by E. C. Jarvis
“And what of the occupants?” Orother asked.
“We found no one aboard alive.”
“No one alive?”
Orother turned back to the ship as he noticed four men struggling to offload a body from the ship. The men had awkwardly balanced the body atop the guard rail and tried to tie ropes around it in an attempt to lower it to the ground. Unfortunately they seemed to have not communicated who was in charge of holding onto the body while the ropes were collected.
Orother took a long, laboured breath as the large cadaver slid gracefully off the side and plopped down onto the ground with a heavy thud. Even at a distance, he could tell from the size of the corpse who it was.
“We found Hans,” the guard confirmed. He flinched visibly, expecting a harsh rebuke for the ineptitude of his men.
“Bring him to my lab,” Orother instructed.
“But, Sir, he’s dead. Very dead. I don’t think there’s any chance in reviving him.”
“I didn’t say I wanted to revive him did I, you moron? He is a prime specimen. He will be worth cutting open. I can get a great deal of research out of him, at the least.”
“Of course, my apologies.”
“There was no one else aboard? You searched the entire ship top to bottom?”
“Yes, Sir, there was no one there.”
“Damn. I was looking forward to getting hold of some new toys.”
Orother took a few steps towards the mansion when he caught sight of Serenia, and his disappointment faded away in an instant. More of his men returned from the ship, including the four who struggled to carry Hans’ large corpse.
“Take the body to the Doctor’s lab,” the senior guard instructed.
“Very good. And bring the woman down, too,” Orother barked.
“Woman? There was no one else on board, Sir.”
Orother didn’t answer but gave one final glance at Serenia. Her mouth dropped and she reached for her concealed weapons, but it was too late as the guards descended upon her.
“I am sorry, my dear, but you had to realize I don’t like to leave loose ends untied.”
Serenia kicked and fought the collection of men pinning her arms and legs, and she spat at Orother just as another man tied a gag around her mouth.
“You want her in the workshop to drill holes in her head?” the guard asked.
“No, I have no interest in her sordid little memories. Put her in the lab with the body. I haven’t performed a live dissection for a while. It’ll give me some entertainment while we wait for our guests to arrive.”
“Guests?”
“Yes, we’re expecting some form of attack. Double security. Put them on alert and summon the Cleric. Tell him to ready his devices.”
“Yes, Sir.”
Orother watched as the panicking woman was carried in, followed by Hans’ large body. He wondered which he was going to enjoy more.
. . .
Larissa leaned her temple against the cool brick wall of the clock shop and fiddled with the lace of her dress, having abandoned the priest's robe. She stared at the mansion further down the road. The pirate ship had long since disappeared behind the building to land, she presumed, in Orother’s back garden.
She let out a loud sigh as she tried not to think of Grubbs and the other man she’d left on board. They were either dead or locked away with the Professor, being subjected to whatever tortures Orother could concoct. It was her plan, her scheme that had failed at even the simplest hurdle, and now doubt riddled her mind.
It had seemed so simple at the outset, rescue the Professor and return to a normal life. Now, as she thought back to her old life, it seemed so distant and ill-suited to the person she had already become. She couldn’t decide if she was more terrified of actually succeeding in her plan or of dying in the attempt.
“Friar Narry says he’ll be ready soon,” Holt interrupted her train of thought.
“Oh.” Larissa sighed again “What did he say he was doing, again?”
“He’s making some form of spyglass.”
“To do what?”
“To detect illusions.”
“Magical illusions?” Larissa asked.
Holt raised an eyebrow. “I don’t think he would refer to them that way, but yes.”
“And you believe in all that, do you?”
“I’ve seen some interesting things over the years, things that can’t be explained in any other way. You’ve seen it yourself.” Holt poked her shoulder, jabbing at the knife wound that took only hours to heal.
“You said that was the Anthonium?” Larissa asked.
“Yes, I believe that is what has aided you, but it is not the only source of mysterious power in the world.”
