Chapter 1.24.

Captain Stan Baltimore spent all last night asking around the Jolly Oyster Cafe about Mike. And as usual, no one saw or heard anything. But he did learn something. After he left, the city guard on this street arrested a thief in hot pursuit. Stan thought it couldn't be related to Mike's disappearance. But as soon as he had some free time, he was going to check it out.

Today his superiors did not let him go anywhere but made him work on papers, preparing a report for the past month. So, Stan stayed in his department most of the day until the evening. He was free when it got dark.

Stan worked only a few blocks from his apartment. He walked there on foot every day. He didn't have to pay for his transportation, and that helped him save a little more than one gold coin a month.

This time, as he left the Central District Guard Department building, he slowly walked along the street. On the way, he stopped at a bar for a late dinner. Stan couldn't resist ordering himself a glass of strong liquor. His worrying about Mike was taking its toll. And he needed to warm up at least a little. After the day's rain, the temperature was low. It felt piercingly cold.

Walking out of the bar, Stan took a cigarette out of his pocket and smoked, thinking over his actions for the next day. Stan couldn't choose between going to Mike's direct superior, Colonel Tirel, or trying to get an appointment with Deputy of Catherine de Graf. It surprised him that after two days no one had ever come to see him, either from Foreign Intelligence or the city guard. Nor had Stan seen any mention of any incident even remotely related to Mike in the morning bulletins. And those fed his paranoia. Several times he caught himself thinking there was no need to do anything. Since they haven't come to him, you don't need to go to them. In time, things would clear up and settle down.

Between the bar and Stan's house was a small park with a pond, where birds often swam, and passersby fed them with breadcrumbs.

The park was noisy during the day, but at night it was quiet - no people, no birds. There were no lights either. The locals used the park at night, too, if they needed to. Stan, for that matter, walked through the park every day and knew practically everything about it.

This time Stan was walking through the park with a lit cigarette in his mouth. It was quite quiet and unexpectedly cold around him. Fortunately, there was no evening fog, probably because it had rained earlier. His path passed near the pond. He did not use his night vision; there were no clouds in the sky, and the stars provided the minimum of light necessary to walk safely.

As Stan approached the pond, he heard what sounded like someone's footsteps behind him several times. The sounds were on the verge of being audible, so either they were far away, or someone was trying to conceal them. Stan looked back to see. But he saw nothing but darkness there.

Once around the pond, Stan had less than half of the park to go. Suddenly he heard distinct footsteps in front of him. After a couple of seconds, he saw two tall silhouettes ahead of him. Judging by the figures, they were obviously not women. In another couple of seconds, the two men were in front of him. They were walking wide, completely blocking the path.

Stan stopped. So did the two men blocking his path.

"Got a smoke?" One of them asked.

Stan didn't know them. Apparently, they weren't from around the neighborhood.

"I don't smoke," Stan answered sharply, taking a puff of his cigarette, which flashed blindingly bright in the darkness. "Let me pass," Stan said without giving them a moment's hesitation.

He took a step forward, but contrary to his expectations, the two men did not part, letting him pass. On the contrary, they closed in a little in front of him.

"Not so fast," said the other.

"My dears," Stan said to them. "You may be blind, but I am, after all, captain of the capital guard."

"We know," replied the first.

"And we're not blind," added the second.

The situation was getting worse and worse.

"And what do you want from me?" Stan asked them.

"You come with us," replied the first one.

"I have other plans."

"That's out of the question," said the second. "The boss ordered us to take you to him."

"We've been waiting for you since lunch," added the first.

"And who's your boss," Stan tried questioning them.

"That's not for you to know."

"Then I decline."

"That's fine with us, too," grinned the first.

They were dressed in the usual dense road clothes. Their cloaks concealed their swords. It was only when they opened their cloaks that Stan noticed their weapons. Unfortunately, he could not see if they had additional body protection in the form of chain mail or plate armor. But judging by the lack of a distinctive sound, there was no metal on them. That diminished their advantage over Stan. Whether they possessed magic, he did not know, but he thought it best to assume that they did. He prepared to activate his shield at the first burst of magical energy. His sword hung loosely on his belt and was easily detached, and his hand was already near the sword.

Both men took a step back and simultaneously began to draw their swords, apparently short one-handed swords. The other hands were both free. Stan hoped they didn't have revolvers or something similar, or his chances of winning might be greatly diminished.

Stan bounced back a meter and unsheathed his sword. He could see pretty well in this darkness, up to four meters. Suddenly he felt a surge of magical energy. He immediately activated his magic shield and jumped aside.

