CHAPTER 9.5: MYSTERIES
“Hakon steel?! You call that Hakon steel?! Listen here you whiskerless whelp, what you’ve made is barely a step above pig iron, it’s swine steel, and without a hint of magic! A breastplate of this slag wouldn’t stop me grandma’s dentures, let alone a strike from a bull troll! You botched the enchantment utterly, this lump of slag makes me think you want to be some human village’s pet tinker! You’ve got a long way to go if you ever want to be a true Hakon-marked smith!”- Forgemaster Nainor of Hakon Hold
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:: Two Days Later ::
Despite Natalie’s best arguments, the Temple refused to let her and Cole return to the Final Flagon. But they had moved them from the small cell to an unused apartment in the Temple set aside for visiting officials and dignitaries. Which Cole technically counted as. The Paladin slept much of his first night and second day in Vindabon away. His unnatural body healed from its injuries during that time. Leaving a bored Natalie alone.
She’d been scared to practice what Isabelle had taught her inside the Temple, fearing exposure. So she’d been reduced to wandering the Temples halls and scaring the Acolytes and Priests she encountered. Word of the “refugee Vampire” brought to the Temple by a mysterious Paladin had spread through the Tenth Temple like any good gossip. Sending packs of youthful Acolytes fleeing whenever Natalie got anywhere close. Leaving Natalie little entertainment but constantly walking through the labyrinthian halls of the Temple.
The Castle-sized complex was an odd mix of painfully dull and disturbingly beautiful. Natalie would traverse what felt like kilometers of cold stone hallways only to stumble into some shrine, tomb, or similar. Each decorated with breathtaking artistry, almost always depicting morbid topics. Natalie had never considered all the ways a skull could be used in murals, tapestries, carvings, and statuary. The followers of Master Time had a set style they ascribed to, and it seemed to glory in what others would find unsettling. Which did seem fitting for worshipers of Death, Time, and Cold.
Eventually, after enough scared Acolytes complained, an annoyed Morri decided Natalie needed a chaperon. Mina drew the short straw. The young Priestess had been overtaxing herself helping the Guards. So with Cole to replace her, Mina found herself in the unenviable position of keeping Natalie company. Which pretty much manifested as the two women sitting in the same room, Natalie trying and failing to make small talk. It was in this awkward situation Cole found himself as he prepared to meet with the Wienstadt Guards.
“Okay, then what is your favorite Color?” Natalie asked, almost pleading with Mina.
The Priestess shrugged. “Gray?”
Scoffing, Natalie waived her arms in exasperation. “Gray! No one’s favorite color is Gray! If you are going to stonewall me, then at least be more creative!”
Letting out an exhausted huff, Natalie uncoiled herself from the plush chair she’d been occupying and wrapped her arms around Cole. “Love, please don’t leave me alone with this Golem!” she begged.
Smiling beside himself, he gave her a quick kiss. “I’m sorry, Nat. Is there anything I can do for you?”
Pouting slightly, Natalie shrugged. “Besides freeing me? Maybe grab something to keep me sane from the market. A book or even a block of wood? I’ll pay you back when you return.”
Cole disentangled himself from Natalie’s comforting form and said. “I’ll keep that in mind. Love you, Natalie.”
As Cole left, he heard Natalie return the sentiment and direct something else at Mina. “I love you too, Cole. Thank yo-Hey! Don’t look so mortified.”
Chuckling under his breath, Cole left the Temple and headed towards the nearby market square. He had a little time before he was expected, so grabbing her something nice seemed like a good idea. Romantic gifts weren’t the only reason Cole visited the market. He needed to resupply and reequip. The entire disastrous Glockmire affair and the incident with the Werewolves had forced Cole to reconsider his general strategy. He couldn’t afford to be so blaise with his life anymore. A decade on the road fighting lesser Undead and rogue Vampires had made him sloppy and unmotivated. He’d become a shadow of the Homunculus Knight and never really grown into a proper Paladin. That stopped now.