“And why is he so sure we will encounter these illusions?”
“Because,” Friar Narry interrupted, joining them, “Orother has a certain person working for him, someone I have had the misfortune of encountering in my travels. A man well-versed in the illusory and mental arts.”
“Who?” Larissa and Holt asked in unison.
Narry produced a spyglass from beneath the sleeve of his robe. He lifted it to his eye and scanned the mansion, speaking as he looked.
“He doesn’t even have a name, as far as I know. I only ever heard my brothers and sisters refer to him as the Cleric.”
Narry lowered the glass and fiddled with the lens. Larissa noticed some form of cog-and-button section attached at the front. Each time Narry pressed a button, a filter clicked into place across the lens, and with each new filter applied he tested the spyglass again.
“Ah,” Narry exclaimed, “there it is, or isn’t, I should say.”
He passed the spyglass to Larissa and she looked through it towards the mansion. The filter cast the view with an odd tint of red. The mansion disappeared out of sight almost completely, leaving a pile of rubble in its place. Frowning, she lowered the spyglass, finding the mansion had popped back up on the landscape, in clear view.
“I...don’t understand,” she muttered.
“It’s an illusion,” Narry said, taking the spyglass from her.
“The entire house is an illusion? How?”
“There will be some form of device in place maintaining it.”
“Why would someone go to that much trouble?”
“The same reason any illusions exist, to obscure the truth. My brothers and sisters grew suspicious when the mansion was built. Orother got permission immediately, which meant he had connections in Government, as very few new homes gain approval in this town these days. The structure was built far too quickly, and so we suspected it to be an incredibly well-crafted vision.”
“And you haven’t confirmed it until now?”
“As I said, it’s not our place to pry. It’s against the rules, in fact. Now, I’m not an engineer myself, but if I had to guess I’d say the actual work was done belowground.”
“Wonderful.” Larissa’s heart sank, the idea of probing around a beautiful mansion house was far more appealing than the thought of slipping into some underground—no, under-mountain lair.
She looked to Holt to try and gauge his thoughts, but Holt was diligently watching the area around them, on sentry duty, his expression unreadable. If he was concerned about the magical illusion, the underground lair, the devices that could create illusions, or anything else that lay ahead, he did a good job of not showing it.
“Where are Cid and Goodson?” Larissa asked Holt, looking around the shop corner to the alleyway where they’d left the other two. They’d found them missing, but she sure she could smell an odd sort of burning.
“Working,” Narry answered.
Holt gave her a sideways nod, indicating a place further back behind the shop, and she followed the direction of his nod. Rounding the corner, she found Cid and Goodson huddled together over a small fire which burned with an unnaturally red flame. Each of them appeared to be holding a thin filter clutched between a pair of tweezers over the flame. Larissa opened her
mouth to speak but shut it again in silence as she realized they were both in deep concentration and she didn’t want to interrupt.
After a while both Cid and Goodson removed their filters from the flame. Cid passed his to Goodson and reached behind to pick up the goggles he’d set down. Larissa watched on in silence as the two men worked quickly and quietly to apply the filters to the lenses of Cid’s goggles, the odd material adhering to the glass as soon as it touched.
“You’re still intending to go in there alone?” Holt appeared at her shoulder, making her jump.
“I haven’t come up with a better plan yet, have you?”
“No. These are for you.”
Holt pointed to the goggles and Cid held them up to her. She studied Cid then Goodson. Their expressions were priceless; they looked proud of their work and both appeared to be awaiting some form of praise, though she wasn’t entirely sure what it was they had done.
“Thank you. Good work,” she said, trying to hide her ignorance.
She pulled the goggles over her head. The strap was far too large and they immediately slipped down around her neck. She spent a moment or two trying to adjust the strap before Holt unceremoniously grabbed hold of them, yanked them back into place over her eyes, and squeezed the strap into place at the back of her head. Next, he proceeded to pull and tug at her hair with rough, anxious hands.
