The Clan

by D. Rus

  Yeah, right. Keep on dreaming.

  Congratulations! You've learned a skill: Broody Hen.

  Now you'll be able to instantaneously hatch any egg of your choice, bringing a new creature into this world.

  Oh, no. I had to make sure no one found out about this new ability. I didn't look forward to being nicknamed the Broody Elf for the rest of eternity. My sarcastic friends would be constantly pestering me to hatch eggs for them! Wish I had had this ability in real life. At least then I could get a job at some poultry farm and start raking it in!

  Quest completion alert: Grief of a Dragon II. Quest completed!

  Reward: a new skill Dragon Whisperer.

  Once every twenty-four hours, you will have the ability to divine all hidden gold within a thousand paces, boosting your treasure hunting instincts.

  I shrugged. This particular ability definitely didn't look promising. Did they think AlterWorld was stuffed with unclaimed gold? Windows kept popping up, obstructing my view; I swept them away and stared at the egg. What are you like, then, a baby Phantom Dragon?

  The shell cracked into perfect petals, opening up. A curious head poked out, shattering the air with a deafening screech that defied the sound barrier. The little chick didn't hold her emotions back. A powerful surge of joy and happiness flooded the place forcing your lips to smile as your heart missed a beat in anticipation of something inevitably wonderful. The baby dragon's tiny armor scales gleamed as she tried to change her colors, chameleon-like, or make herself invisible altogether. Her little fanged face glowed with all the colors of the rainbow which occasionally resonated, making the chick disappear for a few brief moments like a faulty hologram.

  She looked around, casting a facetious glance my way baring a threatening upper lip. Then she whistled again, only this time emitting an alarm call filled with uneasiness and loneliness, with her desire to cuddle up to a strong bone chest, trusting it to protect her and conceal her in the swirling darkness. Mom, Mommy, where are you?

  Unwillingly I recoiled, covering my ears. This little 'un had to stop it pretty soon. She had no idea of her own ability to jack-hammer other people's heads!

  Still, her alarmed squeaks rose to a crescendo of hopeless desperation, finally growing into an eye-watering physical agony, pushing me further and further away. Leaning forward as if against a gust of wind, I tried to stay put without letting it force me off the platform. In the clatter of the stones falling behind my back, I heard the Orc scream as he toppled off the tower. His voice gave me the extra motivation I needed. Why wasn't my appeal for divine help working? Was it because this wasn't a conscious mental attack but a simple amplification of emotion? Jesus.

  I should probably let her brother out, too. Together they might cheer up a bit.

  Pressing my back against a dangerously loose rampart, I selected the second egg and set the chick free.

  Weeeeoo! The second shriek, alarmed and inquiring, joined the song of bitter desperation. A brief pause, a rapid exchange of mental images—then a double surge of anxiety and fear hit my momentarily eased nerves. I collapsed to my knees, groaning with the mental pressure and sniveling with my suddenly bleeding nose.

  I barely registered the sound of bare feet slapping quickly against the stone when a disheveled Lena rushed onto the wretched platform. Her slim frame was barely covered by a thigh-long T-shirt, her feet bloodied by her mad sprint across the shards of stone that covered all of the castle's floors. At least she wasn't followed by an equally half-dressed Cryl, saving me from any indecent ideas.

  She looked me over, her eyes tearful with sympathy. "Hold on, Max," she gasped, rushing toward the chicks. She struggled to reach and hug both their spiky heads, paying no heed to the blood that started oozing from at least a dozen cuts on her arms and hands, and whispered something very soothing, kissing and stroking the sobbing baby dragons.

  The pressure started to subside. The pain and anxiety were still there but at least they didn't make you feel like wanting to jump to your death in a stupid attempt to escape it.

  I wiped my still bleeding nose with my sleeve and dried my tears, then struggled to my feet to take a look at the chicks. They were sniveling and complaining, crystal liquid forming in the corners of their eyes. A heavy viscous droplet rolled down a scaly cheek, hardening as it fell.

  Ding dong, the vitrified tear rang against the flagstones and rolled toward my feet.

