Minos PoV [https://i.imgur.com/FzLSe2O.jpg]

Minos reached the end of the hallway and carefully limped up the stairs, cursing and muttering to himself. Arriving at the top, he continued along the second-floor corridor, shouting for Rei's name under his breath.

"Rei!" He twisted one door knob and found it locked. He moved on the next. "Rei! Where are you?"

He passed by three more doors, shaking the knob more violent than the previous one. He was ready to kick the next door when the last one he passed by opened and a sharp whistle called out to him. He turned around and found Rei's head peeking out of the room.

"There you are," he started limping back.

Rei saw his bloody thigh and he tilted his head to the side as if asking what happened.

"Your stupid knife." Minos tossed Rei's blade back to him.

"Did you stab yourself with my dagger?" Rei asked. Minos might not see his mouth but he could tell that the foreigner was laughing right under his mask.

"I didn't stab myself. What are you laughing at?" he said with annoyance, "Weeks of traveling together, hundreds of jokes, and this is what you find funny?"

"I can't believe you stabbed yourself in the leg."

"I didn't stab myself--" Minos' head dropped in surrender, before raising his index finger right at Rei's face, "you know what, you're not allowed to talk anymore. No more, I don't wanna hear your voice again, just stay quiet."

Without the mask, Minos' would've seen Rei's amused grin, but all he saw was him motioning his head towards the room.

"What's in there?" Minos asked. He stepped in and found the dead body of a drow lying on the floor, its thick blood seeping into the carpet. On the far end of the room, another drow was sitting on a corner, bloodied and chained. "Yehey, another dead drow. What's our body count?" He added, nonchalantly.

Minos walked in and took note of the knife wound on the drow's neck. He correctly assumed that Rei sneaked in and stabbed him from behind while he was facing away from the door. He glanced to his left and found a bed with a chain tied to its post, the sheets and blankets were stained with blood. He then rested his elbow on top of a cabinet to his right, beside a ceramic plate covered with dried blood, a curved needle and a length of thread.

"Would you look at that, exactly what I needed! Thank Moira." Minos cheered and made a holy gestur pointed to the sky. "Can you help me stitch my leg?" he asked his companion, pointing to the paraphernalia on the furniture. Rei motioned for later.

The foreigner beckoned for Minos and they both approached the drow sitting on the far side, bound in chains.

"What are we gonna do with this one?" asked Minos. He rubbed his eyes, feeling the effect of the potion he drank earlier starting to wear off.

The drow raised his head and faced the two. "She told me you are here to save Cassana? My name is Otheric, I am her..." the drow paused for a moment before continuing, "fiance."

"Wait, you talked to him?" Minos asked Rei.

The foreigner nodded.

"Seti's breath, it took you days to start talking to me, and you meet this guy and you just tell him who we are."

Rei rolled back his eyes once more, as his usual reaction to Minos' complaints.

"Also, fiance?" Minos returned to Otheric. "That broad has a fiance? You're kidding, right? There's no way... You must be lying."

"It is true," said Otheric.

"How will we know that you really are the person you claim you are? That you're not one of these folks? I don't know, maybe you botched their breakfast, and they got mad and tied you up to punish you?"

"What?" asked Otheric, confused.

"If we free you, what's gonna stop you from stabbing us in the back the first moment you get?"

"Fair enough." Otheric grunted, "take a gander at that fallen portrait on the vanity table."

Minos indulged the drow and picked up the portrait on the table. He flipped it and found a painting of a pair of humans embracing a drow child. "This supposed to be you?" Minos raised the portrait right along Otheric's face and compared the two. "Alright, looks close enough."

As Minos walked about, he felt his thigh throb in pain, so he sat on the bed instead. "So, where is Cassana?"

"If I am to guess, the parlor." answered the drow.

"Do you know what they want with her?"

"I do."

"Spill it then."

"There is... there is a weapon that they brought here, and they want her to confirm its veracity."

"A weapon?" Minos asked, hiding the smile from his lips and the keenness from his eyes.

"Yes, an ancient artifact, a powerful weapon that has been hidden away."

"Interesting... and why her?"

"I was supposed to ask her father for help, but I did not know that he perished while I was away. They fo- they manipulated me into bringing the artifact here."

"Away? You were away?"

"I have been away for months, and I have just returned this morning."

"I see. So I'm assuming Cassana didn't cooperate, so they attacked her, and now they're holding you here to make sure that she does."

Otheric nodded.

Minos glanced at Rei and grinned, he could no longer contain the excitement in his eyes. The reward of my faith. He looked back at Otheric and proceeded to continue their conversation, "It really is in this house... the weapon..."

"Should be in the parlor as well."

