CHAPTER 51

The room Miss Amelia leads me into wouldn’t have shamed a king. To me, it looks like the peak of luxury. The bed is fit for three. The fire, more for presence than warmth, I imagine, has burned down to coals that glow red beyond the grating. The aura of comfort and coziness that permeated the study is present here as well.

I turn back to see Miss Amelia handing the tray to the shadowy figure of a servant, who then shuffles down the hall. The housekeeper turns to me with an appraising smile.

“Now, then. This will be your room while you stay with us. Clothes are in the dresser there, facilities through that door, and as for the big tour you’ll have to wait for tomorrow. Would you like help getting undressed?” Amelia gives a meaningful nod towards my bandages.

“I think I can manage,” I say. In truth, I’m mortified by the thought of this woman helping me dress, like I’m a child.

She pierces me with eyes that seem perfectly capable of killing a person by staring them down.

“Very well,” she says. “Then I should imagine the best course of action is to go straight to bed. I should warn you not to go wandering around the house tonight. I haven’t told the servants about you yet, and strangers get them jumpy. Is that understood?”

I nod. Last thing I need after evading death by drake is to be brained by a nervous servant.

“Then off to bed, then. Tomorrow, as they say, is a new day.”

The door closes softly behind Amelia. After a moment, I hear her walk down the corridor, footsteps muffled by the thick rug. Soon enough, there isn’t even that; just the creaks of a settling house and the slow death of the fire in the hearth.

I visit ‘the facilities’, as Amelia called them. It seems I have a private bathing pool, though I’m sure a Godtouched would call it a washing tub.

The room is curiously devoid of distractions. No books, no paintings; the luxury extends only to the quality of the furniture, not the entertainment. I walk to the window and press my face against it but can’t see more than the waving mass of a tree in the center of a pool of darkness. There’s a skitter when the occasionl branch scrapes along the glass.

The bed calls, huge, deep, and inviting. But after the last few hours’ excitement, I feel too awake. I still can’t quite believe I ran through the corridors of Black Sword Keep with nothing but a shift on. Godtouched had recognized me! And… And apparently Valkas has it in for me. If earlier it was about fairness and me having infiltrated the Challenge – a generous description, since I’d actually run in in sight of thousands –, now I could see it being about his humiliation in front of other guild members.

And then I remember that there are things left undone. Focusing, I summon the misty pages.

You have gained a level!

Congratulations, Malco of Reach! You have attained Level 2. Choose your EXPERTISE. Available options:

A deluge of information floods me then. It takes me a moment to identify what seems to be a list of trades, though not exactly trades. Architecture comes up and is followed a few lines down by Beggar. Mercenary appears half down the list, and closer to the end Pirate shows up. Artist is given the exact same relevance as Cultist. There are more than two hundred entries.

I try focusing on one of them at random.

Scribe

Scribes are experts in copying, calligraphy, and following dictation, and have knowledge on various academic subjects.

And that’s it. Not a lot of commentary on how the ability to keep up with dictation is going to help me should I find myself in a dungeon again. When am I going into a dungeon again? Something to ask Lysander in the morning. I feel like a stabled racehorse, waiting for a future run. Is this what Medrein was trying to save us from?

A pang of guilt. I haven’t yet spared a thought for what must have happened to Medrein. Attacking all those guards alone, surrounded by Godtouched?

Because of me.

I shake my head and don’t let the thought distract me. He did what he did to atone for giving Katha away and to save his eldest daughter.

Rev…

Every thought is a trap. Hilde in the clutches of some Godtouched, Rue considered loot, Rev vanished, and Katha… Sold. No matter where I turn, I find myself standing not that far from where I started the day Katha was taken. Up a level and down a sister.

To distract myself, I make my way slowly up the list. Spelunker and Ratcatcher, Mariner and Locksmith, Juggler and Boatswain. I’m close to the top, reading idly, letting the options flit in front of my eyes like so many flies, when I find it. Alchemist.

Dala was never truly and alchemist, or at least not trained as such. Healing was her family’s trade, and from there came the knowledge of plants, the apothecary’s eye in the wilderness. Well, plants were not so common in dungeons, but potions…

Alchemist

Alchemists are skilled in the preparation and identification of potions.

If I’d had this when I found the laboratory in the fourth level… Well, things might not have gone the way they did.

And it would bring you closer to Dala, something whispers inside my head.

I silence that treasonous side of myself, focus on what’s important: preparation and identification of potions. Meaning I could finally find out what the thing I carried into and through a dungeon actually does, and I would be able to circumvent the issue Medrein found with potions. That is, that knowing what they do is largely a matter of trying them out, with all the dangers that encompasses.

