060 – Departed
***
“Are you sure this is the right way?” Iiyluzh the Viridescent Blade asked me.
“It’s the right street. We just have to find the building.”
The two of us walked along one of Nettlewreath’s original streets, which now served as an underground canal to transport waste out of the city to the ocean. To either side of this soupy waterway, layers of mold grew over the facades of old buildings. Bugs and rats scurried along the walkways besides us.
“It’s disgusting down here. We should have gone in through the roof.”
“I didn’t think a master of poison would mind a few bad smells.”
I didn’t see why Iiyluzh complained about going through the sewers when I was the one hauling the body. Fownst the Alchemist hung over my shoulder in a burlap bag. We had killed the man, but it wouldn’t do to have him disappear without a trace. He had to die at home in a way that would not arouse the suspicions of the royal Gardeners. Luniquial had been clear on that point.
“This must be his shop,” I said. “Everything downstream from here is dead. He must have dumped his lab wastes straight into the sewer.”
The mold and the mice disappeared past the building’s underground door. A rainbow sheen covered the surface of the bubbling water. The bad smell changed to something less biological in nature but still repugnant.
Iiyluzh used Fownst’s keys to open the door and we slipped inside the basement of the shop. This was the original ground floor of the building, so it had spacious rooms and stone walls, even an old hearth. However this level was prone to flooding. When the river rose, it flushed out the sewers and seeped into the basements. Nothing important could be stored down here. Besides piles of coal, there were barrels with leftover alchemic wastes ready to further pollute the sewer.
We crept up the stairs to the workshop where Frownst had created his elixirs. I unwrapped the dead man, and he stared at me with cold, glassy eyes.
“How are you going to make this death believable?” I asked. “He’s covered in cuts and burns.”
“He’ll need to have a lab accident. It’s a common occurrence with alchemists. They handle dangerous substances, some of which are explosive and highly inflammable. All it takes is one mistake, and poof, the whole place goes up in smoke.” Iiyluzh looked through the jars and bottles and collected the things he needed to commit arson. He dumped powders and thick syrups into a metal cauldron. “Place him in the chair here. His body will burn up to in the resulting fire, leaving only charred bones behind.”
As Iiyluzh mixed the concoction, I looked around the shop. Fownst had gathered a whole catalog of rare reagents, mostly harvested from plants but also some animal parts and minerals. My probes of soul fire revealed they possessed a multitude of aetheric essences. Besides the raw ingredients, the shop also had finished products. Rows of glass vials contained a variety of medicines and elixirs useful for increasing a mage’s natural healing. Under the counter was an iron lockbox heavy with loose coins that jingled inside.
Although I wanted to take the entire contents of this lab back to the citadel with me, including the equipment, what really interested me was the shelf of ancient tomes. Knowledge was the most valuable treasure. The codices had no labels on the spines, so I pulled one out at random and opened the cover. The vellum pages bore complex diagrams and fantastic illustrations of monsters and gods.
“Ah ah, disciple. We can’t pilfer anything from the crime scene. That might tip off the investigators that this death was no accident,” Iiyluzh said as he dribbled distilled alcohol over the corpse. He wanted to make sure the body caught fire.
“I’ve thought of that and brought along decoys.” I pulled a book out of the burlap bag. It was a cheap paper book purchased from one of the local shops. “I can swap these with the real manuals so the shelf looks undisturbed. And most will be ruined by the fire.”
“So you really are interested in the mystic arts of alchemy?” Iiyluzh gave me a sinister grin. The teeth on the right half of his face had gold caps sharpened into points.
“Not the way you do it. I prefer working safely in a lab.”
“All drugs complete their work inside the human body. That’s the final step. With advanced knowledge of the art, one can perform every step, from beginning to end, internally, with no need beakers and glass tubes. The body is the cauldron; the soul is the fire.”
“While you may be correct, I plan to specialize in projection. The augmentation techniques needed to eat poison are too advanced for me. They would divert me from my goal.”
“Bah! Specialized in projection? How foolish. You’ll never be a true alchemist that way.”
“I don’t plan to be. It would be enough for me to learn the basics of the art and create some healing pills for my own use. Since my avoidance of augmentation will limit my healing techniques, alchemic medicines should prove extremely useful for me.”
