Shadows Never Die

Temuulen and Theja took custody of Hroudland and hauled him in to complete Theja’s adventurer’s guild assignment.

Alphaeus, Nona and Rhy’sae entered the building unchallenged. Hroudland had surrendered his keys, and given them directions. It proved true, though Alphaeus had kept an eye out for potential traps.

Underground, hidden tunnels once used for smuggling goods now held people and drugs. Cell after cell of drug addled captive. Rhys’s heart sank as he saw each of them, his gut hollow.

This could have been him. This might very well have been him.

When finally they found the man Nona was after, he hung back, watching, eyes trained on the drug-addled man.

“Sohan!” Nona choked his name out. It was the most upset Rhys had ever heard her.

“Celeste….?” The man asked, pressed back against the wall.

“No, Sohan,” she said, hands moving to pat his sweaty, hair, “It’s not Celeste.”

He blinked at her in the darkness, though Rhys’s Keeper eyes saw it clearly.

“No….” Sohan reached for her face, touched her cheek. “You’re not Celeste. ….You’re not real either.” He pushed her away, but he didn’t seem to have any strength.

His mind was not in the present.

Rhys took two steps backwards, looking down the hall to all the doors they’d left unlocked and ajar. Some of the wretches had wandered out into the hallway, where Dr. Streamside was standing, keeping watch as he murmured into a linkpearl.

This could have been him, if Nona and her friends hadn’t come to him. If they hadn’t pulled him into their fold and into the know. If he’d failed to win enough to pay down his debts, if he’d fallen even further and even deeper into his debts…

His imagination was spinning out abstract plausibilities, one scenario after the other, each worse than the last.

But, it hadn’t happened.

It would not happen.

Something in his chest loosened, a tension he hadn’t realized was there. He approached Dr. Streamside, moving to join him. The elezen glanced down, nodding.

Theja and Nona took the lead, Alphaeus, Temuulen, and Rhy’sae close behind. Khet had departed with the Den Master, hauling him to the Brass Blades with a written confession and promise to roll on his partner in exchange for leniency. That was the mercy they had chosen for him, and he’d latched onto it like the opportunistic leech he was. 

But they weren’t going to leave the rest of this matter in the Brass Blade’s hands. Theja’s job for the adventurer’s guild was their ticket to handling this their way, and they were taking advantage of it to the fullest. 

 Rhy’sae and Alphaeus worked together to bypass the mansion’s magical warding, though it took some doing. Nona and Theja handled the guards that came for them while Temuulen guarded everyone’s back. 

When they finally came upon Hroudland Alvey, he was holed up in his office, brass knuckles adorning each fist and a simmering rage on his face. But as his men fell one by one before him, and he was left standing alone, the realization that he was outnumbered and out of time was slow to sink in. 

It wasn’t until Nona’s plate gauntleted fist broke his lip and shattered a tooth that he really realized how serious they were. 

Hroudland crumpled to his knee, and Nona stood above him, a spirit of dark vengeance, ringed by the solemn, threatening faces of her comrades. 

“Start talking.” 

Stunned, he stared up at her, naked hatred in his eyes.

She punched him again.

“THE GAMBLERS!” She barked, “From the DEN! Where are they?” 

He spit blood, glowering at her, “Why should I tell you? You’ll only kill me.” 

Alphaeus drew his rapier and flicked it under the man’s chin, letting the point rest above his throat, “No,” he said, and Hroudland’s eyes found his, and the fallen highlander froze. Something in the elezen’s gaze would not allow him to look away. “We would not kill you. No matter how much you begged. Time and time again, I will put you back together, until you have told us what we want.” 

His free hand moved forward, touched Hroudland on the top of the head. There was a surge of aether, and the pain in the highlander’s face eased and faded.

Within the small cell, the Den Master was kneeling on the floor, head bowed as he pleaded for his life. Nobody had yet thought to inform him they didn’t intend to kill him.

Nona and Theja finished their quiet discussion of the prisoner’s fate, and they approached the bars. Nona took the lead, though now she had her hand on the hilt of her massive sword, rather than a broken bottle. 

“Tell us what we want to know, and you just might get to see that rancid little den of yours again,” she started. 

“Anything!” The Den Master cried, interrupting her before she could launch into any monologuing, “What is it you want? Gil? I can get you gil. I’m very good at getting gil—”

“The missing people.” Nona cut right to the heart of it. 

The Den Master froze. 

“The men and women who entered your den, never to be seen again. Where are they?” 

Slowly, he raised his head, face ashen. 

“Is it related to the drugs?” Theja asked, stepping up beside Nona. 

Nona shot her a look, but didn’t speak up. 

The Den Master was quivering, “Oh, oh my, oh my that’s not something I—”

“You don’t place much value on your life,” Alphaeus said, joining the women with an air of boredom about him. 

The Den Master gulped. 

“This is what passes for a man in the gambling dens of Ul’dah?” Khet thoughtfully fingered a knife at his belt. 

