Darkness Rising, Pages 251-300

                Flashing a dazzling smile, Felicity asked him, “What sort of cargo?”

                “You show me yours and I’ll show you mine!”  Blaine laughed at her from across the water.  By now the two ships were drawing apart again.

                Felicity laughed, not missing the double entendre in his words and shook her head.  “Not on your best day if it was my worst Blaine!”

                He placed his hands over his heart and pretended she had wounded him.  “You say the meanest things amazon!”

                “When next we’re both in Purgatori, we should meet up at the Hydra’s Den and have that drink you keep promising me!”  She said, the ships almost too far apart to continue the conversation now.

                “You’re on gorgeous!”  And then they were apart and moving in their separate directions.

                Ariana, who had been defending the laws of the land for long enough to know that Purgatori was the “secret” floating city that served as the Capitol of the Pirate Confederacy approached Felicity and remarked.  “Drink he keeps promising?”

                She grimaced.  “I have no doubt if I ever allow him to buy it he will try to lace it with some sort of love potion.  That’s why I always send word ahead before docking in Purgatori to make certain the Plunderer is not there.  I’m always certain to leave before he arrives too… I’m not so foolish as to let myself be taken in by that cad.”  She turned then and called to the pretty amazon that was currently handling the wheel of the small ship.  “Set course for Morlanta’s dock.”  She turned her head and looked into Ariana’s eyes. “No offense Lady Moonstone, but the sooner I have you and yours off my ship the better I’ll like it.”

                “That makes two of us.”  Ariana told her, turning away and moving across the deck to ensure that Rylan was caring for her gear properly.

                Several hours later the Shorerunner was tied off at the small dock on the edge of Morlanta, which was a colony that had been settled by Errgaunt about two decades earlier.  Though it was ruled by the human empire, its relative isolation from its people meant that the general human supremacist attitude of the empire itself wasn’t as strongly felt here.  The laws were the same, meaning that only humans had any real rights in the town, but what few guardsmen were stationed here tended to treat everyone equally. 

                As Ariana and her party prepared to leave the Shorerunner they were met at the top of the boarding ramp by Felicity Murkwood.  “Good luck to you my old friend.”  She said to Ariana, pulling the paladin into an embrace that Ariana returned easily.

                “Damn!”  Rellik muttered to no one in particular.  “How’d you like to be the meat in the middle of that sandwich?”  Gar turned and glowered at the human, but he ignored the dwarf.  Both Devlin and Kelvan smirked at the mans words.  Shayla just rolled her eyes and Rylan looked uncomfortable.  If Magnus had any reaction, he didn’t show it.

                Ignoring her step-brother, as she had been doing most of her life, Ariana turned and led the way down to the dock.  They passed the dock master on their way and Ariana exchanged a smile with the nervous looking human.  No doubt he was always nervous when forced to deal with known pirate vessels, though Ariana knew that the Shorerunner never harassed people in port.  Not only that, but she had given Felicity enough gold to cover the expenses of docking her ship here for a few days so she and her crew could get some shore leave.  “We’ll find an Inn here in town and rest for the night.  Then we’ll move out in the morning.”  She glanced over at the barbarians.  “It will be up to you three to guide us to your village.”

                Devlin nodded.  “That’s no problem.”

                They had reached the main street that ran east to west through the center of town and they paused to let a magnificent black carriage roll past.  It was pulled by a team of six horses and was being driven by a fierce looking black skinned orc with shining red eyes.  Ariana’s eyes played over the silver trim of the carriage, noting that there was a coat of arms on its side that she didn’t readily recognize.  Her knowledge of Heraldry was quite good and the fact that she couldn’t place this one made her frown slightly.  She glanced to her right, thinking to ask Gar about it, but in doing so she noticed the frown creasing Magnus’s brow.  Her wizard was frowning at the carriage, which was now well past them and she opened her mouth to ask him what was wrong, but he beat her to it.  “Shadow magic.”

                “What?”  She turned her head to look at the wagon again.

                “There’s shadow magic about that carriage.”  He turned to meet her gaze, his expression troubled.  “I’ve been thinking about what our friends here were telling us regarding some of the magic they saw at their village.  I was reserving judgment till we got there and I could see it for myself, but to me it sounded like shadow magic.  Now to sense it in that carriage, here where the barbarians call home.  Is that coincidence?”

                Ariana turned her head again to watch the carriage, realizing that it was nearing the edge of town and would soon be gone.  “Gar?”

                The dwarf shrugged his burly shoulders, fingering the handle of his warhammer, which hung on his hip.  “Couldn’t hurt to ask them some questions, could it?”

                “It’s possible that it could.”  She informed him.

                The old dwarf smiled wickedly.  “Then we’ll know we were right to stop them.”

                “Magnus.”  She said, and he stepped forward, knowing what she wanted him to do without her having to say any more.  This was, after all, why she had brought him along.

                The mage raised his hands and mumbled an incomprehensible spell, his fingers wriggling slightly.  Suddenly the dirt road beneath the carriage transformed into a morass of mud and the carriage was instantly bogged down.  Before they started toward the carriage, Ariana turned to the little goblin priest and said, “Rachnid, stay out of sight.  We may need your services shortly and I don’t want you in the line of fire if things get out of hand.”  The little priest nodded, took a couple of steps away from the group and then, eliciting a gasp of surprise from Shayla, he shrunk down and transformed into a big spider, scampering off under the raised boardwalk that ran along the front of the businesses.  As one, the rest of the group started toward the carriage.

                The doors to either side of it popped open and two men stepped out, the dark skinned orc on the drivers seat leaning over to watch.  Ariana narrowed her eyes as she regarded the two men, noting their black skin and odd hair.  One had silvery white hair and silver eyes while the other had blue tint to his hair and yellow eyes.  The paladins party slowed their advance, noting that the dark elves were well armed. “What is the meaning of this?”  the one of the left of the carriage asked.  As he spoke, Ariana saw the carriage move somewhat, telling her there were still people within.

                Ariana tried her most diplomatic smile.  “My apologies for the inconvenience, milord, but we wanted to ask you some questions. You see, my friends here,” she motioned toward the children of Rolfe, “were recently forced from their home by members of the same race as you… we simply wondered whether you might know anything about that?”

                Ariana saw both men glance into the open doors of the carriage, then suddenly they exploded into movement, the one on the right drawing his sword while his other hand began to glow with a dark energy.  “Guess that means they do!”  Gar growled as he and the others fanned out across the street.  Suddenly they were engulfed in darkness and Ariana started to call to Magnus, but then she heard a shout of pain from her right and she realized that the shadow elves had struck with such swiftness that she hadn’t the time to call out. 

                As soon as the blanket of shadow had blocked out the light, Gar had drawn his hammer but no sooner had he done so than he felt a sharp pain pierce his left shoulder.  He staggered back, feeling a lingering burn in the wound and ducked instinctively as he felt the air current off the blade sweeping by where his head had just been.  The dwarf, a veteran of many battles in which magic was used against him, growled and swung his hammer in a wide arc in front of him, wanting to put some distance between himself and the attacker.  He figured the shadow elves could probably see in this darkness, and that meant he needed to even the odds.  He began to back away quickly, straining to hear any sign of movement around him.  He could hear his comrades to the left and right, their booted feet heavy on the dirt road, but the shadow elves were moving like shadows themselves through this darkness.  He kept swinging his hammer in wide arcs and at different heights all around him, trying to keep whoever might be pursuing at bay.  When he suddenly found himself free of the blanket of shadow he blinked, surprised by the light and found himself facing what looked like a solid wall of blackness.

                “Come out and face me!” he growled at the dark.  There was a sudden, sharp cracking noise and he yelped as a whip circled his ankles and cinched tight, then he found himself lying flat on his back as his feet were jerked out from under him.  He kept a tight hold on his hammer and lifted his head to watch as a shadow elf emerged from the darkness, his black hair cut short, his wide, bloodshot eyes seeming fastened on the dwarfs face.  Gar scowled, seeing something in the others gaze that he didn’t like, something he had seen a few times before.  This one was completely out of touch with reality, the fire of insanity blazed in his eyes.

                He grinned broadly, his teeth flashing brilliantly from his dark skin.  Gar was struck by the fact that this shadow elf with his black hair, skin and leathers was reflecting the darkness inside himself.  “Dwarf teeth!”  The elf exclaimed in delight and Gar frowned, then his eyes widened as he realized that the elf was wearing a shirt of mail, but not composed of chain. His shirt was composed of hundreds of interwoven teeth!  Gar brought his hammer up to swing at the crazy elf and only then did he notice that the elf had a whip in both hands and as he brought up his hammer the other whip came around and lashed tightly about the dwarfs forearm, just beneath the hilt of that hammer.  Leaning back, the shadow elf tried to pull the dwarfs arm to the side, which would leave his chest open for some sort of attack.  Growling deep in that barrel chest, Gar strained against the pull, his muscles bulging and the shadow elf’s eyes widened even further.  Suddenly the dwarf changed the direction of his pull, jerking the whip back over his head instead of in toward his body.  The elf yelped as he was pulled forward and Gar, both his feet bound by the other whip, simply raised them both and drove them into the shadow elf’s stomach.  The man flew backward into the darkness, losing his grip on both his whips.  Wolfgar sat up and quickly untangled himself from the lashes, then regained his feet, kicking the whips away behind him.  “You’re gonna have to do better than that if you want to add my teeth to that foul shirt lad!”

                As soon as the darkness had engulfed them, Magnus had tried to counteract it but found that he could not.  Scowling, he quickly ran through his repertoire of spells and cast one on himself that augmented his own vision.  It didn’t allow him to see in this supernatural darkness, not really, but the see aura spell allowed him to view the variously colored auras of the people around him.  He had seen the auras of most of the people he traveled with often enough to recognize Ariana and Gar, and the shadow elves all had similar enough auras to set them apart from the others.  He immediately began casting another spell, thinking to take out the warrior mage who had set this darkness, but suddenly he was distracted by the fact that there were three auras within the carriage that didn’t match those of the shadow elves.  Two of them he thought he recognized!

                “Ariana!” he called quickly, “I think the Countess and Ishara are in that wagon!”

                It was all he could offer by way of informing her, for then he saw another figure leave the carriage and this ones aura, while it was similar to those of the shadow elves, radiated a little brighter than the others.  A mage?

                “Can you do something about this darkness?”  Ariana called to him and he thought he heard the telltale sound of Vindicator clashing with another sword.  Evidently the darkness didn’t stop her from defending herself.

                “No!” he responded, moving through it himself so that he wouldn’t be standing in the same spot he had been when the shadow blanket was cast.  “You’ll have to get clear!”

                “Come this way!”  Gar’s voice bellowed from behind them.   

                Magnus didn’t know if Ariana and the others had followed the dwarf’s advice or not, but he actually did the opposite, moving toward the two auras he had identified as magic users of some sort.  The one that shone a little less brightly he was certain had to be the warrior mage, the other… well he wasn’t sure what it was yet.  “Look out!”  hissed a womans voice and he thought it might have been who the brighter aura belonged to.  He heard a man curse and then a wave of coldness swept over him, slowing his movements considerably.  ‘She can cast without speaking.’  He realized suddenly and a grim realization dawned upon him.  ‘She must be a priestess.’  Magnus knew that holy people could access their gods given magics without having to speak any incantations like he did.  That meant that those few holy people who happened to have offensive magic were exceedingly dangerous to fight.

                Suddenly the warrior mages aura was moving swiftly toward him and he tightened his grip upon his staff, preparing to meet the assault.  He started to mumble a spell, hoping to cancel the coldness that was slowing him before his opponent reached him.  There was a sizzling sound and he heard a woman scream in pain, but it didn’t sound to him like Ariana’s voice.  Perhaps Shayla had been wounded by something.  Just before the warrior mage reached him he felt the cold numbness lift from his own body and whirled away, narrowly avoiding a slice from the mans sword.  The shadow elf spun about and came at him again, stabbing toward Magnus’s middle and the mage parried it aside with his staff.

                “How can you see me?”  The shadow elf asked, his tone astonished.

                Magnus couldn’t help but gloat a little.  “There is much to see about a person other than their physical form!”  The shadow elf stabbed at him again and again Magnus parried it aside, then he thrust the head of his staff toward the elf and released a torrent of electricity that had been stored within it.  The shadow elf saw the blow coming and weaved to the side, but he hadn’t expected the electrical wave that issued forth and he screamed as his body was enveloped in electricity.  He collapsed, still convulsing slightly as his body crackled with lightning and Magnus turned to the female shadow elf who was now turning back toward him, having heard her comrade fall.

                “Athan’Dae?”  she called.  “Brother?”

                So they were family.  Magnus filed that fact away for later study as he moved toward her.  When she realized that it wasn’t her brother moving toward her she fell silent and he realized she must be concentrating on the power necessary to cast a spell at him.  Calling on the other latent power of his staff he slammed its bottom into the ground and sent a shockwave racing toward her through the ground.  She cried out as she was knocked from her feet and he heard a splash, grinning slightly as he realized she had fallen into the mud he had created beneath their carriage.  Swiftly the mage approached the carriage and when he slipped his head inside he was surprised to find that the shadow blanket did not affect the interior.  He blinked in surprise, having not expected to be able to see anything and he saw three people seated within.  He recognized the Countess and her sister, both bound and gagged and looking at him in some surprise.  The Countess tried to shout a warning at him through her gag and he saw the flicker of movement from the other side of the carriage, which he thought must have been magically augmented to be larger within than it was outside.  He started to turn his head that way, saw a darkly clad man with a scar over one eye just visible above a facemask, then there was a searing pain in his chest and he fell away with a shout.  Shadow Stalker followed him out of the carriage.

                Following Gar’s voice Ariana fell back, trying to find the edge of the blanket of shadow that was making it impossible to see.  She silently sent a thank you to Reaper, the master assassin that had once traveled with her father’s incarnation of the Dragons, who had taught her some of the art of blind fighting so that she was able to defend herself, at least a little bit, from the attacks of the shadow elf who was accosting her in the darkness.  She was listening to movement and feeling shifts in air currents as she backed away.  She sensed another swing coming from the right and she brought Vindicator around in a blur to meet that strike, then realized that her opponent must have been dual wielding for another strike was stabbing toward her almost simultaneously.  Ariana twisted her shapely hips away from that blow and felt the flat of the blade, cool and hard, slide across her belly beneath her armors halter top.  Bringing Vindicator back across her body, she knocked his second blade away and then kicked out, slamming her booted foot into his chest and knocking him backward with a grunt.  Hearing him retreat somewhat from that blow, she took advantage of the space she had put between them and leapt backward, finally clearing the edge of the magical darkness.  No sooner had she landed than she heard Magnus’s shout of pain and she realized that rather than trying to get clear of the dark, he had gone deeper, toward where he had seen the Countess and Ishara.  She wondered if he had found some means to see through the shadow, but then her thoughts were distracted as her opponent lunged from the darkness.

                He was a whirlwind of motion as he came on hard, slashing, stabbing and whirling manically.  Ariana had her hands full just parrying his blows, retreating from his fierce attack while she tried to look for an opening in his assault.  She was taller than her opponent, and Vindicator was longer by far than either of his blades, so she was able to keep him at a distance, at least somewhat, but the man was so quick and vicious that she knew if she didn’t find a way through his intricate fighting style quickly she was going to have to either retreat or sacrifice a wound to those unknown blades in order to score a hit.  Shadow elves, she knew, were prone to poisoning their weapons and she wasn’t keen on letting him hit her, so that meant if she couldn’t get inside his offense she would have to retreat.

                He finished one particularly swift flurry of movements with a deep lunge, stabbing both blades toward her stomach after having knocked Vindicator to one side.  Ariana, no novice in combat, spun to her right, but not backward.  She moved just to the side of his blades and then up along his arms, Vindicator’s blade flashing in an arc around her as she spun.  The shadow elf barely ducked in time to avoid a beheading, but Ariana had anticipated this and when she came out of her spin behind the elf she kicked him as hard as she could in the back of his knees and he fell to them, snarling and twirling his blades to stab back at her under his armpits.  Ariana, who had the advantage in reach, was outside the range of those swords and she drove Vindicator toward the point directly between his shoulder blades.  The point of her sword had barely impacted his armor though when he moved with the strike, letting his strange leathers absorb some of the impact as he dove forward into a shoulder roll and came up on one knee, facing her.  His silver eyes moved down the length of her enchanted blade and saw that his blood was dripping from its point.

                “First blood goes to you fair one.”  He said, his voice a lilting whisper that sent a shiver down her spine, though she realized if he weren’t trying to kill her she would quite enjoy that voice.  “I’ll be tasting yours next!”  With that he launched himself forward, spinning low, his right hand blade flashing at her knees.  As it passed he stood, still spinning, his left hand blade crossing at the level of her neck.  Ariana jumped the first blade, then sensing his intent she nimbly curled into a ball and flipped backward, avoiding the second blade.  But Celeb’Dae came on fast, striking again before she had managed to regain her footing fully and she had to stagger back into the shadow to avoid his next stab.  She hadn’t realized she was so close to the edge of the shadow blanket and so as she was deprived of her sight it took a moment for her blind fighting training to kick in.  In that moment her opponent drove the point of his sword into her thigh and she screamed as she felt a white hot burning spreading out from the point of that wound.  She also heard a sizzling and smelt charred flesh as she staggered away from him, then she heard him laugh and knew he was coming after her….

