It was well after sunset, not that anyone could tell. The rain poured down upon the city in sheets so thick that seeing the sky was nest to impossible. All one got from looking up was a face full of cold rain. The deluge dulled all the senses... plunging everything into a watery gayer cloud and blanketing the sounds of the city beneath the its constant roar. And every other breath took in about as much water as it did air.

"Damn this place," said Jake Fast. He and Breshious huddled beneath the wide overhang of a building. They were both soaked. Jake's normally immaculate dark blonde hair hugged his scalp like some kind of sea creature. His handsome features dripped water onto his already ruined silk shirt. The wide, stocky warrior Breshious stood slightly before him, his longsword held ready.


The ground beneath them was not stone or dirt... but wood. Most of the city of New Venyce was built over the great River Hames, perched upon great wooden platforms that hung over the mile-wide river on each bank. Jake had no idea why the river hadn't flooded yet... and he didn't care. They were both soaking wet and out of breath. They'd stopped in this town for a few days of rest... that had been a mistake. Things started going wrong... and they'd been running all afternoon. Running and trying not to drown in the rain.

"I don't see anything in all this damn rain," said Breshious. "Maybe they can't either. Could be gone by now."

"Oh, they're out there, all right" said Jake. "The question is... are they-"

"Shht!" Breshious hissed. "Men coming." Breshious pointed across the street, where four men were emerging from an alley. The quartet paused, and one of the men began pointing... most likely pointing out the various places on the street where someone could hide. The men drew their weapons and fanned out into the street.

"They're searching for us," said Breshious.

"Fight or run?" Jake whispered.

"There's four of 'em... only two of us."

"Best odds we've seen so far today."

Jake drew his own sword... a single-edged sabre. It slid silently from the scabbard on his hip. Jake felt the brief tingling of his skin as the sword's magic spread outward... completely muting the sounds for ten yard in every direction. While they could still hear everything around them, no sound could be generated within the sphere of influence. Jake could scream at the top of his lungs and no one would hear him. Breshious, well within the sword's influence and thus unable to make himself heard, made a quick hand signal which ended in a pointing motion at two of the searches. The men were approaching, but their attention was elsewhere... they could be dispatched well before they raised an alarm.

Jake and Breshious charged. Breshious's battle cry was as silent as their rushing footsteps on the wet wood. Nevertheless, one man saw the movement and turned towards them. He opened his mouth to shout to the other... but the magic of Jake's sword swallowed his warning.

Breshious was on top of him an instant later. He literally collided with the searcher, knocking him back but not down. The combatants jumped apart. Swords swung around and met each other in the air... but there was no resounding clang of metal against metal. Two trained fighters fought in total silence... thrust, slash, block, parry... Breshious feigned a lunge, then spun to his left. He brought his elbow to the base of the other's skull. The man stumbled forward, and Breshious impaled him from behind.

Meanwhile, the second warrior was peering into a dark corner, unaware of the attack. Thinking he'd seen something in the darkness, he crept forward... and noticed that he could not hear his own footsteps.

"Huh?" he tried to say... but no sound emerged from his throat.

Instead, Jake's Sabre burst from the man's chest. His eyes went wide... then lost focus as he died in total silence.

Jake yanked his sword free-

"GET THEM!" came a shout. The third and fourth warriors had seen them, and were now charging. Breshious rushed to meet them, but Jake hesitated. He was no fighter... he couldn't hold this own against these trained men.

He wouldn't have to.

Breshious tore into them like a storm, slashing and hacking and driving both men back towards the direction from which they'd come. The men were not to be taken easily, however. They fought back with the skill of men who'd seen many battles... but not as many as Breshious. Though he was outnumbered, the warrior's strikes and blocks easily matched both foes. While victory was far from certain, so was defeat. Unfortunately, the battle far away from Jake and the sound-muffling sword, so the sounds of their combat would undoubtedly draw attention. Jake had to get closer. Once he'd silenced the combat, then maybe he had something in his pack that could even the odds and get them out of here before any reinforcements came.

