by Oliver Mayes
Lillian’s eyes widened. Her worst fear had come true.
“You can’t see it, can you?”
“It really worked?”
“Not if you can’t see it. Come here.”
Andrew, still looking skeptical, walked over to Lillian. She grabbed his hand and dragged him through the alcove. Or she would’ve, if she could’ve. She crossed the threshold without any problem and a notification popped up as she hit level 49, just shy of level 50. She hadn’t even processed her level when her arm was yanked back: Andrew’s fingers had hit an invisible wall, which to him remained very visible. He pulled out of Lillian’s grip and nursed the hand she’d made him punch the wall with, smiling all the while.
“Lillian? Are you still there?”
He couldn’t see her at all. Lillian stepped back into the room and he locked eyes with her immediately. To Andrew, the room was still sealed. It had been a long time since she’d seen him look so happy.
“I did it.”
“Why can’t you go through?”
“I don’t know. I guess I was wrong. Worked for you, though.”
His eyes widened.
“What are you doing standing around here? You might still be in time!”
“That’s what I said!”
“Go! Go get Excalibur! I’ll be waiting for you here, just message me for help with the last riddle after you’ve dealt with Hammertime.”
“I’m not leaving you here.”
Andrew wrung his hands at her.
“I gave up my artifact for this! We don’t have time to figure out how to get me through as well, just go!”
Lillian looked over her shoulder. Andrew was right. It would be far more terrible if his generosity came to nothing because she was being hardheaded. But she had something to say first. The riddle had made her seem ungrateful. Andrew might’ve been putting a brave face on for her, but she wouldn’t leave until she’d had her say. She took his hands in her own.
“Andrew. Thank you. I’m so lucky—”
“Lillian, stop talki—”
He was trying to shake his hands out of her grip. He was still intent on rushing her along. This was more important to her, even if Andrew didn’t share her sentiment. She grabbed his hands a bit harder.
“Shut up, this is important. I’m so lucky you came with me and we got the chance to fix things between us. That’s more important to me than the quest. No matter what happens with Magnitude, Hammertime and Excalibur, let’s—”
Andrew had been trying to contain himself, but it had proven impossible. Justifiably so.
“That’s lovely! I agree with you! But you said ‘Thank you’, I can see the way through now, stop talking and move!”
The moment her grip loosened he grabbed her by the shoulders, roughly turned her around on the spot and started pushing her into the corridor. His hands were still on her back after a few steps, then Lillian started running herself. That was it? She’d been delivering a big heartfelt speech when all she had to do was say ‘Thank you’? She could not wait to be done with this place. One way or another, that was about to become possible.
“Lillian, weapons!”
Her sword and shield appeared in her hands and she broke into a run. Andrew couldn’t keep up. After a few seconds she arrived in the Throne Room. It was larger than any of the other rooms in the castle, including the courtyard. Stained-glass windows stretching from head height all the way to the ceiling shone prismatic light into every corner. The walls and floor and all else were hewn of white marble, the ceiling a vast mural composed of great and valorous deeds, with a shining sword at the center of it all. Excalibur.
Lillian was standing on a red and gold carpet which led all the way to the steps at the far end. Atop them stood the throne. It was empty.
Lillian eyed it up as Andrew came in and began his own evaluations. It could not be so simple as to sit on it. There was a riddle. There was always a freaking riddle. Her primary concern was making sure the area was secure.
Her eyes tracked backward into the corner behind her. The darkest part of the room, but not nearly dark enough to conceal Hammertime’s bulk. He was curled into a ball, peering out at her over the crook of his arm. He was wearing nothing. He had no armor, no weapon, no apparent inventory item. Just the loincloth, less than the rags players entered the game with. Andrew followed where she was looking. Then they all stared at each other.
Andrew was the first to break the silence, albeit by murmuring into Lillian’s ear.
“I’m glad I didn’t know he’d be like this.”
“Why?”
“I’d have gladly given up my artifact to see this. Which means it wouldn’t have qualified as a charitable act.”
