“Do you see anything?” Nat hissed in a
stage whisper from the dock outside. He and Shadow had stayed behind while the
others delivered Lamm’s Lambs to the orphanage, and Shadow had somehow
convinced him to explore the derelict ship moored behind Lamm’s hideout in the
old fishery. Now there was a huge dead spider on the deck (at least he hoped it was dead – the legs still
twitched occasionally), and Shadow had gone into the ship’s cabin to explore.
Shadow poked his head back out the cabin
door. “The cabin’s a mess, but I don’t see anything interesting. There’s a
stairway leading down into the hold, but it’s too dark to see what might be
down there.” Nat cautiously climbed over the rail, and joined Shadow in the
cabin. All the cobwebs gave him the willies, and he began compulsively casting Prestidigitation to clear them away. The
air coming up from the open stairway was cold and dank smelling, but as Shadow
had said, the hold was pitch black. “Whadya think?” Shadow asked with a grin.
“Should we check it out?”
Nat couldn’t answer fast enough. “No! I
mean, not without the others. We should really wait for them to get back. In
case there’s more spiders. Or other stuff.” He was already backing out of the
cabin.
Shadow’s expression darkened. “If Lamm’s
down there, I don’t want to risk him getting away,” he said in a low voice.
“I’ll stand guard here, so he can’t slip out. You go back and wait for the
others. They won’t have any idea where we are, and I don’t want them to think
we left.” He was remembering how willing some of the others had been to give up
the search for Lamm once the Lambs were safe. He didn’t care what the others
did – he had a score to settle with Gaedren Lamm.
Nat didn’t need much persuading to leave
the spider-infested ship (a single spider had become an infestation in his
mind). However, once he was alone on the walkway leading to the dock, he
started feeling very exposed. He started to wait inside the fishery’s front
door, out of sight, but gave a yelp when he almost tripped over Giggles’ dead
body, lying just inside the door. Not wanting to share a hiding spot with a
corpse, he ended up crouching on the walkway at the corner of the fishery,
hoping he wouldn’t be seen. At one point a mob of about a dozen people, armed
with cudgels and torches appeared on the street, and Nat prepared to flee back
to the ship, but they marched past the fishery and out of sight.
After what felt like an eternity, he saw
his new friends returning to the fishery. They weren’t running, but they were hustling
along. Stepping out of hiding, Nat waved them down. “What trouble have you guys
managed to get into?” Jax asked with a grin.
Nat was offended. “We searched the
fishery again, but didn’t find anything, so we decided to check out the ship
tied up out back. It looks like it’s been used recently – there’s a path
leading into the cabin and down the stairs into the hold. But we had to fight
off a giant spider, and decided not to go any farther until you got here.
Shadow’s standing guard, in case Lamm tries to escape.”
“Lamm’s not here,” Jax snorted. “Trust
me – I’d know. If he was ever here at all, he’s high-tailed it by now.”
Nat bristled. “We can’t be sure of that
until we’ve searched everywhere, and we haven’t searched the ship.”
“Nat’s right,” Erin weighed in. “If
there’s a chance Lamm is here, we can’t let him escape.” In her mind, that
settled the argument. “But we need to get rid of these bodies – we can’t risk
having someone spot them.”
“Hookshanks was looking at me funny, so
I fed him to the sharks,” Nat offered. Now everyone
looked at him funny. “I mean, there’s that shark tank inside the fishery,”
he explained. “We could dump the other bodies in there, and not have to worry
about the river current carrying them away before the sharks eat them.”
That seemed like a reasonable plan.
Tomas and Erin hefted Giggles and began lugging him towards the fishery floor;
when they reached the balcony, they simply tossed him over the railing, then
went down the stairs and rolled the body through the opening into the water
below. Nat went into the office, grabbed Yargin’s feet and dragged him along
the walkway and down the stairs; he left a steady stream of blood and gore
behind. By the time Yargin’s body joined Giggles’, Nat was retching, and he
rushed out the door onto the platform at the foot of the stairs outside.
Dropping to his knees, he stuck his head between the rails and vomited into the
muddy water.
As he wiped his mouth and started to
stand, he caught sight of something in the water under the fishery. It was the
back end of a small skiff, floating in the river. He couldn’t see much from
this vantage point – the boat was so far under the building that he could only
see part of it – but it had to be tied to something, or the river current would
have carried it away. “There’s a boat down here!” he whispered to the others.
