Splinter Angel Chapter 28 (Patreon)

Ana checked the baths first, but the attendants told her that Petra had left with Tellak some time ago. At Petra’s, Mikkel told her that, yes, the two were there, but that they were in the kitchen and “No, please, Miss, you can’t–!”

Ana easily pushed past the kid. In the kitchen she was met by a wall of heat and the smell of stew bubbling in a huge cauldron, ready hours before the dinner rush. At a small table Tellak sat with a bowl in front of her, eating mechanically as Petra kept a close eye on her.

“Kaira?” Petra asked, not taking her eyes off the woman in front of her.

“Ana,” Ana corrected her.

“Great. I’ve got two people taking liberties with my privacy,” Petra sighed with no heat in her voice. “What do you need?”

“I was hoping to bring Tellak back to Touanne.”

Tellak’s spoon paused halfway to her mouth, a few drops of liquid spilling back into the bowl before she resumed eating.

“Touanne needs to talk to you, Tellak,” Ana said. “She’s a mess.”

The spoon paused, and resumed.

“Jancia will need you when she wakes.”

The spoon clattered into the bowl, stew spattering the table and the front of Tellak’s shirt.

“You know that she will.”

Tellak looked at Ana, and the woman radiated shame and pain. “How can you expect me to look her in the eye?” she asked hoarsely. “How can you possibly ask that of me?”

“She’ll want you there when she wakes up.”

“She will hate me. I failed them. Jay is crippled. Med is dead. They’ve been friends since childhood, and I let her die. Jay will never forgive me.”

“Alright. Don’t see her. Do you consider Touanne your friend?”

That callous remark was clearly not something Tellak had expected. “Touanne?” she said. “Yes, she’s… yes. We’re friends.”

After only a few weeks, Ana thought. Touanne had been here only a few weeks, but clearly just had that effect on people. “Well, she needs to talk to you. She’s falling apart because of how badly you’re hurting, and blames herself. You need to talk to her. Please don’t make me drag you there.”

Forgetting her self-recrimination for a moment, Tellak’s eyebrows beetled in confusion. “You’re level 6, and you have a social Class,” she stated. Her tone made it clear that she was explaining why something could never happen. The possibility was exactly zero. It was a logical impossibility, something forbidden by the laws of physics and magic, and any attempt would be, quite frankly, sad.

Petra, still sitting across from Tellak, gave a look that made it clear that she wasn’t so sure that the laws of probability, physics, and magic applied to Ana, but that she also really didn’t want to see that tested in her kitchen.

“Yeah,” Ana said. “And someone important to me is eating herself alive, partially over you, so I’ll drag you down there bodily if I have to. All 6 levels of me. You can be miserable together until you talk it out and get over yourselves. Now finish your damn stew. It’s too good to waste.”

“Mikkel made it,” Petra said softly, her tone telling Ana everything she needed to know.

“Well, you shouldn’t waste food. Finish it anyway.”

Too stunned and tired to argue, Tallak finished her stew.

Five minutes later Ana led Tellak through the square, heading for Touanne’s. “I’m sorry about your friend,” she said. “Touanne told me that you’ve been together for a long time.”

“Seven years,” Tellak said flatly.

“Want to talk about what happened?”

“No.”

“Alright.” That was fine with Ana. As long as she’d come along and helped Touanne let go of some of her unearned guilt, Ana didn’t care what Tellak did or didn’t share with her. She still asked, “Why do you blame yourself?”

“I’m the tank,” Tellak said, as if that was all Ana needed to know.

“Did you go down?”

“No.”

“Did you run?”

Tellak’s nostrils flared, and Ana felt a wave of what she could only describe as restrained anger, so tightly bound that it was barely there. Then it was gone, and Tellak said, simply, “No.”

“Did you fuck up and let whatever it was get past you?”

Tellak snapped, heads turning as they passed. “There were several of them! Sapients, all of them, Revenants and something I couldn’t even Identify. Too many. I couldn’t block them all off, and they got around me. And Med, she…” The big woman clamped down on something like a hiccup and sniffed once. “She drew them off. One of them got to Jay, scratched her, and she was… wild, screaming, took off with half a dozen of the things chasing her. And Med drew them off her while I was tied down, to let her get away.”