“Those are… you see, the drugs are a… it’s an arrangement.”

“With who?” Nona demanded. “Where are the missing people? Where have they gone?” 

The Den Master spilled his guts. Metaphorically. “They were… they were unable to pay their debts to the house, you see, and they were… taken by my partner. For business research. For…. they’re working their debt off.” 

Rhys was quite interested in anywhere but the lalafel at the moment. If he’d gone through with his plan to try to cancel out his debts with gambling… that could have been him. 

“Cooperate with us,” Temuulen spoke up from behind the others, “and the gods have bade me that we show mercy.” 

“Shit, shit, shit!” Theja whispered under her breath, groping through her pockets for something to pass as a weapon. 

Temuulen broke a bottle of his own, booze splashing to the floor as Khet fell into a combative stance beside him. 

“YOU FACE PROUD WARRIORS OF THE STEPPE!” Khet cried, “For the BUDUGA!”

“The gods have sent me this day!” Temuulen intoned, his voice a dire warning as he brandished his broken bottle. 

Rhy’sae ducked behind Alphaeus, digging through his pockets much like Theja. His glasses slid down his nose, his ears laid flat to his hair as he started to all but turn out his bag, digging through his botanical collection. “WHAT’S PLAN B?” He demanded.

Alphaeus clapped his hands together, a surge of aether rising. He grabbed at the shadows of his right hand and pulled, the darkness peeling away from his skin and taking solid shape between his fingers, a sword drawn forth. The shadow seemed to pulse and harden into a rapier, and he yanked his heavy pendant off. Aether caught it, and the disguised focus bobbed in the air above his palm. “Make it up while we go along!” he replied. 

“Then, then cover me!” Rhys shot back, scooping up his things and diving under a table where he kept frantically cobbling something together. He opened a bag, the salty-sea smell of dried benthos weed hitting him in the face. He didn’t stop. He’d prepared this bag for the vague Just In Case scenarios they’d talked about in the days leading up to the tournament. Too bad they hadn’t actually made a solid Plan B together.

Across the room, the roes had gathered together, Crane holding the men back from diving gleefully in, “It’s just a stupid game, you idiots!” She growled at them. 

Security seemed torn as to just where it had to go, but the Den Master’s shrill, wordless shout drew their ire. Nona shanked her broken bottle where the small man had been standing, and he scrambled away shouting for aid.

The security guards jumped Nona. Temuulen and Khet jumped the guards. Theja still hadn’t found a weapon and held back. Alphaeus slid between the action and the table Rhys was hiding under. 

The smartest patrons were rushing out the door with the hostess and the bar keeper. Nobody tried to stop them. Gwayne and F’zula were pressed back against a wall, making hasty bets on the outcome of the action.

Drunken Stump somehow broke free from Crane and made a bee-line for the unattended bar, starting to shove whole bottles into his pockets. Proud Hill, after a moment’s hesitation, joined him. Crane threw her hands up imploringly to the gods. 

Under the table, Rhys was bundling more dried botanical bits around the benthos weed, string securing it all together.  “Just need… a moment!” 

More of the Den Master’s goons ran into the room, weapons drawn, voices rising. Nona had the Den Master by the legs, that horrifying dark knight power clutching at him even as she shanked her broken bottle into a guard’s side. 

One of the new security goons went for Alphaeus, drawing a short sword to clash with the doctor’s rapier. 

Gripping his tied bundle, Rhys finished it off with a small cloth bag, green and red crystals clinking together as he shoved them in and tied them off. Wind and fire shards. Finally, Rhys shook a glass jar, a pair of dried, shriveled red peppers into his palm. He dropped the open bottle into a pocket, shoving one of the peppers into his mouth and pressing it between his teeth and cheek, holding it but not biting. 

Quickly, he crawled out from under the table, just as Alphaeus pushed away his bleeding attacker. Rhys shoved the second pepper at Alphaeus, “Bite this when it goes off!” He shouted. 

“When what goes off?” The doctor demanded, incredulous as he grabbed the pepper with the hand his focus floated over. He stuffed it in his mouth.

“THIS!” Rhys tossed the dried bundle above his head, whole body tensing as a surge of aether left him. He winced, and the bag caught flame mid air above them. Smoke poured from the bundle, and a jolt of wind aspected aether shoved the smoke out, enveloping the whole room with the scent of sea and smoke.

Wooziness struck almost instantly. Rhys bit into the pepper, flooding his mouth with distracting, spicy heat. It snapped him right out of it, kicking the smoke’s effects to the side. 

Alphaeus swayed. Bit his own pepper, then straightened, making an indignant choking sound. “Thal’s balls that’s hot!” 

Rhys could barely speak around the burning heat in his mouth—he hated spicy food, it disagreed with his Sharlayan palate—”Get the, get the Den Master. I’ll, I’ll get everyone else!” He managed.

Around them, the fighting was slowing, everyone in the room stumbling, losing their balance and slumping towards the floor. Weapons clattered as bodies fell. Not unconscious, not quite, but too dizzy and disoriented to continue the fray. 

