Taen looked around himself within the bar, the sun was just creeping through the windows about then. Faint light didn’t reflect off of the dull, rough, beer stained and alcohol stinking cheap table he was sitting at. The only good part about it in his mind as he looked around was, ‘There was no doing any better, not here.’ Every other table was the same flavor of filthy. Beer, rotted cheese, old liquor…
He pinched his own nose shut, ‘And so many unwashed bodies. Stars above these people are filthy. At least the rains give this quarter a much needed bath.’ Men and women were slumped over in their seats, dead drunk, some of them probably dead as often happened during the rains. Fall over passed out drunk indoors or out, and there was a chance of alcohol doing it, or the water drowning the unfortunate soul. Such was the case now, “Hey… barkeep...!” Taen shouted with a raised hand.
A large breasted woman with a face that only a mother could love, and that only as long as she didn’t have to look, turned toward him from behind the bar. She looked at him, cross-eyed and folded thick, powerful arms in front of her chest. “What?!” She demanded with a grimace.
“I’ll get the dead and the dead drunk out of here for a copper each!” He said, like he was eager for the work. A bright, charming smile on his face, he held onto the back of the crude chair and even cruder table like he was about to jump up.
“Copper total. An’ah say ah saw nothin if their pockets’r empty when they wake up. Slugs.” She spat onto the floor next to her, the faint sound of it striking water told him that the water hadn’t completely drained yet.
“Yes’m!” he said obligingly and began to drag drunken men and women out of the bar and out into the nearby alley. It didn’t take him very long despite the dead weight, largely because he didn’t care if he dragged them face down over the stone or face up. Once they were removed, he approached the tavern woman and held out his hand for a coin with a pleasant smile on his face. “All done!”
“What? Who’re you? You want booze you gotta offer coin.” She reached down and took out a heavy truncheon from behind the bar.
“Sorry! My mistake!” Taen said hastily, back pedaling fast enough that he fell with a thud to the grimy floor, then rolling to his side, he scurried out of the place. He slammed the door and sighed with relief. ‘Good, still works, it wouldn’t do for there to be someone to remember I was here. There are lots of scary people in this world.’
He went around to the alley where the patrons were strewn about, living and dead alike, and checked them out one by one. A dead girl. ‘Dress? No, no I think not.’ He chuckled and turned her already pale face away to check the one underneath. ‘Old man, doesn’t matter but, no not the right size.’
He went through the lot of stinking drunks until he found someone as average as himself in as many ways as possible. It was a middle aged looking man with a careworn face and the beginnings of gray in his beard, he stank of shit, which was an added bonus. ‘Only downside, you’re alive.’ Taen dragged the limp body behind a stack of crates and swiftly unbuttoned his clothing, tearing it off till he was nude, he undressed the drunk that sat up in front of him. Taen held his breath while he put the other man’s clothing on himself, then redressed the unconscious man again, this time in Taen’s own clothes. ‘Likely the nicest things you’ve ever worn old man. My parting gift.’ He waved farewell, took out a knife, and shoved it into the man’s ribs so that it pierced his heart. The body twitched reflexively, but only for a moment.
He slumped down again, head resting forward against the chest which no longer housed a beating heart, and Taen stood up, leaving the dagger embedded within, he moved on.
He adjusted the cheap felt cap of faded blue and put his hands into his pockets and trudged like one of the many beaten down peasants that eked out an existence in the massive lower district. The regiments were out in force now, and that made his adapted plan easier.
“S’kuse me.” Taen said to the regimental officer on horseback that was directing a squad of men in bright armor on foot.
He was a relatively slender man of middle years and a very tan face from ample time outdoors, he carried a curved sabre with a rounded tip, and his horse was one of the more slender, swift mounts that typified Pasenian cavalry. His burnished metal and the bright emblems on his chest spoke of his status and his pride in his position.
“Yes?” Big brown eyes went wider with wild hope.
‘The perfect tool!’ Taen kept the grin to himself, and took his cap off, and while holding it in front of himself and wringing it uncomfortably, “I… I got some information, you know, heard about whatcher look’n for. Might know some’thin.”
The cavalry officer wheeled his head around and yelled at the squad of men questioning slobbering drunks that were slurring their words and wasting the time of the soldiers themselves. “Keep searching! I’ll return soon!” He shouted and thrust his arm down to the peasant, grabbed his forearm, and hauled him up. “Hold on to me!” The cavalry officer snapped, his spurs stabbed into the flanks of his horse and it bolted into high speed like an arrow from a bow.
Taen clung with his arms around the slender torso of the middle aged man and they swiftly left the stink of the lower districts behind. ‘It’s disgusting, ferrying this shit stink with me, but it’s necessary.’ He pointedly reminded himself as he considered the information locked in his head.
