Fortress Al-Mir

“You know, I come in here with gifts. I try to be nice. I explain what is going on…”

Arkk looked over the gorgon, feeling strangely calm. Stupid. Yes. He had his eyes open, staring at creatures that could turn him to stone with eye contact. Still, the tranquility running under the surface managed to suppress the instinct to flee in fear. Maybe his calmness came from the fact that he probably wouldn’t even know what hit him if they decided to attack. Vezta would surely go on a rampage. At that point, Arkk wouldn’t be in much of a position to worry or care.

Either this worked or it wasn’t his problem anymore. That thought was strangely freeing.

He had the full attention of the gorgon now. Were glowing eyes that big of a deal? It was true that when that purifier had been chasing him and Zullie around the Cliff Academy’s tunnels, he had found the glowing embers of her eyes unnerving. To command the attention of creatures entire mercenary companies wanted to avoid with just a look?

Arkk might have to be even more careful in the future to not let people he didn’t want to know see his eyes like this.

“I know you’re upset. Or if you aren’t yet, you will be if you manage to see through Savren’s illusions.” Arkk paused, looking around as if daring them to petrify him. “But I need him alive. I’m willing to offer food and shelter in exchange. Maybe more than that. Meaningful work. Magical tomes. Other things you might want. Or you can walk away.” Arkk paused, looking downward at the nearest gorgon. “Or… slither away. Or you can even stay here, though the threat of an oncoming army of humans is looming on the horizon.

“But I need him alive.”

The orange gorgon that Vezta had knocked aside said something in an elongated hissing noise. Arkk made sure not to look directly at it, feeling like that was the most likely gorgon to try to turn him to stone at this moment, but he still caught its movements in the corner of his eye. From the way it looked at Arkk and bared its fangs once again, it was probably something like ‘Kill the human!’

Vezta’s tendril sliced through the air in front of it. If she wasn’t keeping her eyes closed, she probably would have taken its head off. As it was, the swipe passed just in front of its snout, making it stop its advance before it could begin.

Arkk didn’t flinch, trusting Vezta to keep it at bay. He settled his gaze on the green gorgon, putting as much intent into his gaze as possible. He had suffered too many setbacks, too many failures. He wasn’t going to falter again without a fight.

“So. What will it be? Take my offerings? Walk away? I don’t mind if you confront him as long as he stays alive.”

A smattering of hissing started up around him. From their earlier voting, it seemed like they would go with whatever the majority decided, not whatever the green one said. Still, it had been the spokesperson—spokes snake?—so far, so Arkk didn’t look away.

The hissed dialog of the other snakes petered out after a few seconds. The green snake hadn’t joined in, choosing to stare back.

Eventually, it spoke.

“Sstarss…”

Arkk quirked an eyebrow. The tight grip of his fist loosened as he stared with a little less determination and a little more confusion. “Excuse me?”

“The human sspeakss with the power of the ancientss,” the green gorgon said. “Ssavren iss a traitor and desseiver.”

“You… believe me now. Just like that?”

“The ssirkessh honor the old wayss,” the green snake said, bowing its head.

Arkk blinked twice, watching as several of the others also ducked their heads. The orange one that had attacked Arkk didn’t. Neither did the brown one that had also voted to kill him. The iridescent black gorgon looked around in what Arkk assumed was confusion as did a red and black gorgon. The other four were practically bowing—or whatever the equivalent was for beings that lacked a defined waist.

“Vezta,” Arkk whispered. “What’s going on?”

“In my former master’s days, snakelike beings lived in the [UNDERWORLD],” Vezta whispered into Arkk’s ear. “Keepers brought them over to this plane. These gorgon must be descendants of the beings I once knew. I presume they remember their ancestral allegiances.”

“Half of them do,” Arkk said, looking to the four who hadn’t bowed down. “Is there a proper response to this?”

“That would have been my former master’s domain of expertise, not mine. I suggest you make minions of them as soon as possible to prevent them from changing their minds and backstabbing you without warning.”

Arkk took a breath and slowly walked forward, ending up even more encircled by the gathering of gorgon in the narrow tunnel. “You wish to join me?” he said, louder than the tone he used with Vezta.

