Chapter 20 - Part 5

The top of the wall was smooth, but not slippery. Orphan stooped to look over the city once Delegado had him hauled up. Ashtakala had a mixture of buildings that we collapsed into ruins and buildings that seemed to be recently painted and maintenanced. The city itself seemed to have no plan to its streets or structures. There was a fractured tumult of basalt galleries, towers of volcanic glass, and cracked domes – some of them emitting barely perceptible vapors. The titanic obsidian shards that scraped hungrily at the sky cast thick shadows that seemed to hunger for life to suck and bone to chew on.

Orphan wriggled out of the rope and they dropped the makeshift harness down to the waiting paladin. Thomas was already gone, so Flamebearer had to loop the rope under her arms herself. She seemed fairly competent, even if her armor inhibited her somewhat.

“She knows how to fasten a harness,” Orphan noted. “She helped me get into mine.” He was surprised to see Delegado’s brow furrow. “She’s ready, let’s pull.”

They worked together, yanking the rope up hand over hand. Delegado did most of the work, his huge biceps straining, while Orphan braced behind him, keeping the rope from going slack. Flamebearer ascended quickly.

“You’re going to have to talk to her when we are stalking in the city,” Orphan warned. “You can’t keep turning your back to her, it will be too dangerous.”

“No kidding,” Delegado said. Orphan sensed that he should not push his luck.

Flamebearer came up over the top of the wall and quickly got out of the rope. “Thank you,” she said to Delegado as the half-orc retrieved the rope and began to coil it.

“The mission needed me to do it,” Delegado said, paying attention to his coiling and not looking at her. “Keep your thanks.”

“Come on, Flamebearer,” said Orphan. “There’s a ladder over there, down to street level. I’ll go first to test it, I can fall for a good distance without being injured if I am near a wall, so don’t worry.”

“Flame guide your steps, but let me check it first,” she said. She walked over to the wall as Feather swooped down onto Delegado’s shoulder from a quick look over the city. Orphan listen to Delegado murmur his woodsman’s magic to the hawk, and he watched fascinated was the bugbear paladin took out a stiff line of wire from a hidden belt pouch and traced it over the top of the ladder.

“What are you doing?” Orphan asked.

“Checking for traps,” she said. “There may be something here.”

Orphan watched for a minute, then heard Delegado finish his murmuring. “Feather didn’t go far, but from what he saw, the streets are deserted,” Delegado said. “He had an impression of flickering, like an illusion of the buildings being whole. I think there are leftover glamers around here.” The half-orc noticed Flamebearer’s wire. “What is she doing?”

“Checking the ladder,” Orphan told him.

“I already checked the ladder,” Delegado said. “It’s as safe as it can be, but I wouldn’t put everyone’s weight on it at once.”

“She’s checking it for traps,” Orphan explained.

The warforged was prepared for an angry reaction from the half-orc, perhaps something on the lines of his skill being questioned. The warforged was also prepared for a disparaging remark from the half-orc, or some gesture of impatience to get down into the city already. Certainly they had no time to waste. The second they were detected they were finished. But instead, Delegado’s reaction was…nothing.

No, not nothing, he’s thinking and he’s thinking hard, Orphan realized. But about what? As good as Orphan had become at reading his friend’s mood, he was no Riedran mind-perceiver.

“Here,” Flamebearer said with satisfaction. “Here’s the guide wire.” She took a collapsing pair of pliers out of her belt and cut it. “This little thing would have rung a bell down there, right down in that guardhouse. When I get closer I will use my Flame-blessed abilities to detect the evil there. I expect it’s some small fiend assigned to guard duty that is likely taking its ease, reveling in the sin of sloth.”

“I’ll find it,” Orphan said, sliding off the edge of the wall. He let himself go and fell through the air. Touching the wall occasionally, he used the inner secrets of the Balanced Palm to make his whole body follow his fingertips.

The warforged monk landed on his ankles, taking no more stress than he would have if he had jumped down a few steps of a stairwell. The street he was on was cold, and except for a thin layer of dust on the flagstones it was totally deserted.

The warforged carefully stepped towards the guardhouse. He didn’t need the tracking skills of Delegado to see that the only disturbance in the flagstone dust was from one direction, leading into the structure.

By the time Delegado got down the ladder Orphan had been inside, had successfully snuck up behind the hunched demonling that was extremely similar to the ones Orphan had encountered in the cave attacking the coutal ghost named Sentry, and had snapped its neck. Orphan was standing in the street waiting as the half-orc jumped down from the ladder and took his longbow off his shoulder. Delegado set an arrow against the string as Feather flapped down and landed on a jutting ledge near his master. The half-orc scanned the deserted streets.

