PreCursive

  In minutes, we had reached the shore of Goryuen, traveling in the wake of the two Solstice ships. There wasn’t a real dock structed on the beach just yet, despite all the stru underway. Captain Satoru parked the Kaminari Maru not far from shore and then prepped one of the lifeboats to ferry us onto it.

  Azarus, Liora, Bel, Renauld, Venix, and I all piled into the boat after taking the time to gear up below. It had been a few weeks since I had seen all of us decked out in full bat uniform. Last time had been during our Oni hunt.

  Myself included.

  I had thrown on the armor I had fed and hewn with Azarus’s help, once I’d started getting into fights again here in Kawamara. I didn’t have my Order of the Eclipsed Dawn armor anymore since I…well. I wasn’t really a member anymore. With the dissolution of the Noe Division, I had deliberately resigned my ission and inteo stick to that decision.

  I may have been Grey’s official apprentice, but that didn’t obligate me to be a member of his paramilitary anization.

  It’d taken me a while to realize that.

  I’d tur into the Order quartermaster before I had left Elderwyck. Which had left me high and dry without real prote.

  With Azarus’s help, we’d designed something to my current tastes. While I wasn’t particurly ied in being an assassin anymore, I also wasn’t ied in being a full-on heavily armored knight. I still wahe ability to be stealthy if I o be.

  We had settled on a form of light interlog armor ptes over silk. I’d never worked with silk before stepping foot on Kawamara, and I’d found that the mystically treated version of it they had here was far superior to most leathers. And since I was so associated with Oninite in these isles, and had such easy access to it thanks to my supplier, I’d fed those ptes from my rapidly being signature metal. The bd blue of the metal trasted nicely with the red and bck dyed silk of the under armor, if I said so myself. The armor was capped off with some sturdy knee-high pted boots, and some equally long, pted gloves. Partly to hide the length of my Primordium arm, holy. A thick, dark blue hooded cloak pleted the ensemble.

  I was thankful for the cooling aing entments that had been yered over that cloak. In the jungle heat that I was already feeling from Goryuen, I think I would have drowned in my ow without the cooling. I...didn't yet have the Enting ability to craft those arrays myself, so I had issiohem from a local Hinagan man.

  My supply pouch, plete with new Bond Breaker y at the small of my back, while my extendable daggers y ihes oher side of my waist. Terractus was just beh the dagger on my left hip, the gold of its horns promily visible. In my right hand, I carried the bed staff I had ied from Tzo, with its gleaming amber crystal at the top, cradled in a basket of ebony wood. I'd left my bow behind on the ship, since I wasn't sure I'd just yet.

  I felt ready, no matter what we would enter down on that beach.

  Which…made me feel all the more foolish, when I ced on rowing duty with Azarus. The two of us exged a look as we took an oar and got to work, our respective armors g with the repetitive motions. The rog of the boat made his shield and hammer, strapped to his back, g loudly from the motions.

  Venix, the prick, stood upon the bow of the tiny boat with his arms crossed while Liora and Renauld sat fortably behind him. The Antium man looked like Gee Washington proudly braving the Deware River with his white robe fpping in the isnd wind. Bel, meanwhile, turned around in her seat to smirk at me teasingly, very much aware of how tedious it was to power oars. She wasn’t the type of woman to take circumstances like this very seriously. I just glowered at the smug pirate for a moment before shaking it off.

  Now wasn’t the time. Not with the ‘weling ittee’ I could see f on the bea front of us.

  That was…a lot of Solstice cssers.

  Not all of them looked very friendly

  The Lieutenant from earlier had reached the beach before we had and looked to be arguing with a group of other officers who had pushed their way through the watg crowd. If I had to guess from their dress, all of these guys were much higher up on the proverbial totem pole than the affable helmet head oken to. Thankfully, none of them were as ht wary as some of the onlookers were. However, more than one sidering frown was bei our way across the beach, as our lifeboat slid up it to rest on the white sands.

  By the time I had climbed out of the rowboat to step foot on Goryuen for the first time, the gathered officers were already approag us. Venix stood at the front of our procession waiting for them patiently, his arms still folded over his chest. The Gnolls and Bel had already joined him and were waiting for Azarus and I. I worked the tension out of my shoulders and then exged a nod with said Dwarf, and jogged up just in time for the Solstice officers to e to a halt before us.

  They spoke first.

