CHAPTER 2.02 – THE IRON RAMS: II
Standing in the puddle of weak moonlight penetrating the room, Hugo’s mind shifts away from panic as he begins to sift through his perceptions. The flash of the light spell fixed his position in the room, the floor space and distribution of furnishings. He’s standing on a splash of darkness, a bearskin serving as rug below the window, a large man’s arm’s length from a solid desk. He sighs, returns the lute to his back as he identifies the wrongness he was feeling in the texture of the fur beneath his feet.
He twists the hood on his magic lantern, giving silent thanks to Rian and Bertak’s skill, providing himself enough light to investigate the matted fur. There’s little distinction of shade, nor would there be, he suspects, without full daylight. He reaches down, runs his hand across the spiked, bunched fur. As Hugo catches a faint coppery scent disturbed by his investigation, he maps out the extent of what must be an unsurvivable pool, long since dried. The image of the room rendered by the flash of his spell leaves him certain that he stands in Dolf’s lodgings, the large emblem of a ram over the bed of the Iron Ram himself. A big man, famously, who surely wouldn’t tolerate somebody else’s blood drying into his rug.
Hugo tests his theory, lifts the edge of the rug closest to the stain. Sure enough, the hide pulls up with a catch, a tacky sound like tearing as he strains to separate the hide from the floor. And exposes a stain beneath too dark to be anything other than the metallic scent suggests. So, he reckons, Dolf’s dead. He must be. Flashing back to the guards’ conversation, he reads the implication that Rian’s nemesis, Nevin, was catching the blame. That, his suspicions whisper, or he so alienated Dolf from Perasta’s cause that the wizard was pushed to murder the bandit chief. He shelves his speculation as his senses, honed over a lifetime of entering places he shouldn’t, begin to alert him.
Something’s definitely wrong here, although his instincts aren’t pointing to personal danger. No, this room’s been turned over. Supports the ‘dead Dolf’ theory. He pulls the drawers of the desk carefully, discovers nothing but papers. His experience again rewards him as he finds a small key secured to the underside of a drawer by a tongue of wood, presumably installed by Rudolf himself. He slips some random papers into his bag, begins to hunt for a lock.
The sturdy chest at the foot of the four-poster is, predictably, full of clothes. He gives it a quick rummage, finds nothing secreted, moves on. Shifts attention to the wooden wardrobe beside the bed, expecting similar. He’s half-correct, as he spies a wooden container amongst the riding boots and garments fallen in someone’s hunt through the room. He feels sinking disappointment as he uncovers the small chest, a perfect size for coins and precious possessions. He sighs, finds the key fits perfectly in a lock rendered pointless since someone stoved in the container’s lid.
But wait. Rudi, renowned for a lack of idiocy. Wouldn’t believe in a literal den of thieves that his lockbox hadn’t been recognised for what it was. Hugo gently widens the beam of light, scans the room for hidey holes. Grins, and scrambles onto the bed, towards the iron symbol on the wall. Suppresses an expulsion of glee as he unhooks a pouch from where it hangs in the hollow behind the symbol of a ferocious ram. Doesn’t feel very heavy, but at least the contents clink.
The chest dented his burst of self-admiration a little, ingenuity defused by brute force and ignorance. But no time to think of X. Time ticks on and he needs to return to the group with something more solid than ‘I think Mentari’s dead’. With that in mind, he strums his flattened lute, marvelling as the chords arrange themselves under his fingers, guided by the yielding warmth of the effect he chanced upon earlier.
He worries for a moment that he didn’t recognise the point of success earlier, that he’s facing another iterative process of trial and error. Thankfully, having subsequently sensed the enchantment, he can track the suppressed-shiver growing with the correct combination of notes. He thrills as he feels his invisibility re-establish, still somewhat cowed by the fact that in his own perception he’s still solidly there. But, he realises, with an elusive, wavering quality, the merest suggestion that all is not normal.
He begins picking the lock before confirming that the room’s door is, in fact, secured. So certain is he that Dolf has perished. Another mystery on the docket, though, as nobody seems to have snaked in to replace him. He opens the door quietly, slipping out onto the nearly dark floor. Dolf’s room lies against the north wall of the fort, the largest portion of an internal wall portioning off a quarter of the area’s length. To his right, Rian theorised the bedroom of Nevin, literal right-hand man to Mentari. Off to his left, Hugo’s surprised that he can make out only one door. He was expecting two more rooms, lodgings for Keran and Trey, the Iron Ram’s other lieutenants.
He’s operating by only the muted illumination penetrating the fortress’s windows; however the huge open space of the southern area is thankfully dotted with the occasional lantern. He understands why, as he adjusts his estimation of the Rams’ membership upwards. The entirety of the space is laid out in barracks form, marshalled to maximise occupancy. Dolf truly did have an army at his disposal, possibly a navy too. The effect’s rendered less impressive, however, as to Hugo’s dim perception the majority of the beds are unoccupied.
He struggles to prevent his mind from leaping several steps into an unearned conclusion, focuses on what’s in hand. And what he requires to confirm or deny his suspicions. Scans out again over the space before padding to Nevin’s door. He listens at the wood for a moment, more cursorily than prudence should dictate. The narrative growing in his head is seductive, though, and his internal gambler’s leaning into it. He thinks he should know better than to trust the feeling, is instantly contradicted as the unlocked door swings smoothly inward.
