Val and I returned to the traveller’s inn that night to find the downstairs empty but for Corminar and the elven diplomats. They were usually first to go up for the night, but they’d discovered that this particular inn actually had good wine, and were making up for lost time.

We’d planned to head straight up to my room, but Corminar caught sight of us and waved us over, and there was nothing we could do to excuse ourselves that wouldn’t have made our nighttime plans obvious. Corminar poured us each a rather healthy glass of wine when we joined them, and my promise to myself about not drinking on this particular night was shattered.

They spoke of elven things—that is, things very specific to elvish culture—and Val and I largely kept silent, sipping our wine. But then the grizzled male elf suddenly snapped his head to Corminar, his eyes wide.

‘I fancy that I know who you are,’ the elf said.

‘Urlwan,’ one of the other elves warned him, but the elf was undeterred.

‘You are the Champion of Iranir, are you not? Lieutenant… Cludelor?’

‘Cladenor,’ Val said absent-mindedly, and Corminar shot her the closest he ever achieved to a glare.

‘It is a matter of which I would rather not discuss,’ Corminar responded to the elf.

‘My brother served under you,’ Urlwan continued. ‘On many an occasion did he explain that you were the only reason he survived the Honey Wars. You may not wish to discuss it, yet I must offer you my utmost gratitude. You saved the life of my kin and the hearts of my parents.’

‘Yes, well—’ Corminar started, but Urlwarn, bolstered by the wine, continued some more.

‘And yet I find you in such lands as the Goldmarch? Surely you should be home, leading the Rooted Guard or living the life of a hero?’

‘Urlwan,’ the same elf from earlier said, this time putting more emphasis into the name. She clearly knew the answer to this question, and knew why Corminar might not be comfortable answering it.

‘Yes, quite,’ my ranger friend said. ‘Well, I assure you that I am here with purpose. We are looking for someone, in fact. A woman who dwells in powerful circles.’

‘Oh?’ one of the elves asked. ‘Please, provide us with a name. Perhaps we know her. After all, we have spent the past six months in the presence of those who fit that description.’

‘Her name—’

‘Corminar?’ Val prodded him. ‘Are you sure this is a good idea?’

‘My kind can be trusted, I assure you. We do not tend to gossip quite as much as humans, or tieflings, or Arzak. And perhaps we might learn some vital information.’ He turned back to the group of elves. ‘You may indeed know her. She is a Player. One by name of Niamh.’

Many of the elves leant back in awe, almost unconsciously. ‘We do indeed know Niamh, for she is on one of Queen Amira’s councils.’

There’s that word again.

‘And who are you, in these days, that you have business with the descendents of the Architects?’

‘We mean only to assist her, I can assure you of that,’ Corminar lied. ‘Though in order to do so, we must first find her. I am afraid, alas, that we have only a physical description, and little information about class and skills that may aid in our location of her.’

Urlwan leant forward once more. ‘In this, I can aid you. Anything for the elf who saved my brother. The Player you are looking for… amazingly intelligent she is, particularly for a human—though I mean this in the social sense, rather than that of the system. Though she demonstrated little of her actual skills to us, I do at least have it on good authority that her class is in the Hunter line, perhaps Trapper, I do believe?’

I glanced over at Val, who was doing a very good job of keeping her expression neutral.

‘Thus, you might find her in the forests, though I believe she has risen to a station, these days, where she has attendants to see to any such hands-on work. As far as I am aware, she spends her days in Lenktra, and the surrounding area.’

Corminar nodded. ‘Good. This matches the information we already possess. I am grateful.’

Urlwan smiled, which doesn’t sound like an extreme reaction, but you’ve got to remember that elves don’t express emotions very often. ‘Of course. Any time.’

‘I think we should be getting up,’ I said, gulping down the last of my wine—an action that resulted in blank stares from all the elves but Corminar—and gesturing to the stairs.

Val nodded, and—oblivious to the elven glares—did the same thing with her wine. Corminar, who seemed a bit less comfortable with the other elves now that he’d been recognised, made to do the same.

As we reached the landing, I stopped. ‘Corminar,’ I said, then pointed into my room.

The elf paused, looking at Val and me. ‘I always knew this day would come, though I didn’t think your bedroom antics would grow dull so quickly.’

‘What?’ I replied. ‘No. We need to talk.’

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Corminar nodded. ‘Of course. Perhaps next time, then.’

I closed the door firmly behind him, and listened at it for signs that the elven contingent were coming up to bed. From the sounds of it, they were still happily drinking downstairs.

‘She’s a Trapper,’ I said, turning. ‘A Trapper. Do any of you get the impression that’s exactly what we’re walking into? A Trap?’

‘I think you overstate how much these Players care about—’ Corminar started.

‘Do I? Don’t you remember what Arzak said, a few days back? Niamh could know we’re coming, especially if she was on this same “council” as the pyroknight.’

Corminar paused, then shrugged. ‘I do not believe this changes anything. We still must do what we must do.’

‘We can be more careful about it, though. We don’t have to go blundering in,’ Val said, and only now was she letting her face pale.

The ranger paused when he saw her, immediately recognising something was wrong. ‘You seem… nervous?’ he asked.

‘You should tell him,’ I told Val. ‘All of them, really. They have a right to know.’ I was right, of course, but that didn’t change the fact that this was deeply traumatising for Val. Having to relive it again wouldn’t be easy.

