- by Emanuel, Jeremy, Mike
          - Began December 08, 2005           Last Update: 01/02/06 | CHAPTER: 1 | 2 | The Crimson Basin - Guestbook

I paused for just a moment. I wanted to savor his last few gasps, watching the final contraction of his heart as it hastened the blood from the wound; witnessing his death. I had cut his throat. Ultimately it was a simple task with minimal physical effort on my part (The victim’s body usually lurches, bucking forward in surprise and hastening the bite of the knife into the naked flesh of the neck). The rest is soundless dramatics; more suitable for the mime’s stage, with flailing arms and silent emotion, than the stark reality of life. Although this time it was special. It’s not every day you get to watch a king die.

Once it was done and he lay still in a pool of crimson blood and purple satin, royal colors both, and I started running down the torch lit hallway leading from his solar. Dressed as I was all in motley, the irony of what I had just done was not lost on me: the king slain by his fool. Fool no longer, I cast aside my patchwork cloak and belled hat fearing to be spotted in such conspicuous livery. Rounding a corner I bumped strait into a startled Marra, one of the plump scullery maids of Wentworth Keep, sending a plate of dishes crashing to the floor.

“Oh my!” Marra exclaimed, “What in the world are you doing…” I cut her exclamation short with swift blow to the neck feeling her larynx crumble under the blade of my hand. Her eyes went wide with surprise and confusion as she too slunk to the floor dying. I had no time to lament her death, time was of the essence and I must reach the Vulcuvian tower before they found what I had done. Tonight was my only chance to retrieve the Falcon, or the last three months would all be in vain… and I would assuredly be found and put to death. This was my only chance for glory, glory and redemption, and nothing would stand in my way. The name of Danaleous would be known again!

* * *

In the dead of night she rolled away from the limp body laying next to her. A river of blood flowed freely from the bed to the floor, soaking the room in it's crimson glow. Al Astanya was shaking furiously as her eyes came back into focus. The power flowed through her body and permeated the room. The electricity leaving the Captain filled the room making Al Astanya's tiny hairs stand on end.

Just moments before, Al Astanya and the Captain of the Guard were in the throws of passion, embracing their most carnal impulses. At it's height, she felt it happening again... the subtle intensity of her spirit... the blissful flashes of people and places she didn't know... there was a power rising inside... and then - screaming.

Screaming - but not just screams of passion, but of horror. As Al Astanya tossed her raven black hair from her icy blue eyes, she moaned in complete ecstasy; Captain Feurd on the other hand cried out in pain as his handsomely rugged face distorted in striking pain - his life was being expelled from his body. Blood escaped from his eyes, replacing the tears of pain with drops of death. His own screaming and moaning was soon muffled as his very life-blood filled his ears. The skin peeled away from his naked, sweaty chest, curling up and away revealing the last horrendous palpitations of his heart.

The euphoria quickly left Al Astanya and she trembled with an unknown power. She was frightened, sitting in a pool of her late Captain's blood. Nature's Spirit had consumed another victim.

The King would have her head.

* * *

King Octavio the Fourteenth, Conqueror of the Storm Mountains, Ruler of the Northern Hinterlands, and Overlord of the Crimson Basin passed a weary liver-spotted hand across his face. His study, lit only by the dying embers of a once roaring fire and the dull flicker of a beeswax candle, caused deep shadows to dance eerily on the tapestry laden walls. The King sat hunched in the dim light, quill in hand, before him on a thick wooden table decorated with golden lion inlays stained dark with age, lay brown parchment maps and charts scattered in disarray. He considered briefly giving up for the evening and retiring to bed, then reconsidered and pulled another yellowed map from the pile.

“Ah, fighting for peace is like fucking for maidenhood,” he spoke softly to the flickering darkness.

For years now the great empire his ancient forefathers had wrung from the rag of blood and war, was crumbling under its own incompetence. King Octavio stared idly at the map in front of him and slowly, with the tip of his quill, retraced the southern most boundaries his land shared with the Magog. This time another one hundred and twenty-five hectares from the last line, a full two hundred and fifty leagues from the original boundary established eons ago. King Octavio knew this was the natural way of things, kingdoms give way to larger kingdoms and empires are swallowed by larger empires, or implode upon themselves - nonetheless the world always in constant flux. This loss though, this was preventable.

