by Harry Nix
I’m not quite what happened then. I was looking up at the black between the stars and then it seemed to swim towards me and then all I could see was the endless canvas of nothingness.
17
I awoke with my face on thick warm fur, a pounding headache and a beam of light right in my face.
I sat up, which was a mistake and my world narrowed to just me trying to convince my stomach to hold the vomit back. I talked him down and then moved slower this time, taking in my surroundings and realizing I wasn’t down in the spider caves but in a cell.
The light was coming in between bars into a room that looked comfortable enough until you got to the chains bolted to the stone. One of these chains led to a manacle around my ankle, not tight enough to cut off the blood but close enough you couldn’t fit a toothpick between the metal and skin.
I was clothed at least but back to simple pants, shirt and boots. No staff, no Bag of Holding.
A guard opened the door. It took a moment for me to realize I’d seen him before. The gate guard, the one Scarlet tried to charm.
“You’re... ah... Daniel, right?” I said.
He nodded and then held out a small bottle to me.
“They tell me you were drinking heavily before they took you. Plus the sedative they use for the trip can hurt. Drink that and you’ll feel better.”
I took the bottle, for a brief moment considering smashing it against the floor. Then Daniel moved aside to let an Orc duck under the doorframe. He was like the one who’d killed me, except dressed more conservatively in boots, pants, shirt rather than battle gear. He stood easily ten-feet tall, his head almost touching the roof. He had one green eye and one blue.
If you imagine Orc at the office, that’s what he was like... except he still had a massive metal club in one hand, carved with two faces. In the other he had a metal bar streaked with blue glowing light.
“Drink, fix head,” he said. His voice was deep and, not to put to fine a point on it, dumb.
When he saw me hesitate, a new look came over his, flashing as fast as the shadow of a bird on a sunny day.
“Think it through James. If we wanted to kill you, we would have. If we wanted to force you to drink that concoction, we could. It does what it says and we need you healthy and hale for meeting the boss. We don’t want you to throw up all over his nice clean floor. It’s marble, you know.”
This voice was pure upper crust and intelligent. About half a second away from offering me a snifter of brandy and talking about which country to colonize next for spices they’d end up not wanting to use.
“Do you know Ark and Pico? They’re like you,” I said.
“Please drink. I convince with words but my friend is much more direct,” the orc said.
It wasn’t quite a threat, not yet... but he was right. If I refused, he could just hold my mouth open and force it.
I unstoppered the bottle and drank it down. It was cool and refreshing, a bit like flat cola and as it plumed into my stomach, my headache vanished and I suddenly felt a hell of a lot better. So much so that I checked my HUD to see if I could cast Bolt, get out of here.
“Steady now, that feeling will fade,” the orc said, holding out a hand the size of a dinner plate.
Between one breath and the next it did, leaving me staring at the grayed out icons on the action bar. Even if I wanted to cast a spell or summon Scarlet, I couldn’t.
The orc touched the metal bar to the wall and my chain that was bolted there snapped across to join it.
“You lead, I follow and no one trips over,” the orc said, like a butler explaining protocol.
“Follow me James,” Daniel said.
I left the cell with the orc behind me holding the metal bar my chain was stuck to. I didn’t emerge out into some grim dungeon with rats and dripping water but into a carpeted corridor, the walls hung with paintings, mirrors and tapestries. There were plinths down it here and there. One had a bust of a man’s head on it. Another a wooden carving of a bird rendered in exquisite detail. At the far end was a glass bell jar with small darting colors inside.
I followed Daniel down the corridor, feeling the wealth crowding in around me. This had to be the palace that looked over Bron. The one with gold inlaid pillars and white marble.
They were taking me to see Rax.
An ornate door led to another corridor, and then we went through a room filled with chairs and books, cozy and comfy before emerging into a large hall. There was a throne at the far end, carved in white and black marble with swirls of gold and opal through it. A thousand people could have fit in there without even touching the sides.
Instead of heading to the throne, we took a sharp right turn and went down along the wall to another door obscured by a cloth partition. Unlike the ones used with the spiders, this was embroidered with pictures of a man using a staff to raise a city from the ground.
Daniel went to rap on the door but it opened before he could. The man on the other side was dressed much like me—boots, pants, shirt. Aside from a few rings on his fingers, you wouldn’t have looked twice at him in the street. He was in his early fifties, had a light dusting of stubble and some salt and pepper in his hair.
“Thank you, was it Daniel?”
“Yes my lord, Daniel.”
“Come in, come in James. You’re doing well Daniel.”
My lord? This was Rax?
Daniel stepped aside to allow me to pass. The orc followed, having to duck even more to get through the smaller door. We were in a smaller dining room now, a wooden table in the middle with food set out and a long chair along one wall. There were paintings spread about, nature scenes, figures, a group of women with wings on their backs, naked, trying to entice a young man on horseback to join them. At the far end, above another door, was a Demoness in tones of red and pink, a veil wrapped around her, looking at the viewer.
