Vaozey’s plan, if it could be called a plan, was extremely simple: We would say to everyone that the people we killed were militant detested and their supporters who had abducted our commander for unknown reasons. Our captive, the sole survivor, had agreed to cooperate with us and help us find the rest of his group in exchange for leniency. On the surface, it was probably a solid plan, but there were immediate questions that I had to ask before I would even let her out the door.

“Doesn’t he know who you are?” I asked quietly, gesturing to the quietly crying captive. “Even if he doesn’t, can’t he identify you?”

“I’m not going to let him live,” Vaozey muttered back, barely audible. “Just trust me on this, if he tries anything he’ll be dead before he can get more than one or two words out.” This isn’t a great idea, I thought.

“Why don’t we just find the Tawnay building ourselves?” I asked. “Surely we could just ask someone.”

“We could, but if we bring him, we might even get in the front door before everyone starts trying to kill us,” Vaozey replied. “Do you have any of those pills?” I checked my pocket after wiping my hand on my pants.

“Three,” I grunted.

“Give me one,” Vaozey said, holding out her hand. “Do you need more magic fuel?”

“No, I’m mostly fine,” I said, handing her the pill. She slipped it under her helmet into her mouth, then shivered and inhaled sharply. “You’re sure about this?” I asked.

“Pretty sure,” Vaozey replied. “I’ll just kill him if anything goes wrong. You hear that?” She raised her voice for the question, directing it to the captive, who whimpered.

“How do you plan to carry him?” I asked.

“Thought you’d never ask,” Vaozey replied, and I could tell she was grinning.

The answer was that Vaozey shoved her fingers through the man’s flesh to grip him around his spine between the shoulder blades, allowing her to carry him like a living suitcase. When we exited out into the street, I realized just how bad the air in the bar had gotten, and got to watch as some of the people who had gathered around the entrance due to the noise shirked back and covered their faces in an attempt to avoid the stench. Vaozey was covered nearly head-to-toe in gore, and I was splattered with it as well, so the following screams and scattering civilians were well warranted.

“Where are we going?” Vaozey asked, raising our captive up.

“Left,” he groaned. “Then right at the end of the road. Go straight for a while, I’ll tell you when to stop.”

“Good, very cooperative,” Vaozey said, letting her arm fall back down and ignoring the winces and gasps of pain from the man as his spine was bent from the action. Once again, people avoided us as we headed left down the street, some stumbling over themselves to get out of the way for fear that they might be killed. Sounds of retching and vomiting came from behind us after a few seconds as the more curious of the crowd presumably tried to enter the bar and found the scene that was left behind. I was shocked at how long it took for any of the guards to stop us, considering what we looked like, but they did eventually try to get in our way again after we turned right onto the main road.

“Stop right there!” a male voice yelled, and a team of five men with swords in hand ran over to us, forming a rough quarter circle in our path a few meters away. Vaozey, huffing angrily, slowed to a stop and I stopped shortly behind her. I didn’t trust the captive not to try to call out, so I changed up a dagger and kept it aimed in his direction just in case. “Drop him!” the leader of the group ordered.

“Get out of my way or you’ll end up looking like him,” Vaozey threatened back.

“The military is not allowed to operate in this manner inside city walls!” the leader shouted. “You are in violation of the public order and you will surrender yourselves without incident!” Vaozey did something, probably involving heat magic, and the captive screamed out in pain. Then she pulled him up so he was standing straight and the guards could see his face. It was plain to see that at least three of the five knew who he was.

“Just as I thought,” Vaozey snarled. “Corrupt and lazy idiots, protecting a den of detested filth and waving their little toys around in the faces of their betters.”

“Drop him!” the leader snapped back.

“I am going to give you a choice with three options,” Vaozey said, burning the man again so badly that I saw the flesh on his back begin to boil. “You can die here like the rest of this thing’s associates, you can get out of our way, or you can do the jobs that the citizens’ taxes pay for and assist us in clearing out the main den. Choose wisely, unlike the group of twenty that attacked us with this man.”

“No deal, drop him,” the leader replied, but his men didn’t look very convinced. Two were subtly backing up, and the other two were clearly frozen with indecision. Vaozey, letting the captive drop to her side again, simply began to walk forward. The two scared guards began backing up, the two frozen ones also chose to back up, but the leader stayed in place. When Vaozey was close enough, he swung his sword and struck her on the shoulder. Her armor, which was battered and covered in cuts by this point, gained another tear as the weapon stuck in firmly.

