“So you’ve finally decided to stop screwing around?” Vaozey asked as I pulled her through the network of alleys to get away from the attack site. I hadn’t seen any guards in Muhryehv, but considering the amount of chaos ensuing in the aftermath, it was only a matter of time before some showed up. I had neither the inclination nor the patience to humor them in explaining what our role in the attack was, nor did I have any interest in killing them if I didn’t have to, so the main reason we were putting so much distance between ourselves and the restaurant was to save time.

“If the Rehvites are so brazen here that they would try to assassinate you in public, there’s no sense keeping a low profile at the expense of efficiency,” I replied. “We’re going to find this Baotaov, take everything useful he has, and get out of here as soon as we can.”

“You can’t seriously be expecting to get a caravan, right?” Vaozey asked, stopping in her tracks.

“No, we’re going to walk,” I replied.

“But we don’t have-” Vaozey started, but I knew she was going to protest because she had already mentioned how much she hated hiking in the woods.

“We have enough between the two of us, and there might be more in Baotaov's stash,” I replied. “This is essentially enemy territory at this point anyway, it’s a small miracle that we didn’t get betrayed by the smugglers in addition to Zaadey. We don’t have the time to get a caravan and it’s probably not safe to do so. Therefore, we walk.” Vaozey grimaced, but she didn’t try to counter my argument. “During our operation here, you will make your best effort to follow my orders without being told twice,” I continued. “The objectives are simple: We will be interrogating criminals to obtain the location of our target’s home and then executing a smash-and-grab. However, if we encounter the assassin again, our priority will become fleeing from them.”

“We should kill him!” Vaozey retorted. We don’t even know if it’s a man, I thought, I didn’t get a good enough look.

“We know nothing about the assassin at all,” I countered. “Besides, of course, that they are capable of executing an extremely high-energy magic attack that could instantly kill either one of us. We do not know if there are more of them, we do not know if they are directly connected to Baotaov, and we do not know what other techniques they may be capable of. If we encounter the assassin, we will flee to ensure our safety, understood?”

“You’re so seytoydh paranoid,” Vaozey muttered. “You killed a yihzhae in Owsahlk, I don’t see why this guy is freaking you out.”

“My experiences have demonstrated multiple times that underestimating your people is a good way to die,” I replied. “The crime lord I fought in Vehrehr was nearly as strong as that yihzhae, just not as well-trained, and had I not been familiar with how to counter rapid-fire projectile techniques I would certainly have been killed in Owsahlk. You didn’t see what happened in Kahvahrniydah, but I assure you, the assassin I fought there could have killed me in seconds if his objective wasn’t to capture me. In fact, if Baotaov turns out to be powerful, we will also flee. Combat is not necessarily the goal here, gathering resources and ensuring our safety is.”

“What if we can’t get away?” Vaozey asked.

“Then we fight, and we hope that we don’t die,” I replied. Worst case scenario, I use you as a sacrificial pawn, I thought. The idea felt wrong to consider, but I knew it was the correct course of action. The mission came first, always. “Now, follow me,” I ordered.

“Back to the butchery,” Vaozey guessed.

“Correct,” I replied.

“Just let me go in first,” Vaozey requested. “I want to have a bit of fun.”

The butchery was locked up when we arrived, and I could hear at least two humans inside talking to each other. When I knocked on the door, they paused for a moment, then went straight back to talking, content to ignore the noise. I glanced at Vaozey, who drew her mace, then struck the door around the section where the locking bar was on the inside. Even with just muscular strength I probably could have knocked it off of its hinges, but with force magic, my fist punched through the cheap wooden planks and took the entire locking mechanism out with them.

Vaozey and I burst into the front room, seeing the smuggler from earlier and another man who was part of the caravan staring in shock at us. Allowing Vaozey to take the lead as she had requested on the way over, I stayed a few steps behind her as she walked up to engage the two men, who drew swords once they realized there wouldn’t be any talking their way out of combat. The caravan member went down first, trying and failing to block a crushing blow to his shoulder with his flimsy weapon. Vaozey immediately followed through by smashing his jaw and knocking out most of his teeth, rendering him unconscious.