                Rachnid was perched on a low hanging roof that extended out over the walkway, his eight legs clicking slightly as he scampered back and forth, trying to watch everyone at once.  He first saw Shayla stagger backward out of the darkness, falling to her butt and holding up a hand, as though warding off a blow that didn’t come.  Almost at the same time, Gar backed out of the shadow and then was knocked to the ground by the whips. When he saw the whip wielder step forward, looking crazed he started to transform back into his true form in order to assist the dwarf.  But then he saw Gar send the shadow elf flying and he turned his attention elsewhere.  He heard the mage cry out and knew that Magnus had been wounded, but he couldn’t see the man and so turned to Ariana as she came out of the darkness.  He watched them duel from his vantage for a moment, then she was stumbling back into the shadow and he saw the elf lunge in, heard her cry of pain and his spider senses picked up the smell of blood and charred flesh.  Smiling, she shadow elf started into the shadow, pursuing the red headed paladin.

                ‘It’s this infernal shadow that’s causing them so much harm!’ he mused to himself.  He decided the best way he could help them was to do away with it, so scampered back from the edge of the roof and reverted back to his true form.  A goblin once more, he turned his back on the fighting and fell to his knees, facing a spider web that stretched between two walls in a corner.  It was a well known fact that spider webs could be found almost everywhere, but it was especially true whenever a priest of Rachnos needed to send prayers to his or her god.
                “Lord, should you be willing to hear the prayers of your servant, my friends down there on the street could really use a hand!”  He heard the battle raging on the street behind him.  As an afterthought, he added, “I’m certain they’d all be willing to send up a prayer of thanks to you for saving their lives when this is done!”

                Suddenly he heard a shout from the street and he straightened up as he scampered back toward the edge.  There were city guards racing toward the blanket of darkness that shrouded the entire street and Rachnid, watching from the rooftop, saw a woman step from the darkness.  She was beautiful and lithe, clad in snug black leather and a cloak of deep purple. Her hair was mostly white with a hint of purple and as she stepped from the darkness she cast a withering glance toward the approaching guards.  “Back to the carriage!” She cried, “We flee!”

                Suddenly the darkness was gone and he saw the woman running for the black carriage, diving inside while one of the twins followed her.  The other two shadow elf men jumped in to the other side and Rachnid saw Magnus lying on the ground with a blood stained chest a short ways from the mud, which suddenly dried up, pushing the carriages wheels up to the top.  The shadow orc, who had apparently stayed at his post the entire time, slapped the reins to the backs of the team and it shot forward.  Devlin and Kelvan were kneeling by their sister, who was knelt on the side of the street with a hand to her mouth as blood flowed forth.  Rachnid watched the carriage retreat, his eyes narrowing and raised his hand to point toward it, reaching for his gods granted magic to try and stop the carriage.

                “No you don’t little one!”  Said a cold voice from behind him.  Rachnid whirled around, his arm still extended and the spell he had been planning to send toward the carriage instead caught Shadow Stalker squarely in the chest.  The assassin had been about to thrust a dagger into the priests back and instead he exclaimed in astonishment as a massive spider web shot from the little mans hands, lifting him and flinging him backward against a wall, sticking him fast.  The assassin struggled for a moment, then seemed to realize it was pointless and slumped back against the wall, letting his dagger fall from his hand.  A shout from the street turned the goblin around and he saw the door on the right side of the carriage fly open and a figure, tied wrists and ankles and gagged fell out and rolled away from the carriage as it bounced along the road.  The priest saw one of the shadow elf males stick its head out of the carriage and glower at the blond elf that was still tumbling away, then he slammed the carriage door and it was gone.

                “Well,” said the goblin lightly, “that was invigorating!”

                Down on the street Ariana had collapsed to a sitting position on the ground and was clutching at her thigh above the wound, trying to stop it bleeding.  Magnus was lying on the ground near where the carriage had been, unmoving but breathing faintly and Shayla was still crouched nearby, her brothers to either side of her.  Gar was the only one who seemed relatively unscathed and he jogged over to Ariana, crouching at her side.  “You alright red?” he growled.

                Ariana looked up at him, then behind him at where Ishara was lying, struggling in her bonds.  “I’ll be doing much better once you free Ishara!”  she gasped around the pain that was radiating out from her leg.  It felt as though there had been acid on that shadow elf’s blade.

                The dwarf straightened and started toward the almost naked elf, clad as she was only in the chemise she had been wearing beneath her dress.  When she saw him coming, she stopped struggling and watched him, her blue eyes wide with duress.  The dwarf crouched next to her, slipping a small knife from a sheath on his belt.  “I’ll have you out of there in a minute milady!”

                Ishara held perfectly still till Gar had slit the binds on her wrists, then as he moved down her shapely legs to cut the binds on her ankles she reached up and pulled the gag from her mouth.  “Finally!” she gasped out, kicking the ropes away as he cut them.  She scampered to her feet and pushed past the dwarf, running to the fallen mages side.  “Magnus…” she did a quick, cursory inspection of his wound, frowning all the while, “…poison and blood loss.”  She placed a hand over the hole in his chest and bowed her head, closing her eyes as she mumbled a hasty prayer.  After she had finished she added, “Please!”  Her hand started to glow and a moment later Magnus came to with a loud gasp, clutching at her for a moment tell he realized who she was, then he slumped backward, his breathing easing.  She smiled and said shakily, “Thank you Ra.”

                “Ishara!”  Ariana gasped out and the elf turned to her with a frown, then her blue eyes widened as she saw what looked like fumes rising off the beautiful warriors leg.  Her face reflecting astonishment she ran to the paladins side, bending to examine the wound in her thigh.  “What in the hells did they do to you?”

                “I think there was…” she winced and gasped, “…acid on the blade!”  Ishara nodded and placed a hand lightly over the wound, repeating a variation of the prayer she had said over Magnus earlier.  Behind her, the dwarf was helping the wizard to his feet.

                After a few moments Ariana sighed and nodded, reaching up to squeeze Isharas shoulder in thanks.  “I’m glad you’re all right.”  She said softly and the priestess smiled before she rose and glanced around.  She saw the barbarian royal children a short ways off and started their way.

                Devlin and Kelvan saw her coming and stood up, stepping to either side as the elf knelt in front of Shayla, her mouth bloodied.  “That… freak took one of my teeth!”

                Ishara leaned closer, pulling the princess’s mouth open wide as she looked to where the gap in her teeth was located.  It was still bleeding profusely and the priestess frowned slightly.  “He is psychotic, that one.”  She said another prayer, closing her eyes briefly and a moment later not only had the bleeding stopped, but Shayla had another full tooth grown into the place of the original!  The princess ran her tongue over it experimentally and then smiled at the elf. 

                “Thank you milady!”  She said, surprised at the power in this rather slight looking woman.

                Ishara reached out and cradled the young womans face in her hand for a moment, then smiled tiredly.  “You’re welcome.”  She slumped back suddenly, a wave of dizziness overcoming her.

                Kelvan jumped forward and caught her, one arm slipping about her waist while the other pulled one of her arms over his shoulders.  She smiled at the young warrior prince then looked over to where Rachnid was suddenly walking out of an alley half dragging the assassin with him.  She didn’t notice the way Kelvan’s expression changed, darkening greedily as his eyes swept down her voluptuous body.  It didn’t last more than a moment, for when he noticed the goblin priest he scowled like the others.  When Rachnid had joined the rest of the group he shoved Shadow Stalker forward, the assassin falling to his knees in their midst.  “Look what the spider caught!”  the little goblin said with a cackled.

                Ishara left Kelvan’s side, staggering forward slightly and caught the assassin on the side of his head with a resounding slap that rocked the rogues head to the side and knocked him to the ground.  She stumbled again and again Kelvan was there, this time his fingers surreptitiously brushed the side of her firmly rounded breast, though it seemed to her an accident as he caught her.  “You son of a bitch!” she growled at the assassin, who merely looked up at her indifferently.

                Ariana was on her feet now, as was Magnus and the entire group converged upon the rogue.  “You caught him?”  the paladin asked the goblin and Rachnid nodded proudly. 

                “In a spider web!”  The paladin frowned then looked more closely at the bonds holding the assassin, surprised to find that it was thick strands of spider web!

                “What in the nine hells is going on here?” demanded a commanding voice, causing them all to turn and look at the guards who had gathered a short ways off, trying to make sense of what had been happening when they arrived on the scene.  The speaker appeared to be some kind of officer and he was glaring around them all.

                “I’ll deal with this.” Ariana said to the others, turning toward the officer and forcing her best smile onto her face.

                “What do we do with this one?”  Wolfgar growled, nudging the assassin hard with a booted foot.

                “Maybe we should just kill him and be done with it.”  Devlin suggested.

                Magnus was looking at the assassin closely, finding something oddly familiar about the man.  Then his eyes fell on the dagger that was visible on the mans hip, normally hidden beneath his cloak.  Leaning forward slightly, Magnus looked at the dagger more closely, then he reached forward and drew it from the sheath.  Holding it up to his eyes he saw a name engraved upon the blade… Dieter.  His eyes narrowing as he looked back at the assassin, who met his eyes with an emotionless gaze.  “It’s for Ariana to decide what happens to him.”  Magnus commented softly, tucking the dagger away in his cloak.  The gesture was not lost on the assassin and he gave the slightest of frowns as his dagger disappeared.

                Shayla glanced around then and said suddenly, “Wait a minute.  Where’s Rellik?”

                Everyone else glanced around then, noticing that Ariana’s step-brother was missing.  Gar growled as well, “For that matter… where’s the boy?”  More frantic glancing about and it became obvious quickly that Rylan was gone as well.

                The others had started down the street toward the dark carriage and at first Rellik had moved to follow him.  But Rylan, who was used to Lady Moonstone telling him to stay out of harms way, had faded into the shadows at the side of the road.  He saw then as a bird, what looked to him like  a pigeon, fluttered down out of the sky and landed on Rellik’s shoulder.  The big warrior frowned as he stopped, turning his head to look at the bird.  Rylan leaned forward slightly, wanting a closer look, but suddenly the bird stuck out its leg and when Rellik saw the small rolled piece of paper attached to it he glanced around and then stepped quickly into an alley.  Rylan, trying not to be seen, flitted over to the mouth of the alley and watched the big man remove the note from the birds leg after which it seemed to dissolve into mist.  Rylan widened his eyes in surprise, realizing that this had been a magic pigeon.

                Rylan wished he could read what the note said as Rellik unrolled it and began to read, but the knew enough about Rellik Vashόn  to know that anything that could make him scowl like that couldn’t be a good thing.  Still scowling he folded the note and tucked it into the neckline of his armor, between it and the tunic he wore underneath.  Turning back toward the entrance to the alley he started out and Rylan had to quickly scamper back out of the line of sight.

                By the time they had reached the street the fight was over and Rylan, looking to the right, saw that they seemed to have rescued Mistress Ishara and captured the assassin who had kidnapped her!  He stepped out into the street next to Rellik, who frowned at him as he appeared.  “Your sister always tells me to stay out of the way when they fight, till she thinks I’m ready to help.”  Rellik continued to frown but said nothing as they started toward the others.

                Magnus saw them coming and turned to face the pair, “Where the hell were you?”

                Rellik glanced over to where Ariana was speaking to a group of city guards, then his eyes played over the scantily clad form of Ishara Wodan, who was standing near a leering Kelvan, hugging herself as though self-conscious about her attire.  Funny that, he thought, I’ve seen her wear a lot less!  It was true, Ishara was one of those incredible women who felt that less was more when it came to clothing, but perhaps that was only when it was her choice to wear it.  The mage had opened his mouth to ask again where the fighter had been, no doubt thinking that his presence could have been helpful in the fight.  Before he could say anything, Rellik responded, “I thought I saw another of those dark elves duck into an alley.”  He glanced over to Ariana, knowing that if she heard she would sense the lie, “So I followed to make sure he wasn’t trying to outflank us.”

                Magnus scowled, but before he could ask anything else, Rellik pushed past him and approached the assassin.  “Under the laws of the City-State of Peacehope on the Island Kingdom of Algeron you are under arrest for the crimes of murder and kidnapping.”

                Shadow Stalker just looked up at him from where he was kneeling on the ground.  Ariana appeared suddenly at his side and said, “The guards here are willing to let us take the assassin.  I don’t think they’re really prepared to deal with a prisoner of his caliber in this little town.”  Rellik nodded absently.  “So… where’d you go during the fighting?”  He noted there was an absence of accusation to her voice.  She knew him well enough to know that he didn’t run from a fight, she was simply curious why he hadn’t been there.

                Rellik leaned down and grabbed one of the assassins arms, taking charge of the man, then nodded toward Magnus as he shoved the assassin toward the closest inn.  “Ask your pet mage.  Meanwhile I’m going to get him into a small, windowless room and question him till he can’t bleed anymore.”

                Ariana frowned and took Relliks arm, “We don’t torture in the Dragons Rellik.”  She cautioned him.

                He smiled at her grimly.  “I’m not a Dragon, remember?”  She had always suspected that that was a bit of a tender spot for him.

                She watched him go for a moment with a frown on her face.  Magnus stepped up beside her, “We need to talk about that assassin.”  He told her softly.

                She turned and scowled at him, but in explanation he simply removed the dagger he had taken off the rogue and handed it to her.  Ariana looked at it closely, noted the name inscribed on its side and frowned.  “He had this on him?”  Magnus nodded.  Her first thought was that it might once have belonged to Bryant.  “Have we heard anything from our people in Milligant yet?”

                Magnus shook his head.  “No, but that,” he pointed at the dagger, “wasn’t the kids.”

                Ariana frowned at him.  “You’re certain?”            

                The mage nodded sagely.  “Different enchantments.  For example, the dagger that Shadow Walker wields is enchanted so that only he can wield it.  It’s not just a family member… but only him.  This one is similarly enchanted… so only that assassin can wield it.”

                Ariana’s emerald eyes widened slightly.  “That would imply that….”

                “The thief and the assassin are somehow related.”

                Ishara sat on the edge of the bed, wrapped now in Magnus’s cloak, telling them all what had transpired while she and her sister had been prisoners of Shadow Stalker, and then the shadow elves.  She had reached the point of the rescue and was saying, “Then we saw Magnus… which startled us.”  She laughed softly and glanced at the mage, who nodded.  “When Shadow Stalker went after him we thought he was dead.  The next thing we know the shadow elves are diving back into the carriage, there was no sign of Shadow Stalker but the darkness had lifted.  The wheels started rolling, the dark elves were still getting situated in the carriage… the next thing I knew Penny was shoving me out the door with a foot and my nightmare was pretty much over.”  She shuddered slightly.  “I don’t want to think what might be happening to my sister right now.”

                Ariana, who had been leaning against a wall nearby with her arms crossed beneath her breasts, stepped forward and placed a hand on her shoulder.  “We’ll get her back.”  The paladin stepped toward the door of the room, which had been rented for Ishara.  “I need to go and speak to the assassin… there are answers I need, and about more than why he kidnapped you two.” 

                Ariana stepped out into the hall and turned right, toward the room that Rellik had taken and in which he had decided to keep the assassin, where he could guard him.  Behind her, Rylan Eaglehart stepped from the room and she turned, surprised to see her squire.  “You have something Rylan?”

                The young man looked nervous, as though he didn’t want to say what was on his mind.  “I… saw something.”

                Ariana took a step toward him, crouched slightly and looked up into his downcast eyes.  “What is it Rylan?”

                He looked up, saw that she was genuinely concerned about him and squared his shoulders.  He would not appear weak in front of her.  “I don’t want to speak ill of your family, milady but….”

                When he trailed off, understanding dawned on Ariana.  She knew who this was about, if not what.  “He’s not my family Rylan.  Through marriage, yes, but he’s never done anything to make me consider him a brother.”

                Her words bolstered him a bit and when he spoke, his tone was full of confidence.  “Rellik lied to you.” He paused, then shook his head.  “No, that’s not right.  He lied to Magnus, probably because he knew he couldn’t lie to you.”  Anyone who had hung around Ariana long enough knew that she was a walking, talking lie detector.  Magnus had long thought there was something magical about it, but he could never detect such a thing.  But it was true that she couldn’t be lied to.

                “What are you talking about?”  she prompted him.

                “Just before you and the others started to fight those shadow elves… I had ducked to the side, because I know you don’t want me involved in the fighting yet.”  She nodded, “I saw a pigeon fall out of the sky and land on his shoulder.  He ducked into an alley with it and I followed…” he thought perhaps she would be upset about that, but she just nodded for him to continue, “…I saw that the pigeon had a note on its leg and when he took it off the pigeon disappeared.”

                “It was a magic pigeon?”  she asked sharply and when he nodded she said, “That means whoever sent him the letter didn’t want anyone else to overhear the message.”  When Rylan frowned, she explained.  “The faster way to send a magical message would be through magic mouth, or something that uses a voice.  The only reason to send it in a note would be so no one else would overhear something.”  She sighed and nodded, “Now I want to know what you saw.”

                Rylan shrugged. “He just read the note, then he turned and went back to the street.  I didn’t stick around, I wanted to beat him to the street.  I never learned what was in the note.”

                Ariana reached out and put a hand on his shoulder.  “Thank you for trusting me with this Rylan.  I’ll find out what was in the letter.”  The squire nodded, then offered her a wan smile and turned and headed for his own room down the hall, which was next to hers.  She watched him go for a moment, then she turned and headed toward Rellik’s room.

                After knocking, she heard him call “Who goes there?”