The orange one protested immediately, hissing out an obvious objection despite Arkk’s inability to understand exactly what it was saying.

The green gorgon raised its head, glaring at its fellow gorgon as it let out a furious response. Whatever it said, it was clear that everyone was shocked. The other three bowing their heads jerked their heads up to stare at their leader and the three not bowing recoiled slightly. The wide hood around the orange gorgon’s head thinned, pulling in on itself as it seemed to shrink in size.

Before Arkk could ask, the green gorgon turned back to Arkk. “Disscord,” it hissed. “You will confront Ssavren. If Ssavren sslaughterss you, you are unworthy.”

“And I can take him if he doesn’t kill me?”

“We sshall align oursselvess in the interesst of the old wayss.”

Arkk nodded his head. “Acceptable terms.”

“Then come. We sshall deliver you to Ssavren.”

The green-scaled gorgon turned away, slithering ahead down the tunnel. After a slight hesitation, Arkk followed. The other seven gorgon trailed behind, hissing among themselves quietly. Arkk didn’t say a word, moving with full confidence as he descended another staircase.

This was it. He wasn’t quite sure exactly what happened. Something about either his eyes or Vezta’s tendrils had given him an advantage here. It had gotten him what he wanted. He wasn’t about to let this advantage slip away.

The chamber Savren called his home wasn’t far from the second set of stairs. Arkk wasn’t quite sure what the original intention of the room had been. A resting room, presumably, given its beds and the attached latrine. The door wasn’t meant to keep anything out. It was more for privacy.

The green gorgon stopped outside the door, standing off to the side. It dipped its head again as it motioned to the door.

“Vezta,” Arkk said softly, “hide again unless you sense something wrong with me.” Taking a breath, Arkk closed his eyes and let go of the feelings he had been concentrating on. When he opened them again, he was pleased to note a distinct lack of ruby light reflected off the walls of the mine.

With Vezta’s tendrils retracted for now, Arkk stepped up to the door, pushed it open, and stepped inside.

The largest gorgon Arkk had ever seen sat in a chair with a book open in its five-fingered hand. It was a bit strange to see a gorgon sitting in a chair. The way its long, snake-like tail bent at the ‘knee’ and then just flopped across the room looked incredibly awkward. Rather than a hood behind its head, this gorgon had a hard crest rising from the vibrant blue scales around its eyes, forming into a ridged structure with sharp points at the middle and either side.

The pale blue eyes—which lacked slit pupils—slowly tore away from the book to look up at Arkk.

Something immediately hit Arkk as he met the creature’s eyes. A sensation of fear and awe nearly drove him to stumble back out of the room. Pressure at his back—a tendril under his shirt—kept him in place.

“What is thiss?” Savren hissed, rising off the chair. “I’ve not humored any humans for dinner in a handful of moonss.”

Arkk closed his eyes, taking a brief moment to look at the area through the third-person perspective provided by the employee link with Vezta. When he did so, the illusion shattered. A greasy old man with black, unkempt hair who hadn’t had a bath in months stood at the chair. Not a gorgon.

When Arkk opened his eyes, the gorgon was there once again along with the sensation of awe. The fear of it wasn’t.

“Hello, Savren. Or should I call you the Hope Killer?”

The false gorgon blinked. A slight flinch. “What wearisome waste is this? Why have the others allowed a human into my miness?”

“That awe effect is something interesting. It must be why the other gorgon haven’t noticed that you don’t even elongate your s-sounds properly.”

The gorgon’s lips twisted in a distinctly human sneer. Not the kind of expression Arkk thought the others would be able to make. When his eyes looked up over Arkk’s shoulder, Arkk did a quick check behind him using his Keeper sight. Three gorgon stood in the opening. The green one, the black one, and the brown one. “Khan, Zharja, Vezz. What is the meaning of thiss? Do you deign to disregard my directions not to be disturbed.” Savren turned away, setting his book on top of his desk to the side of a small stack of thick tomes. “Dereliction of duty. Dispose of this dunce then return for your disciplining.”

“Turn me to stone,” Arkk said, stepping further into the room.

Savren whipped his head back. “What?”

“You’re a gorgon. Turn me to stone.”

