Chapter Fifty Four

  The doors to Asheli’s office slammed closed, shut by a very displeased paladin on his way out. Asheli let out a sigh, he was a good person she knew, but he was also so frustrating to deal with, especially in situations like the current one. She wished she could simply tell him the truth about the curse, but the likelihood of him believing instead that she was working with the enemy towards the downfall of the empire was too high. Having him as a direct enemy was not something she wanted right now, especially since she would have to hold back against him, but he would do no such thing against her.

  What a noble heart combined with such a stupid head. Can’t he see what I’m doing for his people? Free housing for the homeless and meals given out to any who ask, only to the cost of the rich bastards who would watch all others suffer for their own hedonism and greed. All he can see is villains to slay, why doesn’t he understand that I have removed the need for villainy in Sidus? Maybe that’s why he is so focused on Shuka, no one truly nasty has appeared in so long all his pent up righteousness is being spent on her. Use it on that fanatic Kreivos instead you moron.

  “Was it wise to keep the truth hidden from them both?”

  Mervil asked the question, he still remained even after the meeting ended.

  “Had to, If Validus learned I was actively assisting Shuka he might’ve attacked me on the spot. Maybe I should have let him and just knocked him out and chucked him in a cell somewhere. No, he’s not that dumb, he probably would have just left and returned with half the paladin order.”

  “True. But it means we failed to convince Aurulin. Now they are both against us, even if not so directly.”

  It was true, both Asheli and Mervil had acted cagey enough during that meeting that they garnered little trust from the naturally distrustful priestess. Asheli had worked with Aurulin before and respected her for both her morals and competence, but she often saw the worst in people. Right now she was seeing the worst in the two of them. She didn’t like being lied to, and Asheli was sure she saw through hers. That was fine, at least for the long term. Aurulin understood the importance of deception, even towards allies; she would understand. The only problem was understanding that Asheli had a good reason for lying wouldn’t stop her from searching for the truth. Alienating Validus even further was also a problem. Him and Asheli had never been friendly, or even cordial, but the paladin had every right to arrest every person in the thieves guild. But he didn’t. It wouldn’t take much for him to start though.

  “Validus and Aurulin are a problem, but not a serious one.” Asheli told Mervil. “It’s Sandrin I am worried about. The biggest loss from that meeting was in not recruiting Aurulin to help us find him. As it is though, they will likely bide their time and keep an eye on us. The most we have to be worried about is them messing with the ritual.”

  “Ah, I have a solution for that. Have your thieves leak that the location for the ritual will be Fredericks tower so they will focus all of their attention there. When the day comes however, we will conduct the ritual at the grand temple.”

  It’s a good plan, but a bit simple in its execution. Aurulin would certainly have people watching both locations even if she found the leak to be credible. That’s fine, I can work on the plan to make it work on someone of Aurulin’s calibre.

  “You’re making that face again Asheli. You need a break.”

  “Not if it creates corpses. The situation is dire enough to justify a bit of overwork. Besides, without Aurulin on our side we need someone working on espionage, and it won’t be you.”

  Mervil rolled his eyes, this was not the first time he had had this conversation with her. And this time the situation actually was dire enough to justify Asheli working herself to the bone.

  “I’m not telling you to take a vacation, just think about something that won’t stress you out for a bit. That’s right, isn’t your little sister in Sidus at the moment? Lets talk about her.”

  “Right, thanks for reminding me. It is far too dangerous in Sidus right now, I’ll have to arrange an escort to bring her back to the tribe. Hmm, Sandrin might try to kidnap her as leverage against me, I’ll have to be careful about this…”

  “No Asheli, not like that! Ugh, whatever, we probably do need to get her out of the city anyway. How about I talk to you about my little sister then?”

  “Myra? Did she finally quit as a priestess?”