He took two steps, when suddenly hundreds of snakes sprang up around his feet! The serpents hissed and spat at him. Instinctively, Jake backed away... only to find more serpents BEHIND him! He was surrounded. The snakes slithered towards him drew back in preparation to strike... then they halted.

"Hand over the item!" came a voice. Seven men... one obviously a mage... were calmly walking down the street towards Jake, oblivious to the rain and the field of snakes that separated them.

Jake sheathed his sword... not in surrender, but so that Breshious could hear him.

"WE GOT TROUBLE, BRESH!"

"I'm kinda BUSY right now, JAKE!" Breshious's voice called over the din of combat.

"STOP FIGHTING NOW, OR THIS ONE DIES!" The mage yelled.

"Do what he SAYS, Bresh!" Jake added.

Breshious backed away from his foes, but did not sheath his sword. His opponents did likewise. All three men had numerous cuts and gashes... but none were serious. Clearly the combat could have continued for quite a while.

"The Item..." the mage... his face hidden beneath the hood of his soaking wet robe... extended one gloved hand. The others drew their weapons. Jake found himself staring at the dangerous ends of two crossbows and four swords.

"It isn't yours." said Jake.

"It is now. Consider it payment for all the trouble you have caused by coming here."

"I didn't cause any trouble. If you people weren't so quick to take what isn't yours-"

"You know who runs this town, Mr. Fast. You know what the rules are. Brinks takes whatever he wants... and he wants what YOU have."

"Brinks is a petty smuggler with delusions of grandeur. What I have is of no concern to him."

"We shall be the judge of that. Hand it over."

"No."

"You know that you are outnumbered. You know that, even if you did manage to escape us here you couldn't leave this town... we're watching every ship and road. No one gets in or out of this town without Brinks knowing about it."

"Yeah, I know..." said Jake. He looked down at the snakes that surrounded him, then shook his head to throw some of the rain off of his face. "I also know something else," he said.

"And what might that be, Mr. Fast?"

"I know..." Jake's wrists twisted curiously under beneath the cuffs of his soaked shirt. "...that the deadly Herudian desert asp..." Jake's fingers twitched. "...while easily summoned and commanded... cannot STAND the rain! YAAA!"

Jake threw himself to the side while lifting both arms. He twisted his wrists again-

CLICK!

Two miniature bolts fired from the wrist-mounted crossbows under his sleeves.

zzzz-THUP!
zzz-THIP!

The poison-tipped bolts struck the archers in the throat while their own bolts shot past Jake as he landed painfully on his right shoulder. The snakes closed in instantly and began to strike. Hundreds of sets of fangs closed on his skin... and Jake felt nothing. The serpents were illusions... which Jake had known for quite some time.

Jake was on his feet just as the archer's twitching bodies were hitting the ground. The mage yelled something incomprehensible. Jake didn't understand it... but just in case it was a spoken spell, Jake drew the silencing sword and the mage's words ended.

Instead, the mage merely pointed... and the remaining guards charged.

Meanwhile, Breshious had taken advantage of Jake's surprise. One spinning slash tore one man's throat out. The other quickly responded with an attack of his own... but the attack was a little TWO quick. The man slipped on the wet wooden 'ground' and fell flat on his back... which was how he was still laying when Breshious impaled him.

"RUN, BRESH!" Jake yelled... then he remembered that with his sword drawn, no one could hear him. Jake took his own advice and ran for the closest building. Breshious ran after him. He sheathed his sword, drew his dagger, and fell in line behind the men chasing Jake.

"BEHIND YOU, YOU IDIOTS!" the mage shouted.

Breshious grabbed one man by the hair, yanked him back and slit his throat... all while both of them were still running. Breshious threw the body to one side as two more men turned and leapt at him. The remaining one followed Jake.

