by Hugo Huesca
Ed unclenched his jaw and watched as the Boatman turned transparent and slowly disappeared until only his smile was left—and then even that vanished.
The Dungeon Lord was left alone in his dream, and he could feel the waking world coming to claim him. His heart raced in his chest. He stared at the gray sky.
For a second there, he’d seen the real Kharon, not the quirky persona the Boatman liked to put on.
“Good to know I get on his nerves too,” Ed told himself.
12
Chapter Twelve
Power Gaming
Ed knew he was awake because his body ached all over, his head spun, and the air smelled of wet batblin. A fuzzy shape obstructed his vision. He groaned.
“He’s awake!” a voice exclaimed. “Quick, give him some space.”
A shame. Without Kharon, the lucid dream had been almost nice. Peaceful, even. He wondered if he still had time to go back if only for a few minutes.
Don’t you dare, he told himself. You’ve too much work to waste time on sleep. The Inquisition wouldn’t vanquish itself, after all. He groaned again and blinked until his blurry vision steadied. Klek’s big puppy eyes stared at him.
“I knew you’d wake up,” the batblin told him, moving back so that Ed could sit.
Ed grinned at him. “I’m becoming superb at getting hit. Shame there isn’t a skill for it.” Klek’s unwavering faith in him always cheered him up.
He was back in his room, naked from the waist up, his legs covered by the bedsheets. Someone had spread a nasty green unguent on his chest. Around him, the silver magical circles glinted softly.
“Actually, there is,” Andreena told him. The Herbalist stood next to the bed. She had covered Ed’s nightstand with a tray full of assorted herbs, a steaming teacup, and a mortar filled with more green unguent. “It’s called first aid, and if you keep waking me in the middle of the night to use it, I’ll have it maxed in a couple more years.”
“Well, I’m always glad to help a master of the arts.”
She pushed the cup onto Ed’s hands. “Drink this, just in case you’ve got a concussion.” It smelled of peppermint, but was bitter and grassy. Ed wished that Andreena would, at least once, add a spoonful of honey to her creations.
As he drank, Lavy, Alder, and Kes entered the room. They had been waiting nearby, judging from the time it took them to arrive. They had changed out of their armor into their usual attire, and other than Alder’s shoulder sporting a bandage, they seemed unhurt.
“So, we won,” Ed told them with a small smile. It seemed like a safe assumption to make.
“I knew it was a mistake to let you go,” Kes told him grimly. “Dealing with Gallio on your own was an unnecessary risk, Ed. We almost lost you.”
Alder coughed. “He wasn’t alone. I was there, and so were the Monster Hunters.” He nodded to Ed. “After you went down, the kaftar carried you back to the caravan. I provided them with Bardic support as we ran, of course.”
“What the hell happened back there?” Lavy asked. “Alder told us Gallio’s sunwave missed, but then you screamed and went unconscious anyway. Were you hit by some other spell?”
Ed explained his dream and Kharon’s visit between sips of tea. Kes paced around the room, a frown deepening in her face as she heard the bad news about Ed’s massive weakness to Light magic. Klek sat by the door, a spear in his hand, as if he feared that the Inquisition might come knocking to finish the job.
“Kharon’s visits always get us in trouble,” Lavy said when Ed was finished with his tale. “And now he wants to be your patron? What an asshole.”
Alder glanced nervously at the shadowy corners of the ceiling. The Witch rolled her eyes at him, then went on, “Ed, I know a bit about Dark patrons. Warlocks like Chasan take their powers from them, and that’s how they can cast more than just a few spells per day. Don’t let the name fool you—it is just another form of servitude. If you were to accept Kharon’s offer, he’d be able to order you around. Give you quests, demand sacrifices and loot, and whatever magic he gave you in exchange he could take away at any moment.” She puffed her chest. “Witches and Wizards may have fewer spells per day, but at least the magic comes from us. As a fellow spellcaster, tell me you won’t accept that offer!”
“Don’t worry,” Ed assured her. “I’d rather get sunwaved again rather than work with him. But that doesn’t mean I’ll refuse the patron idea entirely. Just to hedge my bets,” he assured her, seeing her face redden. “Perhaps a small alliance of convenience, like the one we have with Oynnes. There has to be some Dark demigod or spirit or something that is not an asshole. We two are living proof that not all the Dark-aligned are like Kharon.”
