Well, this was a fantastic start to our infiltration.

After the Tlatecian Orc guard had, somehow, immediately known that a group of people were entering the city from the back entrance, we’d all been arrested. Hook had been pretty exhausted from his injuries at the time, and had discreetly ordered us to comply with the guard’s orders.

Before promptly passing out.

I’d ended up being the one to carry the unconscious dwarf on my back as the hulking Orc had paraded us through the streets of Tlatec at sword point. He hadn’t even needed to slap us in cuffs or something. The threat of his extremely sharp-looking greatsword had been more than enough.

That had been fine by me. Hook hadn’t seemed too alarmed by the abrupt arrest before conking out. Dusk didn’t either.

I figured this was expected. Which…I would have appreciated a heads-up.

But whatever.

It gave me more time to observe both the city around me and the actual residents. This was my first time seeing actual living Orcs.

They weren’t quite what I was expecting.

So many people had built them up in my mind over the months that I had been expecting a race of, I dunno, supermen or something. A people that were so much more massively powerful than the Humans, Dwarves, and Sculpted that I was so used to.

But…at least as we’d been force-marched down the neatly planned streets of Tlatec?

They just looked like people.

Well.

Grey-skinned people.

I had been surprised to discover that the grey tinge to the skin I’d noticed on Tlazo’s undead hadn’t just been a symptom of bloodlessness. Orcs in general had a slight heatherish coloring to them, very lightly tinged with nearly purple. Mostly grey, the darkness of their skin ranged from light to dark in the same way it did on humans.

I don’t know what I had been expecting. Media from my old world had me thinking the Orcs were going to be a deep green with somewhat piggish features. But no. While their facial features did seem to trend broader than Humans, Dwarves, or even Elven ones, I wouldn’t call them piggish. Just strong.

They did have tusks and long pointed ears, though.

The tusks themselves seemed to be a kind of elongated canine tooth that poked out of their bottom lips. Males tended to have larger ones, while female Orcs were smaller. Their ears weren’t quite like the elven ones, either. Elven ears looked almost rapier thin, to my eyes. Orcs had thicker and kind of curved ears, noticeably longer than my own. I also noticed that they seemed to have a racial tendency to have black or dark brown hair, in the same way that some ethnicities of humanity did back home.

None of that had been present on the undead I’d seen, far beneath this city. I suppose most of those distinguishing features had either rotted or fallen off, in the passage of time.

All in all, the Orcs weren’t quite as alien as I’d expected them to be.

They definitely had different ideas about clothing, armor, and aesthetics though. Our guard, for example, was barely wearing more than a leather harness with attached steel pauldrons, a sort of long crimson loincloth, and sandals. Well, other than his admittedly impressive large purple feathered headdress.

And the sword. Can’t forget the massive obsidian greatsword.

But he didn’t seem out of place among the populace. The Orcs appeared to trend towards leather straps, barely concealing tunics and loincloths, and the occasional robe for cultural clothing. I saw quite a bit of exposed grey flesh on the streets of the city.

Something else I noticed was the lack of anything else but Orcs. I was definitely the only Human out here, much less Gnolls, Sculpted, or Dwarves like the rest of my party.

I didn’t get a chance to continue my observations before the Orcish guard stopped me in front of a large, nearly pyramidal-like building.

“Inside,” The Guard growled at us, lifting his sword threateningly.

All right, all right. Don’t get your loincloth in a bunch. The four of us shuffled inside the building, brushing aside the cloth entranceway. Inside we found what looked to be a receiving area, populated by a number of different Orcs. There were even some well-crafted, comfortable-looking padded chairs dotting the room that various Tlatecians Orcs were sitting in. But the Guard motioned us past those towards the desk at the back of the hewn stone room.

A particularly bored-looking Orc in bright green robes wearing spectacles of all things was sitting behind it. At our approach, he looked up at us disinterestingly. The apparent clerk didn’t even blink at the sight of our eclectic group. “Offense?” He asked the Guard dully.

The Guard’s thick lips curled. “Intrusion from beyond the walls,” He said curtly. His words caused the Orcish clerk to raise an eyebrow in surprise. The nearby people waiting heard as well, sending a murmur through them.

The clerk fixed us with a curious look before flipping through the large book in front of him. After a moment, he nodded to himself. “A pint of tithe, revocation of any possible merchant’s license, and a two-month prohibition from entering the city is the punishment. Escort the prisoners to the tithing area, Warrior Izel.”