“Very poor choice,” Vaozey said, and she shoved him with her free hand. The leader lost his footing and scraped almost five meters along the cobbled stone of the street before coming to a stop. As he sat up, a faint impression of Vaozey’s hand was visible in his breastplate, and he coughed as he tried to regain his breath. When it was clear he wasn’t going to try to stop her again, Vaozey gestured to me to follow, and I did so, putting the dagger away.

“Might not have been a good idea,” I said once we were out of earshot.

“It made my point to everyone around,” Vazoey replied. “Those useless npoytz won’t have the trust of anyone around here, at least not compared to us.” So it was a social display, I thought, I didn’t think she was considering that. “Now, you,” Vaozey said, burning our captive again. “How long until we’re there?”

“I’ll tell you when,” he groaned. “It’s… a while.”

“You had better hope, for your sake, that they’re more polite than you were,” Vaozey warned. All she got in reply was incoherent whimpers.

The Tawnay building sat on a large lot on the opposite end of town from the bar, yet in an area with a similar demographic to the store where we had initially started our investigation. It was vaguely pyramidal in structure, with the bottom floor being around ten percent larger than the floor atop it, and the one atop that being ten percent smaller again, probably as some way to help its construction achieve stability. Unlike the other stone buildings, it looked to be made almost entirely of cement, which may have explained its strange shape. Crystal glass windows dotted the exterior walls at regular intervals, braced with polished wood.

There were no guards standing at the exterior wall around the property, but the pair in full plate standing to either side of the building’s entrance door took one look at us and sprang into action, ringing a bell and grabbing halberds from nearby. It’s been a while since I’ve seen polearms, I thought, I wonder if that means anything.

“We have something of yours here,” Vaozey announced, holding up our captive. “We’d like to return it to your master, but we’re going to need to have a talk with him about the circumstances surrounding us finding it.” Five more people, who weren’t wearing as much armor as the two guards, ran out through the entrance door with crossbows and swords. Nothing they had was any threat to Vaozey, but I made a point of keeping track of the crossbows. Luckily none were pointed at me.

“You must be seytoydh stupid walking in here like this,” one of the armored guards yelled back. Female, I thought.

“Why don’t you call your boss down here and have him chat with us?” Vaozey offered.

“No chance,” the second armored guard replied. Male, I thought, so then the armor must be unisex. That’s odd, usually there are alterations around the hips and chest for comfort. Perhaps a cost-saving measure?

“What’s the boss’s name?” Vaozey asked.

“Put him-” the female armored guard began.

“I wasn’t asking you,” Vaozey growled at her, and the captive began to scream. “His name, now.”

“Roytmay!” the captive yelled, and it took me a moment to recall where I had heard the name before. When my brain finally found the memories it was looking for, I frowned under my helmet. You have got to be kidding me, I thought. Vaozey was silent as well, then there was a cracking noise as the captive’s spine was pulped inside her fist. He choked out a scream and then Vaozey threw him at the ground hard enough to knock him unconscious before splattering his skull under her boot, shocking everyone.

“So it’s Roytmay then,” she announced, halfway between singing with joy and seething with rage. “Oh, I should have suspected. I should have remembered. That seytoydh npoyt ngaazmayjh stuffed me full of drugs and sent me to an assassin the last time I was in this city. You tell that short little teylm to get his runt ass down here in five minutes or I’ll kill my way up to find him. He had also better not have killed any of the men he brought here this morning.”

“You know the boss?” one of the unarmored men asked.

“Shut up,” another one hissed.

“Who’re you?” a third one asked at the same time. What was the fake name I was given? I tried to remember, stepping forward and tapping Vaozey on the shoulder. We exchanged a glance, and even though neither of us could see the other’s face she knew what my intentions were and stepped back.

“Tell him S’shesk is here to talk to him,” I said. “Specifically, we’re here to negotiate the release of the military officers who are currently his guests.” Nobody moved, and it seemed I wasn’t being taken seriously, so I levitated a fan of twelve daggers out and held them along my arms similarly to R’vaajh, then crackled a few bolts of electricity between them for effect. “Now, if you would,” I added. “We are rather low on time and patience today.” That got a few of them moving, and one rushed back inside.