“Seytoydh ngoyth!” the smuggler yelled, juking past Vaozey and running straight for me. I hadn’t pulled out my weapon, so it appeared that he assumed I wasn’t as dangerous of a combatant as Vaozey. Shoving the point of his sword to my throat as though it was some kind of credible threat, he turned to face Vaozey, apparently intending to use me as some kind of hostage. In response, she paused for a moment, then smiled and started cackling. At the same time, I closed my left hand around the smuggler’s wrist and squeezed with all my strength, pulping all the bones under my fingers and creating a cacophony of snapping noises which were quickly followed by screams.

“We have questions,” I said, pulling the smuggler’s sword out of his currently-useless hand, then turning it around to examine it. The design was a simple symmetrical cross shape, balanced enough to be launched.

“We should take this into the back room,” Vaozey suggested.

“Good idea,” I replied, and as the smuggler watched I hovered his sword out of my hand, then aligned it with my forearm and shot it across the room through the heart of the other caravan member. “It would be in your best interests to cooperate,” I said to him, getting a frantic nod in return. Vaozey kicked the corpse out of the way, then opened up the room where our implanted packages were removed, and I dragged the smuggler across the floor, then threw him inside and closed the door behind us.

“You’re actually the madwoman aren’t you?” the smuggler groaned as his wrist knitted itself back together. “Aoleyt suspected, but-”

“Shut up,” Vaozey growled, kicking him in the stomach. “You’ve stepped in a real pile of shit, and if you want it off your boot, you’re going to answer whatever’s asked of you.”

“You killed Taaz,” the smuggler replied, probably referring to the man whose body was outside the door.

“No, you killed Taaz,” I replied. “Your sword is the one stuck in him, isn’t it?” Realization set in, and the smuggler seemed to deflate a bit, his head dropping to look at the floor. “Where is Baotaov?” I asked.

“You were listenin’ in,” he said, seemingly to himself.

“If you make me ask you again, you will not like the result,” I warned. “I know the packages we were carrying, the black powder and blue leaf in particular, were being delivered to an individual named Baotaov. Where is this person?” The smuggler finally looked up, then glanced at Vaozey for a moment.

“I can’t tell you that,” he said.

“Can’t or won’t?” Vaozey grunted.

“Does it matter?” he replied.

“It certainly does,” I replied, walking up to him and getting close enough to put my hand on his shoulder. I waited a few seconds, then started cooking it from the inside, watching as my victim’s face started to twist from the pain.

“You’re just gonna kill me when you’re done torturin’ me, why would I tell you anythin’?” he grunted.

“This isn’t torture, not yet,” I replied. “Vaozey, is there anything to restrain him with?”

“Yeah, we could pin him down with the knives over here,” Vaozey replied, looking through a cabinet.

“Good,” I replied. “He doesn’t seem magically capable, but I’d rather not have him kill himself before I’m finished.”

As it turned out, the smuggler really didn’t know where Baotaov was, but he did know where the man in the mask was staying, and that man was also responsible for contacting the recipients of his deliveries. I didn’t necessarily believe him, but after the interrogation was done Vaozey told me she thought he was telling the truth. Since we were planning to be out of the city as soon as possible anyway, we didn’t even bother cleaning up the room. Instead, Vaozey threw a bunch of oil around, then knocked the lantern from the ceiling to set it ablaze.

Aoleyt, the masked man, had a house that was three blocks from the butchery according to the smuggler. Thankfully neither Vaozey nor I were covered in blood since the torture was largely done with magic, so walking through the streets wasn’t much of a problem. Still no guards, I noted as we approached our destination, This is obviously a poorer part of the town, but still, are they all near the site of the assassin’s attack or something? Part of my exit plan required finding at least a few of them, so I hoped we would bump into some.

