A miracle. The touch of Abadar's glory. Flabbergasted, he held it up to catch the light, letting the assembly look upon it.
Another might have sought to make further speeches, for he could tell that the crowd still waited upon his word. Yet he had no idea what to say.
"Daylah," he suggested at last, "let us go see your father."
paizo.com #3236236, Corry Douglas
Chapter Twenty-Four
Reckoning
Lisette
She saw no lights in the fortress and tower complex apart from those borne by the guard at the open postern gate. The building she knew for the mayor's residence betrayed light through a number of shuttered first-floor windows.
The best way forward now was to bluff her way in through the front. As she started up the steps to the house's porch she was surprised by a figure that rose from a sitting position.
"Lisette Demonde?" the figure asked, and she knew him immediately for the Brevic guard, Demid. His cheer did not sound forced. "It is you! But where are Drelm and Elyana? What's happened? Did you kill the beast?"
She didn't trust him; she was in no mood to trust anyone. Yet she sensed that his enthusiasm and interest were real, and she could play that to her advantage. "They're fine. And we killed the beast. I've got an urgent message for the mayor. Drelm and Elyana are at the Razmiri temple. The Razmiri were behind all of it. You'd better get there and help them."
"The Razmiri?" Even as he asked the question, Demid hurried down the steps, his silver boot heels glinting in the candlelight. "I wish to hear it all," he said as he dashed off.
He'd hear more than he wished, very soon.
Lisette had forgotten to ask him to unlock the door, but she found it came open at her touch. The Brevan might be seasoned, but he trusted too easily.
She stepped into a sitting room where a stout older woman was folding sheets by candlelight. The lady turned in surprise.
"Message for the mayor," Lisette said, with a smile.
But the woman's expression didn't change, and Lisette realized the woman's gaze had tracked to Lisette's side. The bloodstain across her blouse was larger than she'd expected.
"It's worse than it looks," Lisette said easily, hoping that it was. "Where's the mayor?"
The maid directed her to another door with a shaking finger.
Lisette walked past, pushed open the door, and found Avelis behind a desk, studying a sheet of paper. A chandelier with a dozen candles was suspended above his head. He didn't look up until Lisette closed the door.
Avelis's handsome face froze in astonishment.
"I met some friends of yours," Lisette said, "outside Madame Celene's."
Avelis tried a smile, first. "You sound upset. I think there might have been some misunderstanding. Why don't you let me—" he started to rise.
Lisette leveled the rifle and pulled back the hammer. "There's been a misunderstanding, alright. I want the rest of the gems."
He raised empty palms. "I don't have them with me. Truly. You're a professional—is it really good form to come to my house? Doesn't that make this whole thing—"
He was stalling. Everyone wanted more time from her today. "Shut up. I'm likely to pass out soon, from blood loss. Maybe you're counting on that. Count on this: I'll shoot you before I drop. I want what I'm owed. And I'm owed double, seeing as how you tried to have me killed." She stepped closer, rifle still rock-steady. "I'm going to watch, and you're going to pull money out of that desk. You pull anything else out, and you'll die."
"You won't be able to leave Delgar alive if you shoot me."
Lisette laughed. "But I'll die satisfied."
The mayor opened a drawer and felt around inside. She stepped around to his side, her back to the timber wall. She was thankful to be able to lean on it for support, for she felt faint. "You've got the whole town fooled. Even Elyana, and she's no easy mark. What are you, really? A thief? A murderer?"
"Murderers don't raise children."
"Some third son who ran off with the family riches? I'm getting closer, aren't I? And where's your wife? Did she run with you, or run away?"
He pulled a small canvas sack from the drawer and set it, slowly, on top of the papers before him. "It was nothing like that."
"Are those the gems?"
The door opened behind her and a woman screamed.
Avelis was a hair faster than Lisette; her reflexes had slowed. He sprang out of the chair and knocked the barrel aside. Her shot blasted into the wall and the maid in the doorway screamed again. Gun smoke billowed in their faces and Lisette breathed in the acrid stink.