Everyone else came out to check out
Nat’s discovery. There was only about 3 feet of clearance between the floor of
the fishery and the surface of the water; whoever had been in the boat would
have had to lie down as the boat passed under the building. But there was no
way to see more without going into the water, and the thrashing of the sharks
that were still feeding on the new bodies made that an unattractive
proposition.
“Maybe we should check out that ship
after all,” Jax conceded, and Nat puffed up with pride. “Maybe there’s a way to get from
the deck down to where that boat’s at. Let’s go.”
“I’m staying here,” Erin announced,
pointing down at the platform at the base of the outside stairs. “If Lamm tries
to use the boat to escape, he’ll have to go right past here. I’ll be here to
head him off.” Leaving Erin on guard, the others headed back through the
fishery and down the walkway towards the ship. But as they neared the ship,
Wren stopped. “Erin’s right,” she said. “Lamm could try to escape in the boat.
If he goes downstream, Erin will get him, but what if he goes upstream? Someone
needs to wait here, just in case.” Leaving behind a second guard, the rest
continued on.
They met Shadow at the ship, and he
pointed out the path they’d discovered. “It leads down into the hold,” he
pointed out.
But Jax wasn’t ready to head downstairs
yet. He’d been hoping there’d be a gap between the ship’s hull and the fishery
wall, where you might be able to climb down to the boat they’d seen, but it
looked like the ship was snugged right up against the building. Nonetheless, he
wanted to see if there was any gap that you could at least see through, to get
an idea of what was below. “Wait here just a minute,” he whispered. “I’m going
to take a look over the side.” He climbed over the rail and headed across the
deck.
He only made it halfway across before
the rotten decking gave way beneath his feet. He plunged into the ship’s hold,
landing on a bunch of wooden crates that shattered under his weight. The hold
was pitch black; the night was overcast, and the little light that filtered
down through the Jax-sized hole in the deck provided no illumination. But as he
struggled to his feet, he could hear something scuttling in the darkness around
him.
Shadow was still at the top of the
stairs leading down into the hold. The half-elf could see better in the
darkness than his human companions, and when he heard the crash of Jax plunging
through the deck, he saw him land in a heap in the hold. He also saw a pair of
huge drain spiders stir from their webs and move to attack the intruder. “More
spiders!” he cried, and rushed to the foot of the stairs, pulling out Yargin’s Wand of Acid and splashing one of the
creatures with it. Jax saw the faint green glow of the magical acid fly through
the air; he couldn’t see what it was aimed at, but he swung his sword blindly at
that spot, and felt the satisfying splat of
a crushed spider.
But Jax felt a burning sting on the back
of his leg, and knew there were more unseen enemies to deal with. Shadow saw
three more spiders scuttle from the bow to surround Jax. Upstairs, Nat and
Tomas rushed into the cabin, but found themselves unable to help. They could
see nothing in the darkness of the hold, although they could hear Jax cursing
and see Shadow firing his wand at something. Nat cursed that he hadn’t
memorized any spells that would provide light, but Tomas didn’t rely on magic.
He pulled a torch from his belt and used a match to light it. Its illumination
barely penetrated the hold below, but it revealed a spider directly between
Shadow and Jax. The two spellcasters hit it with acid almost simultaneously,
and its body dissolved.
The torchlight helped Jax only a little;
the narrow stairwell restricted the area it illuminated. But he could barely
make out movement on either side of the stairwell. He swung his sword, and
spider legs flew through the air. But the one on the other side sank its fangs
into his leg, and he hoped its venom wouldn’t kill him.
Tomas knew he had to get his light into
the hold, so they could see what they were fighting. Pushing past Nat and
Shadow, he rushed down the stairs, and leaped over one of the spiders flanking
Jax, then stabbed his short sword down at it. He cut off a leg, but it kept
moving. Shadow and Nat could now see another spider behind Jax; they each fired
another round of acid, but both missed. Jax slashed his sword down on the one
Tomas had crippled, slicing it in half, then limped away towards the bow of the
ship. He’d been badly injured in the fight with Giggles, and these spider bites
left him barely clinging to life. The remaining spider didn’t follow him.