  Forcing my cramped muscles to move, I picked up the still-warm crystal.

  A True Tear of a Phantom Dragon.

  Item class: epic

  Effect: +75 to a characteristic of your choice

  Holy shit. I'd never heard of anything like it. I didn't even dare to venture a guess at its price. I buried myself in the Wiki pages, scanning the search results, my fingers squeezing the crystal even stronger. Fifty to a hundred grand! The price for a unique object like this floated across a large scale, limited only by the buyer's financial muscle. Not everyone was able to pay the price of a good car for a couple of virtual marbles, but the item's cataclysmic rareness and its properties outweighed any expenses in the eyes of those who understood those things. An item like that could allow you to improve any piece of top gear or create a unique customized set of jewelry tailored to one's particular needs. So for the perma players like myself the stone was priceless.

  If you think about it, how many billions, in real life, would a football team owner pay for a tiny diamond which, when pinned to one of his players' shirt, would add 75 points to his strength? How much would an aging millionaire be prepared to offer for +75 to his dwindling life? Or a scientist for an equal bonus to his intellect?

  Ding dong, another crystal rolled across the floor, disrupting my fantasies. The baby dragons kept sobbing and weeping, generating a steady flow of artifacts...

  How's that for a money mill?

  Oh-ow, an especially heart-wrenching bout of despair doubled me up. A tear mill, more likely. How much for a child's tear? And for a baby dragon's? What would I be like, trading in infants' misery?

  "Max!" Lena called anxiously. "Where's their mom?"

  I gulped. Spitting out more blood from my bitten tongue, I croaked, "Dunno. In a zoo... hopefully."

  "You've got to find her! The babies won't last more than a day without her! I can't prevent them from panicking for long!"

  New Quest alert! The &#ç$ Priestess' Request!

  You have 24 hours to find the Phantom Dragons' mother and set her free.

  Reward: ?&@$*é№

  'xcuse me? Was it that Lena had just sent me on a quest? "How did you do that?"

  "What're you saying? Hurry up!" she tilted her head, annoyed. She bit her lip, blood from her scratched arms streaking the chicks' scales red.

  "I got a quest from you! To find the chicks' mother!"

  "Then go and find her!"

  "I am going! Only how are you going to-"

  "Master!" Lurch's worried voice broke into my mind. "The goblins are all running off! The guards have been forced out past the outer walls, and I.. I can't stop crying for some reason... even the starlings have abandoned their nest! They're gone."

  Here's another one looking for a shoulder to cry on. What was it with me that they all turned to me for help? Can't someone help me for a change, at least to get up and clean my face from all the blood and tears?

  "Wait a bit, Lurch," I managed. "Everybody's screwed up at the moment. We've got some new chicks hatched here and their mom is gone. So they're crying us a river. Wait a little, I'll think of something."

  Ding dong. What kind of sadist was he who'd come up with that wretched sequence, grief—tears—money? Couldn't they have thought of Crystals of Laughter or something? Disgusted with myself, I picked up the precious tears from the flagstones making myself the solemn promise that I'd do everything it took to set the Dragon Mom free and wouldn't linger for a second to acquire an extra crystal.

  "Hold on, Lena. I'll be back as soon as I can."

  I scrambled b
ack to my feet, activated the portal and teleported to the Temple. Here the pressure wasn't as heavy but I still found it hard to concentrate, especially considering Lurch's quiet whimpering that had added to the Dragons' duo.

  I had to do something about it. This was a real psychological weapon from some governmental agency's arsenal. Like when the secret services hide a tiny transmitter the size of a dime behind your wallpaper. And there it would sit resonating, driving their unwitting customer to such mind-wrenching depression it would only take him a couple of days to step off the balcony. Or swallow a handful of sleeping pills before laying his head back on the pillow with an angelic smile on his face, anticipating a quick end to his misery.

  And here I had a couple of grief generators cuddling up right next to me. I personally could scram for a day or two, but Lurch couldn't, and I didn't really need a nutter AI around me. But above all, we had to help the chicks. They were tearing my heart out.

