounded for hours. “Go, I’ll handle things down here.”
Aysa let loose her last pair of bolas at a pirate aiming for Karl’s unguarded back, then took off at a sprint. Sal was right behind her. She pulled one of the short spears the pirates favored from the mud before jumping onto Sal’s back. They soared after the rising wooden airship.
Apparently, the pirates had expected a fight in the sky. Three pirates wearing those damned kites launched from the bow of the Unlawful, spears at the ready.
“Dead ahead, Sal,” she shouted. She held on tight with her long legs and pointed her spear forward.
The cold wind stung her face, but she refused to blink. The distance between her and the pirates closed in seconds. Two broke off to flank them, but Aysa didn’t take the bait. Her focus was on the lead. She held her shield high.
“Come at me, you bastard!” she shouted. Sal roared in unison.
She leaned into the attack, and with the advantage afforded by her long arms, she struck first. Her spear sank deep while the pirate’s weapon shattered on her shield, and like that, the sky was clear. She watched as his lifeless body fluttered to the ground.
There was little time to revel in the victory. The two other flyers were coming at them.
“I need to secure the ship, Sal. Can you handle these two flying assholes?”
The dragon responded by flapping his powerful wings harder. Within seconds, they had crested the bow of the Unlawful. Aysa dropped to the wooden deck and Sal went after his prey. Aysa, armed only with her shield, turned her fist toward the door.
“It’s time to take my freaking ship back.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Karl raised his hammer and eyed the three remaining pirates. With Aysa and Sal gone, there was no one to watch his back, and he was quickly surrounded by spears, although none of them attacked.
“What are ye waitin’ for, ye yellow-bellied bastards?” They didn’t respond to his taunts. Instead, they stepped aside as a man at least a head taller than the rest of the pirates stepped out of the shadows. He held two small axes in his hands.
“Remember me, little man?”
“Aye,” Karl said. “Happy to have a chance to keep me promise.”
The man smiled. “We’re on stable ground this time. Don’t expect any tricks to save you.”
“Well, quit yer blabberin’ then if ye feel so damn confident.”
The man charged, and once again, Karl was struck by the brute’s speed. If it wasn’t for the fact that Karl constantly trained with Parker and Vitali, the pirate’s ferocity might have outdone him. Karl dodged as well as he fought, and he managed to jab his hammer into the man’s stomach.
The pirate stumbled back. He must have been wearing armor under hi
s loose-fitting dark clothing; otherwise, the hammer would have split his stomach open. As it was, Karl knew the hit would leave him pissing blood for a week.
“Aye, ye like that?” Karl laughed.
The pirate roared in anger, then leapt back into the fray. This time, his three spearmen joined in. Karl was good, but one against four were terrible odds for anyone, except maybe Hannah. He swung wide, trying to give himself as much space as possible, but these pirates were good with the spears, and with the hatchet-wielding maniac at the lead, they knew how to fight.
Karl barely managed to dodge an axe that cut his arm. Idly, he wondered how Aysa was fairing, but he knew better than to waste his energies fretting over that girl. She’d be just fine. Instead, he gritted his teeth and fought on.
He kept his feet and managed to keep the four fighters in front of him. That left his back safe, and his hammer was a mighty wall. He took a step back as the pirates held up for a second. “Come on then,” Karl yelled. “Next one that steps forward loses his head.”
They must have thought he meant it because they stood still. Karl laughed. “What’s the matter? Afraid of this little man?”
The large pirate grabbed one of his men and threw him forward. Karl gripped his hammer and prepared to strike, but he never got a chance. A body fell from the sky and crushed the man into the ground.
Karl and the pirates stared in horror at the mangled bodies, then looked up. The rearick barely had a chance to jump aside before the Unlawful came crashing to the ground in an explosion of dirt.
The rearick picked himself up and brushed the dirt off. As the dust cleared, there was no sign of the pirates. Either they fled or found their deaths under the hull of the Unlawful.
“Hey, Karl,” Aysa shouted from the deck. “Once you’re done dicking around down there, I could use some help. I need to clean the blood and guts out of the engine room before I can fix it. That is, if our deal is still good.”
“Aye.” He laughed, his buzz barely coming back to him. “Our deal is still good. But I think I’m gonna need another drink first.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Vitali lowered his hood and let cool wind sweep through his fur. It felt good to be outside after being cooped up in the royal chambers all day. Out here, there was little risk of his appearance offending anyone.
There was no one outside.
It was late when he left Kirill’s party in the grand hall, but not so late as to justify the silent streets before him. The message among the elites was “Victory, the evil that terrorized our city has been defeated.” But that message of the saviors had apparently failed to make much of an impact down here among the people who had supposedly been saved.
The king’s murderer was still on the loose, after all.
They killed the king, the old Mylek woman had said. Anyone powerful enough to do that could kill anyone they wanted.
Vitali walked quickly, the cobblestones under his feet giving way to packed dirt, which gave way to mud as he moved farther from the city center. As the nice shops disappeared from view, they were replaced by establishments with dark windows and thick doors. He only had one lead left, but he was fairly confident in his intel.
If he wanted answers, this would be the kind of place to ask questions.
Vitali found the building he was looking for. It had no sign, no outward indication that it was open for business, but he could hear laughter and revelry inside.
Not everyone was afraid tonight. Vitali raised his hood and stepped through the doorway.