His first two stops, at the apothecary and alchemist, filled his pack with a number of interesting tinctures and substances. He then grabbed three books from the local scrivener. A romance novella, a history of Vindabon, and a text on woodworking. Hopefully, Natalie would find some comfort in one of the three. After that, Cole counted his remaining coin and approached the sole Smith in the square.
Under a small pavilion, a short woman with an interesting mix of curves and muscle sat among racks of weapons and armor. Dirty blond hair streamed out from under a leather cap, and her bare arms were exposed to the cold weather. A curious fashion choice explained by the intricate tattoo marking her left upper arm. It was a Dwarven Guild badge. Marking the Smith as a member and listing her accolades. Cole guessed a bit of winter wind was worth the advertisement.
Getting up from her chair, the smith looked over Cole as he approached. Spitting a glob of pipeherb onto the ground, she remarked. “Oh, you are a big fucker aren’t you. Well, I think I’ve got something your size.”
Holding out her calloused hand to Cole, she introduced herself. “I’m Emma of Stonebone. Triple marked smith of Hakon Hold.”
Stonebone, that was the Gate town of Hakon Hold. The non-dwarven settlement that grew up around the Hold’s entrance. Emma probably had some Dwergaz blood in her, or at least enough of their attitude, it didn’t matter.
Shaking her hand, the Paladin said. “Cole of Atredia. I’m looking for something light but durable.”
Emma let go of Cole’s hand but reached up to feel his bicep experimentally. “You certain? A big fellow like you has enough meat to wear proper steel.”
A little surprised by her touch, Cole shrugged. “I travel too much for anything heavier than leather to be practical.”
Grabbing a measuring rope and a piece of charcoal, Emma got to work. “Aye? What are you, a Mercenary? Shouldn’t you be down south with the Prince and the Noble whelps?”
Shaking his head but realizing Emma couldn’t see, her eyes and hands busy marking something on her bare fore-arm. Cole explained. “I’m a Rest-Bringer, just leaving the south, actually.”
Cole saw little reason to spread his true title around the city and found the lesser title of Rest-Bringer more appropriate to his abilities honestly. Emma just nodded. “A Rest-Bringer, hm? I think I might have just the thing.”
Motioning for him to wait, Emma went deeper into the pavilion and rattled about with various bits of equipment. “I’ve equipped one or two of your kind in the past few weeks.” she remarked, barely audible over the market’s murmur and the clatter of moving metal. “They all wanted Plate, Scale, and other heavier types. But they were traveling with the Army, so I guess they could have someone carry it for them.”
Returning to Cole, Emma found an empty table and set down an eclectic mix of equipment. Two open fingered gauntlets of strong steel. An armored doublet and pants made from leather and metal. Two steel reinforced boots and a strange sash-like thing of leather covered in pouches and pockets.
Pointing at each item individually, Emma listed them off. “Albrich-style gauntlets made from Hakon Steel with leather underlay. Protect your forearms from biting Ghouls while keeping your hands free. Ciryonian Jack and Pants, strong enough to stop claws and fangs from most creatures. Light enough, you can run from what it won’t stop. Standard lace-up hobnailed boots with a bit of reinforcement courtesy of yours truly. And lastly, an interesting bit of leather work from Lusitania. They call it a Bandolier, drape it over your shoulder, and have an extra belt. Seems useful to me.”
Picking up and feeling the equipment, Cole was impressed. It was light but felt sturdy. “I’ll take it. How much will it cost?”
Emma smiled. “I’ll give it to you cheap if you promise to be a repeat customer. In my experience, Rest-Bringers are rough on their gear. Musty tombs and rotting bodies turn even the best equipment into junk.”
Lips quirked in amusement, Cole bought the gear. His coin purse was significantly lighter but not completely emptied. Emma packed up the equipment and gave Cole some tips on maintaining it. Leaving the pavilion, Cole looked to the fountain and noted the Fiddler wasn’t present. With his errands completed, Cole set out for the Guards. The Thirteenth District Guard-tower was easy to find. Its plain, unadorned bulk sat near the district center. A giant column of gray stone upholding order, like a lesser column might hold up a roof.