Jake reached into his pocket and pulled out a small wand. He turned and activated it... firing a thin pink ray at a large puddle of water just in front of the guard's feet. The guard halted... instantly. His boots stuck to the ground where the ray had struck, and he couldn't lift them! Even worse, his own momentum carried him forward, causing him to fall face-down in the puddle. Then he discovered that his FACE was stuck, too.

"AGAGHPPTHH!" The enchantment held him like the strongest glue. Face down. In the water.

Jake stopped running and watched the man drown in a inch-deep puddle.

"Well... THAT'S never happened before..."

"JAKE!"

Breshious wasn't having quite as easy a time. These new warriors were a bit more skilled than the last... and it was all he could do to keep from getting hacked to pieces.

"...get some HELP over here!" he shouted. "JAKE!"

Jake glanced at the mage, who was rapidly casting some complicated spell. Jake sheathed his sword.

"Hold on!"

Jake started backing away from the mage... as he did, he reached into his pack and retrieved one of two multi-faceted gems. Each of the enormous blue diamonds was just small enough to fit in the palm of Jake's hand. Jake took one of them and held it up.

"I can't give you what you want!" Jake shouted. "But maybe you'll be interested in THIS!"

Jake threw the stone.

"BRESH! INCOMING!"

The mage had no idea what it was, but he found out soon enough. The gemstone hit the ground a few feet away, and shattered like thin, fine glass.

And then all Hell broke loose.

There was a sound like thunder... then a roaring like the impending doom of a tornado. The temperature dropped 50...60... 120 degrees in the space of a second. It continued to drop as a supernatural wind swallowed the mage and his screams... freezing him solid and tossing him to the ground, where his frozen form shattered like the gem that spawned the storm. The storm expanded...creating a lake of ice atop the wooden platform. The rain that fell into it became pellets of rock-hard ice. A section of the platform collapsed under its own weight and fell into the river below.

Properly forewarned, Breshious took advantage of the distraction. They were at the very edge of the ice-gem's effect. The intense cold assaulted them, turning the water beneath their feet to ice. Both of his foes looked to see the magic at work. Breshious unceremoniously grabbed one of them by the neck and-

"Here, take a GOOD look!"

-shoved him toward the storm. He fell and slid on the ice... then froze solid a second later. His statue-like body slid through the hole that the storm had made in the platform, and splashed into the river.

The second man was making a rapid retreat.

Then, as quickly as the storm had come, it died.

"Damn, you wasted that thing on ONE mage!" Breshious said as he sheathed his bloody sword.

"Who knows what spell he was planning... he could've been trying to summon reinforcements. Besides, I've got another one."

BOOM!
KRASH!

Somewhere not too far away, something either exploded or collapsed... Jake couldn't tell which. From the way the ground shook... it was probably a building. The ground continued to quake at regular intervals as something very large made its way toward them.

Jake and Breshious looked at each other.

"Any idea what it is?" asked Breshious.

"Not a clue."

Then there came shouting. More armed men... shouting orders and running along the nearby streets.

"Another search party?" said Breshious.

"They've probably homed in on the magic I used... no need to search, they know EXACTLY where we are now!"

"Then uhh... why are we still standing here?"

"Let's go-"

"Wait," said Breshious. "You run, Jake. Down to the river...hide among the beggars... in place we hid this morning! I'm gonna stick around here and let them see me. Then lead them away from you. I'll lead them south, that's where they thing we're going anyway!"

"Are you sure-"

"DO IT!"

"Okay... okay meet me at dawn... by the riverbank north of the city!"

"With some more of these bastards' blood on my sword, m'boy! Now GO!"

Jake ran. Even though this was not his home city, he knew where to go and how to get there. He made his way through the streets... running at times, and moving slowly through the shadows at others. He drew his sword on several occasions, using its magic to cloak whatever noises he made as he snuck past taverns and inhabited buildings. No one saw him. No one heard
him.

Jake didn't like it. They were supposed to be searching for him... dozens of men, plus whatever was making that noise that he and Breshious heard. The fact that he didn't see anyone meant that they were ALL chasing Breshious. Jake didn't like that at all... it felt too much like cowardice. And Breshious was his friend. He was a good partner, and
fighter... but could even he handle himself against this much opposition?