Lavy pursed her lips, but let the matter drop, which suited Ed just fine, because he still didn’t know what had happened with the rest of the group after he’d blacked out. He asked his friends about it.
Alder filled him in on the small details. Ed had slept all morning, with Andreena assuring everyone he was actually asleep and not in a coma or something. Then Kes took over with the recounting of how they’d escaped in the first place.
“It was close,” Kes told him. “Alder and the kaftar returned with you in tow not five minutes after you all left, Ed. It happened very, very fast. We threw you in the cart and ran like hell, knowing that the Inquisitors could easily follow our tracks all the way back home if we messed up.” She kept pacing around the room as she spoke. “I feared that with you unconscious, the drones wouldn’t listen to our commands. We’d have been doomed, then, because we couldn’t wake you up no matter how hard we tried. The drones guided us to the tunnels near Burrova, though, just as planned. I think they knew how dire the situation was. We used the tunnels to change directions, and then collapsed them when we were out. I doubt they’ll find our trail again, but they know we are nearby. It’s only a matter of time before the Heroes come knocking.”
Ed nodded. “Then we better hope that our gambit pays off. How’s the coffin?”
Lavy and Kes exchanged glances. Ed felt a knot of apprehension form in his stomach. “We have no way to know,” Lavy said at last. “We left it in a room near Zachary’s chapel. The lid is cracked, but nothing leaked out, and there are no signs that the vampire inside is, well, permanently dead. We didn’t dare look inside, just in case we jiggled loose something important. Governor Brett and Zachary secured the room in case the vampire tries to escape. You should take a look, I think Brett earned his keep this time.”
“Got it,” Ed told her. He pushed the bedsheets away and stood. Andreena gave him a disapproving look, but didn’t stop him as he reached for a shirt, his belt, and his weapons and ordered his drones to help him don his armor. “You think the vampire will appear tonight?” he asked the Witch.
“Only one way to know,” she said.
“Then let’s put the rest of the day to good use,” Ed said. He flashed his Evil Eye and took notice of the rewards for the battle against the Inquisitors. “I’ve quite a few unused experience points now, walk with me while I read the new talent descriptions.”
Andreena took her leave. “Well, there’s a batblin with a sprained ankle I must check up on. It’s one of yours, Klek, so you should pay him a visit later, I’m sure he’d appreciate it. Ed, come see me immediately if you’re feeling dizzy. Or if you feel anything out of the ordinary. I’ve no experience dealing with magical after-effects, so I can’t promise you won’t sprout a donkey tail all of a sudden.”
“Do you guys mind waiting for me in the War Room?” Ed asked his friends as he summoned a group of drones and ordered them to help him don his armor.
“Sure,” Alder said with a fake shrug. With the Bard’s high Charm, it was no surprise that he suspected Ed was planning something. “Klek, Lavy, why don’t you come with me?”
“What, did you suddenly forget the way down the stairs—” Lavy shut up when he caught Alder’s meaningful stare. “Ah, what the hell, sure.”
Klek looked at the both of them
as they hurried out of the room, then followed the pair. Kes frowned and headed for the door.
“Actually,” Ed said as the drones helped him throw the gambeson tunic over his head, “do you mind staying behind, Kes? I wanted to talk to you about something.”
The Marshal bit her lip as if she were considering refusing his request. In the end, her martial sense triumphed, so she put on a neutral expression and closed the door. “Yes?”
Ed took a deep breath, unsure of how to begin. “It’s about what happened back there in the Inquisition camp. With Alvedhra.”
“Look. Ed. We don’t have to do this,” Kes said sharply. “No offense, but you’re a human from another world, and I’m an avian. We don’t have enough common ground to have a chat about my feelings, and neither of us are even very good at it.”
“Maybe,” Ed said. The drones, unaware or unable to understand the situation, barked gibberish at each other as they latched his greaves’ straps behind his leg. “Still, you are my friend, and even if I’m not an old, wise Dungeon Lord that knows exactly what to say, I’m still here for you. If there’s anything you want to say, well, I can listen.”