His eyes adjusted quickly to the dim light inside. An empty bar took up one side of the room, and the rest was filled with tables and soft-looking chairs. The place was packed with men and women enjoying the company of others. Every once in a while, a couple stood up and moved through a curtain in the back. They laughed loudly and held each other close as they went.
The central feature of this back-alley establishment was the utter lack of Mylek features. Everyone was clearly Myrna, born and bred. Everyone except Vitali. He pulled his hood tighter around his face and found a stool at the bar.
The bartender, a woman maybe twice Vitali’s age, although he struggled to tell sometimes among the furless, slid a heavy glass mug toward him. His nose twitched at the smell.
“I didn’t order anything yet,” he told her.
“Didn’t have to,” she responded. “It’s the only thing we serve. That and a little short-term company. But something tells me a man with his cloak wrapped that tightly around him isn’t looking for company.”
Vitali took a sip of the bitter liquid. “The people in this town seem more comfortable in my company when they can’t see what’s under the hood.”
“Then the people you’ve met are assholes. You’re one of them, aren’t ya? The one’s who’ve come to ‘save us?’”
“Something like that,” Vitali responded.
She grabbed a rag, cleaner than Vitali expected it to be, and wiped a glass before filling it. She raised it in his direction. “Then you’re welcome here.”
Vitali raised his drink in reply. “Thank you. It’s nice to meet someone who isn’t...an asshole.”
She took a long drink, then turned to look at the curtain in the back. “Enjoy it while it lasts.”
Vitali heard a loud laugh and twisted his head to follow the bartender's eyes. Emerging from the thick curtain was a massive man with a woman under each arm. He leaned heavily on them as he walked, and they seemed to strain under his weight.
Even though he wasn’t wearing a uniform, he fit Thaed’s description to a tee. From what Vitali had overheard while spying on Kirill, Thaed knew something about the king and his untimely death, which meant the Lynqi had come to the right place.
Vitali turned back toward his drink as the women deposited the customer at the bar.
He grunted. “Another drink.”
“In a second,” the bartender replied.
The large man fumbled in his pockets before pulling out a heavy metal coin. He slammed it down hard on the table. “Now.”
She filled a glass and handed it to him, but when she reached out to take the coin, his hand shot out like a whip and grabbed her wrist.
“I’ve got more where that came from, in case you were interested in stepping out from behind that bar.”
She tried to pull away, but his grip was too tight. “Not my job, man.”
He pulled her closer. “I said I’ve got the damn coin. I don’t give a shit what your job is.”
Vitali was on his feet and at the man’s side in an instant. “Let her go,” Vitali hissed.
Thaed turned his glassy eyes toward the Lynqi, not sure what he was seeing.
“Yeah? What’s it to ya, then?” His voice was slurred with ire and drink.
“Nothing. Just sick of the assholes in this town.”
Thaed let go of the bartender and stood. He was easily a head taller than Vitali, and twice as thick.
“Did you just call me an asshole?” He reached out to grab Vitali, but as he did, the small catman kicked Thaed’s ankle. His leg buckled and he dropped to the ground hard, pulling his fresh mug of beer on top of him as he fell.
Everyone in the bar broke into laughter.
Thaed scrambled to his feet, his already-red cheeks turning redder. He looked like he wanted to scream or fight or burn the place down, but instead, he just ran out the door, the sound of laughter on his heels.
Vitali nodded to the bartender and followed the wet boot prints out the door.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Damp, dank air hung around her as Hannah descended into the lower chambers of the hold. She had managed to slip away from the party easily enough, and finding the prison was simply a matter of memory—Irmand’s. She had seen it when she’d read his mind the first day he met her and her team, and she’d had him take them to the great hall instead.
Turning a corner, she found the guard station, which was empty. She could only assume Irmand had given his charges
the night off for the celebration. It was, after all, they who should've been celebrated for the capture of Aliz.
As she proceeded down the hall, she found the reason Irmand was unconcerned about the guard post being vacant. Cells were lined up next to each other, secured with massive iron bars and locks with impossible-looking mechanisms. The prisoners weren’t going anywhere. Hannah turned her hand over and her eyes lit up with the red of magic. A small blue orb floated in front of her, bringing light to the jailhouse. Drawn faces and sunken eyes looked out of each cell, all of them wordlessly begging for release. Hannah's heart beat in anticipation.
She couldn’t help but wonder about the prisoners. Most of them were Mylek, although there were a few Myrna scattered among them. Were these violent terrorists like the Blue Scarves or products of Solyr’s legal system? Maybe the two weren’t so different. She half-considered melting the bars and breaking down the walls, but she decided to maintain discretion for the time being.
At least until she knew more.
But she swore she would bring Justice in due time.
"We will check on prisoner one and get back to the party," a familiar voice said from behind her.
Hannah extinguished her glowing orb and pressed her body against the wall. Irmand and one of his men came into sight. Her instincts told her to run, but Hannah wasn’t the little girl from the Boulevard anymore. She sent a wave of magic into their minds, a suggestion that they saw nothing out of the ordinary, especially not a young woman trying to hide in plain sight.
Camouflaged by her mental magic, Hannah held her breath and listened.
"I'm sure she's secure, Captain, and it was clever of you to put her at the end of the hall, away from the others. I can't imagine she will be able to inspire a Blue Scarf revolution from behind bars."
Solyrian Conspiracy - C M Raymond & L E Barbant Page 12