Before Avelis could press his advantage, she smacked him in the temple with the gun barrel and retreated around the desk.
The mayor grabbed a sword from the wall behind him and vaulted after.
She threw the rifle at him. Whatever he really was, he was out of practice as a warrior, no matter how fit he looked. He fumbled and stumbled and tripped over the gun, enough that she had time to draw her sword, though she could not hold off a gasp of pain as she did so.
"Go find help, Kandren," Avelis said, and Lisette heard a choked sob and retreating footsteps behind her. Avelis directed his sword toward her and came forward with a professional stance. "You'll never get away now. And no one will believe anything you say."
"Drelm's still alive," she told him, noting with pleasure the fire that lit in the back of his eye.
The mayor lunged in a fury.
Lisette deflected his blow, and the two that followed, astonished by her own weakness. In the old days she would have had a dagger up her sleeve, blinding powder ready. She had none of those things, now. Had she gotten careless, or old? Cocky?
"What did you possibly hope to do?" Avelis asked. "No one will believe you. And you'll be dead in any case. I know the sword. I studied with the finest fencing masters in Andoran."
"Elyana knows," she said. "I left a letter for her. She may be reading it now."
The mayor drove forward recklessly.
Lisette nicked his side and kicked a vase into his way, but her strength had ebbed almost completely. For all his posturing and his trim, athletic shape, she knew she could normally take Avelis, even on a bad day. The problem was that she was bleeding to death. She managed only a partial parry of a blow to her heart and his sword found her side.
She gasped, and nerveless fingers released their hold on her sword as she sank against the walls. As she dropped she spotted that bag of gems on the desk. Damned gems.
He advanced, swishing the sword in the air so that blood drops sprayed.
Lisette thought then of the knife in her left boot. It was agony to move her leg closer; each movement felt like she was ripping every muscle in her side.
"Where is this letter?" Avelis asked. "Tell me, and I'll spare you!" He pointed the sword tip at her throat.
"Go screw yourself."
"I gave your assassins poison," Avelis said, "to wipe upon their blades. I'm surprised it hasn't struck you yet. But I have the antidote. A wise man never handles poisons without an antidote. I'll give it to you if you tell me where the letter is."
She was too weak at that moment to tell him to screw himself again, but she thought her look conveyed the sentiment, because he pulled his sword back. She raised her chin so the strike would be quick. She thought of Kerrigan's broad, smiling face and his scarred brown hands, stained with black powder. Avelis swung.
Another blade interposed, his strike clanging against it.
Lisette turned her head and found Elyana in the room's doorway, weapon extended. The elf trapped the mayor's blade and forced him back as she advanced, eyes narrowed.
Avelis somehow managed to look relieved and stunned at the same time. "Elyana—it's wonderful to see you—"
Elyana's tone was short. Unlike Avelis, she didn't lower her blade. "What are you doing?"
"She got my letter," Lisette said, her voice little more than a whisper. "She knows."
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"Set aside your blade, Mayor," Elyana instructed. "Lisette needs tending."
"I will not. This woman has tried to kill me. She is a member of the Black Coil—"
"And how do you know that?" Elyana asked
The mayor was stopped short by that simple question. "It's...I've made inquiries. It's complicated, Elyana. You'd understand if you'd—"
"Drop the weapon. Now. And step away."
The mayor released the sword, and it rang dully against the carpet thrown over the floor planks.
"Stand over there. In the doorway."
"She's bleeding to death," the mayor said. "It's probably too late."
Lisette thought the bastard was probably right. Elyana came around to her injured side so that she might see the wound and the mayor at the same time. She lay down her blade as she knelt.
"Summon a healer," she said as she ripped open Lisette's shirt fabric.
Avelis sounded like a petulant child. "I will not!"