Kes rubbed her eyes with one tired hand full of scars and only three fingers. “Ah. I guess you’re right. Sorry about the attitude. It’s just that the gods keep shoveling dung into this giant heap and one day you realize it’s about to topple above your head… I mean, in other words, there’s too much shit going on. That’s the thing you say, right? ‘Shit.’ ” The avian used her leg to push a chair her way and took a seat near the bed.
“Shit’s the right word,” Ed said. “It’s a bit more versatile than ‘dung,’ actually. You can use it to say a lot of things. ‘Shit’s downright fucked,’ ‘that shit was incredible,’ ‘shit just hit the fan.’ ”
“Is that literal? People in your world like to hit their admirers with dung?”
“Only on social media and in High School,” Ed said.
“I see. It sounds like Volantian politicians to me.”
Kes and Ed chuckled, both well aware that the other had no idea what they were talking about.
“In her place, I would’ve done the same thing,” Kes blurted out. “Ever since we’re hatchlings we’re taught to mistrust the pacts of Dungeon Lords. We learn about how devious and cruel they are, and that no matter what, trusting one leads to corruption and death. I cannot blame Al, no matter how much I’d like to. Back when we made our pact, I thought I was going to die. It’s hard to explain. I didn’t know the real you, I only knew the tales about your… kind. It took me some time to realize that tales sometimes are just tales. But without the minionship pact ensuring that we couldn’t trick each other, I don’t think I would’ve ever trusted you.”
“Fair enough,” Ed said. “From what I understand, mistrusting a Dungeon Lord is probably the smart thing to do. But I disagree about you not trusting me without the pact. With enough time, we would’ve realized we are on the same side. I believe that to be true to the very core of my being, Kes. Perhaps Alvedhra will come to realize it as well.”
Kes shook her head and grinned mirthlessly. “Ah, bother. See what I told you? I suck at talking about feelings. I’ve misled you without meaning to. I’m over Al, Ed. I’ve been through break-ups before, I’m not a hatchling anymore. When it’s over it’s over, and life’s pile of dung is always growing whether you’re done digging out of the most recent landslide or not, so you may as well enjoy it while you have fresh air. And, hell… There are things you can’t take back after you say them, even if you don’t mean them, and Al crossed a line back there. If the gods somehow become merciful, perhaps in the future she and I may come to amicable terms, but that’s pretty much it. She’s not what I’m concerned about.”
“Oh.” Ed blinked. What could he say to that? “I’m sorry.” That would have to do.
“When we made our pact, I thought I was going to die,” Kes repeated, this time giving an edge of intensity to her words. She bent forward on her chair. “Don’t you see? In a way, that’s what I wanted, Ed.” She frowned, her gaze lost in some distant memory. “All my life I’ve wanted to end injustice. To stop people from suffering. When I was a hatchling, I’d see the bigger kids picking on the smaller ones and my blood would just boil. I got into so many fights the elders thought I simply loved violence. And maybe I do. Who knows? Maybe justice is just the lie I tell myself so I can stab as many people as I want, but if it is, I sure wish it at least felt better.”
She rested her eyes on her sheathed sword, studying it intently, as if looking for some deep truth inside. “My urge to fight never went away as I aged, so I joined the Cardinal Command. I believed it was the right thing to do. I was stronger and bigger than most avians, and there was a war going on. So, I volunteered. I still remember what I told my mother when she heard the news. I’d fight so others wouldn’t have to. And I’d be the best at it, damn it, so the minotaurs would have to think twice about coming after our people. I arrived at the Cardinal Command’s boot-camp and I found myself surrounded by people just like me. Scared, nervous, excited. Green. And then Ria and the others forged us into finely tuned weapons. Together, we were invincible. We would uphold justice with our wings and our spears. Then the fighting began and all that plummeted straight into the ground.”
Ed’s throat knotted up all of a sudden.
