"...so have you gotten a look at December's new lady-friend?" said Lovvorn. He and Eric Hood had quite literally *appeared* on the street near Lovvorn's favorite tavern. Much to Lovvorn's dismay, however, Eric immediately turned and led them away from the bar and towards the site of Lovvorn's previous encounter with Chain's men.

"I caught a glimpse of her the other morning," replied Eric. He had his usual frown drawn across his face as he glanced from one set of shadows to the other. As they walked, he reached into his pocket and withdrew his dagger... a long thin stiletto. He began twirling it between his nimble fingers as if it were an toy.

"Well...?" said Lovvorn.

"Well what?"

"The woman!"

"Bad news," replied Eric. "They're ALL bad news... but THIS one especially."

"You don't like women, do you?"

"They have their uses."

"Oh, really?" Lovvorn's smile widened. "I just HAVE to know what you mean by 'uses.'"

"Catching someone off guard. People trust 'em... have pity for 'em. If I wanted to get close to somebody without raising their suspicion... I'd send a woman. Women make the best spies... and assassins."

"Oh, I don't know... I think Theesa has a certain charm. Its nice to see Big Frosty's soft side for a change."

"Soft sides get ya killed. Or worse."

"True... but still-"

"And did you see the way he was actin' tonight? He wasn't even there. His mind was somewhere else... with her."

"Well if you'd gotten a GOOD look at her then your mind would be-"

"No it wouldn't."

"Oh. Okay. Not your type I imagine? She IS a bit on the petite side... not at ALL like our resident heartbreaker, Zade."

"Don't trust her either... She's another one we need ta keep an eye on."

"You'll get NO argument there! I'd like to keep BOTH eyes on her... and both hands... lips...tongue..."

"Is this the place?" said Eric, interrupting Lovvorn's impromptu daydream. He pointed at an alley between two buildings. Both walls were scorched and cracked, as if damaged in an explosion. Between the full moon and the street lamps, Lovvorn had more than enough light to recognize the place.

"Yep. This is where I blew up those gentlemen this morning. If I recall, they landed right over there..." Lovvorn pointed to the middle of the street. There was nothing there except for a dark stain on the ground. "Then Lefty came along and tried to impress me with his piano-playing skill."

"Think you can get a trace on Belladrox?"

Lovvorn wiggled his nose and licked his lips. He paused for a long while... Then he smiled...

"Got it?" asked Eric.

"Ohhhh, I can only wish..."

"What?"

"OH! Oh, I was thinking about Zade again... You wanted something?"

"Belladrox. You said he used some magic here... think you can trace it?"

"Certainly!"

Lovvorn made a few sweeping motions with his hands and frowned at the air in him. He rotated to face in another direction and repeated the motions.

"Ahhh..." he said.

"Got a trace?"

"Not a *trace* exactly, but I am detecting more of his magic THAT way-" He pointed. "It's recent, too."

"You sure?"

Lovvorn nodded.

"The cemetery is that way." said Eric. "N'Doki."

"Oh, well if Chain's boys went to visit Spooky I'm sure they're all gumbo by now."

"We'll see."

Eric started off at a brisk walk. Lovvorn followed as best he could, but his own bulk slowed him down considerably.

"Wait up!" he yelled.

For a while, Eric didn't respond. Then he slowed down slightly and allowed Lovvorn to catch up.

"Thanks-" Lovvorn stopped suddenly and began looking around. "Eric?"

"What?"

"Uhhh.... I don't know. Something's not right..."

Eric joined Lovvorn in scanning the surroundings. They had halted in the street, right in front of an old inn that had closed its doors for the night. The inn, like most of the surrounding buildings, was a two-story wooden structure with lots of windows facing the street. The windows were dark, and there was no light or movement in the alleys or along the rooftops.

"I suddenly feel very exposed," said Eric.

Lovvorn nodded in agreement.

"I think you'd better get us out of here."

The two stood silently for a few uncomfortable seconds.

"I said get us out of here."

"I'm.... trying..."

Sweat was pouring down the mage's face. None of his teleportation spells were working. As he tried more and more powerful variations, sparks began to crackle around his hands and the air around him started to glow. He tried harder...

Nothing.

"That bastard!" hissed Lovvorn. "He's BLOCKING me!"

"Can he DO that?"

"....obviously..."

"From where?"

Lovvorn looked up at the roof of the inn.

"I don't see anythi-"

"ERIC, GET DOWN!"

Lovvorn threw all of his considerable weight into Eric Hood, shoving them both out of the path of the speeding missile. The bolt from the Belladrox's crossbow imbedded itself in the soft ground just inches away from Lovvorn's foot.

"Snipers! Put a SHIELD around us!"

