Danton was soon helped to his feet by Xera, who had decided
to step in after Elvira had left. Danton refused to speak and so made Xera's
task of helping him more difficult. He started to move on, supporting Danton as
they walked. He asked Raneaux what had happened to Danton but all she had seen
was his eyes glow faintly before he fell to the floor and started to cough up
blood. Xera shook his head and gave Danton a sip of his water before it was
followed by Danton's hip-flask. He told Xera he would be fine and tried to stand
on his own but soon had to be supported again. Xera told him he needed to rest
and likewise for Raneaux, who hadn't really stopped apart from medical
intervention since she been infected and cured. They both were reluctant to
comply but were eventually sat on a bench overlooking a drop to the city below while
Xera asked around for information on the apartments that were now above them.
His line of enquiry was soon met with resistance. It was not
what he asked that the people objected to when he approached them, it was his
clothing. He certainly did not resemble anything close to the fashion of the
rich and his presumption in talking to them, left him red faced. The only
people willing to talk to him were the Metricious. They were the eyes and ears
of the richer parts of the city and for the right amount of money, sold their
secrets. Xera soon returned with lighter pockets but with the information they
needed. Mullen and his brother Dakk were staying in a rented apartment in the
south side of the complex. The buildings themselves were being rebuilt but some
were still habitable. Most of the residents had moved into more suitable accommodation
for their status leaving most of Cloudtouch empty and the security measures,
such as the barred windows, had been removed before refurbishment
Raneaux was soon on her feet after a quick rest and had
already started eyeing the buildings for entry points. She told Xera that the best
entry point would be through one of the windows, rather than risking talking to
the guards and taking the lift directly up. To Xera's surprise, after he had
told her the specific room, she scrambled up the trellises and walls with ease,
arriving on the window ledge without breaking a sweat. She was now two floors
above them and could see only a few spots where she could throw a rope down to
help Danton and Xera up. The only problem was that she had no anchor for the
rope and she certainly couldn't pull them up. She heard the murmurs of men
talking behind the glass pane of the window and pressed herself up against the
wall in hopes she would not be spotted. Both voices were gruff and low, but
were also agitated and augmentative. There then came the sound of a bang on a
table and more shouting before two sets of heavy footsteps fell silent as they
walked out of the room.
She poked her head around and looked through the glass,
noticing that whoever was inside was now gone. She forced open the window and
jumped down with light tread. Inside were furnishings she was more familiar
with, a old set of lounge chairs, a cracked table, dusty curtains and stubs of
candles. She tried to pull at the table to assess its weight and was unable to
move it even by a fraction. She hoped the table would be strong enough to
support Xera and Danton's weight and tied one end of the rope to the table and
chucked the other out. She then turned her attention to not being seen as experience
had taught her and set about making sure the door were locked. The one door out
of the room had not been locked nor did it seem to have a way to lock it from
the inside. She shook her head and sighed and muttered distain under her breath
before pulling out a set of lock picks and jammed them into the lock. She
gentle pulled on the door and the lock gave resistance. She was happy, at least
for the time being, that they were safe as they could be.
Soon she was hastily joined by Xera and Danton who were
still arguing over the best technique to climb a rope. Danton had been advising
him on how to climb but with Xera nearly slipping halfway through, he now blamed
Danton. He rebuked Xera's remarks and put down what had just happened to his
own incompetence. There was nothing that Raneaux found that she could understand.
There were papers on the table but no pictures. There was however symbol on
flat piece of pearl, that dangled on the end of necklace, hanging from a nail
on the wall. She and rest did not recognise the symbol but for it to be
engraved onto something precious, must have meant something. Danton eyed over the
papers; they were concerning multiple payments and meetings with a person named
Moma in Darkperch. As Danton read the list of items that Moma had bought,
Raneaux recognised some of them, including a few he had acquired herself. Raneaux
knew firsthand how dangerous some of these artefacts were and the vast amount
being bought by Moma meant only one thing, whoever Moma was, was create an devastating
arsenal.
Xera had managed to find a trunk of clothes in the meantime that
was in the corner of the room and covered with moth eaten rug. Inside of the
trunk was a collection of robes all in the same style, along with a purse of
gold. Raneaux spotting the clothes, dived in and changed, before being followed
by Xera and Danton as they heard approaching footsteps. There was low tones of
grumbling as someone tried to force the door open before they used brute force
to break the door from the lock. The two men, one portlier than the other but
sharing the same crooked nose and silvery blue eyes, had both entered
brandishing weapons but had stopped in their tracks and soon bowed down to the
two hooded figures they were now in front of. Xera on the other hand had
applied a grey goo to his clothing, allowing the fabric to bend light around
him, rendering him in effect invisible and as normal out of harm's way. The
brothers apologised to the 'Magester' for intruding, and for not knowing of
their arrival.
Danton played the part of displeased leader almost too
perfectly. His tone and wording made both Raneaux and Xera unsure of Danton. It
was almost as if he was used to abusing and insulting subordinates. He told the
brothers that there was a discrepancy in the documentation of the most recent acquisition
and he needed the facts to be set straight. The bothers started to quake a
little in the shoes and both fell to their knees apologetically. He asked them
for the location of the Rejuvenator, to which they both stammered that it had already left the
caldera and was on its way to Darkperch. Danton flew into a rage and told the
portlier brother to hold his sibling still while he drew his karambit. He told
them both that the transportation report had said nothing of it and accused
them both of lying and intentionally stealing from them. He could tell both
were no longer scared but terrified on the edge of turning into blubbering messes
and so he and so he started to prey on that as well. He offered them one final
chance, to bring him the currier. They started to weep as they told him that
the currier had been organised by a third party, Dehart. They were immediately
cut off after saying his name. He told them that if they wanted to live they
needed to capture the currier for him. He flicked his arm and wrist, dismissing
the larger man's hold over his own brother and sending them both out the room.
As the door shut Daton ,breathed out heavily and rested against the wall now relieved
that the issue was over. For both Xera and
Raneaux, they now felt uneasy about how effortlessly Danton had taken to behaving
like a cruel oppressive leader.
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