Book 2 Chapter 34

One night later, Tirr stood pressed against the wall as he peeked around the corner at the large, secluded warehouse some distance away. Maria huddled behind him as they both hid, waiting for the signal from their companions. True to his word, Torvus had brought them to the Assassin’s Guild’s main base within Lutel, an old warehouse district, used to store long-lasting trade goods until they were ready to ship.

The warehouse’s stood at the outskirts of the Capital just before the lands of the more inland villages and towns. It sat behind a barbed fence on a hill overlooking the area around itself. Multiple long buildings clumped together, filled with lumber and other commodities.

Towers that may seem out of place in the civilian warehouse marked the perimeter, their purpose becoming obvious when you knew who the true owners were. Small pockets of light from hanging lamps acted as the only source of light.

A lone group seemed to patrol around the building slowly working their way while they chatted happily, acting as if it was just another night’s work. But Tirr knew that the regular workers had left earlier that day, having been forced to stake out the location until nightfall, and the only people here were the agents of the Confederation.

He also knew that while the patrol seemed to be the only people here, Others hid in the dark around the complex, keeping a watchful eye. The well-placed lamps and patrol acted as a distraction, meant to draw attention towards themselves and away from those that watched from the shadows.

Tirr ducked behind the wall as the patrol came toward the nearby area of the outer fence. “They should have signaled by now…” He whispered towards Maria, feeling not a small amount of irritation at having to go through all of this sneaking around.

“Nerida won’t let Torvus fool around,” Maria replied soothingly.

Tirr replied with a grunt as he let the patrol go past for what seemed like the dozenth time. He understood the reasons why the needed to be careful. A hostage situation was quite different from an open battlefield. He doubted Agir would be happy to stop the war if they returned with a corpse and stories of mystical assassins.

Even then, he would have preferred a more straightforward approach, but after listening to Torvus talk about the shard he and the other assassins used he knew it was no use…

The conversation had been started by Nerida, at the safe house the night before. “If we’re going to be working together…” She had started spitefully, “Don’t you think it’d be a good idea to tell us about the Shard you and your friends use?”

“Never were friends… What do you think it is?” Torvus had replied mischievously.

She stared at him quietly before turning her attention to Tirr, flashing him a smile as she asked if she should cook something. The lack of response made Torvus pout with disappointment

“Okay, okay. I’ll talk, no need to give me the silent treatment.” Torvus muttered to himself. “When you were fighting them, there should have been a few things you noticed right?”

“It was almost impossible to catch them, they moved faster than I could track, and sometimes they seemed to appear from nowhere”

Tirr nodded as he agreed, some of their movement seemed familiar but once more the memories evaded him like mist escaping through his hands.

“That’s all a part of the shard, except they didn’t come from nowhere, they just moved when you couldn’t sense them.”

“How?” Nerida cut in.

“Time…” Torvus replied lazily as he sat back. “The Time shard allows a person a limited control of time itself.”

“There’s no way that’s true… How could you fight that?

“You already have,” Torvus said smiling, “Like I said, it's limited. For scrubs, like we fought tonight, there’s only two real ways for them to even use it without killing themselves.”

He held up a finger as he counted, “First of all they can accelerate their own time. You can think of it as speeding up their body and mind letting them move and react at inhuman speeds. That’s why it felt so hard to keep up with them. However, it's tiring so they can’t keep it up for long. In a battle of endurance, you guys win for sure”

“And the second one?” Tirr asked curiously.

“They can stop time…”

“Stop time!?” The water priestess exclaimed, “Couldn’t they have just done that and killed us then?”

“Doesn’t work like that…” Torvus replied shaking his head. “It takes a huge amount of energy just to stop it in the first place. Many people die on the first attempt as the shard swallows them. I would bet that most of these guys can’t hold it for even a second.”

"Even then that would be long enough right?” Maria questioned.

“When you stop time you and anything directly touching you first stop it can move normally. Everything else though can’t be interacted with” My knife can go through an apple no problem normally right? But if I stopped time, it would be harder than diamond, wouldn’t be able to put a scratch on it.”

“So, you can’t kill someone during the stop?”

No, the best way to use it is either to help your evasion defensively or prepare your approach offensively. You can attack, stop time, and resume just as you’re about to kill them. It takes a good amount of control though. Too late and your attack bounces off uselessly, too early and they have time to react.”

And the other ways you can use it?” Tirr asked staring at Torvus as he remembered the assassin’s implication…

The young man smiled in response, “Well I can not only speed up and stop time for myself, but also slows down or stop time for someone else.” He winked at Tirr, reminding him of the fight in Rasor, ‘Members on my level are rare though and should be guarding the council…”

“Tirr!” A hurried whisper roused him from his thoughts. He looked up just in time to see one of the lamps briefly flash in the distance, signaling their own start to the attack.

“Good,” Tirr said relieved, “Let’s go…”