The earth rises to meet Ablee like a fist. A deafening CRACK splits the mountainside as the fake Karich’s massive frame crashes down, shattering stone and sending a shock-wave rippling through the ground. Ablee's lungs collapse as she breaks the surface of dirt turned paint, plummeting into it. The suffocating pressure becomes unbearable as she sinks deeper. She wrenches her body and twists, spinning into an abyss of thick, syrupy black.

She has no breath to scream, lost in oppressive silence. The liquid soil presses in from all sides, clinging to her skin, filling her nose and ears. Ablee thrashes, clawing at the formless expanse, her limbs flailing in search of something solid. There is nothing, just the endless swirl of dark liquid, a cage of her own making, suffocating her.

Move. MOVE! Her mind screams the command, but her body feels leaden, her lungs screaming for air. Panic churns in her gut. But then—faint, distorted, and distant—a voice cuts through the void.

“Ey lass, ye' down there!?” It’s Pin-Beard’s unmistakable holler, warped and garbled as if spoken into a can on the other end of a string.

Her panic loses some grip, wrestled away by the familiar sound. Her chest heaves with the effort to stay calm, to listen. The voice grows louder, more insistent. “GET YERSELF UP HERE, GIRL!”

A flicker of determination reignites in her chest. Ablee reorients her body, kicking her legs, and pushes through the viscous soup. Her hands claw forward, finding no purchase, but refusing to quit. The sound of Pin-Beard’s coaxing voice grows sharper in the distance.

Then—contact. Her fingers brush against something solid, cold and unyielding. She strains, digging her nails into the surface. Her muscles scream in protest, her lungs burn, as she forces her way upward. The blackness pulls at her, trying to drag her back, but she howls through gritted teeth.

She feels the vice-like fingers of two hands enclose around her exposed wrist, and then yank. She's dragged from the ground. As her head bursts through the surface she gulps up the sharp, pine-scented air of the mountains. Coughing violently, her chest heaves as she's pulled up, inch by inch. The surreal colors of the breaking dawn flicker across her vision, and she recognizes the flowing blonde hair of the assassin. Behind Zeph, a rope twirls in the wind, anchored in the gaping wall of the keep up above. The other girl, Rhody, watches from the newly demolished balcony, her chest heaving, "How about some warning... the next time you jump out of a building Zeph!? That's gotta be at least... a four story drop!"

Ablee collapses, brown paint dripping from her trembling hands. A sharp laugh escapes her, bitter and triumphant.

Karich's wreckage groans under its own weight, a jagged mess of broken chalk-stained stone. Ablee pushes up to a seated position, her breath coming in short, uneven bursts. Her ribs protest each movement, but her eyes stay locked to a large chunk of debris. Half of Pin-Beard’s chalky figure is illustrated along its side, cut at the waist by a jagged break in the stone. Depicted upside-down, his head is buried beneath the earth's surface "Well this sure isn't ideal," he chuckles.

“Hang on you old barnacle,” Ablee mutters, crawling her way over to him. Pulling herself up to a squat, she grabs hold of the uneven edges of hunk of rubble. The jagged stone digs into her palms, but she doesn’t flinch. Leaning into it, her muscles tremble and she wedges her shoulder beneath its immense weight.

“C’mon…” she growls, her voice raw with effort. The stone shifts a fraction of an inch, groaning like a grizzly rising from hibernation. Her knees buckle, but she digs her heels in, summoning every ounce of strength she has left. Her breath hisses through gritted teeth, "Gimme a hand, witch!"

Ablee receives no response.

"Fine then..." She powers forward, and shoves with a final, primal roar. The mass rises and crashes to its side, sending up a cloud of rainbow-colored chalk dust. Pin-Beard’s dirt-smeared face lets out a guffawing laugh. He adjusts his tricorn hat with exaggerated dignity “That’s an ounce or two better, thank ya girl!”

Ablee collapses to her knees, “You’re welcome,” she snaps back, wiping a streak of dripping paint from her brow. Pin-Beard raises his mug her, his grin as wide as his cartoonish face can allow. “Aye! Never doubted ya for a second!”

Before Ablee can retort, the air shifts. The living wind howls, curling around them like a hunting predator. The voices of the chalk villagers, trapped within its whirling form, rise in a dissonant chorus. Pin-Beard looks up, his grin turning wistful. “Well now. Guess my ship’s leaving port!”

“What?” Ablee asks, her chin dropping, “Where are you all going?”

The wind catches against his chalky form, swirling him into its spectral embrace. He rises with the storm, his tricorn hat barely holding to his head. “Wherever the wind takes us, lass! That’s the pirate way!” he hollers, his voice echoing as he’s carried upward. “You got us out of that brig, dear girl! Give Cline our best, and your father your worst!”

Ablee stares into the onslaught of color, the storm growing more brilliant with each passing second. As Pin-Beard ascends, the inevitable happens—his hat catches in the wind, whipping away and dissipating in a jaunty spiral. “Wait—blasted thing!” he yells, flailing in mid-air to grab it. His form smears into a trail of black and red dust. The ridiculous scramble draws a snort of laughter from Ablee, her chest heaving as she watches him vanish into the whirlwind.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

The storm rises higher and higher, the voices of the villagers retreating with it. Completing a final figure-eight, it whisks away, Tower-ward. Ablee sits back, paint-streaked and aching, a crooked grin tugging at her lips. “What a clown.”

She pulls herself upright, leaning against Karich’s broken remains. Wiping her face with the back of her hand she lets out a sharp, bitter laugh.

