A small chatter of excitement rippled through the assembled guests, and Edda looked up to see what the commotion was about. Captain Gustav was standing at the base of the grand staircase while three figures were descending from the third floor balcony. As they got closer, Edda saw that it was an older man in noble finery flanked by two servants, each holding what looked like a large, ornate staff. Each staff had a large, familiar looking turquoise crystal at its head. Edda felt goosebumps down her arms and back as air around them began to chill as the three people descended.
“Piking hells,” Edda whispered. “The same crystals from the warehouse.”
“We are leaving once I’m ready, Nert or not,” Egveny said. “Those things will make it rather hard for me to do my job if I stay here much longer.” Edda nodded silently.
“So that is the man trying to poison us?” a woman asked, her voice deep and her accent thick.
Edda almost jumped out of her shoes. Turning she saw that the two Forn had moved to join them. They both looked furious, and Edda could see the man’s impressive neck muscles bulging as he contained his anger.
“How did you know?” Edda whispered.
“Only rank amateurs try and poison Forn,” the woman said. Even through the thick accent, Edda could detect the venom. The green woman’s eyes were locked on the central figure descending the stairs. “We were waiting for this Lord Titus to show himself. He has made a mistake today. No one trifles with us.”
Captain Gustav clapped his gauntleted hands once, a tremendous sound silencing the assembled crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen! Friends of Bellkeep, and honored guests. May I present Lord Felix Titus, Custodian of the Purse!”
The guests politely clapped as Titus, the central figure Edda guessed, came into view. He was a non-descript man, his short black hair framed on either side with silver shocks. Titus wore the same benignly paternal face that patient fathers and forgiving priests seemed to always have. Nothing about him seemed to jump out at her. The two figures on either side of him, however…
“Pike me sideways,” she spat, fear clutching her heart. “Those two holding the staffs, it’s-”
“Gods save us, it’s Sailey and Carpey,” Egveny whispered.
The two former Consortium mercenaries held the crystal-laden staffs in front of them with the bearing of trained soldiers. Their eyes seemed dull and unfocused, never looking around the room or down at the stairs before them. Yet they marched in unison, always at Titus’ side. They halted on the final step as Titus reached the floor. The temperature had begun dropping so quickly that Edda saw the guests begin to huddle within their own clothes. She also noted that the cold seemed to have no impact on the two Forn, who were almost scandalously under dressed.
Edda felt Captain Gustav’s eyes on her and she watched as he looked up at Sailey and Carpey and back to her, a fiendish grin on his face. Despite her fear, Edda felt white-hot rage build in her. Having been a puppet once before, she held nothing but pure hatred for those who would hold the strings of others. Her knives begged to spend some time in Gustav’s skull.
Felix Titus, ending his descent, shook hands with Captain Gustav, and Edda caught the knowing look they shared. Titus turned towards the small crowd and smiled.
“Ah, my friends. I am glad so many of you and your organizations took my offer and invitation seriously.” His opening words were delivered...poorly Edda thought. His voice was weak and didn’t carry well in the room. “Now, uh each of you represent something, something that has what Bellkeep needs if it is to rise back to prominence. Now, I uh, hope you have enjoyed the refreshment provided, as all of you will now need strength, of a kind, in the coming days.” Titus paused to accept a drink from a servant.
“If he says ‘now’ one more time I may strike him down,” the male Forn said through grit teeth.
“Easy Krif,” the Forn woman said, placing a friendly hand on the man’s arm. “He deserves death simply for the color scheme of this place.” Maybe Edda was wrong about those two.
Titus finished his drink and set it down on the stairs behind him. “Now, as individuals, we are all strong, but ultimately our reach and grasp are limited. Even city-states cannot stand alone. I know, er, I know that in my initial offer to your respective organizations, I had originally proposed a series of lengthy negotiations with each of you to ensure the new partnerships we forge here will be fair and equitable.” Titus fell silent as a large contingent of City Watch silently entered the room from a number of the blocked off doors. Three groups of five Watchmen stood around the guests, each armed with cudgels and short swords. A massive, misshapen figure stood behind each group of Watchmen. Their features were concealed under a hood, and they wore naked iron pauldrons on their shoulders and what looked like manacles on their wrists, A crude Bellkeep insignia was painted slapdash on their cloaks.
