Forty-two years later.
Serrus left Rivia on lookout at the door, then snuck through to the room that Alvas’ treasure was meant to be in. He got a handful of a dust that was pure black from his pocket, and threw it in the air, trying his hardest not to make a sound.
The dust revealed two indistinct figures, but both were clearly wearing robes. Stealth magi as guards… it would be too easy.
He knew that they waited for you to find them, then when you inadvertently stumbled onto or into them, their massive amounts of defensive spells would trigger. He had been prepared, however, and silently, being cautious to remain out of sight, he coated his two daggers with Rosethorn, one of the only poisons known to completely neutralise magic. For a few seconds, anyway.
It didn’t matter. Assassins generally don’t need more than half a minute to terminate someone.
He snuck around them as well as he could. Then he plunged the dagger into the back of the first one, whirled around, and stabbed the second. At least, he tried to.
The daggers bent, but the poison affected the magic field around the two mages, and revealed their true forms. Massive four legged, reptilian creatures. They were both red, and both angry. But the red did mean one thing – they were fire wyrmkin, and therefore weak to frost magic.
Serrus wasn’t a frost mage, and he’d left all his frost poisons at his lodgings in the Assassin’s quarter. He still had help.
“Rivia!” he shouted, as the two dragonkin advanced on him.
Rivia heard her master’s name, and came flapping into the room.
“Frrrrrwiiiiiiii!” she frrrrrwiiiiiiii-ed furiously, as the cone of cold emerged from her mouth and froze the two fire wyrmkin in place.
“Good girl,” said Serrus, running back into the first room as quietly as he could. He jumped out the window. It was the third storey up, but he knew how to land softly.
He sprained his ankle, though, because he wasn’t as informed about landing on trolls. Especially not the ones that then handcuff him and bring him to the City Watch’s headquarters in Dedæf Yard.
Six hours later he was walking back towards the Assassin’s Guild headquarters. That had been annoying… the Watch these days was harder to buy off.
That watchman guarding his cell would be disappointed when he tried to spend those coins, because they were a fairly obvious forgery that most people could spot. Evidently not that watchman, though.
He found the spot. It was marked, but very barely.
It was only here that he could cast the spell. His hands glowed, the black markings on his hands beginning to glow. They glowed on his chest and legs too, but those were covered.
He went pure white… and vanished.
*
Drakaya was in her room in the dorms, but even so, she could tell Serrus was back. It wasn’t hard, though. He constantly emitted a kind of “I’m here” aura, that let you know whenever he was in the same building as you. He wasn’t tricky to spot in a crowd, either. He tended to wear black – not unusual for assassins – but his black was… blacker. He was astonishingly handsome, and he had those markings. And the pointed ears were a bit of a giveaway. It all came together to form one simple idea.
Dark elf.
Vampires had been mentioned to Drakaya, but she knew they weren’t real. They were just the less civil dark elves, the ones that enjoyed preying upon humans. And, presumably, wearing their collars turned up, those horrible V shaped haircuts, and avoiding the sun.
Dark elves tended to avoid the sun anyway. The real reason was that they actually just get sunburnt easily.
Drakaya never got sunburnt. Sunburned just wouldn’t look good.
High elves like to look good.
She sighed. She’d have to confront him about the conditioner eventually.
It’s not like he doesn’t have his own stash, she thought.
She was getting hungry, and poison theory isn’t that interesting.
She stood up, and teleported through the wall.
She didn’t quite have the hang of teleport magic yet, so she was stuck in the next wall along for three hours before someone got her out.
*
“Hey, Victor,” said Serrus, sitting down at the bench in the canteen.
“Hey. How’re ya going?” said Victor. He was on a raised stool – there really wasn’t any other ways for Dwarves to reach the tables – and was eating some indistinguishable food. It looked vaguely like meat.
“Could be better. The Watch arrested me…”
“That’s… what. The sixth time this month?” said Victor.
“Seventh.”
“Exactly. You’re playing it too risky. You’re still just a student…”
Victor waited for a response. It didn’t seem like he was getting one.
“Serrus? Are you there?”
“Huh?” he said. Drakaya had entered the room. It was a large room, so he’d been straining his neck to get a better view.
“Is that why you’ve been trying to get into Alvas’ stash?”
“What are you talking about?”
“You’re trying to impress her, aren’t you?
Serrus looked embarrassed for a moment. Then he lowered his voice slightly.
