Inside the dimly lit keep, a shadow flitted from one hiding spot to the next. Behind tapestries, suits of armor, and darkened corners, Ilvara kept herself out of sight as she followed the trail. Her ability to detect magical signatures had weakened since they arrived in Adelgard, no doubt thanks to the vampire’s foul magic, but still she could sense something in the building. More than one signature, actually. Not just Rozena, but the vampires and their magical auras were all around her.
To progress forward, she had no choice but to try and meld her physical and mental tracking abilities to hone in on the right person. As she moved through the halls, her eyes gravitated from following the human tracks on the ground to also keeping an eye out for any guards. As of yet, she hadn’t encountered anyone. Not any vampires, nor any thralls. It was slightly disconcerting, as if they were waiting to spring some sort of trap, but she forced herself to press on.
There really wasn’t any sense in turning back at this point.
The tracks she followed had a distinct size and gait to them that matched the same trail she picked up near the tent. Judging by the shape of them, they were of a small duine female, presumably Rozena. The elf felt that luck was on her side. If the attackers had decided to carry or drag the girl away, this trail wouldn’t have been so easy to follow.
They didn’t have any reason to believe such a trail would be left behind, and they surely felt confident that their plans to cover up the kidnapping would succeed against any sort of human investigation. Unfortunately for them, they earned the ire of a Geevshey pathfinder. She would make them regret that.
It was down a flight of stairs that she encountered her first guard. Another human thrall, formerly a guard. This one had a slightly different uniform than the rest. He wore less armor, had some sort of club or flail instead of a polearm, and most importantly, a big keychain on his hip. Considering the usual layout of duine castles, she had to assume she was near a dungeon of some kind, which made this man a jailor.
At the moment, he was sitting alone at a small table, with another closed door just beyond him. This room seemed to be some sort of break room for the men of the castle, with other chairs and tables with foodstuffs and drink littered around. It was a place she expected to find more guards and so she found it eerily quiet, just as the upstairs had been.
Watching him from the darkened stairwell, her unease grew as she realized he was simply staring straight ahead at the far wall, like some sort of shambler. He sat there barely blinking, only taking shallow breaths. The man seemed to be hiding some great discomfort. No doubt the rot was eating away at him from the inside, the transformation into ghoul edging closer and closer.
From her pack she procured a trio of throwing knives and deftly placed them between her fingers. Taking but a moment to aim, the elf narrowed her eyes and focused. With a flick of her wrist, she sent the knives flying into the air on a crash course with her target. The thrall took its last breath, stifling a gasp as the sharpened blades pierced his neck and head. He collapsed onto the floor, dark liquid pouring out from his wounds. She quickly entered the room and grabbed his keys off of him. They would come in handy.
To the next door she went, and was satisfied to find it unlocked. On the opposite end she found what she’d expected to find—a dungeon. Rows of poorly lit, barren, and decrepit cells lined either side of the long tunnel-like room that seemed to stretch on for ages. No guards there either, so she slowly crept forward, on the lookout for any signs of life in the cells.
Nothing, not a single person. She felt a growing sense of frustration as she eyed multiple sets of tracks littering the floor there. Prisoners had occupied these cells, some fairly recently, but at some point they’d been taken away. She doubted their fate had been anything pleasant. No doubt a meal for the vampires up above.
Ilvara pressed further, her frown growing deeper every cell she passed with no one inside of it. Before long the trail went cold, and she hit a wall. An actual stone wall in this case, the end of the dungeon. No Rozena, she’d been misled somehow.
Yet, as she knelt to get a closer look at the glowing tracks, she felt the faint scent of magic not far from her. Closely examining the trail she noticed the girl had been made to stand still there, both her feet paired right next to each other instead of one in front of the other. Meaning Rozena had been forced to wait while her captors did something. Question being, what?
Ilvara grunted, she despised the idea of a secret passageway being her obstacle now. She hated puzzles, especially ones so contrived as a human-made trap door. Still, it was the only lead she had, and so the elf began to gingerly feel along the wall for something out of place. Thankfully, it didn’t take long, as she caught the faint glow of a set of fingertips on a slight indent in the wall. One brick was just slightly out of place, how predictable.