My explanation, though entirely reasonable and truthful, displeased the assassin. Potions for healing. He sneered at the idea. “An amateur shouldn’t handle such dangerous knowledge. They might get hurt.”
Instantly I withdrew my hand from the books at the shelf. There was something sinister in the way he said those words. My fire extended over the books and sensed a strong presence of rare essences in the pages. “They’re soaked in poison.”
“Ha ha. An old trick to repel bookworms and moths. Better wear gloves.”
Iiyluzh crept close and waved his hands over the bookshelf. He drew one particularly large volume, disregarding the lethal poison, and flipped through its pages. It was an entirely hand written, one of Fownst’s research logs. I saw an illustration of a large tree bearing fruit of different shapes and colors. The tome must have been the old man’s life long study of the toxic Axiol fruit and his development of an antidote.
“This one. This one holds the most dangerous lore of all,” Iiyluzh said. “We’ll return it to its master…”
He tossed the book onto the lap of the corpse. Fownst’s antidote had debilitated Iiyluzh, so he didn’t want the secret of its manufacture to survive its creator. There was no way he’d let another member of the Void Cult learn his weakness.
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“I noticed, disciple, that you did not come to my aid in the battle against Fownst. You stood idly to the side. Why is that?”
“You said you wanted a duel in alchemy. It would have been improper to interrupt.”
“Yes. I suppose it would have been. But is that all?” He leaned in close and narrowed his eyes.
“Besides that, there was also a basic sense of self preservation. Both of you demonstrated your extreme toxicity. Even a stray drop of blood could have killed a novice like me. I didn’t want to get within a dozen paces of either one of you.”
At the end of the duel, Iiyluzh was left half paralyzed on the ground and twitching in pain. It would have been nearly impossible for him to notice my intent to strike him down. The thought only passed my mind for a brief moment. But then again, he was a skilled swordsman, and a paranoid one as well. He might have suspected me.
“Right. Very sensible. Caution will serve you well, young one,” the assassin said. He snapped his fingers and the cauldron burst into flames. Hot sparks cascaded over the entire workshop. “Gather what books you can. It’s time for us to be on our way.”
***
The assassination of Fownst the Alchemist demonstrated to me how infeasible it was for a wizard to live in peace. The old man had given up on fighting. His fire was crippled. He only produced helpful medicines for others. Yet, despite that, we decided he had to die. His arcane knowledge made him a threat to the Void Cult’s operations.
Now I saw why wizards famously lived as hermits in remote sanctuaries. Even an inoffensive area of study, such as alchemic medicine, summoned thieves and assassins. Nowhere was safe. To delve into fields with more practical uses in combat would surely bring mad swordsmen determined to steal those secret techniques for themselves. My own plans to revise the Ancient arts of aetherics would make me a target for any ambitious swordsman.
Even my passing interest in alchemy brought unwanted attention from Iiyluzh the Viridescent Blade, because he couldn’t risk a fellow cultist devising counters to his poisonous techniques. My insistence on being a mere dabbler in the art is what saved me. Without committing to a balanced style between projection and augmentation, the art’s most advanced techniques lay outside my grasp. Had I wished to take the path of an alchemist, Iiyluzh would have either forced me into an apprenticeship or simply left me dead in the sewers of Nettlewreath. The other officers in the Phantoms might have scolded him for carelessly losing a disciple on a mission, but they would have done no more.
From here on, I had to consider how much of my research I shared with others. Being too open could inspire jealousy, curiosity, or fear within the hearts of my fellow cultists.
“Strythe. What the hell are you doing with all that junk?” Zambulon asked me as we got ready to depart for home.
“I’m taking it with me. It’s research material and tools.” I pushed a wheelbarrow out the front door of our rented cottage. The other disciples traveled much lighter than me. They had their bags packed and ready for the voyage.
“You’re going to sink the ship with that load.”
The metal pipes and fixtures I had obtained for cheap in Drainditch made up the heaviest portion of the wheelbarrow’s load. And the collection of books, both stolen and purchased, made up another sizable part. Beyond that I had jars of beeswax, raw glass lumps, semi precious stones, green and blue vitriol, aqua regia, sticky naptha, exotic tree resins, bright red squid ink, and other materials. Knowing that many of them would break or wear out, I bought a number of extra steel tools which I could not easily craft in my own workshop.