Twenty five years ago the warriors of Magog began encroaching upon the fertile grain fields of the South with little consequence. Good King Akenaten he’s called, sitting high in Wentworth Keep, Lord of Magog, Venerable Chosen of the War Goddess Hamemnite… Pig Shit if you asked the King. King Octavio had the unpleasant occasion to meet King Akenaten years earlier during the Magog’s first incursions into his empire. A ruthless bloodthirsty idiot left simple by years of royal inbreeding, yet still he held his lands by the iron fist of his almost fanatical warriors. Once there had been talk of a treaty, even the signing of parchment. A year of peace was all that the King got his people from the south. Still he doubted the Magog would be the end of his Empire. In fact, if all continued the way it was headed the Empire would crumble shortly after the Kings death anyway. He had no one to blame but his predecessors and himself.

Centuries of over-reliance on the fattened fops of The Crimson Court had left him now hamstrung and without a viable army to offer any real resistance to the Magog. Truthfully, the powers of the throne had been rendered impotent long before he assumed the Crown and Crimson Robe. Of course they still bow and scrape to him, stuttering on their tongues bloated with lies and excuses, meanwhile slyly sucking the coffers dry like some harbor whore; anything to placate a doddering old figurehead on the cusp of death. His once mighty kingdom was now the dung of shame eating too much stupidity. Yet he knew he had one more hand to play before sweet death took him, a chance to save his Empire.

* * *

As planned, the regular guards were absent from their posts outside the tower but the real dangers still lay ahead. Looming as a silent sentinel was Danaleous’s first obstacle, the Vulcuvian gate. Squatting like an iron and steel giant, the monstrosity’s razor sharp spines forfended the portal. Embossed into the dark metal were images of armored warriors clutched in desperate battle with fantastical beasts, empty eyes gazing out ominously at all who approach. He knew that a man could be torn to shreds if he attempted to scale the gate itself and the walls of the tower offered no purchase. Fixed in the center of the gate was a smaller door, referred to as the Halfman gate (because many who entered often returned shorter, usually by a head). In the center of the gate was a gilded lock crafted by the great master locksmiths of the Platinum Dales, its inner workings complex enough to confound even the greatest of lockpicks. However, if one were brash enough to attempt the feat it was said that the smiths had laid a fatal trap somewhere within the mechanism. One small slip could trigger the devise and that would be the last anyone would hear of Danaleous. Luckily, he had the key.

Once inside, a few sputtering torches cast strange shadows against the wall, sending up sulfurous tendrils of acrid smoke to mill around the roof of the chamber. The musky hallway led away a short distance to a steep upward winding stairway. Pausing on the first step Danaleous examined the stairway, something just didn’t feel right. Kneeling down he felt around the edges of the step, probing gently in the gloom with his fingertips. That’s when he felt the small protrusions on the otherwise smooth stone slab. Backing away Danaleous carefully pressed one of the protrusions, which immediately unleashed a salvo of darts into the opposite wall where his leg would have been. “I see this is going to be harder than I thought,” he said to nobody in particular. Reaching into his small leather bag Danaleous removed two long black leather thongs, worn and faded by years of use, and tightly wrapped his hands. Then, placing one hand on each side of the wall and using his legs for leverage he hoisted himself upward, hovering a few feet above the trapped steps. The rest was a simple act of acrobatics as Danaleous stemmed his way thirty stories to the top of the winding stair.

The famed Vulcuvian holding chamber of the now late King Akenaten was a surprisingly small room at the top of the tower. Moonlight streamed through high glass windows bathing the circular chamber is an enchanting sylvan light. The chamber floor was carved with stylized runes intertwined with Arcalian warding glyphs. In the back of the room stood a tall statue of a reptilian creature carved from what seemed to be dark obsidian. The moonlight danced across its angular features fracturing into a rainbow of vibrant colors. In the center of the room, under the chatoyant gaze of the midnight figure, was a broad marble alter. From his position at the far end of the chamber Danaleous spied a gleaming pile of treasure haphazardly arranged on the surface of the alter. “What now?” He asked himself. “This can’t be it…, that’s way too easy.” But nothing stirred and the tomblike silence seemed to mock him. “Fine then, let’s do this.”