She pressed the stone block further into the wall and was rewarded with a satisfying click. The wall gave way with a low rumble, covering the ground in dust as it sank into the ground. Either a complex mechanism or a magical solution, but still impressive nonetheless. She doubted Alistair or the Brianca girl would have deduced the location, or any human for that matter. Only through trial and error and a ton of manpower searching through the castle would they have found that door, and by then it would probably be too late to save the girl.
It could still be too late, Ilvara thought as she stared down the hidden passage. She readied her daggers and proceeded further into the dark, toward the source of magic, a sense of unease growing in her stomach.
----------------------------------------
Alistair stepped over the dead guards left at the castle’s gate. No doubt Ilvara’s handiwork, he mused, a frown growing beneath his helm. He would have preferred to have them live and be cured of whatever power had gotten hold of them but, judging by the severity of the infection around the neck bite, these men were close to death's door.
Brianca knelt to get a closer look, her expression hidden beneath the blackened armor. After a while she shook her head, clearly upset.
“How barbaric,” she muttered, almost seething. “These men never stood a chance against this kind of plague, or power, or—” Brianca paused, growing frustrated. “—Or whatever it is these monsters did to them. An absolute travesty they could get this far without anyone noticing.”
“Agreed,” Alistair replied, his focus on the keep ahead. No other guards were around. A skeleton crew, though he hoped not literally. “We aren’t here to rescue just Rozena any longer, I’m afraid. The worst is yet to come.”
“The viscount himself could even be a hostage.”
“We can’t allow ourselves to be tricked or swayed.” Alistair steadied his grip on the pike and shield, as he’d transformed back to Aegis. He said it more for himself than for her. This was far beyond what he’d expected to find in Adelgard of all places. “Our duty is clear. Destroy the undead in this city, no matter what.”
“Of course,” Brianca said, at his side again. “We best not keep your friend waiting. She seems keen on getting herself into trouble. Why wouldn’t she wait for us?”
Alistair shrugged as he marched over to the keep. “I don’t know, but I do trust her. She’s smart, smarter than me at least.”
“You should give yourself more credit, Sir Alistair.” Brianca’s northern accent sounded oddly pleasant to his ears. It was less harsh than the southern tongue, more flowy and sophisticated sounding, though that might have been from her noble background. “It took more than simple courage to plead your case like you did in Isenfell. And even more to stand up for your friend when no one else would. Without your resolve to see this through, we never would have made it here in time.”
“We may still be too late, Brianca.” They stood in front of the set of large wooden doors leading to the inner keep. He hesitated, gathering his thoughts. “I’ve already had one run-in with overconfidence, and it’ll last me a lifetime. Let’s just get in there and finish this.”
“As you say.”
The doors were pushed open without much effort. There was no time for the subtlety Ilvara no doubt employed when she entered. Inside of the building, the lowborn was reminded of his last visit there. He only vaguely remembered the layout, but the more time he spent in castles, he found them easier and easier to navigate.
Besides, Brianca seemed more than willing to lead the way. She suggested they head further in to find the viscount first and took off in a sprint down one hall. Given that they had no way of knowing which way Ilvara went or what she was up to, it seemed they would have to operate independently for now. Alistair picked up the pace, his red body thundering down the passage with heavy footfalls echoing throughout.
Their lack of stealth was oddly left unchallenged. No guards, no servants, not even any signs of a struggle. Everything remained quiet and still like the city outside. This false tranquility only added to the tension Alistair was feeling. As if it was all building up to blow up in their faces at the worst possible moment.
Brianca seemed to have been leading him toward the viscount’s personal chambers, passing what he believed to be the audience chamber and various other offices and rooms scattered throughout the keep. Things were going well until she came to a skidding stop ahead of him, and she became deathly still. The red giant slowed in its pace, curious what the hold up was. At that moment, he heard something.
Raucous, unchallenged laughter coming from somewhere nearby. The voice wasn’t familiar, and whoever they were certainly didn’t sound friendly or welcoming. Beneath their elated cries was a musical score being played—a somber, foreboding orchestral piece. The music gave rise to more voices, muffled by obstacles and distance, all of them sounding in strangely good spirits.
“Am I hearing things?”
Brianca shook her head. “I don’t think so, look.” She pointed toward another set of doors, a hint of light peeking out through the cracks. Alistair heard a light gasp emerge from the young woman, and then he noticed it. Another detail, laid out for them to find.
