Path of Dragons

Book 6: Chapter 90: Slums

“That was the grosses thing I’ve ever experienced,” mumbled Sadie, squeezing the water out of her hair. To Elijah’s surprise, entry into the Seat of Thunder had gone off without a hitch, and all four groups had managed to squeeze into a vacant building. The way had been wracked with stress, but Elijah’s initial impression of the city beneath the palace was erroneous in one respect – it was far less populated than he’d first thought. Due to that, it wasn’t difficult to usher everyone out of the drainage pipe and into a nearby building.

But categorizing it as not difficult didn’t make it any easier to endure. Everyone had made that abundantly clear when they’d practically demanded that Elijah summon Healing Rain so they could wash the muck off. For his part, he hadn’t enjoyed it, but his scales made it much easier to endure.

“We’re inside. That’s all that matters,” he pointed out.

“I feel like what we just went through matters. I think it matters quite a bit,” she said with a grimace.

He could only shrug at that. Once everyone was reasonably clean – or at least to the extent possible without undressing, using a metric ton of cleansing powder, and going through his entire store of soap – they gathered in one corner of the building’s ground floor.

Elijah broached the most pressing subject, saying, “Okay. I got us in. What’s the plan now?”

“You don’t know?” asked Ikan. “I presumed that you already had a list of orders for us. We were all prepared to concede your obvious superiority and follow you.”

Elijah didn’t need the war elf’s tone to detect the obvious sarcasm. It seemed that his hopes for a smooth operation were destined to hit a wall. Clearly, Ikan wasn’t happy with his place in the established hierarchy. Such as it was, at least. Nobody had outright labeled Elijah’s party as the leaders of the expedition, but that was just how it had worked out.

And Ikan wasn’t happy about it. Neither was Brika, the feather-headed leader of the other group. Only Lamar seemed neutral, having taken a whatever-works sort of attitude. To say that they were headed toward disfunction was an understatement, though Elijah had no idea how to cut it off.

One thing he knew was that he had no intention of blindly following Ikan or his ilk. He didn’t trust the war elf, and there was nothing Ikan could do – at least in the short-term – to change that.

“And what do you suggest?” asked Sadie. Her voice was calm, but Elijah could feel the frigid anger beneath. She clearly didn’t care much for the war elf, either, and rightly so. The first time they’d met, he’d used an ability to manipulate her and the rest of Elijah’s team.

“I would not be so presumptuous as to overstep my status, my lady,” Ikan said, bowing. It made Elijah want to punch him. Or worse. “I am ever your humble servant. I can read the hierarchy as well as anyone.”

Sadie rolled her eyes, but before she could speak, Brika cut in. Despite an overly long and sharp nose, she was beautiful, with a mane of multi-colored feathers and perfect bone structure. She said, “Kill them all. More kill energy.”

“We call it experience, bro.”

“And we’re not killing a bunch of people just because they’re in the way,” Sadie said. “That’s what Dat meant to say.”

He looked like a deer in headlights as he said, “Oh. Yeah. That.”

“They’re already dead,” argued one of Brika’s group members. A human woman. “We can’t take them with us, right? They’re just going to get swallowed up by the Abyss, aren’t they? There’s no reason to restrain ourselves.”

“Except that I refuse to be the sort of person who kills people just because they’re inconvenient and there are no consequences,” Sadie said, fixing the woman with an icy glare. “And I will not stand by while others do the same.”

“Is that a threat?” the woman asked, stepping forward, her hand on the hilt of a sword.

“A promise.”

“You uppity little –”

“Enough,” Elijah said, stepping between them. “We’re not killing people unless we need to. Here’s what I suggest – I’ll go and scout things out. I can see if there’s a way to avoid killing these people. Anyone else with stealth abilities can go as well.”

“We do not have time for this,” said Ikan. “Every moment we spend in this city, we risk discovery. If that happens…”

“I know,” Elijah said. “I’ll be quick. Just try not to kill one another in the meantime.”

After that, he, Dat, and Helen all set out under the cover of their various versions of stealth. Elijah didn’t like leaving the group like that. They were a powder keg waiting for a spark. As much as everyone had the same ultimate goal – to kill Yloa and get home – they all possessed different motivations, philosophies, and demeanors. It wasn’t a matter of if a fight broke out, but rather when.

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Elijah only hoped that they could hold off for now.

If he was truthful with himself, he knew that sparing the ka’alaki peasants – because that was what they clearly were – was a pointless proposition. As had already been pointed out, they were doomed one way or the other. Still, Elijah felt that if they didn’t make every effort to avoid the slaughter, he and his group would be adversely affected. Perhaps it would only manifest psychologically, but he expected that the system would take that into account as well.

Or maybe not. Perhaps it was just blind hope that the system wouldn’t reward such actions.

Whatever the case, Elijah had long since vowed to control the things he could control while accepting what he could not. The system was certainly one of the latter, while the decision to spare the ka’alaki peasants was obviously among the former.

As he searched the town, he came to a few conclusions. First, the area was almost entirely deserted, with most of the population congregating on the western portion of the complex. The subterranean facility seemed to have been built to accommodate as many as fifty thousand people, complete with residences and buildings meant for commerce. However, if there was even a tenth of that remaining, Elijah would have been incredibly surprised.

In addition, he noticed that a large portion of them seemed malformed. Given what he knew about the history of Ka’arath and the isolated nature of the Seat of Thunder, it didn’t take a leap of logic to determine that they were inbred, with all the consequences that entailed. When they came into range of One with Nature, he confirmed that fact. They didn’t feel unnatural, but they weren’t quite right, either.

It was a bit pitiful, and somewhere in the back of his mind, Elijah wondered if it wasn’t mercy to simply kill them. Consciously, he rejected that notion, but the thought continued to needle him.

As Elijah observed them, he found that they weren’t without organization. Not surprising, really. Any group of people needed structure and leadership in order to survive. It didn’t take him long before he found someone who seemed like he was in charge. Part of that was because he didn’t appear to be inbred, but it was also because he was far more powerful than any of the others.

It wasn’t long before Elijah followed the ka’alaki into a building.

“You can drop that stealth ability,” the ka’alaki said in a deep voice. He turned to look at Elijah, saying, “I’ve known you were here since you first crawled out of that drainage pipe.”

Elijah’s heart jumped into his throat, but he quickly suppressed his panic. He let Shape of Venom fall way, resuming his human form. “You knew?”

“That’s a neat trick,” the ka’alaki said, leaning against a wall and picking at his teeth. The other set of arms were crossed before his chest. “Don’t know many shapeshifters. Is that your only form?”

“I don’t think that’s something you need to know,” Elijah stated.

“Just curious is all. So, here’s the deal. You’re here to kill Yloa. Do you have the bane weapon?”

“Also not your business.”

“You won’t succeed unless you have that weapon. People have tried to kill him before, and he’s come out of it every time,” the ka’alaki stated. “If you do have it – and I’ll assume that you do – I can help you reach him. If not…well, I’ve got a few thousand people who might want to taste whatever it is that you are.”

Elijah took a chance. “I have it.”

“Figured as much. The system probably wouldn’t have sent you here if you didn’t. So, I’m guessing you want free passage, right? I can do that. You’re still going to have to deal with the Guard Captain, the General, and the Houndmaster. And Yloa himself, but you probably expected that,” said the big ka’alaki. “It won’t be easy, but I suppose if it was –”n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Just then, a clatter, followed by a series of screams erupted outside. Elijah felt ethera stir a second before the ka’alaki’s demeanor change. Because of that, he was able to dodge a blade of pure energy that very nearly bisected him.

“Trickery?! I was prepared to help you!” he bellowed, holding a scimitar of pure ethera in each of his four hands.

Elijah danced backward, already shifting into the Shape of Thorn. He considered trying to reason with the ka’alaki, but he knew it would do no good. After all, he could feel what was going on outside, and it was an unmitigated disaster. A certain war elf and his party were gleefully hacking through one malformed ka’alaki after another.

He tried to explain as much, but the big leader was clearly beyond reason, and Elijah didn’t blame him. From his perspective, Elijah had orchestrated a betrayal under the assumption of a truce. It was despicable.

And though Elijah hadn’t had anything to do with the attack, he wasn’t going to simply stand by and let the ka’alaki finish him off. So, he fought back.

The enemy was fast, and those energy scimitars were deadly.

Or they should have been. Against Elijah’s recently upgraded form, it was decidedly less lethal. What’s more, every attack the ka’alaki landed got a toxin-bearing thorn as a response. And he didn’t have the Constitution to resist it. Soon enough, he had slowed considerably, which allowed Elijah to land a single blow that caved the ka’alaki’s chest in.

He lay there, his face a mask of agony, as he struggled to rise. But by that point, as much as Elijah sympathized with the creature’s plight, he wasn’t in a position to allow him to live. So, without further ado, he crushed the ka’alaki’s head beneath his foot. A wave of experience nearly let him cross over to the next level, but it wasn’t quite enough to tip him over the edge.

It did tell Elijah that the creature had been strong, though. The matchup was just bad for the ka’alaki. The Shape of Thorn was strong against most enemies – at least from what Elijah could tell – but it seemed particularly baneful against those who relied on speed.

In any case, he didn’t have time to consider it, because Ikan was busy hacking his way through the other peasants. Elijah barely had a chance to step toward the door before two things happened.

First, Sadie, Lamar, and their respective groups arrived. Elijah could feel their horrified expressions, even from so far away. But he was far more concerned with the arrival of a creature that somehow looked like a stronger version of the hulking ka’alaki he’d seen outside.

And it was not happy, as a surprised Ikan discovered only a moment later when the thing rammed into him. He went flying through the air, skipped across the ground, and came to a rest, broken and unmoving, almost a hundred yards away.

Silence reigned for a brief second before Ikan’s allies rushed the monster. It responded with a bellowing roar and met their charge.