Instead it charged at the torch-wielding Tomas, and he felt the burn of its
bite. With a curse, he stabbed his sword down, impaling it to the deck.
No more arachnids emerged from the
darkness, and Shadow and Nat cautiously entered the hold. The air was dank and
damp, reeking of mildew. Several barrels and crates lay haphazardly about the
hold, but they were covered with grime and mold, and showed no signs of being
touched in a decade or more. Puddles of river water gathered on the floor near
the stern, where the ship apparently sat lower in the water.
Shadow was intently examining the floor.
“Look! You can see that the stairs are worn in the center, and there’s kind of
a path where the grime’s been worn away.” He was bowed almost to the floor,
studying it intently. “Here, at the bottom of the stairs. Then over here,
behind the mast, then …” He stopped at Tomas’ feet. “It goes right here.”
Tomas turned. With Shadow pointing it
out, he could see that the cleared area seemed to lead directly through the
hull of the ship. Moving his torch back and forth, he could see a shadow form
on the timbers of the hull – the outline of a hidden door! “Jax! Come check
this out!”
The rogue moved slowly to join him. One
leg felt numb, and drug behind him as he walked. Nat saw what bad shape he was
in, and went back on deck, then down the walkway to fetch Wren. “Jax fell into
the ship and got bit by lots of spiders. I think he’s pretty badly hurt. Oh,
and we found a secret door.” She was reluctant to leave her spot until Nat
agreed to take her place on watch.
By the time she reached the hold, Jax
was just finishing his examination of the secret door. “I don’t see any signs
of traps, and it’s not locked,” he said with relief. “Should I open it?”
“Just a minute,” Wren said. Holding her
holy symbol of Pharasma aloft, she said a short prayer, and a wave of holy
energy washed out from her. Jax felt his wounds knit, and the numbness in his
leg went away. “Thanks,” he sighed with gratitude, then turned back to the
door.
“Hold this,” Tomas whispered, handing
his torch to Wren as he unlimbered his bow. Jax held up three fingers, then
counted silently down and pulled open the door.
It revealed a narrow space under the
fishery, with about three feet of room between the floor of the of the building above and the languid, foamy river water below. Wooden pilings supported the building,
and thick mats of moss and cobwebs hung from ropes and rusted chains between
them. A wooden walkway floated on the river’s surface, winding along first the
hull of the ship, then turning to follow the southern wall of the building. Dim
light spilled into the area through the opening in the floor above that they
had used to dispose of the bodies. Shark fins could still be seen circling
where they had chummed the water. At the far end of the walkway they could see
a small two-and-a-half-foot-square door that led into an understructure below
the fishery’s land-bound half. The pilings below this understructure were
densely arrayed, leaving only narrow gaps into the water below that area; the
sharks would not be able enter there.
Tied to the near end of the walkway,
right beside their position, was a small johnboat, empty save for a single
paddle. After confirming that there was nothing of interested in the boat, Jax
and Tomas moved forward along the walkway, followed by Wren with the torch. The
space was so low that the only way to traverse the walkway was on hands and
knees, and the floating walkway bobbed precariously as they moved. They were
all too aware of the triangular fins circling mere feet away, but the sharks,
perhaps sated by their recent feast, made no move to come out of the water to
attack.
As they advanced, Shadow hung back by
the door into the ship. After a moment’s hesitation, he untied the skiff, and
nudged it away, letting the river’s current catch it and carry it downstream.
“What are you doing?” Wren hissed. “We might need that!” Shadow ignored her.
Jax examined the small trapdoor at the
end of the walkway. It had an obvious lock, but he could find no evidence of
traps or alarms. He looked back at Tomas and raised his eyebrows – should he
open it? Tomas shook his head. “Let’s get
the others,” he mouthed, then turned and gave that instruction to Wren. She
crawled back, handing the torch to Shadow as she passed, then hustled back. She
told Nat what was going on as she passed him, then ran through the fishery to
the spot where Erin was still on guard. Erin had seen the empty skiff come
floating out and wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or a bad one. Wren told
her about the secret door. “It leads under the front part of the fishery –
there must be a hidden room there.”