A sound cuts through the quiet—the scraping of rope against stone. Ablee’s smile falters as her head tilts toward the noise. The taut line quivers as a figure descends it in frantic slides. Rhody, the younger one with the keen eyes and nervous hands, her red pouch bouncing against her chest.

Ablee’s brow arches. “She doesn’t waste any time,” she mutters.

Rhody clatters into gravel at the keep’s base with a graceless thud, immediately stumbling over to Zeph. The assassin lies in the rubble nearby, her flat-brimmed hat thrown aside. Her breathing is shallow, and blood pools at her side.

“Zeph!” Rhody's frantic voice calls out as drops to her knees beside the woman. She shakes the Zeph's shoulder, but she only groans, her her eyes fluttering. Rhody's gasps, “Oh gods. That's so much blood. Not good—not good.”

Ablee ambles closer. “Yeah, Rinval stung her pretty bad…”

Rhody’s head snaps up, her face flushed with anger and panic. “You! She pushed herself this far to save you! Fix her like you did before!”

“Save me?" Ablee runs a hand through her hair, "I had already reached the surface…”

Rhody’s voice catches as Zeph’s hand weakly rises, catching her wrist. “Stop… bickering,” Zeph mutters, her voice thin but edged with steel. She lifts her head just enough to pin Ablee with a glare. “You… You’re my captive...”

Ablee crouches down, her grin sharp. “Oh yeah? Just let me know when you’re ready to slap the cuffs on. Oh, wait.” She taps her wrist mockingly. “You’d need to actually stand for that.”

“Enough!” Rhody snaps, surprising even herself. “If you’re going to mock her, then at least do your little trick to stop the bleeding!”

Ablee’s expression softens, just slightly. Brushing the painted dirt from her hands, she leans over Zeph. “Fine. But you’ll need to tend her wound when I’m done. My stuff doesn’t last long.”

Ablee undoes the top two buttons of Zeph’s black blouse and peels its fabric away from her shoulders. Like she’d done before, she finger-paints clean liquid skin onto Zeph’s dribbling wound. Rhody watches with wide, anxious eyes, her knuckles white as they grip Zeph’s clammy hand. The assassin winces faintly, her breath shallow but steadying.

“There, I’d say we’re even,” Ablee declares, plopping down onto the ground to rest her head against a broken stone. Rhody looks to Zeph with concern, before retreating to the rope, heading back up to retrieve her pack.

She re-descends with the pack a short while later, having shackled Rinval in the cell. Zeph and Ablee both lay sprawled out, Zeph’s shallow breaths punctuated by Ablees irksome snoring.

Rhody digs through the pack for alcohol and bandages. The log-book catches her eye, its black, leather cover peeking out of its pocket. She turns to look at the wild-haired girl snoozing beside her charge. She’s on the list. She thinks, One of the six Urough’s, guilty of consuming Ambrosia. We’re going to have to kill her...I should have told Zeph earlier…

Applause hangs limp on Zeph’s hip, gleaming in the Tower-light. Rhody’s mind twists, and she feels slimy just considering it. We can’t let her get away, and Zeph won’t have the strength when they wake up.

She trudges over to them, loose stone crackling beneath her boots. Ablee stirs for a moment, shifting onto her side and pulling her knees to her chest.

Applause’s presence purrs to Rhody. This is an acolyte’s duty.

But another voice echoes in her ear, Brenna’s, her friend who had abandoned this honor to her, “It’s not as great as it seems.”

----------------------------------------

When Zeph stirs, the warmth of the sun radiates through her hat, which Rhody has laid across the side of her face. Zeph grabs its top and lifts it, her eyes fixing on Ablee. “Rhody… you should… tie her up…” she murmurs, her voice raspy but firm.

Rhody, perched on a stone’s edge, looks at the girl, “I don’t know if that’d do us much good. You saw what she’s capable of.”

“Heh, guess you’re right… We need her though… She can probably help us find Karich…” Zeph rolls her shoulders and groans, “Ahh, that pinches.”

“Zeph, about that…” Rhody stumbles over her words.

“What is it?” Zeph says, leveling her eyes with Rhody’s.

“Well… I know you’ve told me many times… Not to discuss future marks…”, the words slip from Rhody in hesitant spurts.

Zeph winces as she raises her left hand to pinch her nose, “Stop… I don’t care what you think I need to know. If it’s going to pull my focus from Karich, stop. Just stop.”

“I… Alright.” Rhody turns to look at Ablee, the girl’s eyes are blinking awake.

Ablee tilts her head up to take in the two and lets out an exaggerated yawn, “Looks like you survived!”

Zeph’s head spins to face her, her whip-like reflexes pulling the little remaining blood from her face. She goes white, and lays her scowling cheek upon the ground, “Yes,” Zeph’s shaking right hand pulls Applause from its holster and points it at Ablee, “Now don’t do anything stupid. You’re coming with us.”

Ablee snorts, leaning back on her hands with a smirk. “Really? That’s the first thing you have to say? Not, ‘Thanks for patching me up, Ablee. You’re a lifesaver’?”

Zeph tries to sit up, wincing as Rhody rushes to steady her. Her golden hair clings to her face, streaked with sweat and dirt. “You’re helping us find your father,” she says, her tone still sharp despite the weakness in her voice.

Ablee rolls her eyes. “What makes you think I’m going to turn that offer down? He’s going up The Tower. So am I. Join my climbing party and you can do whatever you want to him when we pass him by. After I’ve had my turn of course!”

Her lip twitching, Zeph lowers Applause, “We’re not joining your climbing party. You are my captive. I run this show.”

Ablee stares at her for a long moment. Finally, she lets out a low laugh. “You two can call this whatever you want, I’m just glad to have you on board!”