“Avians’ only advantage against a minotaur are our wings,” Kes explained. “They are bigger and stronger than us, and they can saddle their bodies with energy-demanding talents because of their insane Endurance. No matter how well trained or how many hundreds of experience points you have, if you fight a minotaur head on, you’ll die. So we fight them in waves, from afar. Our army tries to break their ranks by raining projectiles and area-of-effect spells on them, and they hold on with defensive magic, nets, and ballistas. Most battles, neither army breaks and we go back to camp and repeat it all the next day. But if, say, the minotaur flank fails at blocking a volley of spells and they lose cohesion, then our squads dive in.” She demonstrated by plunging her hand down through an imaginary air current and then lifting back up, at right at the last moment. “We use enchanted spears we call steel talons—a long, weighted shafts with a barbed tip—and fly almost straight down at max speed. The minotaur archers try to guess our flight pattern and shoot us, and sometimes they get lucky. An arrow from a bow strong enough to resist the pull of a Brawn 25 arm can turn half-a-dozen avians into mincemeat before anyone realizes what just happened. If the arrows don’t kill you and you aimed your path well, there’s this instant where you have a minotaur right below you and you have all the momentum of your plunge, so you spear them with your steel talon right as you pull back up. Mind you, this only works because we enchant our wings, otherwise we’d just splat on the ground. If you don’t miss the strike, the steel talon’s magic will fight the enchantments of the minotaur’s armor—which is a very thick piece of plate. If the steel talon wins, it will probably penetrate the armor out of sheer momentum. Then the barbed tip will do its job, and the minotaur will bleed out in seconds, prey to his own blood pressure and lack of oxygen. That’s their weakness, you see.” She winced for an instant and drew a horizontal line with her hand. “Our weakness, on the other hand… right after spearing our target, there’s this window of time when we must fly low, parallel to the ground, where we’re open to counterattack with only our side-weapons to defend ourselves. It only lasts about five seconds before we can regain altitude, but it feels like hours. I lost most of my friends that way. Torn to pieces by axes or dragged down by weighted nets. The lucky ones had time to cut their own throats before the minotaurs captured them.”
Perhaps Kes had more of Alder in her than she realized, because without intending to, she’d sown an image in Ed’s mind, like a wide painting of an unnamed battle. He saw a scorched mountain pass overlooking a glistening green sea, with rows upon rows of armored giants like humanoid tanks holding axes as big as a man’s torso. He watched figures breaking
through a field of clouds like falling stars, these elven amazons wearing copper and flowing tunics, holding talons several times their size. He heard their war cries as they dove through the incoming minotaur arrows, the projectiles tearing holes through the span of their white wings, culling their numbers. He saw the fury in their faces painted gold by the sunset and crimson by the blood of their fellow warriors. He felt in his bones the reverberation of the impact as they reached the lowest point of their dive together, then blood and dust bursting up into the air. Bodies collapsed with minotaur and avian rolling brutally on the ground, dead on impact, crumpled wings stained with mud and guts, and the survivors frantically pulling up as the axes and arrows pursued them and, sometimes, struck the avians out of the sky and pulled them back to earth while their hands futilely reached for the sun as it rose farther and farther from their reach.
One avian that made it out had Kes’ features. She was looking over her shoulder as she flew up and up among the survivors, her face contorted in pain as she saw what she was leaving behind, broken and bloodied on the ground below.
“They told us how dangerous the dive was,” Kes said. “And also how crucial to victory it was, because without the dive, our armies had no way of reaching the minotaur command to assassinate it. With enough training, we could make it out alive, they told us. It was a lie. Training had nothing to do with who lived or who died. It was luck. Either you got targeted or you didn’t.” She steadied herself. “I thought I could protect them. I was wrong. The war lasted a long time, and somehow I lived long enough to stumble my way into a promotion, but deep down I knew that I had failed. But I kept trying. I don’t know why. Maybe I am just too stubborn, or maybe I just love violence deep down. When my squad got killed, I thought it was over. One last defeat. Apparently some god is entertained by my failures, though, because I survived, although my wings were broken beyond repair and had to be amputated. They exiled me like a carrion avian and I came to Starevos swearing I’d never fight again, but it turns out I don’t know anything else but fighting. After a month in Undercity without a single coin in my pocket, it was either taking up the sword again, or the whorehouse.”