She thought that Elyana tried to mask her reaction, but it was clear enough to see, as the elf studied her wounds, that it wasn't good.
"I've drained all my energies, Lisette," Elyana said simply. "I have no healing magic left this night."
She tried a laugh, but it was painful. "He tried to hire..." She coughed, and tasted blood.
"I believe you."
Lisette was very weary, now. There were things that had mattered to her very much, only a short while ago, that didn't seem to matter at all anymore. "Tell Drelm," she said, "enjoy...happy ending."
paizo.com #3236236, Corry Douglas
Chapter Twenty-Five
Farewells
Elyana
She knew it was only a matter of moments, then. She would sit next to her comrade while her life faded, and then she would decide what to do about the mayor.
Someone heavy had come into the house; she heard the footfalls, and a moment later recognized the distinctive jangle of Drelm's gear. The mayor stared at him in dread as he pushed through.
Something about Drelm had changed. Elyana thought she saw a peculiar, faraway look in her friend's face, and there was a curious sense of wisdom and sorrow there she'd never seen before.
The half-orc drove his axe through the carpet and into the floor, then knelt down on Lisette's other side.
She understood then what he must plan to do.
"Your ring can't help her, Drelm," she told him. "It can only heal damage taken while the ring is worn."
"I'm not giving her the ring," Drelm answered. He set his hand to Lisette's side, and a faint red glow arose from his fingertips, as though he had been touched with roses and cinnamon.
Elyana watched in astonishment as Lisette breathed in deeply, and the bloody holes in her side sealed from within. There was a faint lingering radiance, and an afterglow of warm light, and then the woman was fumbling disbelievingly at the site of her wounds.
"How..." was all Lisette managed. Elyana was wondering much the same thing. She would have asked her friend, but Drelm was rising to address the mayor.
"Your heart is torn," the half-orc told him. "By two mistresses: love and hate. You must seek absolution."
"From you?" the mayor spat. "Who led my son to his death? Who would taint my family's blood with that of orc?"
"He was fine with it while the boy lived," Lisette remarked to Elyana. "As long as he had an heir—a human heir—to pass the town on to, he was willing to give the girl as payment for Delgar's safety."
There were more footfalls from within the home, and as Elyana rose she saw Demid and Daylah arrive. Their faces were both fixed in strange, rapturous expressions.
The mayor sidestepped so he could address his daughter and keep his eyes upon the rest of them. "You shouldn't be here."
"Why did you hire her to kill Drelm?" Elyana asked.
"He killed my boy." The mayor's face twisted in anger. "You're so blind to it! Don't you see?"
"Your own grief blinded you," Elyana said wearily.
Daylah's brow furrowed, and she looked first to Elyana, then to Drelm for some kind of confirmation before finally turning to Avelis. "Father, is this true?"
All could see the answer in his glare.
"What about all those fine words?" Elyana asked. "Of a future where we could live as one. Together, no matter our origins or station. You meant them. I saw it in your eyes."
"We all did," Demid added quietly from the doorway.
Avelis struggled. "My child will not marry a monster."
"He's no monster, but a man," Daylah said, and went to take the man's arm. "The noblest one I know."
"Let us past," Drelm said, and moved for the door. Daylah walked at his side, her cheeks streaked with tears.
"You don't understand!" Avelis said. "It's so much more involved than any of you realize!"
Elyana bent to offer Lisette a hand, but whirled at a flurry of movement behind her.
It had happened in a heartbeat, and was already resolved, the figures falling from the action they'd taken. There was Avelis, halfway toward Daylah's back, a knife in his hand. But he was sagging, for Demid's sword had plunged through the mayor's chest.
Avelis landed a foot from Drelm's axe, clutching his bleeding side.
Demid pulled the blade out. His eyes were haunted. "I didn't mean—I just wanted to—"
Elyana shushed him as Daylah rushed past and threw herself down beside her father. "Drelm! Please, Drelm, save him!"
The half-orc turned on his heel and reentered the room.