Lovvorn cast the spell to create a protective bubble of magic. But instead of snapping into place instantly, the magical barrier flowed slowly around them like a curtain of thick molasses.

"That SEWER RAT! He's trying to interfere-"

Something slammed into the nascent barrier just seconds before it was complete. The unexpected force was so great that it created a feedback spike that was like a nail being drive into Lovvorn's skull

"AIIIGH!!"

The barrier wavered... sparked... but held fast.

"What was that?" shouted Eric.

"I don't...ARRRRGH!"

The second bolt from Bradley's crossbow burst the protective shield like a soap-bubble. Lovvorn grabbed his head and fell to his knees... twin streams of blood were trickling out of each nostril.

"Run Eric!" he shouted.

Eric took a step...

zzzz-thup!

...and fell to the ground. A crossbow bolt was protruding from his chest. Eric's favorite knife fell from his limp fingers and slid into a puddle of mud not far away.

"ERIC!!!"

Lovvorn reached for his friend, but his attention was drawn by six armed men emerging from the still-dark inn.

"Eric, PLEASE!!!"

Lovvorn tried to cast another protective spell around them, but encountered the same interference as before, now augmented by the throbbing pain in his own head. He knew that by the time the barrier actually finished forming, both he and Eric would be hacked to ribbons.

Beside him, Eric Hood suddenly jerked and coughed up a mouth-full of red fluid. He moaned once, and then lay still. The bolt in his chest had pierced his lung... he was drowning in his own blood.

zzzz-thup!

A similar bolt ripped into the mage's shoulder, knocking Lovvorn onto his back.

Lovvorn heard the footsteps of the men. He grasped the bolt in his shoulder and tried to push it through.

"Here, let me help," said a gruff voice.

Lovvorn tried to kick the man standing over him, but he couldn't prevent the man from grabbing the bolt and yanking it halfway out. The barbed head of the weapon tore at his flesh from the inside.

"AIIIIIIIGH!!!!"

The pain was so great that it actually felt *numb* for a few merciful seconds. Undaunted, Lovvorn squirmed and kicked.

"Oh, I'm sorry," said Belladrox. "I forgot... you're supposed to push it though, NOT yank it out. Did that HURT?"

Lovvorn spat on Belladrox's boot, which was the closest thing to his head. The battle-mage responded by kicking him in his injured shoulder. Lovvorn howled in pain.

"What about HIM?" asked one of the other men. He nodded to Eric. "He's still breathin... a little."

"Let's fix that..." Belladrox pointed his loaded crossbow hand at Eric, but before he could fire, Lovvorn kicked him in the knee and tried to squirm away.

"OUCH! Dammit!" Belladrox's reflexes fired the bolt, ended up in Eric's thigh instead of his head where Belladrox had intended. Eric remained motionless as the pool of blood accelerated its growth beneath him.

"Grab that mage!"

Someone grabbed a handful of Lovvorn's hair, lifted his head, and punched him hard in the face.

"Th-that didn't h-hurt," moaned Lovvorn, now the proud owner of a broken nose.

"Well maybe THIS will!"

Belladrox removed the spiked mace from his belt and hefted it in his left hand.

"Stretch his legs out, boys..."

"NO!"

"Oh, yeah..."

The men complied, and soon had Lovvorn's right leg stretched out and held tightly in place.

Belladrox lifted the mace and brought it down on Lovvorn's knee with all his strength.

Lovvorn felt his kneecap shatter. Jagged shards of bone ripped through tendon, muscle and skin as the force of the blow pulverized his leg.

"AAAAAAAIIIIIIIIGGGGHHH!!"

"That ought to do it," said Belladrox. He handed his mace to one of the other men and then retrieved a small gray stone from his own pocket. It was smooth and shiny, with one oddly flat surface. He kneeled down and placed the flat part of the stone against Lovvorn's forehead.

"Open wide..." he said.

The stone began to glow...

Somewhere... somewhere beyond the pain... Lovvorn felt a slight tingling at the corners of his mind. At first it was gentle, like a lover hand... but then it became an insistent mental itch... then a burning that grew until his mind was on fire.

If it weren't impossible for him to scream any louder, then he would have done so.

The fire-storm swept through his mind like a tornado, sucking up his memories and tossing them about in random disarray. He could have resisted... he could have forced it out... but his leg... His LEG!!!

"SOMEBODY HELLLP MEEEEEE!!!!"

Convulsions set it. Lovvorn bit down on his own tongue, and that pain added to the ocean of agony that stood between him and his own mind.

The storm dug deeper... yanking up thought after thought from the depths of his mind. Inner sanctums that had long been held tight against intrusion were ripped open and violated.... deeper...deeper...

And then it was over.

Belladrox removed the stone and placed it back in his pocket.

