Chapter 49

After Bertrand and Wraine disengaged with Reed’s men in the front enclosure, our group of four hurried to the back of the stronghold where we’ll be meeting up with Angelene and figure out what we’re going to do next. There’s only four of us running because Wraine’s carrying Mary while I’m carrying Ilya. Bertrand and Quinn thought it’d be faster and safer if we were the ones who carried them while they protected us. I wanted to disagree because I’d rather throw myself into the mob chasing us than have to rely on myself to protect Ilya but they’re our best fighters and they need to be free to move around and fight. Right now Bertrand’s leading from the front, clearing out any stragglers that pop out in front of us and Quinn’s at the rear, holding off and picking off any pursuer who comes too close to us. Before long, we get to the backyard and Angelene’s finishing off another one of Midriver’s Finest. It looks like she’s been pretty busy here since I left judging by the dozen or so bodies littering the ground. When she sees us arriving along with the mob behind us, she points to one of the houses and shouts, “In there!”

Bertrand rushes inside to clear it out first while Angelene heads over to give Quinn some help. Once Bertrand gives us the okay, Wraine and I head inside the building and put the girls down. Bertrand’s moving the dressers and the tables in the building towards the front door, preparing to barricade it off. There really isn’t much furniture inside the building we can use but we make do and start tearing apart the cupboards for more wood. While all this is happening, Angelene and Quinn are slowly backing up into the building as they keep fighting each step they take. When they’re inside, we block off the front door and take positions near the windows, ready to intercept anyone who tries to crawl through. Ilya and Mary are on the second floor, watching us with frightened eyes through the gaps in the wooden stair rails.

It doesn’t take long before Reed’s men realize getting through the barricaded front door won’t be easy and choose to try the windows instead. The very first victim tried coming in through Wraine’s window and he lost his head for the attempt. For the next ten minutes, Reed’s men try to get inside through the windows to no avail and lose nearly a dozen men in the process before they stop. There’s a silence both inside the house and outside as both parties wait for the other to make their move. I don’t know about them but this house is clearly a deathtrap. They can’t get inside safely and no matter how many men he may have outside, Reed won’t be able to convince them all to throw their lives away. I don’t know why he’s doing this in the first place. If I were him, I’d set the fucking house on fire and burn all of us to death in here. But I guess the fire would spread and even if Alira doesn’t give a fuck about what happens inside this compound, if any of his buildings around here get burned down, there’ll be hell to pay. I suppose this ends in a standoff then, which is good for us since we have the advantage the longer this goes on. My thoughts are interrupted by someone shouting from outside who I think is Reed.

“Bertrand, we all know how this ends. Why don’t you make it easy on yourselves and surrender? I know Derriv’s coming back to the city today and that’s where you’re placing your bet but don’t be expecting him getting here anytime soon or at all even. I made sure someone will keep him preoccupied while I finish up here. Who knows? He might have bit the dust already. Just give up, you’re not getting out of this alive and I could use someone of your talents. What d’you say? Candle in the Dark’s on its last limb and a smart man knows when to leave a sinking ship. I’ll offer the same to you Quinn, you know I hate nobles as much as you do. I have no business with any of them. I think we’ll get along just fine, you and I. Angelene, I know you’re in there. I could use a woman like you by my side. Just hand over Derriv’s daughter and this’ll all be over without any more bloodshed.”

I turn around to look at Bertrand’s, Quinn’s, and Angelene’s faces and all three of them have smirks plastered on their lips. It’s Angelene who responds to Reed first, “I’d rather gouge out my own eyes with a burning torch than become your woman Reed. I think the vast majority of the women in this city share the same sentiment. Why don’t you go fuck yourself and become your own woman instead? At least you won’t have to spend as much to get someone to touch you.”

Everyone on our side shares a laugh but it’s dead silent outside. It’s Quinn who speaks next, “Don’t hate all nobles Reed. Hate what they represent and the type of people they become living that sort of lifestyle. Being honest with you, I hate you more than the dirtiest, most heinous noble living in this city and that’s saying something. I’ll agree with Angelene here, you can go fuck yourself silly for all I fucking care.”

Once again, uproarious laughter inside the house but nothing except silence outside. Bertrand speaks last and wraps it all up, “You heard ‘em Reed. You might have been able to gather quite a few bodies around yourself but not one of them is worth a single hair off my sack. I could tell just by looking at them and how frail looking they are. You’ve surrounded yourself with junkies from your own product and now you realize just how worthless all of them are. Hells, Isaac here hasn’t held a sword in his hand seriously for more than a month and he tore through them like wheat. That’s the difference between you and Derriv. One of you is a leader who chooses who will follow him and the other’s a drug dealer who levies his own customers because no one else will follow him. Need I say more? You know what, I’m with Angelene and Quinn on this one. You can go fuck yourself sideways.” Well, alright, they might be junkies and addicts but I did a hell of a job these past two days. Looking at Bertrand with scorn, he chuckles and tells me not to take it the wrong way.

There’s a moment of silence as Reed takes in everything he just heard. He might be calming himself down before saying anything or he might be thinking of a way to get us out of this house. Before a minute passes, he breaks his silence, “Alright, you heard ‘em boys. 100 gold for all their heads.” Holy shit! How does he have so much money? Drugs are fucking money makers apparently. I thought we stole a good portion of their money when we robbed their stash house but it seems we barely touched their reserves.