Erin frowned. “I can’t believe Lamm
would let himself be cornered without some way out. We didn’t find any way down
into a lower level from upstairs, but there must be one. I’m going to stay out
here, and cover any possible escape routes.” Now that the skiff was eliminated
as a possible means of escape, she abandoned the landing by the river on the
north side of the fishery, and returned to the front door, confident that if
Lamm did have a secret escape route, he’d have to come through the fishery.
Shrugging, Wren retraced her steps to rejoin the others.
Jax was waiting impatiently. Shadow had
joined him and Tomas, while Nat had hung back. As soon as Jax saw Wren at the
secret door into the ship, he gave Tomas a nod, then turned his lockpicks on
the lock. Within seconds, the lock gave way with an audible click. Jax silently
cursed, wishing once again that he’d been quieter. But he held up three
fingers, silently counted down, and pushed the door open.
The instant he did so, there was a loud thunk as a crossbow bolt buried itself
in the wall just ahead of him. The small opening was a tight squeeze, and it
took some effort to pull himself through, but he managed to come up on his
feet.
He found himself in a large chilly room
that stank of river water, thanks to a huge opening in the floor that dropped
away to the river and muddy bank three feet below. Several pilings emerged from
the waters to support the roof eight feet above the floor, with mossy ropes slung
between them. In two places, rusty manacles hung from the ropes over the water.
On one side of the chamber a collection of old cabinets, lockboxes, and piles
of clutter were strewn about. Chipped porcelain plates, a cracked goblet, badly
rusted silverware, an old wooden shield with a crossbow bolt embedded in it,
the odd dinged helm, and other “treasures” littered the floor of that side of
the chamber. In the southwest corner, a wooden door provides access to a
walled-off section that had been built to create a separate room.
But that’s not what had Jax attention.
On the opposite side of the opening in the floor were two people. One was a
muscled thug, reloading a crossbow. Standing next to him was a jaundiced and
bent corpse of a man, his eyes yellowed and skin speckled from age.
“It’s Lamm!” Jax screamed, then charged
around the perimeter of the hole in the floor to try to close with the pair.
Lamm’s eyes grew wide as he recognized Jax. He clapped the thug on the
shoulder. “Slow them down!” he cried. “I’ve got more weapons in my room.” He
ducked through the door to the small inner room and slammed it behind him. Jax
heard the sound of a bar being dropped into place.
“You asshole!” the thug cursed; he knew
he’d just been abandoned. But he showed no willingness to back down from a
fight. He stepped back from the charging Jax, fired his crossbow wildly, then
tossed it aside. He grabbed at something on his belt, and when he raised his
hand his fist was wrapped in a set of brass knuckles with a nasty looking blade
protruding from them.
The crossbow bolt missed Jax by a mile,
and he continued with his attack, slashing his sword across the thug’s chest.
Across the room, Tomas had also made his way thought the narrow opening and
found his feet. He moved just far enough to clear the way for those behind him,
then fired a pair of arrows into the thug. Shadow was on his heels, but the
tall half-elf had more trouble with the small trapdoor, and was still on hands
and knees. Rather than waste time getting up, he fired a Magic Missile without standing.
Wren was right behind him. She had just
crawled through the opening and was climbing to her feet when there was a
thrashing in the water in the opening. A hugely fat alligator lunged out of the
water, and snapped its jaws at her.
Gobblegut! Wren screamed as the terror
that had haunted her nightmares came after her. She swung her mace at the
beast, but her fear sapped her strength, and the weapon barely scratched its tough hide. Nat was behind her, unable to get through the tiny doorway, but he
thrust his arm through and fired a Force
Missile at the alligator. Shadow, still on his knees with Gobblegut right
beside him, reached out and slapped at the creature with both hands. His attack
seemed insane, but there was a spray of blood and a bellow of pain, and when
Shadow drew back his friends saw that both hands were tipped with wicked
three-inch claws.
On the opposite side of the room, Jax
recognized Gobblegut’s bellow, and his guts turned to water with old fear. But
he still had his hands full with another enemy. The thug swung at him with his
punching dagger, but Jax easily dodged the blow, and slashed again with his
sword, cutting deep. Tomas fired an arrow that pierced the thug’s temple, then
turned without missing a beat and followed up with a shot into Gobblegut’s
armored back.