  Asheli knew little about the girl, mostly just what Mervil told her. Admittedly, he told her a lot, but she wasn’t politically involved enough for Asheli to worry about her. If she quit, though, someone would take her place, and whoever they were, they would be almost guaranteed to be a more active member of the Celestial Order. The bar was on the floor at the moment, after all.

  “No she didn’t quit. She started a new painting though. I have a feeling it’s prophetic as well.”

  “Oh yeah? How can you tell?”

  “Just a feeling. Her prophetic paintings are always of important things happening in the near future.”

  “Ah, so you think it will be related to Sandrin’s plot then? That painting could give us an edge, what does it depict?”

  Mervil realized his mistake too late. He had wanted to get his friend’s mind off of serious matters, but inadvertently led her straight back to business.

  “I don’t know what it depicts, Myra won’t show anyone her paintings until they are done or she gives up. And I doubt it will be as helpful as you are expecting, the important things they depict are only things important to her. She doesn’t care about Sandrin or Shuka or anyone else involved so a painting of them is unlikely. If anything her painting will be tangentially related to our current situation, but only through happenstance.”

  “Or, Sandrin’s plan will be so far-reaching that it will even affect your sister in a way she will care about. Even she can’t ignore a demonic invasion, right?”

  “You’d be surprised. But yes, getting killed by demons would be important enough for a prophetic painting. I don’t know if Sandrin’s goal is as banal as death and destruction though. The last time Sidus was invaded by demons there was a clear reason why, but why would Sandrin want that?”

  The former archmages goals were still, frustratingly, an enigma. There were simply too many things he could do and too few hints as to what.

  “You know,” Asheli started, “there is one thing that Myra would care about that wouldn’t be far-reaching.”

  “Is there? Well, please enlighten me.”

  “Your death.”

  It was a worrying thought. One Mervil was reluctant to think about.

  “How would my death advance Sandrin’s goals? He is a practical man, he wouldn’t go out of his to murder me when it would put him or his plan in jeopardy.”

  “The Sandrin we knew was a practical man, but we are not dealing with the Sandrin we knew. Besides, we are actively working against him right now, it would only be practical to remove us.”

  “Well then I guess we will just have to deal with that since not stopping him isn’t an option. Besides, Sandrin is no warmage I doubt he could take down either of us in a straight fight and we are already keeping an eye out for tricks and traps.”

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  “Sure, but you know what would help us not get caught in a trap? A painting that shows us what happens when we trigger it. You don’t even need to do anything, I’ll sneak into the temple and take a peek myself.”

  Mervil gave Asheli a stern glare, even if he knew she was joking. Mostly.

  “Leave her painting alone. If we are lucky she will finish it before the ritual anyway.”

  “Oh yeah? And how likely is that?”

  “It… is possible. Her paintings usually take anywhere from a few days to a month or two. She has spent multiple sessions painting this one though, so she is already on the faster side of things. Shit, why are we still talking about serious things? That’s it, we are doing something fun Asheli, whether you want to or not.”

  Fun. It was not for Asheli, she knew. There was too much good to be done to waste time having fun. Too many hungry mouths to feed, too many violent crimes to be prevented. Too many archmages with sinister plots.

  Every minute wasted, a corpse made. Well, a bit longer than a minute these days, people aren’t starving in the streets anymore. And there’s not much I can do about Sandrin until he reveals himself.

  “Fine, but only for an hour, then we are going to make preparations in case Sandrin tries to assassinate us.”

  Mervil smiled, and got up from his chair, but before he could say anything the door to Asheli’s office flew open and one of her thieves was shouting a report.

  “Asheli, bad news! Kreivos was seen chasing Shuka through the marketplace! What should we do?”

  All Mervil did was groan, there was no way Asheli was going to take a break now.

  *

  The door to the safehouse shut closed and thus the need for desperation disappeared. The spell enchanting Shuka left her, returning her arms to normal and giving her a normal reaction to the pain she was in.

  “Ow, fuck!”

