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Chapter 83
The unlit staircase of the Grindlefecht West Tower seemed to stretch on forever as he stumbled up its dank, dust-strewn steps.


"How much farther?" he asked his companion.


"To the top of the tower, Marcus!" Silas shouted up at him as they peered around the bend in the staircase column. "We must make it through the guard barracks to the adjoining spire. Let us move with haste—I fear our unfortunate dungeon guard will have been discover—"


His voice was stopped by the sudden appearance of two ratguards that had just thrown open a door beside them, eyeballs bulging with the shock of what they'd just found.


"Sh-Shai-Alud! The Shai-Alud has—"


Marcus's hand flared with green fire that leaped from his fingertips to silence the ratguard. His friend brought his halberd to bear with cries of "By the Unclean!" on his lips as Marcus threw himself at him and jammed his fingers in the ratman's eyes, searing them clean from their sockets and leaving his face a hollowed-out skull while he kept the creature's body pressed down under his own.


He'd already taken enough lives down here…what did two more matter?


The rats had come from the guard barracks that were still in a relatively stable state. Evidently, the Western Wing of the keep had managed to weather the explosions.


If the adrenaline of the escape was not overcoming Marcus's senses at this moment, he might have paused to reflect on how curious it was that this tower in particular, and its adjoining buildings, had been left untouched by the explosions.


Presently, he heard a general shout go up from the bottom of the West Tower, and he stood shakily and began following Silas as the latter scurried to the end of the barracks.


"Hurry, Marcus!" he shouted. "They will be coming for us!"


Marcus wasted no time in staring at his broken foes beneath him. He forced himself to sprint past the barracks tables, flipping them over as he barged through the hall, still grabbing his wrist to still the raging energy coursing through him.


"STOP!"


A voice—a chorus from behind. He knew they had found them.


"ARCHERS! BE FIRING!"


Silas was at the far door as the first volley of crossbow bolts sailed past Marcus's neck and he fell into a roll, taking up one of the long barrack tables and pressing his back against it.


"Silas!" he barked as he heard the crossbow-rats reload. "What's happening?"


The Putrefact was fumbling with the door-lock, trying to pick at it with his fumbling claws.


"Silas!"


"They are changing the locks on my spire's door, Sire!" he shouted back at him. "I must pick the lock with—"


"We don't have time!" Marcus screamed as the next volley of bolts slammed into his table shield and almost pierced his neck. "Let me burn it."


"No, Sire!" Silas called over his shoulder. "Focus on our enemies—do not let them gain on us!"


Chancing a look over the lip of his meager defensive position, Marcus saw a squad of ratguards advancing on his position, shields bared, nostrils flaring with murderous intent.


Damn it, he thought, looking past them to the small unit of crossbowmen that had him pinned, readying their weapons to splinter the table apart with the next volley. This time…they're shooting to kill.


He dragged his hand up over the lip of the table and let fly an arc of scintillating green lightning that instantly sent the ratguard squad flying back into their compatriots, their backs taking the brunt of the crossbow bolts that had just been fired.


It seemed that there were more uses to this little trick of light in his hand than he'd at first thought. Though, with every new use of the power, he felt his every muscle become weaker and weaker...


"Silas!" he shouted as the ratguard threw the wounded forms of their comrades from them and readied their weapons again.


"Just…a second…longer!" the Putrefact groaned, his fingers working like thin silver picks as they turned each tumbler of the rusted door locks.


"A second's about all we have!" Marcus shouted back, looking up at the grand chandelier that dominated this room's ceiling—a testament to dwarven craftsmanship that, like the rest of this place, was about to become just another pile of decorative rubble.


Before the next flurry of bolts struck his table, he sent a spear of lightning towards the chandelier's anchor and watched it tear free from the ceiling to crash in between both him and the slowly advancing squad at the door.


"Ready, Sire!" Silas squeaked from behind.


Marcus didn't wait for the dust to settle. He'd seen enough in the rage-filled eyes of the ratguard that had once been his to command as they sent their projectiles flying towards him to know that they had completely turned against him at this point. His friends—his real comrades—they were dead and forgotten. So much for the constancy of rats...


He and Silas slipped through the door without slamming it shut behind them.


