“I hope Bartholomew is alright.”

“He's probably fine. He's a giant, very fast bird and he's not here.”

Wade had brought up his bird a few times, having had to watch as the bird finally caught on that he had to run away and wait in the forest. It had taken a while since Wade had taken, it seemed, far too good care of the beast and it didn't want to leave but something had clicked in it's bird brain and it had vanished into the dark like a shadow.

Wormwood had been grumbling about the lost treasure and sniping at their situation, which was sneaking through a dead city.

They tried to move quietly but the water announced every step they took, the waves moving away from them like alarms until they could see the edge of the small shanty town that some of the scyllites gathered in before and after their ceremonies.

Eye contact passed between them, each wondering just when the dark night would erupt into scales and teeth and weapons goring them every which way. Clarke took the lead and pulled Gwen close beside him with the others following closely.

He'd explained in brief on but she was still surprised when pushed the folded up hole into her hands and she was confused about how exactly she was holding a hole and shook her head, whipping the thoughts out of her mind. They had to be ready to move fast and Wade, Alouella and Wormwood watched the small houses, each dark front door like a waiting jaw.

Gwen unfolded the hole and the shifting of dirt sounded from within as she waved some spare bits of jerkey she'd held onto in front of the hole.

“C'mon fishy, come get a snack.”

She whispered. A surge from within had her drop the meat in midair but it was swallowed up and a sound like a high speed saw powered by two crazed lumberjacks filled the air. Chips of door and splinters flew to the sides, flung free of the feeding frenzy as the captured sandjaw tore the door to shreds.

“Faster please!”

The nervousness in Alouella's voice was felt by all of them as they began to hear sounds joining the lapping waves, movement. Sometimes the jaws of the monster would scrape Gwen's gauntlets and let out a screech of tooth and metal and something would respond from the city, a wondering question.

Clarke motioned her back and felt at the wood but grit his teeth when he felt no give and motioned her to go on.

“Faster!!”

Alouella whined as the sounds grew closer, a wave of movement coming their way, a glint in the far off dark sloshing closer as the roar called them.

Gwen stepped back and folded the hole up and a few solid pinches later pushed the remaining wooden shards out of the way, a chill cold washing out on her. She ducked inside, pushing the rest as she went and Clarke hurried them over, hissing for them to move as lights began to appear out in the surrounding area.

Clarke had just one last part of his plan to hopefully keep them safe. If it worked.

Elemental shards did funny things when broken and treating them into special bottles with specific reagents to temper those reactions was how you kept from killing yourself.

Clarke set the shard down, untempered, untreated, in the entrance they'd made and pointed Wade at it.

“Hit and run. And I mean run, everyone.”

The sounds grew louder, slimy creatures clawing at the door as Wade brought the mace down with one hand and began fleeing before it collided, shattered particles of ice elemental core pushing out from the blow, each broken piece igniting as they turned and fled.

Ice erupted from the very air, heavy with water and perfect for freezing. It exploded out of the hole, crawling up the wood and out, freezing over and filling their path and following closely behind them in sheets of ice that grew into spikes behind them. The shrieks and bestial sounds from beyond gave them the only indication of what was happening but the hole was sealed.

“We don't have time. Alouella, light please.”

He barked but she stared at the door, her breathing fast at what she considered a betrayal even as it was self defense. Gwen tapped her arm, bringing her to the present and Clarke's request.

“Oh...right.”

The glow was small around them, kept low as they took to the map and followed it into the castle, the sounds hounding them until they grew so quiet as to be lost between the walls.

This quiet was even worse as they traversed the back ways of the castle, following servants passages and back stairways. Every far off splash or drip, every sound had them on edge. The lower they went into the castle and the root of the mountain it was carved from, the wetter it became. Water rose, seeping from cracks and dripping down stone walls until it sloshed around their ankles, then knees. The cold seeped into them, someone's teeth chattering but no one said a word.

Finally Clarke stopped them at a doorway, checking the map and rubbing the stone archway as though it might give him a hint.

“I think we're here.”

He took a step in and fell up to his chest, arms swooping up with the still dry map as he searched for his footing, slipping on whatever slime gathered on the floor until he got his feet stable. Luckily it was only the first step and the rest of the floor was fairly level. He turned to the group.