Hammertime rose to his feet. He was bigger than them, but that hardly mattered. With all the stats from his gear absent and no armor, he posed no threat at all. Even Berserker Rage wouldn’t help him. Which was just as well, because he’d activated it and was running toward them. Whatever he lacked, it wasn’t courage. Lillian braced herself behind her shield and called out her warning.
“Don’t do this, I want to t—”
His bare shoulder dropped into her at full tilt. He managed to push her back, to her surprise. It was still not enough for her to lose her footing. Andrew had run to the side of them and his hands were glowing red.
“Andrew, no killing! That’s an order!”
She activated her Divine Might and shoved Hammertime back on the second push. If she could contain the Black Knight without killing him, this would be child’s play. Except that Hammertime had now set his sights on Andrew.
“Hammertime, if you attack Andrew I won’t—”
Off Hammertime went, his hands extended forward to wrap themselves around Andrew’s throat. Andrew twisted sideways and Blinked to the far side of the room, appearing in front of the wall. This was ridiculous. Hammertime had to know he couldn’t beat either of them like this, let alone both of them. Lillian was tired of him embarrassing himself.
Hammertime turned toward Andrew, ignoring Lillian in favor of the unarmored mage with Blink on cooldown, and Charged at him. Lillian knew her enemy was in a desperate situation, but how could he possibly imagine he could get past her? Sure, killing Aetherius was a much more realistic prospect than killing her. It still lay beyond the realm of fantasy. She couldn’t reasonably expect Andrew not to kill Hammertime if she didn’t stop him first.
She deactivated Divine Might and jumped sideways. It wasn’t quite enough to block Hammertime’s path, although she could’ve if she had wanted to. Hammertime curved, trying to pass her. Lillian’s feet hardly touched the ground as she jumped again, right into his side, swinging her shield directly into his torso.
Hammertime doubled over around it and his hit points dropped. Good thing she’d deactivated Divine Might. He still didn’t fall, although he’d been brought to a complete halt, and his health was replenishing quickly. Berserker Rage was unreal. He turned on her and drew back his fist, teeth clenched and eyes wild. Lillian promptly reactivated Divine Might, drew back her unhelmeted head and snapped it forward to meet his closed fist. Hammertime took more damage than she did, although his health pool was restoring faster than hers. Brawn meets brains, except Lillian’s brain had plenty of brawn behind it. Hammertime hadn’t even dredged up enough damage for a stun.
Lillian unequipped her sword. She didn’t want to kill him by accident. She caught the second punch, plain and simple: her ‘Swift Justice’ trait, coupled with Divine Might, made it relatively simple against someone with less than half her pure strength. She twisted her wrist and rotated her arm in a wide circle, which Hammertime followed all the way to the floor. His health was very low now, which was okay as he’d heal in a few seconds anyway. Then she unceremoniously dragged him across the floor by his wrist, back toward the War Room.
“Andrew. Stay here, discover what you can. I won’t be long.”
Hammertime kicked and struggled the whole way there. Getting him thro
ugh the doorway required a little more oomph, but after that there was nowhere for him to find purchase. Lillian dragged him down the corridor by his wrist until they were back in the War Room. She deposited him on the floor and stood in the doorway, keeping herself between him and Andrew. She didn’t want to have this conversation in front of him without knowing how it would play out.
“I’d like to talk. I’d rather not kill an unarmed opponent but if you keep attacking me I’ll have to. Would you like to talk?”
Hammertime sat there in surly silence until his Berserker Rage was finished. He knew it was over. The red aura surrounding him dissipated, marking the end of any threat he posed. Where once he’d been all but equal to her in the party, now he was at her mercy. She wanted to show it, if he’d allow her to.
“What happened to your gear? I’m guessing it had something to do with this room?”
“Just kill me. Don’t gloat about it. You beat me. Congratulations.”
“I wanted us to do this together. You’re the one who turned it into a competition. A competition with no winners, only losers.”
Hammertime pulled himself up to sit cross-legged, his hands braced on his knees.
