Chained

They walked into Kibou together and made it perhaps thirty metres before Rask stopped.

"I would like to set out to retrieve the heirloom as quickly as possible" he said. "So we can get Kira back."

"I agree with you" Haruki said. "But I think this is a trap."

Rask looked at him.

"Lyra said it herself in that room --- there are stronger parties in Kibou, larger ones, better equipped for this kind of job. He chose us specifically. And he didn't decide that when we arrived here --- he planned it before we left Akebono. The tomb job, Kira, all of it was already in motion." Haruki looked at the street around them --- the foot traffic, the market noise, the ordinary business of a large town. "There's more going on than we know."

"Even if it's a trap" Hayate said, "we still need to go. Kira is still there."

"Agreed. But we're not having this conversation here." Haruki kept his voice low. "One of the guards back there called him Lord Dagan. That's not a title you earn from merchants and adventurers --- his influence reaches town officials. We find an inn, get off the street, then plan."

They found one two blocks from the gate --- modest, clean enough, a proprietor who asked no questions about the composition of the group. They rented three rooms and reconvened in one of them.

"What do you think Dagan is actually after?" Izel asked, once they were settled.

"Irrelevant right now" Rask said. "The immediate priority is the heirloom. We get it, we get Kira back."

Haruki said nothing. He was somewhere else --- the particular inward stillness that meant he was running through something and hadn't finished yet.

Hayate looked at his brother, then reached over and pulled the scroll from Haruki's bag. Haruki didn't notice. Hayate unrolled it across the bed and studied the map.

"Lyra. How long to the marked location?"

Lyra leaned over to look. "Assuming we avoid demon parties --- four days."

Haruki came back. He looked at the scroll, then at the room, then straightened up.

"Okay. Here's the plan."

He looked at Rask first. "Take flight and scout the route to the marked location. Get as close to the village as you safely can and survey the area. If it looks too dangerous, don't push it --- come back immediately. What we need is information. Mark anything on the map that matters --- potential ambush points, viable camp sites, terrain we can use or they can use against us. High cliffs, dense bush, long tree lines. Take the full day if you need it."

Rask nodded once.

Haruki looked at Lyra. "You and Freyja get supplies. Four days assumes a clean journey --- plan for five. Ten days total, there and back."

Lyra nodded.

"Hayate --- you and Izel go to Gerd's shop. Take all the weapons and ask him to service them, sharpen them, full maintenance. While you're there, ask him what he knows about the town and about Dagan. Keep it casual --- you ran into him here after Akebono, you're curious. Don't tell him anything, don't pull him into this."

Hayate was already nodding.

"I'll take the job board and the tavern. I want to know what people here know about the kidnappings, about Dagan, where he operates from. If anyone asks why I'm interested in him, I admire him. That's all." He looked around the room. "Keep your ears open out there. One thing on its own might mean nothing. Everything together might mean something. We meet back here mid-afternoon, share what we've learned, and head out at sunset. We travel at night --- less chance of being seen."

The room was quiet for a moment as each of them absorbed their assignment. Then the nods came, one by one --- some accompanied by a grunt of approval, some without. Nobody argued.

"We all know what we need to do" Haruki said. "Go. Be safe. Don't take any risks."

Hayate rolled the scroll back up and threw it at Rask. Rask caught it without looking and tucked it away.

They went.

Hayate spotted the sign from halfway down the street.

wepons

He and Izel pushed through the door to find Gerd still unpacking, wares spread across every surface in the organised chaos of a man who knew exactly where everything was and had not yet convinced the shop of the same. He startled at the sound of the door.

"Cleared by the guards, I hope?"

"Of course" said Izel.

Hayate and Izel walked to the counter and set down their weapons alongside a bag of silver. "Think you can service these by mid-afternoon?" Hayate asked. "We'll pay extra --- need it done quickly."

Gerd left what he was doing and walked over. He looked at the weapons, then at the silver, then back at Hayate.

"Don't worry about paying. I still owe your lot for the escort job --- never got to pay you after you were taken in." He picked up the nearest blade and turned it in his hands, already assessing. "I'll get these done urgently and we'll call it even."

