(This chapter is short, only 2300 words, but there is an explanation at the end of the chapter)
Ruy was tired, that was all he was able to feel. He didn't know where he was, and for a moment, he didn't know who he was.
It wasn't until he looked up, his vision blurry, and stared at the slats in his cell door.
Gethen's eyes stared back at him.
"Welcome back," Was all he said.
Ruy turned his head to look beside him, and groaned, trying to form words as he recognized his cell partner. Keefe Sencen was asleep beside him, a nasty bruise on his left eye. It seems they got him too.
They were with the Neverseen.
Ruy closed his eyes, unable to form a single word, and fell back asleep.
Sun Wukong stretched his arms over his body, laughing with a few other new recruits as they all tried the parkour and climbing practice. The winter chill was finally settling in Inalia, and the new Assassin recruits were practicing outside as much as possible before it became too cold.
"Guys we should head to bed soon, Mentore Amalia and the Inner Circle are supposed to be back soon and we should knock out some of these contracts before they come back," Sun answered.
"Ughhh, but I just want to go to the beach! I heard a few Grecian folks are holding a midnight dancing contest on the eastern side of the beach tomorrow! I want to show off some of my awesome moves!" The Assassin Fiona answered.
"Whatever, I'll just go grab a few from the mission room, maybe getting a few extra done will help us get higher in the guild!" Sun said cheerfully, his monkey tail swishing behind him. The others finally caved, and Sun quickly darted to the mission room to pick them up some contracts. Sun's last contract was a low level one, just getting rid of some bandits harassing the village of Meteora, just on the edge of the Grecian boundaries against the mountains.
Sun stopped once he walked past Maria's workshop. It was a massive room with skylights and machinery everywhere. She clearly left in a hurry since tools and scrap was still left around. But the harsh beeping coming from one of the control panels caught Sun's attention. He carefully maneuvered through the workshop, careful to avoid Maria's massive inventions. Luram Bak never understood all of the tech and such, but Sun Wukong found them curious.
The constant ringing came from the panic ring receivers. Mansi, Alvar, Nour, Alexios... no ringing from Mentore Amalia or Maha though.
Gods, did the Conference go wrong?
Sun turned on his heel, his minding reeling for people to go to. Normally he would go to Luram Bak, but now-
Sun stopped as the sound of a dagger sliding out of its sheath.
Sun didn't move as the point of the dagger sat on the back of his neck. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the dagger wielder slam their fist into the Panic ring receiver, silencing all the calls at once. The dagger gentle grazed around his shoulder and his chest as the enemy slowly came into Sun's line of sight.
They were hooded, but they just muttered Sun's name, then took down their hood.
"You... you're the traitor?" Sun asked, his body shaking. They didn't say a thing.
Through Sun's gritted teeth, he whispered, "How could you?"
They didn't say anything as they brought their fist down on Sun's jaw and knocked him out cold.
The silent panic ring receiver left the Inner Circle stranded without the help of their loyal guild.
Maha awoke shaking, her body numb. Her eyes slowly opened and the panic froze her. Brutal cold wind, nothing like in Inalia. She couldn't move, her lips were frozen together. Even then, she shakingly turned her neck and saw she was laying on the soft membrane of Ricin's wing as he sheltered her. His breath was uneven, his wings shaking every so slightly, but his head was pressed against his companion's body as she laid on her stomach, her face pointed slightly away from Maha.
"Amalia," Maha groaned, trying to get up. She did not respond, her body frozen like Maha's was. Maha forced her aching body up, to move, as she crawled over to Amalia. Her honey hair was splayed out around her head, her golden dress mere scraps on her now. Kynareth's mark was as clean as day on her dress, the chiffon straps once covering ripped off by the wind. Her face was as still as death, her chest barely moving.
Maha almost started crying as she noticed the frost covering her fingertips, the cold stinging her ears. Her nose and cheeks were bright red, her skin pale as the snow Ricin protected them from. Her eyes were closed, ice forming on her eyelashes. Maha turned her arms over, staring at disbelief at the blue light illuminating from underneath the skin, pumping through her veins. The veins crackled and were the only thing warm in Amalia's body as Maha ran her shaky hands over them, only now noticing the frost adorning her fingertips as well.
"Byzanthar, I am your heiress. I beg you... please don't allow the fates to kill us." Maha begged as she slumped down next to Amalia, wrapping her arms around her.
Maha's body began to shut down as she heard the swinging of a massive door, people's unbelieving gasps mixed with the sounds of howling wind. Were they on a mountain?
There was the sound of a clunking cane going down the stairs and rushing feet. Ricin peeked his head out of his wing and hissed at the incomers, struggling to focus on them in his frozen haze.
But the sound of Sanaa's voice gently sounded against the membrane of Ricin's wing.
"Let me see them," She said gently to the dragon. Ricin whimpered thumping his head back against Amalia and Maha as he opened his wing.
Sanaa gasped as she stared at the frozen women.
"You fools! Help me!" Sanaa called out to the other footsteps. Maha didn't struggle of hands pulled her away from Amalia, lifting her up and carrying her to a blurry stone building Maha couldn't focus on.
"I should've known... these girls were perfect for the gods to pick. I should've protected them." Sanaa sadly mumbled to herself. Maha gently whimpered with her frozen tongue as they picked up the blonde in Ricin's wing.
"It is alright girl," The man carrying her said.
"The dragon will follow wherever they go, he is a loyal lizard, I'll give him that," Sanaa muttered, quickly hobbling towards the stone building.
"Quickly, into Kynareth's temple!" She hissed at all of them as Maha's body finally gave out.
Alexios held his Lilac in his arms, running alongside the river bank with a cloaked Arsinoe, bloodied Governor, and a panting Fang Guanyu. Arsinoe was shaking, her eyes straight ahead.