                “Ariana.”  She responded and a moment later she heard the door unlatch and he pulled it open.  He stood there in a sleeveless tunic and loose pants, sword in hand. “I’d like to speak to him for a while.  I’ll stand watch if you like.”

                He opened the door wider and she passed through, though he didn’t step aside wide enough and the tips of her breasts brushed his chest.  He smiled and she met his gaze, but didn’t let any anger enter her eyes, which brought a frown to his face.  Normally she would have berated him for that.  “I could use a drink.”

                “There’s a decent tavern downstairs.”  She glanced over to where the assassin sat, tied to a chair by the rooms only table.  “When I’ve finished talking to him, I’ll set someone else to guard and join you.  I could use one as well.”  He seemed surprised at her offer, but nodded and gave a small smile, then turned and headed toward the tavern downstairs. 

                Ariana closed the door, then turned and regarded the assassin where he sat tied to the chair.  “Who are you?”

                He regarded her a moment, his eyes flat and emotionless.  “You know who I am.”

                She shook her head, crossing the room to perch on the edge of the table next to him.  “I know who you claim to be.  Shadow Stalker… assassin for hire.  But there are some… inconsistencies there.”

                “Such as?”  he asked, tilting his head to the side.

                “I just finished hearing from Ishara Wodan regarding your treatment of her and her sister.  She claims that while you were firm… they did not feel as though they were in danger.  She said you protected them when crews aboard the zeppelin and the Plunderer showed a carnal interest in them.”  She shook her head.  “I feel I should thank you for that, actually.  The Countess, she could probably have handled being raped.  I’m not so sure Ishara could have… she isn’t quite as mentally… resilient as her sister.”

                “Those men had no honor.  Rape is a violation of more than a womans morals, it violates her soul.  And it’s… rude.”  He said that last word as though he were saying something truly foul, and might have left a bad taste in his mouth.

                “And yet you assassinated the duke, kidnapped her and her sister and destroyed the Cloud Dancer.”  Ariana shook her head, a slight smile playing over her face. 

                “Business.  In order to complete my mission they had to die.”  He shrugged.  “You and your people are tenacious.  I had to throw you off the scent.”  He laughed bitterly then.  “I sent the band you had chasing me to Milligant, though I was through with you.”  He shook his head.  “Where’d you find that goblin?  I owe him something.”

                She laughed outright at that.  “Bested by a priest of Rachnos.  I’m sure that had to sting.”  He looked away with a disgusted grunt.  “Let me ask you something else now.  And how you answer this next question will go a long way toward what decision I might make regarding you.”  He turned his head back to face her, his eyes questioning.  She reached to the small of her back and drew forth the dagger that had been taken from him, then she flung it quickly and the assassin managed to gasp, his eyes dropping to where the dagger was sticking out the thick wood of the chair… right between his legs.  “What does that dagger mean to you?”

                He studied her quietly for a moment, then spoke softly, for the first time the icy whisper was gone and he used what she thought might be close to his true voice.  Deeper and more cultured perhaps… but it was a voice similar to Bryants.  “What do you think it means to me?”

                “I think that it’s a family dagger.  That the name inscribed on its blade is your family name.  And I think… that I have seen another one just like it.”  Something flickered behind his eyes then.  “You’ve been looking for him, haven’t you?”

                His eyes met hers steadily, then he looked away.  “He’s dead.  I was never able to find him because he drowned years ago.”

                She leaned down, her face inches from his.  “He’s not dead.  Bryant Dieter is very much alive, he’s been traveling with me… working for me for a couple of years now.  He’s an amazing young man, probably the best thief I’ve ever seen.”

                Shadow Stalker turned back to her, his eyes narrowing.  “You… you can’t be certain it’s him.  Maybe he found the dagger somewhere.”

                Ariana shook her head.  “Even if that were true, how would he have known the name?  You’ve both gone to great lengths to protect your names.  But your brother has learned something that I think you still need to work on.”  She cocked her head slightly, her eyes still boring into his.  “He has learned to trust.  Not much mind you… but a little.  He trusts me.  He’s told me his story.”  She reached out and lightly slipped her index finger into the mask that covered the lower half of his face.  He did not try to stop her, not that he could have the way he was tied up. She lowered the mask, revealing a broad but undeniably handsome face, marred by a scar running down the right side, by the eye.  It did not mare his features, but added to them.  She thought that it made him look more dangerous but also more appealing to a certain… shadowy corner of her heart that most women kept locked away.  “He’s told me about you… Nathaniel.”

                He didn’t speak for a long while and she straightened up, propping herself once more on the side of the table.  “What… what do you want?” he asked her.

                “For you and your brother to be reunited.”  She shrugged.  “You’ve murdered, that’s true and you may have to answer for that.  But it’s possible I can help you.  I can at least bring you and Bryant together again.  But you’ll need to help me… what’s happening here is bigger than anyone knows.  If the shadow elves are involved, it has to be.  You know more about that than you’re letting on… but without your help I don’t know what chance we stand.  We’re moving into the dark without any torches or lanterns, but you could light the way for us.  I need you to think about that… think about what we can do for each other.”  She started to move for the door, paused with her hand on the knob.  “I’ll come back after you’ve had some time to think things over.  You seem like a smart man Nathaniel Dieter, make the right choice.  For yourself, for us and for your brother.  Bryant has done all right for himself, but he’s alone.  He could use you in his life.  But you’re the only one that can make that happen now.”  With that she turned and left the room.

                On her way down the stairs, Ariana knocked at the door of Devlin and when the large barbarian answered she asked him to stand watch with the assassin.  He agreed, all be it grudgingly and she headed down the hall to her room.  Closing the door behind her she leaned back and tilted her head against it.  She took a deep breath, then another, and then she crossed the room and stood before the mirror, staring into it.  After a few moments she stripped out of her armor till she stood naked in the room after which she washed herself from a basin on the dresser top.  Once she had gotten herself as clean as she could without a genuine bath, she brushed out her long hair till it gleamed then she pulled on a clean blouse and a clean pair of cotton pants which fit snugly over her hips and buttocks.  She pulled on boots and gloves, then buckled on a sword belt from which hung a broadsword.  She left Vindicator between the mattress and box springs of her rented bed. 

                After she had dressed she again looked into the mirror over her dresser and sighed again, steeling herself for what she knew must come.  “Now dear brother… it’s your turn.”

                Rellik was aware of the silence that fell over the room as she entered and he turned, along with every other head in the place to watch her walk down the stairs.  She came down slowly, a stair at a time, her hips moving sensuously with every stair.  She paused at the half way point, her green eyes sweeping the room, her full red lips spreading in a smile, obviously enjoying the stares of the men in the room.  ‘She is fully aware of the effect she has on us.’  Rellik thought to himself, shaking his head with a slight smile.  When she saw him, Ariana smiled wider and came across the room and he couldn’t help noticing that her blouse was sagging open, the top three buttons undone.  In fact, he doubted she could have buttoned them! 

                Ariana stepped up next to him at the bar, bumping two men out of the way with her hips as she did so.  “Excuse me boys.”  

                “Any time.”  One of them said,  eyeing her up and down.

                She smiled and gave him a little nod.  She glanced at her step-brother then hailed the bartender.  When the young human appeared, smiling eagerly she placed a gold piece on the polished bar and pushed it across to him.  “A bottle of your finest wine, and I’d like to pay for whatever my friend here has drunk… and whatever he may yet drink!”  The bartender nodded, slipped the coin away and returned with a slightly green bottle and goblet.

                “Thank you.”  Rellik said, a little uncertainly.  He was thrown off by her generosity, something she never showed him.  “Want to tell me why your being so nice?  Normally you don’t have two words to spare for me.”  

                As she turned her head to face him she noted that there were three shot glasses lined up in front of him.  Good, he’d been drinking heavily, that made her job easier.  “I’m beginning to think I’ve misjudged you Rellik.”

                He frowned slightly, nodding to the bartender as the man placed another drink in front of him, along with a tankard of ale.  “How so?” he asked, then tossed back his shot and gasped, wincing.  Ariana had to fight not to wrinkle her nose at the fumes that buffeted her face.  Gods but his breath was foul with alcohol!

                “I saw the way you were trying to help the prince the other day on the Shorerunner.  And you handled yourself honorably around the amazon women…” she shook her head, “…you haven’t even tried to get into my pants since we started traveling together!  I think that’s new record for you.”  She waved at the drink in front of him.  “I just wanted to show my appreciation… hopefully this is the start of something pretty positive for us.  It’s high time you made yourself part of the family.”

                He smiled, keeping his thoughts to himself in favor of the free alcohol, and raised his tankard to her before taking a deep draw of it.  Ariana began to drink in earnest, polishing off the whole bottle of wine quickly and ordering up a second.  She kept up appearances for two hours, standing beside her step-brother and keeping up a steady flow of conversation, all the while allowing her words to slur more and more.  He had never seen her drink so he didn’t know what it took to get her drunk… though in truth Ariana had never been drunk.  No matter how much she drank, and she had had occasion to drink quite a lot, she had never been drunk.  She’d been drugged, and could succumb to drugs, but alcohol seemed to have no effect upon her.  Rellik, however, didn’t know that, so when she finished her second bottle and turned to him, she was certain he had no trouble believing she was completely compromised.  “I think I’ve had enough,” she swayed slightly as she stood up, leaning against him, deliberately pushing her breasts against his shoulder, “time for me to go to bed!”  Then she promptly fell forward, appearing to pass out.  Rellik turned and caught her before she slumped to the ground and the bartender glanced over with a raised eyebrow, asking if he needed help. 

                “Apparently she can’t hold her alcohol!”  Rellik offered the man, standing up from his stool and hefting Ariana’s slack form in his arms.  Her arms and head sagged, her hair trailing nearly to the floor.  Rellik turned for the stairs and carried his drunken step-sister up them, heading for her room.  Pausing outside her door, he had to shift her weight against his chest to test her doorknob.  He found it unlocked and pushed the door open, carrying her across the threshold and chuckling softly at the irony in that gesture.  He crossed the room and laid her on the narrow single bed, then straightened and looked down at her. She lay there, breathing deeply, one hand across her abdomen, the other at her side, her beautiful face turned to the side.  He glanced over his shoulder at the still opened door, then back at her, sleeping peacefully.  He grinned, then crossed the room and closed the door softly, locking it before turning back to Ariana.  As he crossed the room back toward her he undid his sword belt and draped it over the back of chair, then untucked his shirt.  Still smiling, anticipating what was coming, he sat on the edge of the bed and looked down at his step-sister.  He’d been dreaming of getting his hands… and other parts of his body… on her since his mother married her father more than twenty years earlier. 

                Fighting to keep his breathing steady he reached out and started to unbuckled her sword belt, her body jerking slightly as he undid the belt.  He had to remove the broadsword, which he leaned against a nearby wall, then he slipped the belt out from under her.  She shifted slightly in her sleep, but didn’t make a sound.  Dropping the belt on the ground next to the bed he leaned forward and with both hands gently started to pull her blouse from the waistline of her soft cotton pants.  When that was done his eager fingers went for the buttons of her shirt, starting at the fourth and working downward.  There were only four, and when the last one opened the fold of the shirt parted and his breath caught in his throat.  Her flesh was smooth and bronzed by the sun, her stomach impossibly flat and toned, but her breasts were the most magnificent thing he had ever seen!  She hadn’t been wearing a bra under the blouse, so he saw them in all their glory, large, round and firm, thrusting straight up like proud mountain peaks. 

                “Gods!” he moaned softly, reaching out and trailing his fingers ever so gently down the center of her flat stomach, just the tips grazing her warm flesh. 

                Ariana shifted slightly, “Yes!” she moaned softly and Rellik was spurred to greater lengths.  He raised his hand and moved it up to her impressive bosom, lowering his hand and filling it with one of her incredible breasts.  He felt his manhood swelling painfully against his pants, the firmness of her globe was astounding.  He moved his thumb, rolling her large nipple under it and thrilling at the fell of it swelling beneath his hand.

                “Fires of Hades!” he gasped, then couldn’t contain himself and leaned forward to take one of the large nipples between his lips.  He chewed on it softly and she shifted beneath him, her hips raising off the bed slightly.  Rellik slipped a hand down, his fingers worming their way into her waistband and then lower, inching toward the soft down between her thighs.  She was coming around slowly, but Rellik, being a few sheets to the wind himself was losing his self control.  He couldn’t stop himself now, he’d wanted her for so long that he figured this might well be his only opportunity.  He moved his face to the side, kissing his way down the slope of her breast,  burying his face between her massive globes.  Suddenly he felt her hands come down on the back of his head, her fingers running through his hair and he thrilled at her touch, wondering if she was so aroused that she didn’t so much care who was in her bed with her.  Her grip on his head tightened, pressing his face further into her chest and she brought her arms together then, pressing the taut spheres together to either side of his head.  Within moments Rellik couldn’t breathe and he started to struggle, putting his hands to her mattress to either side of her waist and pushing.  Her long legs shot up, circling his middle and pulling him snugly downward, holding him.  She was wide awake… had always been, having known the only way she could get him into a compromising position was to convince him that she trusted him.  It was the only way he would have trusted the situation enough to make a move like this.  They struggled mightily for a few minutes, and he was very strong, but could only fight with his arms and her legs were much stronger than his arms.  It took a few minutes, but eventually Rellik was smothered… slumping on top of the paladin when he passed out.

                “Gah!” she gasped as his full weight settled upon her, “Get off me!” She shoved him  hard and he rolled off against the wall, then she rolled in the opposite direction and got to her feet, standing beside the bed.  She stared down at him in disgust and shivered with revulsion, still able to feel his hands and mouth on her.  Absently, she started to button up her blouse and bent to retrieve her sword belt and sword, then she bent to searching her step-brother.  She found what she was looking for in moments, secreted away almost exactly where Rylan had said.  Moving toward the dimly burning lantern on the rooms only table she sat on one of the chairs and, after a quick glance back and Rellik to be sure he was still out, she unfolded it and read:

Cyrrik, Talon and Rellik,

                There has been a change in plan… things here in Peacehope have taken a turn for the better though I cannot go into more detail here for fear that this letter will be intercepted.  It is now imperative that you ensure that Ariana, Wolfgar, Rylan, Magnus, Vance, Strut, Tasha, Blaze and Talia do not return from their missions.  The other party members don’t matter, but those few must be eliminated!  Also, if possible, my step-mother and her sister must be taken out of the equation as well.  Once this has been accomplished you can return home and be certain of a great reward awaiting you my friends!

Huntyr.

                Ariana turned and regarded Rellik through narrowed eyes, wondering if he had been making plans yet to do away with her and her people.  He had only just received the letter, according to Rylan, so likely he hadn’t yet had time to prepare anything.  Obviously Cyrrik and Talon had received similar letters, could this be why she hadn’t heard anything from the other two teams?  Had they been eliminated?  No.  She wouldn’t dwell on that, her people were the best there was and it would be cold day in all seven levels of Hell before Cyrrik Eaglehart or Talon Rethbourne could get the best of them.  She knew now that she had to finish here in the Trey’Elden mountains quickly and get east into Errgaunt, where Tasha, Strut and Vance were supposed to be looking for the very assassin they now had captive.  She couldn’t do that, though, until after she had fulfilled her obligations to the children of Rolfe.

                Glowering at her step-brother, she rose and approached the bed, her eyes playing over him critically.  She wondered if she should just kill him, but realized that she wasn’t that cold blooded.  There was absolutely no way he was going on with them though, not now.  Her eyes fell on the gear that hung from his belt, which was his guardsmen gear.  There was a pair of manacles there and she smiled, coming to a decision. 

                It was a matter of a few minutes work to strip him out of his armor and clothing and when he was lying naked on his bed she stood up and regarded him for a moment.  He was a well built man, that much was true.  In fact, she thought it likely that he was built similarly to Strut… it wasn’t the first time she had wondered what the barbarian might look like out of that armor he wore.  Rellik was well muscled and, as her gaze lingered for a moment with raised eyebrows upon his groin, well endowed she realized.  She shook her head, turning him onto his stomach and then extending his hands up well over his head, pushing them through the bars of his headboard.  Once she had done this she manacled his wrists together and stood up, surveying his work.  Eventually he would get free, she knew, but Rellik was no tracker.  They’d be long gone and well free of him by the time he managed to free himself, so it was likely he would find his way back to Peacehope then.  Of course, Huntyr would know that they weren’t dead, and whatever plans the man had set would be foiled by the rescue of the Countess… she’d make certain of that.  With a sigh she realized she would have to rouse her people, they didn’t have the time she had thought they would to rest up.  What little time she had bought them would be for naught if they didn’t get moving right away.

Chapter Eight

                They came out of the tunnels one at a time, pulling themselves up into the crypt that had once held the remains of Donovan Moonstone.  The first up was Talia, assisted by her sister who followed her a moment later.  Then Krystel turned and helped to bring Blaze up through the hole that had been dug into the floor.  She laid the still unconscious elf out next to her sister, who was still favoring her knee and was now seated with her back to the wall of the crypt.  The sisters watched as the remaining three men, Relic, Lance and Cyrrik hoisted themselves up through the hole to join them.  Krystel frowned, looking down into the tunnel, still wondering what had become of Reaper.  Relic had assured her that they had seen no sign of him, but she and Talia had both seen the assassin head into the tunnel after them.

                “We’re almost to the surface.”  Cyrrik commented, glancing toward the stairway that led up to the entry tomb where Donovan’s wife and Aribeth’s mother were laid to rest.

                “I can smell the fresh air already!”  Said Lance with a deep breath and a smile.