  Wincing from the pressure of unwanted emotions, I activated the portal to the Vets. A quick ID check, mutual nods of greeting, a few hundred feet of narrow stairways and corridors, then I collapsed into a chair. It had been a hard day, considering it had only just started, so it was time I made myself some soothing herbal tea. By nighttime, I would sure need some.

  Now. Task #1: locate the dragon. A few keyword searches promptly offered the information I needed. Not a minute too soon, though. The administration of the City of Light announced that this very midday, the servants of the God of Light would use the purifying power of sunrays to exterminate the vile spawn of the Dark: the Bone Dragon. Actually, as some independent reporters sneered, the decision had been taken in view of the dragon's explicit unwillingness to live, so that she was about to kick the bucket on her own accord depriving the zoo owners of a stable cash flow. That's why they decided to squeeze the last drops of gold out of the collapsing story: an exemplary execution, entrance fee ten gold. Truly medieval. In another hundred years, they might start burning witches at the stake.

  I had about four hours left. Theoretically. The cooldown from yesterday's High Spell would only expire one hour before midday. And I still hadn't got hold of the Reset Potion. Twice had it showed up at the auction and each time the bids exceeded my auto buy's reserve. And in any case, I still had to break into the dome shield as they wouldn't be able to restrain the Bone Dragon with ordinary chains and bars. They did say in the news that she was very weak, the question was how weak exactly. Anyway, we'd have to solve that problem when we came to it. I just hoped she was strong enough to pull her backside off the ground and stay in the air for a few miles.

  Task #2: a support group. No one was going to let me deactivate the dome and steal an important dragon in full view from the city square. I didn't want to ask the Vets for help: they would take too much time to get their act together. Besides, I wasn't really prepared to shoulder another moral debt—that's not even talking about the money which I'd have to pay them anyway. It often happens in life that you end up paying more for a friend's service than what professional mercenaries would have charged you. So mercenaries it was, then. I had a few contacts and faces to turn to. I scrolled through my already-long contact list for Zena's name and PM'd her asking for an urgent appointment.

  She replied instantly,

  Our secretive Max, finally! It's taken you awhile! What caused you to remember the ladies you dumped in the Dead Lands? Okay, RV: Original City, The Pickled Penguin ice cream parlor. If it's something serious, you'd better make it quick. Ladies don't need much: we'll be as high as a kite after a couple of banana splits.

  Scratching my head, I searched for the map I'd bought ages ago and found the café in question, then rushed down the stairway looking for the hiccupping Porthos or whoever it was on duty in the Portal Hall.

  The next minute I was rubbing my bruised feet after landing on the square's flagstones: the portal had hauled me too high up. It had never happened before: either the wizard had hiccupped while casting the spell or, God forbid, my magic had begun to play up. Which wasn't a good thing considering this square was about to witness a highly publicized event. Moreover, I hoped that the viewers would get a lot more show for their bucks. How interesting could it be, really, watching twenty servants of Light disembody an apathetic dragon which would then crumble to the ground in a heap of bones? But an attack of the Dark Ones and the following mass slaughter, that would be a totally different scenario.

  The place promised to be pretty crowded. Market stalls lined the square already busy with vendors laying out their wares. The city carpenters drove the last nails into the long rows of benches that semi-circled the improvised arena. I estimated the average backside's size, multiplied it by the number of benches by twenty rows and shook my head, disheartened. The organizers were looking at about three thousand spectators. Way too many.

  Checking my internal compass, I trotted toward the mysterious café. I located the girls at once: you had to be blind not to notice the massive Troll hugging a bowlful of colored ice-cream scoops the size of a washtub.

  "Hello, ladies!"

  Zena's purple tongue demonstratively licked her spoon. She gave me a wink. "Hello you too, castle conqueror and dead dragon slayer! What brings you here? What on earth would make you remember our green-faced bunch?"

  The Troll gave their leader an offended look. "Gray-faced, too!" she boomed grudgingly.

  I waved my hands at them trying to extinguish the first spark of the conflict. "Don't listen to them, baby! They're just jealous. I thought more of you than I did of them put together."