He slips into the darkened space, the level of illumination itself good news. Barely pauses to confirm there isn’t, say, soft breathing from the bed before he’s twisting his ‘lantern’ hood to better see the interior. Nothing to fear here. The bed’s empty, the room bereft of any decoration or personal touches. Despite the fact that Rian’s description of Nevin ascribes little in the way of sophistry or self-expression, it takes very little to determine that the man has upped sticks and left.
He twists the lightstick shut, stands in the darkness for a moment, rebalancing himself. Breathing. Recalls his advice to Berin, to the rest of his clique. Satisfy yourself that the place is empty, but don’t fall for it entirely. You’re still in dangerous territory, where you don’t belong. So keep your senses honed and your reactions sharp for the unexpected. He starts to second-guess the fact that he didn’t re-lock Dolf’s door, but that could save him seconds, and noisy ones too, should he need to sprint for his only tested escape route. He slows his breathing, enforces calm.
-x-
He stands at the third door, ear pressed to the wood. This room is definitely occupied. He’d love to leave, present the party with his theories, but he can’t bring himself to do so. He has plenty of time for a quick investigation and escape, but only if he remains undetected. Invisibility’s wonderful, but even stupid bandits could prevent his escape. Not to mention that there are still sufficient remaining bandits to set up patrols and ruin his friends’ day.
He tries the latch extremely gently, finds the door to be locked. Feels his own eyebrow cock at this, but Rian had very few interactions with Trey, or Keran, or whomever has since laid claim to this room. He tries to suppress his hand’s shudder as he speculates ‘guest room’. Imagines stumbling in on a fully alerted Perasta with offensive magic sizzling on his fingers. Thankfully, the Rams seem to have invested in the upkeep of their stronghold, as the lock disengages smoothly, Hugo’s practiced hands suppressing as much of an audible click as possible.
He breathes for a moment, listening for stirs from the inside before easing the door open enough to accommodate him. Another dark threshold, merest vestiges of illumination from the walls intruding into the room. His risen hackles confirm that he is not alone, so he doesn’t risk his lightstick. Instead, he leans into his night vision as he matches his breathing to the rhythm of the room. He feels Three’s warmth under his breastbone, the little guy used to sleeping through his master’s trespasses. As if in response to the thought, the squirrel nuzzles his head against Hugo’s ribs, ever the calming presence.
He focuses on the shadow shapes resolving as he gets his bearings in this narrow room. It’s been elbowed into the area left over from Dolf’s commanding bedroom and Nevin’s unshowy but comfortable living space. A bed to his right, in the lee of the door against the wall and window. Definitely occupant, thankfully breathing evenly. His eye moves to the lump of a chest at the bed end, past it to the far wall. Another bed? Empty though, a similar chest in its shadow, the silhouette complicated by…
He just about swallows his fucking tongue as the complex shape resolves into a man, huddled like a goblin over the chest. The pose suggested he was about to spring at Hugo, but as the frantic thrum of his heart reduces to merely a staccato drum solo, he realises this man’s also asleep. A crazed laugh threatens to burst through Hugo’s self-control as the scene resolves into a scenario he had been too frightened to court, to believe in. In fact, maybe something even better…
-x-
As he exits, carefully locking the lieutenants’ door behind him, he’s part-jubilant, part nervous at how long he spent in the room. He should be okay for time, he thinks, but has absolutely none to spare. He’s just finished with the mechanism when his heart freezes, detecting movement in the enormous space of the floor below before he catches a stumble and curse from the barracks area. He chides himself, frozen for a moment he can’t afford while he judges the presumed bandit waking for a piss or for a shift on the walls to be far removed from him and moving still further away.
He pads to Dolf’s door, doesn’t pause to listen as the tremulous feeling of his magic confirms that he will return to visibility within minutes. Suddenly, the distance he has to cover, and the proportion of that vertically, impinges on his nerves. As he controls the pulse in his ears, his imagination forms monsters – or worse, bandits – inside the silhouettes of the room. He curses his shaking hands as he re-seals Rudolf’s murder scene, this time with a worryingly audible click.
He can feel his panic rising as he extricates himself from the window, hurriedly shuffling his pick to re-engage the latch. A thick droplet of rain shocks him as it dodges under his collar and trickles down his already chilled spine. Fortunately, the surprise centres him as a stiff upshot of breeze catches his clothes. Cat burglary was never his favourite approach, a curse since his natural attributes are perfectly suited to the risky business. And his experience is sufficient that he flattens himself to the wall, fingers and feet anchoring to available holds.
The lesson, learned once and confirmed repeatedly: on a climb, the fastest progress is the safest. At least, the fastest progress from which you get to walk away. He’s grateful for the inclement weather even as his guilt rises for abandoning his friends to the same. But he refocuses as he factors that he must avoid obvious tracks in the wet soil beneath Dolf’s window, add more distance to his trek by sticking to the grassy verges of the vegetable plots below him.
Then, he thinks grimly, it’s easy street. Just up and over the walls with their patrols. And a pell-mell sprint across the killing ground to the treeline. He catches himself envying Thae a goddess to petition to grant him sufficient invisibility that the killing ground becomes just…ground.
