Shade brushed past a small cluster of heavily armed guards chatting around a burning brazier in the winter cold. These were not thugs like most of the other guards on these streets, but soldiers adorned in thick blue plate armor, emblazoned with the insignia of the white lion of Doljinaar. The small company of guards did not so much as raise an eyebrow at the Dark Elf’s passing. Most soldiers posted in Jile had been disgraced or demoted. Their embittered resentment for their military sticking them in this backwater post made them that much easier to buy.
The assassin turned down an alley leaving the main streets of Jile behind him. He slipped onto a quiet street lined with tall gray brick homes and wood shingled roofs. Steam fogged the paned glass windows from the glow of brick hearths, warm baths or the company of women. He continued down the empty streets on his way out of town.
Shade froze. His keen senses picked up on a near inaudible scurry of movement down an alleyway not five paces in front of him. Soft footfalls. A cold rush of adrenaline washed over him. He felt like his spine was being pricked by a thousand icy needles. His hands went back to his daggers. ‘A Shaltearan Assassin!’ he thought. He peaked cautiously around the building. He half-expected a dagger to be thrust into his face, but he was able to glimpse down the alleyway.
A small rat-like-man, no taller than four feet in height, knocked over a garbage can at the far end of the alley. He scowled. A Dragol!
Shade’s blood boiled. Dragols were ugly creatures with beady black eyes, whiskered cheeks and big buckteeth. Dragols had the face of men, except for their rodent-like shaped skulls. They were hairless save the few stray hairs on their scraggily scalps and the long, usually crusted, black goatees under their chins.
His fingers danced along his dagger hilt. For a moment he regretted his reluctance in not slaying the creature. He could watch in satisfaction as it sunk into the Dragol’s back. Instead, he was left glaring in the rat-man’s wake. He watched in disgust as the rat-man stuffed a rotten fish into his mouth and tucked a maggot infested drumstick and three moldy rinds under his arms. The Dragol glanced guardedly about and ran off down the alley. Shade frowned. He despised Dragols. He noticed three more spilled garbage cans in the alley.
Shade ducked back behind the wall as the nauseating stench of garbage hit him too hard in the face. He shook his head. Jile harbored a much larger population of Dragols than he would have liked. Dragols had been hunted down like night mortals for decades, but like rats they had only managed to survive and flourish. These days Doljinaar had a growing number of places that actually found uses for the vile race. In Jile Dragols were paid well to retrieve Stardust from the Ice Marshes. Shade found it ironic that no matter how much a Dragol made, the miserable creature never lost its unquenchable taste for garbage.
Shade whispered and his hand left his dagger hilt, “Wretched trollbreed.”
The assassin thought again of his quarry. He pondered over Warlord Lewd’s race. Lewd was called Troll due to his revolting appearance and unknown racial roots. Trolls had existed only in tall tales and fables up until a few hundred years ago. They had not been discovered like other people groups, but occasionally bred into existence. It was said that when Doelms and men crossbred they produced a race far more hideous than any that walked the face of Covent. This race was so vile and malformed that newborns were put to the sword.
Shade could not say whether Warlord Lewd was in fact a living, breathing Troll. He was curious about the crimelord’s race, but he would wipe Lewd off the face of Covent just as quickly as a man might butcher a trollborn child. His only intrigue was that Warlord Lewd’s indistinguishable race had proven to be an asset which had catapulted him into the highest seat of the Kurn underworld. Lewd must be an exceptional leader to rise so high in such a cold prejudiced world.
The assassin frowned at the irony. In some ways Warlord Lewd was just like him. The Dark Elf looked forward to that fateful meeting, but until then he’d have to settle for duller recreational diversions. He saw several shadows reflect off a building in the moonlight. He knew who followed him. The assassin’s wits were always sharp and sensing, even when lost in the privacy of his own thoughts. He decided he had toyed with them long enough. He just hoped they were man enough to finish the game they started.
Shade stopped calmly. He kept his back turned. “You’re a slow learner.” he said in a cold callous tone that wafted up in puffs of steam.
“We humans are a stubborn breed,” said a gruff, familiar voice from behind him, “I told you, we don’t like being told what to do in our own country.”
“We?” Shade turned slowly. He saw Bearus, the tall Brigorian man and the two other thugs he had thrown out of the tavern.
Bearus had drawn his huge battleaxe.
The assassin was amused at the small tears of bloody cloth jammed up the man’s nostrils. The other two ruffians brandished long swords and had stuffed themselves into so much armor the Dark Elf thought he could tip them over and roll them down the street like trashcans. He sighed, bored already, “Stubbornness and foolish pride. Those failings will see you to an early grave, friend.”
“Shut your filthy mouth, Welf!” Bearus snapped, “It’s time someone showed you how we welcome your kind in Doljinaar. Tell you what…we’ll even throw you a party, you know, the kind where we leave you dangling from the end of a rope?”
Shade shifted his weight and blinked at Bearus slowly.
A huge portly Grull lumbered out from an alleyway with arms as thick as tree trunks. The man even towered over Bearus, filthy from head to toe. His black hair was clumped into grease-matted locks, not by the skill of human hands, but the neglect of tending one’s hair. The Grull wore a big dumb grin on his lips. He held a noose in his left hand and clutched a massive spiked ball and chain in his right.
“Bearus,” the assassin said calmly, his yellow eyes burning in the night, “tonight you and your friends are all going to die.”
“Y—” Bearus stammered, then recovered, “You said you could take me without the aid of your shadowcraft, dare to make good on that boast?”
“Ah, I see. Tell you what, I’ll do you one better,” said Shade, “I’ll take all four.”
“NOW!” shouted Bearus, then he whistled.
Shade threw two daggers and before Bearus’ fingers even left his lips, he gasped and looked around in staggered shock. His eyes bulged out of his head.
Two of the Dark Elf’s knifes had been planted neatly in the hair-thin chinks in his companions’ armor. The pair teetered over and hit the ground dead with two loud clangs. Bearus gasped.
The assassin vaulted forward, pulling off a perfect handspring and landed right in front of the stunned man. Bearus stumbled backward. He had not even seen the assassin draw fresh blades, but already he felt the stinging pain of three gashes—one across his left thigh, another on his right side and the last running down the full length of his sword arm.
Shade brandished his two bloodstained daggers and winked at Bearus. This would not be a quick death, not for Bearus. Bearus nursed his right arm. He struggled with his axe and fell back just as eight other men came running around the corner.
Shade grinned. The Grull was not the end of Bearus’ cowardice. The men surged forward, waving their weapons, but the assassin lingered long enough to ensure Bearus caught his boastful glare.