Upon closer inspection the gilded mass strewn about the alter was actually a variety of statutes and figurines all exquisitely crafted and worth a fortune. There were miniature knights clad in silver armor with golden scrollwork traced upon their delicate helms. There was an image of a rearing stallion carved from virgin jade, so lifelike it seemed as though it would gallop across the table at any moment. In the center of the alter, amongst the bounty of kings, was the most amazing treasure Danaleous had ever seen. Shaped like a great bird of prey, the creature’s diamond encrusted wings flared in glorious salute, baring its proud opal and jasper encrusted breast. The beak was made of hammered enamel crisscrossed with silver etching and culminating in a gilded point at the tip. Its eyes were deeply sunken rubies wreathed by carefully tooled topaz, giving the impression that the beast was edaciously gazing at some distant prey. Danaleous was tantalized, transfixed by the beauty and majesty of the recherché effigy.

Almost as though in a trance Danaleous’s hand reached for the centerpiece, craving to hold it close. His fingers closed around the proud jeweled plumage, caressing the cold metal and tracing its long fine lines. Suddenly Danaleous knew something was wrong. The hypnotic effect was gone, and his intuition screamed that he had fallen into the most insidious of traps. Looking about him nothing seemed blatantly amiss, but the sense of forbearing was palpable. Then he saw a slight change in the room as the runes and wards in the floor began to glow faintly. His eyes darted around searching for an answer… “What the hell have I done now?!” he cursed at himself. Just then he noticed the other figure on the alter. It looked like a rough section of granite had been haphazardly hewn into the shape of a bird. The image was devoid of any finery and could easily be missed amongst all the gilded treasures. “That must be it” Danaleous thought. Reaching out again he suddenly realized that the reptilian statue in the back of the room looked different somehow. Snatching up the rough granite statue he turned quickly for the door...and that’s when it happened.

Contrary to all the laws of nature the obsidian statue was moving with incredible speed and agility, its eyes burning with a deeper and more terrifying glow than that of the moonlight. Turning in terror Danaleous ran headlong for the stairs not daring to look behind him. Flying at breakneck speed down the twisting stairway, fatal darts narrowly missing behind him, he could hear the obsidian creature closing fast. Once on the ground floor he could almost feel the icy clutch of the creature’s claw on his back, reaching out to wring his neck. Bursting through the Halfman gate he tumbled into the dirt, fitfully gasping in the chilly midnight air.

“I am glad you could join us,” said the most mellifluous feminine voice, “I was beginning to wonder if you were going to succeed.” Looking up Danaleous stared into the pompous grin of Xill Litha, the High Priestess of the Vulcuvian order… and she was not alone.

* * *

Lord Bertrand Glenmont reclined comfortably in his solar staring languidly into his morning glass of mulled wine. He allowed his thoughts to wander as he peered into the amber depths swirling gently within the fine crystal goblet. Today might prove to be an auspicious one, if all his machinations were to bare fruit. Today might be the beginning of his rise to power, and the final ignominious fall of Octavio would mark his own ascension to the Crimson throne. His muses were interrupted by his manservant, “My Lord, the man you sent for is awaiting you presence.”

“Thank you Hector, please show him in and make sure we are not disturbed.” A moment later the man was ushered in, and gracefully sank into the opposite couch. His face was partially concealed by the hood of a riding cloak, but Lord Glenmont could still see the fiery twinkle in his eyes peering out at him. “Thank you for attending me so quickly, Ahesheem. The matter on which I wish to speak is urgent, and… delicate. Care for some wine or perhaps a morsel to break your fast?”

“No thank you, your lordship, I have already dined.” His voice was sharp and steady like a blade being drawn over a whetstone. “How might the Brotherhood be of service?”

Damn these Dolemites, Bertrand thought, always straight to the point, ignoring the need for careful diplomacy in such matters. “I appreciate your eagerness to serve, Ahesheem, the Brotherhood has always been a loyal and resolute arm of the Empire. However, it is in times of tribulation such as this that true citizens must shoulder the burden of protecting the Empire against her enemies, wherever they might be.” Bertrand paused, studying his guest.

