NOVEL NEXT Chapter 99: After His Father
An argument and commotion woke Kess that night from a fitful slumber against the corner of her cell. Shouting and swearing—an older man's voice, fighting against his guards, from the sound of the scuffling.
Kess peeked out of her cell, watching as they passed. The Witchblades, to their credit, tried to be gentle with the thrashing elderly man as they pulled him towards the cell next to her. He had wide brown eyes and a full head of hair in spite of his age. A fresh bruise flowered on his cheek as he tugged and twisted. His face was…familiar somehow.
"Give me a chisel, and we'll see how tough you boys are," he snapped. "I'll gouge your eyes out, you Fulminant bastards."
The guards tossed him into the next cell, where Kess could just make out his face through the gloom and the storm grate that divided their cells. He spewed a litany of obscenities that made Kess blush as he plopped down in the center of his cell.
"Serves them right," he muttered. "Playing with things they shouldn't be. I hope they rot in—"
"Excuse me," Kess said quietly from her corner. The man's eyes snapped to her incredulously.
"Oh great. Now I'm expected to be social with my cell neighbor too. I've had quite enough socialization today with the honorable Lord Northmont, who plays a terrible game of Stormclap, I might add. Can you believe he opens with P5 after J7? An absolutely abysmal choice when you could just play—"
"K5," Kess murmured. Stormclap. Kess felt the board open up in her mind, a stunning contrast to her last day of pain and screaming.
"Why would you play K5 when you could…" Then he trailed off, his mouth twisting into a frown. "No, no, that does protect your territory while best threatening your opponent. But it's not a conventional move. Is that what they're teaching in those Stormclap schools now? It's brilliant."
"Stormclap schools?" Kess repeated, stunned. It seemed out of place to talk about Stormclap in her damp cell, but well…
"Yes, Stormclap," he snapped. "Did they stop playing that while I was down here?" He put his head in his hands. "Clouds, my business is going to be run into the ground. I bet they gave it to Morris of all people. He can barely play the game. We'll all be begging Downhill next."
"Morris?" Kess asked. Then she realized why he was so familiar as she peered through the bars. "You're his grandfather."
"And who in Mariel's gray skies are you?"
"A friend," she replied quietly. "I've…played a few games with your grandson. He asked me to look for you, though you might be in here because of me."
"Not unless you're the one who turned me in for that business in the Archives."
Kess frowned at that, confused. "I thought the Council took you to hide their connections to a Stormclap board?"
"Oh, that board," he said, waving dismissively. "I knew that boy was trouble when he sauntered in. He's been working for them for years. Never a good thing when he shows up." Kess's chest tightened, but Westhill went on. "But no, the board was an excuse. They wanted to keep an eye on me. But that's not why I'm down here."
He said it with a note of pride.
"What did you do?" Kess asked, curious.
"Locked away their toys and threw away the key," he said, cackling. "They didn't like it."
"Their…toys."
"Books, research, whatever you want to call it. I spent years trying to convince those bastards that I could unlock their little door into the Archives. Finally, one of them took the bait. They hired me to haul some books down there—provided I could get the door open. Brought the books, dumped them off, and then I broke the mechanism from the inside." His voice was smug, a faint smile on his face. "Not even Fulminancers are getting through a door that thick. And I caved in the side of the mountain to boot. Only Mariel herself is getting in there now."
"But there's an entrance through the Archives," Kess argued. "Can't they just get in that way?"
Westhill snorted. "Only if you're descended from a Founder. The back door was built as an emergency exit when they built the Archives—it's designed to be opened from the inside only, but the Council hired me to break into it."
"I…I thought you made Stormclap boards."
"Among other things," Westhill said, leaning back with a grin. It faded slowly as he took in his surroundings. "The boards are just a front. We were locksmiths Downhill before we went legitimate. Morris will run the business into the ground anyway—he's too nice."
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Kess stared at the wall in stunned silence. She did have something the Council wanted. They'd never had access to the Archives in the first place. And if she hadn't blown the place to pieces, she would have given them unbridled access to information that Mariel herself thought should be locked away.
She looked at Westhill again, who leaned against the back of his cell. "Why?" she asked.
"Spite," he replied simply, his eyes gone cold. "I've had enough of those bastards trampling on us Downhill. Took years to build up my business and take it Uphill. Forced some of my sons into the Bloodcrawler trade to do it. All so I could get one last shot at that cloudspawned Council." His eyes turned glassy as he gazed at the ceiling. "I'll die with my secrets." He looked at Kess, assessing. "You'd do well to die with yours."
The guards came for Westhill later that night.
He didn't come back.
Rowan slammed his knife into another point from Claire's hurriedly scrawled diagram. The woman herself was gone now, sent away by Arlette as the group was pressed back into the tunnels. Rae had followed not long after that, having taken a scythe wound to the stomach that nearly gutted her. Rowan cut down Blocker after Blocker, but still more appeared. Sometimes he kicked at the bodies, wondering if they were regenerating—but no, the ones he cut down stayed down. There were just too many of them.