  Her healing potion had done a good job of healing her lung into a usable state, but the wound had been reopened while she was fighting Kreivos. She didn’t mind at the time, but she certainly did now. The hunter fell to her knees and clutched her blood-soaked chest in pain. She felt woozy and faint, likely from the blood loss. She had been bleeding the whole way to the safehouse, not to mention all of the blood she lost when she initially got stabbed.

  The potion must have restored some of my blood when I drank it, I should have bled out by now with how much blood I’ve lost.

  Maryam, still transformed quite heavily, prowled over to Shuka in a distinctly animalistic way. Her scaled tail swished back and forth anxiously as her clawed hands dug through one of her pouches for a potion. It was a healing potion, of course, and Maryam was offering it to her. A small voice in the back of Shuka’s head said that potions were expensive and that she should refuse the potion, but a bigger voice said ‘ow, having a hole in my chest sucks’ so she took the potion and drank it with shaking hands. This one tasted like… wheels? Just the concept of them.

  “Potions… taste weird.”

  As weird as they tasted, they were also effective. Within moments, the agonizing pain Shuka was in dissipated and she was left with only her bloody and torn clothing as proof of her injury. And perhaps some trauma, but she had plenty of that already from Validus. Xorvos found a chair and sat down in it, exhausted from the near-death experience. Shuka was too, so she just laid down on the ground, not bothering to get up. Melia had opened up a crate in the corner of the room and was raiding it for food while Maryam paced on all fours in front of the door. It was really unnerving watching her in such an unnatural state, covered in scales and bearing animalistic traits. She didn’t just look like a drakkin either, Maryams transformation felt more… haphazard. Her proportions were just slightly off, and she was stuck between a form favouring two legs and one favouring two. Even her mannerisms were altered, to the point where Shuka was reading her as a wild animal more than a human.

  She’s tense. I guess the safe house isn’t safe enough for her. Or maybe she can’t feel safe, she did say that she gets focused on whatever she’s thinking about when she casts magic. She was probably thinking about survival when Kreivos attacked us. Wait, she was also caught in that inferno wasn’t she? Everyone must still be injured from the fire, do we have enough potions?

  It was hard to see the burns on Maryam due to her scales, but both Xorvos and Melia were covered in the distinctive wavy burn marks of holy fire.

  “You’re all injured! How many potions do we have? Is it enough for everyone’s burns?”

  Maryam snapped her head to Shuka, quick as any paranoid beast, then cocked her head to the side quizzically. She acted so much like an animal that it almost surprised Shuka when she spoke.

  “I have two more. Not needed, I am fine.”

  Her voice was deeper by far and guttural. But understandable at least. Xorvos spoke next.

  “I used mine to heal you, but you should still have yours at least.”

  “Wait, you healed me with yours? I thought you used mine, I would have fully healed myself before the ambush if I knew I still had it on me.”

  Melia, now chewy on some jerky she found, came up and flicked Shuka on the forehead.

  “Good thing ya didn’t. You can’t use healing potions back to back, you gotta wait a few minutes first. You would’ve just wasted a potion.”

  “Really? Huh. Oh, you are still burned though Melia, do you need one of ours, or do you have your own potion?”

  “Uhh, probably? Not gonna bother looking for it though, all I got hit by was the fire.”

  Shuka was confused by her nonchalance. Every patch of exposed skin on her Xorvos, and presumably Maryam under her scales, was marred by the divine burns, but none of them seemed to care.

  “You were in the center of that inferno with me, aren’t you hurt? I can see the burns all over you.”

  “Yeah, but they’re from holy fire. All it does is hurt, it doesn’t actually do that much damage. It even heals fast, the burns will probably be gone by tomorrow.”

  Now that I think about it, I never really noticed my own burns when we were running to the safehouse. I thought my lung wound was just overriding the pain, but I guess there just wasn’t much pain in the first place.

  “Well… that’s good. Ah, Xorvos, if we don’t need to use all of our potions healing the burns, then you should take mine. You used yours on my injury after all..”

