Liliana and I were forced to wait for a few minutes while our desire to speak with the bishop was made known. I was getting a little twitchy, Liliana was fidgeting with the sleeve of her robes, both of us just wanted to get this over with as soon as possible. When the head priest that we had been talking to did return, he ushered us over to him silently with a gesture of his hand.
We followed along, and once we were deeper into the church and away from the general population of priests, he explained what had come of his conversation with the bishop. “The bishop is disturbed to hear of this and wishes to speak with you in his private office. If we can get ahead of this plot, then we might be able to prevent even the possibility of it coming to pass. Please, come this way, and quickly.”
We weren’t about to argue with him for giving us exactly what we wanted, so we continued to trail his steps as we were led upstairs and down a few more hallways. Then, we suddenly stopped in front of a door with the head priest gesturing for us to continue inside.
“The bishop is waiting for you. I will be returning to my regular duties to not raise any suspicion or concern. If this can end quietly, then all the better.”
I let Liliana take the lead as I was supposed to be hired help. She nodded to the head priest before taking a short breath and reaching for the door. The wood creaked slightly as it was pushed open to reveal the office of the bishop.
It was similar to the one that the champion had, but not as lavish in the decoration department. There were still very expensive looking pieces of furniture in the room, bookshelves, paintings, and heavy curtains that could be drawn over the windows, but it all had a feeling like it was of lesser make than the superbly crafted items I had seen before.
At the desk sat the bishop, Corvin, who had a very contemplative look on his face. He looked up from his ruminations as we entered, and he stood to greet us. He was quite a tall individual, standing a bit over six feet with straight ebon hair flowing down his back. The bishop’s robes had quite a lot of golden colors integrated in the design, lending him a very lordly appearance that probably wasn’t too far off from his actual social status.
He made a gesture to the chairs in front of his desk as he started to talk. “Please, come in, we have much to discuss.” Both of us stepped inside, and I closed the door behind us, even going as far as to throw the locking bolt. I thought that maybe he would find that suspicious, but apparently that was deemed as an acceptable amount of caution by him as he did not seem to mind it.
Liliana took a seat in one of the open chairs, I continued to stand right behind her. Once we were situated, the bishop continued with the, perceived, point of this meeting. “You bring very dark tidings with you sister, but your service to the order and the kingdom will be rewarded greatly if this plot you have uncovered can be brought to bear. Now, what have you heard, who are the culprits, and do you know the details of their plan?”
She didn’t answer him. Right now, she was rubbing her fingers in a fit of nervousness. If I had to guess, I figured that her being in front of this venerated figure that she was taught to respect had rendered her mute considering the reality of the situation. She had shown an exceptional level of bravery up to this point, especially since this was challenging her world view.
The bishop, also sensing her apparent hesitance to speak, started to try and encourage her to open up. “Sister, I know it must be a frightening situation, but we need to know what is going to happen and how to stop it.”
Liliana tried to speak. “I... The thing is, we...” She just couldn’t seem to get it out, so I moved to relieve her of that duty.
Placing a hand on her shoulder, I relieved her of the need to continue speaking. “Forgive her, she is just nervous. We have indeed uncovered an insidious plot, one that has existed for a long time now.”
I could tell in the way that the bishop looked at me that he did not afford me the same level of respect that he did Liliana. The bastard probably considered me at the same level as the dirt he stepped on whenever he went outside. He leaned back in his chair, demeanor becoming much haughtier than before.
“You are a witness to this, so I will allow you to speak in her stead. Be quick about it so that this may all be put to rest.”
I resisted the overwhelming urge to simply rush him and bash his skull in. Instead, I slowly started to walk around the side of the desk. “What we have uncovered is the product of pure evil, a callous disregard of life. It is being perpetrated by those in a position of power over others for the sake of their own wellbeing.”
Corvin sighed. “Might we dispense with the theatrics and get to the point already?”
“As you wish.” I had to stifle my desire to smile maliciously. “We know who the perpetrators are...” My slow walk around the desk eventually allowed me direct access to the monster, and now that he was in reach, I drew my hidden knife and quickly pressed it just under his throat. “And one of them is sitting right in front of me.”
The stunned look on his face was satisfying to see, but I kept focused even as he finally managed to get a few words out. “What is the meaning of this!”