                Relic turned to the blonde soldier, “Why don’t you go on ahead and make certain the coast is clear?  We’ll help the ladies get up the stairs.”  Cyrrik nodded, anxious to not only get out of the crypt but also to get some much needed medical help for the wounds he suffered when the zombies had tried to eat him!  Turning, he headed for the stairs and Relic turned to the three women.  “I’ll take Blaze,” he said to Krystel, “why don’t you and Lance help Talia?”  Without waiting for a response he bent and hefted the unconscious elf into his arms, turning then toward the staircase that led out.  He was already half way across the room when Lance and Krys had managed to hoist Talia to her feet, her arms across each of their shoulders for support.  They moved much slower with her hindering them as they made their way toward the stairs.  By the time they were at the top there was no sign of Cyrrik or Relic, evidently they had moved on outside without waiting for them.

                “We should close that before we leave.”  Lance commented, nodding toward the sarcophagus of Aribeth Case.  “It’s unseemly to leave her open to the elements like that.”

                Talia nodded, “You’re right of course.”  She glanced to her other side, where her sister was looking at the coffin with an odd expression, one that Talia thought she understood.  “You should put the sword back too.”

                Krystel glanced sharply at Talia, her hand reflexively coming to rest on the sword hilt where it hung from her hip.  She shook her head. “I think she’d want me to use it.”

                Talia knew her sister was wrong about that.  “She was interred with that blade because she didn’t want it used by anyone else. It’s cursed Krys… its bad news… leave it here… please?”

                Krystels’ hand tightened around the hilt of Nightmare and she looked for a moment like she was going to draw it forth.  Talia was aware of Lance watching the exchange curiously, but she had eyes only for her sister.  After a moment, Krystel shook her head.  “I… I can’t.  We might need it, it’s a powerful weapon!”  Talia sighed, understanding that whatever hold Nightmare had maintained over Aribeth Case it now had its hooks in her sister as well.  “I’ll put it back with her when we don’t need it anymore!”

                Talia shook her head.  “When will that be Krys?  Once the current trouble is over you’ll find another excuse to need to keep it.  It’s just a sword… you already had a good blade, remember?  Gar made them for all of us.”

                Krystel shook her head and looked angry now.  “It’s not the same as Nightmare.  It doesn’t feel as well balanced or powerful.”

                Talia would have argued more, but a sudden pain shot through her leg and made her wince.  She took a moment to fight through the pain, then she turned and nodded at Lance.  He left her side, leaving Krystel to support her weight for a moment, and took the time to wrestle the lid of the stone coffin back over its inhabitant.  When that was done he came back to her side and the three of them started for the door.

                They moved out into the cool night air, and despite the sun being down it was still brighter out here than it had been in the tomb.  They paused just outside the door to let their vision adjust and as it did a group of men standing in a half circle, blocking the path away from the tomb came into view.  Talia and Krystel recognized them by their armor as Sentinels, and Cyrrik was standing near the one that had the highest rank insignia on his shoulder, reading a letter.  Relic and Tanya were on the ground, from the looks of things the templar had been ambushed and dropped the Monster Slayer as he fell.  Neither of them were moving, but both seemed to be breathing.

                “What is the meaning of this?”  Krystel demanded as the group of eight Sentinels leveled spear points at them.  The trio froze, not daring to move in the light of such a threat.

                No one answered until Cyrrik appeared to have finished reading the letter, then he glanced up and met the eye of the officer in charge of the Sentinel patrol.  He nodded, then turned to Krystel, Talia and Lance.  “In the name of Count Huntyr Shroude you are under arrest, relinquish your weapons and come along quietly.”

                Krystel, who in addition to being a knight happened to be a university trained lawyer that had successfully defended dozens of cases here on Algeron, frowned and regarded the soldier coldly.  “What charge could you possibly have to level against us that will stick in court?”

                It was the officer standing to Cyrrik’s side that answered.  Krystel didn’t recognize him, but that wasn’t unusual.  It was a big city and he might have been new.  “You’re being charged with treason against the crown.”       

                “Treason!?”  Talia growled, trying to move toward the soldier in spite of her wounded leg but being held back by her sister and the demon hunter.

                “That’s a hefty charge.”  Krystel told him, her voice still professionally cool.  “What are we supposed to have done?”

                Now Cyrrik answered, his voice steady and calm.  “Apparently while we were underground battling undead, Huntyr orchestrated a daring and successful rescue of Countess Shroude.”

                “What?”  Lance and Talia said together.  Krystel was silent, listening with a frown on her beautiful face.

                The other officer picked it up again.  “Mistress Ishara was killed in the rescue attempt, but the Countess was rescued and when her captors were questioned they said they had been hired by the Moonstone family.”

                “That’s absurd!”  Talia cried, but Krystel squeezed her arm gently, quieting her.  The knight was beginning to see what was happening here.

                “We all know that the man who took the Countess and her sister hostage fled the island.  They’re not here anymore, so how could he have rescued them?”  Krystel asked analytically.

                The officer shrugged.  “A smoke screen to hide the real intent.  We suspect this was an attempt by your family to overtake the throne and rulership of the city.”

                “I’ve never heard anything so preposterous!”  Talia spat, her fair skin flushing pink as her anger rose up within her.  “We’ve always been the closest of friends to the Shroudes!”

                That wasn’t strictly true, Krystel reflected.  Huntyr Shroude had never been friendly with the sisters, though he had tried on countless occasions.  She suspected he had been successful with Sasha, but really, that wasn’t much of a claim to fame, her gypsy sister had been with most… if not all… of the handsome and eligible bachelors in the city.  “It’s not for us to decide whether you’re guilty or innocent ladies, that falls to the Count.”

                “Why are you calling him that?  If the Countess is back, then he no longer rules.”  Talia growled.

                The officer smirked at her in a superior fashion, “She was so moved by his actions on her behalf that she has agreed to become his wife… they will be married within the next couple of days.  We call him Count since it is only a matter of hours till the title is true, and we may as well get used to it.”

                Now Krystel definitely knew that something was amiss, for there was no way on Kyzanthia that Penelope Shroude would ever have married her step-son.  She didn’t exactly despise him, but she didn’t trust him either.  And there was another person she knew of that could be impersonating the countess, and if that were the case then it would make sense for them to want certain people out of the way.  She turned and pressed her lips to Talia’s ear, whispering, “We’re outnumbered, you’re injured and they’ve stacked the deck against us.  Surrender… we might find a way out of this later.”

                Talia turned an incredulous expression on her older sister.  “You can’t seriously be considering letting them arrest us!?”

                Krystel shrugged, nodding toward the fallen templar and warrior mage, then indicating the rangers own wounded leg.  “I don’t see that we have a lot of options sis.”  She turned to the officers then and asked, “If we surrender, what’s to become of us?”

                Cyrrik, who was still playing catch up on this whole scenario, looked to his junior officer.  “You’re to be taken before the Count and Countess for sentencing.”

                The Moonstone sisters exchanged glances, then Talia sighed and tossed her sword onto the ground.  Krystel followed suit and nodded to Lance, who did the same with his spear, looking none too happy about it.  “You’ve got us.”  Krystel told them morosely.

                “Shackle them, search them, then we go to the palace.”  The officer said, smiling victoriously.

                He watched from the shadowy entrance of the tomb, crouched down and eyes narrowed, listening to every word.  So, they had replaced the Countess with a double… likely her twin sister… and were planning on keeping control of the throne by naming the Moonstone sisters and their allies as enemies of the state.  Reaper shook his head, it was actually pretty clever, especially since most people in the world didn’t even know that Countess Shroude had a twin, much less that she would stand in for her from time to time.  Reaper knew of course, but he made it his business to know other peoples secrets.  He watched as three of the Sentinels came forward and searched the trio standing just a few feet in front of him.  He saw sisters get groped and fondled a lot in the process and he felt his anger rise slightly, causing him to reach into his cloak for one of the many throwing blades he kept concealed there.  He stopped himself though, shaking his head slightly.  That would help no one, especially not the sisters.  He was good, but he knew his limitations and eight armed and armored Sentinels were definitely well outside his limitations at the moment.  No, he corrected himself mildly, nine Sentinels, for Cyrrik had gone turn cloak as soon as he emerged, it seemed.

                ‘I wonder what’s in that letter he read?’ the master assassin wondered to himself.  He also wondered if he might possibly get hold of it.  Certainly not here, while Cyrrik was in the open and surrounded by his soldiers.  But he felt certain that some of the answers he needed right now were on that piece of parchment. 

                He watched, forcing himself to do nothing, as the Sentinels clapped irons on the women and the demon hunter, then lashed Blaze and Relic to the backs of horses like sacks of potatoes, and headed out of the cemetery.  They didn’t even bother to close Sir Donovan’s tomb, which had been open since the sisters had come to visit… what had that been?  Three days ago now?  He had been watching that touching scene from the roof of another crypt a hundred yards away.  He didn’t really know why he spied on them, for some reason the Moonstone family had come to mean a lot to him. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that Donovan Moonstone had accepted him… made him one of his Dragons… all be it unofficially.  Or perhaps it was that the Moonstones were a family worth caring about, every one of them always fighting the good fight and never giving up.  He laughed to himself softly, confident that the Sentinels and their prisoners were now too far away to hear him.  Maybe it was just that the Moonstone sisters were among the most beautiful women on the planet!  Between them and that elf they ran around with, not to mention Blaze, they had the monopoly on beauty for this part of the world.  Whatever it was, Reaper knew that he would help them, because he had been doing so for years, largely without them even knowing about it.  He knew that Ariana for certain wouldn’t accept his help if she knew how often he had given it.  Never mind that her father had trusted him, well, somewhat anyway.  She could never bring herself to trust the assassin… besides, she had her own rogue on the team now.  Young Shadow Walker, the master assassin thought, smiling slightly at thought of the young thief.  Reaper had his suspicions about who Shadow Walker was, and if he was correct than sticking around Peacehope all these years was the right decision after all.  But he could deal with that revelation later… right now he had to find a way to help Krystel and Talia… as well as Blaze and the others in the bargain he supposed.  Perhaps it would be prudent to go to Aribeth and Sasha, they weren’t yet as experienced as the other sisters, especially Aribeth, but they might be of help, and they were certainly in danger if Shroude and Wodan hadn’t already gotten to them.  He nodded to himself, yes, Aribeth and Sasha were the right decision, they could help each other help their sisters.

                Leaving the cemetery, he headed east across the sleeping city, knowing that one of the Moonstone girls at least would be awake.  Likely Huntyr and Demona knew that as well, so she was likely to be their first target now that they had made their intentions known.  Reaper took to the rooftops, staying out of sight as much as possible as he dashed through the night, leaping cat like from roof to roof.  He was little more than a shadow as he moved through the night, his cloak billowing about him but still managing to blend to the surrounding darkness.  He was a block away from his destination when he saw them.  A patrol of Sentinels, no doubt sent to arrest her in much the same way her sisters had been.  He scowled in the night, for they stood in a loose cluster in a narrow alley, no doubt going over their plan.  He lowered himself to his stomach right at the edge of the overhanging eave above them and listened, the guardsmen oblivious to his presence.

                “There are eight of us, so we shouldn’t meet with much resistance.  By all accounts she’s no fighter, not like her sisters.  You three,” he indicated the three men nearest to him, “will come in the front with me.  You four,” he indicated the remainder of the patrol, “will stake out the back in case she tries to run.  The place is big, but we’re going in during her performance, so she shouldn’t be able to hide from us.  Everyone ready?”  There was a chorus of “Aye’s” all around the group and then they fell in behind the leader as he turned and headed down the street.

                Reaper let them get a little ways ahead of him, then he stood up on the eave and gazed down the street, past the eight man patrol.  There, at the end of the street, its windows lit brightly with flickering candle light and the strains of music audible even at this distance, was the Gypsy Fortune.  A tavern, inn, gaming hall and, though only a select clientele knew of this aspect, a brothel.  It was owned and operated by Sasha Moonstone, though while ensconced within those walls she was known by her professional name, Kizmet, which she had adopted when she first set out to be a professional dancer.  She had done rather well for herself, and with the money she had made while dancing and the small fortune left to her following her fathers death, she had bought the place and started fixing it up.  Reaper stayed there quite often, though never in his assassins garb, always he went in as Shane Ebonblade, the famous artist whose identity he had shared for several decades now.  Shane was his alter ego, the man he became when he wanted Reaper to subside for a while.  He wondered if it weren’t prudent to bring Shane into the picture now, he would certainly be able to move more freely among the streets and people.  But no… this situation demanded the skills of an assassin, not those of an artist.

                By now they were a block ahead of him and the assassin felt safe in moving.  Once again sprinting across rooftops he easily caught up to and then outdistanced the patrol, after all they weren’t running.  From the roof of the building next door to the Gypsy Fortune he lowered himself into the alley that ran between them and then slipped out to the street, being sure to stay concealed by shadows.  The patrol was only a couple of hundred feet away at this point and he stayed where he was, perfectly still, watching as the four their leader had directed to the rear of the place broke off and made for the very alley he had come from.  The other four entered the establishment through the front door.  As the door opened to admit them, Reaper could almost feel the music and celebration from within wash over him.  When the door swung shut again, it was muted, though still easily audible.  Shifting along the front of the building, Reaper moved to one of the many windows that lined its street face and, careful to stay to one side so that he wasn’t silhouetted against the night, he peered in.

                The four soldiers had spread out across the room so that they wouldn’t be clustered together.  One, the leader, had stayed by the front door while another had moved up to position himself by the stage.  A third was near the swinging door that led to the kitchen and the fourth had stationed himself by the stairs that led up to the gaming rooms and then the bedrooms above that.  They all stood, stiff as boards, their muscled arms folded across their chainmail clad chests, staring at the stage.  They weren’t alone in that, everyone in the room was staring at the stage, every man at least, and the only women in the place were servers.  On that stage was their hostess, Kizmet, owner of the Gypsy Fortune and object of just about every dream all the men in the tavern were currently having.  She was, as she did every night, dancing.  Reaper had to hand it to her, the woman could move, and not for the first time he wondered if she moved that good in bed.  He had to fight back a laugh, wondering what old Donovan Moonstone would have thought about him entertaining such thoughts about his daughters.  Not that it mattered, Donovan had been dead a long time and Reaper was still very much alive and very much a man.  He had always known, had he truly wished to sample her wares, he could easily have wooed her in his guise as Shane Ebonblade, but thus far he had only flirted harmlessly with the sexy gypsy.

                He watched, along with everyone else, as she pranced around on the stage, clad in one of her trademark skimpy gypsy dancer outfits.  This one consisted of a filmy green top that was daringly low cut as well as riding high, coming to just below her rib cage.  Her lean belly was bare and the skirt she wore, which looked like a bunch of silk scarves all tied to a string of pearls, rode low on her shapely hips.  She had sandals on, the straps of those wrapping around her calves and rising almost to her knees.  On her wrists sparkled a number of shiny bracelets while a lot of necklaces adorned her neck, including the Moonstone Medallion that she and her sister had all retrieved from the door of their fathers tomb.  He saw something sparkling on her brow as well and realized she wore another string of gems about her head, what looked to be a sapphire dangling down her forehead.  Her long black hair seemed to swirl as much as her skirts did as she spun and capered about, shapely legs flashing every time she kicked.  As he watched, Reaper saw her dark brown eyes dart to all four of the soldiers and though she likely didn’t know why, he could see that she knew they were there for her.  Undeterred, she continued to dance, her hips seeming to move of their own volition as she stepped forward and then leapt from the stage, landing lithely atop a nearby table.  The men seated at that table smiled and leaned back in their chairs, filling their eyes with the statuesque gypsies curves as she continued to undulate before them.  She had locked eyes with the patrol leader Reaper saw and was slowly working her way toward him, stepping from tabletop to tabletop, pausing at each one to give the men seated there a personal show.  When she was close to the soldier, she paused a good while longer than she had on the other tables and looked down at the man who was seated on the chair between her and the guard. 

                She smiled down at him, still dancing and said, too softly to be overheard though Reaper read her lips, “If you’ll give up that chair I’ll personally pay your tab for the night at the bar.”  His eyes widened slightly but he grinned, leaping up from the chair and making a bee line for the bar to add some more alcohol to the tab he no longer had to pay.  Sasha stepped down, planting one foot on the seat of the chair and the other on the top of its straight back, then rode it down as the chair tilted backward.  She smoothly stepped to the floor and moved toward the guard, who Reaper now noticed was a lieutenant.  She danced up to him and then around, trailing her fingers across his broad chest and shoulders as she went.  The lieutenant turned only his head as he watched her, trying to maintain his stern glower, though Reaper could see the strain that having the scantily clad beauty so near to him was causing his professional manner.  “Did I forget to pay my protection to Major Falcone this month?” she asked lightly into his ear as she pressed against him from behind, squirming and rubbing against him.  He swallowed and, apparently not trusting himself just then to talk, only shook his head.  Reaper couldn’t blame him, he wasn’t certain if he would have been able to talk clearly in those circumstances.  “Then what are you and your boys doing here Lieutenant Danvers?”  Reaper blinked, slightly taken aback that she knew him.  It occurred to him then that the officer must have been a client of hers, perhaps to the gaming tables.  He knew that she didn’t let any of the Sentinels touch her girls, he didn’t think any of them even knew she ran a brothel out of the top floor.  As a rule, no one trusted the Sentinels of Peacehope, but especially not the Moonstone sisters.

                After a moment Danvers was able to speak.  “We were sent to bring you to the palace.”

