Robin’s heart was hammering in his chest. They needed to take Cor’Leon down and fast or they would be neck-deep in the crime lordling’s underlings. Maybe his new spell could find a chink in the man’s armour.

So Robin tried it. He hadn’t really had cause to before now. But if not now, when?

He opened his mouth and spoke words no tongue should shape, spoke words no ear should hear. These eldritch syllables echoed with the maddening vastness beyond time and Robin pitched them just so. They twisted through the airs, carried by breath and dark intent, these [Whispers from Beyond].

And Cor’Leon…ignored them. Ignored them or resisted the (debatable) might of Robin’s magic.

Well, most of it. Robin could see the man’s jaw clench, his eyes wince at the tearing, teasing, terrible words. But he didn’t run gibbering in fear and horror, which would have been the desired effect. Instead, the damnable man retained enough presence of mind to place the desk between himself and Lantha’s next attack while simultaneously casting a handful of a coarse blue powder into Ora-Jean’s face.

The scout coughed and sneezed and began flailing at the air, roaring in a frothing rage.

‘Ora-Jean!’ Fiamah strode into the room. She was supposed to have held back, an ace in the hole, support as needed, or healing if things took a very wrong turn, but the cleric rushed in to try and deal with whatever was afflicting the scout.

Grathilde was still firing sparks at Cor’Leon. His amulet protected him, glowing brighter and brighter, but the aeromancer wasn’t trying to do damage; she was trying to distract the crime boss and score Lantha an opening.

Lantha struck and her dagger came away wet with blood. It wasn’t enough to take Cor’Leon down, but it clearly hurt him. Robin tossed out another insult with [Cutting Words], trying to keep the man off balance. He received a look of pure hatred in response.

Fiamah was trying to get close enough to Ora-Jean to lay hands on her and remove whatever affliction was plaguing the scout, but the halfling was in a berserk rage, swinging wildly at anyone and anything that came near her. Whatever that stuff was, it was clearly potent and a very effective distraction.

‘You’ll never take me alive before my crew gets here,’ Cor’Leon taunted them. ‘And you’ll need to do a lot better than—’

‘Then we’ll settle for you dead.’ Lantha lunged again, forcing Cor’Leon to scramble back.

FIamah finally managed to get her hands on Ora-Jean. The cleansing power of the cleric’s magic drove the fury from the scout’s eyes. Cor’Leon cursed.

‘And who says your crew is coming?’ Robin leapt in. ‘Foolish to think that it’s hard to buy out a bunch of criminals. How do you think we got in here?’

‘Lies.’ Cor’Leon spat at Robin.

Lantha used the distraction to strike at Cor’Leon again. Ora-Jean flanked. Grathilde tossed out a covering spread of sparks, harrying and hassling. The crime boss was in very serious danger of being overwhelmed.

‘If it’s a lie, why aren’t they here? You certainly made enough noise with that little toy of yours.’ Robin grimaced theatrically. ‘My ears are still ringing. Curious that it didn’t bring anyone running.’

Robin was gambling that the pressure they were putting on Cor’Leon would distract the man. He had no reason to believe the rest of the crew wasn’t almost here. But if he could break Cor’Leon’s spirit, they could take him down before that happened.

‘Damn you.’ Cor’Leon’s face flickered with fear and he vanished.

‘No!’ Lantha lunged for the space the man had just occupied but didn’t strike anything.

Robin had been waiting for something like this to happen. Ever since he’d seen the mysterious figure in the brothel vanish, he’d been thinking about ways to deal with invisibility.

‘Close your eyes!’ He shouted.

Robin pulled a bag of flour out of his storage space and flung it as hard as he could at the centre of the room. A cloud—a wave—of white powder flashed through the room, coating everything and everyone with a layer of fine, white dust.

Including the invisible Cor’Leon.

Like a decaying ghost, the flour clung to one side of the invisible man. And because he was visible, he was once again easily targeted. Lantha and Ora-Jean quickly moved back into flanking position.

‘Clever.’ Cor’Leon coughed. ‘Too clever by half. But you’ll have to do better still.’

The shape of the man blurred, like it had been before in the brothel. Hard to see, harder to target. Cor’Leon managed to evade both Lantha and Ora-Jean’s attacks and retreated toward the window. It was barred with thick rods of iron, but Cor’Leon didn’t seen to care. With a flick of his hand, he threw something to the ground. A bright light flashed, blinding in its intensity.

When Robin managed to blink his eyes clear, there was no sign of the man.

‘Watch the floor for footprints,’ he shouted.

‘There!’ Ora-Jean pointed. ‘They lead to the window.’

The window was still barred. Lantha rattled it. It stayed solidly in place.

‘There must be some kind of latch or trick catch to it,’ she said.

‘Well, find it!’ Grathilde called. ‘We’re going to have company any minute now.’