Entering the Guard-Tower, Cole found himself in a large room filled with people milling about. It was an eclectic mix. Puffed-up Nobles, ratty beggars, and everything in between competing for cramped space. The smell of stale sweat mixed with old leather and dried sick; filling the cold space with a nauseating sense of exhaustion and worry. Somewhere hidden by the crowd, a voice called out.
“ALRIGHT! WHO'S NEXT?!”
The throng of people surged forward slightly, and Cole followed behind them. Slowly but surely, he pressed his way through the crowd. Using his intimidating appearance and sheer size to part the mass of people. Eventually, finding the crowd’s focus. A trio of guards sitting at desks behind a wall of bars. The exhausted-looking guards were listening to a never-ending stream of people coming up to the bars and ranting various complaints and suggestions.
The middle guard was currently listening to a well-dressed Nobleman flanked by his own Footmen. Wiry thin with a prominent Adam's apple. The Noble waived a trembling hand at the listening guard as he spoke. “Resources of House Louon are at your disposal! Just say it, and my Men will gladly start patrolling the streets looking for any Mutts!”
A few nearby people murmured in agreement as the Noble continued. “This has gone on too long! Those rabid brutes have made the streets unsafe; let's drive them out into the stinking wilds where they belong!”
Shutting his eyes in momentary weariness, Cole pushed forward. He was tempted to tell these people the truth about the killings. That it was an Undead, not a Werefolk. The fact Captain Iron-Teeth hadn’t shared that fact stopped him. The Dwarf probably had his reasons, and Cole would respect them till he knew them. Still, he could put a stop to this high-born twit and his rabble-rousing.
Shouldering past the Noble’s footman and stepping past the ranting Aristocrat Cole reached the bars. The Noble stopped mid-tirade to sputter his surprise and outrage at Cole’s action. “You there! What do you think you are doing!”
Not bothering to turn away from the Guard’s desk, Cole answered. “Not wasting the City Guard’s time.” nodding to the suddenly nervous-looking Guard, he continued. “Captain Iron-Teeth should be expecting me.”
The Guard jumped up from his chair and nodded vigorously. His hands moved to salute while his head ducked in a bow. Uncertain but clearly aware of Cole’s identity, the Guard stopped his fumbled show of deference and went to a door in the wall of bars. Unbolting and swinging it open, the Guard ushered Cole deeper into the tower. All while the Noble squawked and protested this turn of events.
Guiding Cole to a staircase, they went to the third floor and passed down a long hallway to a small office. Barely decorated and built for a Dwarf. Even without an occupant, Cole could guess the office’s owner. The Guard gestured to a standard-sized chair. “Wait here; I’ll go find the Captain.”
It didn’t take long for Iron-Teeth to appear. Bags large enough to hold a month's worth of exhaustion hung under the Dwarf's eyes while his beard was greasy and matted. Cole suddenly wondered if Iron-Teeth had slept at all since their last encounter. Seeing Cole, the Guard-Captain gave a grunt of acknowledgment before sharing his bleak news.
“We found another body; follow me.”
Without a word between them, the Paladin and Guard-Captain left the Tower and slipped down side streets. Finding themselves in a small shrine hidden away in an alley. A quartet of nervous-looking Guards blocked the alley’s entrance, and the shrine itself was watched over by Cat-Eyes and a bandaged Darvy. Hidden between great buildings and unmarked on any common map, the Shrine was a small but cared-for thing. A crude but recognizable likeness of Saint Marin sitting in a wooden shack decorated with simple offerings and talismans. Aside from the brutalized corpse splayed out across the altar, it could be any Begger Shrine.
Dried blood covered the cobblestones, and the smell of cold death mixed with refuse in the alley. Softly, Cole reached the body, the nervous Guards and Officers letting him pass. Maybe twenty five in age, the Victim was a woman with a flat nose and brown hair. Bloody lips were split in an incongruous smile while glassy eyes stared vacantly at the Shrine’s tarpaulin roof. The Victim's chest was a mess of gore, and she leaned against the Shrine altar like it was a makeshift chair.