Written in still dripping blood above the door were the words ‘Welcome!’.
These vampires had no sense of tact to go along with their poor sense of humor. Alistair steeled himself as he felt anger rise within him. His chest felt tight as he stalked toward the door with a strange surge of confidence. He was tired of these games.
With a resounding kick, he forced the doors open, smashing them off their hinges. They landed with a resounding crack, echoing throughout the room within. With the way clear, he recognized this was the keep’s dining hall. In the center of this wide arena sat an incredibly long table, even longer than Baron Caldwell’s back home in Wyrdwood, more than enough seats to entertain a viscount’s measure of guests.
And every one of these seats were occupied. Rather, instead of humans, they were creatures of the night. Vampires—men and women—in garb not far from those they had already met in the market square, were all sat in these luxurious seats having a grand time gossiping and snacking on what looked like plates of entrails, covered in more red liquid he doubted was simple red sauce. A mix of skeletons and thralls acted as their dining servants, some of which were clearly servants of Viscount Lathurn, freshly turned by their new masters. Of Alphonse, the viscount himself, there was no sign.
Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.
Seated in the noble’s chair instead was someone who looked oddly familiar. Alistair’s eyes widened in sudden recognition—the viscount’s chamberlain. The man with the strange complexion, one he’d originally believed to be a side-effect of being from the north. Instead, it was apparently a paper-thin disguise, supported by some sort of magic that blocked the Sight from recognizing him as an undead abomination.
“Arkaz,” the paladin said under his breath, presuming the obvious.
The master vampire stood from his chair, clapping. “What an entrance, bravo sir!” Once balding, the chamberlain now had long flowing locks of white behind his back and over his shoulders, which made him appear older and wiser than his brethren. Not just that, he seemed bigger than the rest. Not just in personality, but in stature as well. “I suppose you saw the writing outside? A bit of gallows humor, all meant in good fun.” He chuckled, expelling air from his rotting cheekbones. “Though, you entered with a bit more gusto than I expected. No matter. We prepared seats for you, come!”
There were indeed two seats left open at the end of the table, opposite Arkaz and closest to the two paladins. They certainly planned ahead for this little theatrical performance. None of the vampires seemed perturbed by the loud and sudden entrance. They smiled and gawked at the two, oscillating between gazes filled with hunger and those offered to children who acted out beneath their elders.
Both expressions served to make Alistair’s blood boil.
“Did your friend not join you?” Arkaz asked, finger to his chin. Alistair glanced to his side and found Brianca missing. No doubt she’d turned invisible somehow in the confusion. Good on her. “Please, if she’s hiding about somewhere, there’s no need. We’re all civilized enough to not disturb the vaunted Alban dining culture. No violence, no tricks—a time for enemies to break bread.”
Alistair said nothing in response. Instead, he deliberately rolled his elbows and made himself look as large as he could. An unnecessary gesture this time, as all attention in the hall was already focused on him. Still, the action served to calm his nerves somewhat. He counted at least two dozen vampires, with a dozen more wights in the back, and he refused to believe Arkaz had shown his entire hand.
The vampire continued, seemingly unbothered. “Now, now. You’re more than just outnumbered this time, but outclassed as well. The riff raff outside I mean, I wanted to thank the both of you for dealing with them.” The vampire clutched his head and took on a dramatic pose, his expression one of exaggerated disappointment. “In the last month or so, Adelgard has received an influx of my kin, smuggled in through various means from the bounds of Deadwood. Some of the younger ones, turned only within the last century or so, are more eager for blood and violence than the rest of us. Hard to control, even for me. Townsfolk have been disappearing. The whole city has been growing suspicious of our little ruse, if I can be honest. You’ve saved me from needing to come up with any future excuses.”
“Where’s Rozena?” Alistair asked with booming authority, ignoring the droll speech.
Arkaz’s eyebrow twitched, as if annoyed by the interruption. Still, he answered, with slightly less theatric energy than before. “You mean the girl with fey magic, daughter of that false goddess you paladins love to go on about? Oh, she’s here.” He paused a moment, to let his statement soak in. “Not here, of course. Don’t bother trying to find her. Rest assured, she’s being put to good use along with the rest of her kin we’ve taken. Our own spellcasters built this magical barrier around the city with their help, after all.”