They’d stopped at the southern edge of the square. Ana watched silently as Tellak’s jaw clenched, over and over again. “When I found Med, she… they’d… it took a while to gather her. I could only stay until the pyre was burning. Barely time for a prayer.”

“So she died to save her friend? How is that your fault?”

Tellak shook her head. “It should have been me. I’m the tank.”

Those were the last words she spoke until they reached Touanne’s.

Touanne didn’t answer the door. Ana found her sitting on the floor outside of Jancia’s room, her head in her hands. She’d done as Ana had asked, barely, by staying out, but from her red-rimmed, puffy eyes and the stains on her blouse it was clear that she’d been crying again.

“Come on.” Ana squatted in front of the Healer, offering her a hand. “Tellak is here, in the front room. Come talk to her.”

“Tellak?” Touanne blinked at Ana, but her confusion cleared quickly and she took Ana’s proffered hand. “Right. Yes. Thank you.”

Tellak was sitting in one of the two chairs in the front room, staring with apprehension at the door to the back.

“Hello again, Tellak,” Touanne said as Ana guided her into the other chair. “Thank you for coming.”

“Hi, Touanne. I’m sorry about earlier. For the way I left.”

Ana looked at the two. “Alright. I’m going back to Petra’s. You two, talk. You both need it.”

With that, and both women’s eyes on her, Ana left.

Right. Now what?

She really needed to talk to Messy, the sooner the better. No point in putting it off, so she started making her way back to the square. Not that she knew where Messy lived, or where the jeweller’s where she worked was, but she knew which way the woman had gone and she could probably ask around. Messy’s boss was named Ravi, Remy, something like that…

“Oh, Ana! Great, this makes my afternoon so much easier!”

Ana looked up when she heard her name shouted across the square, and saw Tor approaching with quick strides. She turned, meeting him halfway.

“Hey, Tor. What’s up?”

“What’s…?”

“What do you need? How can I help you?”

“Oh, well, I… are we having dinner at Petra’s tonight?”

“That’s the plan, yeah. But with the Delving group.”

“Right, that makes sense. Hope you have a good time. And hey, congratulations on the levels!”

Ana smiled. Not a word about her class from him. “Yeah, thanks. So what did you want?”

“Captain Falk asked me to find you, actually. He’d like to talk to you.”

Ana’s eyes narrowed at that. Captain Falk had been polite enough, even kind. But he was, first and foremost, the head cop in this place. “Why?”

The way she looked at Tor seemed to make him uncomfortable. “Don’t know. But he asked for me shortly after you all came back, and word went out about Miss Versil. And then Tellak came back and… it’s a small place, alright? Word gets around quickly. I assume it was about that.”

That just made her more suspicious. “Why would he want to talk to me about that?”

“I really don’t know, Ana. But he usually has a good reason, alright? Could you just…? I mean, you’re a Guild member now, and he could order you to talk to him if it’s serious enough, but no one wants that.”

“I’m not being detained. He just wants to ask some questions,” Ana said sourly. “Yeah, I’ve heard that one before. Fine.”

She might as well get this over with. And it might be important. The fact that it gave her an excuse not to talk to Messy yet had nothing to do with it.

They crossed the short distance to the guardhouse. Inside Ana looked at Tor. “So, do I just go up and knock, or what?”

“Pretty much. This place is too small to stand much on formality. Want me to wait for you?”

“I don’t see why. This is just a friendly conversation, right?”

Tor rubbed his neck. “I mean, yes. But you seemed so uncomfortable, I–”

“It’s fine. I just don’t have a lot of good experiences with… guards. Nothing personal.”

Tor seemed mildly hurt at that. “Right. I might see you at Petra’s, then.”

“Yeah. See you.”

Ana went through the door to the back, then up the stairs. It looked just the same as it had a few days before. Marra’s door stood open, and Ana heard the soft scratching and rustling of paperwork, along with odd snatches of melody or mumbling. Rather than knocking on the Captain’s door directly, Ana went to Marra.

Marra didn’t seem to have noticed her coming in, and Ana watched her work, her curly hair bouncing back and forth as she switched her focus between a stack of papers and a notebook. Ana hadn’t actually Inspected the woman before, and was surprised when she came back as a Human Clerk (25). Not only at the level, but at the fact that she was a Clerk. As Ana had understood it, Clerk was like Apprentice or Fighter: a beginning Class that was replaced at some later date.