I select Alchemist and confirm my choice. The misty pages contract and expand, and I’m taken to a different sort of table. The new page says,

Malco of Reach

Level 2 Inquisitor

ARCHETYPES

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

TRAITS

While everything else is a pale, misty white, the words Archetypes and Traits glow with a faint orange. I focus on the first and see the letters morph once again.

Archetype: INQUISITOR

SECRETS:

1 Local Secret Available

1 Regional Secret Available

Hmm.

SECRETS

Twisted Minds, Local

In Black Sword Keep, servants talk about the strange and labyrinthine rooms in the catacombs where no one is allowed to enter apart from a few select Godtouched.

Persons of interest: Thomas, a servant. Maid Meriana, a Godtouched.

I… I don’t even know who these people are. Strange catacombs? Select Godtouched?

Whatever it is, it doesn’t have a thing to do with Katha or Rev, and my interest is suitably reduced.

The Right Way, Regional

Who is Kord? What interest does Lysander have in him? Why did he buy Katha from Reach?

Now this is more like it.

Kord. Kord from Olvion, buyer of Katha for unknown reasons. He had kept her from the Challenge, and for that alone I supposed I owed him a debt of gratitude. But why had he done that? What were his motives? And as the misty pages so eloquently put it, what interest does Lysander have in him?

Lysander. I lay down on the bed, which is as soft as a cloud, and stare at the ceiling. I’d picked his Door as an exit and he is now my patron, which probably means something closer to owner. And now more dungeons will follow until I’m as powerful as the two Challengers I saw locked in battle. That, or until I die trying.

And then there’s Arbiter’s warning that a war is coming. Let them go. Had she said that, or had that been Hilde down in the sand arena, while Rev’s blood was flowing through my fingers?

Dungeons or war. Lysander or Arbiter. And, possibly, a third path. I have the levels I craved since I was a child. I have a clear goal in Olvion. What’s tying me to Lysander, to this place?

My eyes begin to close. Yawning, I focus on Traits.

Traits:

Origin

Luck’s Fool

Observant

Sneaky

Lockpicker

Dirty Fighter

Origin (Language) (Gift)

One of the earliest languages, spoken by the progeny of the First Clay.

Figures that was my Gift.

I try focusing on First Clay, but nothing comes up. I only know that the Digger, the entity carving out tunnels under the Barrow Hills, is related to it. And Rue, of course, though his memory wasn’t the best. But an early language? How early? In what sense?

I yawn again, fighting to stay awake. This bed really is softer than softness. One more minute.

Luck’s Fool (Curse)

You tested your luck too far and now must pay up. She will come calling.

I blink. Curse? The misty pages dissolve, leaving me staring at the tall ceiling. I don’t remember any curse. When was this? When did I test my luck? Who is she?

When didn’t you test your luck, whispers my dungeon mind. Miracles mounted on miracles got you out of that place and others paid the price. Isn’t it time you suffered for it?

I did suffer for it, I think back indignantly, lifting my bandaged hand.

As much as Verra? Or Dako? Tale, Edd, Gaun, even Rev?

Exhaustion piles on exhaustion. Faces course through my mind mixed with screams and blood, the world collapsing on the desperate. I curl into a ball, hugging my knees. Everything fades.

*

I wake up when distant bangs intrude upon chaotic, frantic nightmares. I reach up and grab the pillow in a tight fist, reassuring myself the dungeon is behind me. It works; nothing so soft existed under the earth. It’s still dark outside and a last defiant blaze remains in the hearth, so I can’t have been asleep for long.

I sit up, drowsy and relieved, and the banging comes again, three hard strikes on a door knocker. There’s movement in the house. Light slides under the door from corridor, and a shadow reveals someone outside my bedroom door, unmoving. A servant protecting Lysander’s investment?

Without making a sound, I move through the darkness to peek outside. The night is alive and wild. The tree I heard scraping outside my window dances and sings in a fierce gale. The blaze in the hearth flares orange, fanned by the wind in the chimney.

There is a figure standing out in front of the house, carrying a torch and looking intently at each window. After another bout of knocking, a second person joins him. To my surprise, I recognize them. One is Valkas’ muscle, the one who advanced right before Lysander magic’d us away from Black Sword Keep, now clad in softly glowing yellow armor. The other, dressed in guild-approved red and black, is the man who appeared when me and Medrein were attacked by the Godtouched robbers. They wait in silence.

A door opens and light spills out into the courtyard.

“Sirs?” says a voice, yelling to be heard above the wind. Though she doesn’t come into view, I recognize it as Amelia’s.