“Indeed, my Lord.” Ahesheem’s voice remained flat but those eyes seemed to twinkle with understanding. “The Brotherhood is as always committed to the preservation of the realm.” More like the preservation of its own interests, Bertrand thought darkly to himself, but that was neither here nor there.

“I’m glad we agree. As you well know the realm has suffered greatly to the encroachments of our enemies, especially the recent invasion by the Magog and the trade embargo of the Vitruvian Federation. However, I believe that these challenges have been brought about by our own weakened domestic conditions, which have further emboldened our enemies.” Here Bertrand was finally coming to the point, and Ahesheem’s reaction could determine the success or failure of his ambition. “Many of us in positions of influence feel that the ship of state has gone adrift because of a broken tiller, and that it might be time to careen and put in for repairs.” There it was, Bertrand had spoken treason although he had taken care to obfuscate it as best he could. It was now Ahesheem’s turn to pick his words and intimate the Brotherhood’s stance without blatantly advocating sedition.

Ahesheem sat silently for a moment until finally clearing his throat he said, “My good Lord Glenmont, these are indeed trying times for all true citizens of the Empire, and we in the Brotherhood sympathize with your concerns. However, at this time we find ourselves in a most disadvantageous position which limits our ability to aid in this matter.”

Bertrand allowed himself a private smile. Perhaps he had underestimated Ahesheem’s diplomatic acumen, who was clearly offering an opening for negotiation. Very well, he would have to play this game if his plans were to have any chance of success. “I appreciate your sympathy, but it pains me to hear that the Brotherhood has suffered some distress, prey tell me of these troubles.”

“I thank you for your concern my Lord. You see, the honored council of high ministers has recently decreed that our chapels in Gilchrest and Fiddicton must be turned over to the Trillarian Priesthood. Furthermore, the Brotherhood’s traditional exemption from land taxes is currently under review, while the same privilege has been granted to them. The Trillarian's have already gained considerable clout amongst the ministers and with his Highness the King. We in the Brotherhood have found ourselves falling out of favor, and therefore our ability to act has been much denuded.”

Splendid, thought Bertrand, the Brotherhood can be bought, and for cheap. “It is most unfortunate that some of the ministers have been charmed by the proselytizations of the Trillarian's, and that his Majesty has not seen it fit to countermand their encroachments. I’m sure such edicts and attitudes would not be tolerated if the ministers were under a more benevolent aegis.” If the Brotherhood wanted the Trillarian's out of the way he would be willing to offer that in exchange for their support. Ultimately it would be a simple matter once he stood as head of state.

Ahesheem stood and bowed deeply, “Your support for the Brotherhood is most appreciated my Lord Glenmont. I wish you the best in your attempt to shore up the Empire’s shortcomings, and we shall endeavor to assist you as best we can.” Bertrand also rose and returned a short bow. The meeting concluded, Ahesheem took his leave and was shown out. Left to himself again Bertrand stared out into the garden and reflected on the conversation. The Brotherhood would help him unseat the King if he could demonstrate to them that he would emerge victorious. Perhaps reinstating their chapels in Gilchrest and Fiddicton would due, or maybe preserving their tax exemption. Regardless, once accomplished he would have to watch his back. Ahesheem had proven defter than he previously imagined and might pose a future liability. “All in good time,” he said to himself, “…all in good time.”

* * *

Blindly Al Astanya stumbled through the barracks of Retrivia, capitol of the Crimson Basin. Dancing through the shadows she wondered where she would go. For twenty long years she had lived outside the laws of men. She had nowhere to call home and no way to find it. She reflected on the many dark deeds that had brought her to the Crimson Court. Captain Feurd had been a target for Al Astanya ever since he was demoted from a Commander of the King's Elite Vulcuvian Order for mixing business with pleasure. He was in a position to gain access to the King's private chambers, but was no longer protected by the walls of the keep.