“Is that why you’ve gotten this brave? Revealing yourselves like this?” Alistair gestured around the room with his pike. Arkaz’s smile grew a little wider.
“Why not? Isen’s been ripe for the taking for quite some time.” The vampire began to laugh again, a throaty chuckle reserved for a storybook villain. “Honestly, the schemes my brother and I hatched to precede this little coup d'etat were unnecessary, more of an icing on the cake than anything. This pitiful ‘duchy’ has always been a backwater place, the runt of the pack, only ever getting attention from the dear king when the border wars threatened to spill over into the heartland. If the rest of the country doesn’t care to properly defend Isen, why should you?”
“Are you seriously asking me that question?”
Arkaz thought for a moment, then held up his finger. “Ah, right. You’re the Wyrdwood boy, of course. How could I forgot your lovely presence from one of my little plays I put on for dear Alphonse. He really had no idea his father’s killer was right beneath his red little nose the entire time. Such a shame.”
“A shame indeed,” Alistair echoed him, still sizing up how best to approach this fight.
“He’s here with us, actually.” The vampire almost gleefully raised a silver platter from the table, still covered. With a practiced flourish, he flipped the lid with the technique of a thespian. “Behold, the man you once spat the word ‘milord’ upon, as if it were some dreaded curse!”
Alistair winced as he met the gaze of Viscount Alphonse Lathurn. The head, now heavily decomposed, stared back at him with wide eyes and a terrified expression locked by rigor mortis. The vampires altogether began to laugh at this grisly display, recognizing it as the crowning achievement of their rule of the city.
Arkaz let the room somewhat calm down before he snapped his fingers. Two human thralls emerged with new platters and set them down where the paladins were invited to sit. Another snap, and they revealed a well-prepared meal of actually edible food—cooked boar, cheeses, and all manner of side dishes.
“Again, I invite you and your friend to have one last meal. Rest assured, none of us will disturb you until you’re finished. Say what you will about the undead as a whole, but we vampires, and especially vampires of the Crimson Rose court, have a code of honor.”
“Given the mess we left in the market square, I’d say your honor means a whole lot of nothing.” Arkaz said nothing in return, though he sensed the mood shift into something less jovial.
He glanced down at his left, and then slowly panned to the right. The vampires seated at his flanks were staring up at his armored form with a mix of apprehension and eagerness. Like they were waiting for a signal from their dear master to rip his head off. Alistair wanted to make a move, but he feared it would be too predictable, too easy for these vampires to spot.
Right now, he was the center of attention. A prized hunk of meat, surrounded by wolves.
Halfway down the table, a female vampire suddenly gasped and her body twitched. An invisible blade had been thrust through her back. Another hole appeared in the back of her head and dark ichor spurted out. The vampire next to the freshly dead one made to reach for its weapon, but it was too slow. Brianca’s invisibility ran out just in time to see her pull the dagger from the woman and chuck it at the next vampire, all in an amazingly swift motion. The dagger caught in the creature’s unprotected neck, its words turning into frothy gurgles, all of which were cut silent as she thrust her silvered broadsword into the vampire’s ribcage.
Then all hell broke loose.
----------------------------------------
Further below, Ilvara stalked forward, further down the unveiled passageway. She had only the faintest sense of movement above her through her magical senses, but the elf had no way to know whether or not it was Alistair or something else skulking around the keep. Instead, she kept her mind focused on reaching the far end of the darkened hall where a single door acted as her final obstacle before reaching the end of Rozena’s trail.
Before she could even reach the door, she heard voices. Severely muffled, not only from the heavy iron door but from magical barriers as well. Whoever had built this room had designed it well to keep its contents sequestered and secret. Such evidence pointed to it being a creation of the vampires, which had stark implications of just how long they’d been on this side of the border, planning this conspiracy.
At the door, she took a closer look at the locking mechanism. An old fashioned one with a key, though she found it unlikely the jailor would have access to this place. If she were to try even a single key to test the lock, those on the other side would almost certainly be able to tell. The sound obstruction would only work one-way if it was designed properly, to best give those inside advanced warning should someone breach their first barrier.