“Wade, Wormwood, you're with me. Gwen, you and Alouella stay there so you don't have to tread water. Alouella, have the light follow us. Oh, and-”

He looked between the two and finally settled on Alouella to give his book to.

“Please keep this dry.”

She nodded and held it close as she guided the light after them in their search, looking into open cells, the rotten iron bars long since melted to rust with only the bits in the ceiling left behind like rotten teeth. The ball lightning cast visions as it passed by pillars and old bars, shadows darting back and forth, flickers distracting them from the search even as they knew there was nothing other than themselves there.

They hoped.

“Sorry about your fish people.”

Gwen whispered. It may as well have been a yell in the awful quiet. A sad look crossed Alouella's face but she quickly smiled, a big one that chattered from the cold.

“It's fine. I did my best after all to be friendly with them but these things happen. And I learned a little about this weird mana so it wasn't a loss. It's fine.”

Gwen wasn't convinced but she put on a smile too. Enough fake positivity might turn into real positivity.

“That's the spirit.”

The next several minutes passed in silence until Wormwood popped out of the water, rubbing the sting of salt water from his eyes.

“I may have gotten lockjaw doing it but I think I found it.”

“So, two wins.”

Gwen mocked him and he made a mocking face back at her.

“This wall here.”

He guide the others into the second to farthest cell and hit it a few times with a weak thump like any other wall. The sound changed as he moved his fist to a thin sliver no different than the rest. An actual drum-like thump resonated.

“It's hard to disguise a false wall. It's always something with the sound. But he did this part well.”

Wade pulled his mace back.

“Then we just need to bash it down, right?”

Both Clarke and Wormwood grappled his arm, trying to restrain his mace shaped enthusiasm.

“No!”

Clarke yelled. Fear lit up Wormwood's eyes at the very thought.

“Anyone who taught the Spymaster Twinty would almost certainly have placed traps. What kind we don't know. Take your lizard strength and get out of here before you kill us all!”

Wade looked at the wall, stepping away slowly as though any quick movements might set it off. Wormwood tapped the wall, each stone in order, over and over until he was below the water. He would resurface every half minute, breathe and go down until he finally rose with a flat stone in hand.

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“Got the cover off.”

He threw it out of the cell and Clarke asked.

“Can you disarm it?”

Wormwood weighed his hands side to side.

“It's fairly complex. This is beyond something like a cloud of poison gas released with a lever system and some poison. There are gears and bottles. Levers. I don't even know what it does if we break it. It's professional class. It would be much safer to open it with a key and when I say much safer I mean I'm not touching this thing otherwise we will almost certainly die. Also, there was this.”

He pulled a glass vial from somewhere under the water and unplugged the wax stopper. A folded piece of yellow stained parchment sat inside and he emptied it out into Clarke's hand.

Twinty, you dumb bastard, I'm amazed you didn't kill yourself just trying to pull the secret handle. You always did have dumb luck on your side since you don't have anything else in your head.

A lot of things about Twinty suddenly made a lot more sense given his teacher's teacher's teaching style.

If you've gotten this far I might as well just uproot my whole goddamned operation if a blind mouse like you can stumble in. I left the key with that painted up, flat tart you're always ogling.

Enjoy,

Ratleby Shadowstalker

“Good name. Gotta admire the ratling sense for naming. Really tells you what you're dealing with.”

Wormwood noted. Clarke couldn't tell if he was serious but it somehow seemed like genuine praise from.

“Well, what do we do? This 'painted up, flat tart' is long gone.”

Clarke stared at the note. These were spies they were dealing with, people who didn't just leave the keys to their secret lairs with random women. If Twinty was any example, these were people that never came right out and said anything without some convoluted second message and to Clarke, who only ever dealt exactly with things as they were in his line of work, it was the worst match.

He knocked his head against the stone wall, irritation growing with each bonk.

“Maybe Gwen could have a look. She's a dwarf, maybe-”

“I don't think she's that kind of dwarf.”

“Maybe I could...set an explosive bottle-”

“And bring the whole place down on us or drown us? Or signal a mass of creepy swimmy scyllites to come tear us apart? No thank you.”

“Hey.”

Gwen did her best to keep her voice down but it didn't come naturally to her.

“Wasn't Twinty in love with your mom or something?”

They looked at her, sudden dawning realization followed by confusion.

“Why do you say that?”

“Well, I heard you and Twinty talking that night we were all sick and he just had this...less harsh tone. And he said he knew of her and that he owed her. So maybe he knew her a little better than he let on.”

