Chapter 5 Found It.

A half an hour before Lenny’s arrival, at the cafe Isaac and Lenna were waiting at, Lenny had been watching Tic’s Trinkets like a hawk. He had lost sight of James four minutes before he decided to make a move. Walking up to the front door of the pawn shop Lenny pulled on the door only to find it locked. A second later the latch was undone and the middle aged clerk opened the door. “Sorry about that. I had to step out for a moment.” The clerk said amiably. “Do come in.” He opened the door completely and stepped out of the way.

Lenny was rooted in place. His fear had been confirmed and he also knew that he was a worse fighter than his brother. If his brother was beaten so easily then it meant that he stood no chance. There was only one option left for the young rogue. Run. Run to Isaac. Lenny took off in a dead sprint like the archfiends were on his heels. There was no point in hiding the fact that they had been caught snooping if they already had James. He could only hope that Isaac would be able to clean everything up even with Mr. Nobody aware of their presence.

“Stop! Thief!” The clerk yelled after Lenny. It wouldn’t have made sense for him to chase a random guy down the street. Especially considering his position as the clerk of a pawn shop. A few people turned to look at Lenny but he was already gone by the time anyone realized that he was supposedly a thief running from the victim of supposedly his most recent theft. Once he was far enough away Lenny ducked through a side street as quickly as he could before walking out the other side as if nothing had happened. He then walked as fast as he could to meet Isaac, Lenna, and presumably Thomas without drawing too much attention.

—

“They got James.” Lenny told Isaac who straightened in his chair. Lenny was breathing hard but measured. “They got him and I couldn’t even see what happened. He went to leave but the door never opened. He was just gone.”

Isaac shared a look with Lenna. “It looks like we’ve been made.” He told Lenna. “If they noticed me and got James then I worry about Thomas.”

“What’s plan B?” Lenna asked.

“You won’t like it.” He told her. She frowned. If he said that she wouldn’t like it then that meant only one thing. “We split up. I’ll go after James and see if I can’t find a trail. You go to Thomas and make sure he’s alive. If he is then meet me at the trinket place.”

Lenna did not look pleased but she did as directed. She put her helmet on and started off in a brisk walk towards the bar on the west side of town. “Be. Careful.” She ordered Isaac before she left.

“You too.” He replied and then turned to Lenny. “How’s your parkour?”

“My what?” Lenny asked.

“I’m taking the rooftops. Meet me at the trinket shop.” Isaac directed and teleported onto the top of a nearby building. Most of the rooftops were flat and quite a few of them were used in place of a deck. A few were even occupied. Isaac ignored them as he ran and teleported from rooftop to rooftop.

Isaac was at the pawn shop in a little over five minutes. He had made sure not to run out of mana but was down to a quarter by the time he arrived. He teleported into the building as he hid himself in his shadowcloak. The clerk was behind the counter. There was no one else in the store so Isaac was free to do as he pleased. Isaac walked up behind the clerk and put him in a headlock while coating him in his shadowcloak. The man struggled and squirmed while trying to pry Isaac’s arm off of his neck. Isaac only clamped harder. He drug the man into the back and inside one of the side rooms. Once inside he put the glowing stones that were lighting the room into his Inventory and tossed the man to the floor.

While the clerk coughed and struggled to get enough oxygen to his brain Isaac sealed the room off in a layer of shadows. Their ‘conversation’ was going to be a quick and quiet one. “Where is the man that was in here half an hour ago?” Isaac demanded. The man struggled to get up to his hands and knees but Isaac kicked him hard in the ribs causing him to drop back onto his face a few feet from where he originally was. “I’m in a rush so answer me before I start taking fingers.”

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The clerk continued to cough for a few more seconds and Isaac was getting impatient. “It won’t matter. I won’t talk.” He wheezed out. “They’ll find you.”

Isaac called out Kahtesh and the dragon grabbed the man by the arm and drug him back over to Isaac. The dragon ignored the man’s cries of pain and weak punches. Kahtesh held the clerk’s arm in a way that raised his hand up towards Isaac. Isaac gripped the hand with one of his and then grabbed one of the clerks fingers with the other. “Three seconds.” Isaac told the clerk. The clerk went to reply but Isaac cut him off. “Three.” He ran death flames through the finger in his hand and then grabbed another one. The first one tumbled to the ground as nothing but a black cloud of dust.

“Fuck. You.” The clerk cursed him through gritted teeth and watering eyes.

“That’s not what I asked.” Isaac replied and removed another finger. “What did you do with James?”

“Kill yourself.” The clerk continued defiantly.