But the injuries just served to
infuriate the alligator. With another bellow, it lunged again at Wren. This
time its jaws clamped shut on her midsection, and it dragged her back into the muddy water. Nat managed to grab her ankles, hoping to pull her to safety, but found
himself being pulled towards the river with her, and let go at the last minute.
Jax was in a rage. He would not
see another friend die in Gobblegut’s jaws. He leaped down to the muddy
riverbank and chopped down with his sword, splitting his skin. He heard the
twang of a bowstring, and the thunk of an arrow hitting flesh. Gobblegut’s
thrashing ceased, and Wren fought her way back to the surface, coughing.
As soon as he was sure Wren was OK, Jax
climbed out and went to Lamm’s door. He leaned his shoulder against it, but as
he suspected, it was firmly barred. He took a deep breath and stepped back,
preparing to give it a solid kick, when he felt a hand on his arm.
It was Wren. Her face was still
spattered with dried gore, which her short dunk in the river had done little to
clean, and fresh blood leaked through the links of her mail shirt. Bits of
Yargin still clung to the head of her mace as she raised it. “I’ve got this,”
she said simply, and Jax stepped aside. He nodded once to Tomas, who nodded
back and drew his bowstring.
Wren slammed her mace into the door, and
there was a cracking sound. She hit it again. The plank that barred the door
was solid, but the rotten wood of the fishery was not and the door flew inward.
Wren and Jax rushed in, weapons raised, as Tomas followed, his bow seeking a
target.
But the foul-smelling room was empty. It
appeared to be a combination bedroom/dining room/study. Just inside the door
was a round table, heaped with dirty plates, bread crusts, stained goblets,
fruit rinds, and scuttling cockroaches. A wooden bed with a lumpy mattress
stood against the far wall, with a large strongbox at its foot. A sagging
dresser full of moth-eaten clothes was in another corner. But Lamm was not
there. Wren crouched down to peer beneath the bed from across the room, but all
she saw were more roaches.
Swearing in frustration, Jax stomped out
of the room. Shadow took his place, and once again his keen eyes spotted an
anomaly, a set of semi-circular scrape marks by one of the legs of the bed.
“The bed moves!” he exclaimed, and pulled on the bed. Sure enough, it slid
aside, revealing a hole through the floor of the room, leading into a dark
tunnel. Without waiting for anyone else, Shadow dove into the tunnel. It was
crudely dug and haphazardly propped up with poorly worked pieces of wood. It
led north, parallel to the river, for some 15 feet before it opened out on the
river bank. The opening had been concealed by several empty crates, which were
now pushed aside. Shadow could see a muddy rut in the riverbank where a small
boat had apparently been beached, and footprints in the mud around where it had
been. But there was no sign of the boat, or of Lamm.
Shadow’s confirmation of Lamm’s escape
was not much of a surprise to those inside. Wren was still standing in the
doorway, almost afraid to enter the room. On the table amid the moldy food
scraps sat an oversized glass jar. It was filled with a yellowish liquid, with
what appeared to be black smoke suspended in the liquid. Something about the
jar made Wren profoundly uneasy, and she was loathe to approach it. Concerned
about some magical danger, she cast Detect
Magic. Something inside the strongbox glowed, as did a small wooden box on
the table, sitting beside the glass jar.
Wren moved to examine the small box,
being careful not to touch the jar. As she approached, she realized that what
she had taken to be smoke in the jar was in fact black hair. With a shudder,
she realized that the jar contained a severed head. She had no desire to see
another of Lamm’s abominations, so she looked away.
But Nat was not so cautious. “What do
you think this is?” he asked. Before Wren could stop him, he turned the jar to
face him. The hair swirled, and Nat let out a strangled cry and staggered
backwards, landing hard on his butt with his back against the bed. A face came
into view. It was a face he recognized. A face he had seen just a few hours
ago. It was Zellara Esmeranda.
Nat’s cry brought the others into the
room, and they stared in horror at Lamm’s hideous souvenir. “Look at where it’s
at,” Nat choked through his tears, pointing at the jar’s place of honor among
Lamm’s table scraps. “He looked at that while he ate!”
“But how?” Erin stammered. “We just saw
her this afternoon. How did he get to her? How did he get her here? We were
watching all day.”
Wren shook her head sadly. “No, this
didn’t happen today. She’s been dead for weeks.” She looked back down at the
wooden box in her hand. It was well made, and worn, clearly very old. And it
was just the size to hold a Harrow deck.
