We ran. Fast and uncaring of who was in our way. Weapons were drawn, which was more than enough to convince people that they didn’t want to remain in front of us for very long. The messenger, who had already sprinted to bring us the news, was lagging behind. I practically picked the man up and ran with him. I didn’t care if he took offense or not, I wasn’t going to slow down on account of his comfort.

Sprinting downhill occasionally yelling at crowds to move, we descended several layers of society. Kala must have wanted to reach the foundation of the coalition, the people that she was more familiar with and could relate to. I swear that if I find the person who took advantage of her in that situation, they’re going to lose most of their teeth and their blood too if they so much as scratched her.

I saw where it happened before our guide even had to point it out to me. There was a crowd circled around the entrance to an alley, chatter filling the air with incomprehensible noise as dozens of people all looked at a scene hidden from me behind their bodies.

“Fucking move!” I shouted as I stormed up to the crowd. Those with any sense to them followed my command while the rest were hastily thrown out of the way. When I finally pushed my way through the crowd, I came upon a scene that made my eyes go wide in shock.

It was chaos. A mess of bodies and blood, and most of those bodies were familiar. There were guards securing the area and tending to four people. Three of them I could immediately identify by their uniforms if nothing else. The closest person to me was Velian who was lying motionless in front of the alleyway.

As I moved to help an Ulgor guard stepped in front of me. “Sir, this is a crime scene, we-”

“They’re my people!” I growled at him, barely giving him a second thought as I brushed him aside. The intensity of my rebuttal stunned the man, but he didn’t pursue the issue any further as I kneeled down to check on my friend.

He was still breathing, so that was a relief. There was a gash on his head, but it looked to be superficial, meaning blunt force trauma. His weapon was still in his sheath, meaning he was the first to be attacked and didn’t even get a chance to retaliate. He would live, just needed to keep him still.

“Don’t touch him until we can get someone to heal him, and make sure he stays still.” I ordered Otar who nodded and began his vigil as I moved on deeper into the alleyway.

Things got bloodier from there. Ulthises was taking up a lot of space in the narrow alley with his long body. There were several cuts all along his tail, but they were shallow as the scales and thick muscles prevented any real damage. The real problem was the heavily bleeding gash in his right arm that the guards were doing their best to staunch and the fact that he seemed to wince every time he breathed, indicating he probably had chest injuries of some kind.

My approach was noticed, and his eyes grew as he saw me. “Jamesss...” Talking made him wince and his voice came out strained.

“Ulthises! What happened? Where’s Kala?”

He suddenly grabbed me with his left arm and struggled to speak through the pain. “You have... to help... Holdrem!”

“What?” My head immediately snapped to look further into the alley where I saw a trio of guards actively fussing over a familiar red-tailed Trelnval. I could feel my heart drop into my stomach as I noticed the pool of blood beneath them.

My feet carried me to his side in an instant. I stood over him, too shocked to say anything as he blearily looked up at me before cracking a strained bloody toothed smile. “Hey... nice of you to join us.” He punctuated his statement with a cough that sprayed blood.

I finally pulled myself together enough to assess his condition. There were two obvious stab wounds, one in his chest, another in his gut. Something thin, long, and sharp must have been pushed with great force behind it to make it through his mail, padding, and scales yet leave such a deep wound. The damage was extensive, and obviously hit vital points like his lungs. I rushed over and moved one of the guards out of the way so I could have access.

Immediately I started to call upon my healing abilities and focused on the wound in his chest, trying to at least close the hole that was in his lungs. I was barely able to even slow the bleeding before the effort drained me completely and left me impotent in my moment of need.

“No no no no, come on! Just a little more!” I looked at the guards who seemed mostly at a loss for what to do as they had already stuffed his wounds with as many bandages as they could fit. “Fucking do something! Get another healer, get me a fucking crystal, anything!”

“W-we already sent for a healer. They should be here soon.”

“Soon needs to be now! Get the fuck out there and drag them here faster if you need to!” Another cough pulled my attention away from the guard who was cowering under my wrath. “Holdrem! Easy, deep breaths, we’ll get you help so just keep it together.”

He grunted as he tried to steady his listing head. “It’s not looking good, is it?”

“Fuck that, you’ll be just fine. Now stop talking and conserve your strength.”