"There is no time!" Silas roared as Marcus turned and sent two more arcs of light cascading towards the advancing rats. "Come, Marcus!"


Up the spiral staircase of the West tower spire they lumbered, Silas taking the lead, being careful to check around the narrow column of the staircase lest they have assailants already charging them from above. But it was from below that the threats were coming. Even from within this grim passage of stone, Marcus could hear the shrill cries of the ratguard as they thundered up from below, chainmail and weapons clattering in their hands, paws scampering to capture the human that would bring them glory in the eyes of their King.


When they finally reached the top of the tower, Silas pushed open the ornate metal door and ushered his charge inside, with Marcus sending three more bolts traveling down the staircase to slow their assailants. He watched as the green tendrils shot forth from his hand, ricocheting off the pristine masonry of the Dwarven walls and traveling down the length of the staircase. The anguished wails of the rats below, coupled by the sounds of clattering shields and burning bodies falling like dominoes back down the stairs, told him his aim had been true.


And yet still, he had to stop and collapse as the pain of his new power overcame him yet again. He looked about at the low-ceiling chamber they had just blundered into, filled with meager tables and chairs and a star-shaped imprint etched into the center of the room. At various raised grooves along the six-pointed star were set a series of gray-waxen candles which Silas was presently lighting with haste.


"Silas…" he breathed as he moved to barricade the door with the simple furniture he found in the room. "What do you need?"


"Time, Marcus," the Putrefact replied. "The summoning ritual is delicate. Not so violent as that which would result from one's transportation from the Place Beyond, of course. But the experience will be no less jarring for you."


Marcus grimaced as he rose, beating his twitching right hand against his door-barricade that Silas momentarily paused to regard him as he slumped down beside it.


"Silas," he wheezed. "Can you do it?"


The ratman smirked down at him. "If the Unclean is willing."


"I suppose we'll find out soon enough," Marcus snorted as he felt the barricade shudder behind him, knowing the ratguard had made it to the door with murder in their hearts.


And they weren't alone.


"Stand in the center," Silas told him hastily. "Breathe deeply. Keep your body as steady as possible. A single limb outside the radius of the summoning sigil is unlikely to remain attached to its bearer."


*Just another horror before I leave this place. Typical.*


From outside the glass windows, Marcus could hear the scarpering of paws on stone, digging into the grooves in the spire's brickwork and bearing relentlessly towards their destination.


"Do it, Silas," Marcus ordered, readying his shaking hand and aiming it, open-palmed, at the window nearest the door. "You have until they take this hand from me."


The ratman nodded relentlessly. "You are as brave as they say, Marcus Graham."


The next few seconds passed by in a series of snapshots punctuated by the roaring of Marcus's lightning. Two ratmen smashed through the windows, teeth flaring and weapons shining in the light that arced towards them.


He got one in the jugular, the lightning coiling around his neck and burning the life out of him almost instantly. The other rat was faster, dropping into a roll to avoid the next attack and managing to enter the circle proper. Marcus threw himself to the ground to avoid the vicious swipe that his assailant aimed at his kneecap and felt his calf open as the blade nicked it.


He crouched low, his hand raised to strike back, still thrumming with the energies that he felt would kill him any minute if he didn't direct them at another target.


And then he looked into the eyes of the ratman who had maimed him—the ratman who was presently staring right back at him from the other side of the summoning circle, and whose blade was now dripping with Marcus's fresh blood.


He was looking into the eyes of Skeever Steelclaw.





***

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Discord
 
Chapter 84
The First-Talon watched the eyes of the Talon-Commander of Clan Red-Eye in the split second he had before the latter lunged with his machete, killing instincts well and truly taking over now.

Marcus's hand flew of its own accord to protect him, firing an arc of chained green lightning at Skeever's body, which the ratman only narrowly managed to meet with the edge of his weapon. He was pushed back, slowly being dragged from the circle by the power of Marcus's new ability.

"Deekius, I am being sure!" Skeever roared. "He is being a thorn in my side even in death!"

Marcus grimaced, one eye flying towards Silas as he made his final inkings on the edge of the star-platform. Behind him, his basic barricade was slowly being torn apart by the claws of the ratguard, who had managed to rip through pieces of the doorway.