“Unfortunately,” Titus continued, gesturing to the newly arrived men, “due to a number of factors outside my, er, our control, I’m afraid the negotiations will all have to take place tonight. If you would all be so kind as to submit any arms you may be carrying to my men, we can begin.”
An outburst of angry mutterings and curses from the guests answered Titus’s declaration. Edda was shocked by how poor a speaker Titus was. She had been under the impression that he would be some charismatic politician, someone able to use charm and guile to make this grand conspiracy possible. Instead, he was a bookkeeper, a ledgerman. Edda’s eyes rested on Gustav, and it all fell into place.
“It’s Gustav,” she whispered as Titus, Gustav, and party guests exchanged words. The two Forn and Egveny looked at her. “He’s the one behind all of this,” she said. “Somehow Titus is Gustav’s front man. He’s only here to hand out the coin and interact with the nobility while Gustav is the one on the ground doing all of the work.”
“Makes a small amount of sense,” Egveny said. “No way to actually prove it though.”
“From what we’ve both seen Egg, do you really think these two deserve a trial?”
“Actually, I’m more concerned with simply leaving.”
“Oh really?” Edda asked. “If we stop Gustav now, we may save the whole city. What happened to the guy who said he’d take Gustav out if things went badly?”
“I don’t think you realize just how bad it just got,” Egveny said. “Two of those crystals will leech us all of our life force if we stay here much longer.”
“Our immediate danger, I think, is freezing to death,” Edda mumbled, eyeing the armed Watchmen and their large, disjointed officers behind them.
“That isn’t cold you feel, remember? It's the effects of those crystals. Short term exposure shouldn’t...er, won’t do any lasting harm. But two together do a nasty job of scrambling the Ether vectors here.”
“The hells does that mean?” Edda asked.
“Simply put, the longer I’m here, the less effectively I can Weave. With that in mind, look over there.”
Egveny gestured with his head slightly. Following the direction, Edda saw Nerthus slowly easing her way through the same kitchen door she had disappeared into earlier. She was still separated from them by almost a dozen silent guards and hooded figures, not counting the guests themselves who were outraged at the arrival of armed guards. Nert had something large crammed in her armpit, but Edda couldn’t make it out.
“Get us the hells out of here Egg,” Edda said. “All of us,” she added, looking at the two Forn.
“With pleasure,” the Weaver said, and he made one final adjustment to his watch and put it back into his pocket. There was a flicker of light from his pocket, visible for only a second, but the results were immediate.
“Him! That’s the Weaver!” Gustav bellowed from across the room. His sword was drawn and he gestured it furiously at Egveny. “Stop him!”
The nearest group of Watchmen drew their cudgels and advanced on them. Edda pulled two long, thin daggers from under her dress, her grip loose and relaxed despite the danger. Now that the trap was sprun
g, she found that she was much more at ease. If all they threw at her was a dozen or so men, that was something she could handle. The Watchmen were wearing mail shirts and helmets, but already she could see exposed places on their bodies where armor was weak or nonexistent. Where the shoulder met the neck. The eye slits in their helmets. Their legs.
Edda was already giving herself a decent chance at getting out of there when the large, hooded officer behind the advancing Watchmen raised its arms. Yellow crackles of light played between its fingers, and Egveny cried out.
“Oh gods, it’s a mage!” he said, drawing a strange symbol in front of them. The room seemed to shimmer and shift around Egveny, Edda, and the two Forn as if they were standing underneath the surface of a pond looking up. Even the sounds of screaming guests and Gustav bellowing were muffled. Edda looked around the room, but she couldn’t see where Nerthus had gone.