  “Captairom, Order of Solstice’s Fme,” The lead officer, a bald, middle-aged man with a truly impressive steel grey beard said in a clipped tone. “You are the delegation from the River Throne?”

  I raised an eyebrow at the man. “ly,” I said when Venix didn’t immediately speak up.

  The Captain switched his gaze over to me and frowned harder. “Be clear, man. Are you or aren’t you representatives of Kawamara?”

  “We are scouts,” Venix finally said, drawing the attention of the officers. “Granted leave by the Emperor to search the Imperial Garden for a specific purpose. We do not represent the throne.”

  Wernstrom’s brow furrowed, but it was another officer who spoke first. “Who are you then? Why did you inform Lieutenant Salzen that you wished to speak to the Grandmaster?”

  Venix took a deep breath then. “I,” He said almost proudly. “Am Venix, sworn sword of the Shadowed Sun.”

  Oh man. That wasn’t going to go over well.

  Sure enough, the mood around us immediately ged. Where before roup was merely being regarded with suspi, that had ged. Now there was a great deal of hostility in the air. No bdes had been draw, but there were certainly a number of hands resting on hilts now.

  Captairom narrowed his eyes at us, the numerous creases around them f an imposing spiderweb of distrust. “What are a bunch of Eclipsed Dawn mutts doing all the way out here?”

  Okay.

  I know Venix had asked me to trust him a him hahis. But I think he needed a bit of…help, with the delicacies of iation.

  I handed my staff off to Azarus and stepped forward, holding my hand's palm ft before me. “Peace, Captairom,” I said, in as disarming a tone as I could muster. “None of us here are direct members of the Order of the Eclipsed Dawn. Not any longer. We are here on private matters and were quite surprised to see you and your patriots on this…quite restricted isnd. As such, we merely thought to iigate the matter on behalf of our beors,” I stressed the word. “Among the Imperial court.”

  To my surprise, someone ued pushed their way through the crowd. It wasn’t anyone I personally knew, but I hadn’t expected to see someone like them among the Solstice members.

  It was a Kawamaran man around my own age, dressed in a simir mao Venix. The man wore a green robe decorated with crimson spider lilies, while underh it I could see hardy leather armor. At his side, he carried a katana in much the same manner I had seen other samurai in Hinaga.

  The man narrowed his bck eyes at me specifically and pointed an acg finger. “Prove it,” He said suspiciously. “If you are truly here by the grace of the court, you should have a permit.”

  I nodded slowly at the man. “I do in fact have one. I even have it on me,” I said, reag behind my back. The move caused the tension in the air to ratchet up sharply, making me freeze in pce. I eyed the gathered cssers warily. “Gentlemen, I o retrieve the writ if I am to present it for iion.”

  The Captain and the samurai exged gnces before Wernstrom me sharply. “Hurry up.”

  I did as he asked, withdrawing the writ of permission that Masayuki had preseo me. Unfurling it, I held it out for the samurai. He strode up to me aably snatched the piece of part out of my hand and then back away.

  The watg crowd held its breath while the samurai ied the writ.

  “Well, Kazuma?” Captairom asked promptingly. “Is it a real dot?”

  After a moment, ‘Kazuma’ looked up from the dot and gave the older man a relut nod. “Yes, Captain. This is a real writ of travel, issued by the Imperial court. You ot truly fe the Emperor’s seal.”

  “Well, well, well,” A strangely high-pitched, creaky voice called out causing the surrounding soldiers to still. In trast, the officers jumped to attention, spinning io face the dire the voice had e from. “What do we have here, eh?”

  In an oddly guilty mahe crowd shifted out of the way to reveal the speaker, while Captairom and the officers bowed their heads in respect. “Grandmaster Shacklock, sir.”

  So.

  This was Shacklock.

  He…wasn’t what I had been expeg.

  I hadn’t heard all that much about the mahe months, since we had first entered the Order of Solstice’s Fme back at Helstein. The only thing I had ever learned about the man was that he and Grey had some form of mutual antipathy going on. In a moment of ht callousness, my mentor had told me ohat he would probably celebrate if the man dropped dead. What…I had taken away from that was that the two of them had been b each other for a long, long time. Another of Herztal’s old monsters, in essence.

  And he looked like a plete buffoon.