“Aetherius is the winner. He’s used you, again, to get what he wanted. While we’re sitting here talking, he’s getting Excalibur. You didn’t listen to a single word I said. I was right to try and do this without you, since you insisted on putting ‘Andrew’ first. You’re just a silly little girl, being emotionally manipulated by an evil, selfish man.”
Lillian looked him over. He was so confident he was right. She was equally confident he was wrong, with good reason. She laid her cards on the table.
“A few minutes ago, Andrew gave his artifact as tribute so I could get to the last room. Yes, he had an artifact. That’s how he was pulling his tricks. It’s only a lucky accident he’s in the Throne Room at all. He did most of the work getting us through the riddles after you split the party. He never left anyone behind. Everything he’s done, he did for me, as a way of apologizing for his past behavior.”
She thought this would be enough, but Hammertime was more set in his thinking than she’d imagined.
“Yet now Andrew is in that room, alone, and you’re here talking to me. You think he’s helping you when he’s been using you all along! That’s how he’s always played this game. He worked to mend your trust so you wouldn’t suspect him, waiting for the opportunity to stab you in the back. His patience has paid off! You’ve given it to him!”
Lillian considered it. Hammertime’s position was logical, were Aetherius the person he’d presented himself as publicly. Hammertime did not know the finer points of Lillian’s relationship with Andrew, or his personal life, or the conversations they’d shared on the way to this moment. He was completely disregarding everything she’d told him, with less than half the information.
Setting that aside, what Hammertime was saying was not completely impossible. Andrew might, given the circumstances, have a crack at taking Excalibur for himself. That didn’t bother Lillian. She’d already told him he had every right to try. It would be less than perfect, but given his circumstances she could accept it.
“It’s not too late,” Hammertime said. “If we stop talking now you can kill him before he gets Excalibur. To be honest, I don’t think you have what it takes to be a great leader. You won’t handle the stress and you’ll be manipulated by the first person who offers you a few kind words. Better you get it than it ends up in the hands of that manipulative trash!”
This was pointless. Hammertime had already made up his mind. He was stuck like this, forever. She should’ve just killed him at the start, when he’d told her frankly how little he thought of her, and nipped this whole fiasco in the bud.
Since she was already here and hadn’t needed to kill him outright, she could at least give it her best shot. Not for Hammertime: she didn’t owe him anything. She owed it to herself, so she could look back on this and know there was nothing else she could’ve done. He wouldn’t be receptive in this state unless he had something to gain, so she gave it to him.
“I’ll tell you how things look from where I’m standing, then you can come through and try for Excalibur with us. You don’t need to say a word. You can, if you want to, but you don’t have to. If you stay quiet and actually listen for a minute, two minutes tops, we’ll be done here. There’s no hurry; Andrew has no interest in finishing the quest himself. I can’t convince you of that, since I’m a ‘silly little girl’, but it’s true. I don’t mind if you interrupt or don’t pay attention, but we’ll stay here until I’m satisfied we’ve hashed this out properly. All I ask is that you listen.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Yeah, I’ve gathered that. But I know you’re recording. It won’t look great if I go back on my word, will it? I promise if you hear me out, you can try for Excalibur with us.”
She stuck out her hand and looked to it, waiting for Hammertime to accept. It wasn’t as though he had any other option. He took it and they shook. Now came the hard part. She stared at him, her mouth tightly closed but working in every direction, her eyes narrowing and widening. It must’ve looked like she was having a seizure. It was only as Hammertime drew breath to speak, which could only make her task harder, that she finally managed to force out the words.
“I’m sorry! Sorry. Sorry I’ve been a mess. I was in decent shape to lead the group when we set off, but things went downhill right from the start. That’s not something I wanted any of you to see, and it’s definitely not anything you should have to worry about. I did my best, but I wasn’t in a good way even before we fell out over the first quest. I could’ve conducted myself better. Sorry.”
“Apology accepted.”