“But how…” Erin began again, then
stopped. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know.
“This is bad,” Jax muttered darkly.
“Really bad. We need to clean this place out and get the fuck out of here.”
Jax returned to search the large room,
leaving the others to search Lamm’s quarters. Nat turned his attention to the
strongbox. It was secured with a rusty padlock, and a moldy ledger lay on top
of it, its pages rippled from moisture. Nat thumbed through the ledger and his
eyes lit up. “This looks like some sort of accounting, but it’s in some sort of
cipher. If we could decode this, I’ll bet it would be really useful to the
authorities!” He tugged on the lock. “Let’s call Jax and see if he can pick
this lock.”
“We don’t need Jax,” Wren said, raising
her mace.
“Wait! What if there’s …” CRASH.
Wren’s mace removed the lock, and hasp it was secured to.
“… something fragile inside,” Nat
finished meekly.
They raised the lid and began removing the
box’s contents. These appeared to be Lamm’s special treasures, each wrapped
carefully in cloth and tied with twine. There was a small gold ingot, various
pieces of jewelry and small sculptures, and an intricately inlaid cigar box.
One piece was especially odd. It was clearly a dagger or knife of some kind,
with a bone handle and a seven-inch blade, but the blade was formed in the
shape of a key. Nat felt a shudder go through him when he saw it. “Can I see
that?” he asked tentatively, and Shadow handed it over. Nat turned it over in
his hands a few times; the blade was razor sharp. “Ewww. Don’t you know what
this is supposed to be?” The others shook their heads.
“Haven’t you heard of the Key-Lock Killer?
he asked, but only got blank looks. “OK, it was a long time ago – I don’t know,
15, 20 years? But still, it was pretty famous.” Still nothing. “OK, there was
this serial killer in Korvosa, who killed dozens of people. He was called the
Key-Lock Killer because he’d break into locked houses, eviscerate one person in
the family while the rest slept, and leave with all the doors still locked. And
the knives he used were shaped like keys.” He held up the knife from the
strongbox. “Like this.” The lantern light caught something on the back of the
blade. “Hey, I think there’s an inscription on here.” He held the knife close
to the lantern and turned it, squinting to read. “For an inspiration of a father” Nat gulped. “Uh … maybe one of you
ought to keep this.”
“For
my darling Ileosa” she read.
“But isn’t that …” Nat began.
“Ileosa!” Wren gasped.
“But isn’t that …” Nat stammered again.
Tomas nodded. “Our new Queen.”
They all stood in silence, staring at
the royal treasure that had fallen into their hands. Finally Erin broke the
silence. “There’s a maker’s mark on here, too. If we could find out who made
it, maybe we could figure out what to do with it.”
Shadow reached out his hand. “Let me
take a look at that.” Erin handed over the brooch, and he squinted at the back.
“Oh yeah – I know this place. Fancy jewelry store in Citadel Crest, right near
the castle. Nice place.” He tossed the brooch back to Erin, who almost dropped
it in her surprise. Shadow didn’t seem
like the sort to be familiar with jewelers who served royalty.
They wrapped their haul in one of Lamm’s
blankets, and rejoined Jax in the larger room. He was standing over the body of
the dead thug, who he’d stripped of possessions. “Not much of value out here,
or on him,” he said giving the thug a casual kick. They could now see that the
dead man had an elaborate tattoo of a moray eel on his left arm, it’s toothy
mouth open on the back of his hand and its body wrapping up his forearm.
“I did find these, though,” Jax continued.
He pointed to a darkwood coffer and a sack on the floor before him. He opened
the coffer to reveal a couple of dozen small glass vials full of greenish
liquid. He then shook out the sack and dozens more identical vials spilled out.
“Is this what I think it is?” he asked, looking at Shadow.
“Shiver,” he whispered. His voice was
filled with a combination of revulsion and longing.
Jax nodded. “I found the box hidden away
in the cabinets over there, but the sack was sitting out on one of the tables.
Here’s what I think happened. I think the box was Lamm’s inventory on-hand, and
tattoo guy here,” he gave the body another kick, “was making a delivery of new
stock. We must have interrupted the deal. I don’t know what this stuff is worth,
but we didn’t find any cash to speak of, so Lamm must have made off with the
payment. Now we just have to figure out what to do with this.” He waved his hand at the drugs on the floor.