                Sasha, still swaying to the rhythm of the music her live band was playing for her across the room, danced back around in front of the strapping guard and raised her delicate eyebrows.  “A command performance?”  His eyes narrowed and she nodded, smiling shrewdly.  “Ah… a captive one then.”  She spun away a few steps, then turned and danced back toward him, reaching out and caressing his face she said, “Let me finish my number first?  After all, if it may be my last, I want it to be memorable!”

                “Make it quick lady, and don’t try anything, we’ve got all the exits covered.”  Danvers told her.

                Reaper was no fool, he knew the only reason the officer was letting her continue was because he wanted to see her dance as much as any other guy in the room.  But Danvers was a fool if he truly thought she didn’t have another way out!  Reaper tore his gaze from the shapely gypsy and flicked his eyes toward the curtain that ran along the back of the stage.  It was positioned so that it looked like it ran the length of the wall, but Reaper could see from outside that the wall the curtain ran along was too thick, meaning there was likely a passageway inside.  Sasha was making her way toward the stage, ostensibly to finish her number, but Reaper suddenly knew what she was going to do.  ‘Clever girl.’ He thought to himself with a smile, sticking around just long enough to see the perplexed expression that he was sure Danvers would be wearing in a minute.

                Sasha had reached the stage and rather than climbing onto it, she seemed to slither onto it on her belly, then she rolled over, her long legs kicking up and spreading out as she rolled, then she curled into a ball and when she straightened she was again standing upright.  She turned to face the crowded tavern and started to move backward, hips swaying and arms waving in an oddly hypnotic pattern.  She was smiling at Danvers Reaper realized and glancing at the officer he saw that the mans eyes had narrowed slightly in suspicion.  ‘Maybe he’s not as stupid as he looks.’  Reaper thought, glancing back toward the gypsy.  ‘But he’s far too slow to stop her now!’  The guard had started toward the stage, sensing that something wasn’t right but Sasha had reached the curtain now.  Extending an arm behind her she pulled it aside, revealing nothing but a bare wall behind her and she spun into it, leaving only a bare, shapely leg curled around the edge of the curtain for a moment, and then it, like her, was gone.  Danvers leapt onto the stage as the men seated at the tables erupted in applause and stalked across it to the curtain.  He whipped it aside and glared at the bare wall… there was no sign of Sasha anywhere.  He reached out and ran his hand over the wall for a moment, then punched it hard and shook his fist as though it had hurt.  Turning, he waved to his men and motioned for them to split up and start searching the huge building for her.

                Reaper was laughing as he turned away from the window, the sound of the applause still reverberating through the building, the men who had been watching not realizing her disappearance hadn’t been part of the show… not really.  He slipped back into the alley and started toward the back of the building, fairly certain she would eventually try to slip out that way and knowing that there were four guards there waiting for her.  He got to the edge of the building and sidled up to the corner, then glanced around it, his cloak keeping him swathed in shadows.  The four guards were there, three of them standing with their spears pointed at the back door of the Gypsy Fortune while the fourth stood a couple of paces behind them to do the talking should the lady show her pretty face.  Turning away from the corner Reaper glanced around, saw a stack of empty crates against the far wall of the alley and quickly scrambled to the top of it without making a sound.  Turning, he launched himself across the narrow alley and caught the ledge of the roof of the Gypsy Fortune, quickly pulling himself up.  As he straightened, he heard voices from the back alley and thought for a moment that he had been too slow, that she had appeared and been caught.  But as he approached the rear of the building he recognized the voice of Danvers.  Apparently he had come to tell his men that she had given them the slip inside, and so they were to be extra alert.  As Danvers disappeared back inside Reaper stepped up to the edge of the roof, some three stories above them and looked down.  He shook his head, from that height even he would break something if he dropped down. But there was a small roof over the back door, no doubt to shelter the cook from rain storms when he came back here to smoke on breaks.  The shadow cast by the overhanging roof made the darkness above the back door seem particularly thick.  Reaper smiled, pulling his cloak around himself and calling upon the magic that he had had it imbued with years before.  The shadows around him seemed to swallow the assassin up and he disappeared, a moment later being disgorged by the shadow atop the back doors overhang.

                As the assassin appeared above them, one of the guards, slightly more alert than his friends, glanced up and his eyes widened to see the most wanted assassin in the world standing there smiling at them.  “…the Hell!”  He shouted, starting to raise his spear.  His friends, hearing his retort, started to look up as well but Reaper wasn’t there anymore, he had allowed himself to fall forward, flipping and twisting in the air so that he came down with his softly booted feet planted squarely on the guards spear.  The point was forced into the dirt ground and the shaft split as Reapers weight came to rest on it.  The guard who had spotted him staggered, dropping the spear on reflex and reaching for his sword.  No sooner had his weight settled on the ground than Reaper had drawn a pair of throwing blades from within his cloak.  The other two spear wielders hadn’t caught up with his movement yet and were still turning toward him as his arms shot out straight to either side, his hands releasing the long, thin blades that sunk into each mans throat.  They fell back, gagging on their own blood and clawing at the blades protruding from their necks.

                “Damn!” said the one who’d been standing behind the three and Reaper bent forward slightly, driving his foot back into the stomach of that guard.  With a grunt he staggered back, slamming into the wall but the guard who’d had his spear shattered had succeeded by now in drawing his sword and came forward in a rush, stabbing at Reaper.  The assassin spun away, making his cloak billow up as a distraction and there was a flash of silver, then the tip of Reaper’s katana protruded from the front of the guards throat with a spray of scarlet.  As he fell forward the master assassin turned toward the fourth guard, who was still struggling to rise after having been kicked in the stomach.  He lifted his head, his eyes wide with terror to realize he was alone in the alley with this most deadly of rogues.  He turned and started to run deeper into the alley but Reaper smiled and shook his head slightly.

                “You can’t run from death!”  he called after the man, his voice carrying in spite of its light rasp, the tone of the assassins voice sending a chill of trepidation through the guard.  He glanced over his shoulder, saw that Reaper didn’t seem to be giving chase and thought perhaps he had a chance.  Reaper’s left hand, opposite his katana, shot out from his cloak and a long nylon rope shot forth, an oblong weight at its end.  His aim was perfect, the oblong length of metal slipping between the fleeing mans ankles.  Reaper gave a slight jerk on the rope and there was an accompanying click as a pair of grapples shot out from either side of the oblong piece of metal.  They hooked on the front of the fleeing soldiers ankles and Reaper hauled back, pulling his feet out from under him.  The man went down in a heap, crashing into a barrel that was half full of rain water, the barrel cracking and a stream of water shooting out to pelt him over the head.  The guard stirred feebly, barely conscious but fear was driving him to move, to escape to try and run!  Reaper moved toward him slowly, stepping around the bodies of his comrades, his soft leather boots making nary a sound.  “Death always finds you.”  Rasped the assassin, dropping something small and rectangular on the ground next to the guards face.  He turned his head slightly to look at it and when he realized it was a death card from a tarot deck he started to cry in earnest.  There wasn’t a city guard in Kyzanthia that didn’t recognize the calling card of Reaper.  The assassin raised his katana, blade pointed down and dropped to one knee, using the momentum of his drop to drive his razor sharp blade through the mans sternum from behind, then twisting the blade to shred as many internal organs as he could.  As he was pulling the sword free he heard the door of the Gypsy Fortune open and he turned to see Sasha, now wrapped in a shawl, step out and gasp, her eyes widening at sight of the carnage behind her business.  Her eyes traveled right then left down the alley and she saw him at last, wiping his blade clean on the cape of the last guard to die.

                Her brows shot up and he thought it was to her credit that he saw no fear in her eyes.  Though he had met her many times before as Shane Ebonblade, this was the first time the gypsy Moonstone had met the master assassin.  “Reaper?”

                He gave a deep bow, pulling his shadow cloak around him as he did so in courtly fashion.  “At your service milady.”

                “Did you do this?”  she asked, gesturing at the death, then she shook her head and sighed, “Of course you did it!  But why?”

                He shrugged.  “They had been stationed here to hinder your escape, it seemed prudent to remove them.”

                “You want to help me escape?  Why?”  She asked, as suspicious of his motives as her older sister always was.

                He sighed, “Let’s just say I’d like to have a favor owed me by a Moonstone.”  He moved quickly toward her down the alley.  “Now listen carefully, we’ve only moments before Danvers comes looking for you back here and finds all this.”  He paused a moment to be certain he had her attention, then he went on.  “A pretender has taken the place of Countess Shroude on the throne and she had joined forces with Huntyr Shroude to hold onto their newfound power.  The people in this town that would be able to cause them trouble now have targets on their backs, do you understand?”

                “That would be me and my sisters.”  Sasha said softly with a nod.

                “Among a very few others, yes.  Though those others are currently out of town with the Dragons on various missions.”  Again Sasha nodded her understanding.  “However, your sisters Krystel and Talia, along with Blaze and her companions were taken by Shroude’s men as they exited the tomb of your father earlier this evening.”  Sasha’s eyes narrowed slightly but she said nothing, waiting for him to continue.  “I knew that they’d come after you and your sister Aribeth next.  Obviously I knew where to find you, but I have no idea where in the city your younger sister is, do you?”

                “You’re going to help me get her to safety as well?”  Sasha asked, still sounding dubious of his help.

                “That’s the general idea, yes.”  He said, his voice that icy rasp that he had mastered so well over the years.  It was like second nature now, whenever he wore the cloak and garb of Reaper to speak in that voice.  It was very different from the light, cultured notes of Shane Ebonblade’s voice.  “After that, we’ll see if we can help the others, but for now Aribeth has to be our priority, agreed?”

                Sasha regarded him for a moment, trying to read his expression from just the lower half of his face, which was all that was visible outside the shadow of his cloaks deep hood.  Realizing she had little choice but to trust him, she nodded.  “I know where she is, come on.”  She turned and darted down the alley and the assassin turned to follow.

                It wasn’t ten seconds later that Danvers stepped out on the back stoop to check with his men and his eyes widened to see them all lying dead in the alley.  A brief search turned up the death card and he felt a shiver run down his spine as he recognized it.  Standing, he glanced fearfully around then scampered back inside the building, slamming the door closed behind him.

                Aribeth Bethany Moonstone leaned back on her chair, placing her palms against the small of her back and stretched.  She felt several pops down the length of her spine and felt the tightness of the material stretching across her thrusting breasts.  Her long silver hair was caught up in a ponytail that came off the top of her head and would have trailed to the middle of her back if she hadn’t draped it over her shoulder instead.  Slumping slightly after she had finished stretching she reached up and rubbed her tired eyes, wondering idly what time it was.  Lowering her hands, she stared balefully at the large leather bound book lying open on the tabletop in front of her. 

                “For some reason I just can’t seem to wrap my head around this whole concept!” she said, trying desperately not to sound like she was whining.             

                “The concept of the Glass House spell is not so difficult to grasp Beth.”  Said her former master, Gideon Tyrell.  He was the head of the Peacehope University of Mystical Studies and a high ranking member of the mages guild.  It had been he who chose Aribeth as his apprentice when she had finished training as an initiate some years before.  He had been convinced then, and remained so now, that she had the makings of one of the most powerful mages he had ever encountered.  “We must simply find a way to work you around this mental block you seem to have developed!” 

                Gideon was a tall, spare human in his late seventies, though he moved with the spryness of a man half his age.  His voice was a pleasant, even tone, not deep but nor was it high pitched.  There wasn’t the slightest nasal quality to it, but it did have a hard to place accent.  He had a good teachers voice she had always thought, and he was the stereotypical idea of the powerful old mage.  He had a full head of hair still, in spite of his age and a long, bull beard that hung practically to his knees.  He always wore mages robes of either blue or white and he carried a staff that she had seen him channel some truly amazing magic through.  Another thing she liked about Gideon, though she would never say so to him, was that in spite of all his wisdom and power, he was still very much a man.  When she had started training with him she had been little more than a girl, but she had grown to a woman while under his tutelage and the difference had not escaped Gideons notice.  It had become more and more common, as the years went on, for her to catch the old man watching her avidly as she did things like stretch to reach a book off the top shelf or stretch after hours of study… as she had just done.  And yes, when she started to realize that he was male enough to notice, she had started having fun with it.  She knew she had nothing to fear from Gideon… therefore it was fun to torment him.

                “I’m beginning to think I’ll not make any further progress on this tonight though master.”  She lamented.  He winced slightly, for he hated her to call him master… which was part of the reason she did it.

                He paused for a moment, turning his ancient head to glance out the window and seeing that the night sky was full of brilliant stars.  “Perhaps you’re right.  It is late… I hadn’t realized so much time had passed!”  He turned back to her with a kindly smile under his beard.  “Why don’t you go get some rest… and take that infernal book with you.  I’ll be away for a few days on school business so you may as well study it on your own time.”

                Her eyes widened slightly at this generous offer.  The book in question had a great deal more to offer her than just the Glass House spell, and Gideon knew that as well as she.  She could imagine the look on Magnus Jorvel’s face if he learned she had it.  She had to fight not to giggle at that. If Gideon was fun to flirt with… Magnus was a bona fide crush.  But she didn’t know if he even knew she existed as yet.  He was a bit older than her, true, and he always had his face buried in a book, but she held out hope that she might turn his head one day.  “Thank you very much master!” She said, suppressing her smile when he winced again.  He had long ago stopped telling her not to call him that, having seen that it did no good.  “I’ll return it when you get back from wherever your going then, shall I?”

                “That will be fine, yes.”  He walked with her across the small room, which was located near the top of his personal tower, which was in turn located on the grounds of the university he ran.  “Now be safe walking home milady.  It’s a strange time in Peacehope of late… the winds of change seem to be blowing harder than ever.”

                “Not to worry!” She said lightly, standing up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek before skipping out the door.  “I’m a Moonstone remember?  We run this town!” Gideon had colored with pleasure at her kiss, but as he closed the door behind her, hearing her descending toward the ground floor of his tower beyond it, he couldn’t help hoping that her words weren’t just the over confidence of youth talking.

                Aribeth had been inside Gideon’s tower countless times over the years, had even cleaned it from top to bottom on several occasions in those first days of her apprenticeship, so she knew the way out by heart.  She also knew by heart all of his fascinating magical trinkets and other items, so she paid them no mind as she raced down the stairs two and three at a time, anxious to get to her Apartment on the other side of the city and spend a few more hours studying the book.  Perhaps she could pick up something other than glass house, since it was true she seemed to have developed a block against that one!  She had nothing scheduled for the next day and so could sleep it away if she chose, therefore she could study this book as long as she liked.

                She let herself out of her former masters tower and started off across the University grounds, her sandaled feet traveling the familiar gravel path toward the gate without her having to direct them.  She became aware of movement off to her right and glanced that way, then laughed as the man she saw working at the base of the Psychic Department building let out a low, appreciative whistle.  It was Ryman Lag, who had long been the maintenance man for the university.  It wasn’t unusual to see him working so late.  Often these were the only hours that were quiet enough for him to get anything done!

                “Ryman you old hound!  What would your wife think?”  she called to him.

                The caretaker, a human in his fifties, tall and spindly with stringy gray hair and wickedly hooked nose clad in tattered and filthy rags leaned on the shovel he had been working in the garden with and boldly watched her walk by, his eyes playing along the smooth line of her legs as they slipped from her skirt with every step.  “She’d probably be happy she could finally get rid of me!”  He called back and cackled at his own joke. 

                Beth shook her head, still smiling and still feeling his eyes on her until she had achieved the gate.  She wasn’t too concerned, she knew she was attractive and that men wanted her, but she also knew that Ryman was devoted to his wife and in truth only kept an eye on her to make sure she got out of the university safely.  He just liked to mask his concern in a façade of “horny old man” syndrome.  Once outside the schools gate she paused on the side of the street and then glanced left and right to ensure the way was clear.  When she was assured it was she crossed the street and stepped up onto the raised walkway that ran the length of the road, allowing easy access to shop windows and doors.  Turning left, she headed East across the city toward the Arena District, where she kept an apartment.

                In order to reach the Arena District Aribeth had to travel through the merchant district, where most of the shopkeepers of the city plied their wares.  Because it was so late all the business’s were closed down for the night, but faintly Beth could hear the sounds of music and raucous laughter from off to her right where she knew the Moonlight District was located.  It was there that her sister Sasha had her place the Gypsy Fortune, which competed with all the other taverns, dance halls and gaming parlors in the city.  The biggest competition for Sasha though was a place called the Pleasure Palace, run by a grotesque and obese half ogre who went by the name Tunn.  Thankfully, the young mage had never had cause to run afoul of him, but a couple of her sisters had done so.  It was from them that she had heard the rumor that Tunn was something of a kingpin of crime in Peacehope.  Ariana had told her that there was nothing illicit happening in the city that Tunn didn’t know about or have his hand in.  She said that the guild masters for the thieves and assassin’s guilds even answered to him, though of course she could prove none of it.  If she could, she would certainly have dealt with him by now, but he was far too careful to ever let obvious evidence come to light.

                She turned her attention from the temptations of the Moonlight district and kept going toward her apartment.  As she rounded a corner near the edge of the Arena district she paused, seeing movement on the street ahead of her.  After a moment she breathed a sigh of relief, it was just a trio of guards on patrol.  Squaring her shoulders she continued forward, her pace and stature reminding everyone in view that she was a Moonstone.  She saw the three guards notice her, caught the interest that lit up their faces and knew they had recognized her.  She kept walking, feeling her heartbeat quicken slightly as the three men paused and put their heads together for a moment.  She saw them talk amongst themselves, one of them nodded toward her and the others glanced in her direction.  Beth was parallel to them now, though she kept her gaze straight ahead of her she watched them in her peripheral vision.  From across the street she was close enough to hear the apparent leader say, “Yeah, that’s her.”