A small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “I’m going to have to... respectfully decline... that order. There are a few things, I need to say to you.”

“You can save them for when you're not-”

His hand came up unexpectedly and grabbed me by the collar, smearing a bit of blood on my clothes. “Let me speak, damnit.” I wanted to protest, but my shoulders just slumped, defeated by his insistence.

He nodded his head weakly as he saw me submit to his whims before continuing. “First, don’t blame yourself. I know you, you’ll try to take responsibility, even if you’re not the cause.”

“But-”

“No buts! And for the love of the gods, stop interrupting me!” He struggled to raise his voice as a small cough sprayed bloody spittle. “Now, second, I want you to know, I don’t fear what comes next. I believe, in the goddess and the cycle, just as I do in you.”

I opened my mouth to reply but was met with a glare that made me shut it again. “The third thing, well, it ties into my second and is more a request than anything else.” His face twisted into the best expression of humor that he could manage at the moment. “When I do come back, could you make it a bit more comfortable around here? Less wanton bloodshed and more soft pillows and warm fires please. I know, you’ll have something pretty impressive to show the new me then.”

Despite myself, I huffed with amusement, a painful grin struggling its way onto my face. “Sure thing, but you won’t have to come back to experience that because you’re going to see it in this life. You’ll grow old and withered before you get to have another shot at this living thing.”

Holdrem grinned before taking a very wet sounding inhale and leaning his head back. “That does sound nice, but I don’t think I'm supposed to be tasting this much copper.” His breathing picked up slightly, like he was winded. “I’m sorry, but... you’re going to... have to...” All at once his body went slack like someone cut the puppet strings above him.

My eyes went wide, and my heart started to beat painfully fast against my ribs like it was trying to burst through them. “Holdrem? Holdrem!” I shook him by the shoulders, but he was unresponsive. His half-lidded eyes were staring further than anyone could possibly see. “Fuck!”

I immediately moved him to a prone position and started doing chest compressions in a frenzy. “Fuck, fuck, fuck! Holdrem! Wake the fuck up! I swear, if you don’t wake up right fucking now, I'm going to blaspheme, and you won’t be able to tell me off unless you open your damn eyes you stupid fucking lizard!”

Over and over, I continued to push down on his chest, hoping to stimulate his heart into action again. He continued to be unresponsive as my actions continued for a minute, then two, and three. My vision was starting to get blurry, my breath coming in labored waves as I fought on. It was shortly after the third minute that a hand rested on my shoulder and the voice of Hargon spoke up from behind me.

“James...” I turned quickly and lashed out with my left hand, striking his arm away from me before returning to doing compressions. Hargon only hesitated for a second before trying again, grabbing more firmly this time. “James, stop.”

“Get the fuck off me!” I tried to throw off his grip, but he just applied more pressure and began to pull.

“James, please.”

I threw my weight against his efforts, trying to remain over Holdrem so I could continue with what I thought, I hoped, to be lifesaving treatment. “Get off! I have to keep going! He needs-”

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Suddenly his arm wrapped around my waist as he picked me up and tossed me against the opposite wall of the alley. My first instinct was to rush back, but his hand returned to plant itself in the middle of my chest and force me to stay still. “James, enough! There’s nothing more we can do.”

I looked at him with anger, but then I saw his face for the first time and noticed his own anguished expression. My gaze drifted down to Holdrem’s body, laying there in a pool of his own blood. He lost too much of it. All the chest compressions in the world wouldn’t be enough to change that, and yet, I didn’t want to accept it.

My breathing elevated, my head felt light, I slumped against the wall for support lest I fall. A sense of vertigo consumed me as I clasped a hand over my eyes to block out at least one sense. My grip tightened around my own skull like the pressure would be enough to hold me together.

“Voltrum...” I began, my emotions shifting tones to something darker. “That bank heist, the convoy raid, fucking Yol’vastume. All of that, all of it, he survived, only to die here, betrayed by the people he was fighting to protect.”

My hand released my head only to form into a fist and hammer itself against the wall. My jaw locked with teeth grinding pressure as my eyes refocused with dark lucidity. Misery turned to malice like the flip of a switch.

“They owe me.” I growled out. “Whoever did this owes me blood, and I'm not going to stop until I find them and make them pay me every, last, drop.”