The house was locked, but a lantern was lit inside, so again I knocked on the door to try to gain entry without destroying it. Unlike at the butchery, my knocking was answered by a man with blue eyes, blonde hair, and a mark of ire on his face. For a moment, nobody said a thing, as even Vaozey was stunned by the Aoleyt’s real appearance. Aside from the scars on his cheek, his features were very soft, and he looked much younger than he probably was.

“How did you find me?” he asked, breaking the silence. “Nevermind, let’s go inside to talk. It’s very late, no need to wake the neighbors.” Every single instinct in my mind told me that I was walking into an ambush, but Vaozey pushed ahead of me to follow Aoleyt without hesitation. As long as it looks like she’s the leader, she’ll be targeted first, I reminded myself, following her inside.

Aoleyt’s home was larger than most of the others in the neighborhood and appeared to feature a living room, kitchen, and a closed room that was likely a bedroom of some sort. He led us to the former, then sat down in a padded chair, inviting us to do the same. Neither Vaozey nor I took him up on the offer, though her motivation was probably different from mine.

“Baotaov,” Vaozey said. “Where is he?”

“So that’s what you’re here for?” Aoleyt asked with a strange grin. “The madwoman herself, butcher of Rehvites, is in my home because she wants me to introduce her to one.”

“Answer the question,” I said. “It will be morning in a few hours, and we would prefer to conclude our business with him before sunrise.”

“He’ll kill you, you know?” Aoleyt prompted. “If you’re going to die anyway, why not do it here instead? We could have some real fu-” Aoleyt’s taunting was cut off by Vaozey kicking him in the face, knocking both him and the chair he was sitting in over onto the ground. As he got to his feet and spat out some teeth Aoleyt laughed, apparently amused by the outburst.

“Seytoydh zaeternaaf,” Vaozey swore.

“Takes one to know one,” Aoleyt taunted. “I must say, I’m disappointed that your face has been healed. I’m sure its scars were beautiful.”

“Baotaov,” I reminded him, stepping in front of Vaozey to stop her from clobbering him. “I won’t ask nicely again.”

“And who are you supposed to be?” Aoleyt asked. “Some mercenary she hired to help her out? A kehpveht? No, you’re foreign…” Not being immediately recognized for once was almost a strange feeling. “Regardless, I doubt you have any way to make me talk,” he finished.

“That’s almost exactly what the last guy said,” I replied. “He told us where to find you.”

“Who was it? Taaz? Zhaol?” Aoleyt asked. “Zhaol it is then, I’ll have to thank him if you left him in one piece. Oh, you didn’t. Well, that’s a bit of a shame.” Pretty good at reading expressions, I thought.

“So, easy way or hard way?” Vaozey asked.

“Hard way,” Aoleyt grinned. “I’ll have much more fun if this takes a while.”

“You’re… still not… giving me enough… stimulation…” Aoleyt gasped thirty minutes later, covered in blood and missing an arm as he sat propped up against a wall. Maddening as it was, he genuinely appeared to enjoy being harmed, which made a majority of my interrogation techniques completely useless. When I ripped his right arm off with my bare hands, he looked more like he was impressed than suffering. “Maybe you can… have your pretty friend… help me out…” he joked.

“You’re almost as disgusting as they are,” Vaozey snarled, gesturing for me to move out of the way. I let her take the lead again, wiping my sword off on the nearby couch and sheathing it as I stood back and watched. Vaozey reached out and put her hand on his face, covering up the mark of ire with her palm gently. “If I do this, I can’t even tell the difference,” she muttered.

“I much prefer physical pain, but I’ll take that too,” Aoleyt snarked. In response, Vaozey shoved him to the ground and the smell of cooking flesh filling the air. “But wait, you’re-you can’t do-” Aoleyt stuttered, sounding more surprised than uncomfortable.