He must've been doing an adequate job so far, because Jake reached the lower city... the dark underworld that existed underneath the platform on the banks of the river... without incident. Jake lit a torch and wandered among the lower city's denizens... beggars and drunks who'd fallen... some literally... from the society above. They existed like rats, nibbling at the foundation of the place that rejected them. Some had built flimsy homes from the garbage and driftwood that the river tossed to them. Others simply wandered to and fro, either on foot or on home-made rafts. However, the incessant rain had raised the river's level almost eight feet above what it had been a week ago... flooding most of the rats, both human AND rodent, from their hiding places to either scurry away or drown. Jake wondered how many bodies had to be fished out of the river due to this damnable rain. Another week of rain and the river would threaten the city itself, but for now it was only a disaster to those who lived below.

"What a mess," said Jake. "GET OFF OF ME!" He shoved a solitary beggar away, then checked his pockets to make sure nothing had been lifted.

Jake wandered for a while. There were no crowds in which he could hide... so he sought the opposite: a place devoid of people. Jake and Breshious had hidden in such a place earlier... right after the assassins had run them out of their hotel room. It was easy enough to find again. Jake lodged himself in between a large rock and one of the platform's thick wooden support beams. The land was at a slope here... sloping downward toward the riverbank. Even with the platform sixty feet above him, rain still poured down on him from the tiny cracks and spaces in the wood. Still, it wasn't as bad as it would be if he were topside. Of course, if he were topside he'd probably be running so fast that he wouldn't notice.

He looked around quietly to see if he was alone.

He was.

He waited and looked again, just to be sure.

He was still alone.

Jake unslung his pack and opened the main flap. There, inside was a roughly spherical object wrapped in several layers of simple cloth. Jake didn't unwrap it... just running his fingers across the thing sent shivers down his spine. The Item was worth several fortunes. Several DOZEN fortunes.

All he had to do was deliver it to a man thousands of miles away.

No problem.

Tomorrow morning he and Breshious would find a way out of the city, and the rest would be child's play.

But just in case...

Jake moved the Item aside and pulled out another cloth-wrapped bundle. This one contained a simple smooth stone, into which five tiny magical wards had been painstakingly etched. The stone had one flat surface, and on that surface was a larger, more complex rune. Jake produced a sheaf of parchment and a writing instrument from elsewhere in the pack.

He wrote:

"D: I have in my possession an Item which may be of interest to you. It is a jewel of exceptional size quality... superior even to those that I have acquired for you in the past. It also is said to possess some rather unique magical qualities, which I have not yet been able to verify. Even should those claims prove false, the Item is still worth both our weights in gold at the very least. My intention is meet you in Montfort, however some difficulties in New Venyce have delayed my associate and I. We intend to depart tomorrow morning, and I will notify you when we are under way. If you receive no further word from me, and are interested in what I have to show you, then you may need to send associates to seek me in New Venyce, as we may have encountered rather serious delays. Await my message tomorrow. J. Fast"

Jake pressed his signet ring onto the page... and the ring left a magical impression bearing his seal. Then he lay the paper down on his pack and sat the stone on top of it. He placed the fingers and thumb of his right hand over the five tiny runes... and the stone began to hum. It was a deep, powerful vibration that rapidly rose in intensity... and then suddenly stopped.

The parchment beneath the stone was gone. The stone's magic had teleported it instantly to its destination. Hopefully someone was there to receive it.

Jake placed the stone back in his pack, then took a moment to figure out what to do next. He knew he couldn't stay where he was Brink's mages could trace magic anywhere in the city, and he needed to be out of here before they found this place. Then what? Despite what the mage had said, getting out of the town unnoticed was NOT impossible. The fact that they thought it WAS impossible would make it that much easier. It was just a matter of applying a bit of wit and cunning-

BOOM!

High above him, the wooden platform shook.

THUD!THUD!THUD!THUD!