"Is this the ending you wanted, Skeever?" Marcus asked as he pressed forward, focusing all his remaining strength and willpower into his flaring fingers. "For the sake of the camaraderie we once shared, I'll offer you this: drop your weapon, and I shall go in peace. Tell your King you did your duty."

"Tsk!" Skeever grimaced. "You are thinking I will ever trust the word of a human?"

"You dare talk to me of trust?" Marcus screamed back, sounding more rat-like by the second.

Slowly the ratman began to press forward, his blade deflecting the energies of Marcus's lightning right back at him, so that its thin, deathly tendrils ripped past his shoulders and impacted the furniture and walls behind.

"Sire!" Silas wailed. "I am ready!"

Marcus saw the crimson eyes of Skeever fly towards those of Silas for only the briefest of moments before he turned his attention back to Marcus, taking another beleaguered step towards him.

"You are being a fool, Marcus," he growled against the cacophony of Marcus's cackling light. "You are thinking this creature will truly help you escape?"

Marcus saw the intent in the rat's eyes. He saw him eye Silas again as the Putrefact knelt to intone the words of Summoning – words that Marcus could barely even hear over the chaos that was to be his final moments in the Underkingdom.

"Try it," he said. "And I will kill you."

Skeever Steelclaw licked his lips, clenched his fingers tighter around the handle of his Brother's blade, and grinned.

"You. Will. Try."

Before the final syllable even left his mouth, he had tossed his weapon at Marcus's throat, and the killing light of the Gloomraav traveled with the blade – turning the weapon into a vicious boomerang of magical energy that flew for Marcus's head.

Had the luck of his God been with him, the attack would have severed Marcus's forehead and sent nothing more than a blathering numbskull into the surface-world. Instead, it tore clean through the Red-Eye insignia Marcus wore upon his helmet and continued on its path of destruction around the room, breaking everything in its path and even slicing through the ratguard who had just managed to get the door open.

But Skeever did not wait to see the results of his desperate attack. As he had launched the blade, he had leaped for the crouched form of Silas, and only Marcus's lean, lanky body allowed him to intercept the rat and hold him down, pinning him to the chamber floor.

"SILAS!" Marcus wailed as Skeever bit down on his arm with raw, animal strength. "NOW!"

But the Putrefact needed no further instruction. Before Marcus's eyes, he saw the room begin to spin, then felt a distinct feeling of weightlessness accompany the sudden change in motion. The Summoning Chamber of Grindlefect melted away – a kaleidoscopic vision of browns and greys mixed in with the vibrant crimson of Marcus's blood rising like a levitating stream above his arm, where Skeever's teeth had made their mark. The ratman himself had cried out in fury in the very moment when the spinning room finally disappeared entirely, the last sights being those of the ratguard blundering their way into the room and seeing nothing but Silas's doubled-over form bowed before them.

The world vanished as all light receded. Nothing remained except pure, unfiltered color – a spectrum of light that Marcus could barely comprehend. The entire floor had opened up and swallowed him. The ceiling had broken and given way to the deluge of otherworldly light. It was like the most lucid dream or a hallucinogenic trip brought to vivid, full, and blooming life around him. All sound was gone. All pain – a memory. Nothing but he, his body, and the feeling of motion as he traveled through means unknown towards a destination he could no longer even remember.

Skeever tumbled beside him, his voice lost in the unknown passage between lands. His weapon was gone. His claws, teeth, eyes, and mouth all dribbled and frothed, alight with agony. Perhaps such teleportation magics were inherently dangerous for Ratkin. Perhaps their brains simply could not cope with the sudden onrush of stimuli. Even Marcus was having trouble focusing as he floated towards the twitching rat.

Skeever seemed to acknowledge his presence. For, as he swam towards him in the psychedelic void, the Ratman's beady eyes lighted on his face. His face – and the pale hand outstretched towards him. The one that did not bear the marks of the Gloomraav.

"Take my hand!" Marcus shouted, his voice practically a child's whimper.

Even in this moment of lucidity, Marcus was struck by just how powerful unchecked hatred could be. He saw the shuddering eyes of Skeever see his hand, watching as his fingers stretched towards him. He saw the Ratman look up at him with quiet, seething disdain – disdain born from the fact he had let this human command him all this time. Marcus saw, as clear as the deluge of colors that cascaded down all around them, just how palpable Skeever's anger was – and how resolute was his belief that Marcus had betrayed him and his people.