Tithing area? Ominous.

But Dusk still didn’t look alarmed by anything that was happening. If anything, she looked annoyed. “A pint is more than it was last time,” She said to the clerk with a frown.

The clerk's brow furrowed. “Make a habit of trespassing, do you?” He shook his head. “All tithings have increased. Yours is not unique.” At that, the clerk looked back down at his book and deliberately started ignoring us.

I was shoved forward by the flat of the Guard’s blade. “Through that door,” He growled at us, nodding towards a large cloth-covered entryway to our right. I stumbled but managed to not drop Hook. I shot ‘Izel’ a dirty look, but complied anyway.

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He didn’t care.

…………………………………..

Turns out, ‘tithing’ was getting your blood drained. Apparently in Orcish society, most punishments were handled by paying a tithe in literal blood. They had a small jail that we passed on the way to the tithing room, but the cells were all empty.

Our group ended up being forcibly drained of a pint of blood each by a disturbingly enthusiastic Orcish ‘Healer’. He hadn’t cared about how Hook was recovering from being seriously injured, or that he was still unconscious. The dwarf had still gotten drained, without ever waking up. The guy didn’t even need any equipment in order to get it done. He had a Skill for that, instead.

Amusingly enough, the blood-drainer had shuddered at the sight of Sylvia. She had yet to reapply the human-seeming illusion that Tlazo had dispelled, so her Mithril skin had been on full display. As a Sculpted, she didn’t actually have any blood for him to draw from her. Problem was, a punishment was still needed for her crime of unlawfully entering the city limits. She was given a choice of either spending a week in the jail or having someone pay the tithe in her place.

I volunteered.

So, in the end, the Healer ended up draining me of a whole two pints of blood. The actual draining process was drawn out enough that I didn’t immediately pass out from the loss of blood, but by the time he was finished, I was close. As a criminal, I wasn’t offered a blood-replenishing potion, so I had to weakly paw around in my pouch for my own. Thankfully, I still had one of those. After all of our travels and without a chance to stock up on more potions, though, I was down to my last one.

Hook and Dusk hadn’t needed one, so after we’d all been suitably drained, the same Guard that had arrested us practically shoved us out the door of the guard station.

It was fully dark by that time, and Elys was high in the sky. Strangely magical red crystalline lights had been lit on each of the street corners outside the station, acting almost like street lamps from back home. It seemed to me that the number of Orcs out on the streets had only increased while we were inside.

The three of us, plus Hook once more on my back, stood around for a moment before retreating into a nearby alleyway between buildings, doing our best to evade the notice of the locals. After everything, we finally had a moment to talk and plan our next move.

First, though, Sylvia leaned in and brushed her lips over my stubble roughened cheek. Pulling back, she smiled at me. “Thank you, Nathan,” She said softly. “I wasn’t looking forward to spending time in an Orcish jail.”

Repositioning Hook’s insensate form on my back, I returned her smile. “No problem. Besides, we have stuff to do.”

Dusk pointedly cleared her throat, bringing our attention to her. “Our next course of action is to pass the checkpoint into Elderwyck,” She said sharply, causing Sylvia and I to straighten up at her unexpectedly commanding tone. I guess with Hook out of commission for now, she was taking command.

Fine by me.

I did have one thing to say, though.

“Did you and Hook know we were going to be caught immediately once we were inside?” I asked her with a frown.

Dusk eyed me for a moment before nodding. “It was nearly unavoidable,” She admitted. “Which is why it was a plan of last resort. Tlactec is well aware of the path that leads from the mausoleum, and their detection wards both extend well below the surface and operate on principles different than our own. We were never going to pass beneath their notice. It was…a point of confusion for some time now, why the path was said to be unguarded. But that mystery has been solved, considering Tlatec’s newest…asset.”

Yeah, I guess you could call an apparently century’s old Lich an ‘asset’.

“Yeah, well,” I sighed and grumbled. “A little heads up would have been nice.”

Dusk just shrugged apathetically.

Sylvia lay her hand on my shoulder and cleared her throat, drawing Dusk's attention.“Will passing into Elderwyck be difficult?” Sylvia asked professionally.

“No,” Dusk’s eyes left me to rest on Sylvia. She shook her head. “On this side of the checkpoint, the Orcs will be downright eager for us to leave. In case you didn’t notice, people actually from Vereden are scarce within Tlatec. The Orcs…prefer their own kind, to be blunt.”

