by Eric Nylund
REWARD
10,000 gold quins for the RED KNIGHT’s death.
1,000 gold quins for information leading to his capture.
There was a sketch of this Red Knight in plate mail cobbled together from pieces and parts of various styles that made him look more Frankenstein’s monster than Lancelot du Lac.
No quest alert popped.
Just as well. The money might have been nice, but I was helping a friend tonight, and then afterwards I had my own distractions to attend to that concerned more than mere coin.
“Wouldn’t be staring too hard at that wall,” Elmac muttered. His dwarven accent was a dead ringer for a Scottish brogue. “Timbers be so rotten, the whole mess could come down on our heads with one dirty look.”
I grunted in agreement.
Elmac was correct about the state of the buildings in Low District: most were deserted, had windows broken, and two within sight had recently burned down.
“Didn’t you say there was a building code in High Hill? Every structure has to be enchanted fireproof after the Southern Section burned?”
“Aye, but ’tis expensive, and I suspect no one would mind if all this” —he flared his pudgy fingers— “went poof.”
We lurked in deep shadow ten paces from where we were supposed to be: the intersection of Street of Skulkers and Gut Slit Lane.
No way I was standing there, though.
Streams of effluent and excrement snaked over these “roads.” Some puddles were so big I wondered if a horse might have drowned in those quagmire depths.
Have I mentioned the smells? Drifting upon the night air was a bouquet of shit, sickly sweet gangrene, and the lingering scent of burnt hair and roasted meat (toasted rat, perhaps?).
The skin at the nape of my neck crinkled to gooseflesh.
I was suddenly much more awake and did a quick tactical assessment.
Near the intersection were three alleyways, crammed with garbage, and capable of concealing a dozen enemies. Three rooftops offered excellent sightlines, the better to rain arrows down upon us unsuspecting fish in the proverbial barrel.
“Nice place for an ambush,” I remarked.
“Nothing ‘nice’ ’bout Gut Slit Lane,” Elmac said. “’Tis where you can find all sorts ’o illicit services, stolen goods, and dumped bodies.”
“Speaking from personal experience?”
“Maybe.” He shrugged. “But it be no secret that Gut Slit Lane has the honor of being the least desirable street, in the least desirable part ’o High Hill.”
Elmac had a talent for speaking the obvious.
Ah yes, Elmac… what to tell you of him?
He was my friend, battle brother, and drinking companion. His left arm had been amputated at the shoulder, and the dwarf wore a magical prosthetic in its place that could punch through concrete walls.
Last week, we’d met and joined forces to save High Hill from an invading demon army. Stopping that evil horde, however, had not been Elmac’s greatest battle. Forty years ago he had been the Grand General of the Armies of High Hill. With three thousand warriors under his command, he had faced a hundred thousand in the great War of Underhill.
Only seven heroes had returned from that epic battle. Elmac was one… but he had lost the love of his life, a son, and his two brothers.
For decades he’d coped with that loss by doing his best to drink himself into oblivion (which for a dwarf is saying something).
He was better now. I think. Going on that last quest had breathed some life back into the cantankerous little guy.
One important detail about Elmac: He owned a tavern called the Bloody Rooster. It was a dive, but it also had the best selection of ales in High Hill (of which I planned to sample his entire inventory).
Strike that. How could I forget? The most important detail about Elmac was actually this: He wasn’t a player but nonetheless knew about the Game.
Huge security breach, I know. All my fault.
I had told him, though, because I had recruited him into my clan. That is, I was going to recruit him as soon as I reached fifth level and a new player slot opened in the clan.
Maybe helping Morgana tonight would get me enough experience.
I concentrated and summoned my game interface.
An alabaster-framed window popped into existence before me and tilted to an ergonomic angle for optimal reading. This was the augmented-reality user interface and my main link to the Game.
I tabbed to the Message Center where players conveyed notes to one another.
On-screen was the reason Elmac and I were here, my last message from Morgana:
>_Morgana Nox: My quest’s gone pear-shaped
>_Morgana Nox: At Gut Slit & Skulkers
>_Morgana Nox: Hurry. Might need help
Morgana was a third-level druid, third-level thief player, and our mutual friend. Her distress call had pinged my inbox just as Elmac and I were lifting frosty Silvercrest Ales to our parched lips at the Bloody Rooster.
We had naturally dropped everything and heeded Fate’s call to adventure.
Sure, there were reasons not to trust Morgana. She and I were, after all, on competing teams in the Game. Morgana had joined the Tricksters LLC clan—sponsored by gods like Loki, Coyote, or in her case, the Celtic nature spirit and giant rabbit, The Great Pooka—powerful practical joker deities never to be fully trusted.
Could this “rescue call” from Morgana be a practical joke?
I didn’t think so. Morgana had risked her neck to save mine. She was also from Earth (although one in an alternate universe), and having a more-or-less common origin gave us a leg up in understanding one another. I might not trust her gods, but I did trust her.
Elmac and she were friends too. I suspected, though, he had a crush on her (somehow missing the age difference of about a hundred years between them). If that was the case, I predicted there was going to be a train wreck of a conversation between them soon—the “just friends” talk.