Before long he found himself in front of the hotel. The subject of his interest, a slender elf of light skin and clad in an expensive green leaf and brown wood patterned attire was in front of an elf not dissimilar to herself except for the collar of iron around her throat and the armor that she wore identifying her as a bonded warrior.
The armored elf was on her knees before the foreigner and making a report that Taen caught part of. “Mistress, I took it on myself to check the tax records sorted by race, there were eighty-two half elves living in this city, the tax records showed where they lived, and I sent a pair of soldiers to each location district by district starting with the wealthy upper districts…”
“We settled on the most likely location being the lowers, slave, why did you begin in the least likely area?” Nua asked with her hands firmly on her hips.
The well armored elf on her knees was quick to answer and quick to pale at the hint of displeasure. “Mistress, the rains hadn’t drained yet, the upper districts were immediately available, we followed the path of the rain drainage, most of the half elves lived in the upper district, that let us clear them quickly. Twelve had died, six were in the last levy, twenty were out of the city and had been for some time. Twelve more were in the military and their units have not entered the city in the last three months.”
“Skip the details slave, give me the key findings. I understand, you worked hard, I don’t care about how hard, I care about success. Are there any half elves, unaccounted for or not, that couldn’t be cleared of involvement?” Nua made the question sharp and began to tap her foot.
“One, mistress. I cross checked him against criminal records, I had to… ah, borrow your name, my lady, to drag him out of bed in the upper district, so that may come back to you.” She hung her head, “I am prepared to take responsibility if I went over the line, I wish only to serve well… and I was successful.” Taen noted the way the elf on her knees trembled hesitantly, from behind her it seemed as if she was on the verge of tears.
“And, what do you know?” Nua asked, her eyes boring downward.
“The man is a criminal named Hoadnam, he has several aliases, but he uses that most often. He has no permanent address in the city, which means he could be anywhere… but mistress, may I propose something?” Freyjin shifted uncomfortably on the grass, her knees squelched in the muck, ‘Veema, you’re so close… I can almost feel your hand, I need only succeed this one time!’ She thought urgently, and her owner above her nodded sharply.
“Mistress, I checked his record, his role in most of his crimes was as a lookout, when he kills, he does it from ambush, but most of the time he is not violent, he watches out for his targets… I believe… I believe he is likely the one to have been driving the carriage, and I believe he is likely watching this hotel. Either as a guest, or from somewhere he can see everything that happens here.”
Nua’s jaw clenched, “There are only three buildings with a view of this area.” She thrust her finger out and pointed to the soldier standing behind Taen. “You! Summon a group of soldiers, occupy the three buildings in front of this one, I want every bed flipped, every wardrobe thrown open, every room searched. Capture is better than kill. Do it… and… why are you here? Shouldn’t you be searching?” Her brows furrowed suddenly as she noticed Taen.
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“Information… Duchessa.” The commander laid a hand on Taen’s shoulder, and Taen did his best to look down and look humble, playing with the hat in hand.
The demon-elf near her almost jumped him, “The mistress waits for your words! Speak!” Kaiji barked sharply, her gaze hard as steel. She took a step forward, hands already coming up, only for Nua to hold an arm out in front across Kaiji’s path.
“Slow down, Kaiji, he’s just nervous. Go on good man, what is it?” Nua asked more calmly.
Taen bit his lower lip and shuffled his feet, “Well, ah, Duchessa, sees I was down at the, well you know, the shit place, an, you all been lookin fer that young’n what worked at this hotel. See ah had me ah cheap’ore an we were a ruttin there quick on account of it stank there an we wanned to go, an ah saw that’n headin to the south east quarter.” Taen took a breath, ‘Well, Hoadnam is good as dead, that saves me the trouble, the rest’ll get caught, but they had a good run. Always another lot I can take from somewhere else.” He shrugged mentally while he threw them away.
“South-East, that’s a big area still…” Nua said quietly, Kaiji’s dark purple ears were twitching wildly and her feet shifted like a horse too close to a snake, eager to take off running.
“Pardon me, mistress, but if they took her in a carriage, well when we were going through the search organization, well there just aren’t that many places a carriage could ‘be’ there. Small wagons, sure, but a carriage? No. No way. There are maybe four or five roads set to carriage width, and those are in the warehouse area of the south east and south west quarter., eliminate the west, and there are two.” Freyjin didn’t wait for permission when she spoke, and immediately her heart flared as she waited for wrath to fall on her for the loose tongue, but it did not happen.
“And they won’t want to carry anyone, even there, for very far, so maybe five buildings or so there.” Freyjin boldly continued her deduction when she realized it would not be painful, “If Karlo was murdered, I’ll bet he was killed there, and I’ll bet they’re holding Priceless in the same place. Somewhere nobody wants to go, even there.”