Gripping onto his medallion, Cole called on his power. Unnaturally pale blue eyes turned silver as holy light coursed through him. Looking into the victim’s eyes, he caught glimpses of her last moments. It was a confused jumble of thoughts and soporific sensations. Broken only by the muted pain of something sharp at work.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
Blinking away the sensation, Cole asked the watching Iron-Teeth. “She was drugged? Were all of them?”
Nodding, Iron-Teeth elaborated. “Aye, everyone Mina could examine was not right when they died. I’ve shaken the local Dens and Dealers with little result. Did you find anything else?”
Cole got into his haunches and looked at the body. “No, whatever was used made my Corpse Sight near useless.”
Cat-Eyes scoffed then. “Mina could have told us that? Aren’t you supposed to be a Paladin? Shouldn’t you have found more?”
Ignoring the prickly Catblooded woman, Cole mused on his vision. Her death barely hurt, yet she was also conscious.”
Iron-Teeth grunted. “Yes, all the previous ones Mina examined were awake but not aware of the pain when they died.”
Standing up and looking over the body more closely, Cole remarked. “It's odd. Drugging the victim, so they don’t feel any pain almost seems merciful. Yet if that was the goal, why not knock them out? That would be easier than keeping the victim in this sort of stupor, right?”
Darvy made a noise of confirmation from beneath his bandaged mouth. Seeing the injured guard, Cole winced. “I’m sorry about the teeth.”
Darvy simply shrugged, pointed at Iron-Teeth, and made a noise half-way between a laugh and groan. Cat-Eyes sighed in annoyance. “Before they fixed his jaw and put in the new teeth, he said matching the Captain would be ‘fun.’ His word, not mine”
Scratching at his chin, Cole nodded to the corpse. “Having the victim awake for their death must have been important. Why, though? If the goal was cruelty, why drug them? If the goal was mercy, why let them be awake? It's a strange middle ground that makes little sense.”
Stroking his ill-kept beard in thought, Iron-Teeth asked. “Magic or madness seems the only reason I can think of. Is there some kind of Undead that does this? Anything you’ve encountered, Paladin?”
Shaking his head in the negative, Cole asked. “I need more details before I can say. How many dead, and is there anything linking them?”
Cole bent down and, with a gloved hand, prodded the torn-open victim as Iron-Teeth listed off the details. “This will be our tenth victim. Each killed the same way. Drugged, and their heart ripped out with bare teeth. Each murder has been at a shrine, grave, or similar. We found the first victims about a month ago but only realized there was a pattern by the fourth, nearly a week later. They all were fairly young humans. In their twenties and thirties. Each with a legitimate reason to be out at night and near where we found them.”
Frowning, Cole ran his finger along the victim’s chest cavity. A sharp blade had been used to open the chest, and then teeth were used to pull the heart free. Pointlessly messy and gruesome. While there were Undead who favored eating their victims' hearts, Cole had a hard time seeing any of them being responsible. It was time to take a closer look.
Shutting his eyes, Cole took a deep breath and drew upon his soul's connection to the divine. Whenever Cole used his Paladin abilities, he caught glimpses of the Aether. A side effect of using the tiny piece of divinity enmeshed in his soul. Now that he was using those abilities more, Cole was starting to think of new ways to use them. If he could peek into the Aether by accident, why not do it on purpose?
Cole opened his eyes and saw the Shrine as a spirit might. The residue of a violent death clung to the corpse like filth. While the sickly-sweet taint of a drugged mind muddied the Aether’s waters. Creating a murky mix of thoughts and feelings. Sifting through this, Cole hunted for the telltale signs of Dark Magic. But try as he might, no hint of Necromancy or Undeath stained the Shrine. Yet it wasn’t as if the Aether had been scrubbed clean. The Shrine was coated in faith and desperation like so many layers of paint. While the city's larger mix of emotions and actions pressed down on the small alley like some tidal current. Even in that tumultuous environment, the touch of Darkness should have been clear.