Or maybe I’d misread Elmac’s intentions.
I returned to my interface and sent the following to Morgana:
>_Hektor Saint-Savage: We r here
>_Hektor Saint-Savage: Where r u?
An alert window instantly popped with:
ALERT!
Player has invoked PRIVACY.
Your message(s) will be stored in their mailbox.
That was my fifth attempt to contact her. And the fifth time I’d gotten this automated reply. At least it wasn’t “There is no active player, Morgana Nox” …which would have indicated she was dead.
So, good news, right?
Then how come with each passing moment, I felt less sure about this? Felt like it might not be only Morgana who’d need rescuing tonight?
As an experiment, I turned my interface to face the intersection. The light from the screen could illuminate the area and reveal some clue that Morgana had already been here.
No dice. The dark was still dark.
My augmented reality window apparently only existed in my brain. At least gazing into the lit screen hadn’t ruined my night vision. As an elf, I could see like a cat. Elmac had no problem. Dwarves could see in total darkness.
For a second, I considered scrolling to the part of the interface on character classes. I’d started reading it yesterday… and there were hundreds of entries on new classes. If I was going to pick up a new class, become a so-called multiclass character, I’d need to do some serious studying.
It was but a momentary temptation. I wasn’t here to read.
Where are you, Morgana?
I glanced around. Saw no one.
Elmac’s hairy ears twitched. “Hmmm.”
“What?”
“Shhhh… there be something, close.”
I closed my eyes. Listened.
Gurgling water.
Two cats fighting (or, ahem, on a date).
A block away, drunken half laughter and yips. Werewolves having too much fun, I suspected.
> And… ten paces around the corner, a faint “sclorch.”
I nonchalantly poked my head out.
There was mud. Shadows. An angle of bat wing flashed by and melted back into the night.
I saw no one who might have made that sclorch.
Could the bat have been Morgana? As a thief and druid, she could sneak about and shift shape. I’d seen her transform into a panther, wolf, and she had also mentioned a mouse form as well. Why not a bat?
Another squelchy step. This time across the street.
“Ambush,” I told Elmac.
By way of acknowledgement, he unslung his battle axe and gripped it tight with both meat and metal hands.
My hands balled into fists and I tensed.
This was bad ground to fight on. We were easily surrounded. Vulnerable from above. No cover.
But there was another option: across the intersection, a house. Its second floor was destroyed. The stone chimney rubble. But, apart from that, it wasn’t so bad. The foundation was concrete and river rock. The remaining upright lumber could be silver-aged cedar (or at least not completely rotten). Maybe.
It did, however, provide cover… or possibly a spot where we might be cornered, but you know what they say about the availability of safe ports in storms? It’d do.
I nudged Elmac and nodded at the place. “Go. I’ve got your back.”
Elmac sprinted across the street as quick as he could move his short legs.
I fired off my chi-powered buff, Perfect Motion, and it felt like electrified grease had been injected into my limbs.
Behind me: a trio of low whistles.
I spun—
—in time to see three steel blurs slice through the air at me as fast as a major-league fastball.
I was faster.
I caught the first inbound streak.
Ah, a dagger.
I slashed, deflecting the second blur speeding toward me—a shower of sparks—and then I sidestepped a third thrown blade.
I chucked the caught dagger back along its original trajectory.
And it impaled a shadow… that groaned, toppled over, and convulsed. This shaking figure wore a black jumpsuit and balaclava.
A poisoned blade. Of course. I’d have been disappointed if there wasn’t some additional catch to this ambush.
The cut-rate ninja performed his death rattle and grew still.
It appeared that the poison they used was of the lethal variety.
The air filled with whooshes and whistles as thrown daggers, crossbow bolts, and shuriken came at me from every direction.
I twisted and bounded backward into a flip—landed, skidded, but caught my balance before doing a face plant in the mud.
Dark figures emerged to surround me.
I glanced across the street. No Elmac. He must be inside.
Good. I was done doing my impersonation of a bullseye.
I ran, zigging and zagging, to the building.
Projectiles splashed the mud at my feet and thunked into nearby walls.
I dove through a broken window and a shard of glass sliced my tunic. Too close.
Inside the building, I noted there were two other windows and one exit missing its door. Busted bottles, syringes, and un-identifiable sticky things littered the floor. The roof sagged.
And as predicted, Elmac was here too, with axe held high—already swinging. He halted his murderous strike before his blade made two half-monks out of me.
“They’re” —I panted— “coming. Ten. Maybe a dozen.”
Elmac pressed a slender gold flask into my hand. “Drink. Be quick.”
“Come on, Elmac. No time for whiskey.”
He glowered his impatience at my mud-splattered shirt.
I looked at whatever wasn’t meeting Elmac’s approval.
Blood seeped through my tunic. Must have been that glass.
I pulled back the fabric and saw a tiny cut across the ripples of my abdomen. Barely a shaving nick. The skin around the incision, however, blistered, blackened, and peeled as I watched. My tongue thickened. My throat swelled, and it was hard to even take a breath.