Isaac removed another finger. “You have until you run out of fingers before I start only burning off your skin and healing it back with potions.” Isaac warned. The man didn’t reply so Isaac took another finger. The man’s cries of pain were loud enough that without the sound dampening of Isaac’s shadows he would have hurt his ears. “That was my informant you abducted.” Isaac explained. “I don’t like people taking my things.” He removed another finger.

“I’ll talk just, just stop.” The clerk said. It sounded like the man was delirious from the pain.

Isaac tsked and let go of the hand. He bent down and grabbed the man’s face with one hand. He pulled a glowing stone out of his Inventory with the other and held it next to the man’s face so he could get a good look at Isaac. Isaac’s scowl was filled with uncontrolled rage seeped in violence. “Where did you take him?” He demanded.

The man locked eyes with Isaac and the fear was clear in them but there was some resolve left. “To… the… ninth… layer of hell you bas-” He was cut off by his own scream as Isaac ran death flames along the inside of the hand that was holding the man’s face.

Isaac set the stone down and pulled his healing potion out of Inventory before pouring it onto the man’s face. The decayed and rotted skin smoked and sizzled as the potion tried to do its job. The man continued to scream and writhe in agony for nearly half a minute before the potion was done trying to put his face back together. In the end, half of the clerk’s face was new and raw skin while the rest was perfectly fine. “I’m running out of patience.” Isaac spoke evenly and grabbed the man’s face again. “Answer me.”

The man’s eyes weren’t focusing on anything anymore and were just wandering around aimlessly. His neck was limp as was the rest of his body. Isaac took out a waterskin and dumped it on the man’s face. It seemed to bring him back to his senses slightly. “She’ll get you.” He whispered out but his eyes still wouldn’t focus on Isaac. Isaac’s face turned up in a snarl. “She’ll get you.” The man repeated.

Isaac threw him down and sent Kahtesh back into the void. “Damnit!” Isaac swore and kicked the man again before collecting his shadows and shrouding himself in his shadowcloak. Isaac moved through the rest of the building like a wraith. He ignored walls and doors. He found the room with the missing paperwork but no traces of James. He threw all of the paperwork into his Inventory and paced around the bottom floor. After the few minutes to cool off he started talking to himself again: “I have to be missing something. How do they get people out of here once they are in? A secret door or a teleportation circle.” He checked the exterior walls by dragging his sword across them but he found nothing amiss.

He looked down at the floor. It had to be a trapdoor but where it was Isaac had no idea. “Fine.” Isaac said and pulled all of his shadows into himself to help top off his mana reserves. No hidden wards triggered so he went along with his plan. Pure, raw, dark mana poured out of him and forced its way into the floor. He swept the entirety of the bottom floor of the building with enough mana that Alexander almost had a heart attack in his tower from the sudden ripple of power. Unfortunately for Isaac his mana didn’t reveal any illusions.

Isaac pulled as much of the mana back into himself as he could. There was always a lot of waste but some return was better than none. Right at that moment the door to the shop flew open as Lenny burst in panting. “Hey, boss, find, anything?” He asked though deep breaths. It was clear that he had run there from where Isaac had left him. The rogue didn’t have the ability to go in a straight line from point A to point B like Isaac could nor could he teleport so it had taken him a lot longer to arrive.

Isaac frowned and shook his head. “Nothing.” He replied with suppressed irritation. He wanted to meet up with Lenna not get stuck there turning the building upside down. “There’s no illusions hiding the trapdoor.” He explained. “It has to be purely physical but I can’t find it.”

“Trapdoor?” Lenny asked.

Isaac nodded. “That is the only way out of here other than the front door.” He replied.

Lenny started tearing the building apart from the inside to try and find the trap door. Eventually he found his way into the room the clerk was left in. The clerk had bled out but it was clear who had attacked him. There was black dust scattered around and floating in the drying blood. The missing fingers were crusted with it as well and the man’s face looked like it had been removed and healed back. No other injury looked quite like weak magical healing and the only way to heal something was if it was damaged or removed in the first place. Lenny recoiled at the confined scents of death and decay that were trapped in the sideroom. He looked over at Isaac with a wrinkled face from the smell and a raised eyebrow in question.

“He wasn’t helpful.” Isaac replied. “Kept telling me to kill myself and that ‘she’ would find me.”

Lenny nodded. “I see.” He replied and moved on. When they arrived at the bathroom Lenny started tearing at the medicine cabinet. After a few rattles it popped off the wall. He pushed it to the side and revealed a wall passage. “Found it.”