Amid my downward spiral of vitriol and hatred I noticed Hargon again. His face was a mixture of concern and disturbance. “James, we’re all hurting right now. We’ll seek justice for this, but what you’re talking about sounds like revenge.”

“What’s the difference?” I challenged him, feeling annoyed that he wasn’t with me on this.

“We have to keep calm and focused, James. This isn’t the time to be lost in emotions.”

“This is the exact fucking time to be! Why the fuck aren’t you! They killed one of us! We should be tearing this city up by the fucking roots looking for those shit stains and making them regret they were ever-”

“And what about Kala!?” Hargon interrupted my tirade with a firm question. Her name was like a splash of cold water to the face as lucidity returned to my thoughts. Hargon took a slow deep breath before continuing. “We must stay focused, at least until we get her back. We can mourn after that.”

I wasn’t sure if that was just his experience as a soldier talking, but he was right. Despite my rage at the perpetrators, just running around in a frenzy wasn’t going to help Kala. I needed to be cold right now, no matter how much it hurt. Taking a few controlled breaths, I was ready to return to the conversation as a more levelheaded individual.

“I’m sorry, you’re right. We need to find Kala and...” I swallowed a lump in my throat, “and get the others back on their feet.”

Hargon, now satisfied with my change in temperament, nodded somberly and let me go. I moved around him and noticed the Otar had taken it upon himself to tend to Holdrem’s body, arranging his limbs more respectfully and closing his eyes all the way. Now he just sat there with a stoic expression on his face, but behind his eyes there was a fiery determination.

When I stepped up to his side, he tore his gaze away from Holdrem to look at me. Not a word was spoken between us, but we had a perfect understanding of one another in that moment. I reached up and gave his shoulder a simple pat in camaraderie before walking back to the entrance of the alley feeling absolutely exhausted. Releasing anger without an outlet was a draining experience.

A few minutes later the healer finally showed up. The satyr was dragging a heavy satchel filled with crystals as he sought out anyone with an injury. I resisted the urge to pin some kind of blame on him. Thoughts of if he had gotten here sooner had to be actively squashed in my mind before they grew into something violent and unjustifiable.

Even after Velian was healed he still remained unconscious. The brain was a complicated piece of meat. Most healers agreed not to mess with it due to a lack of understanding of how it worked. Despite my scientific understanding of a brain and its operations, not even I would be willing to perform magical brain surgery on someone. Velian would just have to rest until he woke up on his own.

In the meantime, we took to questioning Ulthises and getting his account of what happened. The cuts across his body were closed again, and his, apparently, broken ribs were mended. “It was an ambush. The moment we passed in front of the alley Velian was hit from behind. Before we even had a chance to react to that, two more jumped out of the crowd and grabbed Kala, dragging her into the alley where three more were waiting. We tried to fight, to go after her, but we were heavily outnumbered, and I took a mace to the chest hardly a minute later. Holdrem, he... he kept going after them, even managed to cut one down, but then he encountered a big Ulgor with a scar on his head. There wasn’t much he could do against that kind of strength, and he was stabbed twice by the brute while I could only lay there and watch, barely able to breathe.”

Ulthises looked distraught, and I could tell he was feeling like being knocked out of the fight led to what happened. I was quick to put a hand on his shoulder in comfort. “You did the best you could do given the situation. For now, we have to focus on finding out who took Kala, where, and why, everything else can wait.” He didn’t appear to be completely absolved of his feelings on the matter, but he just nodded his head and did the best he could to focus.

The first step in achieving this goal was investigating the fourth inhabitant of the alleyway, one of the assholes that Holdrem managed to kill. While obviously an Ulgor, we removed the crude mask he was wearing to get a better look at his face. He was a dirty, grungy, and unkempt bastard, but unfortunately not one that I, or anyone else in our group knew. His pockets were empty, he had no jewelry or identification tag, and his weapon of choice was a simple wooden club with bands of metal riveted down its length. Sometimes I wished that life would mimic games more often, because if it did there would be some kind of note or message about some mysterious employer or deal that was agreed upon at a certain location for us to work with. As it was, we were shit out of luck on that front, so we turned to guards to see if they had any knowledge to share.

We asked around to see if any of the guards had known or seen the attacker before now. Many of them said no, but one had something interesting to say. They recalled a fellow guard complaining about a group of Ulgor that tore up a bar after getting drunk a few days ago. One of them seemed to match the description of our dead jolly green giant. It seemed he was potentially part of a mercenary group, but where they were currently based, we did not know. The guard promised to look into it for us and see if there was anything that could help.