“What are you doing?” Larissa half-yelled as he jerked her head sideways with a handful of her curls. Holt didn’t answer. Eventually he let go, and she reached up to rub her sore scalp, finding he had pulled her hair back into a bun.
“You tied my hair up?”
“If you need to run or fight, you will be better off without a face-full of hair. Besides, it will help to keep the goggles in place.”
Larissa turned to face him, peering through the oddly tinted goggles at his distorted face.
“If my plan works, I won’t need to fight or run.”
“Have any of your plans been so simple thus far?”
“No.”
“Orother is a maniac. If you somehow manage to sneak in and find him without being detected, he will overpower you. Especially if he has this Cleric in his employment. As far as you have come with your skills, you cannot defeat the entire operation single-handed.”
“I don’t need to though, do I? I’m the distraction. My task is the procurement of time.”
A clock in the shop beside them softly chimed the announcement of five o’clock and the assortment of other time-pieces followed with their mixed bells and peels. Imago rubbed his face across her ankle and let out a soft yowl. An odd chill worked its way down Larissa’s spine.
Friar Narry rejoined the group as he tucked the spyglass back into his robe sleeve. He stood for a moment, assessing Larissa, his grey beard shifting back and forth as he ground his teeth together in deep thought.
“It’s crude,” he began, “but it should suffice. It’s the best we can hope for at such short notice. You won’t reconsider waiting one more day?”
“No, Friar, I fear we’ve taken too long as it is.”
“Very well. You must not trust your own mind, child. The illusions could be anything, people, objects, doorways, animals. The intention is likely to cause intruders to react to the illusions and draw the guards’ attention. When you find one you must find the source, the device that operates it, and shut it off.”
“So, these illusions can’t hurt me?”
“As far as I’m aware there haven’t been any successful devices made that can create tangible illusions to cause actual harm. That level of skill can only be achieved by someone in person.”
“The Cleric?”
“He is a dangerous man. If you find him, you’d do well to run.”
“It seems I’m entering a yet another den of dangerous men.”
“A bad habit,” Cid huffed.
“I will follow,” Holt said.
“We will follow,” Cid corrected him.
Larissa rolled her eyes at the pair of them before she remembered they wouldn’t be able to see her eye rolling behind the goggles. Imago rubbed against her ankle once more and a cool breeze blew through the alleyway as the sun started to dip in the sky.
“It’s time to go,” Larissa said, and silently the men fell into step behind her.
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN
Larissa reached the end of the winding path at the bottom of the flight of steps leading toward the mansion. Friar Narry had directed her to take the Servant's Passage to avoid drawing too much attention to her approach. She had tucked a series of knives in amongst her bodice and skirt ruffles.
She moved the goggles up to her forehead and took a moment to glare up at the structure ahead. It looked like some form of castle from her childhood dreams. The structure was entirely grey, matching the mountain stone much like the other buildings in the town. It had a large balcony at the back and several floors of symmetrical windows. As she pulled the goggles back down over her eyes the main building disappeared, leaving behind a pile of rubble at the front and the balcony at the back with a basic box-like entrance.
She climbed the steps to the top and found the entire structure surrounded by a large wall, too high to scale without the aid of a rope. Luckily, the steps led to a passage, which headed toward a gate. Beyond the gate she could see the pirate ship landed neatly in the back gardens; the large balloon had started to deflate. The sound of voices inside the compound travelled towards her and she ducked behind an alcove in the stone to peek out.
Two men came into view. They ran across the neatly maintained grass, covered head to foot in black soot, leaving black footprints in their wake. As they approached the gate Larissa had to keep herself from screaming at them when she recognized the pair. They were the men she’d left on board, Grubbs and the other man whose name she couldn’t remember. Grubbs reached the gate and frantically hacked at the lock with a small axe while the other man watched their backs.
