The guards parted their spears, then grabbed our arms and yanked us through the barrier. Cursing us for our stench and general filthiness, the tired, annoyed guards hauled us through the enormous gates and into the city.
And with that, the three of us were inside Luminescent Spires, and the downfall of Elandriel and the Blood God had begun.
Chapter Eighteen
Even though the guards were weary and apathetic at the end of the day, the three who accompanied us into the city kept a close eye on us, and their weapons were at the ready in their hands. I knew we would have to move fast when the right time to strike came. We needed to hit them hard and melt into the shadows before anyone else realized anything was amiss.
“Where are you goblin nutsacks taking us, eh?” I growled in my commoner’s rasp.
“The back of the food market, scum,” one guard muttered. “Where else would we be taking you?”
“I know that, ya prick, but I don’t usually go this way is all,” I said. “I don’t trust you lot; bunch of lyin’ whore’s assholes, the lot of ya!”
“By the Lord of Light you stink,” another guard said. “And if you don’t shut your mouth and stop complaining about the route we’re taking, we’ll give you three dog turds a good dunking in the moat when we kick you out! You need a good fucking bath or three!”
“Take me my usual way and I’ll shut up.” I stopped and defiantly folded my arms across my chest. “I’m a creature of habit, I am! I don’t like this way!”
“For the Lord’s sake,” the third guard said, exasperated. “Let’s just take this filthy hunchback by whatever route he wants. It’s pointless trying to argue with a dirty animal like him. We’ll end up at the same place anyway, and I just want to pack up and go home for the evening.”
“All right, all right,” the first guard grumbled. “Okay, you reeking wretch, have it your way. Which of Luminescent Spires’ glorious roads do you insist on taking to the food market?”
“That way.” I raised a shaking hand and pointed to a dark alley that led to the rear of a jumble of taverns and brothels.
“Just the kind of rank alley you and your ilk usually sleep in, eh?” the second guard said. “Fine, we’ll go that way; just hurry up and shut your toothless trap, okay?”
“Thank you most kindly, good sir,” I said. The guard couldn’t see the sinister smile that came across my face from within the inky darkness of my hood.
We walked into the alley, and I waited to get a few paces into the dark gloom before I struck. A sudden, savage elbow strike to the jaw was enough to instantly drop the guard to my right. Before his body had even hit the ground, I sprang up in a spinning typhoon kick. My boot whipped in a blurred arc of speed and brute power, smashing into the side of the front guard’s head and knocking him out cold.
“What the—” the third guard started to say.
Before he could raise his weapon or shout out a cry and raise the alarm, I landed from my airborne typhoon kick, rolled forward, and smashed a vicious punch into his junk. The blow to his cock and balls vanquished whatever fight he might have had in him. All the air from his lungs was expelled in a loud gasp. He dropped his spear and fell to his knees, retching like a fish drowning in air as he clutched at his crotch. I backflipped up onto my feet, then delivered a swift and powerful knee to his chin that snapped his head back and sent him into the dreamless sleep of unconsciousness.
“Impressive,” Friya commented.
“Damn, it felt good to do that again.” I dusted off my hands. “It’s been too long since I used unarmed techniques. Come on, let’s get out of here before these three clowns wake up.”
“Can we get rid of these awful rags too?” Yumo-Rezu asked. “I can’t believe I’ve gone the whole day inhaling this revolting stench and somehow not puked. I don’t know how much longer I can keep it up; every time I catch a whiff of them my stomach turns.”
“You’ll have to put up with the reek for a few minutes longer, I’m afraid,” I said. “If we dump the rags here, they’ll know we were enemies in disguise. As it stands, without any evidence, they’ll just assume some crazy beggar jumped them because he wanted to stay inside the city walls for the night. Given the famine in the countryside, it’s a reasonable enough explanation. Now quick, follow me.”
I took off at a quick job, dashing nimbly through the network of back alleys. I’d only been in Luminescent Spires once, many years ago, but I never forgot the layout of a place once I had explored it. It was a skill that had come in very handy during my days as a crypt diver, when I had to navigate impossibly complex and dangerous labyrinths and mazes.
After a few minutes of fast-paced racing through alleys, scrambling over walls and barrels, and ducking under abandoned carts, not to mention scampering across a rooftop or two, I dropped down from a high wall between two ramshackle, squalid whorehouses into a narrow alley filled with thick mist.
Yumo-Rezu and Friya jumped down into the mist behind me. Once they were in the alley, I whispered to them to stop.
“What’s the matter?” Friya whispered back. “Are there guards nearby?”
“No, and this is the last place in Luminescent Spires that anyone would find a guard—a living one, at least. Friya and Yumo-Rezu, welcome to Cutthroat Alley.”
“Cutthroat Alley?” Yumo-Rezu asked. “What sort of