The corrupted mage extended its hands, and a yellow crackle of Power burst from its fingertips at them, but Egveny’s barrier withstood the attack. The yellow energy was both absorbed and redirected by the blue light, scattering away harmlessly. The five Watchmen were similarly halted, as if confronted by a wall. They responded by smashing their cudgels into the barrier with dull-sounding thuds. The barrier seemed to ripple slightly underneath each attack, reinforcing Edda’s image of a wall of water. Another flash of yellow, this time to their right, caught her attention. Then a third crackle of yellow Power washed over the barrier. The other corrupted mages had joined in. Thin cracks of yellow began to appear in the blue, but now the cracks didn’t disappear. Edda could tell the barrier wouldn’t last long under all of this.
“Egg!” Edda shouted. “Please tell me your plan is more than this!”
“If you’d be so kind as to shut up for a second,” Egveny said through grit teeth, “you’ll see that-ah, here we are.”
A tremendous crash shook the entire room, loud even under Egveny’s spell, Three heavily armored men had crashed through the large windows of Titus’ manor and had engaged the Watchmen. The men wore bronze-colored armor from head to toe, and fought with large pikes. Edda watched through the barrier as the three bronze knights decimated the nearest group of Watchmen, impaling and slamming Gustav’s men to the ground with reckless abandon. One of the mages turned its attention away from Egveny’s barrier and onto the new arrivals. A blast of yellow Power sent one of the bronze knights flying backwards against the wall. The knight hit the ground in a heap, but it charged forwards, not missing a beat. He thrust his pike into the mage, raised it up over his head, and slammed it down on the ground behind him. The other two knights leaped upon the fallen mage and shredded it in a flurry of strikes.
“Get ready to run,” Egveny said as a second Weaver broke off its assault on Egveny’s barrier to focus on the knights. Edda turned and saw Egveny mumbling something, his eyes closed as he struggled to keep the barrier up. His eyes opened abruptly and a wordless shout escaped his lips. The blue barrier that surrounded them exploded outwards, sending both party guests and the Watchmen hammering away on it flying through the air. Two of the Watchmen collided with their mage officer, staggering him. Egveny extended one of his hands, and a splash of blue light, resembling a jet of water, caught the mage square in the chest, dropping the mage to the ground. As it crumpled, its hood fell back revealing a face pockmarked with lesions and clumps of diseased flesh.
The third mage now found itself under siege by the two of the bronze knights. It had erected a shield of its own, constructed of that same sickly yellow light, and held it in front of itself with one hand as the knights hammered away at it. With its other free hand, the Weaver was conjuring smaller spikes of yellow light and hurling them at the knights. So focused was its attention on the knights in front of it that it paid the crystal vial of acid Edda hurled at it no mind. The thin vial shattered on the monster’s shoulder, hissing as it seeped into the corrupted flesh. Surprisingly, the creature actually cried out in a vaguely female voice as the acid consumed it. The yellow shield flickered and vanished as the Weaver lost its concentration. The two knights made short work of it after that.
The third bronze knight appeared before them, his armor dripping with black ichor and blood too dark and thick to be human. To Edda’s surprise she saw that it wasn’t a knight at all, but a clockwork golem. It had a skeleton-like frame of metal, over which armor plates had been somehow bolted on. The fingers on either of its hands were thin, segmented bits of gleaming metal, and its face was an unmoving mask of bronze, cast in the visage of a handsome man. As it moved, Edda could just barely make out the whirring and clicking of its internal mechanisms keeping it up and running over the din.
“Mister Bok, a pleasure to safeguard you,” the golem said, its voice a combination of human tones and metal reverberations.
“Yes, indeed it is,” Egveny said, panic in his voice. “Could you dispense with the pleasantries and clear us a path out of here?”
“Complying,” the golem said simply before turning and diving back into the fray of Watchmen.
Gustav bellowed again and more doors around the foyer burst open. To Edda’s horror she saw not the silent Bellkeep Watch issuing forth, but more of the silent abominations. No longer were they covered in robes and rags, however. Edda gaped as she saw mounds of knotted muscle, lolling tongues, overlarge eyes, and tattered, diseased flesh amongst the former Bellkeep citizenry. Each monster was unique in its horror, with countless variations of deformity sewn into the very fabric of their being. Two of the abominations were almost upon them when the Forn woman took one step forwards and spewed liquid fire from her mouth. The two abominations staggered backward, never uttering a sound as they fell to the ground writhing in orange flame.