There was already a chair out on one side. The orc did something with the bar and my chain was now connected to the wall. He nodded to the man and then carefully made his way out the door, closing it behind him.
“So, I’m Henry,” the man said, clapping his hands together and taking a seat across from me.
“James. Are you...? Daniel called you my lord. Are you also known as Rax?”
“Ah, Rax, yes, that. My name is Henry Rax but of course when you want to hate someone, to strip them of their humanity, the first thing to go is their name. Never call them by their full name, no. Just a word and try to make it an epithet if you can.”
He grabbed a bread roll as he spoke and broke it in half before pulling a dish of butter closer.
“Please, eat,” he said, starting to butter his roll.
The warm surroundings, the apparent kindness, the food and smell of something that had to be coffee or close to it was almost enough to trick me into forgetting I was bolted to the wall. That I’d been kidnapped from the spiders last night. That Henry, as of yesterday, had hundreds of spiders chained up for milking.
Despite all that, I was hungry and going with the idea that they could poison, enchant or kill me whenever they wanted, I piled food on my plate.
We ate in silence for a little while, Henry pouring me a drink that was very much like coffee with a touch of hazelnut flavor to it.
Eventually Henry looked up at me. His face was still warm but downcast now.
“You want to ask me about the spiders you rescued yesterday I assume?”
“The Apothecary was enslaving them on your behalf, wasn’t he?”
Despite everything I knew and had experienced, it felt... rude... to just say it aloud. Maybe that was his intent with this room and food.
“He has a name too. Or at least a name he gave me. Cavan Zurisaday. But he’s called the Apothecary like I’m called Rax. Except of course in his case, it seems some of what they say may be true.”
“Are you about to say you didn’t know about the spider’s being enslaved and milked right below your feet? Your men going out the forest to poi
son the spider with a red mold that drove the males crazy? You didn’t know about children being taken?”
The anger was starting to bubble now and at the end I was getting close to shouting.
“The spider venom is a key ingredient in a miraculous medicine. It cures many things but is incredibly effective against plague. There is a city, Socie, a day’s ride from here that has been affected by a particularly virulent plague called Red Sorrow. It’s the bloody tears from the eyes, you see. Cavan had been making medicines for years for my associates and me, but we had no idea he’d built that... dungeon of horrors above the mines. We believed the spiders were being paid for the venom, voluntarily giving it to us.”
My anger took a hit, but not much.
“Your associates? Aren’t you the local power around here? Owner of the mine who somehow doesn’t know what is happening in his own mine?”
“I’m one of the owners of the mine and as for power it only extends as far as I employ a lot of people who live in Bron to work in the mine. There is a government here, a council of elders who do most things. I’m a merchant. A very wealthy one, yes, but only a merchant. I admit that I have taken my eye off things over the years. Delegation you see and then I built this place up here which was probably a mistake too. The physical distance produced a greater distance of care and... I understand I have failed badly,” he said, letting out a shaky breath.
“Why am I bolted to the wall then? Why kidnap me in the middle of the night? Did your men kill spiders to do that?”
“You’re bolted to the wall because for all I know this is some scheme of Cavan’s to have the population rise up and kill me. An unknown hero appears from nowhere and within days discovers a hideous crime. The spiders are all gone now, there is a hole in the wall and a laboratory full of evil things and already the rumors spread. You could be an assassin sent by him. That’s why we took you in the night. No one died doing that.”
Henry tore at some bread while he spoke, dropping each piece on his plate. The world was starting to swirl and not in the good way a glass of wine makes it.
“So, you want me to eat your food and then go out and tell everyone you’re not to blame? It was the Apothecary who did it all?”
Henry sighed and pushed his plate away.
“No, I want you to go to the spiders with an offer for me. Compensation for the crimes wrought by Cavan against them. An offer of employment. We still need venom. Cavan was incredibly secretive but we have others here who believe they can produce the medicine. Red Sorrow has been spreading, despite our best efforts. If Socie falls, so does Bron and the rest of the Nine Realms.”
Henry knocked on the table then and Daniel opened the door.
“Daniel, please escort James back to Bron and give him our offer,” Henry said.
He was almost to the other door before I bolted to my feet, the chain jangling.
“Wait! What about Delicia?”
For a moment, I swear there was a flash of recognition, but maybe it was my imagination. Then Henry frowned, his hand on the door.
“Who’s Delicia?”
“A pixie. Her dust was being used on the spiders.”
Henry pinched the bridge of his nose and let out a sigh.
“Daniel, add Delicia, a pixie, to the list.”
Then he turned to me.
“Every hour now I’m discovering more about Cavan and his evils. My associates and I have hired mercenaries and I have my own private guards searching for him. If he’s still in Bron, we’ll find him. Thank you for your time,” he said and then was gone.
Behind me the orc was carefully edging through the doorway, the iron bar in his hand.
“You lead, I follow,” he said.
“What’s your name?”
“Gunther. And my friend is Lel.”
Gunther was the clever one. I decided to take one more risk, despite knowing it might get back to Henry or Rax or whoever he was.
“Where’s Delicia?”