Freyjin looked up at the cap fidgeting peasant, “Sir, what’s in that area that nobody wants to go near?”
Taen suppressed a grin of pleasure and instead wore one of confusion, scratching his head, he looked away seeming to think.
“Well, thers’th shit houses, hold carts and carts’s shit fer farms an thins, two big’ns, one of em kinda old. Can’t say much ther, foul smell so bad it’even a shit shoveler’s dong, that’s one tree it cain’t make grow a’tall.” He gave a goofy grin and then bowed deeply with his face beet red.
“S’ry, shouldn’t talk like tha to a noble…” Taen said, laughing a riot in his head.
Behind them, he could hear soldiers converging on the three buildings. The racket was enormous as people were dragged from their rooms, the noise was such that people were watching from the street, a crowd had begun to gather. Taen turned to observe, the watch of Pas’en proved efficient, as did the available soldiers, they surrounded each building at equal intervals, held their halberds or spears out at the ready, and then groups of others went in through the main entrance.
Nua was similarly impressed, a slow approving nod began, somewhat begrudgingly, but it was there. ‘They’re not the equal of the Papal Three Hundred. But then… why would they be?’ She asked the rhetorical question as people stumbled out of the building cursing and swearing, then falling silent and clutching hats or hands of loved ones when they saw the unprecedented ‘reception’.
Spellbound they watched as the soldiers and watch replaced the voices of the frustrated people within, until a desperate shouting began, a clash of weapons, steel rang on steel, before a soldier cried out, and before their eyes on the upper floor, a half elf in good clothing broke through the glass, shattering the window and tearing the wooden shutters from their hinges as he sought the safety or the hope of it, outside away from his pursuers inside.
The guards piled on him from every direction, and he went down in a cacophony of metal and heavy cursing.
“I believe we’ve caught our half elf.” Nua mused, but kept her hand in front of Kaiji.
She watched the way her servant’s feet shuffled, and she could read her thoughts as if they were her own. ‘They were once mine. Who am I kidding, still mine, it’s what I’m doing now, for Raymond, I hate to be hypocritical about this, but I can’t have disruption to my plans, and she can’t help, not this way.’
Nua didn’t break her line of sight with Kaiji when she gave the order. “Get on your knees.”
Kaiji let out a whimper, but she was already lowering her knees into the wet ground.
“Freyjin, go bring the prisoner to me. Vargas, when she brings him over, keep your sword at the prisoner’s throat.” Nua gave the order and Vargas wordlessly drew his sword while Freyjin rushed to obey as if it were her child being rescued. Beside the commander that had brought the peasant, they made their way over.
“You, good man, I think you’ve done your part.” Nua said, glancing slightly at the peasant, “You’ve guaranteed we’ll find her. I have abundant work to do to cap this off, however, if there is something you would like… as I said, my reward for help would be ‘beyond price’.”
“Ah, well, a reward … reward from a Duchessa…” He scratched his head and his face seemed white with panic.
‘Probably never had a lucky break in his life.’ Nua pondered, ‘He doesn’t know what to do with it.’
“Ah, can I… think about it, maybe come to your home when I eh, think’a somethin, My Lady?” Taen chewed on his tongue and shifted his lips back and forth and looked left and right, nervous as could be.
Nua suppressed a laugh at the human, and looked to her right. “Kaiji, a gold coin. Now.”
Kaiji thrust her hand into her pouch and withdrew one, which she passed up to her mistress.
Nua reached out and took the back of the man’s left hand and drew it away from his cap and toward herself, then turned it palm up. She then closed his fingers over it, keeping her eyes on him. “This is not your reward, present that coin at my estate, and you will be admitted into my presence. Name your reward then, and I will provide it to you.”
“My lady.” Taen bowed up and down several times as he backed away, and fairly scurried when he’d put some distance between them, and that became a near sprint.
As he was departing, Freyjin closed the gap and cast the half elf at Nua’s feet.
He fell with a heavy thud face first into the muck, as he tried to rise, Sergeant Vargas got on top of him and dropped with his knees on the left and right of the half elf’s torso. His left hand grabbed the half elf by the root of his hair, and yanked back so that the captive was craning his eyes upwards. His mouth opened and half tried to close it, gasps of pain emerged. His hands tried to find purchase in the slippery muck and he splashed Nua’s boots a little.
“Beast! Move like that again and I’ll burn you!” Kaiji shrieked.
Nua crouched down, not criticizing Kaiji’s outburst in the least, she took out her bone hilt knife with its jagged edge and put it to the right eye of the half elf.
“You helped steal my property.” Nua said matter of factly.
