Alexei didn’t know how he could tell, but he knew the strange Shade in front of him was… watching him somehow. Considering the creature didn’t have any eyes he wasn’t sure how that was possible. He also wasn’t sure what the shade even was. Alexei had seen shades get formed, he’d seen shades do what shades do, all thanks to the memories that he had been allowed to view by the Demon Lord’s tapestries. The shade in front of him didn’t look like any shade that he’d seen before. The shades the Demon Lord had made were an inky blackness the whole way through, from their core right out to their edge they were clearly a blight on the skin of the world. Wrongness incarnate. Alexei’s shade wasn’t like that. It still had the wrong, dark, core. But its outer edge was a blinding white light, dazzling in its radiance. “The Demon Lord’s power is corrupting me… but, am I corrupting it back?” Alexei muttered to himself. It didn’t matter either way. Whether it was a true shade or some halfway
Waking up the next day Alexei felt like a new man. It was as if the weight of the world had been completely lifted from his shoulders. Yes, there was still a crap ton of stuff that he needed to get done, and the threats that were facing him weren’t exactly gone forever. But he had breathing room for the first time in an age, and that felt great. He stretched and shivered slightly as several little cracks rippled down his spine before finally opening his eyes. He couldn’t help the smile that came across his face as he spotted Neave, curled up in one of the chairs by the fire, pouring over a book that was no doubt filled with all kinds of magery secrets. He hadn’t really expected her to take to magery as readily as she had, but he was glad of it. It was nice for her to have something to do while he was off risking his life in perilous situations, and eventually, she’d be strong enough to lend a hand from time to time if the situation called for it. He had no doubt that she likely
The five of them sat around the round table that Christopher would usually use for making adjustments to clothes in the back of his shop. The old lion tailor had been glad to see Alexei, almost as if he knew what was coming when the man arrived with his party of Neave, Risa and Lyla in tow. “So then, I’ve gathered you all here today for a simple reason,” Alexei said, “With the immediate threat of the assassins gone, it’s about time I lived up to a promise. A promise I made to Christopher to take down the slave tent in the market and free the beastkin who have been trapped there.” Lyra’s eyes widened in shock, while Risa steepled her fingers and rested her chin on the tips. Christopher and Neave both merely smiled. While Neave hadn’t been around for their conversation on the matter, she’d always had a sneaking suspicion that Alexei might one day return to the slave tent, either to liberate some more of the slaves who lived there or simply to burn it all to the ground. “I knew I co
Alexei’s plan, as he explained it, was a simple one. He was going to go in and distract the slave trader that ran the tent while Lyla, Christopher and Garrick broke open the cages that the slaves were kept in. When all of them were free, it would be curtains for the trader and his whole business would go up in flames. Literally. They’d be able to handwave the whole thing away as a terrible fire, one so awful just like the very same that had happened in the dockyards just a few days previously. The inferno would be so terribly strong that even the bones of the slaves and the slave trader were completely turned to dust, unable to be sorted from the rest of the ashes. It was a simple plan, and not much could possibly go wrong. The way Alexei saw it, the slave trader was a man who had gotten fat off of his own success and at that point he likely wasn’t very powerful at all. In fact, he probably relied on his own slaves to do the dirty work when it came to it. “And what about those
All Alexei wanted to do was think about Risa now that Lyla had brought the subject up, but as he arrived back at the Mage Temple he knew that he couldn’t really afford to be thinking about things like that. Not until everything was said and done and they were out from under the thumb of the Assassins Guild. Not until the Demon Lord’s plot was halted. He sighed and opened the big doors of the temple, slipped through them, and shut them behind him. “You’re back, then,” Risa’s voice startled him, and he couldn’t help but jump. “You waited for me at the door?” Alexei asked. Risa was sat on one of the benches by the main door of the temple. Usually, they’d be used by outsiders who were waiting to be spoken to by the mages at the temple. Risa had been using it to wait for Alexei while reading a book. “I wanted… to make sure, I guess, that you weren’t angry at me like Lyla was,” Risa said, unable to meet his eye. He hadn’t noticed it before, but the way her hair played across
“Alexei! Get up right now!” Risa’s shouting cut through the dark of the night and Alexei’s sleep like a knife through butter. It felt like he’d only been asleep for a few minutes.“Risa?” He replied groggily, “What’s the matter?”“The marketplace… it’s on fire, and the fire’s coming from-” Risa began to explain. “The Slave Tent,” Alexei cut her off and sat bolt right up, “The slave tent’s on fire, isn’t it.”It wasn’t a question it was a statement. It had taken Alexei mere moments to figure out what had happened. Christopher had gone out on his own to try and take the Slave Tent down by himself. Alexei could feel it deep in his gut, a rising revulsion propelled by fear. “Look after Neave, I need to go,” He said, getting out of bed and forgetting entirely that he was only wearing his underpants. Risa averted her gaze, but he couldn’t help but feel a little satisfied at the light blush that suddenly came across her cheeks. Alexei cast those kinds of thoughts as far as he could fr
The first time Alexei had walked through the slave tent led by this strange bearskin creature he had felt distinctly unsettled. Now that he was being led through the gloom by the creature once again, only this time with the crackling sound of flames in the distance and the smell of burnt flesh in the air that unsettled feeling was magnified a thousand times over. "Are you taking me to see him?" Alexei asked, before elaborating, "Your master, I mean.""Yessss," the snake beastkin hissed without even turning to look at him.The last time Alecei had walked through the slavers tent he had been amazed and disgusted by how many beastkin were locked up in all the cages. Now not even the cages were left. The place had been completely cleared out, almost as if the slave master had known he was coming. It was strange, far too strange for Alexei's liking. "Where are all the slaves?" Alexei asked, "The last time I was here the place was stinking with them. You couldn't move without them scr
"Now, as I said, you have been transported approximately two thousand years into the future," the slave trader said, "and as you were able to see by looking out of the window the world is much different from the one you left behind."Alexei thought that was putting things a little bit lightly. It had still clearly been Alandria outside the window, the riverways still existed and the market was still there, but it was also vastly different. So different that Alexei didn't even have the ability to put into words how different it was.He decided to put all of that to one side. Understanding the state of a world he was never supposed to experience was a pointless endeavour. "Why have you brought me here?" He asked instead, desperately trying to take the reins of the conversation once more. "Truths needed to be shared, and you needed to be assured that the path you are on is the correct one," the trader said, "as you have seen, the world outside the window is very much real. By combatt