“Shit, there’s guards,” the second man yelped as Grubbs finally destroyed the lock, flinging the gate open. He ran toward the steps, and Larissa reached out to grab his arm as he sprinted past. Grubbs shrieked and attempted to swing the axe at her. The other man fumbled around at his trouser belt to try to grab at the pistol tucked into it.
“Grubbs, it’s me. Calm down.” She yanked on his arm and pulled him into the alcove.
“Cap’n?”
“Yes, Grubbs.” Larissa removed the goggles again and Grubbs calmed, though the other man still fiddled with his trousers as he looked up at the two of them.
“There’s guards coming, Cap’n Rissa. We gotta run,” he said, finally pulling the pistol free. She reached out and grabbed hold of him, attempting to squeeze him into the small alcove.
She stepped out onto the path and pulled a pair of knives free, setting her arms behind her back, elbows relaxed, eyes focused. The two guards came sprinting through the gateway and immediately stopped when they saw her, raising their weapons.
“Hello, boys.” Larissa smiled sweetly. “I was hoping I’d find some customers up here. Those other two lads were in too much of a hurry, though.”
“Just some fucking whore.” One man shoved past her and started down the stairs. The other grabbed her arm.
“Get out of here, Miss. This ain’t the place for doing business. You’ll get yourself killed.” He bent over and whispered in her ear, “Though I’d be happy to meet you after my shift is done.”
The man caught a glimpse of the two pirates hiding in the alcove for the briefest moment. Before he could react, Larissa slammed a knife into his neck and drew it across his throat. He clutched at the gaping wound, pouring blood onto the stony path as he collapsed. She turned and flung the other knife down the stairs, catching the second guard in the back of his neck. The guard fell forward, sliding down the last few steps, and landed at the bottom with a thud. His arms flailed around as he attempted to grab at the knife. A few moments later both men stilled.
Lar
issa looked between the two dead guards and the two men, her men, who in turn stared at her with wide eyes. She felt an unpleasant discomfort in the pit of her stomach at having committed such an efficient killing. Yet she knew it was not the time for question or doubt; she had to press on. She’d made the first move and couldn’t back out now, as sooner or later someone would come looking for the two guards.
“Nice job, Sir…um, Ma’am…um, Cap’n,” Grubbs muttered.
“I’m so glad to see you two. I thought they’d have killed you or captured you.”
“We saw ‘em coming, Cap’n, knew they’d find us. So we went and hid in the coal pile. Didn’t figure they’d dig too deep to look.”
“That’s brilliant,” she gasped.
“It is?” Grubbs beamed a grin, his crooked white teeth a stark contrast to his soot-covered face.
“Yes. It’s so good to have such clever men on my crew...you still want to be on my crew, don’t you, or are you planning on leaving?”
“Well, we weren’t exactly expecting to come across you like this, Cap’n, uhh…”
“It’s all right. If you want to leave I won’t stop you.”
“Really?”
“Of course,” she smiled.
“I’ll stay on with you, Miss.” The other man finally spoke, and Larissa felt like such a fool for not knowing his name.
“Well, now, I can’t let Zeb be the braver man than me,” Grubbs said. “I’ll stay with you too, Cap’n. You got some orders for us?”
“Zeb, Grubbs, I’m very grateful. Listen, we don’t have much time. Holt and the others will be coming this way soon. Let them know you’re alive and do what you can to get the ship ready to fly again. If we have any form of luck on our side we’ll do what we came here to do and escape with our lives. Think you can manage that?”
“Aye, Cap’n,” they answered together.
Larissa nodded to the men, reapplied the goggles, and headed through the gate. She quickly stalked her way around the outside wall and climbed the real steps up to the real balcony, virtually the only parts of the structure that actually existed. On either side of the balcony stood two large, orb-like stones, different in color and texture than the structure above. Without the goggles they looked like two sculptures, but with the goggles she could see some form of aura emanating from them, projecting towards the building. She bent down beside one orb and reached out, tempted to touch it. Something made her snap her hand away as she thought better of it.