“Oh, there’s no question about that,”
Shadow interjected before anyone else could speak. He began stomping on the
glass vials, shattering them, and kicking the remains into the river, the
spilled drug soaking into the filthy floorboards.
“Damn straight!” agreed Tomas, and
joined Shadow in destroying Lamm’s stash. Within a minute it was all gone.
“Well. I guess that’s out of the way,”
Jax said awkwardly. “Now we need to get the hell out of here as … Hey! What the
fuck are you doing with that?” He was staring open-mouthed at Wren, who had
emerged from Lamm’s room carrying the jar containing Zellara’s head.
“We’re taking her home,” Wren answered
simply. “Now help me find a sack or something to carry this in. It’s heavy.”
“No fucking way are we walking around
with a dead woman’s head!” Jax bellowed. “And no way are we going back to her
place. Don’t you see? It’s a trap!”
“What on earth are you talking about?”
Wren asked.
“This was all a set-up!” Jax tried to
explain. “Don’t you see? She’s been dead! That wasn’t really her sending us
after Lamm – it was someone else! Someone who wanted us here for some reason!
We played right into their plans!”
“Who are ‘they’ and what exactly is their ‘plan’?” Tomas asked patiently.
“Well, it’s … See they probably … I don’t
know!” Jax stuttered. “But somebody went to all the trouble to impersonate her
to get us to come here, so they must have some pretty important reasons.”
Shadow shook his head. “It wasn’t
somebody else. It was her. Her
ghost, or her spirit, or something. She sent us here to avenge her murder, and
her son’s.”
Wren nodded. “Why is that so hard to
believe?”
Jax threw up his hands. He lived in a
world where dead people didn’t come back to ask favors, where if something wasn’t
what it appeared, it meant somebody was running a scam. Now he was surrounded
by a bunch of naïve kids who believed in spooks. If he wasn’t careful, they
were going to get him killed.
Wren was unfazed by Jax’s disapproval. “I
don’t know if we’ve done everything she wanted us to do, but we’re not going to
leave her here, in the place where she was murdered. She’s going home, and we’ll
either bury her there, or I’ll take her to the Gray District and inter her
there.”
“And she did tell us we were welcome to
use her house, whether she was there or not,” Nat added. He was well aware that
he didn’t have a home to go home to.
And so they set out for Zellara’s, Jax
grudgingly, the rest willingly. Wren didn’t seem at all uncomfortable to be
carrying a severed head in a jar, in a sack, tied on her back. (“Oh for heaven’s
sake,” she said as Erin averted her eyes as she lowered the jar into her sack. “It’s
just a head. She’s not going to bite. At least, not for now.” Even Shadow had
to admit that was a little weird.)
They could still hear the sounds of
rioting from various points in the city, and the ruddy glow of flames reflected
off the low-lying clouds. But they managed to avoid any confrontations, at
least for a while. But as they neared Zellara’s, their luck ran out. Ahead of
them, the intersection was blocked by a mob of thugs wielding shovels, chair
legs, and other club-like weapons surrounding a beardless young nobleman. One of
the rioters, a burly woman with greasy strings of hair framing her rotund face,
jeered and addressed the young man in a booming voice, “Bet’cha never worked an
honest day’s wage in your life, didja? M’brother had his arm crushed by a
barrel on the docks when he was younger than you. Never raised a mug of ale
with that wrist again. Wanna know what that feels like?”
The terrified nobleman was not alone. An
older man in the uniform of the Korvosan guard stood with him, his sword drawn
protectively. “You all go on home and sleep it off, and no one will get hurt. Otherwise,
you’ll spend the night in a cell, or worse!”
But the mob was uncowed. “You can go to
hell, Queen’s Man!” someone shouted, and the circle began to tighten around the
pair.
Jax was looking for an alternate route
out of here when Nat spoke up. “Hey!” he exclaimed, peering at the guardsman in
the light of the streetlamps. “I know that guy!”
The party earned 583 XP, putting you at
1,293 XP, oh-so-close to the 1300 required for Level 2. Prepare your level 2
characters – you’ll definitely level up next week. We’ll be back at Rich and
Joette’s
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