I pressed the tip of the blade into his skin just a little bit to silence his complaints. My free hand started to pat him down until I found his little talisman of their order. Didn’t need him to have access to any annoying spells. With him effectively disarmed now, I could finally put an end to this.
“You are the reason I am here. You, who sanctions and commands others to commit murder in the name of some sanctimonious idea that it somehow benefits people.”
I could tell that he recognized what I was talking about even though I didn’t explicitly say it. He tried to hide it, deflecting the conversation back onto me. “You appear to be a very confused individual. We can get you help for your condition if you would...”
“HA! I’ve seen what your ‘help’ is. It would be little better than silencing me.”
He looked over at Liliana with a judging gaze, probably assuming she was responsible for this leak of information. She avoided his gaze, not as zealous in her conviction for the truth as I was. I didn’t like the way he was looking at her, so I refocused his attention on me.
I slapped the man to push his head back towards me. He looked stunned by my assault of his person, like he couldn’t comprehend that someone would do that to him. “It’s rude to look away from the person who is talking to you. I’d think someone in your position would remember their manners.” His face contorted into a snarl of anger, and I just smirked at him which only fanned the flames further.
It was at this moment that he dropped most of the pretenses that he was keeping up until this point. “I don’t know what you hope to achieve with this, but you won’t be leaving this city alive.”
“Well, I can agree with you on one thing. I certainly won’t be leaving this city, at least not until it’s completely under my control.”
“You really are insane. You honestly think you can take over a city by yourself?”
“Certainly not.” I answered confidently. “In fact, I have a whole army of pissed off people who are just waiting to fall upon you and your corrupt order.”
“You lie!”
“You would certainly like to believe that, wouldn’t you? But no, your secret is out, your schemes are revealed, and the knowledge will continue to spread, so I recommend that you make this easy on yourself and cooperate.”
He seemed to be scanning my features for any sign of deception, but I offered him none as everything I had said was the truth. Whatever he thought, it didn’t matter, and I told him as much. “Believe me or not, your fate is still the same. You will tell me what I want to know, starting with where you make those poisons.”
“I am not so weak willed as to give you what you want for the asking!”
A sinister smile touched my lips. “Oh, I figured you wouldn’t be willing to cooperate, but that just means that I can have some fun dragging it out of you. I don’t normally take pleasure in such an act, but for you, I'll make a special exception.”
Once more he looked at Liliana. “And you, you would betray your god and the vows you took for this wretch of a man?”
Liliana had a hard time finding her voice, but when she did, she spoke her mind plainly. “This... this is not what I swore to uphold. I vowed to defend life, to care for the lost and ailing. What you are doing is a perversion of that vow, and I cannot continue in my service until it is corrected.”
“You stupid girl!” She flinched at his explosive response. “We are defending life. Everything worth doing requires sacrifice, and these short-lived creatures are contributing to something far greater than what they could accomplish in their measly little lives that they spend toiling away in the dirt.”
I could see Liliana clench her fists. Before she could reply and start an argument, I stepped in with a little retribution of my own in the form of a fist hooking into his nose. I’m pretty sure that I broke it with that blow, and it started to bleed soon after. He made a lot of different groaning noises of pain. Next, I seized him roughly by the throat, causing him to gag slightly before growling out my next few words at him.
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“You are more a creature than anyone else. You have destroyed more lives than any plague could possibly hope to match. I thought that you all were sick in the head, just a symptom of the problem, but no, you are the disease, and like any disease you need to be eradicated. You will tell me where these poisons come from, now!” I threw him back against his chair which teetered on the brink of tipping over for a moment.
Corvin breathed heavily for a second while staring up at me with barely concealed resentment. He took a deep and calculated breath as he seemed to collect himself. His expression became blank and stony, then, he slowly pushed himself out of the seat until he was standing. I brandished my knife at him as a warning but allowed him to come to an upright position.
He seemed to disregard my threat almost entirely as he started to slowly walk to the far wall of the of the room where the bookshelves were. “You want to know what we are doing, where we are making our miracles that save the lives of those who fall to illness and would otherwise die without our aid?”