Minos almost jumped off the bed from giddiness. Rei tried his best to calm him down.

"Alright, alright, here's what we do," Minos told Rei, "first, you clean up my leg, then-"

Rei placed his hand on Minos' shoulder motioning for him to stop. He then pointed towards the suffering drow.

"Fine, fine. First, untie him. Then you clean up my thigh."

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Minos wrapped a bandage around his thigh. His companion had just finished stitching the knife wounds he got from the drow earlier. Otheric was sitting on the bed, back against the wall, emptying the contents of Rei's canteen.

"Alright, I'm good," the young nobleman stood up, stretching his leg. "How about you?" He looked at the drow.

"I am ready," answered Otheric.

Minos strapped his shield on his left arm and grabbed his sword with his right. "Awesome. They've probably seen those dead drows by now, so we don't need to sneak about. "Once we give Cassana her--" the young noble looked around and realized something was missing. "Wait a minute..."

Rei gave him a curious look.

"Where's Cassana's staff?"

Rei shrugged.

"I gave it to you, didn't I?"

Rei shook his head.

Minos stood befuddled trying to remember when was the last time he held the staff. "We were in the gallery, and then... Seti's breath, I left it, didn't I? I left it in the gallery. I was distracted and I forgot about it..."

Rei sighed.

Minos let out a big exhausted air.

"Cassana's staff?" Otheric asked.

"Yes, we had it, and we were supposed to hand it to her so she can do her magic stuff..." explained Minos.

"If it is in the gallery, we can grab it on the way."

"It's on the way?"

"Indeed. There is no need to worry about it too much." The young drow stepped down the bed with much difficulty. His ankle had been broken and Rei improvised a splint to keep it secure.

"You can point us the way, but are you sure you can walk?"

"Yes, I can do this," he motioned for the axe lying on the floor, previously owned by the dead drow, and Rei picked it up and handed it to him.

Stolen novel; please report.

"Can you even use that?" Minos asked him.

"Pull and swing. How hard could that be?" he answered, doing the motion of pulling back the axe and swinging it down. Minos could see all the half-a-dozen ways the drow could injure himself doing that, but he kept his mouth shut.

Rei stood behind the door, then Minos took Otheric's arm and placed it over his shoulder. "How about this?" he asked him.

"Better, I think." Minos and Otheric limped behind Rei, him with an injured thigh, the drow with a broken ankle. He tapped Rei and the foreigner opened the door and stepped out.

"Back to the gallery, right? So over here..." Minos pointed to the left and the drow confirmed.

They merely took two steps forward and Rei motioned for them to be quiet. The three of them could hear it, heavy footsteps coming up the stairs. Rei pulled his two daggers and shifted to a defensive stance, Minos readied his shield and Otheric raised his axe.

A tall, muscular, drow stepped out of the corner by the staircase. He wore a wool jacket with a thick fur collar on top of his now naked breast. Around his abdomen appeared a corset made of iron chains, and a sharp blade protruded from his back. He turned to face the trio, who carefully retreated to the other end of the corridor.

"Nymgos." Otheric whispered.

"Oh, he has a name, good for him. I'm getting tired of referring to them as drow number one and drow number two." Minos quipped.

There was something in Nymgos' size that made him appear to move very slowly. He took three steps forward but they can already feel the coldness of his breath touching their faces. "What do we do?" asked Otheric.

"You said you were ready..." answered Minos.

"Ready to leave the room. Not this. Do you have a different plan?"

"My plan? My plan is to make a plan. That's my plan."

With deliberate silence, Rei jumped up from where he was standing and bounced off against the parallel walls of the corridor. In a blink, he was already about to land a blow against Nymgos' neck but the big drow grabbed his wrist as he landed. Rei lunged another dagger to his body but the drow caught his other arm as well.

He pulled Rei's wrists and twisted them together in an attempt to break them, but the foreigner kicked him in the neck and face and his grip loosened. Rei used the momentum of his kick to do a back-flip and freed himself from his grasp.

Minos rushed in as the foreigner was landing behind, and used the short window of opportunity to land a thrust with his longsword. But Nymgos seemed to have anticipated what he was going to do as he had already raised up his armored bracer to aid in his guard. Minos' blade bounced off Nymgos' arm and the young noble shifted his weight to swing his shield arm up, in an attempt to hit the big drow's head.

Nymgos, despite his size, was quick enough to dodge Minos' shield, and he exploited the young nobleman's open guard to counterattack. Minos didn't see the right hook, only that he felt his jaw shake from the mean punch of the big drow. The young nobleman staggered back, tasting the blood in his mouth.