  "Did you really?" Bomba the Troll stared at me with suspicion.

  Not wishing to aggravate my karma with petty lies, I gave her a reconciling smile. "I've got a really nice troll living in my castle, you know. He's strong and agile as a cat, and—he's quite an intellectual. True, he's an NPC but does it really matter? Fancy meeting him?"

  Bomba peered into my eyes trying to work out whether I was poking fun at her. Her face blackened. She lowered her eyes. "Mind if I do? There aren't many of our kind around, actually, and those that are..." her voice trailed away. She made a helpless gesture.

  Actually, I hadn't exactly meant it. I had been poking fun, to a degree. But nothing prevented me from introducing Snowie to her. Wasn't I myself drooling over Ruata the Drow Princess? If so, why couldn't Bomba meet a single responsible Troll seeking same? You never know how the years spent in the skin of a different race could affect your mentality. I could clearly see these girls had been here for quite a while. I'd have loved to hear their story one day. Their strange racial choice for perma mode made me prickle with curiosity.

  An approaching waiter disrupted my musings. To his "What are you having?" Zena turned to me.

  "What you mean to discuss, is it serious?"

  "A contract," I nodded.

  She cringed, her face resembling a pickled lemon, then instructed the waiter, "Two Isabellas for me and a bubbly."

  "Eight brandies," Bomba mumbled, looking upset. "Make sure they're all different!"

  The waiter marked down three more orders in the same vein, then stared at me, expectant. What kind of ice-cream parlor was that? I ventured a guess,

  "A few beers, please. One light, one dark and one Elven."

  Nonplussed, the waiter jotted it down and left.

  Sensing the quizzical silence, I leaned forward and lowered my voice. "Now, girls. I need a group of Dark mercs for a five-minute gig at the main square. Today. In two hours."

  They exchanged glances. "How many are there?"

  I gave it some thought. "At least three hundred. They are going to have a big event there today. At least three thousand attendees are expected. Plus staff, guards and some rapid-response people. We need to distract all that menagerie to allow me about three minutes of absolute immunity so that no arrow or stray bolt of lightning disrupts my concentration. Which means that I will need a group or two to cast a Minor Power Dome. The rest will have to create a security ring to k
eep all the potential assailants at bay," I stopped as Zena shook her head. "What?"

  Her tiny reassuring hand lay over mine. "Max. What you're offering is not some boss raid or a clan scuffle. We here call it 'interference in the sphere of interests of a large faction'. Your contract would bring our Guild into conflict with the City of Light and the King's administration, the Light priests and God knows who else: the guards, the King's officers, and other clans who just happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time..."

  "Doesn't the merc contract say it doesn't affect your relationship with factions?" I said.

  She nodded. "Not officially, no. But in reality, there will be some bad blood left. With time, it might backfire really badly. Imagine if it was your raid we slaughtered while you were busy dishing out the loot? Nothing personal, just business as usual. Imagine for a second that they also know the name of their employer—let's call him Clan X. Imagine that? So you think you wouldn't change your opinion of those mercs? Cross your heart? Ah, you see. So what we need is the Guild Coordinator to sanction it. I can pull a few strings to make sure he sees you as soon as possible. Would you like that?"

  Why was life so complicated? I had no choice, though. I nodded.

  She seemed to have expected it. Her eyes glazed over, her fingers trembling as she hit the virtual keyboard wording the message to the mysterious Guild Coordinator.

  The waiter arrived and began filling the table in front of each of us with a plethora of bowls containing colored scoops of ice-cream. We sat surrounded by whiffs of the aroma best described as an alcohol-delivery truck accident. Finally, he reached me. Placing a crystal thin-stalked bowl onto a lacy napkin, he commented,

  "Your order: a scoop of light, another of dark and," he swallowed enviously, "a scoop of Elven ale, 5142 brew. Enjoy your food."

  "Cheers," Zena raised a spoonful of burgundy Isabella.

  Chapter Twenty

  Moscow. Max's apartment. Current time.