“I found a very talented instructor,” Vaozey replied, grinning widely. “This still hurts a lot, but it has its uses.” As she withdrew her hand, pieces of near-liquid flesh clung to Aoleyt’s face, snapping off and bleeding lightly before being repaired by healing magic. Where there was a mark of ire before, there was now a much larger burn in the shape of a handprint.

“Thanks for the souvenir,” Aoleyt joked through gritted teeth. “I think I’ll need a few more before I tell you where Baotaov is though. How about one on the other side? Actually, let’s do the chest, I’ll need help getting my shirt off though.”

“I’ve got a better idea,” Vaozey replied, grabbing Aoleyt between his legs.

“Sorry to tell you, but that part of me doesn’t work very well,” Aoleyt laughed. “I’m flattered though, truly. You’re exactly my type. This is like a dream for me.”

“I wasn’t thinking of using it that way anyway,” Vaozey replied in an ominous tone. “Let’s give you that second handprint you asked for.” The smell of burning hair and flesh met my nose again, and for the first time since the interrogation began, Aoleyt began screaming in genuine pain.

Aoleyt had a cellar, a fact that came out during torture when he informed us that he had a number of vials of repellent stored in it. Because of that, when we finally got Baotaov’s location from him, I didn’t kill him. Instead, Aoleyt was relieved of the rest of his limbs and tossed into that same cellar for safekeeping, while the limbs in question were left upstairs just in case he had some way to reattach them. It was unlikely, considering the mark of ire he had when we started, but I wasn’t about to take any unnecessary risks.

As Vaozey and I were washing ourselves off in the kitchen with some of Aoleyt’s stored water, I heard someone talking just outside the front door. Vaozey heard it too, just a second after I did, and we both drew weapons in preparation for combat. Because Aoleyt’s windows were made of cheap and foggy glass we couldn’t see who was outside, but they couldn’t see us either, so I crept over to the door while Vaazey took up an ambush position, then cracked it open to peek out, keeping my sword from view.

“Muhryehv city guard,” the man at the door said as soon as he saw me. He and another man in a guard uniform were both standing about a meter from the door, looking relaxed but clearly having some purpose to their presence. “Are you Aoleyt?”

“What’s this about?” I asked. They probably aren’t from this area, I thought, Somehow, I suspect Aoleyt is probably well known to whatever law enforcement officers are normally assigned to this place.

“Someone heard screaming coming from inside your home a few minutes ago and reported it,” the guard said.

“Is that a problem?” I asked.

“Making noise in the middle of the night is a problem,” the guard replied sternly. “Is there some reason you’re hiding behind the door like that?”

“I’m not dressed properly,” I replied.

“Oh,” the guard said, suddenly looking embarrassed for some reason. “That, er, explains it. Listen, if you could just keep it down in there, that would be good for both of us. Also, keep an eye out for anyone suspicious, there’s been some kind of attack at a nearby restaurant.”

“Of course,” I replied, hiding my confusion. “Thanks for the warning.”

“Have a good night,” the guard said, and I nodded and then closed the door. Vaozey, who was standing to left with her mace raised, gave me a strange look as the two men walked away.

“Probably should’ve killed them, just to be sure,” she said.

“By the time they report this, if they do, we’ll be far away,” I replied. “Baotaov’s alleged location is about a twenty minute walk from here. Let’s get going.”

“I thought being done before sunrise was a bit of a stretch, but we might actually pull it off,” Vaozey said, punctuating her sentence with a single grunt of amusement.

“We haven’t even gotten to the dangerous part yet,” I replied. “Remember to stay alert.”

When Aoleyt had told us about the location of Baotaov’s residence he specifically used the word “hideout”. I didn’t take much note of it, since it might have just been a figure of speech, but when we came upon the house that the hideout was allegedly located under I began to have a strange feeling. Rehvites typically had a lot of wealth, but the run-down house looked like it hadn’t been lived in for years and was anything but opulent in terms of material construction. Vaozey looked suspicious too, constantly checking behind us but not finding anything.

The entrance to the lower level was around the back of the house, an obvious set of stairs covered by a simple set of diagonal doors. They were reinforced, locked, and newer than the rest of the house’s construction, but since their base material was wood it didn’t take long for me to simply tear the metal locking components out to gain entry. No lanterns were lit in the basement, so I created a small orb of orange light to illuminate our path as Vaozey and I descended the stairs.

We never actually asked what Baotaov is, I realized once we came to a second, metal door at the end of the short tunnel. I had assumed he was some kind of criminal, or potentially just a more “standard” kind of Rehvite, but as I used force magic to pull aside a thin shutter on the door used for peeking in and out I began to suspect that he might be something else entirely. Aoleyt said he was a Rehvite, but what kind of Rehvite would live like this? I wondered.

The inside of the room was small and spartan, but also filthy. The walls were crude stone, covered in dust and mud, and the floor was made of simple wooden boards. In the far left corner there appeared to be a bundle of blankets and bedding used for sleeping, but no bedframe of any kind. Just across from that was a desk that was covered in knives and bottles. Besides that, there were also a few piles of clothing strewn about, and a single shelf on the left wall that held a book.

“Open it already,” Vaozey said from behind me. “This place is freaking me out.”

“It’s not as easy when the walls are stone and the mechanism isn’t visible,” I replied, trying to get a look at exactly how the door was locked on the other side. I could try using force magic, but it’s probably secured against that, and the effectiveness is limited when I can’t see the target, I thought, examining the simple keyhole. Maybe the finger trick would work? No, it’s too thin.

“Found the key,” Vaozey said, holding up a piece of metal that looked like it would fit the door. For a moment, I was stunned, and my jaw nearly dropped. “Most people leave a spare outside somewhere,” Vaozey explained. “It was in the wall over there.” I looked where she pointed and saw a small section of dirt taken out of the wall of the tunnel.

“Why would someone ever leave a key in such a location?” I wondered aloud as I took it from her and slipped it into the keyhole. It fit perfectly, and a moment later the door swung open, allowing Vaozey to see what I had been observing through the shutter.

“Gods,” she muttered, “it’s filthy.” Ignoring the mess, I walked over to the desk and began examining the bottles. None of this is blue leaf, but this one is black powder, I thought, no repellent either, but I guess he probably doesn’t need it. Is this really everything he has? Several of the substances in the bottles were things I didn’t recognize, and I motioned for Vaozey to assist me.

“Do you know what this is?” I asked, holding up a bottle of green powder.

“Tiyd maybe,” she replied, taking the bottle and looking at it. “Medicine for headaches, not really that useful for us.”

“I’ll take it,” I replied, stashing the bottle in one of my pockets.

“Oh yeah, you have that thing with the repellent,” Vaozey muttered. “Just don’t take too much, it can make you lightheaded. Hey, what’re those?” She pointed to some metal cylinders on the desk that were partially covered with a cloth. Pulling one out, I saw that it was engraved with an ant symbol, along with a triangle with a line from the center to the bottom face like the one on the mark of ire.

“Messages maybe?” I suggested, twisting the cap of the vial off. “No, wait, this is…” Instead of paper, the vial contained blood, or something that looked and smelled exactly like blood. As quickly as I could, I capped the vial again, not wanting to potentially damage the contents.

“Seyt,” Vaozey swore, and I looked up to see her staring at something on the front wall beside the door. “What a bunch of freaky-looking masks.” My eyes followed hers, landing on what she was looking at, and I saw two owl-like face coverings staring back at me, with an empty spot for a third. She didn’t see him on the roof, I remembered as other pieces of evidence began to fit together in my mind. Damn it, I should have realized earlier.

“We’re getting out of here now,” I said. “Grab as many of the bottles as you can.”

“What? Why?” Vaozey asked, walking over to the desk and grabbing the closest bottle.

“Baotaov is the assassin,” I replied. “We need to be gone before he comes back.”