On Monday Father Bartolomeu made his way carefully in his small Renault Clio down the rough track that the catwoman Felicia had described, he parked next to the elderly VW Brasilia in the lee of a low dune and forgave Felicia for describing the track as passable, after all it was passable for the Brasilia with its greater clearance.

He made his way to the beach and blinked, he didn’t know of any offshore reefs but he could clearly see a long line of breakers less than a kilometer from the shore. He would have to remember to ask – or rather tell – Sr. Maçarico the harbormaster about them.

He saw a few people sitting in the shade of a couple of large beach umbrellas whilst two children played in the sand nearby. He smiled when he recognized the woman as Felicia, the elf he didn’t know.

Felicia rose and greeted him smilingly, she introduced him to Elorinal and explained that the remainder of their group were currently doing a bit of scuba diving. She also introduced Silverfin’s children Tessarra and Antor.

Father Bartolomeu handed Felicia a thick envelope, “it arrived this morning and it looks important so I came out. I must admit I was curious.”

“Why thank you Father, if it’s what I think then it is, very,” stated Felicia. “May I?” she indicated opening it.

Father Bartolomeu gestured for her to ‘go ahead.’

Felicia inspected the contents, smiled and thanked the priest. “Here’s something for you and Gato,” she said handing the priest a silver St. Christopher’s medallion. “Just think ‘invoke’ while holding it and you will be able to store or retrieve up to two items from it. It currently holds two fish, one is for you or for one of your needy parishioners the other is for Gato.”

After a few protestations Father Bartolomeu accepted his gift especially after being assured that a storage device with only two slots was not that valuable and that he maybe should let his Bishop that such items were possible.

After Father Bartolomeu left, Felicia dashed through the tunnel to her home where she and Antonio signed the appropriate deeds and contracts then returned to the beach before making her excuses and heading to Lisbon to finalise things with their lawyer.

On her way back Felicia stopped in Feira dos Namorados to ask Father Bartolomeu if he knew of a competent architect in need of work.

* * *

Silverfin swam confidently towards the ridge that he was told would contain Antonio’s main dungeon, to his right and slightly below swam Tessana keeping watch crossbow at the ready. On his left with trident prepared glided Galianna, above and slightly behind swam Druissa magic ready to cast. Finally trailing them slightly came Lilly using the locals scuba gear and armed with one of their spear guns.

Fish were abundant, none of them appeared to be dangerous. With their magically enhanced sight all five were able to see the occasional visitors that were dangerous, namely two huge squids.

The new reef appeared in front of them, near the southern end they could just see Otavio and two of his minions presumably guarding Antonio’s core. The caves they had come to explore were not complete yet and more were open to the sea than would be the case later.

It took them a couple of hours to fully explore and map the caves that would be open to the public, Lilly removed the scuba gear and resumed using magic to breath underwater when the air supply started running low.

When they encroached on the closed caverns that would lead to the core they were surprised at how dangerous the challenges were. Poisonous fish and octopuses, swarming eels, and those dammed electric eels. What really scared them was Antonio’s demonstration of the monofilament wire that was going to replace those strings they had kept breaking. Lily had chills running up her spine when Antonio told them through his pixie that he had replaced it with string, as he didn’t want them dead.

Once back on the beach a now somewhat more sober crew struggled with how to classify this dungeon. Most of it was there to be explored and admired, and yes it was already beautiful. The serious bit had deadly defenders, but they weren’t overwhelming, the traps however were truly horrifying, that invisible wire was – unpleasant. And they were convinced Antonio was still keeping secrets from them. It was only natural; he was a dungeon after all.

* * *

Once in Oslo Valentina and her team met with her contact in the unpretentious pleasant building sitting in well-kept grounds surrounded with iron railings. The flagpole was virtually the only thing indicating what it was.

After liaising with a local official they retired for the night and were ready to move at first light. It was after nine that they heard from the agent the embassy had shadowing Shal, or, for them Nadia Alextranovna, apparently she was visiting Norsk Folkemuseum.

Valentina and Vasili soon arrived trailed discretely by their two aids cum guards. They worked their way carefully towards their target and when they finally found her she was in open-air museum eating a freshly-baked lefse slathered with butter, sugar and cinnamon, while watching two ladies in traditional costume baking lefse.

Valentina approached the girl openly whilst Vasili hung back slightly.

“Good morning Nadia, may I call you Nadia? I’m Valentina.”

Shal smiled back, “Why certainly you may, it’s my name after all.”

“Just curious, but how did you gain the title ‘Defender of the Russian People’?” asked Valentina.

“Oh, I helped Loki thwart the Gods of Light. After all no one wanted those psychotic bastards on Earth.”

“Will you teach your country how to cast those rifts and how to become virtually invisible?”

Shal smirked and pointed at her half full glass, “you do realise someone is listening and recording our conversation.”

Valentina hesitated, “Will you come with us?”

“Yes.”

Vasili joined Valentina and they quickly made their way to their car protectively flanking Shal. Then they were on the way to the Embassy.

* * *

Hans Lomborg-Madsen put his gear away, he’d been lucky that the glass had been near the Russian girl, the laser mike had picked up everything they’d said and not knowing Russian he’d not understood a word but their reaction when the girl had pointed to the glass suggested that something important had been said so he sent the file directly to his boss with an explanation.

The file meandered it’s way slowly up the chain until it reached commissioner Knut Gerhardsen who was the first person other than Hans to realize its importance.