The Fractured Tower

Book 2, Chapter 22

Rue didn’t want to be the one to say it, but she was more than ready for a break when Sorin finally called for them to halt. When it was just the three of them on their own, she felt like she was in great shape, but whenever Sorin came back, there was no comparison. That wasn’t fair, of course. She knew he had at least two different soulprints that boosted his endurance.

What it really means is that I should also be looking into getting some performance enhancers. Heheh. Performance enhancers.

“What are you smiling about?” Nemari asked.

“Nothing. Just… uh… laughing a bit about how many performance enhancers Sorin has that let him keep going and going like he does.”

Nemari regarded her blankly for a moment, then bit back her own laugh before it could bubble out. “God. Well, when you put it that way…”

They were near the top of the trail, supposedly, and waiting for Sorin to return from scouting the floor guardian’s arena. He’d already done it once a few days ago, and he claimed he was confident he’d found every possible hiding spot, so it would only take him a few minutes to check on them this time.

“You can’t really argue with his results,” Od said.

“Only because he’s cheating with his ranks,” Nemari countered.

“Nah. Even when he was the same rank or just one ahead of us, he could run circles around all three of us.”

Rue had filled out her build almost entirely on Sorin’s advice, and she couldn’t really say she’d felt he’d steered her wrong at any point. There were still some holes, but she was only rank 3. For the moment, Nemari and Od were covering her weaknesses, all except for the lack of a solid front-liner. Od was sort of filling that role, but even that was only because Sorin had gone out and found the tools needed to allow for it.

The conversation drifted off for a bit, then Nemari said, “We’re slightly behind the curb on our builds, but significantly worse off in terms of gear and supplies. Sorin is probably the best-equipped among us, and we only see him for a few hours every other day, if that. He can hardly be considered a permanent member of the team at this point, and that means we need to address these weaknesses ourselves.”

“Kind of hard when we don’t have free access to vendors and crafters anymore,” Rue said. “Not that we could really afford it even when we did.”

“This is exactly why most climbers take weeks or months to clear a single floor, why they collect dozens of soulprints they don’t need, which they sell so they can afford the gear they do.”

“So, what you’re saying is that you’re outnumbered and underpowered,” a new voice broke in. “That’s really unfortunate for you.”

Rue nearly jumped out of her skin. It had been months since anyone or anything had gotten the drop on her, even other climbers or ambush monsters. She was used to being aware of anything that got within range of Aura Sense, but this guy had completely slipped close without her noticing. Even now, her eyes and her soulprint couldn’t agree on whether he existed.

“What do you mean by ‘outnumbered?’” Nemari challenged the man. “I don’t see anybody here but us and you.”

“Momentarily,” the climber said with a cocky grin.

At almost the exact same moment, Rue felt five more people coming up the trail behind them. “Full team on their way up,” she hissed. “Two rank 4s, four 3s, including this guy.”

“Oh, very good,” the climber told her. “I guess you must be your team’s scout. Probably would do a better job if you could find things that are capable of hiding, though.”

“What do you want?” Nemari asked, ignoring the man’s condescension.

Rue already knew the answer, and she was sure Nemari did, too. Best case, Sorin would show up in a timely manner and beat the living hell out of all six of these hostile climbers. More likely, they’d be mugged and, if they were really unlucky, killed.

“Nothing much,” the climber told her. A throwing knife materialized in his hand. He showed it off, the tip held between two fingers. A second knife appeared next to it, and then a third.

The first man from the group coming up behind them appeared. He was a big guy, though it was hard to say if he’d been born to his stature or grown thanks to a mutagenic soulprint altering his physical appearance. Either way, he was wearing heavy armor and had a large shield strapped to his back. A thick-bladed sword hung off his belt, and he grunted as he rounded the bend.

A thin man appeared behind him. He had a blue headband holding back hair that looked artificially white in odd contrast to his youthful face. A trio of shimmering blue crystals drifted around the man’s head, and five or six rings glinted on his fingers.

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The next two men shocked Rue, if only because she recognized him. That’s the asshole from the ruin on Floor 1 and his pet healer. What were their names again? Shit, I know Nemari knew him. Yazu? Yangu? Close enough.

It was the last guy that really worried Rue, though. He was one of the rank 4s, and he walked with the same easy confidence and grace that Sorin did. Supple leather armor creased with his body as he moved, and an almost delicate looking sword hung at his hip. A sharply groomed goatee jutted out from the man’s chin, and his calm eyes returned her gaze, gently assessing her team.

She could see the instant he decided they weren’t a threat. They flicked from her to Nemari, to Od, and back to her again. Then, a slow, confident smile unfurled and he gave her a nod. Rue stared back, stone-faced but inwardly seething.

“Yoru?” Nemari asked.

Damn it. I knew that!

“You again?” Yoru replied, surprise in his voice. “I suppose I should have expected it when I spotted your degenerate leader the other day.”

Nemari’s brow furrowed. “What?”