My face contorted into a sneer, but I bit my tongue to allow him to monologue and potentially tell me their secret. I followed his every step all the way up until he stood before the rows of books. He slowly removed some books one at a time in a very mechanical way, placing them aside on another shelf. Once he had created a gap, he reached back behind the books with both hands. I craned my neck to try and see what he was doing, but my vision was blocked by his body and the books.
Just then I heard something that sounded distinctly like a bottle being uncorked. Suddenly he jerked his hands back out and towards his face where he started to gulp loudly. Lunging forward, I grabbed him by the shoulders and spun him around, quickly knocking what was in his hand away. A mostly empty glass vial shattered on the floor as the bishop swallowed one last time.
Almost immediately after that, he started to froth at the mouth, sputtering, and coughing while I could do nothing but stare wide eyed at what was happening. “Then... good... luck.” He managed to say before his body started to slump and fall limply to the floor.
I was stunned, barely able to comprehend that he just committed suicide to prevent the information from getting out. Liliana was likewise shocked by the series of events that just played out in front of her. She had her hands over her mouth and was on the verge of hyperventilating with how quickly she was breathing.
While I stared down at the body of the man, I was pulled from bewilderment when I saw the blue form of a wisp start to make its way out of what was now officially a corpse. It rose through the air, trying to make its way to the other side. A deep scowl spread across my face as my hand lashed out took hold of his soul in a clenched fist.
“You aren’t going anywhere you bastard!” I held the weak looking light in my hand, feeling some confusion coming from it through vague and unfocused thoughts. What I was about to do was technically against the rules as far as they had been explained to me by my pocket god, but I couldn’t just let him take the easy way out.
I hope you’re willing to look the other way for this.
Hmm, what was that? Sorry I’m very distracted by this riveting story that Malery is telling me.
That made me crack a smile and snicker a little to myself before I returned to my serious expression. I brought his soul back to his body, thrusting the hand that held it back against his body's chest. This was certainly not the normal gentle method that I normally used when returning a soul to a body, but frankly he deserved the discomfort that surely came from such an experience.
There was a moment of quiet before his body jerked back to life. His eyes shot open, now filled with the spectral light that was indicative of the undead. They darted around, extremely confused and obviously wondering why he wasn’t dead right now. Well, he still technically was, but I wasn’t about to let him leave just yet.
He started to babble incoherently, trying to say something, but it was only coming out at as a bunch of nonsensical grunting. That got old quickly, so I put a stop to it. “Shut up.” I commanded.
His mouth instantly clamped shut and every sound ceased immediately. We were both rather surprised by the reaction, but his shock was more on the side of panic as he suddenly could not even vocalize in the slightest. He clawed at his mouth and throat, trying to force any sort of sound out.
“Stop squirming.” This command made him freeze completely. The only thing he could do was move his eyes around as he stared out in abject horror at his situation. I heard about the kind of control a human had over an undead from another race, but to experience it for myself was another situation entirely. The bishop, once belligerent and stubborn, was now no better than a slave to my will. I could see how such power over another could be corrupting.
I shook the dark thoughts out of my head so I could get back to the reason we were here. While this hadn’t gone exactly to plan, it was now a much simpler affair to learn what I wanted to know. I still had my travel pack with me, and a spare bone charm that I kept in case I needed to communicate with the soldiers in our army.
Retrieving the small bone, I squatted down over the bishop’s head. “Open your mouth.” He obediently followed my orders, and I inserted the charm into the back of his throat. He instinctively winced as I did, but soon realized that he couldn’t feel anything that I was doing to him, which must have been strange for him in its own way.
Now that I had set everything up, it was time to get him talking. “You are free to speak.”
It was obvious what the first thing out of his mouth would be in this situation, and I was proven correct when his ghostly voice echoed out. “Wha... what did you do to me?”
“Well, after you so rudely decided to exit our conversation in the manner you did, I figured I would give you a chance to apologize for it. Welcome to undeath, a fate you’ve condemned countless humans to over the centuries I'd imagine.”
The realization struck his features viscerally. His mind seemed to jump all over the place as he opened and closed his mouth multiple times, completely at a loss for words that failed to coalesce into a coherent thought. I snapped my fingers a few times in front of his face to get his attention again.
“Hey, don’t go losing your mind on me, that’s the only part of you that has any value right now.”