Deciding to try a different approach, Cole looked for more mundane traces. Magic left marks in the Aether, but so did emotion. Pushing through the cloying cloud of drugged-death, Cole hunted for anything abnormal. To his surprise, it didn’t take long. Small traces of something strange hid within the Aetheric mess the murder made. Flickers of carnal joy, obsessive devotion, and white-hot rage. The contradictory but commingling emotions were sickening in their intensity.
Pulling back, Cole let his Aetheric Sight end. Sucking in lungfuls of air he swore still tasted of sickly-sweet murder, Cole fell to his knees. The experience had been more than he expected, but for a first real attempt, it had worked remarkably well. Regaining his composure, Cole got up to see the nervous-looking guards staring at him.
Iron-Teeth cautiously asked. “What did you do?”
Cole shrugged. “Tried something new. I think it might have paid off.”
Cat-Eyes growled. “Trying something new? You shuffled around the alley like a drunk while your eyes lit up.” looking at Darvy, she asked. “Are we sure this guy is a Paladin? Shouldn’t he be more… impressive?”
Darvy just gave her a confused look and made a noncommittal grunt. Cole ignored the City Warden, uncertain of what he’d done to annoy her. He hadn’t even injured her; why was she so eager to cut him with words?
Gesturing at the body, Cole said. “I couldn’t find a trace of Undeath.” Cat-Eyes looked like she was about to say something, but Iron-Teeth cut her off with a glare, and Cole continued. “But I caught bits of strange emotions. Powerful, twisted feelings clinging to this place.”
Iron-Teeth made a noise of understanding. “You think they belonged to the Killer?”
Cole nodded. “Yes, but that's part of what’s so odd. Undeath tends to mute or simplify emotions. Vampires are the only breed of Higher Undead who retain anything like the complexity I’m seeing. And I find it doubtful the killer is a Vampire. There are no fang marks, and they’d have set off the Wards just as much as Natalie.”
A slightly more receptive Cat-Eyes came over towards the body, wrinkling her nose at the smell she asked. “So what does that mean?”
Cole looked at the beatific face of Saint Marin, splattered with frozen blood. “It means either this is some kind of Undead I’ve never encountered or even heard of. Or the killer is a living being.”
As that idea settled in everyone’s mind, Cole looked to Iron-Teeth. “Why did you think the killer was undead in the first place? Morri told me about the bite marks. Was there anything else?”
Darvy and Iron-Teeth looked at each other, their eyes widening in dawning horror. Iron-Teeth snarled. “Jag me! Mina saw the bite marks, and she assumed it was Undead. We were doubtful at first since the killings happened on hallowed ground. But Mina said some Undead can bypass those protections.”
Frowning in sudden concern, Iron-Teeth asked. “We’ve been operating under that assumption for more than a week. Are you saying Mina was wrong?”
Cat-Eyes stiffened at that. “What else eats raw human flesh? Even Pale Orcs cook their victims first!”
Collecting his thoughts and organizing them into a proper arrangement. Cole spoke. “It's an easy assumption to make. Priestess Mina is young, barely ordained but trained by a retired Rest-Bringer. She saw what her training taught her to see. I wouldn’t blame her for making a good guess with the given information.”
“And City-Warden?” he continued, a sad note to his voice. “The answers to your question are as varied as they are horrible.” Cat-Eyes blanched at that, her tanned skin losing a few shades of bronze at the implications.
Cole barely noticed, he just kept processing everything he’d learned. “The wards caught Natalie but nothing else. Those wards are specifically designed to catch Undead. If it was possible to bypass the wards enough to blatantly kill people for months, then the City would have long fallen to the Blood Duchies. The Refugees are magically marked and can’t spill innocent blood without alerting the entire Tenth Temple. It seems almost impossible for this to be an Undead.”
Grinding his replacement teeth together so hard they almost produced sparks, the Guard Captain asked. “So we have nothing? All this effort for jagging nothing?”
Shrugging, Cole gestured at the body. “No, we eliminated possibilities. It's progress, we can focus on other options now.”