"Gotcha," he said. "Now I know everything YOU know. Every place you've ever been. All your favorite spells. And most importantly... December's security codes."

"Can we kill 'em now?" said one of the men.

Belladrox kicked Lovvorn's right foot, and the mage's lower leg swung out at a nearly 45-degree angle from the shattered knee.

Lovvorn screamed again while everyone else laughed out loud.

"Yeah," said Belladrox. "We got what we needed. Kill 'em both." He retrieved his mace and jogged back towards the inn.

"Lookit that leg!" said one of the men. "Kick it again!"

Someone obliged... this time Lovvorn was already in so much pain that he didn't even feel it.

"Do it again!"

"Again!"

"Again!"

"Make 'im scream some more!"

"Here, let ME do it!"

They toyed with him for a few agonizing minutes, and then one of them unsheathed his sword.

"Watch me cut 'is head off!" he said.

"What's the fun in that?"

"Five gold says I can do it with just one chop!"

"Deal!"

He lifted the weapon high.


*CRACK*

The sword was gone... yanked out of its wielder's hand by the lashing of a black, leather whip. The blade hit the ground a few feet away.

"You going to let a lady in on the fun?" said a sultry female voice. "Or is this party for boys only?"

The sexy, dark-skinned mercenary stepped out of the shadows. Her black leather armor gleamed in the moonlight, and her whip looked like a deadly serpent in her hand.

"Who's that?" said one of the men. He drew his own weapon and scowled at the woman.

"Five against one?" said Zade. "That's hardly fair... to you."

"Get Her!"

Zade sighed as two men charged. Her hand moved...

...zzzZZT...

The first thug's throat exploded in a shower of blood as Zade's shiruken tore completely through his neck. The second man slashed at Zade and jumped back quickly. He slashed again, trying to draw the woman's attention away from the three other men that were moving to surround her.

"Oh, please..." said Zade. "You five...excuse me, FOUR... think you can take me?"

As one man opened his mouth to respond, Zade cracked her whip. The tiny blade on the tip snatched the nose off of his face before he even knew he had been attacked.

"AAAAAH!" He backed away, trying to contain the fountain of blood with his hands.


Instantly, two men rushed in from either side with swords drawn. Zade dropped to the ground and drove her heavy boot upward into one man's crotch. He collapsed like a house of cards, but there was no time to move in for the kill. Zade rolled away just as the other man's sword was about to remove her head. She leapt to her feet and spun away from another sword-strike.

"I'm having fun," she said. "how about you?"

"HA!" One man lunged, trying to run her through from behind. She jumped to her left and twisted hard at the waist, giving the man a powerful backfist strike to the face. He grunted, but managed to spin away just before her kick would have rendered him unconscious. Meanwhile, the man with no nose leapt at her with a dagger in his hand. He sliced at her arm, but the blade glanced harmlessly off of her bracer. With a spin, she looped her whip around his neck and came up behind him.

She gave the whip a gentle tug... and snapped the man's neck like a chicken bone.

"Two down..." she taunted as she dropped the twitching corpse. She reached for her belt

...zzz..zzz..zzZT...

Three stars obliterated another man's face.

"Make that three down. You two still wanna dance?"

The men glared at her as they circled around.

"You can't win," she said.

Both men charged at once.

It was a double-feint. One man dropped to a crouch and made a slash at Zade's long legs. The other arrested his lunge and twisted into a spin... his blade aimed at Zade's neck.

Zade ducked to prevent the loss of her head. She tried to hop over the lower attack, but blade bit painfully into her calf. She felt warm blood pouring down her leg, forming a pool in her boot.

Zade threw herself backwards, hitting the ground and curling into a roll. She came up on one knee with a throwing star in her right hand. She launched it instantly, but both men had been expecting it. As soon as she moved, they dropped. The pointed star whizzed over one man's shoulder. She reached for another as both men charged again... each knowing that she only had time to hit one of them.

So be it.

One throw buried the star in the first man's forehead with such force that he nearly flipped head-over-heals.

The one remaining thug brought his sword down. Zade raised her arms above her in an 'X,' and blocked the blade with her arm bracers.

She swept out with her leg and tried to trip the man, but he leapt out of the way and brought his sword around for another strike.

Zade ducked. As the sword sliced past her, she grabbed the man's arm. With a spin and a yank, she snapped the limb at the elbow.

"AAAAAH!!!


"Doesn't feel so good, does it? Here, let me fix it..."

She drove the heal of her hand upward into his nose, sending lethal bone fragments into his brain. The thief collapsed in a twitching heap.

Zade limped over to where Lovvorn and Eric lay bleeding in the street.