                Beth kept walking, no longer able to see them as she moved past them on the street.  “Lady Moonstone!”  One of the men called, it sounded like the same voice as the one who had talked a moment before.  “We need a word milady!”

                Aribeth paused but didn’t turn to face them yet.  She could hear their boots crunching on the gravel that lay in a thin layer on the road beneath their feet.  She turned her head to the side, able again to see them from the corner of her eye.  “Can I help you gentlemen?”

                “Milady we are under orders to escort you and any of your sisters we might encounter to the palace for a meeting with the Count.”  Said the leader of the trio.

                “Count Shroude is dead, from what I remember he died several years ago.”  She informed them.   

                “There’s a new one… or there will be once he and the Countess get hitched up!”  said one of the guards with a chuckle.

                She did turn then, facing them with a frown.  “I heard the news that Huntyr had managed to rescue the Countess… but marry him?  I refuse to believe that!”

                “Don’t matter what you believe.”  Said one of the three men and Beth took note of the fact that the three of them were spreading out in front of her.  Her eyes flickered from one of them to the others and settled on the leader… she didn’t like the way he was looking at her.  “You’re going to see Mister Shroude, but they didn’t specify what shape you had to be in when you got there.”

                Though she was no adventurer and hadn’t seen as much battle as some of her sisters, Aribeth was still a Moonstone and she sensed danger… so she reacted.  The three men all seemed to move as one, reaching for the silver haired mage with eager looks on their faces.  Aribeth took one quick step backward and through out her right hand, barking a few choice words of power.  A bright flash lit the night and the guards stumbled blindly into each other.

                “Dammit she’s a mage!”  the lead guard shouted, as though reminding the others.  They had recognized her before accosting her, so obviously they had known already that she was a magic user.  “Don’t let her talk!”

                The guard on the right, blinking to clear his vision leapt at the silhouette that was Beth, his mail covered fingers digging into her arm.  She had been in the process of speaking another spell and when he grabbed her she winced but did not relent.  She had been intending on directing the spell toward the leader of the three but as the man grabbed her the mages attention shifted to him.  She finished speaking the incantation and felt the magical energy course through her, directed by her will toward the man who was hurting her.  A blast of wind appeared from out of nowhere, seeming to originate directly behind the mage, or perhaps from her.  It did nothing more than ruffle her silver tresses but it hit the guard with such force as to send him flying backward with a scream of fright, slamming him into a pillar that held up an overhanging roof nearby.  The guard on the left was on her then, grabbing her around the waist from behind, pinning one arm to her side while wrapping his other arm around her head, trying to cover her full lips with his hand.

                She turned her head away from him briefly and barked a single word, “Ishtak!”  In the ancient arcane language this meant “shock” and suddenly the fingers of her free hand crackled with electricity.  She raised it to the mans face and let loose the charge.  He screamed, releasing Aribeth and staggering backward, his hair standing on end and his flesh smoking as the electricity burned through him.  He raised his hands, clutching at his face and fell to the ground, writhing.  Finally she turned her attention to the third guard who had wisely fallen back from the magic user, waiting for his vision to clear before he moved in on her.  Beth regarded him through narrowed eyes, the blue orbs flicking over him quickly from head to toe, wondering how much experience he had with dealing with magic users.  It had been him, after all, who had warned the others not to let her talk.  “Flee now and you don’t have to share their fate!”

                He grinned at her boldly, his eyes sliding over her slender but shapely form.  “Oh, I think I like my chances all right!”  Her frown deepened as her mind raced through her repertoire of spells.  She didn’t know many that were offensive, most of her spells focused on mundane things like creating food or mending various materials.  She had never intended on being an adventurer, it had ever been her plan to turn her talents toward helping others with the every day problems life brought upon them.  A humanitarian mage if you will.  He started toward her and she instantly began muttering the incantation for the first spell that had come to mind.  Hoping to put him to sleep, the guard merely smiled as he came at her and the spell was released before he was within arms reach.  He seemed to slow for a moment, his eyelids fluttering, then his smile widened and he stepped closer.  Aribeth’s eyes widened and then suddenly she felt a wave of fatigue wash over her and those same eyes rolled up in her head as the sleep spell she had intended for the guard rebounded back at her.  She slumped toward the ground, but the guard caught her deftly and lowered her to the ground.  He grinned down at her, relishing the thought of the fun that awaited him before he turned her over to the soon to be Count Shroude.  Then he turned to his men with a scowl. 

                The one who had received an electrical charge to the face was unconscious now, having succumbed to his wounds but his pulse was strong and the guard, Lieutenant Rickard by name, felt he would live.  The other man was a different tale, for when her wind rush had slammed him into the support beam he had broken his neck… he was dead.  Rickard swore colorfully, shaking his head and glancing over at the slumped mage, vowing to make her pay for the mans death, they had been friends after all.  Rifling the dead guards pockets quickly he took the mans coin purse and added it to his own gear, then he took the manacles off his belt and moved over to where Aribeth lay on the ground.  She lay on her back, hips turned and knees bent, one arm draped across her midriff while the other lay at her side.  Her head was turned to one side, her full lips slightly parted.  She was one of the most desirable women he had ever seen, certainly one of the most beautiful in the city.  His eyes played over the mages robe she wore, blue to match her eyes with a silver trim that matched her hair.  It was belted closed at the waist and she had a few pouches and things hanging from it.  He noted a wand tucked into her belt and snickered at the sight of it.  She hadn’t even thought to draw the wand, which he knew would have decimated him and his men.  The robe sagged open above the belt, revealing her naval and broad expanse of alabaster skin, the inner swells of her firmly rounded but not overly large breasts plainly visible.  Dangling between them was her medallion, the one shaped like a crescent moon that marked her as a member of the noble family of her birth. 

                Rickard took the wand and tucked it into his belt at the small of his back, then he took each of the pouches from her belt and searched them.  One had some gold and he took this eagerly, for it was more than he saw in six months of pay.  The others held items that seemed to him mundane, but he was certain they held some meaning to the mage.  In one he found a bunch of wings that looked to have been pulled from a butterfly and several held different kinds of dust.  All of these he tucked into his largest pouch, where Sentinels always stored the suspicious items they took from people they arrested, the evidence bag it was called.  Having thoroughly searched her and removed anything he thought to be a threat he slowly rolled her onto her stomach and pulled her hands behind her back, crossing the wrists.  The lieutenant didn’t know how long the sleep spell that had been reflected back at her by his fathers ring would last, but he wanted to have her properly dealt with before she came to.  As he used the manacles from the dead guard on her slender wrists, he thought about that ring.  His father had been a guard in a large city in Errgaunt, he had served on a specialized team that dealt with the arrest of mages who were suspected of having broken the law.  Many of the men and women on that team had such trinkets, which were designed to help them against magic users.  His father had served with Major Falcone and come here to Peacehope with the officer, bringing his family with him.  When his father had died in the line of duty, Rickard had happily accepted the Major’s offer to take his place.  His father had taught him a few things about catching wizards and their ilk and with that knowledge, and his fathers ring, he had become Falcone’s top man when it came to dealing with magic users.  His knowledge of mages told him that this beauty would need to be silenced before she woke up, but that didn’t require much.  He simply ripped off a long strip of her robe and forced it between her lips and teeth, then tied it around the back of her head, effectively gagging her.  That done, he rolled her back onto her back, making her lie on her manacled hands and ran his eyes over her hungrily.  Reaching out, he ran his bare hand down the length of the flesh that appeared between the folds of her robe, enjoying the smoothness of her skin beneath his palm. 

                “You and I will get better acquainted shortly wench.”  He promised the still sleeping mage, then he turned and straightened, pulling from his belt a small round object which he raised to his lips.  A shrill whistle blasted through the night as he blew through it, summoning the nearest guards to his aid.

                Reaper and Sasha froze at the sound of the whistle blasting through the night, the assassin, who had been leading the gypsy through the back alleys of the city, threw out an arm to stop her.  She reached down and placed her hands lightly on his arm where it crossed in front of her stomach, both of their heads turning instinctively toward the sound of the whistle.  “That’s the call of a guard in distress.”  Reaper muttered, his eyes narrowing thoughtfully within the shadow of his cowl. 

                “Do you think it has anything to do with Aribeth… or maybe one of my other sisters?”  Sasha asked softly.

                Reaper shook his head, not in the negative, but to show that he really didn’t know.  “It would seem like the height of lunacy not to assume that it does have something to do with one of them.”

                “So… we should go and check it out?”  She hedged.  She would never admit it, but being in the presence of this highly dangerous man was a bit unnerving, and exciting!

                The assassin nodded and took her arm, leading her on through the alley they had paused in to where it opened onto the main street.  She halted there, crouched in the shadows and waited.  Sasha had opened her mouth to ask him what they were waiting for when the sound of booted feet on the run reached her ears.  A patrol of six guards raced by from the right to the left, heading in the direction of the whistle blast.  Reaper waited for them to pass, then crept out onto the sidewalk, motioning the gypsy to follow him.  Sasha fell in behind the assassin, trying her best to keep to the shadows but next to him she was a complete novice at this.  Fortunately, the guards had no indication that they were being followed and so they were able to follow them all the way to where the officer stood, looming over the still unconscious Aribeth.  As the scene unfolded before them Sasha let out a soft gasp and Reaper motioned her to silence, crouching into the shadows and watching as the six guards halted in front of the lieutenant.

                “Rickard.”  Sasha whispered and Reaper turned his head toward her, a questioning look on what she could see of his face.  “A low ranking officer with the Sentinels, but he’s something of a regular at the Gypsy Fortune, he’s a fan.”  Reaper nodded, turning his gaze back to what was transpiring on the street.

                “What happened here lieutenant?”  Asked one of the newly arrived guards, glancing around at the two fallen soldiers and the mage, bound and gagged at the lieutenant’s feet.

                “We were apprehending a Moonstone sister, as we were all ordered to do and she… resisted arrest.”  He motioned to his two fallen men.  “Zeke is dead and Caldwell is badly hurt.”

                “What do you need from us?”  Asked the man who appeared to be the spokesman for the newly arrived guards.                 

                “I need a couple of you to take Zeke to the undertakers, a couple to take Caldwell to the Healers Office back at headquarters and the last two can back me up taking the bitch to jail.”  Rickard leaned forward, meeting the eyes of the lead guard.  “Whoever stays with me needs to be not entirely… squeamish.  I don’t intend to take the woman directly to a cell, if you get my meaning.”

                The leader of the newcomers glanced from the lieutenant to the fallen mage and back again, then he smiled and nodded slowly.  “Could those volunteers expect to be similarly compensated?”

                “They could.  This bitch killed one of our own, she deserves everything we do to her and more!”  Rickard growled.

                The lead guard turned to address the other five men and Reaper noticed then that he was a sergeant.  “You and you,” he pointed at the two guards standing nearest to him, “take the body to the undertaker.  You two,” he indicated two others, “can take Caldwell there to the healers.”  He looked at the last man in the group, “Sanders, you’re with me.”  He turned back to Rickard then.  “Does that suffice lieutenant?”

                “What’s your name sergeant?”  The officer asked the other man.

                “Braxton sir.”  Said the sergeant.  He was a large, beefy man with heavy cheeks covered in stubble, a ruddy complexion and thinning black hair.  His arms swelled with muscle beneath the chainmail shirt he wore and he carried a battle axe instead of a sword, not common issue among the Sentinels.

                “Sergeant Braxton,”  Rickard intoned softly, his expression thoughtful, “I’ve heard of you.  Brought up for insubordination a few times weren’t you?”  The sergeant looked none too happy to be remembered thus, but he didn’t deny it.  Instead, he nodded slightly.  Rickard smiled and returned the nod, “You’ll do nicely sergeant.”  He looked at the other man Braxton had chosen to accompany them.  Around them the other four guards were going about following their orders, gathering up the fallen men and hauling them away.  “What’s your name soldier?”

                “Hicks sir.”  Said the final guard.  He was tall and thin with a rodent like face, pale skin and small, watery dark eyes.  His hair was a little long to be military standard, looking greasy and protruding from around his helm.  Rickard nodded, though if he had heard of Hicks he gave no indication.

                “You have any problem with my plans for the woman?”  Rickard asked Hicks.

                The man turned his head and spit a stream of tobacco stained saliva onto the ground next to him.  “Not so long as I get a turn with her.”

                Rickard nodded.  “All right then, you two get her up and bring her along with me.  We’re going to take her to my place, it’s more private than the barracks.”

                Braxton and Hicks moved forward to lift Aribeth off the ground, each of them grabbing one of her arms and hauling her somewhat upright between them.  She still sagged, her head lolling forward, her feet dragging beneath her.  “What did you hit her with to keep her out so long?”

                Rickard started to lead them away, laughing as he answered.  “I didn’t do anything, she did it herself.  Cast a sleep spell and it rebounded back on her.”  He laughed aloud, “Didn’t realize I had my fathers ring on me.  It reflects magic back on the caster, see?  She had used a blinding flash spell on us at first, and since it didn’t have any trouble working she naturally assumed her other spells would work too.  But the way this ring works, it only reflects back the magic cast specifically at me and the flash was used on all three of us.  Got a bit of a shock when she tried to put me out!”  The other two laughed, their expressions showing they were impressed with the lieutenant’s trinket.

                Reaper and Sasha were following along a ways behind them so as not to attract attention.  The assassin would have liked to be closer, but he couldn’t trust the gypsy not to tip off the guards to their presence, nor did he want to leave her alone while he went off on his own.  “How far is your place lieutenant?”  Hicks asked Rickard.

                “Not too far.”  The officer responded, “Just around the corner here in fact.”

                Sasha reached out suddenly and put a hand on Reapers arm, which caused him to look down at it with a frown.  She removed the hand hastily, but he turned to her, wondering why she had stopped him.  “I know where Rickard lives, which house is his.  What do you plan to do?”

                He shrugged.  “What I do best.  Kill them.”

                Rickard and his two recruited helpers approached the front door of his small house eagerly and the officer turned to Hicks.  “You keep watch on the door out here.”  He turned to Braxton.  “You’ll watch the door inside.  When I’m finished with her, you can have a turn and I’ll come out to relieve you Hicks, then you can go in and take a tumble with the bitch when Braxton is done.”  Hicks nodded and turned, leaning his back against the wall next to the door as Braxton and Rickard half dragged Aribeth through the door.  Hicks heard the door close next to him and the sound of the mens booted feet crossing the room beyond.  He grinned, high expectations of his time with the Moonstone wench already raising his spirits.  From a pouch on his belt he pulled forth a small package of papers and another, smaller pouch of tobacco.  With experienced fingers he quickly rolled a cigarette then tucked the makings back into his pouch before fishing out a match.  He was putting the cigarette to his lips when a woman’s voice spoke softly from the darkness.  If it had been a mans voice, his hand would have gone instantly to his sword, but the woman’s voice was soft and sultry and he raised his eyes, squinting into the darkness.

                “Feel like sharing that soldier?”  She stepped closer then, the darkness seeming to part around her and his eyes widened.  She wore a cloak with the hood pulled up to hide her face, but he could see locks of curly black hair protruding from it and the front hung open, revealing an incredible body, scantily clad in a dress that looked to be made of light silken material.  One long and shapely leg was thrust out to the side and his eyes followed the lines of that leg all the way to the ground and back up again slowly.  She let him look, saying nothing till his eyes again tried to pierce the veil of darkness within her hood. 

                In answer to her question he nodded and beckoned her forward, removing the cigarette from his mouth and extending it toward her, butt first.  She came forward enough to reach out and take the cigarette from his hand.  He saw the many bracelets dangling from her wrists and frowned slightly, thinking that she was vaguely familiar, though he wished he could see her face!  Raising the match, he scratched it to life with a thumbnail and as the flame flickered into being it cast her face in its orange light.  Sasha smiled seductively at him as she leaned forward and lit the cigarette, feeling the soldiers gaze on her face, knowing it was a matter of seconds before he placed her.  She had seen him often enough in the Gypsy Fortune.  She leaned back as the cigarette caught, puffing on it lightly and as the shadows of her hood once more hid her face Hicks’s eyes widened, recognition dawning.

                “Wait a minute!  You’re….”  He was reaching for his sword but never got the chance to even close his fingers around its hilt as an arm suddenly encircled his head from behind, bending him backward across a solidly muscled shoulder and another hand circled around from the other side, a daggers razor sharp blade biting into his throat, severing his carotid artery and spraying blood into the night.  Sasha danced aside with a grimace, watching the blood splash the ground where she had been standing, then she looked back toward where Reaper was still holding the now struggling soldier as he bled out, unable to do more than rasp in protest as his voice was lost in the gurgle of blood rising into his mouth.