“It doesn’t matter. Get out of my way. We’ve got a portal guardian to kill.”

“Is that so?” Nemari bristled. “Seems like you need to get in line.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because we were here first?”

Yoru made a show of looking around. “Here being…? I don’t see a guardian on the trail. If you’re just going to loiter here, that’s your business, but get out of our way. And so help me, if I so much as think you’re trying to interfere and disrupt our victory, I’ll haul you back to your pathetic cripple of an uncle by your hair.”

“Oh?” the one with the handband asked. “I thought she looked familiar. She’s the runaway Sildfall girl?”

“We’ve got better things to do than deal with them,” Yoru told him. “So long as she knows her place, I don’t care about her family squabble.”

“Wait,” the knife climber said slowly. “If that’s the fire bitch, then that means the guy you saw the other day is the one the Hellions want? And you just let him go without even telling us who he is?”

“What does it matter?” Yoru snapped. “We’re not here to collect bounties. Your job is to work with me until we reach the Floor 4 portal hub. You can go chase him down on your own time after that if you’re so interested.”

“There’s a bounty on Sorin?” Rue asked before she could stop herself.

“Five thousand danirs,” the knife climber told her. “Ten times what our current employer is paying me. Even split six ways, that’s a damn good pay day.”

“He’d kill you if you tried,” Odric said calmly. “Believe me, I’ve seen him beat climbers more than double his rank. You lot wouldn’t stand a chance.”

“That so?” the front-liner asked. “Well, if I remember right, the bounty is eight hundred a piece for the rest of his group, and I ain’t too good at numbers, but I reckon that’s still more than what we’re getting paid right now.”

“That’s irrelevant,” Yoru snapped. “I’ll remind you that you’re under contract—”

“Aw shut it,” the front-liner said. “Go back down the trail and have a drink. We’ll take care of these three and be back in an hour or two. Now… we have to take ‘em in alive, right? That’s what it said?”

“It is,” the dangerous man with the thin sword said softly. “No easy task, I suspect.”

“No,” Yoru protested. “You are not doing this. We go to the top of the trail, kill the portal guardian, and push through to Floor 4. This isn’t open to deba—”

The front-liner casually backhanded Yoru, slapping him sideways to slam into the rough cliff-face the trail circled around. Yoru hit it with a bone-snapping crunch and went down like a dropped sack of potatoes. Immediately, his pet healer started casting a healing spell.

The man with the headband flicked a finger, and a thin bolt of water ripped through the healer’s stomach. Two more echoed it half a second later, piercing the man’s chest and hip. “Shame,” he said. “Would have been nice to double-dip on the money, but sometimes that’s how life goes when you’re chasing danirs.”

Neither of the two victims of the treacherous group were dead yet, but Rue could see their auras twisting wildly and shrinking, a sure sign that they weren’t far off. If they didn’t get some emergency healing in the next minute or so, they were goners. Fortunately for them, Od had Zephyr’s Whisper to give his healing a bit of range now.

Better keep them talking for another minute while Od works on stabilizing things. Might give us enough time for Sorin to show back up, too.

“Wow, that’s cold-hearted,” she said. “You aren’t worried about the hit to your reputation? Or like… isn’t his family important? They could come after you for letting their golden child get killed even if you lie about how it happened.”

It was kind of creepy the way they all started laughing at the same time. “Kid, you’ve got a lot to learn about how the tower actually works. That asshole’s dad can be as pissed as he wants. He can’t touch us if we did the fucking Black Hellion himself a favor.”

“Doesn’t sound like the Black Hellion I know. That guy doesn’t give a shit about people the second they stop being useful to him. Wouldn’t be surprised if he kills you himself.”

Rue had no way to know if any of that was true or not. She didn’t even particularly care, since she had no intention of getting captured here. The only goal was to make this new group slow down and think twice about what they were trying to do.

“It hardly matters at this point,” the one with the sword said. “We’re already committed to the act.”

“I suppose that’s true. You did kind of break faith on that contract, but on the other hand, it’s not like they’re dead yet. You could patch them up, reprimand the reckless elements in your team, and try to move on.”

“Oh, no. No, that would never work. Those two are most certainly going to die, despite your healer’s attempts to sneakily bring them back from the brink.”

Shit. He could tell?

The man drew his slender blade and assumed a somewhat rigid stance with it held in front of him, perpendicular to the ground. “Now then, remember, we aim to capture, not kill. No lethal wounds. Am I clear?”

“As crystal,” the knife climber said.

Sorin was nowhere nearby, which Rue found especially annoying because he’d said it would only take a few minutes, but it had been close to fifteen already. They were going to have to win this fight without him, and despite her attempts to psych herself up, she was in no way confident she could do it.

“Go,” the enemy leader said.

And a streak of water—the same spell that had felled Yoru’s healer—came straight for Rue. She had just enough time to start to flinch when she felt the impact on her stomach. Oh, fuck. This is going to hurt.