The timber gates of the temple opened just enough to allow passage out one by one. Thael peered out from behind the gate before striding towards the nearest shadow from the clear moon.

The looming circular temple was surrounded by squared stone walls over ten feet, yet was dwarfed by the reedy wooden buildings teetering at least three stories high, looking as if they would collapse over the unyielding dwarven stone.

Mongrel dogs bayed and barked amidst sheltered arguments and muffled weeping in between the clamor. The narrow alleyways choked with the stench of rotting food and acidic tang of piss. But there was something far worse, a taint that could not be caught but hinted of; one of desperation washed over with fetid fear.

Shadows crossed paths with darker shadows as Thael walked alongside Verena, Ircham looming behind beside Shercagh. Nireih crouched atop the buildings, climbing up crevices and jumping over rooftops with a quiet nimbleness only sylvans could reach.

“So what exactly is your plan, Thael?” Verena asked, eyes he knew were looking from the corners of her vision, searching for threats. A pack of half rabid dogs growled in a nearby alley, eyes glinting past the silvered moonlight.

“It’s simple really,” Thael said. “We head to the nearest shithouse of a tavern and ask where Jao is. Leave one standing, and let the rat lead us to his hole.”

“They’ll kill us,” Verena hissed.

“They might. But it will get his attention.”

A dazed thinning beggar appeared to grovel as they drew closer, babbling in Haolo, “Hey, you dumb fuckers! Give me some money, I want to see her! I want to see her again!” His teeth were reddened by the hallucinating herb crimflower, crushed into dust known as rud. Thael had seen people fight for it, kill for it, and always in the end die for it.

He spoke back in Haolo to the beggar, “You want a silver?”

The man nodded, greased black hair matted over gaunt almond shaped eyes now bright with a feverish hunger. A silver piece was enough to buy enough rud for a good while, enough to starve yourself out given enough use and time.

“Show me you have the coin,” the man quipped.

Thael handled a silver piece and raised it over his head, taking a quick step back before the kneeling beggar then shot up to snatch at empty air. He pushed the urchin away with one boot heel and warned once more in Haolo, “Back off, before I feed you to the big man behind me. Show us the nearest tavern, and the piece is yours.”

The man nodded and half skipped with a sudden energy, gesturing to follow him.

"I don't like this," Verena murmured in Cadish.

"Any better than walking into a rebel trap?" Thael replied.

A winding turn here, a back alley there, and he led them to a crooked housing overhanged by a wooden painted sign of a faded green tankard.

"I've shown you. Now your end," the Haolan man grinned, and with one thumb Thael flipped the coin into his hands. The beggar scurried off past and turned out of sight.

Verena motioned in handsign to Nireih's fleeting shadow above, Wait outside. Be ready.

“It’s best you wait outside,” Thael said to Shercagh. “Remain out of sight. You see someone run out, you follow, quietly.”

The dwarf simply shrugged, hooking his halberd over his back and ambled to the shadowed edge of a wall. “I will be here.”

Hacking laughter rang clear as Thael nudged open the door. The tavern was dark, wavering candles revealing keen eyes that judged and waited. Goatees and knotted hair covered honed faces of Haolan descent. Stale ale pooled over sawdust littered floorboards, filling the damp air with its dull tang.

Thael walked over to the rough hewn countertop, pulling back his hood. The man behind the bar frowned, "Never seen you before. You don’t look like you’re here for the sights. What's your business here?"

"Looking for someone," Thael said.

"We serve drink and food. Anything else, look elsewhere."

He moved his hand off the counter top, revealing a silver coin. "Harken Jao. My companions and I are looking to speak with him."

The man shook his head with startled awe. "You're a brave man. Brave, or foolish to ask that here."

As the barkeep spoke, several men stood up from their benches, drawing out either daggers, swords or hatchets. The bartender with wise haste retreated to the safety of the kitchens.

One oxen shaped man spoke in Haolo, "You come to our turf and ask to speak to our boss uninvited? What kind of backwards cunts are you lot?”

Verena backed against the bar, gesturing in rapid handsign to Ircham, No Craft.

The oxen man guffawed, pointing his sword at Verena. “Backwards it is. But I’ll take that pretty cunt myself, and end-”

Thael whipped out a throwing knife that lodged into the man’s throat. He clutched his neck with one hand in befuddled surprise, falling back and leaving a second of stunned silence. Verena and Ircham flung their own knives, killing two men in rapid succession.