Massive racists, got it.

“And the other half of the checkpoint?” I asked Dusk. “Are the Elderwyckians likely to raise a fuss about our appearance?”

“No,” Dusk said simply. “There are arrangments in that matter. Reapply your illusion,” She said to Sylvia, who promptly did so in a shower of sparks. The senior agent nodded sharply at Sylvia’s now human-seeming appearance. “Good. Let us not waste any time. Hook must be seen to by one of our own Healers in a safe house. Now, follow.” At that, the Gnoll woman slipped between Sylvia and I, exiting the alleyway into the street. She didn’t even look back at us as she momentarily wandered out of sight.

Exchanging a glance with Sylvia, we hurried after her.

………………………………

Tlatec was separated from Elderwyck by a large, deep canal that bisected the two cities. Nearly in the center of that canal was a frankly odd building, that Dusk told me housed the actual portal to Indiqua. It was a strange combination of both Herztalian and Xilochtlan construction styles. They…didn’t really complement each other. The large, nearly keep-like building, was a bit of an eyesore. But it sure didn’t look undefended, from the sheer amount of soldiers from both polities that guarded its ramparts even at this time of night.

We didn’t actually approach that, though. Instead, Dusk led us to a bridge that crossed the canal, guarded on both sides by soldiers. When we showed up, the Orcs were all too happy to shove us across the border into Elderwyck. It was only on the other side that we ran into any hiccups.

“Here, now,” The human Loyalist soldier frowned at us, holding a slate board and hunk of chalk. “Yer not on the list. Where did ye come from?” He paused for a moment, looking over my shoulder to peer at Hook quizzically. “And what’s wrong with the stuntie, eh? He drunk, then?”

I did my best to smile sheepishly at the guard. “Ah, he pissed off one o’ the guards,” I said, affecting what I liked to mentally refer to as my ‘peasant accent’. “Had to go get drained, he did. Ye know how the greyskins are.”

Out of nowhere, the guard abruptly backhanded me full in the face. I’d been hit way harder than that before, so it didn’t really hurt much. I still made a show of staggering away from the unexpected attack though, my blood pressure spiking. Had I just given us away somehow?

That wasn’t it, though. The guard glowered at me. “The hells are ye doin’, lettin’ a stuntie cause trouble? Ye know things are tense enough with ‘em as is. We don’t need no more trouble comin’ from the greyapes!” He yelled, raising his hand as if to slap me again.

Even though I didn’t find this guy intimidating in the slightest, I still tried to take a cowering stance at his posturing.

Dusk had my back, though.

She fell to her knees before the guard, clutching at his breeches. “P-please, sir,” She stuttered, with wide pleading eyes. “It were a simple mistake, honest! Ye know how the tuskers are! If ye even so much as look ‘em funny, they's gonna drain ya!”

The guard paused, looking down at the once again tawny-furred and ragged-looking Gnoll. “Well, yer right about that,” He said slowly, before narrowing his eyes at her. “That don’t explain who ye lot are, though? Why aren’t ya on the list?”

“That was my bad, Owen,” An unexpected voice said, coming to our rescue. Following it to the source, I saw another Loyalist Guard had just exited the gatehouse that led into the city. He was a youngish human man, looking to be about my age with light blonde hair. He smiled sheepishly at the other Guard, rubbing the back of his head. “I know this lot, and forgot to mark ‘em down earlier.”

The Guard interrogating us, apparently named ‘Owen’, abruptly sighed and lowered his hand. “Tom, ye can’t be doin’ that.” He groaned, before waggling a finger disapprovingly at ‘Tom’. “I should report ye for this, but I won’t on account of the lunch ye brought earlier. Just don’t let it happen again, ye hear? Go on then, git. Don’t want ta look at ya anymore.” He finished, speaking to us.

I didn’t question our good luck, instead hurrying across the border with the others. As we passed the Guard who had come to our rescue, I briefly met his eyes.

He winked at me, and then signed something with a free hand.

I may have only just started learning the series of hand gestures that Nocturne agents used, but I still recognized that one.

‘Acknowledgement.’

Ah. I get it.

I signed it back, before wandering out into the darkened streets of Elderwyck with the rest of my apparent cell.

Finally, we had reached the city.

Now for the real work to begin.