WARNING!!!
You have been poisoned with:
Sanguine Hellebore (Helleborus album sanguis).
Causes necrotizing blisters for additional damage.
Has a small, but cumulative, chance to auto-catalyze
and rapidly consume the entire body.
Ah, the just-late-enough-to-not-be useful game alert. I was beginning to think it only existed to rub my nose in this sort of stuff.
Elmac snatched his flask back, spun off the top, and shoved it at my mouth. “By all the gods’ hangovers—’tis no whiskey. It be anti-venom from the Temple of the Three Sisters.”
Thanks, Elmac. I guzzled it. The potion had the consistency of motor oil and tasted like habanero-flavored napalm.
I blinked away tears, but I could inhale again. The swelling and necrosis of the wound slowed and stopped. It still itched like hell though.
On the ruined second floor overhead were many padded steps. That had to be our new friends.
Elmac craned his neck. “Stupid to charge us all at once. They’ll bunch up.” He whispered a magical word to his axe and the blade crackled with blue fire and lightning flickers. A golden-toothed smile parted his gray beard.
My hands wavered with the mirage-heat of my Fists of Steel skill.
Stupid to charge us all at once? I thought they were doing pretty good so far.
Elmac’s enthusiasm, however, was catching.
Adrenaline pounded through my blood. I was ready, even eager, to fight. I expected them to next rappel down and swing through the windows, heck even collapse the roof in on us.
Instead, though, outside a window, a body fell and hit the ground with that flat dead-body thump.
Elmac and I exchanged the same confused look. A clumsy ninja?
Before we could figure out why it had happened, the roof splintered and caved in.
Elmac and I dodged debris and ended up in opposite corners.
Eight hooded figures jumped down to join us.
Three of the wannabe assassins surrounded me, bouncing on the balls of their feet, weaving this way and that to throw off my defense.
Yes, these creeps outnumbered us four to one.
And yes, they were fast and had deadly envenomed weapons.
But their motions were crude, and as Elmac had predicted, they were bunching up so it’d be easy to step inside their reach—punch throats, dislocate elbows, and knee groins with impunity.
Sure, I could be killed any number of unpleasant ways… but I couldn’t help grinning like Elmac (although I liked to think mine was more of a half-snarl of intimidation).
A millisecond pause.
Then everyone moved.
Two of the three on me lunged. One held back.
I twisted around a dagger thrust and closed—punched my attacker’s throat, grabbed the voice box, and slammed him into the wall so hard, he went through and landed inert on the street.
I scissored a leg up—lashed down.
An instant neck snap on the thug who’d been angling for a backstab.
On the guy who had hesitated a few milliseconds, I let loose a series of rapid-fire punches that punctuated him, solar plexus to chin. He crumpled.
Meanwhile, with a mighty battle cry, Elmac severed the legs of the two he faced. He brought his axe about for another swing as two more filled the space where their comrades had stood. It looked like they were going to try for a grapple.
Usually it was a mistake to grapple a dwarf. It was always a mistake, however, when that dwarf was Elmac.
He embedded his massive axe in one of their thighs. Bright arterial blood gushed.
Elmac left his axe there, ducked, and came up with daggers in each hand—slashed knee and groin and left the other fellow gelded, screaming… and then silent on the floor.
A shadow blur streaked toward my throat.
I dodged two
throwing stars—rolled toward this new attacker and open palmed his chest, splintering sternum and ribs. His heart punctured with a wet pop. The guy dropped at my feet.
I stopped.
Elmac and I were the only ones standing.
The odors of coppery blood, excrement, and bitter almond were thick in the air.
None of our attackers moved. Or even breathed. Not even the guy I’d slammed through the wall (who I thought might only be knocked out).
I nudged one with my boot and rolled him over. Foam bubbled through his black hood.
I’d read that some toxin was supposed to have an almond smell. Cyanide? Had they suicided rather than be captured?
Hmm. Maybe they weren’t simple thugs after all.
Too bad they were dead. I would have liked to discuss why they were trying to shuffle us off this mortal coil.
“We best move on,” Elmac said as he pulled free his axe.
I nodded. “I wonder why that first guy fell off the roof. Slipped?”
Elmac turned as if to offer his opinion, but halted, mouth open as he stared over my shoulder.
I turned.
From the ruined upstairs floor protruded a black snout, and from that… a rippling forked tongue.
A snake’s head appeared. It was the size of a basketball.
I raised my hands, ready to take this monster out if it made a move toward me.
Elmac grabbed my arm and whispered, “Don’t. That be a heartbeat cobra. I’ve got no anti-toxin for that beastie’s venom.”
I stepped back.
Look, I don’t have a snake phobia, but this was Thera. Anything that could live here had to be deadly. And anything that made mighty Elmac pause—well, that went double.
The serpent’s body flowed and dropped to the floor. It was a horrifying twenty feet long. Its scales were beautiful, though: black heart-shapes edged with crimson… that undulated in a mesmerizing fashion.
It reared up, hood flared—and lunged.
CHAPTER 2
The snake struck—