“Oh...OH.”

It clicked for Alouella, the pieces coming together.

“The painting! Keys. A 'painted' up tart and it had keys.”

The tumblers turned for the rest of them and the lock on the puzzle swung wide open.

“Right, a painting wouldn't move, would it? What about the painting of your mother?”

Excitement grew in the group as the likely solution opened the next path and Clarke opened his mouth, only for the entire world around them to shake.

The water sloshed, a deep, booming echo reaching their ears. Something was happening above.

“Let's not wait to find out what that was. Alouella, can you take us to the painting?”

She nodded quickly and the group hurried along the paths and stairs as quickly as they could, their speed slowed just enough to check for anyone lurking but the castle still remained empty until they reached the main hall.

“Douse the light!”

Even before the whispered warning reached her Alouella had killed it. She could feel the air surging and rolling like the sea, the mana stirred up and trying to invade her spell even as it passed her by. What pulled it was terrifying.

The shark woman waved her arms, her body twisting and rolling in some ancient dance that gave away the nature of her magic as a shaman. In her hands were foci for her spell, a spherical bottle of water tainted a greenish black. She danced in circles, her eyes glowing blue green as she called the water up into the air to spray against the layers of ice, beating it back bit by bit. She hissed and spat in the scyillian language as she spoke, something obviously venomous and hateful.

Another boom, this one far louder, far closer, sounded from beyond the door as of something big and powerful striking against it.

“We can't all go but we can't take a light. Too easy to be spotted.”

He put a hand on the wall, thinking.

“It's just a straight path to the throne room, right?”

Alouella nodded.

“I'll just hang on to the wall then.”

“I'll go too. You may think you're sneaky but I cut my teeth on the shadows. Plus, like the shark, there are other custodians of this place who may be around.”

Clarke was slow to nod but agreed.

“Sounds almost like you've become a team player.”

Wormwood shrugged.

“Might be gold.”

The other three hunkered away from the staircase as the two snuck along the wall, back towards the church proper.

It was a straight shot and a slit of light between two large doors. Clarke peeked in, saw the lit braziers, the throne at the far end of the hall above everything else. The paintings above it. The light cast long shadows as the fish people prayed, kneeling and standing, waving their fins, hands and tentacles in a stilted, halting manner.

Wormwood took the initiative and slipped in, Clarke close behind as they moved from pillar to pillar, peeking around to see where eyes were looking and moving along. Scyllites were lower than the throne, below the stairs but they'd still be within eyesight for even a few seconds and that was a few seconds too long.

“Could you hook the painting with your grapple?”

Clarke whispered.

Wormwood cursed under his breath and a second later Clarke knew why from the wet, warm drip down his lip and the taste of iron. They peeked around the pillar but the scyllites had not changed at all, continuing their prayer as before to their relief.

“I believe so.”

He said, lining up his shot and raising his arm at various angles. The entrance doors swept open, tendrils of water pushing them aside as the shark stepped in, her head turning this way and that, sniffing along the floor.

The scyllites turned to her, speaking in their thick language and she spoke back, turning her head around and around, weaving by the pillars in such a way that they knew she smelled something like a dog on the hunt. She stopped at one, the blood smell filling her nose as she whipped around it.

And found nothing.

She spoke to the others as they followed her, the two hanging from the rafters far above.

“Now what?”

The pillar began to shift. Their weight on the beam, the wood shifting and loosening the blocks had them began to tilt and slide, their eyes meeting in shock moments before it collapsed.

Wormwood grabbed Clarke and fired off the other grappling hook, swinging them away from the collapse of stone and wooden beams crashed to the ground.

Clarke ran for the painting and tore it off the wall, screaming for Wormwood to run as soon as it was in his hands.

The pile shifted, tendrils of water pushing the stone away from the group they had protected. She screeched after them, a sound neither was sure whether it was a word or just anger but it spurred them to scrambling, full speed flight down the hallway.

Clarke fumbled his knife along the edges, cutting the painting out of the heavy frame and feeling something hard along the bottom of the canvas as he rolled it up.

Yes! We may not die!

His enthusiasm waned when he heard the flooding roar of water behind and turned to see the horrifying sight of the tendrils rolling along the floor in the form of a ball rolling after them and the enraged shark swimming through it much faster than if she'd run, her jaws snapping and chomping after their guts.