  The Grandmaster of the Order of Solstice’s Fme looked like someone’s shlubby grandad. The man was short and slightly stooped over, holding himself up with a stout wooden e hewn from what looked to be cherry wood. Visible blue veins stood out underh his paper-thin skin as his boney hand clutched at the knob on his walking stick tightly. Despite his bent back, the man’s figure was actually whipcord thin and shogly muscled despite his apparent advanced age.

  Over which he was wearing what might be the loudest, most ridiculous coat I had ever seen. It was bright, bright e, for one, with loud red, green, and even blue and yellow ats. The colors bleogether in a ye-dye manner, as if it was mimig a social movement from decades ih’s past. It hung almost limply over the man’s bony shoulders, trailing in the white sand of the beach below. While that…thing he was wearing was dht hideous, the Herztalian officer’s uniform he was wearing underh it was shogly muhe trast betweewo was s that it took me a moment to notice the hat.

  The cowboy hat.

  The bright green, dyed leather cowboy hat, in a style that made me think the man was an old West cattle wrangler.

  I…

  They had those here? I had never seen them before! Not once!

  I almost wao ugh hysterically at the man, before I caught sight of what was beh that hat. I only barely registered the shock ht white wispy hair that stuck out oher side of the hideous hat. Instead, it was Shacklock’s eyes that drew my own.

  This man was insane.

  Batshit, bugfuck, crazy.

  The glint in his beady bck eyes told that Grandmaster Shacklock had nard for me, or anyone else for that matter. We were all just window dressing upoy to this old moools and toys to be pyed with and discarded at a whim. I’m not sure that even Nerexxa could have topped Shacklo pure insanity.

  Did he evehe same things the rest of the p did? I…I couldn’t be sure.

  And by the crooked grin on his thin lips, he khat I khat he khat I knew….

  I shuddered and broke the gaze with the enemy Grandmaster.

  I think I had just seen something I wasn’t supposed to.

  A barked ugh from in front of me made me look back at him. But this time, I was careful not to look the man in the eyes.

  Shacklock was shaking his head. “Oh ho ho ho,” He said mogly. “I know who this lot is. I’ve even crossed bdes with one of ‘em!” He spped his knee and ughed out loud, free and clear. “Venix, you old sack of bug guts, how are ya! Why, how long has it been?”

  Venix wasn’t intimidated by the old man, even though I could tell the rest of my panions were at least a little fazed by him. “Not long enough, madman,” He said, unblinking. “I believe it was the battle of Ryesfeld.”

  Shackloodded faux wisely, stroking the white stubble on his pointy . “Yeah, that’s right. Ryesfeld. I remember now. I stuck ya like a hog and then kicked your carcass off my spear like it was said hogs shit. I left ya bleeding in that field, sure you were done for,” He ughed again, sweeping off his hat to waggle it at Venix mogly, with the hand not on his e. I was somehow unsurprised to see that the man’s only hair was the two tufts that stuck out from the sides of his head. The rest of the geriatrics liver spot dotted e dome was so smooth it gleamed in the sun. “Boy was I surprised when I saw ya again in the capital.”

  The Antium man was unmoved by the old man’s mog. Instead, he just ined his head. “Would that be the capital that you are now barred from, old monster?”

  The smile on Shacklock’s face dimmed slightly. He snorted, putting his vomit-indugly ugly hat ba his head. “Ain’t gotta piss on my parade like that,” He muttered grumpily, before sighing loudly. “Oh, what do you want? Why are you on my damn isnd?”

  “Your isnd?” I muttered to myself.

  Turns out, I wasn’t quiet enough. Shacklock’s beady little eyes zeroed in on me in a sed. “You’re damn right my isnd!” He snapped, before taking a closer look at me. He tilted his head in thought, tapping his lips. “Say, you look familiar boy. Do I know you from somewhere? I kill your pa, perhaps?”

  I tensed up a little at Shacklock’s regard. “No. I-”

  I didn’t get the ce to speak any further. Shacklock’s eyes lit up, and he snapped his fingers. “I remember now! I saw a sketch of ya st year from a Loyalist profile!” He crowed, pointing a crooked fi me. “You’re old Grey’s little apprehe hell are ya doing here, boy?”

  Something happehen that caused my blood to run cold. The maniac’s face abruptly went cold, as all emotion seemingly vanished from him. He eyed me in much the same way the liohe gazelle.

  “You lookin’ to die or somethin’?”