I glided lower to match the pace of the golem. “Six guards, no signs of trouble,” I said to Vesma and Mahrai.
“Could this whole thing have been a ruse?” Vesma asked.
“I doubt it,” I said grimly. “But we’ll play it carefully from here on out. Mahrai, can you summon the golem again? Or do you have to wait another day to pull him up?”
A smirk flitted across her face. “It’s multiple times a day now.”
“Then dispel your golem,” I said. “We’ll approach the castle on foot. No sense scaring them if we don’t have to. And you can always summon the golem again if we need it.”
The golem pulled to a halt. When Mahrai flicked her fingers, her bone-white golem dissolved into dust. I landed beside the others, tightened the leather straps of my harness, and led the way toward the outpost near the elevator.
The guards started forward as we approached them, and I took in the details. Black leather armor gleamed in the afternoon sun. Their knuckles whitened around pikes and swords, and the lone archer of the group nocked an arrow to his bow as I gestured for my friends to halt. A mountain breeze ruffled the grass around our feet, and I measured the distance between the contingent of guards and our position. We were roughly 20 yards away. Plenty of distance to use Augmentation if this went badly.
“You have all of the advantages,” Nydarth agreed.
“What is your business here?” demanded the captain of the guards. His eagle-shaped badge of office glinted as he leaned on his spear and studied us with narrow eyes. “Clan Wysaro has closed its doors to visitors.”
“Cinder Wysaro sent us a letter,” I said. “She called for assistance at Wysaro Castle.”
Vesma held up the bloodstained scroll, and the captain of the guard peered at it. A frown touched his face, and he murmured something to the others. Their body language shifted from tense to downright hostile, and they marched closer. Two of the guards recoiled as they spotted the weapons on my back, but the captain growled an order, and they fell back into formation without a second thought.
“You’re not needed here, Swordslinger,” the captain said. “Cinder Wysaro has been outed from the clan and exiled in disgrace. She’s been found guilty of treason against her family. Her letter is of no concern to us, and you have no business here.”
“You always find the most charming guards,” Nydarth commented inside my head.
“Mm,” Yono agreed. “They are quite rude.”
“Under whose authority?” Vesma asked. “Cinder Wysaro is the highest ranking noble of the clan. And I doubt she exiled herself. What’s really going on here?”
The captain smiled unpleasantly. “Official clan business, missy. Go home to your husband and make him a cup of tea, won’t you? I said it before. You’re not needed here.”
Mahrai and Vesma glanced at me, and I took another step forward. The guards shifted nervously as I halted 10 feet away from the captain and met his gaze with cold eyes.
“Answer the question,” I said. “Under whose authority?”
“Jiven Wysaro,” the man said, matter-of-factly. “The ruling head of the Wysaro Clan.”
Jiven had returned to Flametongue Valley, then. The last I’d heard of him, the lord of the clan had fled after the battle at the Radiant Dragon Guild House, after turning his son into an Augmented freak of nature. He was a power-hungry megalomaniac who was absolutely convinced that control of the guild would help unite the Empire. Demons in Danibo Forest, a missing group of monks, and now, the disgraced Lord Wysaro?
I doubted that this was just a series of coincidences. If Jiven had truly returned, then we needed to find him. And fast.
The captain’s face tightened as I pulled my warhammer from my harness and gave it a few experimental swings. “Here’s how this is going to go,” I said. “You’re going to get out of our way, or we’re going to walk straight through whatever’s left of you and use that elevator.”
The captain sneered at me. “You’re all talk, lo Pashat.”
I turned my eyes to the other guards. “Last warning. Lay down your weapons and flee. Or die. You get to make the choice. But I’m running out of patience.”
Two of the pikemen dropped their spears and sprinted away without a second thought.
“Mercy, Master?” Nydarth said in disbelief. “For the unjust?”
“This isn’t going to be a fair fight,” I told her. “There’s nothing wrong with a warning shot.”
The archer’s bow creaked as he drew it back. I pushed water through my physical channels, and the arrow shot away from the recurve. My fingers closed around it half a second later, and I incinerated the barbed shaft with a small touch of Untamed Torch. Vesma’s hands flared as she activated her own channels, and Mahrai hefted her staff with a grin.
The captain leveled his pike at me and rushed forward. I slapped the point away from my chest with the Demure Rebirth, and a searing bolt of Untamed Torch whipped past my face. Vesma’s technique tore through the captain’s leather armor like butter, ignited his body, and filled the air with the smell of burned flesh.
I used my Augmented speed to rush the next soldier. He slashed at my arm, but I caught the blade on my new bracer and swept the Demure Rebirth at his thigh. The man’s femur splintered under the blow, and he went down with a screaming howl. I crushed his throat with a vicious stomp.
The gears of the elevator creaked, and the rattle of chains pulled my attention upward.
Three Augmenters in Wysaro robes appeared as the elevator whizzed down toward us. Mahrai came beside me, caught a sword on her brass-capped staff, and jabbed her weapon into his gut. The guard recoiled with a curse, and I called up a small Plank Pillar between his feet. I fed the technique Vigor from the environment, and a thorned spike erupted from the ground. The Pillar impaled the
