Anton cleaned his sword on the tunic of a dead thief. The easy part was over.
Maybe not entirely. Anton couldn’t guarantee there wasn’t some gang member still hiding in the building. But no more were coming. Zaphar had assured him that the building only had one entrance, so it should be a while before any reinforcements showed up.
Unless they had an exit on the roof, or to the sewers. Zaphar couldn’t check for that.
“Tyla, Aris—” he started. Then he coughed and cleared his throat. When had he gotten hoarse? He vaguely remembered starting to scream orders to the others in the heat of battle. Then just screaming… he shook his head.
“Can you check if anyone got out through the roof?” he asked. Tyla’s senses and Aris’s firepower. A good two-person combination. “Kelsey, can you check for a sewer exit?”
“Secret passages leading into the dark beneath?” Kelsey said brightly. “My specialty!”
“You two are with me,” he said to Lyra and Syrena. The least frightening of everyone here… though that wasn’t saying much. Both of them had more than a little blood on them, and Lyra was just now finishing off one of the fallen gang members.
“That… isn’t a Doxy Trait, is it?” he asked uneasily. The smooth and efficient way she slid her sword through the man’s ribs was either a Trait or a lot of training.
Lyra’s green eyes flashed as she looked up at him. “Hunter’s Trait,” she said. “Mercy Kill.”
“Oh, good,” Anton said, unaccountably relieved that Doxy didn’t provide a Trait to help the classholder kill clients in their sleep. “We’re going to see to the children. None of them should have classes, so try not to overreact. They’ll probably try to rush us when we open the door.”
Lyra nodded and carefully cleaned her sword off. Stabbing through the heart, Anton noted, greatly reduced the amount of blood spilling out of the corpse. It was the sort of thing that he should have known, but the majority of his kills had been from creatures already dead.
Syrena watched Lyra closely and then followed her example.
“Are you all right?” Anton asked her.
She nodded. “It’s not that much different from killing zombies,” she said. “I froze a few times back in the monster room; and threw up once. But it got me ready for this.”
Anton nodded, put away his sword and drew out the light stone. The rooms had been poorly lit by lanterns suspended from the ceiling, but the stone cast a strong white radiance around him. Ignoring how the new light source made all the bodies around him seem more real, Anton strode to the one door that hadn’t been opened during the fight.
Listening intently, Anton thought he could hear quiet sobbing from behind it.
“I’m going to open the door now,” he called. “Don’t panic, we’re not here to hurt you.”
There wasn’t any response, but he hadn’t expected one. The door was barred, but it was barred from this side, so it was easily opened. There was only darkness beyond.
Not willing to put himself at a tactical disadvantage, even against children, Anton tossed the stone into the room. It lit up an open area, surrounded by shadowy structures that looked like bunk beds. Four stacks on each side, looking to be about three beds high.
Anton paused to let his eyes get used to the darkness. “The first thing is, you’re no longer prisoners here.”
He waited for a response, but it took a while. Finally, someone spoke up.
“Yer still ‘tween us un der door.”
Anton blinked at the heavily accented Elitran. He struggled with it for a moment, but he got the gist.
“Just for the moment,” he said. “I don’t want you all running out into the night. Some of you have homes to go to.”
“Na all’ve us.”
“No. Sorry about that,” Anton said helplessly. “I’m told that some of you were snatched off the street, and that you want to go back to your old haunts. Is that true?”
There were a few murmurs, but nothing that could be called a response. Anton tried again.
“Can anyone who wants to just run, to go back to the streets, come forward into the light?” he asked.
It took a while, but they came forward, in dribs and drabs. Eventually, nine kids, all boys, stood where he could see them. They looked back at him warily.
“If you want to leave now, that’s fine,” Anton said. “Walk, don’t run. If you want to go through the pockets of the people on the floor, that’s fine too. You’ll need money.”
He stepped away from the door, gesturing for the girls to get out of the way as well.
“Yer just lettin’ us go? Why?” One of the boys demanded.
“I want to help you,” Anton said. “Whether that’s finding your parents or helping you find a way to live. If you don’t want my help, though, the best I can do is show you the way out.”
“Can you really find mum and dad?” somebody said from the darkness.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
“I can help you do that,” Anton said. “You’re going to have to tell me where you live.”
Some of the nine looked doubtful, but one of them strode confidently forward. His gait stuttered when he got within arms length of Anton, but he recovered and walked through the door.
Seeing that he made it, the others started walking as well. Some of them started to run, but just a cough from Anton stopped them.
Mixed shouts of dismay and delighted started sounding from outside, as the kids were shocked by the dead bodies and delighted by the treasures they held.
“Are you sure it’s fine for them to be robbing corpses?” Syrena asked.
Anton shrugged. “I think that those ones have seen, maybe done, worse,” he said.
“It’s our booty, though,” Lyra muttered. “Spoils of war and all that.”
“Leave the corpses to Kelsey,” Anton said. He turned back to the hidden kids.
“How many of you think they have homes to go to?” he asked. “Come forward.”
Seven came into the light this time.
“How many of you think you could find your home at night time?” Anton asked gently. No one spoke up, but several of them shook their heads doubtfully.
“All right then, this is what we’re going to do,” Anton said. “We’re going to take you back to our hideout, and tomorrow we’re going to go out and look for your parents. Is that okay with you?”