Ana raised her hand to knock on the open door, and twitched when Marra spoke without looking up. “The Captain is in, dear. Just go on in, but knock before you enter.”

“Oh, right. Thanks.”

Had Marra known she was there the whole time? She hadn’t looked up once! What kind of Perception did she have? Why did a Clerk have that kind of Perception, anyway?

With that thought in her mind she knocked on and opened the Captain’s door, stepping inside as he looked up from a book.

“Ah, Miss Cole! I’m glad to see that Mister Barlo found you. Please, take a seat.” He gestured to the chair in front of his desk.

Ana sat down warily, leaving the door open behind her. “You wanted to talk.”

“I did, yes. Rather urgently. Would you like some tea? Love–” he shouted, then corrected himself, “–Marra, would you bring some tea for Miss Cole, please?”

“Certainly, Captain!”

“...yeah, sure.” Ana mumbled. “You don’t need to… whatever you’re doing,” she said to the Captain. “She’s your, what? Wife? Right?”

The Captain blushed slightly. “Well, yes. These past 30 years. But we’re working.” He sighed. “The professionalism that this job asks for doesn’t come naturally to me, I admit. It was so much easier to just be a patrolling Peacekeeper, but the Guild called and I answered. But enough of an old man’s nostalgia. Do you know why I want to talk to you?”

More like, ‘Would you like to incriminate yourself?’ Ana thought. “I have no idea.”

[Skills partially calibrated, based on use.]

Ana suppressed a surprised twitch. Was that the first time she’d told a serious lie? Did she just pick up Lying or Deception or something? She didn’t want to spend her Advancement Points yet, so she didn’t check, but it must be something like that. Either way, the Captain didn’t seem to be buying it, only giving her a patient smile. He was a super-powered cop around his fifties. Might as well remember that.

“In that case, I’ll just tell you, Miss Cole. When you arrived here a few days ago, you told me that you had left several bodies behind you, in the forest and on the road. I don’t know how much you’ve learned since then, but fresh bodies, especially the corpses of sapients, are prime targets for possession.”

Ana stiffened at the mention, memories of her nightmare welling up.

The Captain looked past her, and two steaming mugs of tea plunked down before them. “Ah, thank you, Marra!”

“My pleasure, Captain.”

Falk smiled warmly before turning back to Ana. “Now, despite what some of my colleagues would say, I believe that honest ignorance is an excellent excuse, so I do not blame you at all. And even if you had known, you were in no position to do anything about it. So, after speaking with you, I asked a trio of Delvers to go out and either destroy the bodies, or find and put down any revenants that might have risen.

“Oh.” Ana had an unpleasant feeling that she knew where this was going. She picked up her team and sipped it carefully, using the mug to partially cover her face. It was minty. Quite nice, really.

Falk read her perfectly, his sympathy softening his expression. “I understand that you were part of the group that rescued Miss Versil, the trio’s mage. And that you’ve also met Miss Tellak. Miss Medecilia has not returned.”

“She’s dead.” Ana’s face and voice were both carefully flat. She’d played the distraught young lady with Falk before, but there was no point. He’d seen through her anyway. “Tellak told me. She burned the body.”

Falk sighed. “That’s what I feared. But you understand why I want to talk to you? This was a trio of experienced Delvers. Lower mid-levels, yes, but they should have been able to handle anything they might have come across within many days of the Outpost. The mana density simply should not allow anything strong enough to threaten them to get close.”

“Tellak told me that they’d been fighting a bunch of opponents. All of them human –  sorry, sapients – Revenants and something else. Didn’t give a count, but lots of them. More than I left behind. From what Tellak said it sounded more like a problem of being outnumbered than overpowered.”

Falk slowly put his mug down. “All of the sapients? You’re sure?”

“That’s what she said.”

“Ah, well. That is disturbing in a whole different way than if they had faced one overwhelming opponent. For one, demons rarely move together unless inside a Delve, where there is plenty of mana for all of them, but it happens. But besides that, we have not had any reported losses here for many weeks until the two… misguided fellows that you met. But then, you said that there were three men present when you arrived here in our Splinter, and we have no idea who they may be, either.” He sighed. “Thank you for this information, Miss Cole. It will be a great help when I speak with Miss Tellak, and Miss Versil once she's recovered.”