  “What? No, keep your potion Shuka, you’re the one being targeted. I decided to use my potion on my own, I’m fine going without one.”

  “But you are the one going toe-to-toe with everyone chasing us, you are much more likely to get injured than me.”

  “I’m tough, I can take it. Besides they ne-”

  Maryam interrupted the two friends' polite nonsense by stalking up to Xorvos and shoving one of her two remaining potions into his hands before going back to the door to keep watch.

  Well that solves that. I guess it’s probably for the best for us all to have a potion on us.

  “So why didn’t you kill him?” Melia asked out of nowhere.

  “Huh? Do you mean Kreivos?”

  “Yeah. I get the quanso, they get all weird about killing and stuff, but you ain't a quanso.”

  Shuka hadn’t been thinking clearly at the time with Melia’s spell putting her even more into survival mode than usual, but she certainly had the opportunity.

  Was it because Xorvos was there? No, I wasn’t thinking about that at all, not with that spell on me at least.

  “I guess I just didn’t think about it. Maybe your spell made me so focused on survival that I couldn’t do anything else but run.”

  “Then why didya help your buddy up? Besides, the best way to survive is taking out your predators when you got the chance.”

  “I guess… I just didn’t want to kill him. I mean, he’s an asshole, but murder isn’t something I want to do. Maybe if I had to kill him to survive, but I didn’t need to.”

  Xorvos furrowed his brows as if he was contemplating something that Shuka had said, but he didn’t speak up. Melia turned her attention to Maryam instead.

  “How about you? Dragons ain’t known for their mercy. You could’ve done it easy.”

  “Not a dragon. Malformed. Less control than a real dragon, more instinctual. Less merciful.”

  Maryam clenched her hands and feet, scratching shallow gashes into the stone floor with her claws.

  “I was seventeen. Got into a fight. Can’t remember why, it was something stupid. Transformed more than I had ever before outside of training. Shoved a claw through his eye. Almost killed him. Didn’t feel bad. Not until after. Careful now, always focus on not killing when I transform. No claws, gentle magic. Could’ve killed Kreivos. Could’ve killed a guardsman too, or a bystander. No difference to a malformed dragon. So no killing at all.”

  There was a long silence in the room after that. Maryam had never told Shuka that before, and judging by how shocked Xorvos looked he hadn’t heard it either. Eventually though, he gave his own answer.

  “I for one, won’t kill on principle no matter how practical it may be for me. Every life has immense value, no matter their disposition and to take those lives is always a tragedy. I would rather die than kill.”

  “Yeah?” Melia commented, not impressed by his conviction. “Would you rather let Shuka die than kill? I mean, if someone's gonna die, might as well let it be the person you like less, right?”

  “I- that- no, killing itself is bad! It’s not a matter of choosing who lives or dies, it’s a matter of taking another life.”

  “Oh, so if you kill Kreivos then wouldn’t you be saving him from the sin of killing more people? That’s the kind of sacrifice hero’s make right?”

  “That’s not- it doesn’t work that way! Besides, you could have killed him too, why didn’t you do it?”

  Xorvos was mad. He didn’t like Melia at the best of times, and it seemed like she didn’t like him either with how she was egging him on. She answered playfully, with a lack of seriousness that only served to irritate Xorvos more.

  “Cuz I’m a raccoon, duh. Raccoons scavenge for food, not hunt for it.”

  “Actually,” Shuka cut in, “Raccoons do hunt-”

  “Nope, don’t care. What raccoons actually do doesn’t matter, all that matters is what I feel like they do. I feel like raccoons are thieves, scavengers, and rascals. But if a rascal kills someone then they aren’t a rascal anymore, they’re a problem. If I act against my nature, then my nature will change to match how I act. That’s true for everyone, but especially for witches.”

  It was hard to argue against that, so Xorvos didn’t. No one did. They all just waited in silence for something to happen. It would be a long time before something did.