I’d never seen a battle break out on a face before and certainly not on an Orc.
“There is no PRISON... here. No prison, no Delicia,” Gunther said, his voice smoothing over Lel’s attempt to speak.
They led me out of the palace then. The grounds were teeming with guards, virtually a private army. Some were in matching uniforms, Henry’s men, but others were clearly mercenaries, hired to do a job.
Soon I was outside the gates where a horse was waiting for me. Gunther returned my gear and then Daniel gave me a letter of offer and said I was free to read it.
“The horse will take you to the city edge and no further. Dismount and it will return to us,” Gunther said, touching the metal bar to the manacle to unlock it. All my icons lit up again. If I wanted to zap either or both I could. He gathered the chains and rushed away.
“Hey Lel, where’s Delicia?” I called out.
The orc faltered in his step, stumbling before righting himself. Then he and Daniel were gone, leaving me on the other side of a tall gate to put my armor back on.
Lel knew where Delicia was. Which meant the orc was either working for Cavan and Henry was an innocent merchant who took his eye off the ball or that “Henry” was a disguise worn by Rax, a lie to twist some greater evil.
Everything was mixed up but I couldn’t stop the feeling that Henry was one hundred percent goddamn lying to me.
18
I’d never ridden a horse in real life so it was a little odd to find myself doing it so easily in the virtual world. The horse was clearly well-trained; as soon as I was on, it trotted down the winding road that led back to Bron.
Along the way there were more guards building barricades, making chokepoints, getting set up for war.
Was it really as bad as Henry had claimed? Rumors had spread and now people were coming to kill him?
Henry... fuck him... Rax. For no reason I could pinpoint I was becoming more convinced by the minute he was the true evil. I just had to prove it.
I got plenty of hard stares going down from the palace. I kept my staff in my hand, ready to attack even though I knew I’d be likely killed quick. The guards were all armed to the teeth. As I passed through another chokepoint, I saw them setting up siege crossbows, making a killbox of the road in front of them.
I reached the gates of Bron and the horse stopped on a dime. After dismounting, I gave it a pat, it chuffed in response and then took itself off back up the hill.
More hard stares at the gates but it appeared I’d been given permission to pass. The gates were open and there were teams of workers using magic to weld metal reinforcement on the place side of the door. From the looks of things they were planning to pen the population of Bron in, rather than keep travelers out.
I kept to main streets but even so, there was a palpable air of unrest in the city. Some of the shops had armed guards outside, private security. Others were shuttered. Down one alleyway I looked and saw a group of women geared up for battle having an argument in quiet whispers.
A cart passed me, full of shimmershine ore, with three times the guards the last one had. People watched it go, scowling at it.
Eventually I found myself up on the bridge that overlooked most of the city. From up on high it was looking far worse. There were barricades forming in parts of the city. They weren’t in place yet but just off to the side, ready to cut off main arterials in an instant. On the far side of the city there was a steady stream of carts leaving, more than before. When I squinted I could see that more than half were armed, carrying barrels coming out of the mines.
Maybe Rax was shipping out as much valuable ore as he could in case war broke out.
The bridge was relatively deserted so I took the opportunity to summon Scarlet.
Except nothing. I pressed the button (waving my finger in the air) like an idiot a few times before I realized that I couldn’t summon her unless she was dead. She and Ori were probably still with the spiders or had come to the city to look for me.
For a moment
I went meta, thinking that if blowing a hand off at the wrist screwed with summoning and if alive monsters of legend couldn’t be summoned then a good way to wipe my class was to cut off both my hands and imprison my demons.
Go another level and build a small graveyard nearby so even if the Summoner escaped by suicide, they’d be caught just as quick.
I focused back on the world when I saw a woman with ample curves slinking towards me. For a moment I thought it was Scarlet. She was a demoness, no doubt, but wrapped up like a nun with only part of her face visible.
She passed by, speeding up as she did, casting a few worried looks behind her. I followed her gaze but didn’t see anyone chasing her.
Despite feeling the city might go into lockdown any moment, I read Rax’s offer.
A thousand gold lump sum plus one hundred gold per missing spider. Ongoing payment of one gold per venom delivered.
And of course, his deepest apologies.
I suppressed the urge to toss the letter off the bridge, and put it away. It wasn’t up to me to determine the spiders’ future.
As I left the city, it was hard not to give in to the desire to run. The streets were becoming more crowded, worried parents with children carrying bundles, leaving their homes. I saw a group of rabbits in ornate waistcoats running with what they could carry. They were small but all had knives kept close at paw.
Just seeing them reminded me of Augustus and the Moles. It wouldn’t be long before I failed the quest. If I moved quick enough I’d be able to collect the reward from Ebony and then take a few hours to pay off the Moles, resolve it all.
I hadn’t quite mastered reading the HUD and focusing on the world in front of me, which is how I kicked a black cat that ran in front of me, punting it into a nearby wall.
“Hey, watch it!” the cat swore.
“You ran in front of me!”
“I’ve seen your type before, focused on some other reality and not on this one. You don’t think we matter, do you?”