"No!" Avelis cried. His voice shook with fury even as blood drained from his face. "He will not touch me! I will not look on a world...where you..."
He fell silent.
"Drelm, Please!" Daylah sobbed. "Save him! Please!"
"I don't have that power," Drelm said simply.
This morning you didn't have any powers at all, Elyana thought, but those were questions for another time.
The girl's head fell, and she sobbed as she draped herself over her father's body.
"I'm sorry," Drelm told her.
∗ ∗ ∗
That night the expedition survivors gathered in the tower's hall for a strange and muted celebration. When they learned what had happened to the mayor, to a one they announced that they didn't wish to remain for his funeral. Elyana, acting as the city's ruler—for no other stepped forward—paid each of them promptly.
A few toasts were raised, and directions were exchanged among those who thought they might find their way to visit someday. Cyrelle made her farewells then, saying she'd be off before the dawn, and Melias said she'd be going with her. The huntswoman promised she'd turn Drutha's dog over to the halfling's relatives if they came to claim him. Drelm left next, saying he needed to go look in on Daylah, and the others all filed out of the hall where they'd first made their plans to fight the beast. All save Aladel, who waited for her beside the doorway as the servants came in to lower the wagon wheel and snuff the candles.
"I'll be leaving in the morning myself," he said. "I must make my report to Kyonin." His gaze then was level and direct. "If you're here when I return, I'd like to take some time to get to know you better. Over candlelight, firelight, or beneath the stars. Whatever you prefer."
She laughed gently.
"I think we're of a kind," Aladel continued.
"You have your charms," she admitted. "But you may well miss me. You can always seek me on the road."
"Which one?"
"Wherever the wind takes me."
He laughed. "You leave me a fair challenge!"
"Every courtship is a challenge, isn't it, Aladel?"
He laughed, then bowed to her and pressed her fingers to his lips. "I hope that we one day meet again, fair cousin."
With that, he walked from the keep and out into the night.
∗ ∗ ∗
She woke early herself to brush and saddle Calda, who'd led all of the horses back to Delgar without any incident
apart from something that had come out of the water after them. Despite the magic that allowed her to speak to the animal, the horse hadn't really remembered the details, only that the entire herd had gotten away.
Elyana expected there to be more goodbyes come the morning, so she wasn't surprised by the sound of footsteps in the dark stable, only by the person she saw when she looked up.
Daylah.
The young woman's hair was disheveled, though some attempt had been made to push it into place. Her eyes were red-rimmed.
The two stared at each other for a long moment, and then Daylah glided forward so that she stood in the lantern light. It burnished her locks with a hint of scarlet.
"Drelm said that you would be leaving," she said.
"Yes."
"He didn't think you'd ride out this morning."
"But you did?"
She smiled sadly. "Drelm sometimes believes what he hopes rather than what he expects."
Elyana hadn't realized the young woman was quite so perceptive.
"Do you know, I was just a little jealous of you at first," Daylah continued. "I knew there really was nothing between you two but friendship, but you still had something that he and I don't have."
"I don't know what you mean."
Daylah seemed reluctant to explain, but she cleared her throat. "Well, I have many friends. But how many of them would risk their life for me? It seems like there ought to be another word for that kind of friend. He trusts you in a different way than he trusts me."
"I am his sister. You are to be his wife. Of course it's different. But we're both family to him." As she finished, she saw Daylah's expression cloud.
"Family isn't always what it seems to be."
"Your father loved you," Elyana pointed out.
"I know. Among all that he did, I can hold onto that. But there's a lot I don't understand. Maybe I never will. Did he really believe all those things he was saying about living in harmony and working together? Were those the lies, and all that hatred for Drelm the real truth?"
Elyana hesitated, wanting to choose her answer with care. "Grief," she said at last, "can twist a person into strange shapes. I think your father wanted to believe what he said, even if he still carried hate."
Stalking the Beast Page 27