Love for his race, and hatred for another. That was the dichotomy that ruled Skeever Steelclaw.

And it was that same dichotomy that made him relinquish his one good arm and kick away from Marcus, floating silently into the psychedelic ocean until he finally disappeared from view.

"Skeever…" Marcus murmured as the lightshow finally began to recede. "Damn you…"



He awoke to a sight that he never thought he'd ever see again and had to blink through the hazy blur before his face to assure himself that he was really looking at what he thought he was:

A clear, crisp, pale blue sky.

He took it in. He focused his vision, seeing the sun of mid-afternoon peek through a small wisp of cloud before vanishing again like a celestial deity playing a children's game.

He breathed. Air. Pure. Unfiltered. A little humid, perhaps, but anything was a blessing compared to the corrupted stank he'd had to put up with in the cavernous realm that now lay below his feet.

As he lay, enjoying the feeling of the sun on his grime-soaked skin, he suddenly began to make out thin trails of black streaking their way through the air – like small blankets being draped across the day. Like little columns of smoke being belched by a cheerful bird gracing the heavens with its flight. Or…or like…

"MOVE!"

Someone grabbed him by the shoulder and forced him up, throwing both of them into the rain-beaten mud of the jungle that had suddenly burst into view before Marcus's unblinking eyes. Just as quickly as he had picked out the sight of the smoking column streaking towards them, the thing exploded and threw up a blanket of dirt and vegetation across their backs.

"Alright, up, son!" the voice of Marcus's savior grunted. "The next Hakka volley's comin' in three. That's plenty o' time ta hog tail it outta dodge!"

Marcus found himself unable to even protest. Without another word, the owner of this voice lifted him up and slung him over his shoulders, sprinting through the thick jungle overgrowth towards a destination that must have been deeply ingrained in his mind – so singular was the path he tore towards it.

Marcus then looked down at the hasty feet of his savior and noticed something even more shocking to his system than the blue sky and clean air of the surface:

This man was a human.

A great, burly mountain of a human, true enough. But – everything – down to his physique, his relative lack of skin-hair, his tailless behind…everything about him just screamed 'human.' Everything, that is, except the iron collar affixed to his neck. And the disconcerting, laser-focused imprinting of '#621' along its dull length…

But his voice, gruff and tinged with what sounded like a blend between a country accent and that of an old English peasant farmer, only cemented Marcus's suspicions.

"By the blazin' balls of Anathemus!" he laughed, panting with every frenzied step. "I knew that damn light was the work o' magic. Thought maybe we had a new shaman to help out Jun-Ei, but hot-DAMN did we strike it lucky! Woulda helped you out regardless o' your station, good sir. But ho-ho! When I saw it was you lying there, smiling up at these skies like you'd never laid eyes on 'em before, well! I knew I'd done the right thing taking the chance during the daily barrage. Name's Marvin, by the way. Marvin Trellosk. Farmer – well, ex-farmer, technically, owing to the whole slavery thing. But – hey! Now that you're here, I'm thinkin' we don't got nothing to worry about no more! No, sir! Not when we got –"

"Y…you," Marcus stammered.

Marvin glanced around to see Marcus hanging off his shoulder, bloodshot eyes glaring at him like a hungry gremlin.

"You…you're human…"

The sprinting ex-farmer smiled a toothy smile. "Sure am, bucko," he said. "Same as you. Am I your first? Hope I make a good impression. The way I hear it, you've been hanging with rats for way too long."

"Rats…" Marcus mumbled, taking in the sights of increasingly dead or burning trees and foliage around him. "Where…where are we?"

"Questions for Jun-Ei, son," Marvin rumbled as he quickened his pace. "Brace yourself – next barrage incoming!"

Before Marcus could ask any follow-up questions, the piercing, shrill din of another arcing projectile screamed through the sky towards them, hitting a tree to their left and engulfing it and the small primates that called it home in white-hot fire.

White-hot…Marcus thought. Come to think of it…this increasingly ruined jungle environment does remind me of something…

Another rocket screeched through the air to batter a small river running alongside them, throwing Marvin momentarily off course and sending him careening towards a nearby cave.