Rei jumped in again and threw a barrage of slashes and thrusts with his dual daggers. Minos could barely see the young foreigner move, yet the big drow didn't seem to be all bothered by him. Minos glanced back at Otheric, who was valiantly holding up his axe despite his obvious lack of chance. Both of them were trying to find a moment to step and swing their own attacks.

If only they weren't in a narrow corridor, then the three of them could overwhelm the big drow, and the odds of beating him would be in their favor. Their location however, was very much against them. Minos re-sheathed his sword and pulled out his short bow and arrow. His eyes followed Rei's lightning-speed movement, while aiming for the drow's neck. FWIPT! He released the string as he found the right moment, but the big drow simply swatted the projectile away.

"How did he see that?" Minos bemoaned. He nocked another arrow and made another shot. And another. And another. All missing. He realized he had been stepping backwards this whole time and the rear of his heel finally touched the wall behind him. Cornered.

He glanced to their left and motioned for the last door. "Where does that lead?" he asked Otheric.

"A guest bedroom," the young drow answered.

"Can you open it?"

Without answering, Otheric reached for the handle and frantically pushed the door open.

"Get inside." Ordered Minos. He fired another shot, and this time he almost hit Rei. "Sorry!"

Minos stepped through the door and saw the fairly-sized bedroom that Otheric mentioned, with a window at the end. He reached for the window and opened it and his hunch was right, it was a dormer window. He peered out his head and looked to find a short slope of slate roof hanging around twenty feet above ground. He looked to the side and the roof continued further up to the gables.

"Do you have a plan now?" Otheric asked him.

"Yeah, bits of it." Minos returned to the corridor, where Rei was pinned down under the drow's foot and knee. Nymgos was about to stab the foreigner with his own dagger when an arrow pierced through his neck. Nice shot. Minos praised himself.

Rei twisted his body so he could escape the drow's grapple, and as he struggled to stand up, he felt his ribcage tremble from the tremendously powerful blow that came from the drow's fist. Rei lost half-a-second of time and the next thing he realized, he was lying down at the end of the corridor with his head on Minos' lap.

"Are you okay?" asked Minos, despite the obvious.

Rei nodded all the same. Spots of blood had dirtied his mask, and his upper garment had wear and tear all around. Meanwhile, the big drow stamped his foot on the floor, and with his left and right hand, snapped both tips of the arrow that Minos planted on his neck. He then pulled it out and tossed it on the floor.

"Is this guy for real?" blurted Minos. He glanced towards the door and remembered his plan, "inside, now, go." Minos pushed the masked foreigner and he followed behind, closing the door. Otheric then pushed a vanity cabinet to bar the entrance. "Good job, lover boy."

"What next?" asked Otheric.

"We lure him to the roof," answered Minos.

"Why the roof?"

"He seems to be unbeatable. Our advantage is that we outnumber him, but we can't use that advantage in a tight spot. We need to fight him in the open, overwhelm him."

Every other phrase of Minos' plan was interrupted by a loud banging on the door. Yet, Rei nodded to all of it. Minos was the first to climb out the window, followed by Otheric, then the foreigner.

The three took positions up top. Otheric climbed up right along the main gable, and hugged his arms around a chimney to help in his balance. Minos steadied himself on the edge of the roof far to the right of the dormer window, pulling the string of his bow, ready to shoot the moment anything pops out. "If we're lucky, he might slip, fall down and hit his head." He whispered to the three, smiling, though they were probably too focused to hear him.

Rei was on the top of the dormer roof gable, his daggers ready to stab the neck of anyone who even dare peek out the window. The three waited with bated breath, counting the stomping on the door, until they finally heard their facile barricade break down, followed by an unnerving stillness.

Minos could hear every beating of his heart. Like war drums in a battlefield. His bow hand shook along with it so he tried to quiet it down, to no avail. A drop of sweat slid from his eyebrows down to the corner of his eye, but he refused to even blink just for a moment. He watched his shadow on the roof tiles fade away as another thick cloud covered the full moon above them. Come on big guy, come find us here. He whispered.

With a loud crash, a large blade pierced through the dormer roof, throwing and tossing fragments of slate tiles all around Rei. He jumped off before he could lose his footing and managed to land on the side near Minos.

Nymgos climbed out of the broken roof with a roar, like a giant misshapen reptile bursting out of its egg. Minos released his arrow and it just whizzed through right above his shoulder. The big drow was now holding a blade, the same one hanging from his back earlier. He then unfurled the length of chain wrapped around his belly which Minos earlier thought was a corset. The chain was revealed to be attached to his giant naked blade, and he spun his weapon around like a heavy pendulum on a rope.

"Great, now he has a weapon." Minos remarked, before letting loose another arrow.