“In Alvas’ treasure, there’s a high elven ring. It used to belong to her father. No-one knows how he got it, but no-one’s proved anything, so it seems legal. That’s the thing. If I can get it back, we might be able to prove something… and it’d make a great gift for her, too.”
“Right… but… Oh, nevermind. Wait… where’s your dragon?”
“… I haven’t seen Rivia since that troll arrested me…”
Drakaya had walked up to their table. Serrus almost blushed.
“Serrus?” she said coldly, “A dragon whelpling was flapping around at the portal. I’d assume she was yours, but I’m sure someone as responsible as you couldn’t possibly lose a dragon. So I handed her into the Watch… seeing as she was used in the committing of a crime. I heard they have a werewolf officer now… they’d be able to track you down from just one thing you’ve touched. For example… a baby dragon?”
Serrus had gone as white as a sheet. Well… some sheets. White ones, anyway. Probably not Victor’s, though.
“Although, however, I may be able to help you recover your dragon… unfortunately, my father claims that for a high elf… appearance is everything. And I just happen to have run out of conditioner. You wouldn’t happen to know where I could find any, would you?”
“… I think so…” said Serrus. How had she found out?
“Could you show me where?”
Twelve minutes later, Serrus had led her to his room. It was quite a way away – the boys and girls rooms at the Assassin’s Guild were separated by quite a large distance.
“This is where you live?” said Drakaya. There was an expression of disgust on her face.
“Look, I share this room with a dwarf. He never tidies up.”
“Ah. So where have you put the conditioner?”
Serrus muttered something under his breath. The bed vanished.
There was a safe on the floor. He opened it carefully, then pulled out the box.
He passed it to Drakaya.
“All your stair huff is in there.”
“What?”
“Slip of the tongue. I meant hair stuff. All of it. Now give me Rivia.”
“What? I didn’t lie. The Watch has her.”
“WHAT? Wasn’t that just a ploy to get your conditioner back?” blurted Serrus.
“No. Do you want my help or not?”
“…” said Serrus.
He was feeling unusually conflicted. He was really annoyed at Drakaya, but he couldn’t help looking forward to looking for Rivia… together.
Urgh. I’m a dark elf, he told himself, I do NOT, under any circumstances, enjoy spending time with a high elf.
Am I sure?
No. But that’s what I should be like.
“But you do enjoy it. I can tell,” said Drakaya, “Personally, I can’t see why.”
“… Look, being around you is just too confusing. Could we just get Rivia back?”
“… Okay…”
*
And now it was later.
Drakaya was thrown into a cell with Serrus, protesting feebly. Rivia, who had been in there a while, was definitely pleased to see Serrus. Less so to Drakaya.
“Look, what did we do wrong?” said Drakaya.
“You. Do. Not. Charge. In. And. Threaten. To. Incinerate. Everyone,” said Serrus, carefully pronouncing each word.
“Why?”
“You’re a damn high elf. As if you’d ever do anything if they hadn’t done anything wrong to you.”
“Wrong,” said Drakaya. She was getting annoyed.
“Hey… why are your hands glowing blue?” said Serrus, shortly before being frozen in a giant block of ice.
She warped out of the cell, and then cast a lesser invisibility spell.
She then went back to the assassin’s guild. Drakaya almost felt sorry for him.
As an afterthought, she notified Darokh, the head of the guild, about Serrus’ capture.
He didn’t seem happy, so she left out her part in the matter.
*
Serrus defrosted after six hours. There are many things it can be uncomfortable and unpleasant to wake up to, or defrost to, and a knife at your throat is one of them.
Unfortunately, he was in such a position.
“Now. You are going to come with me,” purred a soft female voice behind him, “or this knife may just slip. Don’t talk,” said the voice behind him as he opened his mouth, “people talking makes me nervous. When I get nervous, I tend to drop things.”
“…” said Serrus. He could feel a tiny drop of blood coming down his neck where the knife had “slipped” slightly.
“Now. You are coming?” the voice said.
Serrus nodded slightly, enough to show agreement, but not enough to make the knife cut him.
“Alright. Good,” said the voice, which was followed by a “NARUTIA’S HAMMER! WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?” said the voice, accidentally flinging the knife away as Rivia bit down on the assaulter’s buttocks as hard as the little dragon could.
