A Lye for an Eye

[Warpath]

Two days later, Jake sat staring at three bodies draped in white shrouds. His fingers ached, wrapped tight in their stained bandages. Down here, so far from the sun, time lost its weight and it seemed to him that a miserable eternity had passed. It was equally possible that there had been no passage of days at all: that it had been scant minutes or hours since he’d watched the life go out of that woman’s eyes. He’d only caught little snatches of sleep, and the mechanical clocks everywhere were so quiet that he suspected them of being liars.

There was the droning and unceasing sound of work down here, and the work came in two unpalatable flavors: the mining and clearing and shoring work of the dwarves, and the far less tasteful labor performed by Radek. The fourth man - the last surviving assassin - was screaming. Just when it seemed that the victim’s voice was spent, the wolfish Salvarman apparently found some horrible new pain to explore, and the screams started anew.

Flint’s crew had managed to save only two of the assassins. The woman had been the first to die, since she had not relied on the poison at all. The one Flint stopped with the thrown knife had crawled after his lost capsule and stuffed it back into his mouth, and in an effort to stop him the brute had stomped on him. That had prevented him from ingesting the poison, but he nevertheless died from internal bleeding.

The third assassin had ingested some poison, but had vomited most of it up after the struggle. It was Radek’s attentions that ultimately ended him not long into the first night. Ironically, the last survivor was the leader, who had been the first to ingest his false tooth and got the largest dose of poison. Between a good constitution and the work of an Aleraran alchemist, he had the good fortune of surviving long after his followers had gone beyond pain.

...and the miserable fate to know Radek the longest.

No one, Jake included, thought there was much chance that the hapless assassin would live long enough to break. Lye trained his dogs well, or they simply feared the Hands more than unspeakable agony punctuated by an ignoble death. The demon hunter had opened another dark chapter in his life and, it seemed, would have nothing to show for it. Was this worth another black spot on his soul?

He was musing on this when the screaming stopped and, after a moment, the door to the makeshift torture chamber opened. Jake leaned around the corner just in time to watch Radek emerge, slam the door closed, and stalk down the hallway away from him. The lanky Salvarman was bare-chested and sweaty, smeared everywhere with blood and grime. His hands were shaking. Jake followed, at a distance.

He heard voices echoing down the hallway, interspersed between loud interjections from the miners and their equipment.

“...long left,” Radek was saying to someone. “...learned too late.”

“...time…” a woman’s voice replied. Roxanna, Jake decided. “...recover...another crack once his body is whole. He did just recover from a poisoning.”

Radek grunted in the negative. “...point. His mind is broken. Thought he was just tough, but it’s not that. This guy...Lichensith...twisted. Poor fucker’s indoctrinated. I broke him hours ago...just didn’t realize I’m not making him afraid of me. Making him...more...of his boss. Like it’s Lye in there instead of me, testing him. He’s babbling the same thing over and over. His mind wants to give me want I’m asking for, he just...can’t make his mouth do it. Imprisoned...own brain.”

There was a long silence.

“...have it right here. We should use it,” Roxanna said at last. “...heard what Radek just said. The answer is there...locked...and we have the key right here. We can read his mind.”

“No,” a new voice interjected immediately. It was Flint. “No magic. None of us are paying that cost.”

“...regenerate…” Roxanna said, insisting.

“It is not the same,” Flint growled. “Magic has its own rules, and they are harder to violate.”

“It’s not just magic,” Roxanna insisted, louder. “It’s mechanical. Alchemical. The magic is just a small part…”

“The answer is no,” Flint said with finality. “Give it to me. Leave it on the table. Now. Radek, go rest. I need to think. We can still use this assassin as a message, or a bargaining chip.”

Jake stepped back into the shadows of the hallway. He was still dressed in the outfit he’d chosen for his nocturnal mission two nights before, and it served well to obscure him in the unfinished tunnels. Radek stalked past looking exhausted, and was none the wiser to the half-elf’s presence.

“...was a mistake…” Roxanna was saying.

“It was a calculated risk,” Flint said. Jake could imagine the dismissive shrug that must have accompanied the statement. “We learned much about the Hands.”

“...about the boy?”

“...potential ally,” Flint mused.

“...dangerous…” Roxanna said, doubtful.

“No,” Flint said. “The Breaker already knows where I am, and Narmolanya is focused on Lye, not me. He isn’t tied to any of my enemies. He walks free. It will soon be irrelevant if he continues on this path. Lye is death.”

Roxanna said something more, but Jake couldn’t make it out over a large rumble from some distance down the tunnel.

“...to bed, Roxanna,” Flint was saying.

Moments later, the leather-clad woman exited Flint’s quarters with her shoulders drawn up. She slowed near the entrance to the hallway Jake was hiding in, paused with a pensive glance over her shoulder, and then she shook her head and continued on her way, muttering to herself. Jake lingered in the dark for a long time, musing on all of this, and felt a thrill when he heard Flint’s distinct, heavy footfalls retreating into the distance. The brute was leaving.

He felt the risk keenly, but he also felt the weight of the cost he’d already paid. He couldn’t walk away. Not now.

He sneaked into Flint’s sanctum, cautious, and found it as deserted as it sounded. There were the maps, the books, the exercise equipment...and something that hadn’t been there before.

It looked like a sailor’s spyglass, except that it was black and smooth and did not collapse or adjust in any way. There were wide openings on either end, and lenses set inside them, except that the lenses were bowed in on both sides and set too deep inside the tube. One end had six small, wicked claws splayed out around the edge, and it was clear that these were designed to close down around any eye placed against that end of the device. To the half-elf’s dismay, he discovered that the other end promised its own equally horrific attitude toward eyeballs: the lens had a hole in the center, through which a tiny glass spike emerged.

The thing had weight - not just physical, but magical. Roxanna had called it a key...a key to their prisoner’s mind. A key that exacted a cost Flint was not willing to pay...

[Jake Narmolanya]

The lens slid open, and the glass spike impaled Jake’s left eye. The half elf stifled a cry of pain and forced himself to stay in place. At first everything went black, but then fuzzy images started to flicker before him. He closed his right eye and focused on the soundless narrative.

The banging on the portal-door turned into a thunderous pounding. Flint had arrived. Beneath the brute’s fists the iron-bound door shattered, but he found himself blocked by the portal leading to the warehouse’s rooftop. With a roar the mountainous main pivoted and slammed a fist into the wall. Solid rock crumbled away, and he struck again, and again. His knuckles bled, but he took a moment’s respite and the wounds healed themselves, and then he laid back into the wall, sundering chunks of stone. One way or another, Flint was entering the room.

Jake was watching a slow reel of memories from the assassin’s early life. Being beaten up by brothers, yielding to an early life of violent crime, moving around Salvar and living like a vagrant. It was all pitiable enough, but Jake had no time for it. He concentrated on thoughts of the white-haired grandmaster assassin, Lichensith Ulroké. The slow reel became a blur and then paused and resumed at a regular pace.

He was in a room - a chamber hewn from the living rock that formed its walls. There was a large bed covered in thick furs, and thicker rugs covering the floors. The mounted heads of various Salvic beasts stared lifelessly down from the walls. Further away, armor glistened on a set of mannequins. Ulroké stood before him, glowing, speaking soundlessly. He was receiving praise in the master’s quarters.

Jake had seen the room before in small glimpses, in memories Amari had shown him, whether intentionally or not. Only now, he had a solid mental image of it. Now, he could picture the details of the walls and ornamentation, of the rugs on the floor.

Now, he could portal to the lair of the beast.

The demon hunter groaned, pain spasming in his left eye socket as he pulled his head away from the device, leaving it strapped to the still-screaming assassin. Blood flowed down Jake’s face, absorbing partially into the bandage on the hand he pressed over it. He took two steps toward the door and lost his balance and sat down. He would practically need to re-learn how to move and fight, with only one eye.

Well worth it. Jake’s gut burned as if full of coals, the anger threatening to consume him. Seeing Ulroké’s face had awoken the rage. Temper it, he reminded himself, whet it, but do not use it until the time is right.

The wall shook with the force of Flint’s fists, and Jake saw pieces of it begin to crumble off.

Right. I’d best let them in.

Jake allowed the portal to dissipate, and Flint’s men poured into the room with the brute close behind. Some of them levelled rifles, while others merely watched to see what their leader would do. Skovik’s hazel eyes nearly bulged out of his head as he approached Jake, towering over the seated half elf in every respect.

The thief looked up with his good eye, and gave his best effort at a cheeky grin. He only managed a pained leer.

“Right, I know…” he quipped, “but if you kill me, I can’t portal you to Ulroké’s bedchamber.”

[Warpath]

Flint brought Jake to the chirurgeon-alchemist, a dark elf that sneered the second he laid eyes on the young man’s half-elf features. Still, he knew better than to complain or refuse the work. Jake slipped in and out of consciousness as the remains of his damaged eye were cleaned from the wound and the socket was packed with absorbent material and wrapped in gauze. Flint thought he bore the pain well. “Make him sleep,” Flint ordered, and a potion was produced.

Roxanna was furious when he handed the bloody device back to her some hours later. “You left it out on purpose!” she hissed. He only stared at her for a beat.

“When Radek wakes up,” he said after a moment, “send him up to buy an eye patch for Mister Narmolanya. You will do what you can to help him acclimate to his loss. No more painkillers. I need him sharp.”

Roxanna fumed, and then shook her head slightly. “For what?”

“Preparations,” Flint said. “We are going to assassinate the king of assassins.”

[Jake Narmolanya]

The fresh mountain breeze teased Jake’s dirty blond locks, and tugged at his sweat stained clothing.