The rhythmic quaking drew closer, and Jake recognized the sound... the footsteps of something incredibly heavy.

"By the gods... they were right above me the whole time!"

Jake turned to run.

CRASH!

Two huge fists punched through the platform above. Each gigantic hand was larger than Jake's chest... and completely encased in a thick metal gauntlet. The hands grabbed the sides of the hole they'd just made, and yanked a section of the platform away...

CRRRRRACK!

...leaving a large hole where there had once been solid wood.

The hands withdrew... and a second later a shape fell through the hole.

Stunned, Jake forced his legs to back away... but they were not fast enough to spare him the sight as the heap of bloody flesh and clothing landed just in front of Jake.

It was Breshious.

He'd been pulverized. Shards of shattered bone jutted from the pulped flesh. His head looked like it had been crushed like a grape.

"Oh, no... Bresh..."

THOOM!!

The ground shook as something ENORMOUS hit the ground. The man... if it was a man... was over nine feet tall, with shoulders like mountains and fists like boulders. Every inch of him... every single inch... was hidden by the suit of heavy platemail he wore. His eyes wee dark slits in the ornate helmet that covered his head and face. The golden metal seemed to reflect light that wasn't there... as if it were giving off illumination of its own.

The metal covering his body must have weighed at least a ton... yet it didn't seem to effect the huge warrior's movements one bit as he stepped over Breshious's body and moved toward Jake.

Jake's hand ventured to his sword... but had no idea what he was going to do with it. The warrior looked like he could shrug off a cannon-ball to the chest, so he certainly wouldn't notice Jake's sword.

"I...uhhh...." Jake began. His mind was racing. He had to do something... and not out of revenge for Breshious. He had to do it to save his OWN skin! "Look... whatever you're being paid-"

"Shut up!" the warrior's voice sounded exactly like Jake thought it would... like thunder trapped in a metal drum. He advanced quickly on Jake who was steadily backing away. "You think this is only business?... You killed a friend of mine..."

"I... didn't kill anyone who wasn't trying to kill me!"

Jake reached into his pack, and felt for the remaining ice gem...

"He was an illusionist," said the warrior. "He couldn't have hurt you. All he wanted was the Item... but YOU had to be unreasonable. They woulda let ya go if you'd just given it to 'em... now I'm gonna have to relive you of your property AND your life."

"My property? Is THAT what you want... here... TAKE IT!"

In a fluid motion that surprised even Jake, he yanked the blue gemstone from the pack and hurled it at the warrior's broad metal-clad chest. Jake hoped he was far enough away to avoid getting frozen himself.... but as it turned out he didn't have to worry.

The warrior's arm shot out like a striking snake and snatched the gem out of the air. He brought the gem to his face and looked at it... then held it out and crushed it in the palm of his hand. The magic roared to life... the temperature dropped hundreds of degrees while the hurricane winds ripped and tore at everything nearby. Every ounce of water in the area froze instantly... even Jake's wet clothing became hard and brittle as his skin began to sting from the cold. The water pouring down from the hole in the platform above became a shower of ice.

The warrior stood motionless at the center of the supernatural blizzard. The water on his armor became a layer of ice that thickened rapidly as the seconds went by. When the storm ended, more than an inch of ice coated his motionless form.

Jake was almost too cold to move... he shivered and rubbed his limbs in an attempt to get the feeling back into them.

KRACK!

Jake stopped moving.

KRACK!

A sheet of ice fell away from the warrior's chest.

KRAAAAACK!

The warrior flexed his tree-trunk arms, and all the ice that coated him fell away.

"I DO hope that wasn't the best you could do," he said as he marched toward Jake. "Not that it matters... you can't hurt me. NOTHING can hurt me. But I can certainly hurt you... just like I did your friend, topside. Didn't take him any time at all to tell me you'd be hiding down here in the filth. All I had to do was break every bone in his body... one... at.. a... time."

Jake had no choice now... he turned and ran as fast as his numb legs could carry him... which wasn't all that fast.