Lost in her thoughts, she haphazardly turned round down the side of one of the barracks into one of King Octavio's guards. "Oy dere! Wat's the idear?!" cried the filthy old guard, leaning against a wall and eating a maggot filled loaf. Al Astanya had tripped over the old fool, falling to her knees, her deep blue silk wears billowing about her. "Wat chu doin 'ere? Zat blood on yer face?! Wait a..." The poor old fool didn't have a prayer as he reached for his sword. No other options immediately springing to mind, Al Astanya leapt to her feet, eyes directly in the old codgers. The Captain's shining blood covered Al Astanya's otherwise perfectly porcelain young face. Her long shocks matted to her face and an otherworldly fire was burning in her icy gaze that froze the oaf in his place. "Help," he whispered, "Help," he wordlessly called, "Help," he gasped as Al Astanya's razor-sharp sickle sliced his throat and larynx wide open. Blood sprayed on her already imbrued face and clothes. His eyes rolled back in head as she punched out with her left palm, smashing his head firmly into the wall, knocking him out instantly. As he fell to the floor, Al Astanya covered his opened throat with her hand, looked around for any spectators, and muttered a few simple words. When she turned and began to again hustle down the alleyways of the barracks, the old guards throat had stopped bleeding and in it's place was a large mound of scabbed tissue. 'No need for unnecessary casualties, but no need to leave him with the ability to yammer to others,' she thought.

No one had seen her enter the Captain's chambers a few hours prior. She had found him intoxicated between a crude drinking hole and the barracks. After her many weeks of patience, hiding in shadows and learning his patterns, all it took was showing Feurd a little leg. He took her back to his quarters under the cover of night, avoiding the guards on duty for she was wrapped in his heavy traveling cloak. She seduced the Captain, which took very little given his condition. Fortunately for him, she had no intention on killing the good Captain - his access to Octavio's private quarters was far too valuable.

Leaving the barracks behind, Al Astanya realized she had no place to go. She was covered in blood and her clothes were ruined. Worse yet, she had still nothing to report back. She slipped down a street that led towards a nasty old pub she had occasioned. If she could make it there without being spotted, she had stowed some extra goods with the barkeep. First, she had to wash the blood off her face.

The Captain was very talkative, but mainly about the lude things he was going to do to her; How it would do his old heart, among other things, good to get a piece of a pretty young thing like her. She played into his advances with just right amount of teasing and carnal delight. Things were going better than she could have expected. Hope was finally on the horizon after her many decades of life. But it was that very hope that sabotaged her chances of success.

She washed the crimson blood off her face from a pool of muddy water just off the street. Once clean of blood, now dirty of mud, Al Astanya's eye caught the light of a fire in the reflection of the pool. The flames danced in the night sky, capturing her gaze, pulling her back to that moment of passion when it all went wrong. During her sinful strut with Feurd, the excitement of her families inevitable endgame was building inside. This is when it happened, when it always seemed to happen. The fire rose inside her until it consumed the Captain - it destroyed her one lead to enter the keep. Nature's Spirit had destroyed hope once again.

"Elbooz. My personal attires, I need them now," she said quietly in a harsh musical tone. The startled keep turned around suddenly, dropping the pipe and weed he had been smoking in his chambers. "Wha- Tanya? Zat you? You rotter!" he said cleaning his pipe from the floor. "You scarred the livin - Tanya. You look like you've been - " she cut him off with a single finger to her pursed lips. "Quiet Elbooz." She walked to him, her face an inch from his confused face. "My things?"

"Of course. Caught me off guard is all Tanya. That's all," he said exiting to the another room. She breathed a sigh of relief as she surveyed this dump, roaches crawling the walls. This man, who called her Tanya, would be safe from the Spirit - hope will never enter this place.

***

“My Liege… my Liege sir… your Eminence?” Octavio awoke with a start still seated at his desk from the night before. “By what leave have you to wake me Boy?!” he thundered more out of irritation at being awoken then any true anger. The young ewer hit the floor with his forehead and bowed so deeply the pitcher of water shook unsteadily in his hand.

“My Eminence, it is light out, the morning has… come,” the ewer squeaked never taking his eyes away from the floor.