They nodded nervously.
“Come forward then,” Anton said. “Who does that leave?”
He could see a couple of kids still in the darkness, whispering to each other.
“If you just plan on escaping when we leave, you missed a prime looting opportunity,” Anton said. “We won’t be leaving any corpses behind.”
The two kids stepped forward. “We da have homes,” one of them said. “But we da want ta go back ta the street.”
“You want my help,” Anton said.
“Ya said you would,”
“Sure,” Anton agreed. “For now, food and a bed. I’ll tell you about Kirido and you can decide later if you want to come with us.”
“Fine.”
You have reached Level 2.
Please select a new Trait
Please allocate two free Ability points.
Anton wasn’t sure if the level came from the two kids accepting his help, or if it had just been waiting for him to relax. He let the girls organise themselves and the kids for the trip back while he considered his options.
Applying Benefits for Level 2
Strength + 1
Toughness + 1
Agility + 1
Dexterity + 1
Perception + 1
Willpower + 1
Charisma + 1
Assign free points:
He went with Strength and Dexterity for his free points. That wouldn’t get him close to Al-Kadir, but it was a start in the right direction. And having a balanced Agility and Dexterity was generally considered a good idea for an adventurer.
Available Traits: Sense Peril | Sense Degradation | Sense Destiny | Danger Sense
Anton boggled at the options before him. The first Trait for a Tier Three class was generally sense-based, but what were these?
Danger Sense, at least, he knew. This was an old standby from Adventurer. Useful, and probably offered here as a second chance to take it. As a Tier Two trait, it was probably strictly inferior to the other three… but what did they do?
Peril was just a synonym for Danger, so on the face of it, the two were the same Trait. When that happened, Anton knew, it tended to mean that it was a similar trait that could be described by the same name. Since it was Tier Three, Anton decided that it had to be a better version of Danger Sense. Either it saw further in advance, or the threats it could detect were expanded somehow.
Sense Degradation sounded creepy, but when he turned it around and started thinking about what his Class needed, it made sense. This sense would lead him right to situations like the one he’d just found. Bountiful sources of experience. It sounded great, but Anton was worried that while they were in Denasti it would be going off non-stop.
That left Sense Destiny… which was probably the one that Kesley would want him to take. Or would she? She’d admitted that she wanted to tag along with him, wherever his path took him, but she’d been coy about where she thought that would be.
If she didn’t know, then she’d want him to take the trait, the better to lead her there. If she did know and was keeping it from him, she probably wouldn’t want him to take the Trait, the better to keep him in the dark.
Anton thought about asking Kelsey what she thought, to gain some insight into what she knew… but she’d probably see through that trap and choose what she said on how she thought he would react… she was better at that game than him. He resolved to choose without consulting her.
Thinking about Kelsey’s plans put it all in stark contrast. Danger—or peril— was something that would make itself known eventually. As long as he was alert he could see it in time. He could find his own sources of experience— Denasti wasn’t exactly lacking them.
His destiny, though, was where he was completely lost. He didn’t know what it meant, let alone what it was. If he ever wanted to catch up with Kelsey, then that was what he needed more information on.
I choose Sense Destiny, he thought.
He had thought there would be an immediate difference, that he’d suddenly see the way forward. Nothing changed, though. He didn’t feel any tug, any call to action.
Did I dupe myself into taking a dud? He wondered. The other two options had seemed pretty good. He sighed and decided to see what the future would bring him.
----------------------------------------
“My boy, my boy, my beautiful boy! You brought him back!” Dimr’s mother was monopolising hugging the boy, which left the father free to shake Anton’s hand effusively, tears in his eyes.
“Thank you, a thousand thanks, kind stranger.”
“It’s nothing,” Anton said. “I ran into a den of thieves and I couldn’t exactly leave him where I found him.”
“Please, you must stay. We will hold a feast in your honour, and give thanks for the return of our son!”
“I can’t stay,” Anton demurred. “There were other kids trapped there, and I have to get along and find their parents as well.”
“Then money! We offered a reward, you must have it!”
“I don’t need it,” Anton said. “Your joy is reward enough. Keep the money, spend it on your son.”
“Haha…” the man laughed, tears in his eyes. “We will, surely. But there must be something we can do for you, some way to show our gratitude!”
“Well…” Anton said. “You could get the full story out of your son, and then take it to the Guard.”
“The Guard! Bah! Of what use are they? We went to them before, and they did nothing!”
“There’s not much they can do,” Anton explained. “Some kid goes missing, how are they going to find him? And it’s not like the Fisher’s territory is near here.”
“That’s true,” the father said, frowning. “We have heard of the Fisher gang, but this is not their territory.”
“The Fishers are still out there,” Anton said. “I cleared out one workshop, but they will rebuild and start grabbing kids again.”
The father growled, deep in his throat. “And we are helpless to stop them! The guard does nothing, cares nothing for us!”
“I think it might care,” Anton said, “If enough citizens complained. I’m returning seven boys to their parents today. If they all tell their friends what happened, and who did it, and they all complain to the Guard…”
“They might do something,” the father said thoughtfully. “Even if they have taken money to do nothing.”
“Tell your friends. Tell everyone,” Anton said. “I don’t know if it will work. But if the Guard set their mind to it, they can take the Fishers down.”