Chapter 25

The wall in the sewer open up giving way to a long stretch of tunnel with a distant glow at the end. Chris peered into the strip slowly with mild curiosity as the light from the torch illuminated the tunnel. The casting of shadows stretching out giving it a look of horror. The thief with the torch gave a hard punch behind Chris’s shoulder forcing him to take a step forward causing Chris to groan inwards. The blow came unbidden shocking the squire, forcing him to take his first step into the tunnel. The illusion that he didn’t know was there disappeared giving him a front row seat to the thieves’ guilds headquarters.

The head thief threw a punch directed at Zayne’s kidneys, he didn’t try to move or dodge instead taking it head on. The punch landed with an audible crack; the owner of the hand had a sharp intake of breath as he pull his hand to his face.

“The fuck!” He shrieked. He stared at his miss shaped hand as most of his fingers were bent at odd angles, the bone was protruding out of a few of them with his palm now shaped as a flat oval. The shocking sight of his deformed hand made him reach out to it forcing him to drop the torch, one of his lackies bent over to pick it up.

That was Zayne’s cue, he mist stepped out of sight before the thieves. The one that picked up the torch shouted out. “Where is he?”

Chris was standing still taking in the underground city that laid before him, half listening to what was transpiring behind him. The guild was a city carver out of the earth built on the cliff face of one massive trench that went far down below. Wooden ladders and bridges connected to wooden structures that shouldn’t be stable from the sight of things. The buildings stretched out for miles from side to side, top to bottom. IT was a haunting sight to take in.

The three thief’s were getting antsy from the large knight missing, causing them to huddle together as they all looked around franticly. There was no sign of kicked up dust or shifting of debris that gave Zayne way to them.

“Hey, squire! Where did your friend go?” The one that now carried the torch asked unsteadily.

Chris looked around catching no hint of were his killer friend could have gone. That could only mean one thing. “He’s out for blood now.” He said in a whisper.

What do you mean he’s out for blood, we haven’t done anything to him. If anything, he broke Kyd’s hand here, we should be out looking for blood not him!” the man with the torch said. Something broke off in the distant tunnel causing the three to abruptly turn their heads to the noise.

Chris looked at the three huddling thieves, “Before you die, what did your boss want from us?” He had no malice in his tone as he calmly waited for an answer.

“That’s not for us to know, all we were told was to bring you two here after you started to tail our young initiates.” His mouth was getting dry from the fear creeping up his chest. He coughed a few times, than continued. “Why don’t we just continue with going to our boss that way he can explain everything to you. Don’t you have that tournament that’s supposed to be happening here in a few hours? Wouldn’t want you to miss it now would we.” He was desperate, that was plain to see for Chris.

He still needed money so he could get Zayne a sigil and new colors, that problem wasn’t fixed yet. “We need money, that’s why we did what we did this morning. Would your boss know any way for us to make a quick buck around these parts?” He had little hope that all of this could be worked out.

I don’t know about jobs but Mr. Gros has been known to led money out to certain individuals that were in need of such a loan.” The grin could be seen a bright as day on his face. “Lets get you to our boss that way we can get you set up intime for the tournament.”

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Zayne was listening to their conversation while he was in the mist realm, not too concerned about what was being said but had a tinge bitt of disappointment that he wasn’t going to kill them just yet. There was still hope that he would be able to do just that.

“This boss of yours, is he friendly guy? And what kind of interest is there. What amount can I get and are there any strings attached to this or just a pay by weekly thing” Chris rapid fired question after question.

Zayne appeared next to Chris as they waited for an response. The man with the broken hand chuckled. “those can all be answered once you met the big guy. All you have to do is follow and keep that knight of yours in sight during the exchange.”

Chris and Zayne gave it a quick second to discuss the matter, going over if this was a good idea or if he should just kill everyone there now. What boiled down to it was if Chris felt that things were too shifty, Zayne had free rain to kill them. With both of them of on the same page, they turned and Chris nodded.

“Yeah, just lead the way.” The three said in union.

Through the winding stairs and ladders, they tracked down passing black market stalls and shops alike. There they seen weapons to food being smuggled, the human trafficking was further below and Chris was shocked to find that humans were the only ones that were illegal to sell here. That didn’t include other races. On and on they went till they came to a large building that was in a massive crack in the wall.

“We’re here. Kneel down when you see the boss, if not than it’s your funeral.” The one with the broken hand that was now white said. He seemed to be holding back tears from the pain that his hand was causing him.

A large bald man with a kimono came out, his face was puggy with red liquid still smeared around his face. The first impression Chris had was that this mother fucker was a vampire, and by the looks of it he seemed to be well fed.

“Welcome noble guess, I’m sure that you’re confused to be here but I can ashore you that everything is alright. The reason is quiet simple, I liked your work that you did when you captured my boys and I want to employ you.” He talked while he was walking to a makeshift throne in the center of the room. The floor had a red carpet strewn about with odd decorations hanging on the wall. This part of the building within the crack so the walls were stone. Golden chandeliers hung at weird heights making it so no two were at the same distance from the floor.

Once he sat down, his belly jiggled sending crumbs across his lap as he continued to talk. “So, all that I ask of you is to keep an open mind and give me an honest answer.”

“Are you a vampire?” Chris asked blatantly.

The fat man stared at Chris for a second gawking, “No, whatever gave you that idea?”

“Well, there’s red smears across your face as if you just finished feeding.”

The man looked at his large neck where he did in fact find the pointed-out evidence still there, as though that was a mark against him. “This?” he said pointing a finger, “why that’s just jelly left from the pasties that I had before seeing you. I can promise that I’m no vampire.” He laughed like it was no big deal, but to Chris this was a very big deal.

If a vampire got caught feeding with blood all over his face while he wanted to make a deal with you, wouldn’t he tell you that he wasn’t in fact a vampire. That had suspicion written all over it and Chris didn’t have any of it.

“You sure about that? Why don’t you go ahead and eat some garlic in front of us. And I want to check the garlic to make sure it really is garlic.”

“Listen, I’m not a vampire and I’m not going to eat garlic right after I finished eating sweets. They just don’t go well together. About the job that I wanted you two to do, it is pretty simple. I want you to kill the royal knights that will be participating in the joisting tournament.” He waved a hand over to his men and one of them throw a bag between Chris and Zayne with gold spilling out.

“There’s fifty gold in there for you to start the job, buy better armor and a lance I don’t care just get it done. Once you completed then I’ll pay you the rest, is that fair?” he asked while grinning. He had a runner come down to him relaying what was talked about between them and he knew they wouldn’t turn down the money.

As if on cue, Chris picked up the bag of gold making sure to pick up the pieces that spilled out back into the bag. “You can bet on us; we’ll have that knight Bartholomew deader then a witch’s tit by today.” Chris smiled as he turned away.

The fat guild leader laughed at that, “You think I want him killed, HA. No, I want the champion sir John.”