“Oh… so it has, hasn’t it Boy? Hmmmm... well stop examining the ground and come here to wash my hands.” The young ewar’s eyes peered upward and he leapt to his feet fetching the wash basin from the stand he began pouring the water. “So my boy, what news do you bring me today?” Octavio held his hands outward over the basin.

“The Brotherhood was here last night my liege.”

Ocatvio’s hands suddenly clenched white with anger. “Who did they come and see Boy?” Octavio hissed.

“I do… I do not know sire, the Brotherhood has… ways of making themselves unseen, as you know my liege… it was only by chance I saw them”. The boy’s eyes never left the Kings hands as he waited patiently for them to unclench.

“The Brotherhood is a pox on this land,” the King muttered, placing his hands on the white cloth for drying. “Boy, when you leave here I want you to keep your eyes and ears open for more visits from the Brotherhood - and be careful, it would not be difficult to disappear an orphan, even if he does work for the King… Now go.” The boy jumped to his feet, bowed deeply again and left the room. The door only lay closed only for a second and in came his valet.

“Good morrow my Liege,” he said cheerily. Spurius was tall and lanky, his beak like nose and lithe frame reminded Ocatvio of a crane.

“What makes today so good Spirius? You have dressed me for the past thirty-two years and I have yet to wake up happy.” Spurius grinned annoyingly and proceeded to the King’s wardrobe.

“Once I am ready for the day Spurius, you will fetch me my quill and parchment. Find for me a trustworthy rider with a good steed, then send me the High Preistess of the Trillarians. We will break our fast together in the Solarium… and Alburtus… I require absolute privacy this time, ensure that any eavesdroppers will be dealt with severely.” Alburtus nodded gravely as he began dressing the King.

Once Spurius had left, King Octavio sighed deeply as he sat again at his desk and put quill to parchment.

Lord Fionan
Lord of Storm Mountain Keep,

With a heavy heart I write to you my friend, I am requesting your presence, and those of your chieftains at the Crimson Court. Wild boar has come in season.

Your King and your Friend
Octavio

* * *

'I wonder if I’m dead,' Danaleous thought solemnly to himself. He tried to flex his limbs and was rewarded instead with a sharp pain shooting down his back. 'I would imagine death would be a bit more comfortable.' Blinking away some of the haze in his mind, Danaleous’s eyes slowly began adjusting to the opaque gloom. Patches of darkness began to congeal into recognizable forms. He could see the silhouette of a small iron door flanked by the faint lines of large rough flagstones, and could barely make out another shape directly opposite. 'I guess I am alive, but I seem to be in a dungeon.' Danaleous could hardly believe it. He was convinced that the reptilian stone-creature was going to kill him, or that Xill Litha surely would have; and he wondered which foe was worse. 'They must be keeping me here before the execution, or perhaps they intend to torture me first. What an undignified ending to the greatest entrepreneur the world has ever known; brought low on his comeback job!'

Hours seemed to pass until someone could be heard approaching the door of his cell. Torchlight shone under the portal and shed a sliver of light into Danaleous’s cloister. He could see now that his hands and feet had been bound and manacled, and that he was not the first guest in this room. Lying prostrate directly opposite him was the grinning skeleton of a previous inhabitant, his twisted limbs still bound to the wall with large rot iron chains. Contemplating his own impeding torture and death he thought the skeleton might have gotten the better bargain. The footsteps stopped outside his door and he could hear a key probing his cell door, which eventually opened with a rusty screech. “Is it time to dress for supper?” Danaleous quipped, “I really am a might pekish.”

“There will be no food for you, worm,” growled the grotesquely fat jailer, “less you count er’self as food for the crows.” Taking pleasure at his own macabre joke the jailer chuckled to himself, his belly jiggling from side to side.

“Yes well, I would expect they would grant a man his last meal and a change of livery. Dying hungry and dressed like this is quite undignified for a man like me.”

“You’ll die naked and hungry like a dog,” spat the jailer as he kicked Danaleous squarely in the ribs. “Come on then, we don’t want to keep’em waiting.” The jailer then covered Danaleous’ head with a black sack and unhooked him from the wall. “Now up an march you dog!”