The gorgon form of Savren shifted in a distinctly humanlike movement of discomfort. “You don’t know what you ask, human. Petrification is a poor penalty, death is preferable. Your body freezes but your faculties still function. You don’t see, you don’t feel, you just think until you succumb to the senseless situation.”

“Not sure why you care. I’m just a human. Go on. Turn me to stone. I won’t blink or look away. Do it. If you can.”

The gorgon’s jaw slid to one side and Arkk heard a very human set of teeth grinding together. “I have no time for this. Khan, dispose of this human. Now.”

Behind Arkk’s back, Arkk watched the three gorgon look at each other. He couldn’t quite read their expressions but if he were to make a guess, he would guess they were a bit angry. Even the orange one, despite its anger at Arkk, looked none too pleased with the actions of their so-called leader.

“I think that is one item checked off my list,” Arkk said, taking his eyes off Savren to look around the room. “How are you maintaining this illusion? A hidden ritual circle somewhere? Or maybe—”

“You… Lumpuhkan yang di depanku—”

“Electro Deus.”

A thin bolt of weak lightning jumped from Arkk’s fingertips to the large gorgon before he could get his incantation off the ground. It wasn’t a powerful bolt. It was still enough to send Savren to his hands and knees.

And he had knees now. Arkk couldn’t guess whether the illusion required mental concentration or if he had an item on his person that the lightning bolt had damaged. Either way, a human knelt on the ground in front of him, panting. He spat a bit of blood out of his mouth, having bit his tongue from the jolt.

“We have sseen enough,” the green gorgon hissed from behind Arkk.

Savren’s head snapped up. He looked down at his grime-coated robes before looking back up with fear in his eyes. “You fool. They’ll kill us both!”

Arkk just slowly shook his head. He looked back over his shoulder.

“The ssirkessh will join you,” the lead gorgon said, dipping its head once again. The other two gorgon dipped their heads as well, though not quite as reverently. The black gorgon still looked confused while the orange one maintained a faint glare.

“You would follow a human?” Savren shouted, disbelief filling his tone.

“We follow the wayss of the sstarss.”

As soon as the gorgon spoke, Arkk felt it. Eight new employee links forming. No exchange of gold necessary. It was more like when Ilya had accidentally joined up as his employee. A bit strange but not something he was going to question. He simply nodded to the gorgon. “Gather up what belongings you might have. We’ll leave these mines as soon as I’m done dealing with Savren.”

“You need him alive,” the green gorgon said—Khan, if Savren had their names right. “We can sstone him if you wissh and return him to normal ssome other time.”

Arkk turned back to Savren as the man let out a long squeaking noise. “I’ll think about it. Let me talk with him first.”

“We undersstand.”

“Wait,” Arkk said before they could slither away. “The humans at the entrance. You can unpetrify them?”

The black gorgon—Zharja—exchanged a look with Khan. “It may be more merssiful to ssmash the sstatuess.”

Arkk shook his head. “Are there other petrified humans in the mines?”

“A ssmall number.”

“Gather them up at the entrance, please. Wait to unpetrify them until I’m ready.”

Khan ducked his head. “We obey.”

Arkk opened his mouth, about to complain about the gorgon’s mannerisms. He got enough subservience from Vezta. Something held his tongue, however. He wasn’t quite sure what their perspective of him was, exactly, but he didn’t want to damage that perspective right now while the situation was still precarious. There would be time to talk to them normally later, once they were all at Fortress Al-Mir.

Instead, he let them slither away.

Turning back to the room, Arkk stepped past Savren, moving to the stack of books. Flipping open one, he looked through a few pages. Mind magic rituals. Mass rituals. Rituals that were intended to affect a large number of people.

Something like what he did at the village of Hope, then.

Movement at his back had him turning.

Savren was trussed up, held by a tentacle at each limb and around his waist. A long, thick rod of knotted wood with a green glowstone attached to the tip fell from his fingers as Vezta’s tendrils twisted his arm. He let out a few pained gasps before she stopped.

“Wha—What are you?”

Arkk stared at him. Blinking his eyes, he welled up his feelings of irritation, making a red light return to the room. “I’m not in the mood,” Arkk said. “I came down here with a gift basket for you in an attempt to appease you. I don’t think I’m going to give you a choice now, however.”