“There was a dretch in there,” Orphan said. “I killed it.”

“Right,” Delegado said, his voice distant. While his eyes were professionally keeping track of everything, they seemed distant. There was something wrong, something off.

Orphan was worried. He had never seen Delegado look like this. “What’s wrong?” he asked the half-orc.

“Goblinoids have certain similarities,” Delegado said, his voice oddly hoarse. “Bugbears, goblins, hobgoblins, despite their differences, they’re very similar. Same root race. They walk the same way, sweat the same way, and their veins and arteries follow the same pattern. I’ve studied them, you see. I started getting contracts from Darguun to deal with their fugitives. I eventually brought in my second-biggest bounty, one named Marcuiss, based on that knowledge.” His voice was wandering now, like he was eager to tell side details because his main point was too difficult.

“I don’t understand,” Orphan said. He heard Flamebearer begin her descent.

“Their hair, the way it grows, it’s extremely predictable,” Delegado continued. He fumbled with his bow. “You never meet a goblinoid whose temple hair isn’t straight, with a strong tendency to lay flat and downwards.” Delegado looked up the ladder meaningfully.

Orphan watched Flamebearer descend, puzzled by what the half-orc meant. Then he noticed that the bugbear paladin’s temple hair, from what he could see of it peeking out of her hood of mail, had a slight curl to it.

“Which way are we heading?” Flamebearer whispered as she got to the last few rungs on the ladder. Her sword was sheathed so that she could climb properly.

Delegado dropped his bow and arrow and rushed the bugbear as she stepped onto the street. Before she could realize what was happening he had slammed her into the wall and drawn her sword out of her sheath, tossing it aside.

“Delegado, what are you doing?” Orphan demanded.

“Change back,” Delegado demanded hoarsely, pressing a strong forearm against her throat. She scrambled for a dagger but he grabbed her wrists so tight she gasped. “Don’t screw with me anymore. Just don’t. I’ll kill you and then myself.”

Flamebearer’s face was set in stone, and she stared into Delegado’s eyes. “I was wondering when you would realize it,” she said. “Although I thought that given your hatred of the Silver Flame you would never look at me close enough to figure it out.”

“What’s going on?” Orphan demanded, stepping forward. “Delegado, get your hands off of her.” Neither the half-orc nor the bugbear moved. “Now, Delegado,” Orphan said. “Or I’ll put you in a headlock and cut off the blood flow to your neck until you pass out.”

Delegado’s nostrils flared, but the half-orc took a step back and let the bugbear go. She rubbed her throat. “You want to show him what’s going on?” he asked Flamebearer.

Flamebearer rubbed her wrists, and then there was a barely perceptible shimmer in the air. Her armor became different, turning into a simpler breastplate rather than the heavier layers that it had appeared to be since they’d met her. The stylized silver flames vanished, but it stayed mithril, leaving only a simple, polished surface.

“Do you recognize the armor?” she asked Delegado. “I had it repaired once I got back to Thrane, and then it was enchanted with the glamering.”

Delegado stormed back to his bow and arrow, grabbed them off the street, then whirled around. As he grabbed his weapon, she darted for her sword. Orphan stepped between the two of them.

“Put your weapons down, both of you,” the warforged said.

“I punctured that armor before, I can do it again,” Delegado said, sighting at her. “Orphan, get the f’test out of the way!”

“Put your bow down,” Flamebearer said. “And lower your voice.”

“Flamebearer, sheathe your weapon and tell me what’s going on!” Orphan said.

“Move, Orphan!” Delegado demanded.

“No,” the monk said. “And if you fire I’ll catch your arrow.” He was bluffing, but there were monks in the history of the Balanced Palm who had done that.

The paladin sheathed her sword. “Calm yourself, Orphan,” she said. “I’ll tell you. Delegado and I know each other.”

“Why ‘Flamebearer’?” Delegado demanded, his knuckles whitening on his bow. “You couldn’t think of another name?”

“It’s my title,” she said. Her face changed.

Orphan was stunned. The bugbear’s hair shrank in, and her nose receded. Her flat face pulled back, forming into planes and surfaces very similar to a human’s. Her hands became thinner, but not by much. Her skin and lips were a pale gray, her hair thin and fair, and her eyes were all white, almost blank. Only the angled scar on one cheek remained the same.

“Ois Silva I presume,” Orphan suddenly realized.