"Gods damn it Nour, where the hell are you?!" Alexios hissed to himself, looking through the brush for his fellow Assassin.
"My kingdom... my people..." Arsinoe muttered. Alexios turned to see Arsinoe wiping a tear away, pulling the hood farther down her head. Fang Guanyu solemnly looked at the escaping civilians pouring out of Egypitnat's gates, trying to run from the attack.
Surprisingly, The Governor of Cariana spoke first, "Cariana is too far away for us to take refuge in, but I will try to assemble my forces-"
"No." Fang Guanyu answered.
The Governor glared at him, "What do you mean no?"
"I mean no. This is the exact same thing that happened during the Fall of Inalia, and the Inalian refugees came to Chiranu far sanctuary. We are better equipped for this then you are, we need to handle the people first, not taking back the city."
"Taking back the city?" Lilac whispered.
Fang Guanyu stared at the burning Egypitnat as he whispered, "As from this day forth, The Neverseen have taken over Egypitnat."
Lilac clutched onto Alexios tighter, and he swallowed. Where was Amalia, where was the guild?! He pressed his damn panic switch a million times, where were they?!
"We need to keep moving," Alexios said, his voice even, though he was panicking on the inside.
"This way," Fang Ganyu said, pointing to a distant oasis.
"I have emergency men set up there." He said, helping Arsinoe as they started towards it.
In the distance, Alexios saw the outline of the Hidden Ones fiercely protecting Arsinoe's burning city, but he turned to escort the leaders towards Fang Guanyu's men.
Dex chuckled as Linh poked her brother, teasing him about some silly crush he had, though neither would say the girl's name. Biana kept glancing at Tam, opening her mouth to say something, but Fitz came up the treehouse instead. They all went back to the treehouse from Havenfield, just for old times sake. Grady and Edaaline said they had to watch Iggy while they were at the treehouse, the imp happily zipping around the room.
"I found one of Keefe's sketchbooks guys!" Fitz said promptly walking in with a smile.
"Are you sure we should be going through it? It's his private property!" Linh asked.
"Surprisingly, when I went knocking for one of them, Ro gave this one to me, said Keefe knew we would've figured it out sooner than later and didn't mind. She seemed really bothered with the whole thing though," He explained, plopping down on one of the bean bags and opening it up.
They looked like they belonged in museums.
Watercolor painting of Inalian buildings, graphite sketchings of the Grecian coast, colored pencils drawings of the various people he noticed perusing the streets of Inalia on the rare occasions they were able to explore.
He had paintings of Mansi and Alvar, silly pictures of Alexios and Sophie, he even had a few pictures of Allesandro in it. He must have found them in Maria's basement when they were hiding out.
"These are all practice sketches for the new propaganda." Fitz decided. Dex smiled at one drawing, a sketchy colored pencil one. It was of Sophie when she was maybe 9, her father carrying her on his shoulders in the ocean, the sun setting behind them. It was an old photo Maria had, it was faded, but Keefe remade it in the sketchbook, filling it with life.
Allesandro seemed so menacing, burly muscles, his family crest on his shoulder, stubbly face. But he radiated kindness and laughter from the photo, smiling at his daughter who squealed as another wave crashed against them. Sophie looked a lot like him, same smile, same nose, and of course, same brilliant brown eyes. He looked so happy in the picture, they both did.
"Maybe we can help him with more ideas for future propaganda and stuff." Tam proposed, lazily picking at his nails.
Iggy scrambled over the sketchbook pages, hounding and desperately needing their attention. Dex grabbed him by the scruff of his neck.
"Iggy, chill out-" Iggy squirmed out of Dex's grip and flew over to an old device sitting on the table, jumping on it. Dex sighed, getting up and examining the thin disk.
He paled as he saw the blinking yellow light.
"Woah, Woah, Woah... What?" Dex asked himself, sitting down in front of the desk.
"What is it?" Biana asked, looking over his shoulder.
"It's the old panic ring receiver I made, like, years ago. It started up again."
"What do you mean?"
"When I created the panic rings, I made it so they emit a special frequency only the special receivers can get. But I upgraded it, so I don't use this receiver anymore, so I left it behind here."
"Who's ring is blinking?" Linh asked.
Dex held up a finger, working through the diagnostics.
"Not one of ours," Dex muttered.
"Huh?"
"You all have specific codes assigned to your rings, this one is different entirely, but it is still being sent to my device. It must be a similar model to ours."
"But who used panic rings beside us?"
Dex thought for a moment, before remembering Alexios showing his around the guild. And the rings Maria reversed engineered from his.
"The Assassins," Dex whispered.
Everyone was quiet.
"What?" Tam snarled in disbelief.
"We are picking up the assassin's panic ring waves!" Dex repeated, scrambling around the desk, looking for some spare tools. He found a few things, tightening the device and fine-tuning to the signal. Finally, it snapped into place, and the receiver fully hummed to life. It thought for a few moments, before flicking on a small screen and showing the panic ring's assigned name.
Alexios Morretti in need
Reason: Under Attack
Another signal buzzed through.
Alvar Vacker in need.
Reason: Under Attack
Another signal
Mansi Shenandoah in need.
Reason: Under attack
A final signal.
Nour Dawound in need.
Reason: Under attack.
Maha, Sophie, Ruy, and Keefe's signals were surprisingly quiet. Dex turned to the elves, his skin pale.
"Something went wrong." He whispered.
I KNOW THIS CHAPTER IS SHORT! But this whole chapter is a segway into the new act of the book, so it is a bit shorter. Thank you all for the support you have given the AAD series, and the new act will be released in about A WEEK AND A HALF! MAYBE EVEN TWO WEEKS!
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