Frowning, Cat-Eyes asked. “You still want to help us? But if this doesn’t involve Undead, you have no jurisdiction?”
Cole smiled weakly. “These people had their Time cut short by something twisted. Living or undead, the killer cannot go free. Also, I swore an oath to Captain Iron-Teeth and others besides. I’ll lend my skills to this investigation as long as you will have me.”
Iron-Teeth’s face tightened in a grimace. He didn’t particularly like the Paladin, but saw no reason not to accept his help. “Fine, we’ll put you to use, Sir Paladin. Do you have any suggestions?”
Looking at the desecrated shrine, Cole asked. “The use of holy places strikes me as important. Perhaps there is a pattern there. Would you mind sharing the details of each location?”
Iron-Teeth quickly rattled off all ten locations, the victims, and their professions from memory. His people's knack for memorization turned to grim use. Cole listened intently. Marking the locations in his mental map of Vindabon. Each murder had happened somewhere secluded but sacred. Family tombs, shrines to minor Saints, that sort of place. The seventh murder, the one at the Vindabon cemetery, was the only one at a prominent location, but that seemed to be an abnormality. As Iron-Teeth finished his grim list, Cole noted an absence.
“What about the murder near the docks?” he asked. Thinking back to the alley he’d visited upon first arriving in Vindabon. Master Time’s influence had practically dragged him there, and he’d sensed the pall of violent death upon it. But Iron-Teeth hadn’t listed the location.
The Guard-Captain looked at Cole with confusion. “What murder? None of the killings have been close to Doxwerva?”
The eastern part of the Canal went through multiple districts of Vindabon. With the Twelfth District, Doxwerva, taking up much of the port. The alley had been right near the border of the Twelfth and Thirteenth districts, and Cole wondered if the Doxwerva Guards had kept information from their Weinstadt counterparts.
“Strange, I sensed something… unpleasant there when I first arrived.” Cole mused out loud. Privately wondering what other reason could Master Time have directed him there if it didn’t connect to the murders.
Darvy then made a loud exclamation and started waving his hands. Once all eyes were on him, he fumbled through his belt and pulled out a notepad, and frantically scribbled something onto it. Cat-Eyes grabbed the pad then and read Darvy’s note.
“Apparently, there’s a recently discovered under-building near where the Paladin is describing. The Lieutenant has assigned people to guard the entrance and keep it clear of riff-raff.”
Confused, Cole asked. “Under-building?”
Iron-Teeth looked at Cole as if he was daft. “An Under-Building. You’ve never heard of them?”
At Cole’s confirmation, the Guard Captain explained. “Vindabon is an old city. It survived the Bloody Centuries, but not without difficulty. Some of the magic used to attack and defend the city was vicious. Whole sections of the city were flooded, crushed, burned, and worse. The old Vindabonites didn’t have the time to properly rebuild, so they often just built right on top of ruins. Some of those ruins are still somewhat usable; we call them Under-Buildings.”
Cat-Eyes piped up then. “They’re usually not much more than a partially caved-in cellar or something, but smugglers, thieves, and other Rats make good use of them. We try to document and seal them off to keep the city safe.”
Darvy grabbed his note-pad back from Cat-Eyes and scribbled something more. Annoyed to act as translator, Cat-Eyes took the pad back and sighed. She gave the lieutenant a look but still read the message. “Darvy wonders if the Under-Building connects into the warrens.”
Shrugging, Darvy pantomimed a bunch of tunnels crisscrossing each other in a mess of underground chambers. Cat-Eyes swatted at the Lieutenant with his own notepad. “Horse shit, the Warrens aren’t nearly that complicated.”
Darvy gestured wildly at the surrounding city, pointed downwards, and grunted. Cat-Eyes snapped back. “I’ve helped map them, you idiot! Sure they connect into the new and old sewers, but they aren’t some sprawling catacomb. Like you and every other gullible fool seem to believe.”
Feeling a little confused, Cole asked. “Warrens? Does the city have a catacomb system?”