“Yeah, happy to help,” Ana said with all the fake sincerity she could muster. “No idea how long it’ll take for Jancia to get better though. Didn’t sound like Touanne could do anything for her.”

“Hmm?”

Ana did not like the look that Falk gave her at all. It was way too inquisitive, as though he’d just heard something that went against everything he’d thought possible, and was convinced that she had the answers to set the world right again. And there was something about the look that made her want to talk. To start talking, and keep talking until she’d told him everything he might possibly want to know, and everything that he didn’t even know that he wanted to know but which she thought might be useful.

If her Willpower had been any lower she might have just done that. As it was she frowned, then volunteered the one thing that she legitimately thought that he needed to know, if he didn’t already,

“She’s got some kind of infection from the battle. Little crystals, growing around the wound. Sounds like they may be messing with her Connection, somehow? The mages said that they couldn’t feel her, and she said something similar before she passed out. Hadn’t you heard?”

“No, I must say that this is the first I’ve heard about this. And Touanne is having trouble treating her, you say?”

“She’s pretty torn up about it, yeah.”

“She would be.”

“Yeah. I dragged Tellak over there so they could talk. Commiserate a little, you know? Hope it does them both some good.”

Falk nodded vigorously with approval. “Well done, yes! Now, then, let me just confirm. How many bodies did you leave behind you in the forest during your unfortunate arrival here. And let me reassure you that there is no suspicion of wrongdoing on your part.”

Ana wanted to trust Falk on that. She really did. “Six. Including Nicola.”

Falk nodded sympathetically. “And you do not care to elaborate on how you managed that, at your level? No, of course, forgive me for asking. But you believe that Miss Tellak faced more possessed or revenants than that?”

“Right.”

“And you do not know anything else about what may have happened to the ladies of the Living Daylights?”

“Afraid not.”

“Well, in that case I thank you for your time, Miss Cole, and for coming so quickly. And let me congratulate you on your new levels! Despite all this nasty business, it is good to see you taking an interest in Delving. It’s the basis of the Guild, after all. Good day, now.”

Ana drained the rest of her tea and put the mug down. “Yeah, pleasure. Good day, Captain Falk.”

Ana left with a vision of bridges burning before she even crossed them. Tellak and Jancia were going to hate her when they learned that she was the reason they’d been sent out.

There was a small, subdued reunion at Petra’s that evening. Deni wasn’t there. That made sense. Her parents were probably so relieved that she’d come home in one piece that they didn’t want to let her out of their sight. But everyone else did, though there was little conversation while they ate their stew and bread and drank their ale.

Kaira had sold the Supreme Crystal they found, as well as the harvested plants and demon parts they hadn’t gifted to Touanne. Split 7 ways, with Kaira steadfastly refusing a share, it made 3 gold and 5 silver each. With what remained from selling the sword, Ana suddenly found herself sitting on a tidy sum of money, enough to cover her expenses for a month at least. And she did have enough Crystals to take her just over to level 7…

She decided against it. She’d gotten much more out of the Delve than the others. It would probably look like she was rubbing their faces in it if she grabbed another level at the table.

After Kaira shared out the money to those present, an awkward silence descended. It broke when Mikkel, at some signal from Petra, brought over a tray of small clay… well, shot glasses, Ana thought, filled with a liquid of uncertain colour. Petra put one in front of each woman, then held hers up in silence until everyone followed suit.

Ana sniffed hers. It smelled like roses and bad decisions.

“I don’t know if anyone here besides Kaira knew Med,” Petra said when everyone had their cup raised. “But before Kaira even got here, Med took me out on my first Delve. She was a Huntress back then, just like you, Rayni. Switched over at 15. Doesn’t matter. Fucking amazing archer. She was a great Casuals guide, and a great friend. I’m gonna miss her.” Her voice broke, just a little. She squeezed her eyes shut hard, swallowed, and continued, her voice strong and steady. “To Medecilia, Sharpshooter and one hell of a woman. May she have found peace.”