Serrus took advantage of this opportunity, and grabbed his own twin daggers. They had been enchanted, and as he spun around and pointed one of them at the attacker it glowed, menacingly.
Serrus snarled, waved the dagger slightly while chanting in the Dark Elven language – it was actually just him saying how much he hated sunburn, but it sounded menacing, and that helped in the end – and a bolt of shadow energy shot from the end and hit the attacker – now revealed as a human teenage girl, 18 or 19 by the looks of it – in the chest. She was flung back, hit the wall of the room – Serrus only now noted that he wasn’t in the cell anymore – and slid down it. The girl stood up.
“What on earth was that for?” she said, in an irate voice.
“You were trying to kill me!”
“What? This was just my assessment task!” said the girl.
“… and they sent you to kill me.”
“No! I was just meant to escort you out of the room without you harming me!”
“Ah. Serrus,” said a new voice, behind Serrus. Serrus froze in fear. He knew that voice.
“Darokh? Were you aware the dragon was in here?” said the girl. She didn’t seem scared.
“Yes, Teraura. It was part of the test. Many nobles do have pets that will defend them vigilantly, as Rivia here did for Serrus,” said Darokh, “But, Serrus… this is the seventh time you’ve been caught now. This month alone.”
Serrus said nothing. When dealing with the master of the Assassin’s Guild, he’d found that safest.
“I’m afraid after your… escape… from the prison cell, the Watch has set your bounty up to more than 500,000 eru. It’s not safe for you to go out anymore. Until your bounty goes down significantly, it’s not safe for you to come out of the guild.”
Serrus could feel the fury building up inside him. It wasn’t his fault. Drakaya had blackmailed him into it, and then bailed out. And raising the bounty for escaping? He hadn’t done it. Why had they even taken him out?
“So, wait. I’m just supposed to sit here and be… practiced on?” he said.
“Well… not exactly. You do have an impressive record, I must admit. For every one time you get caught there are two where you succeed. Many assassins fail to get a second chance. So… we’re going to give you a real assignment. It’s dangerous, but… it could work,” replied Darokh.
“Could work? So you’re not certain?”
“No. We are not. However… Teraura here… she’s actually quite the alchemist. We… might, and I mean might, have a way to get you out of the guild. It would also give you easy access to the palace.”
“What… so… an invisibility potion?”
“Metaphorically, yes. Literally, no. I think… you should simply visit Teraura’s makeshift lab. It’s not perfect, of course, but… if you are still humanoid by tomorrow, report to my office at 8:30 AM.”
And with that, Darokh strode off.
After a bit of silence, Serrus said “So… are you going to show me there?”
“What? Oh. Right. Yeah. Sure.” said Teraura. And she walked, rather nervously, along the corridors towards the girl’s dorms. Serrus didn’t actually see anything, but he had the feeling he was being watched. The giggling from some of the rooms seemed to confirm his suspicions.
Eventually, he arrived there. It was a fairly normal room. The only out of place things there were the vials and bottles on the desk, and Drakaya.
“What? Why are you here?”
“I was going to ask you that, but… I see Darokh’s found a guinea pig for Teraura’s experiments,” said Drakaya.
“Guinea pig? What? Is that the whole point? I become a rodent?”
“Don’t worry… it’s nothing like that. Well… not much, anyway…” said Teraura.
“What? Not much? So what will it d-“
He was cut off by Teraura taking the opportunity to pour the entire contents of a vial down his throat.
It tasted of strawberries.
“Hm. No visible affects at 10 seconds…” said Teraura, “That mean’s it’s probably not instant in it’s effect.”
“Right. So we should be seeing a difference by tomorrow?” said Drakaya.
“If it’s a success, yes… but this hasn’t been tested on humans. Or any elves. If it’s a success, I should be able to develop one that works in reverse, but either way, if it works on him, it should work on all elves.”
Serrus felt his throat. It seemed fine, but the strawberries lingered.
“What’ve you… what… you… done… t’me…” he mumbled, then fell asleep.
“Okay, extreme drowsiness seems a fairly major side effect,” said Teraura, as Rivia fluttered nervously near her master. She pulled out a notebook.
“Okay, I reckon we should keep him here… until we’re certain. If it doesn’t work, I could teleport him back,” said Drakaya.
“Fine. As long as you don’t teleport him two hundred metres higher than he’s meant to be.”
“Look, that was once!”
“My leg still hurts. And that was two years ago.”
“Shut up.”