                “I should think that by now you people would understand that the Moonstones have a guardian angel.”  Reaper whispered into his ear in that chilling, raspy voice of his.  “And it’s an angel of death!”  Hicks died quickly and Reaper lowered him to the ground, not wanting the sound of his body falling to alert the men inside, though he suspected at least one of them was far too distracted by this point to notice anything outside.  Reaper glanced at the gypsy and nodded, then motioned for her to get back.  Sasha receded into the darkness and would have disappeared all together if not for the lit end of the cigarette she was still smoking.  ‘I didn’t know she smoked.’  Reaper thought to himself idly as he turned and tested the door through which Braxton and Rickard had taken Aribeth.  He knew he had to move quickly or the young mage was sure to be in the process of being raped by the time he got to her.  Finding that the door had been left unlocked, he pushed it open and stepped through, casting about with his eyes and taking in the interior quickly.  It seemed to be a small enough place, a single large room with a wood stove and a bed, several cabinets.  Braxton was standing near the bed, watching as Rickard was slowly removing Beth’s clothing.  Reaper saw that the young mage was now awake, but they had secured her wrists to the headboard above her head with the same manacles they had used on her earlier.

                Both men glanced toward the door, at first unconcerned, thinking that Hicks had just grown impatient, but when they caught sight of the darkly clad assassin their eyes widened in mingled surprise and fear.  When Beth turned her head and saw him, her eyes widened as well, for though she had never actually met the assassin, all the sisters knew who he was.  “Take him!”  Rickard growled at Braxton and the larger soldier turned toward Reaper, pulling his battle axe free of its harness as he advanced on the rogue.  Reaper turned to meet the mans approach, but flicked his hand lightly so that a throwing blade dropped from a wrist mounted sheath into his hand.  Braxton was still several paces away when Reaper launched the dagger across the room, not at the large soldier but at Rickard.  The officer had been in the process of opening Beth’s robes when he came in and now he was trying to quickly undo her manacles, no doubt to pull her up and use as a shield against the assassin.  Reapers throwing blade caught the officer in the shoulder and he howled in pain as the impact knocked him to the side, off the mage, rolling him to the floor on the far side of the bed.

                Braxton was on him then, bellowing a challenge as he swung his axe in an overhead swing hoping to cleave the assassin in two from the head down.  Reaper, thinking it uncanny how slowly the man seemed to move, didn’t retreat as the soldier might have expected but instead moved toward the fighter, spinning and throwing his cloak up to distract the man.  His katana cleared the scabbard with a distinct ringing of metal, the blade flashing as Reaper spun beneath the descending axe.  Braxton staggered slightly, feeling a white hot pain against his ribs.  He stumbled into the wall next to the door and turned, reaching across his body to touch where he had been cut, his hand coming away red.  His eyes narrowed, wondering what sort of blade the assassin wielded that it could so easily slice through chainmail.  Reaper faced the man and raised his sword, showing the officer his own blood as it ran down the length of the blade, then he flicked it downward, shaking the blood onto the floor.  That simple little gesture enraged Braxton and he launched himself at Reaper again, this time swinging his axe in a wide arc from the left to the right.

                Reaper turned his body to the side and then leapt, his body parallel to the floor, twisting through the air over the top of the moving axe.  His feet touched the ground, light as a cat and his sword stabbed to the side, biting deep into Braxtons side and again he staggered, this time with a grunt.  He stumbled into a dresser, catching himself upon it to keep from falling.  He raised his arm and looked down at where the assassin had stabbed him.  Blood welled up so dark it was nearly black and he felt suddenly feint.  Reaper spoke, “Dark blood… means I got the kidney.  And that weakness your feeling?  That’s poison… my own special blend.  Having pierced an organ with a blade treated with my poison?”  The assassin shrugged slightly, “I’d say you have just long enough to send a final prayer to whatever god you worship.”  He heard movement behind him and knew that Rickard was picking himself back up off the ground, so he turned his back on Braxton, dismissing the soldier who was already slumping to the ground, his body giving out on him a little at a time.  Reaper was aware of Sasha standing in the doorway watching as he faced the officer, who had come around the bed and was glowering at him.  He had pulled Reapers blade from his shoulder, which was now bleeding freely, and tossed the small object aside as he drew forth his sword, grimacing at the pain the movement caused in that same shoulder.

                Rickard spared a glance for the woman in the door, noted that she wore a crescent moon medallion and recognized her by the brighter light within his home.  He returned his attention to Reaper then.  “First I’m going to kill you assassin, then I’m going to fuck both of these women before I turn them over to Count Shroude.”

                “He isn’t the Count yet,” said the assassin softly, “and were I you, I wouldn’t hold out much hope that he will live long enough to gain the title.”

                His face contorting into an enraged snarl Rickard launched himself at the assassin, pain and anger causing him to come on recklessly.  Reaper let him take three strides, then he flung himself forward, dropping into a somersault which he came out of in a crouch, thrusting his katana forward.  The officer didn’t have a prayer of adjusting his trajectory, Reaper had let him build up enough momentum in his charge to assure that and so as he continued to charge forward he impaled himself upon the assassins blade.  The impact of the officer as the assassin ran him through knocked the rogue backward but Reaper just rolled with the blow, planting his feet into the mans stomach and thrusting them upward, flinging the officer back over his head to slam into a wall near the door.  Sasha gasped slightly, jumping to one side as the officer hit. She watched him slump to the floor where he lay, unmoving.  The whole altercation had taken about three seconds and when she turned back to Reaper he was already on his feet and moving toward the bed, katana still in hand.

                Aribeth looked up at him fearfully and, seeing her sisters expression, Sasha stepped more fully into the room.  “Reaper, maybe you’d better let me.”  The assassin glanced at the young mage, who had scampered up as close as she could get to the headboard with her wrists manacled to it and was curled against it, watching him fearfully.  Sasha didn’t wait for his reply but came across the room and sat on the bed next to her sister.  “Beth?  It’s me… it’s Sasha.”  The mage looked away from Reaper hesitantly and when she met Sasha’s gaze she seemed to relax visibly. 

                “Sasha?” she said weakly as the gypsy removed her gag.  She was obviously traumatized by what she had nearly had to endure, and the sight of the most wanted assassin in the land hadn’t done much to calm her fears, in spite of him having rescued her.

                “Let’s get you out of here.”  Sasha said, leaning forward to examine the locks on the manacles.  Reaper had reached into his cloak to retrieve his lockpick set but paused when he saw the dancer reach up into her wild tresses and withdraw what looked like a hairpin.  A moment later there was a pair of clicks and the manacles fell away.  Reaper was suddenly glad that his cloaks cowl hid the upper half of his face, for he was certain that he had blinked in surprise.             

                “How is it that you know how to pick locks?”  he asked her, impressed in spite of himself.  That didn’t strike him as the sort of skill a noble woman would normally have bothered to learn.

                Once she had been freed of the chains Beth had thrown herself into her sisters arms and was now hugging her tightly.  Sasha glanced up at the assassin over her sisters shoulder.  “Hello,” she said with a somewhat sarcastic air, “gypsy, remember?”

                Reaper actually smiled slightly at that.  “So, the stereotypes are all true then?”

                Sasha considered that a moment, then shook her head slightly.  “Not all of them, no.  But we tend to not dissuade the false ones, that way people don’t really know what to expect from us.”  She continued to hold Aribeth, thinking all the while that comforting the younger sisters was more Ariana’s deal than hers, but she didn’t back away from it.  Speaking again she asked, “What now?”

                Reaper hesitated a moment before answering.  “Now we find a place to hide out while I try to think of a way to help your other sisters.”  He had told her all he witnessed of the capture of Talia and Krystel, along with Blaze and her people after they had left their fathers tomb.  “Not to mention the fact that we still have to find a way to warn Ariana and the others who are still overseas about what’s happening here.  At the rate he’s going, Hunter Shroude is going to have a pretty tight hold on this place by the time they get back.”

                “Is there a place we can hide out in the city?  Seems kind of risky to stay.”  Sasha commented.

                Reaper considered that for a moment.  “It is risky, that’s true.  But if we leave it will be much harder to help the others.  Besides, I think I do know a place we can go.”  He looked at Sasha for a moment, then spoke his mind.  “I think it’s time someone informed Ashlyn of her fathers death.”

                Sasha’s face fell, that was the sort of thing her sisters were better at as well, but she couldn’t deny the logic of it.  The Eaglehart family were the closest allies the Moonstone’s had in this city, even if she hadn’t ever really gotten along with any of them.  They weren’t enemies either, and Ashlyn did need to know about Galon.  She would help them, that was certain at least.  “You’re right.  She needs to know her fathers dead and that her brother may have turned on us all.”  She shook her head.  “Her younger brother is in danger too!”  She hadn’t considered that before now, but with Rylan out questing with Ariana and someone no doubt hunting the eldest Moonstone sister that put the boy right in the path of trouble.

                “Let’s move ladies… we can’t stay here.  These men were Sentinels, they’ll be missed quickly, especially when they don’t bring Aribeth to the palace.”  Sasha nodded and got up from the bed, pulling her sister along with her.  Beth seemed to be starting to come to her senses, though she was obviously still shaken by her ordeal.  Reaper walked over and tossed one of his death tarot cards on the bed, then turned and led the way to the door, then out onto the street.

                The first thing he was aware of upon slowly regaining consciousness was that he was alive, though he didn’t know how that could be possible.  ‘He ran me through,’ the ranger thought, ‘then threw me off that zeppelin!’  Falcon felt something cool and damp come to rest on his forehead and his eyes popped open.  This elicited a startled gasp from the young woman in acolyte’s robes that was apparently administering to him.  She was very young, no more than sixteen and rather plain looking with short brown hair, pale skin and brown eyes.  Her robes were the soft tan color associated with acolytes who had yet to choose a more involved profession within the church.  Falcon glanced around, wondering where he was.

                “You’re in the temple of Light in Peacehope.” She informed  him, as though reading his thoughts.

                “How did I get here?” he asked in a hoarse voice, suddenly realizing his throat was very dry.  He realized there was a damp cloth on his forehead and he reached up, taking it in hand and lowering it to his mouth.  He sucked some of the water out of it and felt instantly better as his throat ceased hurting.  Returning the cloth to his forehead he continued, “The last thing I remember was fighting the assassin on the deck of that zeppelin when he stabbed me and I went over the railing.  I must have blacked out on my way down.”

                “As I understand it Lady Moonstone saved you from that fall and once you were stabilized you were brought here.”  She leaned forward and looked into his blue eyes, judging how well he was doing.  “How do you feel?”

                “Ill used.” He responded and she smiled slightly.  “Where is everyone?  I would have expected a bedside full of my concerned admirers gathered about, pining away for me.”

                “They’ve been in and out since you were brought in.  But many of them are away on missions from what I understand.”  She shrugged.  “They went after the Countess and Mistress Ishara, though I suppose they’ll be back soon now that the Countess is back.”

                Falcon turned his head to look at the girl sharply.  “Say that again?”

                She looked taken aback at his tone, but clarified for him.  “They made an announcement together just yesterday.”

                “Who’s they?” he asked, his eyes narrowing.

                “Lord Huntyr and his step-mother, the Countess.  She told the entire city when the gathered that her step-son had acted most heroically, single handedly saving her from the assassins blade.” She sighed sadly.  “Evidently Mistress Ishara was slain in the attempt however.”

                Falcon pushed himself up on his elbows, the sheet falling down to his waist, revealing his hair covered bare chest.  “Let me get this straight, Huntyr Shroude rescued the Countess and brought her back here to Peacehope, but the people that went overseas to retrieve her and hers sister don’t know it yet?”

                The young acolyte nodded.  “That’s right, I’m guessing that word of the rescue just hasn’t reached them yet is all.  Hopefully they’ll get back in time for the wedding!”

                Falcon narrowed his eyes even further.  “What wedding is that exactly?”

                The woman smiled dreamily, “Oh it’s the most romantic thing ever!  The Countess announced that in honor of his gallant rescue of her, the Countess has agreed to take Huntyr as her husband, officially making him the new Count and her co-ruler.  She said that apparently he had grown into a man she hadn’t thought him capable of being, but now she found that she looked forward to her new life with him!”

                Falcon looked at the woman askance, as though wondering if she were playing with him.  “Countess Shroude is going to marry her step-son?  Truly?”

                She nodded.  “The wedding is in three days, the whole city is invited!”

                Falcon suddenly wished that Ariana or one of the other Dragons were available to get him caught up on what had been happening while he was out, because this just seemed to ludicrous to be real!  He glanced at her as another question occurred to him.  “How long was I out?”

                “Five days.”  She responded wistfully.  “You’re lucky to be alive at all to tell you the truth.  That sword shredded several of your internal organs.  You owe that priest of the Traveler in Valor your life, you should go think him one day.”

                Falcon slumped back on his pillows, nodding.  “Maybe I will.”  He said vaguely, his mind whirling with what he had learned in the last few minutes.

                “Excuse me a moment will you?”  He nodded as she rose and headed across the room toward the door to the medical wing.  It wasn’t until she had gone that Falcon noticed he wasn’t the only patient in the room.  Sir Avalon Charm lay in the bed next to his, looking pale and sickly, his eyes closed, his breathing very shallow.  Apparently he had been more seriously wounded than they had thought?  Putting the knight out of his thoughts, Falcon focused instead on the facts at hand.  Apparently Huntyr and the Countess were getting married, because he had rescued her from Shadow Stalker.  The problem with that story was that Falcon had seen the woman in chains on that zeppelin and knew that the rogue had gotten away with her.  The only way Huntyr could have rescued her on his own was to have caught up to the zeppelin, and if he had only been out for four days… there just hadn’t been time for that.  Something was very wrong here.  The acolyte came back into the room then, carrying a pile of clothing and leathers that he recognized as his. His weapons were there too, though he saw that his staff was not and remembered he had lost it on the zeppelin.  He lamented that, it had been a good staff, replacing it would not be easy.  “You seem strong enough to leave if you wish, so here are your things.”  The woman said, “I’ll leave you to get dressed.”

                She laid the pile of clothing at his side and started to turn away but he reached out and grabbed her hand, turning her back toward him.  “What’s your name?”

                “Tabitha.”  She said softly, concerned by the intensity in his gaze.

                “Tabitha, are any of the Moonstone sisters still in the city?”  He asked.

                She frowned. “I don’t know, but surely if they are you’ll be able to find them.  I know you’re all friends.”  Falcon nodded and let her go, watching her walk away with a frown.  Something didn’t feel right and that meant he had to get out of her quickly.  Before the young woman had even walked out of the room he had tossed back the bedding and rose, climbing off the bed.  When he first stood up he suffered a brief dizzy spell and had to catch himself on the side of the bed, but when it passed he felt pretty confident it wouldn’t come back.  He also knew that if he could find something to eat soon he would feel a lot better.  He started to dress, quietly taking inventory of his gear as he did so, happy to find that everything seemed to be present, including his druidic totem rings, which his father had made before he died and which Falcon had gone to great pains to recover when they had been stolen years before.  He had just finished buckling on his belt and was adjusting his sword and kali sticks so they rode more comfortably in their customary places when he heard booted feet approaching.  His mind, so quick with such things, instantly sorted out that there were three of them. 

                He turned as three Sentinels marched into the room in full armor and with hands resting on their weapons.  His eyes narrowed ever so slightly as he watched them come but he said nothing as they approached him, still standing by his former sickbed.  “Kestrel Coral?”  Said the leader of the trio, an elf of middle years, tall and well built with a lieutenants rank on his shoulder.  Flacon nodded, waiting for him to continue.  “Your presence has been requested at the palace.”

                Alarms were starting to go off in Falcon’s mind.  “Why?” he asked abruptly.

                The guard shrugged.  “We don’t know the answer to that sir, we only know that we were told to bring you when you woke up.”

                ‘They knew that I’d figure something was wrong with their story, having been there when the Countess was taken off the island.’  Falcon thought, his blue eyes flicking among the three men.  The elf was the most dangerous he could see, but the other two also seemed ready for trouble.  Smiling as though slightly disconcerted about this attention, Falcon shrugged.  “I only just woke up, I was hoping to get a bite to eat first, get my strength back.  Perhaps I could make my way up there after that?”

                The elf shook his head, his eyes cold as ice.  “Negative sir.  We’re to take you now.”

                While they had been talking Tabitha had come into the room and was watching with concern, standing next to the door.  He knew she had told them he was awake, likely she had been instructed to do so.  Wasn’t her fault, she was just doing what she was told.  Nodding and shrugging as if it weren’t that great of deal to him, Falcon half turned and started toward the door.  The lieutenant fell in behind him and the other two marched along at his sides.  Falcon pulled his cloak up more snugly around himself as though fighting off a chill, easy to understand considering he had just woken from a five day sleep.  Under the cover of the cloak his hands slipped to the small of his back, his fingers curling around the handles of his kali sticks.  As they approached the door he could feel Tabitha’s eyes on him and he met her gaze, seeing the regret there.  She hadn’t known they were going to do this and he smiled reassuringly at her.  “Sorry about this.”  He said as they got closer to her.

                “About what?” she asked as the two guards fell back, the better to let him pass through the door.  Just before he passed through the door Falcon’s hands whipped out from under his cloak, a fighting stick in each one and caught the guards across their stomachs.  Their armor took most of the blow, but their surprise was total and they staggered back with grunts as Falcon stepped through the door and turned to face them.

                The elf was the first to respond, as Falcon had known he would be, drawing his sword and stepping toward the doorway.  Before he could get through it though Falcon stepped toward him, his right hand stick flashing down and extending out, clipping the elven Sentinel across the fingers that held his sword.  They fell from suddenly numb fingers and he cried out in surprise, then Falcon took another half step forward and drove the end of his other stick into the mans throat, not hard enough to kill him, but he still staggered back, gagging.  Falcon dropped back a step, forcing them to come to him and knowing that they would have to do so one at a time because of the doorway.