“Did you spend the entire improvement fund?” Zambulon asked.
“There’s no telling how long it will be until the next field trip to the capital, and coins don’t do us any improving sitting in a dusty old box.”
Hwilla spoke up. “Strythe didn’t spend it all on himself. We also bought something for you two.” She produced the healing elixir and passed it to Zambulon. “You and Yurk won’t have us juniors to look out for you. So keep this for emergencies.”
Zambulon looked uncomfortable as he accepted the gift. “Uh. Thank you. That’s very thoughtful of you.”
“And I got you a present too, Yurk. It’s not as expensive, but I hope you like it.” She gave him a lumpy bag, which he immediately tore into. “It’s just rubber balls. I bought them from a pair of jugglers in the entertainment district. We were never allowed to play sports before, but now that you’re going to be a full fledged swordsman, you can do whatever you like.”
Yurk immediately started bouncing one of the balls one the toe of his boot. He kicked it off the cottage wall and caught it in the bag. A natural jock like Yurk could never resist an inflatable rubber ball. Hwilla had a good eye for gift giving.
“Alright then. There’s no more avoiding it, juniors. We have to get to the ship.”
I pushed my wheelbarrow behind the three disciples as we headed for the main gate and the docks. They walked slowly, not for my benefit but because they didn’t look forward to the long voyage home in the company of the cult’s number one assassin. The Viridescent Blade disgusted and frightened them.
On the docks, we met with the captain a large fishing boat who was headed for Mournhaven. He was one of the older Faceless who had assumed a civilian identity working away from the citadel. Most of the time he lived undercover, gathering information and patiently waiting for instructions. The captain showed us to the cramped cabin where we would stay for the trip around Brimwater Bay.
Iiyluzh had already moved into the cabin. He smoked dried herbs from his long pipe. The disciples were not happy to find him there.
“Good morning, young ones,” he said while rising from his swaying hammock. “So these are the fresh new faces in our little organization. I’ve been away so long, there’s been a changing of the guard.”
“Greetings, Master Iiyluzh,” Zambulon said.
“And you must be the boys ready to graduate. Luniquial told me about you two.” He slithered around the two senior disciples. “Yurk is it? I’m glad to see that not all the young people have rejected the method of augmentation. It seems you’re already on your way. And Zambulon? You have a strong inner fire. You must both be talented to have come so far with that lazy bastard Putrizio as an instructor. He probably hasn’t shown you how to do much more than lace your boots. If you’d like, I could give you some lessons in swordcraft to amend his negligent training.”
“Thank you for the offer, but we’ll pass. Neither of us have a taste for alchemy,” Zambulon said coolly “We saw Jrag’s body before the funeral.”
“Ah! Poor Jrag. I had high hopes for that one. He was a good apprentice while he lasted. It was a true misfortune to lose him. Such a shame.”
Iiyluzh pulled back from the senior disciples, abandoning his recruitment attempts. It would be hard to convince one of the Faceless to work with him, because they remembered what had happened to the previous apprentices. All died by poison. Iiyluzh would be better off finding some a swordsman from outside the cult who hadn’t seen the bloated corpses of those who failed to digest the unholy Axiol fruit.
“Alas. It seems as though I’ll never find a worthy successor to the Black Scorpion Sect. No one will inherit my techniques or carry on our ancient traditions.”
The Void Phantoms seemed to be an unusual case for organizations of swordsmen. Most sects and schools taught one way of fighting to all their disciples, whereas we encouraged everyone to develop their individual styles. And we also adopted rejects and refugees from other sects. Zambulon had run away from his sect before joining the Phantoms. The witches practiced styles based on their daemonic familiars. And Iiyluzh came from a nearly extinct sect of poison-eating assassins that he tried in vain to continue. Dark Lord Hrolzek hired all sorts of freaks while never teaching his own brand of swordcraft: necromancy.
“Has our ‘boss’ ever taken an apprentice?” I asked.
“No. Never,” Iiyluzh scoffed. “No one has ever dared to ask. And even if he accepted one, they would undergo a training a thousand times more perilous than my own. There is no poison more bitter than death itself…”