Lillian suppressed the urge to grumble. She’d apologized, and meant it. She’d been far too aggressive with Hammertime at the inn. He’d behaved himself better than she had, for the most part. The problem wasn’t that her apology was unwarranted; she knew she wasn’t perfect and didn’t mind admitting fault. The problem was that Hammertime had far more to answer for. She couldn’t expect him to meet her at the middle ground if she didn’t take the first step. He showed no intention of joining her there. She coaxed him along.
“Is there anything you’d like to apologize for?”
Hammertime was still looking at the floor. Lillian wouldn’t let this one go. He’d acknowledge what he’d done. She waited. It was his time.
“I took you hostage and split the party.”
“Close enough. Let’s give you credit where credit’s due: you looked at the riddle. You figured out what it wanted in under a minute. You’re very intelligent. I wish you were stupid, that would’ve made this so much easier. Then you used what you’d learned for your own gain, to enact what you thought was the right course of action. The right course of action, as you saw it, was to manipulate me into a position of vulnerability and use me as a tool in your plans. Did you ever stop to think that’s no different from what you hate Andrew for?”
Hammertime didn’t look up from the ground. He could no longer meet her eye. He was decent after all, and he was embarrassed by his despicable behavior. Good. There’s nothing wrong with making mistakes, so long as you learn from them. She’d made her point. It was about time to wind this down.
“Now we’ve both had our say. Unless you have something important to add, I’m ready to move on. Would you like to move on?”
Hammertime’s head didn’t move from the spot of ground between their feet. Lillian got to her feet and held out a hand.
“Let’s draw a line under this and see if Andrew doesn’t try to kill you.”
He took her hand and allowed her to hoist him up. Pretty quickly, all things considered. She led him back through the corridor, into the prismatic light offered by the stained-glass windows on all sides. Andrew was there, arms folded and tapping his foot. Lillian put it down to habit.
Whatever he was doing, he hadn’t tried to do the quest b
y himself. The death knell of Hammertime’s argument, the rock-solid foundation of everything Lillian had told him. Not only did she know herself better than Hammertime did, she knew Andrew better as well. Obviously. If he didn’t comprehend the scale of his blunder now, he never would.
Hammertime approached Andrew with Lillian walking by his side. This would be the very last time she extended the benefit of the doubt to Hammertime, unless he acted appropriately. His body language was positive in that regard: his arms were stuck rigidly by his sides, his fingers flat against his thighs. Andrew’s hands, in contrast, were already glowing red. Hammertime stopped about ten feet away from him, rigid as a board.
“Sorry.”
He turned to Lillian.
“Sorry.”
He straightened and marched into the corner of the room, where he’d been waiting to ambush them earlier. The Logout Sphere consumed him. Lillian and Andrew watched until his presence was gone from that world. Andrew stared into the corner for a few seconds after it had been vacated, then looked at Lillian, raising an eyebrow.
“Damn. What did you do to him?”
“I’ll show you the recording later. Did you find out anything while I was gone?”
“Nope. Sorry. Didn’t want to trigger anything.”
“Alright. Last stretch. Let’s get on with it.”
Lillian drew her weapons and walked the red carpet, Andrew a few paces behind. They were halfway there when a figure emerged from behind the throne and began floating toward them slowly, her hands held in front of her at the midriff. She was dressed neither in robes nor armor but a dress of pure white samite. Her arms were encircled with several bracelets of wrought gold.
She was small and not threatening at first glance, but there was something off about her. More than just the fact she was floating above the ground, which was a pretty pedestrian sight in Saga Online. She drew to a stop ahead of them and her hair flowed above her head and about her face. It was a glamor, like the one Aetherius had used back when his presentation had mattered. Aetherius’s had been an air enchantment, letting him float off the ground until he entered combat and giving him a windswept appearance. This had to be water. Her bracelets only briefly touched upon her arms, her garments flowing out around her. Her eyes were pitch black, yet bright and glistening. Her skin was completely pale, save for the red lips which bore the faintest of smiles. She was undeniably, eerily beautiful. And more than a bit intimidating, if you knew where to look.