The gate shook now, whatever was beyond beginning to break through and then they'd be cornered.

A bright beam of light shone where they'd left the others and they saw Alouella send out a lightning ball, her eyes snapping to both of them and both of them fleeing aside without a word.

Her spell shot off, a bolt of yellow lightning lancing forward to meet the orb of rolling water and for the shark to leap out and land moments before impact. The water collapsed behind her and she whipped her small foci out, arms moving around it as she called water out of the air to form a new water orb.

The shark girl screamed and shrieked, her scyllian language gushing unknown profanity as the door finally broke, pieces breaking apart, shards of ice caught in fat tentacles.

“Liar! Is lying, coward elf! Is BETRAYER! Is fake and hateful, mean liar!”

Alouella looked taken aback, more hurt by the verbal assault than the attempted murder but Clarke grabbed her as he ran by, everyone careening down the stairs so fast that every step might have become a tangled ball of limbs.

The surge of scyllites followed and the noise of an angry ocean hounded their steps, Wormwood leading the way as years of breaking and entering route memorization led them.

Alouella lit two lights, one following them for light and another unstable, electricity bubbling off of it as she left it in the air behind. Pained screeches echoed too loud in the stairs as the ball shot smaller bolts at all those bodies trapped in the stairway.

Clarke picked at the painting, tearing at the sewn pocket on the back and freeing a single key just as they came to the dungeon.

“Wade, give us a hand!”

Gwen yelled. He swept them up, holding them above the water as they waded in, cramming the party into the cell. Wormwood snatched the key from Clarke and dipped below the water. Seconds ticked off, adrenaline pumping as the sound of slithering hell resumed, closer and closer with every eye glued to the entrance.

Wormwood jumped up and sucked in a breath with the clicking and turn of gears, once silent but years of decay having rendered an angry metal on metal that called the pursuers. A hallway opened in the wall and the water rushed in with them, swirling past and carrying them in a current. Whether due to any action by Wormwood or automatic mechanism the door ground shut behind, shadows closed off from pursuit.

The pounding and slamming against the wall said they knew they were still there.

The room they stood in was barely tall enough to stand up in, All but Gwen stooped over in some fashion, Wade bent at the waist. The room was wide though, a table and chairs in one area, numerous boxes all boarded up. Despite the sea air and the wet the room was in remarkable condition. Knives and daggers lined one wall and even a suit of leather armor sat on a mannequin. Several large lock boxes sat around the room, each one sturdy and padlocked, books lining a few shelves.

A muffled gasping and choking from a sprung trap reached them through the wall.

“How long do we have?”

Gwen asked.

“Not long at all.”

Clarke said, what they needed running through his mind. He pointed to Wormwood.

“Look for another exit, now. Alouella, give him the light. Wade and Gwen, help me toss everything, and I mean everything, in the hole.”

“That shark is gonna eat everything and we'll have come here for nothing!”

Wormwood yelled as he knocked at the wall.

“No, it won't.”

Clarke opened the hole and took out a little bottle as the shark looked up at him, its teeth grinding around in hunger. Wade looked at it, some feeling of affection at seeing those big black doll eyes prompting his question.

“You're not gonna kill it, are you?”

Clarke shook his head.

“Might be useful later and I don't have anything to kill it with.”

He tossed the bottle down at it and it chomped, the broken glass harmlessly giving way to the potion as it went completely rigid with paralysis.

Clarke held the hole open and they began tossing in boxes and papers, books, Gwen throwing in the table and chairs when everything else was gone for good measure. The pounding on the wall became breaking stone, the fresh rush of frigid water flooding their small room.

“Wormwood, how about that door?”

Wade asked, readying himself between the scyllites and the group.

“I'm looking.”

He spat, tapping at the wall.

“Look harder.”

“I am looking as hard as I god damn- oh, here it is.”

He slammed his fist into a stone, a piece of the wall sliding away to precious escape. Clarke folded the hole and they lunged for it, Wade at the back this time as they skittered sideways down the hole, sea monsters lashing and grabbing at them, coming single file into the room only for them to become a single mass of squirming, grasping parts shoving after them.

Whether it was the weight, the water or time something clicked, scraped, the sound of stone cracking and water rushing past forcing the tunnel to fold in on itself. Rushing rock and breaking passage rolling around them as they fell.

It was finally quiet.