"Almost there!" he roared above the din of the next rocket flying right towards them. "Let's see if you really do have the luck of the Gods on your side, son!"

"W-wait!" Marcus shouted as he looked up to see the dark pillar of screaming death homing in on them as though it were watching them with a killer's own eyes. The feet of this former farmer weren't going to outrun it. Not even with all his tenacity and almost childlike confidence. Not this time…

***

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Discord
 
Chapter 85
"We're gonna make it, son!" Marvin screamed above the death-rattle of the rocket that was currently on course to turn them both into mincemeat.


No, Marcus thought again as he looked into the black column homing in on their position. Not this time…


Marcus's hand flared up of its own accord and he sent a spark of cackling green energy straight up at the projectile, shielding his eyes as it then exploded directly above them, and Marvin finally lunged towards the stone cave mouth.


When the back of his head hit the grey stone of the cave floor he grimaced in pain and turned back to see the devastation the explosion had unleashed on the landscape. Clearly, these barrages had been a common occurrence – beyond the mouth of this little sanctuary the density of the jungle was carved away like a thin layer of skin peeled from a rotten body. Only the charred, dead earth remained where nothing new grew, and pockets of still flaming vegetation were creeping up the trees that remained to snuff out their colors – sticking to the leaves on their boughs and dripping down to burn clean through their roots.


As his eyes adjusted to the smoky haze that hung over this dying place, Marcus finally recalled what this particular fiery discharge reminded him of.


Napalm…


His companion, meanwhile, seemed much more preoccupied with Marcus's glowing hand.


"Well I'll be a Tuthlatch'ka's flopping teat," Marvin wheezed. "They didn't tell me you were a bleedin' wizard, too!"


"Recently…anointed," Marcus groaned, the pain radiating up his arm becoming more pronounced again, and he was forced to remember exactly how these new powers had come to him. "But…wait…how is it you know who I am?"


Marvin smiled, wiping the residue of soot and dirt from his face, creeping to the end of their small cave and beating his meaty hands on the back wall.


"Buddy," he said as he stood back, apparently satisfied. "You don't know how famous you are round these parts."


At Marcus's questioning glare his savior merely nodded as a small rectangular slab was removed from the wall he'd just knocked on.


Two amber eyes stared out from the gap.


"What is the song of the Pipers?"


"The song that lives in every slave's mind," Marvin said with a full-lipped smile. "The song that breaks the chains that bind."


The eyes blinked once, the slab closed over, and Marcus heard a series of indiscriminate clicks and bumps of activity on the other side of the wall.


Then he saw that it was no wall at all, but a door. One that opened to afford the entrance into a dimly lit hallway that was certainly not part of this natural cave formation.


"Best to let me take the lead, son," Marvin said as he stepped forward abruptly. "The Piper's are a little overly-cautious. Can't blame 'em, really."


Marcus cocked an eyebrow as he followed Marvin into the metal bowels of the hallways and heard the 'door' of the fake cave wall bolt shut behind them.


"Pipers?" he asked, suddenly remembering everything that had been locked behind the wall of color he'd traveled through – the flight from the Grindlefecht dungeons, the confrontation with Skeever, and the name of the place the Yokun assassin had told him to run to if he wanted to find Mari…


"You got it," Marvin smiled, pointing to the number on his neck. "See this? Used to be my 'number' the bastardYokun slapped on me before the Pipers came and torched their slave market. Shoulda seen it, son. They killed the bastards good and shackled the overseers themselves. Jun-El – she's our head-shaman - calls it 'poetic justice'. A Yokun herself, though I don't hate her for what her people do. After all, she's out here fighting the good fight, right?'


Marcus shook his head as he tried to take in all the strange new details this 'ex-farmer' (who was really as it turned out a slave on the run) was imparting to him.


"The Pipers…" Marcus mouthed, almost not even noticing the metal door towards which Marvin was reaching. "You mean to tell me that this is…"


"You got it, son," Marvin smiled, opening the door to reveal an entirely new kind of underground world to Marcus. "Welcome to Piper's Hill."


An entire cavern dug deep into the earth filled his vision, filled with metal-sheath structures that resembled small slum-housing. Coal fires were currently burning within these huts without a care, and Marcus noticed how they stretched on seemingly for miles into the cave system – an entire shanty town built beneath the burning jungle above.