We had exhausted all our options for investigating here, so short of running up and down the city looking under every loose rock, there was nothing else we could do. While the option to do that sounded more appealing than sitting and waiting, there were negatives to taking that course of action that weighed heavily on the scales. For one, it could tip off the kidnappers that we are actively searching for them and drive them further underground. Two, they might feel as if they are being cornered and try to leave the city with Kala before we can find where they are hiding. I knew for certain that right now I would be about as subtle as a battering ram when it came to anything regarding this situation.

So, our course of action saw us escorting Velian to the nearest hospital so he could recover. I made sure to impress upon the staff that his safety was now their responsibility and anything that happened to him would in turn be reflected upon them. After the message got through, we set out with the intent to return to our lodgings.

Everyone was on edge. They walked with hands on their weapons and heads constantly on a swivel. I admired their focus and wished that I could mimic it in some capacity, but my mind was wandering, thinking about what could be done. Asking the church for a favor might work, though I didn’t know the extent of their connections outside of their walls. At the very least they could spread the word about Kala’s kidnapping and ask that the people keep an eye out for her.

Of the councilmembers I was on speaking terms with, there was only one I had any real desire to ask a favor from. Even then, it felt like a stretch to assume he would help me when I've done nothing for him yet. Not to mention that his motives are largely a mystery to me. Sure, he seemed like he wanted to help out of a sense of obligation or piousness, but rare is the person who is so two-dimensional that you can see all they are in a single instance.

As I mulled over all these thoughts in my head we arrived at the lodge before I even realized. There was no clear answer to this problem, and that failure to come up with the solution weighed heavily on me as we walked the halls towards our rooms. Two of our group decided to remain in the lobby in case someone showed up with information so they could quickly relay it to the rest of us. I was fine with that and didn’t have any other ideas for how to spend this time.

The rest of my escort simply returned to their rooms, Hargon briefly breaking character by giving me a soft pat on the back for some comfort. I returned the gesture with a small appreciative smile before he meandered into his room. Left alone, the situation became even more oppressive. The familiar presence of Kala at my side was now sorely missed.

With a sigh, I opened the door to my room, stepped inside, and closed it behind me. Only, once I took another step forward, my foot ended up crunching something beneath it. Surprised, my gaze turned downwards to find a sealed envelope beneath my boot. I did not recognize this envelope and had certainly not written any letters recently.

Bending to pick it up, there was no mark or signature on the front that would give away its origins, so I took the next step and broke the seal to read its contents. My eyes scanned across the tri-folded piece of paper as my brow slowly dropped lower on my face. Rage and relief grew inside me in equal measure until finally I stormed out of my room and started banging on the neighboring doors.

The rest of my group exited with somewhat bewildered faces, questioning what was going on. “Get your gear ready, I'm getting the two in the lobby before I explain, but we’re heading out again.” They didn’t question me beyond that and did as they were told.

Once everyone was ready and gathered in the lobby, I started to explain the sudden change of plans, starting with the reveal of the note. “Found this in my room. Someone seems to have slipped it under the door while we were away. It’s signed by the kidnappers.” That little bit of information got their attention. Suddenly everyone was much more alert.

“To summarize the insulting tones and villain monologues, they want me to show up to an old house in the warehouse district without any guards. An interesting thing is that they called me a liar in the letter. What they think I'm lying about though I can only guess, however, that is hardly important. If they want to be so kind as to let us know where they are hiding, I say, let’s go and say hello. After all, they said no guards, there was nothing in there about my personal escort.”

A few of them chuckled and everyone had eager grins on their faces. They hurt us, they took from us, and now it was time to take our pound of flesh. I did my best to temper my feelings, but that primal part of me was raging for a chance to kick their teeth in. They may or may not be expecting us so soon, but I wasn’t going to let Kala remain in their custody for a second longer than I needed to.

“Let’s get these assholes.” I got many grunts and angry sounds of confirmation. We made doubly sure that we had everything we needed to pull this off, and I even pulled out my little self-defense project. Once we geared up, and I dressed down, we were out the door and on our way at a brisk pace. Hold on Kala, we’re coming.