He was led up a long flight of stairs and through an open courtyard, judging by the chill of the air, until finally arriving in a brightly lit hall. The hood was then removed and Danaleous found himself blinking at a blazing fire-pit sputtering in the center of an ornately decorated chamber. The greasy jailer that had been at his side was now gone and two slender Vulcuvian Blade Mistresses flanked him instead. His wards’ faces were hidden behind austere masks inlaid with gold scrollwork, with long sable cloaks trimmed lightly with Vair. Each held in her hand a meter long weapon that looked like a cross between a sword and a halberd, with a short wooden shaft affixed with a long curved blade. On a raised dais at the other end of the hall sat three elders of the Vulcuvian order, the High Priestess Xill Litha amongst them. 'So it’s to be a fiery execution,' Danaleous thought darkly to himself staring into the fire-pit, “not the way I envisioned myself going… but a blaze of glory nonetheless.' His private pun made him chuckle despite himself.

“Do you find something amusing, Regicide?” Xill Litha intoned, her melodic voice cutting into his private ruminations.

“No my Lady, I meant no disrespect, but-”

“Your very existence is disrespectful!” she cut in. “You have murdered a King, and worse, you have sought to thieve from the Vulcuvians; a transgression that surely cannot go unpunished.”

“My Lady, I know nothing of the King’s death. A tragedy to be sure. However, in regards to the misunderstanding concerning the tower… I was simply curious, nothing more. An honest mistake.”

“Do not pretence your innocence too loudly, Danaleous, we know who you are.”

He gave an unexpected start. How could the Vulcuvians discover his true identity? He had taken great pains to closely guard that secret, and very few men still living could match the name to the face he now wore. Seeing Danaleous’s evident surprise, the High Priestess rose from her chair with a keen grin across her alabaster face. “Bring him with me.” Led by the two Blade Mistresses he was ushered after the Xill Litha into a small antechamber. Dismissing the guards she sank into a leather chair next to a small sputtering hearth, peering into his eyes.

“You wonder at how we know you?” She inquired, a lilt of playfulness in her voice.

“That question had crossed my mind, I do confess.”

“We have known you since you came here to Wentworth. We have watched you play at intrigue, and carefully lay your plans. We have seen all that you have done… and we have waited for the moment to be ripe.”

“I’m glad to have provided some pleasure to your Ladyship.” He was angry now at being so easily discovered and not getting wind of it. How could he have been so sloppy? But he knew that if there was any chance of coming through this ordeal alive, it lay in placating this woman and discovering what game she was playing at. “Perhaps her Ladyship would care to see me juggle?”

She laughed at that, a clean happy laugh that nonetheless chilled his bones. “As much as I have enjoyed seeing you clad in calico and prance around Akenaten’s hall as a moonstruck fool, you have committed a great offense which demands restitution!”

“What does her Ladyship mean?”

“Her Ladyship means for you to die an agonizing and ignominious death, probably by fire… unless...”

“Unless?” Danaleous asked, almost daring to hope.

“Unless… you agree to pay restitution for your deeds, and agree to perform a little task for us.”

“Well I do admit that sounds better than the alternative. Perhaps you could unshackle me and we can discuss this like civilized people over a glass of spice wine?” he said flashing his most charming smile. She moved with dizzying celerity and before he could react there was a serpentine knife at his throat.

“Do not think pretence me, thief. Your life is forfeit to me, and if I so choose you will never see the light of day again, but spend eternity in such pain that you would prey for the end before it comes. You will do this because it is my pleasure, and because you are in my debt.”

“I see your point, my Lady. As you say, I am in your debt.”

“Sit.” she commanded and loosened his bonds with a slight flick of the wrist. “I wish you to travel north into the Crimson Empire.”

“That seems easy enough my Lady, but I imagine there is more involved than a simple journey.”

“As you say. We need you to employ your more special skills and hunt down a specific person of import there, a young woman that we consider immensely valuable but also extremely dangerous. Do this, and we shall hold your debt fulfilled. Fail or go to ground and we shall inevitably find you, and the fire will seem a much preferable fate. The choice is yours Danaleous, and you must choose now.”

CHAPTER: 1 | 2 | The Crimson Basin - Guestbook

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