“A choice—gah!”

“Vezta, it’s okay. Come out, would you?”

A few stray tendrils turned into the shadows under Arkk’s feet, reaching inside. They ripped Vezta’s main body out of the darkness, bringing her out into the open. She still managed to maintain her hold over Savren even as she moved about.

“I was already pretty upset with you after I heard what you did to Hope. I was going to try to convince you to undo that over time. Ease you into things. The way you acted just now kind of pissed me off and I was already a bit on edge from dealing with the gorgon. Hope was bad enough but at least they aren’t dead. Do you have any guilt over ordering the death of some random human who had done you no wrong?”

“You were jeopardizing my—” He cut himself off as one of Vezta’s tendrils started worming its way around his throat.

Arkk didn’t bother admonishing her. Instead, he just bent and picked up the large staff that Savren had pointed at him. It was too large to have come from his clothes. It must have been leaning against the wall. He looked it over, wondering what kind of spell it contained. “Maybe I’m just taking it a little personally because it was me,” he said with a small shake of his head. “So here is the deal. You are coming with me. You can do so as a mostly free man or as a prisoner. We are preparing for a large ritual. You will help with it. This is not negotiable. Whether or not I have a use for you after the ritual depends on how cooperative you are. Understand?”

Savren didn’t speak. He did nod his head.

“Good. So,” Arkk said, holding a gold coin in one hand. He had beaten the man over the head with the stick. It was time for the carrot. “Are you going to work with me and walk out of here on your own?” He held out his other hand, motioning toward Vezta. “Or are we being a little more aggressive in getting you out?”

Vezta unleashed one of his hands. There was a slight hesitation but he reached out quickly enough and took the coin from Arkk’s hand.

The employee bond formed. It felt a bit weaker than most others but it was there enough that Arkk didn’t feel like anything was wrong.

Arkk gave Savren a smile. “Vezta. What are you doing? We don’t treat employees this way.”

All of Vezta’s tendrils snapped back to her, dropping Savren into a pile that he quickly picked himself up from. “My apologies, Master.”

“It’s fine. I’m sure Savren is just happy to be free,” Arkk said, watching the man rub at his wrists where Vezta had tethered him. “These books, are there any others around? Anything else valuable?”

Savren stood still, frowning to himself for a long moment before he realized Arkk was talking to him. “Uh. No.” He cleared his throat and tried to smooth down the front of his dirty robes. “Unless you set your sights on the silver.”

“Tempting, but I think I’ll leave that to the villagers. I’m sure they wouldn’t thank me if I set the servants to eating this place.”

“Eating?” Savren said, looking like he wasn’t sure if he wanted to know.

Arkk paid him little mind. “Vezta, can you carry all these and see them back to Fortress Al-Mir’s library?”

“Certainly, Master,” she said, setting several tendrils to pick up the stacks of books. She carried them over to herself and then held them in her regular arms.

“The plan from here is to get the gorgon and Savren back to the fortress,” Arkk said. “You’ll see them through the ritual circles. I will take the villagers back to the village and see how much renown I can get from the village here. Maybe get them to spread Al-Mir’s name far and wide. I’ll even turn down their silver reward,” he said with a grin. “Al-Mir is strong enough to clear out a den of gorgon with only two people and kind enough to do it out of the goodness of our hearts.”

“A most devious plan, Master.”

“Devious?”

“Well, most plans appear devious when you speak them with glowing red eyes.”

Arkk blinked twice. Taking in a deep breath, he allowed his irritation to fade away.

“Much more genuine, Master,” Vezta said with a smile. “Will you be alright here on your own?”

“You saw that village when we passed through it. They’d be throwing me the greatest feast they can manage if I allowed it.” Arkk pressed his lips together. “I won’t, of course. They don’t have the supplies and I’ll need to get back to the fortress as soon as possible. Try to keep the gorgon from interacting with anyone else before I get back. And if Rekk’ar finds out about them, try to keep him from deserting while you’re at it.”

“Understood,” Vezta said, bowing with the books in her arms. “Any other impossible orders for me?”

Arkk looked over at Savren with a frown. “Keep an eye on him.”

“Naturally.”

“Good. Then let’s get out of here.”