While Gerd worked, they stayed and talked --- asking about the town, about what he'd seen since arriving, about Dagan, all of it wrapped in the casual curiosity Haruki had prescribed. Just two people catching up with a familiar face in an unfamiliar city.

Gerd confirmed what they already knew. Dagan was influential. Dagan had money. Beyond that, Gerd had nothing to add.

They waited for the weapons and kept the conversation light.

The job board at Kibou's administrative building was larger than Akebono's and considerably more grim in its contents.

Haruki stood in front of it and read while other parties came and went around him, listening to their conversations without appearing to. Nothing useful passed between them.

After a while he stopped listening to the conversations and started reading the board properly.

Of every ten listings, nine were hunt quests. Imps, mostly --- the low-level demon creatures that had been seeping through the open portal for decades, aimless and destructive. A handful of contracts for demon stragglers. A few for creature infestations that had nothing to do with the frontier at all.

In Akebono the board had been bandits, goblins, occasional tomb work. Here it was almost entirely demons. He stood there for a while and let that settle.

High above the town and the road beyond it, Rask moved.

He had his presence concealed --- the technique that folded him into the sky, reduced his silhouette to something a watching eye would skip past. Below him the road narrowed and then disappeared into the kind of terrain that demon forces preferred, and he followed it forward slowly, marking the map in short careful strokes as he went.

He was calmer than he had been in days. Not because Kira was safe --- Kira was not safe, and that fact lived in him like a splinter, constant and sharp. But rushing this would not help Kira. Getting spotted would not help Kira. The only thing that would help Kira was good information, and good information required patience.

He understood his role. He did it.

The market was busy enough that moving through it required attention. Lyra and Freyja worked through the supply list methodically. Food for ten days, medicine for whatever they might encounter. At one stall Freyja stopped.

The display was a row of small glass vials, each one filled with what appeared to be plain water.

"Holy water" the shopkeeper said. "Blessed with light magic. Genuine --- not the diluted stuff you get at the eastern stalls."

Freyja thought about what Zaqaru had done when light magic connected. She looked at Lyra.

Lyra had never seen holy water before and her expression showed it --- a careful scepticism. But she trusted Freyja's instinct, and the logic behind it was sound. She nodded.

They bought several vials and packed them carefully.

As Lyra was closing her bag, something caught her ear.

It was two stalls away --- a conversation between two shopkeepers, low enough that it was clearly not meant to carry. It carried anyway.

"More of those robed figures at the north gate again last night."

"Guards let them straight through, I suppose."

"Straight through. Didn't touch the sacks they were carrying."

"Of course not. This is why we can't make any money. They bring in those goods, sell them under our prices---"

"Nobody wants legitimate wares anymore. They all want those."

"Maybe it's time to move on. Find another town."

"Where would we go? An orc town?"

Both of them laughed at that, and the conversation drifted into something else.

Lyra straightened up and looked at Freyja. "Did you catch any of that?"

Freyja shook her head.

Lyra told her what she'd heard as they moved away from the stall, keeping her voice low.

The tavern was warm and already busy by mid-morning.

Haruki took a stool at the bar and ordered something mild. The bartender glanced at him.

"First time in Kibou?"

"That obvious?"

"You've got the look." He set the drink down. "Came from where?"

"Akebono."

The bartender nodded. Haruki asked him about the town. The man talked freely. Nothing Haruki didn't already know or couldn't have guessed.

"One thing worth knowing" the bartender added, "is that this is the largest weapons market for the seven races. Everything passes through here --- armies come to restock, adventurers come to upgrade, merchants come because the buyers are here." He shrugged. "That's why it's worth living at the frontline. The money follows the war."

Haruki thanked him and kept the conversation light, filing the detail away.

A few minutes later, a group came through the door --- four of them, loud, already arguing about something.

"You need to keep up" the loudest one was saying. "I'm not carrying dead weight."

"The only reason you're pulling anything is that sword you bought from Dagan" another one said. "Without that you're nothing special."

"Maybe if you woke up before noon you'd get to his shop before the good stock sells out."

Haruki took a slow drink.

The conversation moved on. He had what he came for.

He finished his drink and headed back to the inn.