“You... you’re a demon, a monster sent by the dark one to...”
“Shut up.” Again, his mouth clamped shut as he was rendered mute once more. “I’m not interested in your drivel and propaganda. What you are going to do now is answer all my questions honestly, clearly, and with none of that inane garbage you like to spew.” He probably had a lot to say in response to that, so it was a good thing he couldn’t because I don’t think I had the mental capacity to sit through it.
“Now, where do you get the poisons and diseases?” His eyes were filled with defiance, but his body betrayed him and forced him to speak.
“We have several different production sites, each studying different diseases.” His teeth were gnashed together as he desperately tried to fight what was a losing battle.
“Stand up.” He got to his feet, and I moved him to the table where I laid out a map. “Mark each site, now.” The many enraged faces he went through as his hand grabbed the quill on his desk that had probably signed numerous orders for the deaths of humans was beautiful to my eyes. He marked several towns, including the capital, that apparently produced these poisons. One of the marked locations was this town, so I decided to find out about that.
“Where is the production happening here?”
“In the cellar.”
“How do you get access to it?”
“You need the keys to the main stairwell.”
“I take it you have a copy of those as well? Hand them over.”
He then started to fish around in the pockets of his robes to remove a small key. At first, I thought that was it, but then he moved to the desk where he used it to unlock a drawer from which he took a key ring. The ring was handed over and I put it in my bag for later.
Corvin was livid, that much I could tell. I was probably stepping all over his inflated ego with this. There was a little bit of sadistic glee that came with that, but I was self-aware enough to recognize it and keep it low on my mental focus list.
We had everything that we wanted from him, now it was time to make our exit. I decided to set up a safety net for our escape in the form of a few commands. “Now, after we leave, you are going to lock the door behind us, sit at your desk like a good boy, and tell everyone who asks for you that you are busy and not to disturb you.” If looks could kill, I’d probably burst into flames on the spot with the intensity he was glaring at me. “Acknowledge the command.”
“I will do as you command.” He said through gritted teeth.
“Good. You have anything to add, Liliana?”
I suppose she was caught a little off guard by my question as she paused for a moment to process it. “Uhm, I... I don’t think so.”
“Alright, then let’s get out of here.” We moved towards the door, and I opened it to allow her out first. Once it was closed behind us, I waited for a second and heard the telltale sound of the locking bolt sliding back into place. I smiled to myself at having the orders carried out before turning back to Liliana.
“So, if anyone asks, we talked to him, he recognized the situation, and then he told us he would take measures to prevent it. Got it?” She nodded her head in affirmation. With our cover story established, we made our way towards the exit of the church so we could meet up with the rest of our volunteer forces in the city.
We did encounter the head priest again on our way out, and of course, he did question us about our meeting, but Liliana did her part with keeping to the cover story we made. It was believed, and it didn’t really matter how long it would remain that way because, hopefully, by the end of the day, the town would be under our control. Normally, Liliana would probably stay at the church, but she made an excuse about seeing me safely off.
Naturally, she had no intention of returning, and the minute we were out the door and out of sight of the church, we ducked into the back streets and started to make our way towards the inns. It was agreed that they would choose one that was close to the main gate, so our search area was limited enough that we wouldn’t get lost.
It was the second inn that we visited where we saw some familiar faces. The volunteers were spread out at a few different tables, some in groups, others by their lonesome. A couple wisps were in the room as well as I asked them to keep an eye on the villagers just in case something happened. It was a relief to see that nothing had happened during our separation, but now the truly dangerous part was about to happen.
The atmosphere around the volunteers was somewhat relaxed, but there was an undercurrent of tension that only the perceptive would be able to pick up on. I approached one of the tables and took a seat, that was when they decided to ask the question that must have been on everyone’s mind.
They spoke in a somewhat low voice. “So, did you get what we came here for? Is it happening?”
I gave a short nod in response before responding in a similarly low voice. “Yes, I know where they are making them, and they even have some production here.”
Their faces turned grim for a moment before another spoke up. “That’s it then, we’re committed to this?”
I looked around at all of them, seeing dark but determined faces. “Yes. Today, the war begins in earnest.” The weight of that statement was not lost on them, but they understood what was at stake. This was the prelude to the madness that would soon consume the world, and we stood at the front.