                One of the two guards who had been walking to his side appeared and lunged at him, a blackjack in hand.  ‘So they’re not out to kill me.’  Falcon thought with a grim smile, knocking the blackjack aside with his left hand kali stick and stepping in to drive his right hand one into the mans stomach.  He groaned and doubled over, Falcon reversing the direction of the left hand stick and twirling it up to slam into the mans face as he double over.  The blow straightened the Sentinel up and sent him careening backward where he slammed into the lieutenant who was just trying to get back into the fight.  Both men toppled to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs, but Falcon wasn’t paying attention to them as now the third Sentinel appeared in the doorway and he too was sporting a blackjack.

                The guard feinted toward Falcon’s stomach, but the ranger was too smart for that and when the guard brought the small club up and around toward his head, Falcon crossed over his body with his right arm, blocking the blow near his head, then extended his right arm down that of the guard and slammed his kali stick into the side of the mans neck, just below his armored helm.  The blow staggered the Sentinel and he slumped against the doorframe, dazed while Falcon turned and bolted for the front door of the temple.  He could hear the three men calling for him to halt, heard them trying to get through the door to come after him and he grinned slightly, dashing through the front door and out into the street before they had even gotten to the hallway.

                He sensed rather then heard or felt the pursuit and glanced over his shoulder, unsurprised to see that they had left a pair of guards on the front door and the two men were now coming after him.  Falcon halted his forward momentum and threw himself backward at them, his kali sticks thrusting back below his arms.  He caught each of the men in the stomach and doubled them up, then spun the sticks forward and brought them up again, catching each guard across the face.  They fell back and tripped over the stairs leading up to the front door of the temple.  They wouldn’t be down long, he knew and so Falcon glanced to his left and right, getting his bearings, thankful that he had come to know the city so well.  His adrenaline was pumping now, so the weakness he had felt earlier was easily pushed aside as he looked for a likely path of escape.  To his left another patrol of Sentinels was making their way toward him, attracted by the brief scuffle in front of the temple.  Turning to his right, he headed toward the distant gate that he knew led to the arena district of the city.  There would be more guards at the gate but hopefully they wouldn’t know to be looking for him.

                That proved to be a mute point however as the guards rushing toward the temple from the left had seen him run and took up the chase, calling out to the guards at the gate as he approached, wanting them to stop him.  Falcon approached the gates with kali sticks in hand, seeing two of the guards moving from the wall to either side of the wide gate into his path.  Not sparing any more thought to what was going on and why the guards were so desperate to take him into custody, Falcon only reacted.  As he approached the guards they reached for their weapons and he smiled ever so slightly, diving into a roll and coming up on one knee between the guards.  His arms flashed out to the left and right, the kali sticks crashing against the backs of ones left knee and the others right.  The guards shouted in pain, weapons forgotten as they bent to clutch at their knees.  Falcon brought his kali sticks back the opposite direction, smacking each man across his stomach, then he stood, spinning the kali sticks in his hands and bringing them back again to the base of each mans skull.  The guards thumped to the ground without so much as a grunt and Falcon broke for the gate, the sounds of pursuing guards ringing in his ears.

                He dashed into the Arena district, casting about for the most likely route of escape, wanting to make it to the edge of the city and then beyond the wall to the forest, where he knew they would never find him.  Falcon kept running down the main street, heading for a cross street he knew to be ahead, the guards racing along behind him, calling for him to halt, calling for other patrols he passed to stop him.  Falcon kept running, smiling like a lunatic, dodging the guards that were trying to get into his path.  He would leap over railings and run up the side and over the tops of wagons and carriages, all the while putting more distance between himself and his pursuers.  The wall at the edge of the city loomed ahead of him, the guards falling away behind and for a while Falcon thought he was home free.  Then he saw a trio of men step into the street ahead of him, standing shoulder to shoulder and blocking his path.  He still had a ways to go before he reached them and so had time to size them up.  These weren’t guards, but he held no illusions about their intentions, they were there to stop him escaping.  From their dress, dark clothing and cloaks and hard, humorless eyes he could see that they were rogues, each of them most likely members of the local guilds, either thieves or assassins.  The middle one would be the leader, he was the biggest and looked to be the most dangerous, though Falcon was experienced enough to understand that it was the two smaller men that would be quicker and more able to get inside his defenses.  He pondered briefly putting up his fighting sticks, which he still held loosely in his hands but realized that two weapons would serve him better than just his sword, though there was better killing power in the blade.

                He also considered, as he neared their position, just lowering his shoulders and bowling right through them.  But he thought it likely that the larger man was heavier than he, and none of the three looked like novices, which meant that a plan like that wasn’t likely to have much success.  He coasted to a halt, stopping a few feet in front of them, his eyes trailing from one mans face to each of the others and a smile played across his lips.  “I suppose it would be pointless for me to ask you boys to just step aside and let me pass?”

                “You got that right.  You’re worth a lot of money to us.”  Said the one in the middle, the spokesman and leader, just as the ranger had thought.  “We’re going to have to take you up to the palace to talk to the new Count.”

                Falcon frowned inwardly, that was the second time he had heard something about the new Count, but outwardly he just grinned at them.  “Which means you’re under orders to take me alive… I assure you boys, I have no such hindrances.  You attempt to stop me, on your heads be it!”

                The two rogues to the outside glanced at the one in the middle and he nodded imperceptibly.  The two outside men lunged for Falcon, moving fluidly as one attack but the ranger had been expecting something like this and rather than retreating from their sudden attack, he lunged straight forward, dodging between the smaller men and went for the bigger one.  He saw the mans eyes widen in surprise within his hood and he attempted to bring his hands up to defend himself, but Falcon, who already had his fighting sticks in hand was too quick for him.  He drove the ends of both his sticks into the gut of the middle rogue and while his leathers absorbed a lot of the blow, the impact was still enough to bend him over and stagger him backward.  From waist height Falcon brought his left hand stick up and caught the larger rogue across the face, breaking his nose and straightening him up, then he brought the right hands stick up in a tight arc that caught him across the left side, turning his head violently and spinning him to the side, staggering him to the rangers left.  Falcon half turned, following the other mans progress with the direction of his own body, dropping his right hand stick down the length of his form to rap it sharply against the front of the mans knee and he shouted in pain as he stepped back, trying to lessen the blow.  What followed was a rapid fire series of blows as the ranger staggered the large rogue backward, “dancing” his sticks up the front of the mans body from the knees all the way up the thighs, into the stomach and across the ribs, then ending with a spin that caught him across the face with both sticks, spinning him to the ground.  All of this happened in the couple of seconds that it took the other two rogues to process what he had done and as he turned from the large rogue, who hadn’t even completed his fall to the ground yet, the other two were coming toward him.

                Now Falcon did retreat, working his kali sticks furiously to parry away the swords of the smaller two men, who were, as he had surmised, the quicker of the three.  Each of them was dual wielding short swords and Northern Ranger found himself hard pressed just to keep their sharp blades at bay as he gave up ground to them, though now his back was to the city wall a hundred yards back and the farther he retreated the closer he got to it.  Suddenly the two men got smart and, still working their swords furiously in intricate patterns that Falcon could barely match they started to work their way apart, moving to his left and right and he started to sweat, realizing that in a moment he was going to have to focus more on one than the other and wind up getting stabbed in the back, which from a rogue was not a pleasant thought to entertain.  His only other option was to break ranks and run for the wall, and now that he had been fleeing the guards already and was in a pitched battle with the two rogues, he didn’t think he had what it took to make it to the wall in one piece.  His recent stay in the temples hospice wing was starting to catch up to him.  And to make matters worse, he could hear the guards he had eluded earlier in the distance, moving toward them, no doubt attracted by the sounds of their fighting.

                Falcon was preparing to extricate himself from the fighting and make a run for the wall when he heard a female voice which he couldn’t place but he did recognize shout at him, “Falcon, go left!”  He didn’t hesitate, pivoting to the left and engaging that rogue in full, hearing suddenly the sounds of metal ringing off metal behind him and feeling a plate clad back press to his.  He could tell by her height and the sounds of the weapons being used that she was either a Sentinel or a member of the militia, and since he knew that there was no women on the Sentinels that left the Algeron militia, and that meant she could be one of only two women who would bother to come to his aid.  Putting that thought aside for the moment he concentrated in full on the rogue who was now frowning in concentration, aware that the ranger was a much more formidable foe one to one than he was when outnumbered.  With only one opponent to focus on Falcon quickly found the other mans rhythm and matched it, though he could feel exhaustion starting to creep through him.  He had to end this quickly and get away before the Sentinels arrived, and with that in mind he stepped forward, leaving his unexpected ally as he moved in on the rogue.  She said nothing behind him, just kept on fighting as the ranger forced his antagonist to retreat, much as he had been doing moments before.  Their weapons flashed, a blur of movement as he caught the other mans swords on the flats of their blades, deflecting them away with his fighting sticks and looking for or attempting to force an opening in his defenses.

                With a sudden rush of movement the ranger closed the gap between them, which put the two men much closer together, too close really for the sword wielder’s weapons to be effective but Falcon’s kali sticks were still devastating.  The rogue frowned and hastily tried to back away, to get a more comfortable space between them and the ranger, who was several inches taller than the rogue, insinuated a booted foot between the other mans ankles and the rogue staggered.  He corrected quickly, but his swords faltered just enough to give Falcon the edge he needed.  With a grunt of triumph Kestrel waded in, forcing his kali sticks up between his opponents arms and forcing them wide, driving the short swords out to either side.  Then he went to work on the mans wide open body, bringing the sticks in to either side of his head, battering him across the ears. The rogue groaned and staggered, but Falcons fighting sticks had only just started their staccato dance, dropping from the mans ears to his shoulders, shattering the collar bones on either side of his neck and the rogues arms dropped uselessly to his sides, then Falcon turned half way and slammed one of his sticks into the mans side, finding a kidney and hammering as hard as he could against that spot.  The rogue grunted and staggered, his vision already swimming from the blows to the head, his senses dulled by the rapidfire succession of blows now raining down on him as Falcon walked his body with the sticks, like a skilled percussionist on a set of drums he hammered the man from the base of the neck down the length of his body to his groin, where he spun one stick up between the mans legs, doubling him over with a moan of pain, then the ranger raised both sticks and spun them so that they pointed upward, then he brought their bases down on top of the rogues hood covered head.

                As the rogue fell Falcon stumbled, his vision swimming as the exertions of the last several minutes caught up to him and his weaker than usual body rebelled.  He staggered against a railing that ran the length of a sidewalk in front of whatever shops these were in front of him and turned his head to see which of the two women he knew from the militia had come to his aid.  Solus’s rays dazzled his eyes, glancing off her shining, blue tinted armor and her long, platinum blonde hair, almost white in the sunlight, whirled as she bashed her shield into the front of the rogue she had been fighting, staggering him back against the railing opposite the ranger, then she lunged forward and drove the blade of her long sword through his middle.  Falcon straightened, some of his strength returning as she turned to regard him, her light blue eyes sliding over him, gauging his status while her soft looking pink lips pursed in a worried expression.

                “Can you run?” asked Ashlyn Eaglehart, the silver eagle that was her families crest glimmered on the breastplate she wore and she glanced worriedly toward the sound of the approaching Sentinels, yelling angrily at the pedestrians to make way for them.

                “I’ll need to rest before I can get over the wall.”  He told her, his voice soft beneath his own panted breathing.

                “You won’t need to, you have friends nearby.”  She told him, coming forward and taking his upper arm in one surprisingly strong hand for slightly built a woman.

                “How far?” He asked.

                “Half a block.” She said to him and he nodded, allowing her to pull him along and breaking into a jog as she increased the pace, leaving the three rogues lying in the street where they had dropped them.

                True to her word, Ashlyn didn’t lead him more than half a block before she was leading him up onto a patio and through the front door of a small, one bedroom house that sat in the shadow of the cities tall perimeter wall.  No sooner had Falcon entered the cool, dimly lit interior than a shapely silver haired form hurtled at him and threw her arms around his neck, hugging him tightly.  Falcon returned the hug on instinct, though it took him a moment to place the warm, soft woman that was now molded so pleasantly to his front.

                “Aribeth?” he asked, looking down at the top of his silver haired head.  He glanced around, saw Sasha Moonstone lounging on a sofa, her shapely legs crossed at the ankles, her colorful skirt bunched behind them in what looked like a deliberately alluring pose.  In one corner, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed beneath his cloak, was the assassin called Reaper.  “Sasha?  What the hell is this?  What’s going on?”  He rather deliberately didn’t acknowledge the presence of the assassin, not because he had anything against the rogue, not really, but more because he would trust answers from these two women he had known for many years more than he would have done from the shadowy form in the corner.  Reaper didn’t seem to take offense either way.

                “A lot has happened since Shadow Stalker ran you through and flung you from the deck of that zeppelin.”  Aribeth said breathlessly as she stepped back from the ranger, flushing slightly in embarrassment at her reaction to his sudden appearance.  “You’re welcome for saving you from that by the way.”  She added this last with a smirk on her pretty face, her blue eyes sparkling with mirth.

                Ashlyn had closed and locked the door behind them when they entered, now she stepped over to the curtained window and pushed it aside slightly with one finger to peer out at the street.  “The guards are going to go door to door to look for him, we probably don’t have much time.”  She said to the rogue, who nodded but said nothing.

                “Where are we?”  Falcon asked the room at large.

                “My place.”  Ashlyn responded at once.  “When I joined the militia and was serving under my…” she paused as though something had pained her, “…father, I didn’t think it would be good for my relationship with him if we were still living in the same house, so I rented this place.”

                “That answers the where… now how about the why?  Why are we here?  What’s going on?”  He told them what he had heard since he awoke, surprised to realize that it had been less than an hour before.

                “Unfortunately,” said Sasha from the sofa, “it’s all true.  We suspect, however, that the woman they’re saying is Countess Shroude is an imposter.  She and Huntyr Shroude are no doubt trying to cement their tenuous hold on the throne of Peacehope with this mockery of a marriage, all the while trying to eliminate the people in the city that might see through their charade.”

                “Namely, us.”  Said Ashlyn bitterly.  “They already got my father.”

                “What?!”  Falcon rounded on her and saw that the pretty blonde warrior was near to tears and thought that she had probably been so for a while now. 

                Ash nodded, but it was Reaper who spoke up.  “I suspect that it was her own brother that had a hand in his death, though I can’t prove that.  He was dead before Krystel and I got to their group to help them.”

                Falcon glanced around.  “What group was that?  And where are the other sisters?”  At that point the others took turns filling him on all that had happened while he was unconscious.  When they had finished, Falcon shook his head and said, “So Krystel and Talia are being held somewhere in the palace, along with Blaze, Lance Crowe and Commander Relic.  Huntyr Shroude sits the throne with a woman you suspect to be the Countess’s twin, who most people don’t even know exists and by all appearances the soon to be new Count Shroude is trying to eliminate those of us that might shed light on their treason.  And that likely includes our friends, who are over seas trying to rescue the Countess and seeing what sort of trouble is befalling the barbarians.  That about right?”

                “In a nutshell.”  Said Reaper, the lower part of his face breaking into a bitter smile. 

                “So what are we doing about all this?  We can’t be planning on just leaving Talia and Krys and the others in the palace dungeons?”  Falcon asked, glancing around at them all.

                “We had been discussing our options when Ashlyn volunteered to go for food.  We’re all being hunted now as well, so it isn’t safe for us to go out in our own city any more!”  Beth snarled, slamming a dainty fist down on the surface of an end table.  “She came back shortly after that with you.”

                Ashlyn spoke up then, “I heard the fighting of the people that were trying to stop him.  I intervened and brought him back here.”

                “I’m glad you did too,” Falcon assured her, “I doubt I’d have lasted much longer against them.  By the way, those were members of the cities rogues guilds I was fighting, so it would seem that Huntyr or his woman have recruited them to the cause.”

                “That’s not surprising.”  Said Reaper.  “Katyara Volupta and Nikko DeVerrit would agree to anything if there was enough money in it.”  Everyone in the room knew he spoke of the heads of the local thieves and assassins guilds, though of course such information had never been proven, everyone knew who they were.  “It’s always kind of stuck in their throats that the Moonstones and their closest friends were off limits too.  They’d jump at the chance to end that.”

                “As to what we’ll do about the sisters and the others being held in the palace, I don’t know what we can do.”  Said Ashlyn, who alone among them knew of the military force that was garrisoned at the palace.  “They have more than a hundred guards on staff there and if they have such important prisoners, assuming they haven’t killed them already, they’ll be under heavy guard.”

                Reaper spoke up quickly at the stricken looks that had come over Aribeth and Sasha’s faces.  “They won’t kill them, not right away.  They’ll need them for leverage in case your older sister comes back, or they manage to actually rescue the real countess.  We have some time to work with, and frankly they’re probably better off there than they would be out here, at least for the time being.”

                “No to mention that we just don’t have the manpower or resources to mount a rescue mission.”  Ashlyn said softly.

                Falcon glanced around at three women, then at the assassin.  “So… what?  What’s our next move?”

                “The thought has been entertained about going to Valor and asking the Rethbournes for help.”  Sasha said softly.

                Falcon shook his head, immediately seeing the problem with that scenario.  “The Duchess would want to help us, but their city is still reeling from the death of the Duke.  Plus, if they openly defied the Shroudes it could lead to a civil war on Algeron that would do more harm than good.  Also, if we’re declared legal outlaws, the guards in Valor would be duty bound to arrest us before we even got close to the Duchess or her family.”