The fervor from Reed’s men when they heard the new bounty was utter madness. It feels like the previous assault came from totally different people. These new assailants threw themselves at us disregarding their own lives and their well being. I cut off a man’s left arm and instead of recoiling in pain and perhaps backing off to get himself treated, he lunged at me with nothing but derangement in his eyes, trying to claw at me with his only remaining hand. I’ve never seen anything like this. Are these men or are they beasts? For them to go this far for money has opened my eyes to the dark underside of a gold coin. But I guess I already knew this. I knew all this the day I came to this city. Weistrell showed me the darkness inside the hearts of men and what they were willing to do for money and now I’m seeing it firsthand in person rather than the aftermath. What pure lunacy.

This renewed assault, this renewed vigor from these madmen is too much for us to handle. They’re not even trying to pull the dead bodies from the windowsills to clear the way for the next person, the next person just crawls over the dead body instead. What is this? How are we supposed to contend with these lunatics? When it looks like mine and Wraine’s positions are about to be overrun, Bertrand shouts at all of us to get upstairs. Stabbing my sword into my last victim’s throat before falling back, he doesn’t collapse instantly but holds his head up to glare at me with crazed eyes while his lips stretch into an unearthly smile as blood gurgles out of the corners of his mouth and waterfalls from the deep gash across his neck. It’s a haunting image that sends shivers down my back. Insanity. All of this is nothing but insanity. His head starts to droop after holding my gaze for a moment and he collapses on the body beneath him. Taking one final look at him and at the smile that’s still on his face even after death, I head up the stairs with everyone else.

It looks like Bertrand’s planning on blockading ourselves off inside the house’s master bedroom. I’m the last one into the room and by the time Quinn slams the doors shut and starts blocking it off with furniture, Reed’s men are on their way up the stairs. We can’t see them anymore at this point but we can hear them ramming their shoulders against the door and once they realize that’s not working, they use their swords instead and start hacking away at the door. No one inside the room says anything as we use this chance to catch our breaths. “Isaac, you’re bleeding.” Looking over at Wraine who spoke, he points at my right hand. Looking down, there’s a thin scratch on the back of my right hand. Now when did that happen? Ahh, it was the one who lost his arm. Quinn walks over and takes out a linen bandage from his pack and helps me wrap up my hand. While my hand’s getting wrapped up, Wraine says with a downtrodden tone, “I’m sorry everyone. None of this would have happened if I didn’t mess up three nights ago and tied up the guards properly.” That came out of nowhere. Has he been brooding over that this whole time?

Bertrand turns to Wraine with a chuckle and says, “Don’t think too much about it. Quinn and I already knew Reed was planning an attack on us. We were watching him for an entire week and saw he was gathering men and supplies for something big and when we found his scouts snooping around the compound, checking the place out, well, it doesn’t take a genius to put the two together. The whole reason we had you boys go in there and rob them in the first place was because we wanted to occupy and stall them with the robbery to get us a day or two while Derriv was coming back. Reed would’ve used any excuse to launch an attack on us and he’s just using the two of you as justification. You boys did well enough and got us a full day. This was inevitable, don’t beat yourself up over it.” Wraine responds with a nod but I can tell he’s not fully satisfied with what he heard. But that’s just the type of person he is, he’ll be back to normal once this is all over.

It’s my turn to ask what’s on my mind, “Why doesn’t Reed set fire to the place and smoke us out? Why go through all this?” My questions elicit whimpers from Ilya who’s being held by Angelene and Mary on the bed. “Sorry Ilya, he won’t set fire to this place, we’ll be fine. Don’t worry.” Fuck. I tried to reassure her but it doesn’t look like it worked at all.

“He’s right, Ilya. Reed won’t set this place on fire because he’s greedy and wants the whole place to himself. He’s been eyeing this compound for years now and only started taking real steps in preparing to take it a little over a week ago. I’m sure he already knew Derriv and the rest of the outfit was out of the city but something changed in the last week. I didn’t fully understand what changed until last night when me and Isaac ran into Nars. If Nars got himself involved, then it explains everything. Reed probably got Nars’s blessing to take our compound and promised Alira wouldn’t bat an eye if Reed took it. Alira doesn’t care about what happens to us and would only involve himself if his own men wanted to clear us out. But if it’s by a third party like Reed, then he’ll keep himself out of it. If I had to place my bet on what’s supposedly occupying Derriv and the rest of them right now like Reed mentioned, I’d put my money on Nars and his boys. Nars can’t touch Derriv but Alira won’t say a word if he’s just fucking around with him and stalling for time. Reed doesn’t fully understand our relationship with Alira either if he actually thinks Nars would kill Derriv. But it doesn’t seem he’s putting all his hope on Nars anyways since he initially wanted to get a hold of Ilya to bargain with or threaten Derriv with when he got here. Regardless of everything else, time’s still on our side. As long as we can hold out, Reed will get trapped in here between us and Derriv’s reinforcements.”

The moment Bertrand finishes speaking, we realize it’s oddly silent on the other side of the door. What happened to all the noise from the ramming and the weapons hacking at the door? All of a sudden, we hear a single man on the other side of the door chanting in a language I don’t understand. As he finishes his chant, something happens to the wooden door and all the wooden furniture barricading against the door as if it’s… aging rapidly before our eyes. In no time at all, the wood disintegrates into dust and the doorway is completely open with Reed’s men staring at us from outside of the room, eyeing us hungrily like we’re nothing more than meat to them.

Bertrand’s the first to react and rushes towards the open doorway with his longsword in hand, “Fucking hells they have a mage! That’s how they got into the compound in the first place! I’ll open up a way forward, follow right behind me!” We can’t catch a fucking break, can we?