1          Soul Bound

1.2        Taking Control

1.2.4      An Artful Carnivale

1.2.4.26   The stalk

Kafana: {I think I have a suspect. Pasini Frassoni. Red velvet half-coat over an embroidered tunic with long lace cuffs and neck fall, black hair in a tight bound queue, wearing a rapier and dagger. I’ll keep looking for others.}

Bulgaria: {I’m looking through their private record books now. Give me a few minutes and I’ll be able to tell you every wager he’s ever laid here.}

Tomsk: {While you’re there, can you check out the brokerage “Murine Insurance”? They don’t fit the pattern of how the other brokerages are responding.}

A while later, when the seal on the package from the courier’s bag was opened and the cargo announced, the prices of Astarium, Manaccium and Tektine listed on the rare metals board, dropped substantially. She heard voices around her speculating that a new meteor had been found amid the glaciers, followed by estimates of total cargo based upon past meteor find sizes.

On the rare herbs board, Windwoe Larkspur, Virtuous Ladysmantle, Dire Moly and Horehound dropped. A few cursed the lack of any extra Ambrosia, but far more groans came from those hopefully standing by the rare timbers board which didn’t budge at all. Wellington’s information had been dead on.

Alderney: {Frassoni is heading for the stairs. Wellington, want us to re-deploy?}

Wellington: {Now we have the names, we can follow those up at our leisure. Alderney, this is your speciality now. How do you want us to handle following the man?}

Alderney: {Bungo, act like you’re tired and prepared to leave. When he appears, keep him in your field of view but don’t watch him - use your head-up to track his actual position. When he leaves, you leave too by the same exit.}

Alderney: {Tomsk and Kafana, make your way down, casually. Wellington, move towards whichever exit Bungo is furthest from - use Bungo’s position marker, don’t look yourself.}

Kafana put a bright smile on her face and wandered off to the stairs, giving each board a last look on the way. Jolanda gave her a hateful glare from behind the bar, and she returned it with a friendly wave as though she were grateful for the house’s hospitality.

A few minutes later, Alderney was trailing Frassoni silently from the rooftops, while the rest of the party made their way in the same direction far enough behind to remain out of sight and hearing range, which the twisting back alleys facilitated. Thank goodness for the path of blue orglife stars Alderney was able to mark on the shared map for them to follow.

Bulgaria: {I’ve picked up a lot of interesting information. But right now, we need to keep our eyes peeled. I’ll tell you later.}

Kafana’s spirits sank as they entered a particularly long and twisty subway passage; it was knee-deep in water and so dark the rough stone walls were illuminated only by the glow from Kafana’s divine blessing. When they finally emerged and the streets started to show some life, it felt like she’d gone through a trial and, as a reward, had been granted access to a hidden city within a city, where the rogues walked freely and the outer-authorities crept around if they entered at all. Light spilled out from a brothel and raucous laughter echoed from a window further along below which hooded figures carrying packages entered and left.

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Alderney: {You’ve been noticed, but I’m detecting no hostile intent yet. Stay on your guard, and try not to provoke anything.}

She really needed to spend some time with Alderney working on stealth. A “don’t look at me” field would be perfect for things like this. There weren’t even any handy canals she could jump into.

Kafana: {Bungo, if everyone held onto you and I made them weightless, do you think you could use your shield flying to take us all up to the rooftops in an emergency?}

Bungo: {The middle of a city isn’t a good place for Sylphs, and that’s six stories straight upwards. If Tomsk and I jump together, we might manage to take you, Wellington and Bulgaria as high as a balcony? Not sure.}

Tomsk: {If you could stun the attackers for thirty seconds, the two of us could throw you one by one, and then Bungo could go last and use his shield. But it risks you going splat. Let’s leave that as a fallback for when we get surrounded by an angry crowd. We’ll practise it somewhere safe. For now, stick to Combat Plan Alpha.}

Kafana switched her interface over to raid mode, checked the pre-combat buffs Alpha called for, and started stealth casting them. Setting maintenance reminders was second nature to her now, but she rather hoped they wouldn’t need their precautions. With luck, Bulgaria could talk them out of most likely problems.

She looked at the others. Tomsk seemed totally relaxed, unaware of his surroundings, and was drunkenly bantering with Bungo about the pub crawl they were planning. Bulgaria was wearing a tough intimidating disguise, fit to be the heel in a wrestling performance, and just happened to be standing in such a way as to block most people from being able to see Kafana. She realised why and produced a lantern from her stash, holding it at head height, so people would think the glow came from that, not from her. Then she put on her best “This customer is pissing me off, one more rude comment and they are toast!” expression.

Alderney: {Ok, that’s unexpected. There’s a burnt-out wreck of a building which doesn’t appear on our maps. It’s darker than the surrounding area, like it has anti-illumination or something. I’m picking up weird vibes. Not evil or dangerous. Just alien, like I don’t belong. Frassoni is heading inside.}

Following the guide stars, they took a left turn through an archway that was still partially blocked by the rusted remains of a portcullis that looked like it had been bashed in by a giant fist. The street here was cobbled with wide cold flagstones and there were no doorways onto the street, just the backs of buildings. The sounds of their footsteps were muffled as though an invisible fog were covering the ground. They moved on in silence, the bantering abandoned.

The road started sloping upwards and, after another hundred meters, the road turned left again, as though all the nearby streets formed a tightening spiral which led to this. In front of them, across a narrow bridge, stood the remains of the building constructed from black marble. The architecture was different from the rest of Torello; with tall square decorative columns (now mostly toppled), pleasing walkways (now fallen) and graceful statues (now defaced). The building itself was only three stories high and not much larger than the Fiorio, but it looked imposing because it stood alone on a huge hemi-spherical mound of dark grey stone, accessible only by the bridge; even now it was majestic in its isolation.

Tomsk: {Where’s Frassoni? Is it safe to come ahead, or will he see us?}

Alderney sounded disgruntled. {Come ahead. He stepped behind a statue near the altar and completely vanished.}

Once across the bridge, Bulgaria looked awestruck.

Bulgaria: “I recognise this energy. This place is sacred to Rac, in the same way that the Sanctum is sacred to Cov. I don’t know what it is, but it must date back at least to the Age of Priests, when fanatics decided that all deities other than Cov were as bad as Bel and tried to clean the lands of their worship.”

Alderney walked towards them, kicking a pebble in frustration.

Alderney: “I know what it is. Come and see.”