45.

The dragon lay curled in a festive ball of light in the middle of the table as Erak slowly pulled his gauntlets off. He’d been stuck in the armor for most of the day and the thought of breathing freely was too enticing to miss. He sat down the heavy gloves and then pulled the helm free of his head, before getting up to walk behind the polished bar.

He ignored the gasps and looks of disgust from the patrons wedged into the bar as he found a pitcher of water and began to clean himself off, leaning over a sink as he poured water over his head and ran his dirty, blood caked fingers through his shaven scalp. Dried sweat, blood, and other things, pooled down and off of his head, mixing into a thick slurry at the bottom of the sink.

He grabbed a stiff bristle brush and cleaned his hands, swirling the brush in the half empty pitcher of water and watching as it turned black as his pale hands were slowly revealed. Dumping the water he found that the sink still worked, so he rinsed out the pitcher and then filled it before quaffing it down in a few hearty swigs. He kept the brush and refilled the pitcher again, before looking around the bar.

He found what he was looking for and smiled as he grabbed the bag and marched back to the table with the princess and her closest followers. Pomp was doing a decent, if embellished, job on reporting what had happened on the Sword of Empire and their rapid descent down to the Red-Light District. Erak hooked a chair leg with his boot and sat down gently on the thin wood.

He grabbed a gauntlet and began to clean, his hands nimble over the thick metal as he cleaned the crevices of flesh, blood, dirt, bone, and anything else that had managed to get stuck in them. He glanced through his eyelashes and saw the mix of horrified looks all fixed on him as the pile of gristle piled up in front of him.

“Then Erak beat her to death with his fists. The rush of Essence was exhausting, it forced me to grow at an alarming rate and I needed to sleep to consolidate my gains. When I woke up we were here!” Pomp finished the story.

“The fuck happened to his face?” a woman whispered to her companion, just a bit too loudly in the crowd. Erak reached over and plucked a roasted and heavily salted peanut out the bag he had looted and popped it into his mouth, shell and all. He crushed down with his molars and enjoyed the creature comfort for a moment. He put down the finished gauntlet and grabbed the next one.

Illyria was too well trained to let her expression change, but there was a light in her eyes as she stared down at the flat and glossy skin on his neck, the burn marks so evident in the blue-light of the bar. Erak cleaned the second gauntlet while he listened to them plan.

“We have nearly five hundred people down here. Maybe more will crawl free of wherever they found to hide as we begin to leave. Will we be able to make our way to the Armory with that large of a group?” Illyria asked. Erak shook his head immediately while Pomp explained.

“The demons are constricted here with the tight streets and the old stone buildings. The smoke is rising and leaving this hollow relatively unharmed as the fires are being kept to the upper levels. The wider boulevards will give the demons more room to attack us as a large group and we’d likely be overwhelmed in short order,” Pomp finished with a sigh and a cloud of vapor rose around his head.

Erak activated his new ability and Pomp yelped as Essence filled the dragon, his ethereal body becoming tightly corded muscle and power. Pomp rose and whirled on Erak, eyes wide with surprise and then he eyed Erak’s sack of peanuts. His long head darted for the open bag and Erak caught the dragon’s thick neck with one hand and held him there.

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“Ok, I understand. No stealing Erak’s food,” Pomp muttered, voice muffled by Erak’s palm.

“What just happened?” one of the courtesans asked as the entire crowd moved closer to the sinuous dragon. A hand went and stroked his frill and Pomp blossomed with joy as he leapt into a woman’s arms and nestled into her silk gown as she let out a shriek of delight.

“He’s cold!”

“He’s an ice dragon,” Illyria said with a roll of her eyes. The crowd left as they cooed over Pomp as he preened for them. Someone had found some food and were feeding the dragon pieces of leftover meals and beer and the spirit was enjoying himself. Erak set down the brush and gauntlet and relaxed now that most of the eyes had left.

“New ability I assume?” Illyria asked. Erak nodded and ate another peanut. He looked at the thin and dirty princess with deep bags under her eyes, the weight of command and the tragedy of the day weighing on her evident. Erak looked at his diminishing bag of peanuts and sighed quietly. He offered her the bag with a quick shake.

Illyria smiled and snaked a handful of the precious commodity before leaning back in her chair. She threw a whole peanut in her mouth and chewed slowly. She was better behaved than her brother at least, Erak thought. He had just stolen the peanuts.

“So we can’t cross the city to the safety to the Armory. I refuse to leave my people, and you refuse to leave here without me. So, where does that leave us?” Erak waited a moment thinking. He smiled and shrugged before pointing down. Illyria frowned for a moment and then her own eyebrows crept up.

“Are you suggesting that I somehow corral half a thousand, whores, club goers, bartenders, and random people, into the sewers?”

Erak nodded.

“Have you been in the sewers since this started?”

Erak nodded again.

“And it’s safe?”

“Safer than the streets. It’s dangerous. Monsters are in there. Maybe undead. No demons when we were there,” Erak signed to her.

“Most of these people are dressed in silk Erak. They don’t have a mountain of steel on them to protect them from monsters. Even my crew, who had their gear, aren’t well equipped for this. It’s miles from here to the Armory, all underground and in the dark.”

“Sewers glow now, you can see.” Erak corrected her.

“Oh, that changes everything,” she leaned back and ate another of his peanuts.

“Sewers or you sit here waiting to die. Palace and Armory are the last defended spots in the city that I know of. Other holdouts like you are possible. Won’t survive tomorrow without strong walls and warriors to man them,” Erak signed.

“I know that. I’ve done some time as a mercenary in the Badlands. Well, as much as a princess can be a mercenary. I know a shit situation when I see it. Normally I’m on the other side of this. Not a fan of being besieged if I’m being honest.”

“No one is,” Erak said as he ate the last peanut. He looked about and saw that Pomp was still the center of attention.

“When dawn comes, we leave. Sleep now, consolidate your power. Let me eat something, drink some water, and use the head. Then I will hold the streets so you can rest,” Erak said.

“Sleep is that important? Pomp said the same thing,” Illyria said.

“It made me feel whole. Just a few hours and it made my body feel natural with all of its new power. Your core group, go and sleep.”

“Fine. You go and take care of business and I’ll organize some shifts. Get people sleeping and eating. Pack up whatever we have, and then as dawn arrives, we enter the sewers.”

Erak grabbed his helmet and poured the last of the water over it, letting it spill across the floor of the club before grabbing the brush and violently scrubbing everything off of it. The inside had begun to smell something fierce.