“Incredible,” Egveny said breathlessly, extending a hand to the Forn woman. “We would be honored if you’d join us in our thrilling escape,” The woman smiled and curtsied briefly before walking past him towards the exit, her large companion following with a grin on his face.
Edda looked around at the carnage happening. The abominations were pouncing on the defenseless guests, but not killing them. Any of the guests unfortunate enough to be seized were dragged back into one of the doors from which the abominations came. Another of the monstrous mages had appeared, taking up a place at Gustav’s side at the base of the staircase. It was emitting a noxious-looking green fog into the crowd. Guests who were enveloped by the fog found themselves doubled over and vomiting. Easy prey for the monsters in the room.
Gustav shot a withering glare at her, and pointed at them. The corrupted mage next to him nodded and began to make its way towards them. That wasn’t good, Edda knew. She took off her hat and flipped it upside down. She reached into one of her small pouches and pulled out another tiny vial, dropping it into the hat. She held it for an instant to adjust her grip, then hurled it at the mage. The hat, with its small brim lined with metal, flew straight and true through the air. It got within a yard of the monstrous creature when an arc of dark jade energy lanced out from the monster at the spinning hat. The hat exploded, sending a volley of acid splashing in all directions. The acid that splashed upon the monster’s face went to work immediately, halting its approach as it began to deteriorate. It let out a loud, pained gurgling sound, its two hands desperately scratching and tearing at itself.
The sound and sight of the burning monster almost halted the entire room. With satisfaction, Edda saw Gustav’s face contorted in rage as he watched one of his prized monsters burn. Edda turned and saw the two Forn looking at her. They nodded approvingly and continued on their way after the golems.
“The hells was that?” Egveny asked as they ran.
“My killer fashion sense, of course,” Edda replied.
Egveny simply groaned in response, which despite their situation, brought a much-needed grin to Edda’s face. If only Nert had been there to have heard that.
The three bronze golems were fighting their way through the stream of abominations and remaining City Wat
ch, thrusting and slamming their pikes into anything that approached as they cleared a path towards the entry door. As Egveny and Edda ran after the two Forn they had picked up, Edda gave the room one final sweep. Nerthus was nowhere to be seen. But Edda had seen her, so she knew her friend had at least made it back to the foyer before the wheels fell off the proverbial wagon.
They followed after the golems out into the night air, and a number of the other guests who hadn’t yet succumbed to either the monsters or the green gas had found their wits and and hurried after Edda and the others. But not all of them were able to escape. Gustav’s abominations were roaming around the entire area, and a handful were giving chase from inside Titus’ mansion. One particularly large monster leaped upon two fleeing guests, its grinning mouth displaying three rows of serrated teeth. Its dull, vacant eyes looked up at Edda in time to see one of her daggers plunge into its face, just beneath its right eye. A quick slice with her other dagger and she opened the throat up of the monster. It released its grip on the two pinned people to grasp at its own throat, silent shock on its face.
Edda pulled the two people to their feet and saw that they were the two Fabricators who had given them harsh glances before the party.
“Thank you,” the one on the right said, as picked up his own slender sword that had been knocked free. Edda caught the slur in the man’s voice. Gustav’s sedative worked quickly. “These things are-”
“Not now,” Edda snapped. “We’ll talk when we aren’t surrounded by piking monsters.” Her eyes widened as she saw two more deformed monsters charging them from over the Fabricator’s shoulders. “Come on, damn you, run!” she yelled as she turned back towards Egveny and the others.
One of the golems dropped back past Edda to act as a rear guard and fended off the monsters. Edda didn’t think the abominations could do much to harm the golems, but she saw at least one serious rend on the golem’s armor plating as it charged past her.
Edda made it to their wagon, the other two golems standing guard around it. She pushed the two Fabricators in and saw it crammed with a handful of other guests that could be gathered, their finery in tatters and makeup running. She climbed up next to Egveny and sat down in a huff.
Chasing Down Glory: The Outrider Legion: Book Two Page 34