Five very tense minutes passed before the one who went inside returned, and the person who followed him was not Roytmay, but one of the large enforcers who I had thrown off the roof of his building the last time I was in Towrkah. I knew that drop wasn’t fatal, I scoffed to myself as the man approached me, getting right up to my face.

“Prove you’re him,” he said.

“So he remembers me?” I asked, trying not to sound amused. “That’s good, let us in.”

“This isn’t a game, prove you’re him,” the enforcer demanded. I suppose I could use this trick again, I thought, focusing magic around the irises of my eyes. A moment later, they began to glow a deep red, bright enough that I could see the color on my nose and upper cheeks. The enforcer inhaled sharply, stonefaced, his eyes going wide. “Seyt,” he whispered.

“So now that you know who I am, you should know who she is,” I said quietly, letting the glow fade and gesturing subtly with my head to Vaozey. “If you say anything, you die. If you make a move, you die. If any of those soldiers are dead, I won’t stop her from killing you. Believe me, between the two of us, you would rather anger me than her. The worst of what happened in that bar we came from was largely her doing.”

“Seyt,” he repeated, baring clenched teeth and stepping back, looking away and scratching nervously at his forehead. After doing a triple take back at his people, who were still standing back with weapons ready, he made a quick hand gesture and turned around. “Everyone back inside except Dehley and Zhehpzh. Keep your hands away from your weapons and your tongues locked up tight. One of you run ahead and tell Roytmay we have company.” Everyone did as he said, and within ten seconds we had entered the building.

There were different types of opulence, I had realized. Wealth always affected the decor of the properties that humans owned, but the exact ways in which it manifested varied dramatically between individuals based on taste. Some, like Vaozey, preferred elegant but practical and high-quality constructions with artwork adorning the walls and carved into the furniture. Fundamentally the appearance of such a house was not that different than most less wealthy ones, just more refined. Others, like Roytmay, were not so subtle.

Gold was plastered on every surface where it could be applied in the entrance room, with gemstones thrown in for good measure in certain places. Along the back wall was a gigantic portrait of Roytmay dressed in merchant robes, standing in front of a literal throne of gold and silver. Even the rugs on the floor had little medallions of precious metals woven into them; as if to display that Roytmay was so wealthy that he could afford to walk upon materials that could likely buy entire houses if collected and sold. Vaozey seemed to step out of her way to spread blood onto them, probably out of distaste.

By the time we got to the fifth floor, where Rotymay's office was located, the halls were getting visibly tighter and even more decorated. It wasn’t just that the same level of wealth was being compressed, more and more wealth was on display, probably because it was better guarded. We finally approached a door that was quite literally lined with gold, at which point the enforcer knocked on it and waited for a response.

“Is that him?” a voice asked from inside. That’s Roytmay, I knew immediately. Even muffled, the sound was distinctive.

“There are two,” the enforcer said. “The woman is with him.”

“Gods and spirits, just open the door and let them in,” Roytmay replied. Vaozey didn’t wait for the enforcer to follow the instructions, and instead kicked the door open, shattering the frame and leaving a boot print on it. The entire room was black and white marble on the inside, trimmed with gold, and Roytmay sat behind a desk made of the same material. He was wearing the same kind of merchant robes that he had on for the portrait, though he looked quite a bit fatter, and as he stood up a nervous smile broke across his face.

“Yuwniht!” he smiled, looking at Vaozey first before turning to me when he realized she had a female outline. “Didn’t figure the ihlzheyv to join up with the Rehvites, but-” he never got a chance to finish speaking because Vaozey stomped over to him and grabbed him by the neck, pulling him into the air and letting his stubby legs dangle. Just how many people in this building know who we are? I wondered. There was nobody else in the room with Roytmay, but at the very least his enforcers must have been aware.

“I should seytoydh rip your head off right now for what you did to me twelve years ago,” she growled. “Where is Shahpao’s group?” Once again, she was gripping her victim too hard, and Roytmay couldn’t breathe well enough to speak. Vaozey noticed after a few seconds, and her grip loosened infinitesimally, allowing Roytmay to form some squeaks.

“Third floor,” he choked.

“Are they alive?” Vaozey demanded.

“Yes,” he gasped. Good, I thought, that’s the biggest problem solved.

“Undamaged?” she stressed. Silence was the reply, and Roytmay began to suffocate again under her grip. “How much?”

“Few fingers,” Roytmay replied, his voice reduced to a hissing whisper. “Didn’t know- they were- with you. I’m sorry.”

“Why did you abduct them then?” I asked. “Vaozey, he needs to be able to speak.”

“Don’t get any ideas,” Vaozey warned, putting Roytmay down. “I’ve been shot once today already, if I get shot again I’m going to be very upset with you.” On that same note, the first thing I did was frisk Roytmay to check for weapons and remove a dagger from inside his robes. It looked a lot like the one I had taken from the merchant in Suwlahtk, but when I drew the weapon to check the blade I saw that it was covered in blue poison.

“Blue leaf,” I thought aloud. Considering how expensive everything else here is, I shouldn’t be too surprised, I thought, better watch for guards with similar equipment.

“It is,” Roytmay confirmed, rubbing his throat. I saw a few burns around the edges of where Vaozey’s fingers had been slowly fading away.

“I’ll be keeping this,” I said, putting the dagger under the cloth across my breastplate and adhering it in place with force magic. “Why did you abduct them?”

“Somebody, I’m assuming you and this zaeternaaf ngoyth, killed a group of my people about a week ago,” Roytmay explained. “Only one guy got away and he told me that a group of soldiers did it, so I naturally kept an eye on who was coming and going. This Shahpao character was the prime suspect, so I sent some boys to go have a chat with him.”

“Then you dragged him back here, probably chained him up, and started cutting his fingers off,” Vaozey added.

“It’s not my fault that he was unwilling to answer my reasonable questions about what happened out there, who he was, and how his caravan managed to kill a group that I was personally funding,” Roytmay countered. “Fingers grow back, it’s not like we killed anyone.” Vaozey raised her hand threateningly, and Roytmay shrunk back.

“Don’t test your luck you little jhahreyv,” she warned. “If you want to keep your limbs you’re going to bring us to Shahpao right now, and you had better hope there are no issues. The only way you leave this building alive is if Shahpao’s group leaves first and equally alive.”

“Of course, of course,” Roytmay agreed, quickly walking over to the barely-together door and beckoning us to follow him. As we started going down the stairs again, he continued talking. “So, what are you two doing here anyway? I’m guessing you’re not joined up with the other side, but I also heard Yuwniht was dead, so maybe I’m wrong.”

“You’re not getting any answers,” I replied. “You have nothing to do with this.” This is going to be a problem, I sighed. We have to kill him, he’s going to talk about this to someone.

“Well, okay,” Roytmay shrugged. “Just so you know, I do forgive you for the whole throwing my guys off a building and threatening to kill me thing. You two did me a pretty big favor-”

“And you seytm us over for it,” Vaozey growled.

“And I did not repay the kindness properly because, at the time, I was upset,” Roytmay admitted. “When I found out more about what happened I calmed down, but by then you were already gone. Then you two started a seytoydh civil war and, I gotta say, business has never been better for me. I think the gods themselves must have sent you down here to bless me with gold, as you can probably tell by how much of it is all over the walls and the floor and-”

“Can you just shut up?” Vaozey snapped.

“Anyway, what I want to know is, what happened out there?” Roytmay asked, changing the subject but continuing to talk. We reached the third floor, then stopped outside of a room with Roytmay blocking the entrance.

“Your idiot bandits shot me full of bolts and then tried to steal our cargo,” I said, glaring down at him. “So, we killed them. Then some ants came and ate the bodies.”

“Ants?” Roytmay mumbled, rubbing his chin. “Probably not city ones-”

“You have exactly one second to move before I move you,” Vaozey said, and Roytmay quickly stepped out of the way, showing his palms in a gesture of acquiescence. Instead of kicking the door, she used the knob to open it, revealing the interior.

It was still stone and gold just like the rest of the rooms, but it wasn’t as highly decorated. Chains and shackles were mounted along the walls, each set comprising two wrist manacles and a collar for the neck. Five of the sets were in use, holding Shahpao and four other soldiers. They had been stripped of their clothing except for their underwear and were each covered in their own dried blood, with further pools of blood beneath them. Most were missing the smallest fingers on both hands, and Shahpao’s right hand was missing all but its thumb. When we walked inside, everyone looked at us, then Shahpao sighed.

“Tell me you didn’t piss off the guards,” he groaned.

“We didn’t kill any,” I said.

“That’s not what I asked,” he sighed, and Vaozey walked over to unbind him. She didn’t bother to unlock the shackles, instead just pulling them until the weakest points snapped and Shahpao could finally collapse to the ground. On all fours, he stayed in place for a moment, heaving deep breaths and groaning as he flexed his muscles. Having been held in an elevated standing position for several hours, he was probably a bit cramped.

“So, as you can see, they’re fine,” Roytmay said, walking inside and locking the door behind him. All five of the soldiers stared daggers at him, but the two that Vaozey had freed didn’t make any moves to attack. “I hope this will resolve our little misunderstanding and open up potential for beneficial cooperation in the future. You two are money, after all, just being around you is making me feel richer.”

As he finished speaking, Vaozey reached up and took off her helmet. She was still caked in dried blood from the massacre at the bar, so when she turned to stare at Roytmay the movement of her facial muscles caused pieces of it to fall off, further emphasizing her expression. She didn’t blink, she didn’t say anything, she just stared at the man. He opened his mouth to speak, then closed it, then repeated the action two more times while stepping back, making a move for the door.

“Richer, is it?” Vaozey asked, finally taking a step towards him, and Roytmay bolted. Without magic, however, he couldn’t possibly match the speed of either of us, so I blocked the door while Vaozey grabbed him from the ground by the neck again with both hands. “You know, I was almost considering letting you go until I saw the inside of this room,” she continued. “How many times have you used this room? How many people have you done this to?”

“Zownayveht Svaaloyweyl,” Shahpao began in a placating tone.

“Don’t you dare try to order me not to kill this paamdoym,” Vaozey replied, briefly turning her glare to him. “He has had this coming for a long time.”

“Will you be able to get us out of here safely if you do?” Shahpao asked. “I can’t fight like this, and we don’t have our weapons here. Our best way out is to keep him alive.” She thought about it, as did I, and then there was a crunching sound followed by a squeak Roytmay’s decapitated body fell to the ground, dripping blood from its mangled neck-hole, and the room went silent. “What are you doing!?” Shahpao yelled.

“I realized you’d be able to talk me out of it so I killed him before you got the chance,” Vaozey said, holding Roytmay’s head in her right hand and looking at its frozen, pained expression. A moment later, she threw it at the wall, splattering brain and bone everywhere as it pulped on impact. “You five stay here, I’ll get your things and bring them back to you. Yuwniht, you can guard them if you want to, but I’m going to go do something I would have done the first time I was in this city if I’d had the power to.” There was no room for argumentation, and I knew I wasn’t capable of fully subduing Vaozey without harming her even if I wanted to, which I did not.

“They might have poisoned weapons,” I reminded her. “Do you want the pistols?”

“No,” Vaozey said, ignoring the pounding of one of Roytmay’s men at the door.

“Take the pills at least,” I said, tossing the pouch to her. “I’ll stay here and make sure they’re safe. If you’re not done in ten minutes, or if it gets too quiet, I’ll come looking for you.” After stowing the pouch, she picked up her helmet and put it back on, then nodded. “And try to keep your face covered,” I added.

“Won’t matter when they’re all dead,” Vaozey grunted. She unlocked the door, swung it open, punched the man who was banging on it so hard that his skull deformed like putty, and then shut it behind her. Screams and shouts echoed down the hallway as I locked the door and leaned against it to keep an eye on the soldiers. They didn’t look upset, more disappointed and tired, and there wasn’t any chatter among them.

“I think we’re going to have to move up our departure schedule,” Shahpao sighed, looking at his mangled hand. “In the name of Rehv, what a screwup.” From the sounds of things outside, it seemed Vaozey was going down first to secure the building’s exit, then intending to double back to clear the upper floors.

“It wasn’t your fault,” I said. “I suspected something might be going on too, but I didn’t predict this. It could have happened to anyone. We didn’t have the proper intel to mitigate the risk.”

“You’re right that there was nothing I could do, but that doesn’t make it any less my fault,” Shahpao replied. “I’m in command, that means the failures lie with me. Blaming it on anyone or anything else is just an excuse. No, it’s my fault, and I have to do my best to make sure it doesn’t happen again. I got lucky this time, I might not next time, so there can’t be a next time.” Though I disagreed with him on the premise, I couldn’t help but sympathize with Shahpao’s motivations. Either way, the end result is improvement, I thought, in that sense, the premise isn’t really important.