Not quite the 'hill' I had in mind, was Marcus's first thought. I escape one underground society and am immediately harried into another. Though as far as I can tell, this place looks like a temporary place of accommodation at most.


The air was far cooler than that of the Underkingdom, and as Marcus and Marvin stepped onto the creaky metal platform that opened out into what looked like a kind of makeshift town square, Marcus realized there must have been an internal ventilation system that was running down here. Either that, or some wizardly magic was at play – perhaps both, judging by what he knew about Thean physics. Orjust how much he still didn't know.


In the middle of the town square there was a ramshackle statue constructed out of pieces of metal shards and discarded weapons. The statue resembled that of a female Yokun in rags with both her hands crushing a pair of broken chains.Children of various races were engaged in hanging from its outstretched arms and playing around its booted feet – children that all shared the same defining trait: the branded number cut into the skinfolds of their necks…


They stopped playing when the saw the new arrival. And they were not alone – all around him Marcus could hear murmurs and whisperings coming from every slum-house that now surrounded him, seeing the eyes of at least two dozen creatures appraise him as though they were looking at a walking God. Some things never change.


THUMP.


His thought was cut off, along with his windpipe, as something fell from the sky and pinned him to the ground.


The crowd breathed a collective gasp and hung back, mothers and fathers appearing from their houses to guide their children away from the sight.


Above him, Marcus heard a distinct sound – something so familiar that it struck him even more than the pain as this creature's thigh dug into his neck.


The sounds of a hissing cat.


"Well, well, well," it said – in a voice that was distinctly feminine. "Whatever do we have here? New prey for this hungry little kitten, Marv?"


Marcus thought discretion the better part of valor. He resisted the urge to let fly his bolts of lightning. This time, if he had to redo his summoning process, he'd have to leave a better first impression…


Marvin, however, barely seemed troubled at all by this assault.


"Kara…" he wheezed. "Why you gotta always spook the new guys like that?"


"You aren't spooked, are you, little one?" the creature on top of Marcus asked as it brought its mouth closer and closer to its prey's pinned face. "Mmmm. You do have a rather pleasant scent. The type I'm quite fond of…"


"I can vouch for him," Marvin said. "He ain't no plant. In fact, he's exactly who we've been looking for!"


Marcus's assailant give him a hearty sniff.


"He smells human," she said. "He feels…human. But…yes…something is off. He's no Thean, that's for sure. But is he our man, really?"


"I'll be the judge of that, Kana," another female voice then called out from above.


Marcus barely even felt his attacker's foot leave his neck. He barely even marveled at her thin, furry tail that poked out of her backside or the twirling of her whiskers as she slipped stealthily away from him. Not because the sight of a catwoman didn't excite the imagination, but because the voice he had just heard compelled him to stand and stare at its owner as though it were a siren's song.


His eyes strained to look at the woman who stepped out of one of the shacks to stand before him. He could see her, alright – he could see the thin leather armor that clung to her body and could trace the pale limbs that poked out from beneath her tunic. He could follow the heavy rise and fall of her chest and could trace every curve of her pink-hued lips as she opened them to stare just as dumfounded at the sight of him as he was at her. He dared not even allow his mind to speak her name, for fear that the apparition he saw before him, parting the crowd of runaway slaves like a living, breathing Boudicca, was nothing but a cruel trick of his mind. A holdover from the hallucinogenic properties of Silas' teleportation method.


Only when she spoke again could his mind truly commit to the insane notion that she was standing here, in front of him.


"Marvin," she breathed. "I asked you to find me scraps out there. Instead, you've brought me gold."


There are times in a man's life when he must remind himself to stand even though he knows that every fibre of his being wants nothing more than to break down and weep. This feeling of responsibility surged through Marcus in this moment with more caustic intensity than it ever had before. He walked – at least, he thought he was walking – towards the lucid vision that swam before his eyes. A dream bearing the form of a woman.


And when he finally stood mere inches from her face, and looked into the lilly-pads of her eyes, the thoughts of oblivion that had so haunted him mere hours ago suddenly faded away into the nape of her neck, the light twitching of her nose as she sniffled, and the short gasp of breath that escaped from her mouth when he finally had enough belief to say her name.


"Maria."