Robin could hear it too, the pounding of footsteps running through the hallways. They wouldn’t have time to escape! His mind flashed through his contingency plans, made some quick alterations, and he leapt into action.

‘Follow my lead.’ He pointed to Lantha and Ora-Jean. ‘You two, fall to the ground when you hear the big noise. Make it convincing. I’m going to give them a little illusion show. Let them see their boss for the villain he is. Fiamah, get rid of the flour!’

Then, Robin was out of time. He quickly cast [Visual Phantasm], replicating the form of Cor’Leon and placing the image in front of the window, where Ora-Jean and Lantha could look like they were still threatening him. Then he started flexing his fingers through the motions for [Lesser Phantasm]. He needed to get the voice just right…

Cor’Leon’s second in command, Dahn, burst into the room with a handful of others. Robin didn’t give him a chance to zero in on any of the party members. He launched right into the illusory performance, and leaned a little on the volume to make it all but impossible to ignore.

‘Fools! All of you!’ The illusion of Cor’Leon roared. ‘You’re idiots if you think Basgar’s got this place in the palm of his hand! Only smart play was to throw in with him!’

‘Traitor!’ Grathilde yelled, trying to be helpful.

Maybe it did. Dahn and the others were standing in the door, confused. Robin flexed his fingers again, keeping the narrative going.

Lantha lunged at the illusion, ‘narrowly missing’, as Ora-Jean telegraphed some broad strokes with her axe. The scout was not the best actress.

Better wrap this up before anyone has time to start questioning things. Robin had the illusion blur, just as Cor’Leon had. He replicated the man pulling out a stone, throwing it to the ground, and then [Lesser Phantasm] replicated as much of that concussive blast of a sound as it could.

It lacked the sheer force of the original, but it was loud. Robin’s timing was also off. The illusory stone hit the floor well before the sound hit, but hopefully no one noticed. Everyone certainly winced when the sound went off.

Ora-Jean and Lantha were also a bit late in tumbling to the floor, but most of the attention was on Robin’s illusion. It was fine. It would be fine. No one would notice. Just stick the ending!

The fake Cor’Leon then dissolved into mist and coiled out the window, slipping easily through the bars. Robin had no idea if that was a real spell here or not, but the man clearly had so many secrets no one should question it.

‘Boss!’ Dahn cried out in disbelief.

But the man didn’t attack the party. He stood there with the other men and women of Cor’Leon’s crew. They looked poleaxed. Well, betrayal was always a surprise. Unexpected that it would hit a criminal gang this hard, but maybe their loyalty had run deeper than usual?

Lantha and Ora-Jean had hopped back to their feet. Fiamah, Grathilde, and Robin regrouped with them, the desk between the party and the stunned members of Cor’Leon’s crew.

‘Cor’Leon was working for Gis,’ Lantha said, seizing control of the situation. ‘We came here to confront him about it and found him in the middle of clearing this place out.’ She pointed to the sack, money clearly spilling out of it. ‘We confronted him and he attacked us.’

Robin was still riding high on the adrenaline from the fight, but this added tension drawing out the uncertainty was giving him a headache.

‘Why should we believe you?’ one of the women behind Dahn asked.

‘I’m willing to cast a truth spell to prove our words,’ Fiamah cut in. ‘Unless you doubt my word as a sworn servant of Serenya?’

Robin wasn’t sure how much weight that argument would carry with this group. They seemed a relatively impious lot. But instead of taking the cleric up on her offer, they merely shuffled and muttered amongst themselves.

‘Look,’ Lantha said, ‘Cor’Leon is gone. We have no intention of messing with your business here. In fact, we’d much prefer if you could address this in house and get things sorted out quickly.’

‘What do you mean?’ Dahn looked at the rogue.

‘Cor’Leon—the traitor—is gone. But I assume your organisation still needs a leader? And I know the resistance would still like to count on your aid as allies.’ Lantha looked around exaggeratedly. ‘Surely one of you knows enough to run this place? Has been thinking about taking over one day?’

That last sentence prompted more uneasy shuffling. Of course they’d all thought about it. But this was unexpected. And no doubt whoever took it right now would have a massive target on their back. Especially with Cor’Leon still in the wind.

‘Dahn should do it.’ The woman who had challenged them earlier spoke up. ‘He was Cor’Leon’s second, sure, but we trust him. There’s no way he was in on any of this.’

‘I don’t really care,’ Lantha said bluntly. ‘It’s up to you to shake down your organisation and see what other rotten fruit falls out. The source of the poison should be gone but you still need to clean the wounds. And that is not our job.’

Lantha gestured subtly. The party began moving carefully toward the exit. No one made a move to stop them.

Dahn was staring thoughtfully at the bag of money on the floor.

‘Just get your house in order fast,’ Lantha said. ‘Now that we’ve cleared out the spy, we’re going to his Basgar where it hurts.’

‘Hard.’