The witch shook her head for an instant, and then… sighed. ‘Maybe.’

The room fell silent, both Corminar and I allowing Val the space to process.

‘I’ll show you mine if you show me yours, Cor,’ the witch finally said. Before Corminar could inevitably start undressing, she clarified, ‘Tell me about the Honey Wars. Tell us what happened at Iranir.’

The elf said nothing for a moment, licking his lips as though deliberating. ‘How much do you know about the Honey Wars?’ he asked.

‘I know they were bad,’ Val replied. ‘Killer bees infested the Dawnwoods. Took lots of lives. But that’s from what I read. I’ve never spoken about it with anyone who was there.’

Corminar nodded. ‘There are not words to describe the horrors I witnessed, and so I will not attempt to. Know only this: times were desperate, and in the most desperate of times, you might find you have to bend otherwise firm moral codes. Do you know we still have treason written in law, in the Dawnwoods? Even after the fall of the elven kings?’

‘I didn’t,’ I said. I knew little of elven affairs, if I was honest, particularly those of the Dawnwoods.

‘I would not say it a crime worse than murder or the like, of course, but it is a crime treated equally by elven law. Now that there is no king to rebel against, you can commit treason in only one way: by burning the Dawnwoods.’

He trailed off there, leaving Val to fill the silence. ‘And at Iranir…’

‘I was a Lieutenant there, but so many of my kin had fallen that command rested on my shoulders. There was still a captain there, it would later turn out, but our soldiers were so scattered that we could not have known. The bees, they… there were too many of them. Our prospect of victory was none, and yet my fellow elves looked to me to save them. And I did just that. By burning Iranir to the ground.’

I felt a chill run down my back. I knew enough about elves at least that I could see burning the trees was truly a last resort for them. It was beyond a last resort, really, and yet Corminar had chosen to do so. ‘They couldn’t charge a hero,’ I said.

The elf nodded. ‘Not formally. But they made it very clear: treason had been committed, and I would never be able to turn home.’

The room fell to silence, everyone processing their thoughts. It was Corminar who recovered fastest—none of this being news to him, of course—and he looked up at Val. ‘Your turn,’ he said.

And so Val told him. She gave him little more detail that she’d given me, only that Niamh had hunted a changeling, and decided one changeling corpse was as good as another. There was only the one thing that she hadn’t said before.

‘I was a kid,’ Val croaked. ‘Just a kid. And when I survived, after the bogspawn, people started to put things together. A month later, all of the northern Goldmarch knew I was a witch. Including my parents.’ Suddenly, she turned on me, almost snarling. ‘You say we can’t be sure she deserves to be killed? We bloody well can.’

I said nothing, but I nodded.

‘Then you know more than you’ve said,’ Corminar said to Val. ‘Urlwan says she’s a trapper. Is that correct?’

‘My information is years out of date, but…’ the witch nodded. ‘Yeah. Yeah, that adds up. But if you think her traps and her tracking and her bow is what we need to watch out for… no, you’re mistaken.

‘The most dangerous thing about Niamh is her mind.’

"Styk"

Level 13 Bladespinner

Base Stats:

Vitality — 32

Intelligence — 127

Dexterity — 61

Strength — 62

Wisdom — 47

Charisma — 24

Skills:

Worldbending — Level 30

Knifework — Level 26

Stealth — Level 12

Needlework — Level 10

Identification — Level 10

Abilities:

Slice — Slice the enemy for physical damage worth weapon’s base damage and additional damage scaling on [STR].

Stab II — Put your weight behind your wielded blade and force the tip through tougher hides and armour. Damage scales on [STR], increased by an additional 20%.

Execution II — Attack a target while undetected for +200% damage.

Closed Reach — Bend reality to narrow the gap between blade and target by up to 8 inches. Uses mana.

Mana-Fuelled — Passive. Optionally, use mana in place of stamina to activate Knifework abilities.

Local Portal II — Create a portal to another location within current range of sight or within a ten yard radius. Uses mana/second.

Portal Slice — Passive. Portals can now be spawned within non-sentient objects. Doing so slices through all objects that are not reinforced by magic.

Tamed Portals — Passive. Increased efficiency of portal magicks means that your portal glow is reduced by 50%, making them less likely to be detected by enemies.

Ash Husk — Convert your flesh to ash, strengthening it against flame for ten minutes. Gain 50% resistance to fire attacks.

Shrill Perimeter — Create a perimeter wall of 20 foot radius, invisible to all but those adept in magicks. If an enemy crosses this perimeter, this spell releases the shriek of a banshee.

Warped Shield — Passive. If an enemy strikes you with a low-level melee weapon, Warp Shield automatically activates to open a portal that deflects this attack. You must not have any portals currently active. Uses mana on activation.

Stealth Attack — Passive. 50% boost to damage when unnoticed by enemy.

In Plain Sight — When activated, you have a heightened abilitiy to hide in plain sight, and are able to spot opportunities to break from combat at a higher rate. Scales on [WIS].

Stitch — Create a basic stitch in common fabrics. Ability scales on [CHA].

Cloth Armour — Craft a cloth armour of higher quality, dependent on materials, time and skill level.

Active Effects:

Legacy of Sisyphus:

XP gain increased by +900%