Rowan slipped a scythe, kicking the creature away before whirling his sword into another that tried to slip by to attack Arlette. The Blocker fell, but not before Rowan felt a searing pain in his thigh—the first one had managed to pull its scythe across his leg as he kicked it back.
Swearing, Rowan stumbled back, letting Eamon and Arlette take the lead for a moment. It was getting harder to move with the bodies piled in the tunnel. Grimly, Rowan realized that they might not be able to win this. Arlette was on full display, her swords moving so fast they were often a blur, her speed the envy of Rowan and Eamon, but even she was tiring. They all were. Their love of swordplay was an advantage against Witchblades, but here it meant that each strike fell just short of where it needed to land.
Rowan tied a makeshift bandage around his leg—he wasn't sure how much more blood he could afford to lose today—and limped his way back to the front lines.
"Lad, you might as well stay back," Eamon said, grunting as he shoved his sword into another hissing Blocker. He bled copiously from a wound in his arm. "We're going to have to retreat before too long, or die in this cloudspawned tunnel."
Rowan ignored him, squaring up with another Blocker that lowered its scythe at him. Nearby, another dropped at Arlette's feet. "We just need a few more minutes, Eamon," she said, her breathing harsh. Arlette's fighting style, though impressive, involved a lot of movement. It kept her alive through many bouts she should have lost, but for an ongoing assault like this one, it was clear that the woman's strength wouldn't last.
Rowan took a shaking breath and pushed forward, ignoring the pain of his wounds. None of them let a single Blocker through, but their efforts weren't enough. Slowly but steadily, the creatures pushed them backwards until they reached an intersection leading to the rest of the underground.
If they get past here, it's over, Rowan thought, slamming his knife into the leg of one creature as it tried to bolt free into the intersection. From the looks on Arlette and Eamon's faces, they realized it too; for better or for worse, this would be their final stand.
Rowan whipped his sword into another, and another. He lost count of how many he'd slain. Numbly, he realized that perhaps he should feel guilty—these had been people, after all—but that guilt evaporated as one of them sheared through Arlette's arm as another distracted her. She grunted and swore, grabbing her sword arm and falling back as the Blockers made to leap over her body and escape.
Rowan darted to the side, his leg screaming, and drew up his Fulminancy. So far, they'd fought the battle the hard way—with steel—but countless encounters with the Blockers hadn't touched Rowan's powers. Let's see if we can do anything with them, he thought.
He drew his Fulminancy up from that sleeping well and forced it through his sword, coaxing that black fire further than the blade itself went. Then he brought the blade over his shoulder and swung it like a great sword, slamming it into several Blockers over Arlette. Fulminancy crackled, and the creatures flew back into the hallway, toppling over their kin in the process. Eamon glanced at him, nodded, and charged, Rowan on his heels.
The tide ebbed—which was strange. His attack had taken out several at once, but even those stood again. Still, some of the Blockers looked around as if confused, pausing in their assault. Thunder rumbled overhead, shaking the building, and Rowan took advantage of the distraction to cut through more of their ranks. His arms screamed, and he was bleeding from more places than he could count, his leg barely holding his weight and his side aching fiercely, but adrenaline kept him alive and moving as he fought his way back to the staircase.
Eventually, the creatures backed off, retreating back up the stairs into the building. Rowan leaned on a nearby wall, chest heaving as he met Eamon's eyes. "What do you suppose that's about?"
"I don't care at this point, lad. Go see if you want, but I'm getting the lass."
He retreated down the hallway to where Arlette was bandaging her arm and a leg, cursing colorfully. Carefully, Rowan crept up the stairs to the lobby above. The creatures were gone, and the smell of rain and wind wafted through the air as he climbed the stairs shakily on his injured leg.
He wasn't ready for the sight that met him as the manor lobby opened up before him. The main doors were thrown open, and outside, the storm was a thick black mass, pulling up white cloaked Blockers and Blueblades alike, dragging them into the air to toss them far away from the manor. Some of the men and creatures ran towards the manor, panic in their eyes, but they were grabbed bodily and thrown before they even made it to the courtyard. The storm wall swirled around the courtyard entrance, but the manor itself remained untouched. Rowan stared.
Dimly, he registered footsteps behind him—Eamon and Arlette.
"By Fanas, Faleas, and Mariel's rutting name," Arlette swore, staring as she leaned against Eamon.
"That cloudspawned storm is…helping us," Eamon breathed. Rowan spoke, dazed.
"What do we do?"
"Are you kidding?" Arlette snapped. "We run. That thing can have the master bedroom for all I care. Let's go."
The three of them hobbled back down the stairs and into the darkness of the underground hallway, the howling wind and screams fading the deeper they limped.
"If it's all the same to you," Arlette said as they walked, her voice pained, "I'm leaving the next Bloodcrawler we run into where we found them."