“Lysander here? We’d like to have a word.”

“Then you should have come at proper hours. M’lord doesn’t wish to be disturbed.”

“Oh, he’s gonna be disturbed, all right,” says Valkas’ muscle. “Tell him that—”

“No, sir. I’m telling you the master of the house does not wish to be disturbed and you should come back at another time.”

Muscle bristles at this, while the man in red and black is content to step back and keep observing the windows. His eyes shine dangerously in the darkness, taking everything in. But as he’s focused on the house, he misses everything taking place in the darkness around him. I think I see strange shapes moving behind them in the stark shadows thrown by the light inside, but whether they’re there or they’re remainders from my nightmares, I cannot tell.

“I don’t know who you think I am,” Muscle replies. He’s also the face of the duo, it seems. “But if you want to go to bed with your head on your shoulders you’ll do as you’re told.”

“Is that a threat?” Amelia asks, voice harsh. “I’ve heard a few threats tonight. The girl you sent ahead to skulk in the woods was fond of them.”

At this, the two men eye each other.

“That woman is an agent of the Black Sword guild,” says Muscle, stepping forward.

“Aye. And when you’re back home in your lovely keep you’ll get plenty of opportunity to ask her how far threats get you with me. When I allow her to respawn, that is.”

Muscle’s sword comes off its scabbard and his yellow armor blazes alight, veins igniting in gold.

“I’ll raze this goddamn place to the ground, woman,” he spits. “Tell Lysander to step out or—”

This time, the interruption comes from Red-and-Black. He places a hand on his partner’s shoulder and points to a spot I can’t see. Muscle spins, aiming his sword, and something else comes up in the darkness behind them. Eyes, quick like fishes, indistinct bodies moving beyond the light. I try to count them without luck; they’re either too fast or too many.

Unnatural shadows coalesce around the two Black Swordsmen, as if the night is pressing down on them, surrounding them. The two stand back to back. There’s a shrill noise that I mistake for wind at first, and then realize is coming from throats, each one braying, hissing, snapping, roaring the same warning note.

Amelia comes into view, stepping fearless into the little circle of light.

“How will it be, sirs? Tuck tail and run, or die here and leave all your nice equipment behind?”

Before Muscle can answer, Red-and-Black puts his sword down.

“We would be grateful if you could tell Lysander we will be passing by tomorrow to discuss official guild business,” he says.

“He will be delighted to have you, I’m sure,” Amelia responds without a trace of irony.

Red and Black gives her a curt bow and sheathes his sword. Still, the shadows linger. Muscle keeps his sword raised, staring into the darkness with teeth bared, until finally relenting and sheathing his sword with a huff.

“Oh, I’m not sure he will. Harboring something like you, does he know what he’s doing? Does he know the shit he’s about to bring onto his pretty blond head?”

“He himself will tell you tomorrow,” Amelia says, the figure of calmness itself.

“Yeah,” the man in yellow nods. “Yeah, that he will.” His eyes focus on Amelia. “What are you, then? Some summoner type thing? Been preparing, huh?”

“Goodnight, sirs.”

“Right,” Muscle spits, a dangerous twinkle in his eye. “One thing that’s always true of summoner bastards: when they die, the whole show crumbles. Isn’t that right?”

Red and Black steps forward, cursing, but he’s too late. In a flash of bright gold, Muscle rushes, sword suddenly alive in the darkness, aimed straight at Amelia. Something splits from the darkness. A hulking shape, all teeth and bristles, claws and long legs, as big as a boar rushes from the roil of darkness to crash into the Godtouched and throw them both past the reach of light again. Muscle screams as a thousand waiting shapes throw themselves at him, and just like that, he’s engulfed. His armor flashes once, a glimmer among the moving shadows, and then disappears.

Amelia remains still, her eyes focused on Red-and-Black. The man’s hand closes the distance to the handle of his sword, uncertain, and the darkness seems to press in attentively, waiting. For a tense moment they remain so, and then the hand unclenches and backs away, hiding behind the man’s back. He gives Amelia a bow, pronounced, respectful.

“Tomorrow, then,” he says.

And then he turns and walks away. The darkness within darkness parts to let him through, and he carries his torch deep into the night without a semblance of fear. Amelia stands in watch for a moment more, until he’s nothing but a distant hint of a shape in the vanishing light, and soon not even that.

She turns. Her hands are clasped into fists. Her breath breaks out for a moment, ragged and anxious, before regaining composure. Before she walks into the house, her eyes flicker in my direction. Without noticing, I’ve pressed my face against the cold window, fogging the glass.

“And you,” she says curtly. “Bed!”

I find it wiser to obey.