She was surprised to find Lovvorn still alive... and still awake. His leg was a wreck, and she knew it would take a miracle for the limb to even remain attached to his body. He was weak from blood loss, but hadn't slipped into shock yet.

Amazing... she thought.

Eric, however, didn't look so good. Two bolts from a crossbow had pretty much sealed this man's fate. Zade didn't bother listening for breathing or checking for a pulse...

"Lovvorn..."

Lovvorn's bloodshot eyes focused on Zade. It didn't look as if he recognized her at first.

Zade knelt down and used a dagger to cut off sections of the mage's robe. After several attempts, she realized it was impossible to stop Lovvorn's bleeding. The wounds in both his shoulder and his knee were too severe.

"Lovvorn, can you hear me?"

Lovvorn mumbled something.

"Lovvorn, you're going to die."

"eeeh? Oh. s'okay..."

"Unless you can gather enough strength to teleport yourself out of here. To a healer..."

"Wha...what about eric?"

Zade looked over at December's second-in-command. He *looked* dead, but as Zade watched him, her ears detected a faint heartbeat. Which was quite odd, considering her head was nowhere near his chest. Perhaps the heartbeat wasn't' so faint after all... or maybe she was imagining the whole thing.

"He's uhh... not good."

"I can't f-feel my leg," said Lovvorn. "Why can't I feel my leg?"

"Believe me, you don't WANT to."

"Oh. Can... Can I feel yours instead?"

Lovvorn's bloody lips curled up into a smile.

"Listen... It's not safe to move you, if you've got any juice left, you've got to get yourself to someone who can help!"

"Push...push me over to Eric... I can t-take us both..."

"Forget about him. He's as good as gone."

"...no...no-no-no-no..."

"He took a bolt to the chest. I don't know why his heart is still beating, because most of his blood is *outside* of his body now. Leave him."

"...but he's my friend..." Lovvorn reached out for Eric. "...only one I've got..."

"He'd leave YOU."

"I know..."

Zade sighed and walked over to Eric. Moving him probably couldn't hurt him any more than he already was, so she uncermimoneously dragged him over towards Lovvorn. Finally, the mage's fingers gripped the sleeve of Eric's blood-soaked shirt.

"Where are you going to go?" said Zade.

"Ni...Night's Bloom."

"No, go to Clussh-"

"m-more important that we warn...warn..."

"I'll warn them."

"No, you... you gotta get 'em... for...for Eric they were....In there..." Lovvorn pointed to the inn across the street.

"Just go, Lovvon. "

Lovvorn started to say something... but then both he and Eric Hood vanished without a sound.

The fact that the mage was not only conscious, but able to still work magic in his condition had earned him new respect in Zade's eyes. She hoped he'd still be alive when this was over.

Zade took a second to check her own injury. She had felt the wound when the sword cut her... it had been deep, almost to the bone. But now the bleeding had stopped and the jagged slash was almost completely healed.

"Must not have been as bad as I thought."

She stood and looked toward the inn. She saw someone move in one of the windows. Without thinking, Zade lifted her chin and stuck her nose in the air. She sniffed... and caught a familiar scent.

"Chain," she growled.

A few seconds later, Zade was kicking down the door to the inn.

"CHAINNN!!!" she howled.

It was dark inside, the inn was lit with a few oil lamps that left more shadows than light. There was distinctive smell of people.

Something moved off to one side.... she was an instant away from flinging a throwing star at it when her eyes adjusted and saw the four people tied up on the floor near the fireplace.

Innkeeper and guests, she thought.

Still listening and watching, Zade crept towards them. She knelt to untie them, then thought better of it. She stood and turned around.

Chain was there... a huge figure half-hidden in the shadows.

"Zade. How nice to see you again."

"Wish I could say the same."

"Still as venomous as ever."

Chain stepped out of the darkness.

"I could have killed you, you know. I had an archer on the roof."

"Why didn't you?"

"I heard you went soft... wanted to see for myself."

Zade didn't respond. She and Chain locked eyes.

The two killers circled each other warily in the center of the room. Chain's chain clinked, and Zade's whip slapped against her thigh with each step they made.

"Still carrying that ridiculous whip, I see."

"Ditto for the chain."

"Oh, I've learned some new tricks that make it more than worthwhile."

"Why are you here? What's this about?"

"You know what I do."

"Who's payrolling this operation?"

"Join me and find out."

"I don't work that way and you know it. Once I'm bought, I STAY bought."

"Too bad..." said Chain. "You're on the losing side."

"We'll see."

"The way I see it, December's rapidly running out of men."

"He's got me."

Chain chuckled.

"Last chance," said Chain. "Join me."

"YOUR last chance... give this up. Now."

Chain shook his head and smiled.

"All right then," said Zade. She sank into a fighting stance. "Let's do it."

[To Be Continued]