The nearest man howled and rushed at Ircham with a sword, who caught his arm and smashed the man’s head over the countertop with a splintering crunch. Verena drew out a straight cutlass, steeled handguard around its handle. Thael criss crossed his hands over the two shortswords at his hips, drawing one out to parry a man’s sword swipe and stab another man’s gut with his other, then pivoting to kick the first man reeling back.

Thael’s limbs moved with a relaxed skill, muscles taut at the right instant, ready to spring forth. He moved no more than where he had to, ducking under an axe's swing and flicking his own swords into exposed flesh with no hesitation, no fear.

Verena moved as a coiling snake, her cutlass its stinging head that stabbed and slit whoever reached her. Ircham wielded a truncheon and steel knuckled dagger already encrusted with gore.

Puddling blood drowned over the sawdusted floor, a metallic sharpness mixing with the dank spilt ale. One man flat on his back moaned over the dozen or so corpses strewn throughout the room.

Thael knelt to wipe his swords against a dead man’s heathered green tunic and sheathed them, striding over to half grab, half strangle the fallen man by his neck.

Thael said in Haolo, tone even, blood speckled across his face. “You’re going to tell Jao that Thael Tanaka wishes to speak with him.”

The man nodded in frenzied agreement. When Thael released him the man hurried out the door, the others retrieving and checking all their equipment.

“We could have just talked,” Verena spoke, her voice a chill quiet.

“They would have attacked us anyways,” Thael said. “I just sped up the process.”

“Now we will never know, will we? Let’s shadow him already. But if you hinder the mission again, I will have Ircham burn you alive. Do you understand?”

“Are we leaving, Verena, or going to spout your threats where it’s needed?”

Thael crouched behind a corner, gazing up at Nireih who was managing to stay ahead of them from above. The Jinn glanced back in futile darkness as he darted past twisting alleyways, staying close to the piss ridden walls.

The man in his haste tripped over a puddle that was a pothole, pained wheezing faint to Thael’s ears. Shercagh for all his size had kept up with them, in quiet work too. The Jinn struggled up, dragging his left foot as he limped faster than he would walk.

He reached a wooden palisade twice as tall as the dwarfs’ dozen foot stone walls, sharpened stakes thick as tree trunks, sentries manning its ramparts. The man spoke to the two guards at its gate, words lost in the distance. One guard rapped on the gate and barked in Haolo. When it opened the same guardsman disappeared inside.

“Seems Jao has done well for himself,” Thael noted. “The rat's hole now a lair. There is no clear entry. Unless you plan to fight Jao’s small army, we should just show ourselves.”

“Just walk out in the open and hope for the best?” Verena hissed. “You whore’s bastard, Thael. You knew this outcome would play out.”

“You know our options.” He shrugged. “Command us.”

Verena motioned in handsign to Nireih, Join us. Within a moment Nireih slipped behind them in the dark.

“Alright then, let’s follow the leader. And no one kills anyone until my word. Thael, take the lead.”

Thael stepped out from the shadows, arms held up, followed by the others. The guards shouted in Haolo overhead, several flatbows aimed down upon them. The surviving man pointed at Thael, “That’s him. That’s the bastard.” The now lone guard drew his sword at their approach.

“I am Thael Tanaka,” Thael announced in their tongue. “We’re here to see Harken Jao.”

The sentries above glanced elsewhere. The wooden gate creaked open, revealing a stoned courtyard with two still forming lines of men who stood stoic, as if they were part of a military parade. They all wore different assortments of leathered armor, but all had the same greyish green tunics underneath. As Thael and the others passed them, the men trailed close behind; their hands remained gripping the handles of their sheathed swords, ready to wield at an instant’s notice.

One man stepped to face them, frowning, hands clasped behind his back. He was stubbled as Ircham, an eye patch strapped over his left eye. He scowled over Thael, his one eye resting over Verena.

“Your weapons,” he gestured to the line of empty handed men before them.

Thael pulled out the silver brooch of his cloak and dropped his pack with a heavy thud, revealing a steel studded black leather brigandine underneath. A clatter of weaponry followed; his leather harness lined with scabbarded daggers, a bolter hooked to its back with a satchel full of quivers, his belt with his two shortswords. The rest did the same, two large men needed to heft Shercagh’s halberd.

A squat building, no more than two stories high, stretched between the fortifications that separated between more wooden buildings to create its own jagged territory, the squat building at its center.

A man’s scream cut off outside, followed by the wet chop of flesh being hacked and the scraping of a body being dragged against the cobblestones. Several men pulled the gate shut and barred it once more from both entry and escape.