Nymgos' chain and blade easily knocked the projectile off its course. He spun his weapon a few more times and tossed it towards Minos and Rei, who both managed to dodge out of the way. The blade scraped along the tiled roof top, sending sparks in all directions. The big drow yanked on the chain and swung it to the side, sending the blade towards Otheric.

The young drow ducked and the blade merely shattered the chimney he was hugging. Without much effort, Nymgos spun the blade around again, keeping Minos and Rei at a length's distance. Anybody who dared to move, Nymgos would toss the blade against them, and pull it away, and spin it up again.

As awesome as his weapon was, Minos soon recognized that it wasn't very effective. Yes, spinning it around makes for a solid defense, but once he tosses his blade out, he leaves himself vulnerable for a few seconds. It was also very easy to predict where the blade would land, and once countered, it would be difficult to make a follow up.

Minos motioned for his other companions to spread out, and hoped that they were thinking what he was thinking. All they needed to do was wait for Nymgos to throw his blade on one of them, then the other two could use that opportunity to land their blows. Minos trusted Rei would be able to catch up with no problem, but he didn't know Otheric, and he was certain this young drow had never been in a fight before.

Nymgos tossed his blade towards Minos, and the young noble dodged away. However, he landed on his wrong foot, and lost his balance along the edge of the roof. He had no choice but to let go of his bow so he could grab onto the ledge and prevent himself from landing twenty feet below.

That would be the opportune moment for the other two to strike, but Minos heard Nymgos yank on his chain again, and swing for another strike. He pulled his body up and saw the drow's blade landing on top of his right hand, so pulled it away just in time, leaving him hanging by one hand. He glimpsed over and saw Otheric trying to sneak behind Nymgos, but Rei was hesitating between attacking the drow or helping Minos.

The big drow yanked on the chain and swung at the young nobleman one more time. Without much room to move around, Minos' choices were to keep his grip and lose his hand from the incoming blade, or let go and fall down to his death. In both cases, he most certainly would die.

He chose the latter.

Minos' grip was already free of the roof before the blade even hit it and shattered it to pieces. He closed his eyes and braced for his inevitable last breath. Yet it never came.

Minos opened his eyes and saw his feet dangling up in the air. He looked up and found Rei, one arm holding on to his collar, the other clinging at the edge of the roof. Nymgos' blade was lodged right beside him, unmoving. With one loud grunt, Rei pulled Minos up and let him reach the roof. Hanging side by side, the young nobleman was about to say something, but Rei glared at him instead, a look that he had grown so familiar with in the past few weeks, so Minos kept his mouth shut.

Climbing back up on the roof, they saw that Otheric had been keeping their opponent busy by becoming Nymgos' own personal punching bag. Minos quickly yanked on the chain that was still attached to Nymgos' arm, and let Rei run up its length. The big drow turned towards them, but found it too late to dodge the foreigner's sharp dagger that landed on his throat.

Minos pulled out his sword once again, and climbed up the slope of the roof. He pushed the pointy end of his blade on Nymgos' back, right between his rib bones, and let it penetrate his chest. "Got you now, you son of a bitch."

Minos took several deep breaths as he pulled his sword out, letting Nymgos bleed on the roof. Rei and Otheric stepped back as well to gather their bearings.

As the thick cloud pulled away revealing the moon behind it, something clicked on Otheric's head. He looked up with fear and followed the beam of moonlight shining down on them. "No... I forgot to mention..." he said, shaking.

"What?" asked Minos.

"He is part of the Silver Moon Order."

"Okay..." Minos nodded, trying to remember what the name implied. He had heard of them, along with a dozen other secret societies and organizations in the continent.

"And..." Otheric continued.

"Wait... you mean to say..."

Otheric nodded.

"So that wasn't just a story? They are afflicted by it?"

"Not all of them..."

"But I heard that they were cured, weren't they?"

"Most of them." Otheric stepped back from Nymgos' body and motioned for the two to keep their distance. The wound on the big drow's body began moving under the moonlight, and the blood dripping from his chest started to turn dry.

"Seti's breath," exclaimed Minos.

"There are some who still carry the disease with them, and naturally, those were the ones they appointed to lead their various cells around the continent."

Nymgos' flesh turned more leathery and the hairs on his arms and chest started growing thicker and longer. Nymgos rolled on his back and lifted his body off the roof tiles, balancing on his four limbs.

"What's happening?" finally asked Rei, not liking the feeling of being left in the dark with their conversation. "What disease?"

As the three reached near the edge of the rooftop, Minos turned to Rei, with a look of horror written all over his face, and answered his question, "Lycanthropy."

The newly transformed creature lifted its head and let out a loud howl that echoed across the night.