The half elf shook his head in denial, the hand on his head, he could feel it pull back, stretching the skin from his scalp, the blade at his throat, he felt a tiny cut and the loss of a drop of blood running away from its source. His ears trembled a bit.
“I’m not asking, Hoadnam. I’m telling you, you helped to steal my property, this isn’t the question, this is the statement of fact. Now I want to know, which warehouse she’s in, the old, or the new, and how I can get to her.”
The half elf’s eyes opened in alarm.
“Hoadnam, I’m not going to hurt you. I’m not going to kill you, not if you tell me the truth, I already know ‘almost’ everything. I just need to confirm it. Now I’m going to ask you the only question that’ll keep your right eye in your head. Then it will be the left, I work my way down, by skinning my way there. ‘All’ the way down, do you understand?” She tapped the knife on his sternum and let the tip point toward his waist.
His face paled and his body started to twitch.
“Good, you understand, now, what do I need to know? Tell me, and I’ll leave you with the city authorities. Refuse, and you’re an example.” Nua asked the question again, and the half elf broke with a groan as his hair was tugged harder and the sword pressed tighter.
“Old warehouse! There’s a… there’s a passage, a hall. Leads a little underground. Your… your property is there! Gah! Stop! Stoooop!” He spasmed and barely kept himself from falling neck first onto Sergeant Vargas’s sharp blade.
“Priceless… her name is Priceless.” Kaiji whispered, “Say it.”
“Priceless!” He all but shouted, eyes going wild with increasing panic, he dug his fingers down into the muck, it chilled his fingers, but it bought him some purchase, holding him steady for a little longer.
“Is she alive? How many are guarding her?” Freyjin asked, “How are they armed, what are their shifts, will they surrender?”
The half elf gasped further, arching his back away from the blade that followed him, no answer came.
“Break his hands.” Nua order brusquely when silence was all they got, “Show him we’re serious.”
“No! Wait!” The half elf cried, sweat was dripping from his forehead and down his face, his entire body trembling from strain, “Ah, not including me, there’s four, three others and the boss. They use a knife, a two handed ax, and a club or a mace.”
“Who is in charge?” Freyjin probed down at the wiggling half elf.
“I, we don’t know, no name. Everything through proxies!” Hoadnam gasped out desperately.
“Like Karlo.” Kaiji spat.
He nodded frantically, his eyes darting around, looking for an escape that didn’t exist.
“Please…” He whimpered.
“He’s dead, isn’t he?” Kaiji asked, her head bowed from at her knees as memories of a good but nervous boy eager to please, came back to mind.
“Please!” Hoadnam groaned out.
“Karlo.” Kaiji demanded quietly.
“Y-Yes, he’s dead! Boss got him to come with the job, we disposed of him… snatched the gash when she was by the road…” The half elf managed to choke out, Sergeant Vargas brought the sword against the throat of the half elf again.
“Priceless! Her name is Priceless!” Kaiji shrieked and her fingers opened like claws, and all she wanted was to gouge his eyes out. She disciplined herself and lowered them back to her side, but they stayed parted, shaking with rage.
“Yes! Priceless! We took her! Hid her in the warehouse to question her!” Hoadnam shouted as loudly as he could as if he feared they couldn’t hear him.
“For whom? You’re common thieves, murderers, you’ve got no reason to do this for yourselves, so… who for?” Freyjin asked, looking sideways up at her owner.
“I don’t know! Boss asks, slaves… they almost always answer, he gets what he wants, sets em free, fakes papers and moves em where they won’t get caught. Usually they’re gone by now! We’re gone by now! Never takes more than a few hours but…” He clenched his teeth and sucked air in past them as the sword began to come away a little.
Kaiji felt her eyes well up and she looked up to her mistress, her dark purple hands clasped together, “Priceless was faithful…”
Nua cast her eyes down to Kaiji with a gentle pair of blue eyes, she shook her head with slow, gentle motions, and it took seconds for Kaiji to understand.
‘She refused to answer… no… no… what will they have done to her…?’ Kaiji’s happy relief turned to ashes in her heart.
“We’re going now.” Nua growled through clenched teeth, “I’ll be leading the raid myself. Take them alive if you can. I want one alive as an example, their boss by preference. Kaiji, you’re coming with me, Sergeant Vargas, Freyjin, you also. We’ll take the regimentals in the area, that’ll be enough to handle whatever they have. “Pray to your stars that she lives, half elf… because if she doesn’t, I’ll skin you all to make her death shroud.”
“Kaiji, bring us horses, and Freyjin… turn this trash over to the guard while Kaiji does that. I want us gone five minutes ago.” Nua barked the words out, and in one voice that shook the ground at their feet they answered…
“At once, Mistress!” Before rushing to obey.