To his surprise, it wasn't a magical attack. The two men synchronously threw something that looked like balloons in different directions, and in a second, they began to glow brightly, illuminating everything around them. Stan only had time to partially turn away, and one of his eyes went blind for a few seconds.

The first man charged at Stan with his sword, hoping to end it with a single blow. But Stan easily deflected his charge and stepped aside, preventing them from coming at him from both sides. They realized this immediately and tried to change their position. Stan couldn't let that happen. He attacked the first abruptly, forcing him to stop and block the blow. Immediately behind him was the second, who tried to attack from behind the first. Stan broke the distance a little and went off in the opposite direction.

They circled around like that for a minute. Stan didn't let them attack at the same time, trying to cover from the second with his partner. Stan was clearly winning in mobility. They realized this, too, and changed tactics. The first stopped actively attacking and began to weave a spell. The second, meanwhile, pulled a pair of throwing knives from his belt.

Stan decided to prepare his own spell as well. He had the elements of earth, water, lightning, and a bit of shadow.

They cast their spells at the same time. The first attacker launched a "fireball" at Stan, which was safely intercepted by his active shield, spreading across it and quickly extinguished, before lighting everything around it with a red light. He grimaced at his failure. Stan, on the other hand, used "stone spikes," which he aimed at the other man when he was already throwing knives at him.

"Aaah," judging from the screams, the use of the spell was successful. Stan grinned but immediately felt a stab in his free hand.

In his left hand, just above the elbow, a throwing knife was sticking out. Stan pulled it out immediately, a sharp pain piercing his arm. The wound seems to have been unpleasant. At that moment the other fell to the ground, grasping his right leg as he continued to scream.

Stan threw the throwing knife aside. At the same time, the first attacker quickly turned around to look at his comrade. After confirming that the wound was not lethal yet, he turned back to Stan. At that moment, unexpectedly for him, Stan was right in front of him and crashed into him with all his might. The first one flew away two meters and fell on his back, but he didn't drop his sword. Before he could get up, Stan was already on top of him. A crossbow bolt whizzed by him. This greatly surprised Stan, but he didn't stop and thrust his sword into his lying enemy with all his might. The man tried to fight back the blow, but his position was very inconvenient. The sword pierced a lung and came out of his back. A sob was heard, and then the man, who was lying there, lost consciousness. Stan didn't take long to add a punch to his head.

He did not pull his sword out but picked up the sword of the attacker. And then he reactivated his shield for physical protection. In the same second the shield flashed a rather bright glow, and a crossbow bolt fell next to him. Quickly he stood up and turned around to see the man shooting at him. He was standing ten meters away, trying to reload his crossbow. Noticing that Stan had risen unharmed, he froze in place. Nearby, the second assailant kept wailing.

Without thinking, Stan began to weave a new spell, but this time it was "Thunder Spear". Once again, they acted simultaneously. There was a deafening thundering sound that could probably be heard outside the park. A crossbow bolt hit the still-active shield right in front of Stan's face. The finger on his left hand, where the ring of protection had been, was red-hot. From the sharp, intense pain in his left hand, he couldn't help but yell, "Aah."

After a few seconds, he looked at his new enemy, lying on the ground, motionless. The crossbow was lying next to him. Stan walked over to him. He was dead. There was a huge hole in his chest where his heart had once been. There was no blood under the body, and the edges of the wound were burned. Stan sighed. He'd overdone it a bit and put a lot of his strength into the spell. Now he could feel slight dizziness. And the smell of burning meat only intensified it.

Stan heard a sound and turned his head. The second attacker was trying to crawl away into the bushes, which were a couple of meters away. He left a long trail of blood behind him. Stan quickly ran up to him.

"Where do you think you're going," he said to the man trying to crawl away. And he kicked the sword out of his hand, which flew away in the air.

The man looked at Stan with a hazy gaze.

"Help," the man wheezed, slumping on his back.

Stan looked down at his feet. One shoe was torn and a little blood was oozing from the wound. Unpleasant, but not deadly. The other leg was bad. The shoe and his foot were a bloody mess with bones sticking out. Blood oozed heavily on the ground.

"Tell me who sent you, and I'll help you," he said to the man lying there.

The man looked at him but said nothing.

"Come on," Stan hurried him. "If I don't help you, you'll bleed to death in a minute."

"Colonel...," he began to say. Stan leaned closer to him. "Colonel Tirel de Graaf," the lying man finally said fully.

"I see," sighed Stan.

Straightening up, he walked over to the sprawled foot. For such an occasion he knew one spell of water magic - "stagnant water". The spell basically made any liquid as viscous as glue. Stan hoped it would help before the healer arrived.

In the distance, he heard the siren whistle of the city guard. He hoped that backup would be arriving soon.