She took his head in her hands and giggled like a schoolgirl as she blinked through the tears forming at the edges of her eyes. The expression was something so innocent, so pure, and so utterly incongruous in this new world that it made Marcus think what she said next was nothing more than the final lines of a nightmare he thought he'd never wake up from:


"Yeah," she said. "Welcome home, Marcus."


***

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Discord
 
Book 1 Epilogue
Silas stared through the cracked windows of his Summoning Chamber, watching the meagre force of ratguard bustle about as they tried to spruce up the place in preparation for the King's arrival.

He smiled to see it. Ants, toiling under his vision.

Only a week ago they had looked on him as an enemy when they burst through the Shai-Alud's barricade and found only the bruised and crumpled body of Silas lying before the Summoning Circle. They had probed him with startled questions – assuming that he was the one who had helped the condemned Shai-Alud escape – but their complaints were soon put to rest by the voice of the Prime Putrefact. As soon as they heard him speak, they knew they had been in the wrong.

With appropriate humility he had explained the situation: their crippled leader, Skeever, had taken pity on his old friend. He had been talked out of handing him over to the King by the honeyed words that dripped from the traitor's human tongue. Together they had beaten Silas and forced him to send them to the vile Yokun above. There, they would plot together to overthrow the very empire they had once helped to build.

Silas licked his frayed lips, savoring the supplication the rats who now danced below him were showing. They had accepted his story almost as quickly as he had spun it – hadn't it been known to everyone that Talon-Commander Skeever had always been the dogged right-hand of the Shai-Alud during their campaigns? Hadn't it also been known that Skeever had gone down to speak with the Shai-Alud on the eve of his escape? It made complete sense, even if it evoked more ire in the ratguards than they had ever had to contain within their tiny breasts. Two betrayals right under their noses…a few of them were beginning to blame themselves.

But Silas – good, honorable, Silas – was there to dissuade them from such notions. They were the bravest rats in all the North Warrens. They were truly loyal to their King, and would await his arrival with hope in their hearts. The Kobolds were no more – dead or enslaved – and the technology of the dwarves were still theirs. They would present the King with a greater prize even than this: they would offer up the Prime Putrefact himself – the ratman who had endured torture upon torture in the name of his faith. Truly, none of the ratguard were even worthy of standing before him…

In truth, it was a pity to be heading home. Silas sighed as he thought of his time within these dark walls. It had been toiling, at times, and it had been a grueling process to win the fat toad and his forces to his side, but he had to admit he had a certain fondness for their base natures. He admired the purity of their minds – untouched by notions of self-preservation and sustained by anger. He would miss their childishness as he entered the realm of petty politics that characterized his own race.

But, he told himself. At least I won't be going home empty handed…

He groped around in his robe and produced the tattered journal he had managed to secure from the Shai-Alud. Already he had flicked through its dense pages, his curiosity growing with every flick of each new page. Secrets were contained within this tome that went far beyond his own understanding – far beyond the ken of anyone who had been born in the grim darkness of this dismal underground they called home.

The mind of this man – this Marcus – had changed things down here. And these words would change yet more. As the man had said himself, they were tools. Tools that simply had to be placed in the right hands.

He wondered where the man and his right-hand rat were now. If they had truly made it to Piper's Hill he would be surprised, but it would not be unpleasant to think they had survived the impromptu transport. Silas wasn't about to believe that a commander as skilled as this Marcus would have truly been felled by an improper teleport. It was why the Putrefact had kept up his word. He'd sent him exactly where he'd wanted to go.After all, this world would be distinctly more interesting with this human in it. Who else would ensure that the war raging above continued? Who else would ensure that the conflict would keep all the surfacers preoccupied while he consolidated his position beneath their feet, biding his time for the Skittering that would end all Skitterings.

It would take time. It would take patience, and it would take a lot more than just honeyed words. But Silas was a very patient rat.

Silas recalled then the words of the man as he had given his last command. Crouched within the infinite darkness of the dungeons, the statement had seemed less like a threat and more like an implied challenge.

You will follow my order, Silas, or I will destroy you.

The Prime Putrefact smiled grimly as he finally saw the crimson flag of Clan Red-Eye appear on the horizon.

"We shall see, Marcus Graham," he said as he closed the book in his hands. "We shall see."
 

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