FINAL STANDINGS

Rhel            Gamduhla     154300 F'zula          Tia          130100 Fafasamu Hihisamu     129500 Nona                               128400 Rhy'sae    Galeni       116800 Khet           Buduga       115400 Alphaeus  Streamside      96700 Eon            Hamyon          92100 Proud       Hill            91100 Temuulen Mol             85800 Nonolu         Nolu            84300 Didiraka    Guguraka        83800 Drunken    Stump           80800 Towering   Crane           78100 Theja          Arda            65200 Gwayne    Piper           62100

Not a single one of them had made it to the final round. The failure struck deep, and Alphaeus stared at the scoreboard as if he could change it with his gaze alone.

Nona lifted a bottle, pouring herself a shot and throwing it back. Her shot glass thunked to the tabletop. “Well. I expected that to go better for all of us.”

“What now?” Alphaeus asked, looking at the others.

Nona rose, “We didn’t get what we came here for,” she said. Their group’s heads turned her way, nods and murmurs passing amongst them, “But there’s a silver lining in all of this.”

“And what would that be?” Theja asked.

Nona smiled, plucking up her bottle. “Den Master’s right there.” Then, she turned, slamming the bottle against the edge of the table. It shattered, leaving a ragged, cutting edge. Instantly all conversation halted, and every eye in the room, both patron, staff, and host alike, was on her.

“...even if I don’t end up placing in the top three—”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“But the… you know… that I want to learn…”

“Mmhmm.”

“...”

She arched a brow. 

He sighed. “You will?” 

“I said I would consider it, didn’t I?” 

“That’s not—”

Alphaeus was cut off by a woman’s voice that cut through the low murmur of the room. “Attention, please!” The woman, a miqote, stood atop of the bar, her scanty garments marking her as one of the den’s many hostesses. “The final round of qualifiers will begin shortly! We will now reveal the current standings!” 

An elezen man behind the bar lifted a chalkboard up and set it on a tabletop stand beside her. She gestured grandly, reading the scores off. 

Current Standings: Nona                           110300

F'zula        Tia        102500

Fafasamu Hihisamu   98700

Rhy'sae    Galeni        95200

Khet          Buduga        88600

Towering  Crane        82600

Eon          Hamyon        80400

Temuulen Mol        78100

Alphaeus  Streamside 72300

Didiraka   Guguraka     64800

Rhel         Gamduhla    64600

Nonolu     Nolu          58500

Proud      Hill         58400

Gwayne   Piper         55000

Drunken  Stump         46500

Theja       Arda         38000

When she reached the end of the list, she turned back to the lot of them, “And now—allow me the honor of introducing the illustrious Den Master Mimilan Lilian!” 

A door behind the bar opened, then closed. Moments later, a feathered hat was visible behind the bar. That hat ascended whatever step stool had been set up behind it, and a male lalafel joined the miqote woman. He was short and wide, his beard and mustache impeccably waxed, and he was dressed as lavishly as any noble. 

Alphaeus looked around the table. The two roe men and the hyur had all come in last in their games as well and all of them were now scowling down at their hands as if their fates rode on them. To be fair, they probably did. 

But, it wasn’t irrecoverable. In one game, a bad hand isn’t the end of it all. In a tournament, built such as this one, one bad game didn’t spell the end either. He could still recover from this. 

He looked to his left, smiling at the hyur there. Gwayne glanced his way with an appraising eye. 

A sudden plan hatched in Alphaeus’s mind. He and Crane had been so distracted in the first game that they’d messed up a few calls here and there. What if he did that…. On purpose? To the others? 

One way to find out. “Hey, handsome.” 

Gwayne blinked, then glanced around, “W-what? Me?” 

Alphaeus grinned, lazy and slow. Oh, this would be far too easy. The man was already flustered. The doctor proceeded to flirt, outrageously, with the entire table the whole game. 

And, somehow, it bloody worked. 

Round 2 Results:

Table 3 Towering Crane 37900 Theja Arda 25000 Didiraka Guguraka 19000 Nonolu Nolu 18100

Rhel Gamduhla dominated from the first hand, and though Nona managed to eek out a small victory, Rhy’sae didn’t have that much luck. He was sitting in fourth from the first hand. After the third hand, he gave up, feckless and reckless, he made his calls after just barely glancing at his drawn tiles. It didn’t matter. It wouldn’t change anything. He was scowling even as he clicked his discards away.

Until… it clicked. He drew a tile, looked to his hand, and saw it. His brows drew together, and he studied his hand before making his move. Three discards later, and he reached riichi. In the end, it was enough to turn the tables. 

Nona let out a low whistle, “Damn, kid,” she said, when the points were tallied. “Surprised the shit out of me.” 

Table One Results:

Khet Buduga 32600 Fafasamu Hihisamu 24000 Temuulen Mol 23600 Eon Hamyon 19800

Table Two Results: