Chapter 12 - Part 9

Her name was Mizha, and she was a young gnome woman who was barely an adult by their lifespan. She had been taking stock of the preserves when the first fireball had hit, and was trapped in the rubble. Delegado and the other men moved the major pieces with a crane, and the warforged known as Iron Orphan jumped down into the darkness with a glowing rod that Delegado had lent him. He came back up with Mizha on his shoulders.

“Scratches and a twisted ankle,” the half-orc said, walking over to the warforged. “But they say she wasn’t going to last much longer because air couldn’t get into where she was trapped. You did good.”

Iron Orphan looked at the tree line to the west. “Nice to know someone likes me,” he said. “If not for Pienna I think I would leave this place.”

“You ready to drop the whole do-good-for-good’s sake just because of some nasty looks?” Delegado asked. For once he wasn’t baiting the warforged, he was merely curious.

“No, for I have been called far worse,” the warforged answered. The half-orc was not exactly a people person, but he could tell that the ‘forged was being truthful. “I just don’t want to be blamed for what other warforged do.” He cocked his head at Delegado. “Some of the newspapers that people read, they have lurid, bloody tales of warforged. And a few nasty tales of half-orcs.”

Delegado smiled a mirthless smile. “People don’t like half-breeds,” he said. “It took centuries for the half-elves to become accepted, and even then it was due to numbers and a pair of dragonmarked houses.” He paused, wondering why he was trying to make peace with this thing. Had the halfling’s words affected him that badly?

“You seem well-liked,” Iron Orphan said. “And from what I heard of your conversation with that boy, I believe you could be more well-liked if you tried.”

Delegado wasn’t shocked anymore. This warforged had uncanny hearing. “Yeah, well, keep that to yourself. I like being blunt, it saves time.” He scratched an ear. “Besides, the kid was sweet on a half-orc, so it touched me.”

“Why are you being nice to me when you resent the fact that I bested you in combat?” the warforged asked him.

“You didn’t best me in combat,” Delegado said. “Those packets of gagging dust you dumped down bested on me. And it was a good move that I can respect, it helps you exploit a natural advantage. I hope you’ve managed to get ahold of more.”

“Yes,” Orphan said carefully, gauging Delegado with a look. “Sort of how you like to stalk in the dark, using your orc sight. But you didn’t answer my question. Why are you being nice to me? Is it because of what Drorin said?”

“No,” Delegado said firmly. “It’s because we’re going to be fighting side-by-side soon. Not easy to do that with bad blood.”

“Not easy to do it when you lie to yourself,” Iron Orphan told him.

Delegado leaned in, and had some satisfaction when the warforged leaned back. “Stay out of my head,” he said firmly. “I’m trying to make peace here. Don’t f’test it all to the Keeper.”

“Fine,” Orphan told him. Delegado backed off. “So we didn’t go with Pienna because we may need to hold off an attack all by ourselves. You seemed to do well enough against the bandits that you met.”

“They were rejects, and they were meant to be cannon fodder,” Delegado said. “They were also first wave. Either they were a tripwire force or their commander was a real idiot when it comes to tactics.”

“What is a tripwire force?”

“It’s a force that when it gets attacked, or wiped out, that alerts another, larger force by its absence.” He patted his longbow. “I got them with range. I could see them coming, and I took them down before they took me down.”

The warforged looked at the bow. “That is a very large weapon.”

Delegado grinned, took it off, and handed it to him. “Here, try and draw it.”

The warforged gingerly took the bow, stood it in front of him, and tried to draw the string. He pulled, and it barely moved. It twanged back into place as he let it go. “That’s some bow,” he said, passing it back. “Adds more punch I take it?”

“You take it right,” Delegado said, putting it back on his shoulder. “It’s a composite weapon with what they call a mighty pull. It’s also specially-crafted for perfect balance. Even with a normal arrow I can punch through plate mail at a distance that you couldn’t rely on one of those spinning knives of yours.”

“They are called shiruken, and they can be hidden far more easily than your giant bow can,” Orphan said. “Alright, so you want to coordinate tactics?”

“That is the plan,” Delegado said. A shout went up from some of the men watching the Orien road. “Or that was the plan. Let’s go!”

They sprinted to the men on watch, some three militia types and one farmer with a club. Orphan made it there well before Delegado, his legs a blur. The half-orc got his bow out and set his feet next to the warforged monk, holding not one, but two arrows in place on the bowstring.

Booted feet marched in cadence as the odd procession came down the road. Nine men walked in a three by three box formation, in studded leather armor with swords sheathed. They each had a sapling, freshly cut, with a white cloth atop it. Another white cloth was tied to their heads like a kerchief.

“I like the hats,” one man muttered.

“It says nasty things on their heads is why,” grunted another man, a shifter who looked ready to bite someone.

“Look behind them,” Iron Orphan said. “And above them.”

A carpet, no more than an ordinary, square throw rug, barely six feet on a side, hovered behind the marching soldiers. A woman sat atop it, her form wrapped in sheets and veils. Flying along with her were two short things, constructs of wrinkly skin with flapping bat wings. Delegado had seen them before, they were homunculi, a status symbol and a pet for many powerful artificers. A chest with legs ran on the ground under the flying rug, and what appeared to be a crossbow with hands and a face sat in the woman’s lap.

“Do we attack, sir?” asked the farmer with the club.

“Do I attack is the question,” Delegado said. “I can end them before they ever get here. What say you, Orphan? There’s a flag of truce.”

“I say tell them to stand back while I go get the mayor,” Orphan said, already turning and running.

“Do not advance any further!” Delegado called to the group. He yelled again, putting all he could into it. “Do not advance any further!”

The men stopped, and they conversed with their leader, the woman on the rug. After a moment she held a device to her mouth and spoke. The device carried her words some three hundred feet to them as clearly as if she was standing within arm’s reach.

“Men and women of Merylsward,” she said. “I am Lo’Paih. I have the means at hand for your deliverance. Assuming I can get them into place of course.”

People looked at each other, excited. The woman sounded so confident, so truthful.

She’s a darn good artificer if she can make and run four constructs, Delegado thought. That means she can easily put an infusion into her speaking-tube that makes her sound more trustworthy, puts more persuasion in her words. “We’d rather not have Aundairians come here just yet,” Delegado told her, keeping his voice firm but not yelling. He assumed that the speaking tube would work both ways. “And we have enough snipers to take your men out in less than a minute, so they would be advised not to advance.”

“I think you want these men – who have thrown off Aundair’s yoke as you yourselves have – with you quite soon,” was her reply. “I have infused their blades with a temporary bane enchantment that works against constructs. There are a few hundred warforged marching on your town. Between my own constructs and the special blades that my men wield, you will have a significant chance. But the infusion is temporary. It will fade in approximately forty-two minutes. If you do not accept me as an ally, then I shall take my task force with their enchanted blades, my constructs, and my devices, and leave you to be slaughtered.”

“I could take your men out and then take the blades,” Delegado said.

In response she threw a whirlygig of tiny, white dragonshards, which burst onto the ground some ten feet in front of her men. A great whooshing sound went up, and a wall of surging elemental air appeared, wide and high. “Feel free to waste your arrows, if you wish,” she said.

“Hey!” said a man behind Delegado, punching him in the shoulder. “You’d better knock off that –”

The half-orc was up and around with a roundhouse punch that lifted the man behind him off of his feet, throwing him backwards in an unconscious heap. Blood poured from a shattered nose and a split lip. “You really don’t want to hit me,” Delegado growled. The men around him took a step back.

“I have no intention of hitting you,” Lo’Paih said. “But I can see with my lens that you weren’t talking to me. That’s a nice belt buckle, by the way. So you are House Tharashk, are you? Has your house taken sides in this conflict? That news would not go over well in some circles.”

“I am helping a fellow house, House Vadalis, whose property and people were attacked in an unjust magical assault,” Delegado said carefully. “And I am sure that Aundair would be more interested in hearing how a Cannith Lady took their soldiers than hearing how a half-orc from the Marches who got stuck in the wrong place at the wrong time decided to give some people a hand.”

“I am no longer of House Cannith,” Lo’Paih said, her voice finally showing some emotion. It was anger, with some bitterness. She felt that Cannith had wronged her, he could tell. He had been tracking humans long enough to know the vocal inflections, even through a magical tube. “Now are you going to bring someone here for me to negotiate with who is empowered to represent this town or will I have to leave?”

“The mayor’s on his way,” Delegado said. He had a very bad feeling about this.

“She wants to help us for free, and the mercenary here hits one of us,” someone grumbled.
A very bad feeling.