“I’m going to have to find a new place to meditate. I could smell you the moment you opened the portal,” Breaker said, “when was the last time you bathed? He stood and turned around, brow creasing as he saw the patch over Jake’s empty socket. “Did Skovik do that to you?”

“No,” Jake said, “I traded it. For a rather valuable memory.”

Breaker smiled at his former apprentice, the Y-shaped scars beneath his eyes dimpling. “You found a way to penetrate Ulroké’s inner sanctum.”

“Penetrate is right,” Jake said wryly, “I can portal straight to his bloody bedchamber.”

“Well done,” Breaker said, “it seems you and Flint make a fine team. Even if it did cost you can eye.”

“Well worth it.” Jake replied. “Only now-”

“You want me to train you to fight with half your sight. It may take longer than you have.”

Jake nodded, lifting the sword still clasped loosely in his right hand. “Let’s begin.”

“I did a little research of my own, on Ulroké.” Rather than pluck a blade of grass, Breaker crafted a curved dagger of ice in each hand. “I learned he favors short blades. He also commands a host of other abilities… but if you’re clever, you’ll find a way to make him fight you, sword to knife.”

“He has a protector,” Jake said. “My once-friend Amari. She commands ethereal serpents that pass through blades and armor to bite flesh. Can you teach me to fight them?”

Josh smiled and placed one palm atop the other. “Althanas exists on many planes,” he said, layering his hands again. “To teach you to navigate all of them would take far too long. But you might learn to strike at all of them simultaneously. You wield a great deal of power when you make portals, Jake. This will merely mean learning a new way of channeling it. Focus on the sword.”

Jake drew on the Eternal Tap, and rather than conjuring a portal or fire, merely attempted to express the energy into the sword. For a moment the crystal blade glowed, and then flames erupted from it. Jake nearly dropped the sword in surprise, but willed the fire away instead.

Breaker chuckled. “That was your arcane influence following a familiar path. Try again. Become one with the blade. Make it everywhere, and nowhere at once, as you are when you fight.”

The half elf narrowed his remaining eye and concentrated. The sword began to glow again, and he could feel power circulating between his body and the blade. He could sense that it had grown stronger, and that it reached… outward, and away.

“Good.” Breaker called. “Now see if you can catch the wind.”

A summoned gust knocked Jake off balance, and the demigod somersaulted through the air to land at his side, stabbing high and low with both icy daggers.

Jake leaned into the direction the gust had pushed him and performed a one-handed handspring of his own. As his body rotated his sword swung out like a lateral pendulum, forcing Cronen to stay at range.

“Good,” Cronen called again, and threw one of his daggers at Jake’s face. The half elf struck the projectile with his sword, shattering it into a thousand shards. “Well done,” the demigod grinned, conjuring a replacement dagger. “You’ve been practicing, since you lost the eye.”

“As best I could, with what was available.” Jake attacked this time, driving forward in a flurry of swift thrusts. Cronen evaded them with casual trunk movement, not bothering to bring his blades to bear. His hands remained at his waist as he backpedalled, bobbing and weaving, and then he spun suddenly and threw an arcing kick at Jake’s head.

The half elf could not see the kick coming - it was on his blind side - but he read the movement in Breaker’s body and countered with an upward swing of his glowing sword.

Clang! Jake turned his head in time to see his blade braced against Breaker’s metal boot, and then the demigod spun again and swept his legs from under him.

“With limited vision, you must learn to think more moves ahead,” Josh said, “every battle is a game of chess. Treat it as such.”

They trained for many hours, until Jake was covered in sweat and breathing hard, his empty socket throbbing painfully. He sheathed his sword as Breaker called a halt, and re-adjusted his eyepatch.

“Many thanks,” Jake said, bowing to his instructor. “I should be on my way back to Ettermire.”

“Hold there,” Josh said. He released the icy daggers he still carried, and they melted into a wave of warm water that swept over Jake, cleansing him from head to toe. It drew the sweat and dirt out of his clothing, and seemed to sponge fatigue and pain from his muscles and grave wound. “Now at least you won’t kill your allies with your scent.”

Jake laughed. “You and your sensitive nose.” He turned, and then paused, and pivoted back to face the demigod. Breaker raised an eyebrow. “Could I ask one more favour of you?”

“I suppose I could grant such a boon,” Josh grinned, “for a former student and old friend.”

“Tomorrow, if you could be on this plateau, meditating… just in case we need your help.”

“Haven’t you faith in Skovik and his people?”

“Some,” Jake said, lone green eye narrowing shrewdly, “but I’d feel better with the Breaker in my back pocket.”

Josh considered the request while the wind whipped between them. He nodded. “Tomorrow I will spend the day here. And if a portal appears, I will step through it, and assist you. But after that I will be leaving this place. Your frequent travelling alters the Tap’s energies.”

“Thank you,” Jake said again, and then he crafted a portal between them and ducked through it.