The heard thundering footsteps behind him. Jake looked... the warrior was moving like a cheetah! And with a ton of armor weighing him down! How was that possible!?

Jake didn't have time to do anything... not even scream. One second he was trying to run, but in the following second he was suspended in mid air. The warrior's huge hand clamped down on his left arm and shoulder and lifted him up. The man literally ripped the pack from Jake's back and emptied it on the ground. The Item tumbled near the warrior's feet. As did the teleportation stone. The warrior turned Jake around to face him, but still held him several feet off of the ground with on arm pinned to his side.

"The mages said you sent a message," said the warrior. "But they couldn't trace it. Who'd you send the message to?"

"That's none of your concern."

The metal-clad warrior squeezed Jake's left side. Jake felt his ribs cracking...

"WHO?"

"UNGH! That's... that's not for you to...ungh...know..."

"I think it is," The warrior squeezed harder. Jake pounded on the man's arm with his free hand. It was trying to crack a rock with a feather.

"You... want me to beg...is that it?"

"No. I want you to tell me who you work for..."

"M-myself... I'm... f-freelance...I work for...n-no one..."

"Who gave you the fancy magic? Who did you send a message to?"

"...your...mother!"

CRACK!

Several of Jake's ribs shattered. The sharp, jagged edges stabbed out through his flesh. Jake clamped his mouth shut to keep himself from screaming.

"I'll be taking the Item, now. AND this other stuff too. We'll find out where that stone came from... where the message went..."

"...not...not bloody likely... only... only I can operate it. Only my hand can make it work... to you, it'll be just... just a damned stone. You'll never know-"

"Oh yeah? Hmmm... I guess I'll just have to take this too, then-"

The warrior grabbed Jake's right arm... and snapped it off like a twig from a branch. This time, Jake DID scream... he looked down at the bloody stump where his elbow used to be, then at the severed arm in the warrior's huge hand.

"AAAAIIIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!"

"You scream too much..." The warrior carried Jake's struggling body down the slope to the river.

SPLASH!

The armored man literally threw Jake into the shallow water just off of the shore. Then he waded in after him and grabbed Jake by the head.

Jake tried to fight his way free... but he was too week. His arm was pumping blood out into the river like a fountain, turning the water red. Everything Jake saw was red... and the redness was slowly becoming black as shock set in.

The warrior grabbed Jake's head and held his face down in the water. Jake's limbs thrashed... throwing blood everywhere. Jake held his breath. His one good arm whipped back and forth... trying to grab something... anything. He couldn't fight... he couldn't resist. The warrior was too strong, and his own injuries too dire. His lungs screamed for air. He felt so weak... so much pain... Even as his broken body convulsed, Jake's
mind still raced... trying to think of a way out. He tried to fight the panic back... tried to keep himself alive... but he needed AIR!

He could hold back no longer... Jake's mouth opened involuntarily, and the filthy river water rushed into his lungs...

And he stopped struggling...

...and everything went black.

---

Thorne rose and kicked the body further out into the river. The gentle nudge from his metal boot probably shattered more of the corpse's bones. Thorne wondered if... somewhere... the man wasn't feeling that new pain, as well. If so, good.

The current caught the bloody carcass and carried it away into the dark distance. Thorne watched it go. Perhaps someone would find it eventually... perhaps not. Thorne didn't care. It wasn't his job to care about the minor details... Brinks had other people for that.

He retrieved the articles that Jake had been carrying... most importantly, the Item and the messaging stone... and took them with him as he walked away. He looked down at the cloth-covered Item. It was hard to tell for sure through the metal gauntlets, but the thing seemed to be humming slightly. He was curious, but he did not unwrap it. He was told not to... so he resisted the temptation. Still... he wondered just what it was and why everyone seemed to be in such a hurry to die for it.

Not that it mattered now... whoever it had belonged to before, it was theirs no longer. If they wanted it back, they would have to come to New Venyce and take it.

And that just wasn't going to happen.