No, instead of attempting to unlock the door, she used the keyhole to peer inside. Unlike the rest of the dungeon, the room on the other side was actually well lit, the light streaming out from its confines through the door’s cracks. Ilvara got herself close, pressed to the door, and allowed her eyes to adjust.
What she saw made her cringe with disgust.
A trio of pale-skinned figures, those she quickly recognized to be vampires, all with lithe, feminine forms. Beneath their feet, an intricate seal glowed and bathed the room in magical light, a whiteish-green that she’d expect from fey magic, yet somehow twisted with their own breed of dark magic through the carved rune lines. More disturbing, however, were the occupants of three body racks in the middle of the room.
Three young woman, all of them stripped of their clothes and chained to the table. Their hair and skin, once meticulously well-kempt and magically enhanced to maintain a level of beauty, now looked dirtied and drained of all color. The women, all of them Ilvara imagined to be human priestesses of the lake goddess, were chained to the torture devices, their mouths gagged and eyes covered with thick blindfolds. All of them looked close to death’s door, their bodies malnourished and bruised.
Wisps of magical energy poured from their bodies, drawn out by the vampire women with well-timed chants and arm motions, and funneled into the seal at their feet. No doubt this was the method the vampires had used to cut off the city from the rest of the world. Somehow, not even the powers of the Sight could get through the blindfolds to reach Nimue, their goddess. Powerful magic indeed.
She would have to disrupt the ritual and free the girls, and she’d have to do it alone.
Ilvara reached into her pack for something in particular. Her fingers glanced off of something smooth and she grasped it tightly. She looked down at the small stone shape, specially carved with a specific rune in the middle. For a moment, she was reminded of when she’d offered something similar to Alistair as a means of tracking him.
But this one wasn’t created to track anything. No, it had a much simpler purpose.
The elf wedged the stone against the locking mechanism and pressed her thumb against the rune carved in its center. The rune began to glow a bright red and then suddenly started to dim.
Satisfied the thing wouldn’t fall, she put as much distance between her and the door as she could, leaping into the air and backflipping like some sort of acrobat, further down the hall the way she came.
The red light faded quickly in the dark hall, and when it was snuffed out completely, a loud explosion rocked the hallway as the enchanted stone turned into a bomb. This shaped charge was more than enough to take down the iron door as it fell in on itself. A harsh ringing in Ilvara’s ears was laced with the faded sounds of the vampires further in, shouting and coughing as smoke and debris filled their room in the blink of an eye.
Readying her daggers, Ilvara launched herself into the chaos. She made it to the first before the vampire could even manage to clear her eyes of dust. A well-aimed slice across the neck and a stab to the heart was enough to put her down, but Ilvara didn’t stay to watch her fall.
She leaped over one of the torture tables and practically landed on top of the second, who’d been in the middle of preparing some counterspell. Both daggers sunk deep into the vampire’s chest, illiciting a garbled scream that was swiftly cut off with a subsequent stab to the neck.
Ilvara went for the last one who, at this point, had managed to gather her wits about her and take stock of the fact they’d been ambushed. Perhaps in the most self-serving act displayed so far, the undead woman made a mad dash out of the room, if nothing else to get distance between her and whatever had befallen her comrades.
With a flick of her wrist, Ilvara summoned more throwing knives and threw them down the dark hall after the retreating figure. The vampire suddenly shifted, dodging out of the way, somehow using its senses to detect the danger without breaking stride. Before long, the creature had made it outside of her throwing range and disappeared behind the door of the dungeon, presumably on her way to warn the rest.
A problem for Alistair and his friend to deal with. Meanwhile, she focused her attention on the daughters who’d been grunting into their gags the entire time, begging to be freed. She went to the one that looked maybe the healthiest as she believed it to be Rozena, her judgment based off of the one time she’d met the girl prior, when Ilvara had first met Alistair.
First, she removed the gag. The girl attempted to speak, but her cracked lips struggled to form words, and instead only leaked out a hoarse breath made from sheer exhaustion. Ilvara took her small waterskin and offered it to the girl, letting her have a bit of water. Rozena sighed in relief, greedily swallowing what she could, and again tried to speak.
The poor woman had been through a lot. All three of them had, clearly. Her compatriots honestly seemed worse off, like they’d been held much longer.
“Are you a friend?” she finally asked, voice cracking.
Ilvara thought for a moment, then shrugged.
“Of a sort.”