Darvy shook his head in confirmation while Cat-Eyes interjected. “No, not really. Some of the Underbuildings are interconnected by some tunnels, but it's not like the Necropolis of Parilux or the Eternal City. The Warrens and Under-Buildings are just ruins criminals and beggars sometimes use, not a burial place.”
A tunnel system under the city. The idea sent shivers up Cole’s spine. He had years of experience navigating caverns and the like. But that didn’t mean he hated every second below the surface. To be crushed under stone and buried alive… Few fates seemed worse to an Immortal. Still, he couldn’t let fear consume him; Master Time had pointed him toward this Under-Building for a reason.
Darvy and Cat-Eyes started to squabble about the nature and size of the Warrens, so Cole returned to the body. Hoping to do one final check in case he missed something. Iron-Teeth watched him, the Dwarf half-lost in worried thought. Taking a moment, Cole shut the victim’s eyes and started to pray. The victim’s soul wasn’t trapped in their body; dying on hallowed ground had released them. Still, this empty, desecrated husk deserved something to note its life.
Cole had been fully committed to investigating the murder when he first arrived. Shutting away that hunter side of himself, he looked at the victim as a person, not as a possible clue. Thin with a face unnaturally aged by stress, she looked like someone who’d lived a hard life. Still, it had been her life, not something to be stolen in such a bizarre and terrible fashion. Looking at the grisly wound where the woman’s chest should be, Cole could understand why the people of Vindabon had been so quick to assume a Monster had been behind this. A cursed Werecreature or an Undead horror. The idea something unnatural and warped was behind these murders could be as comforting as it was terrifying.
Years as a Paladin had taught Cole the ugly truth of the world. There are Monsters, truly terrible things born of dark magic and fell curses. But any evil of Demonic or Necromantic origin could be matched by mortalkind if given the opportunity. More than once, Cole had been called to towns and villages supposedly plagued by some Undead. Only to learn petty hatred and cruel stupidity were the cause of whatever deaths the town had experienced. Looking at the dead woman propped against the shrine, Cole had a sense the same thing was happening in Vindabon. Only on a much larger scale.
The killer had intentionally or accidentally bought themselves a pair of scapegoats in the form of the Werefolk and Undead. Distracting and delaying the Guards as the city’s people grew more and more restless. In those towns beset by fictional undead, Cole had seen more than one angry mob. In Vindabon, a metropolis of more than a million citizens, mob violence could cascade into bloodshed comparable to entire wars. Natalie had seen the Angler prepare his net, and Cole could now guess to why.
Grimacing, Cole looked at the murder site. Ten people, six women and four men brutally killed at holy sites, and still no good answers as to why or who was responsible. That thought stuck in Cole’s head, something about it itching at him. Six women and four men. Ten victims, each killed one after another. Six women and four men. Each murdered at a shrine or similar. Six women and four men…
Bolting upright, Cole whirled to face Iron-Teeth. “Captain, what was the order of the victims?” he asked, a sudden intensity to his voice that pulled all eyes onto him.
Iron-Teeth listed the victims in order. Woman, man, woman, man, woman, man, woman, man, woman…woman. A clear pattern for eight victims, only broken for the last two. Except, what if the pattern wasn’t broken? This murder had happened in a Beggar Shrine, somewhere far off the beaten path. Only discovered hours later by chance. What if there was another victim? Their body left somewhere hard to access or among people unlikely to report it.
Turning to Cat-Eyes, Cole asked. “Are there any religious sites in the Warrens? A shrine to an obscure Saint? Some sunken or broken temple? Anything like that?”
Confused, the City Warden answered. “No, not to my knowledge. Why?”
Comprehension dawned on Iron-Teeth’s face as he understood Cole’s line of thought. “You think we have missed a victim? A body down in the Warrens.”
Nodding, Cole let out a deep breath. If the pattern held true and Cat-Eyes was correct, they had another problem. A hidden shrine down in the Warrens was not something worshippers of the Pantheon would build. But it was something followers of a Darker God might.
Running a finger along his axe, Cole said. “Yes, and I think Vindabon might have a Cult problem.”