16. Chapter 16 The Announcement #3
“We’re doing this. Tomorrow morning we’ll handle the last preparations. Portal scrolls from Mildred, provisions into the ring, gear checks. I want Larg to look at the shield one more time and confirm the dark metal work is finished. I am buying a new breastplate. We leave tomorrow afternoon.”
“Tomorrow afternoon?” Liv’s voice had gone quiet, not nervous but focused. “That’s fast.”
“We’re ready,” Bjorna said. “The full moon run proved the party works. Daniel’s healing carried us through things that should have killed us. We’re funded, we’re geared, and the longer we wait, the more loot we’re missing out on, not to mention leveling.”
Sif’s voice came from the other end of the table. “Did the registrar say anything about current conditions?”
Bjorna nodded. “The Splits have been particularly difficult this week. Parties have reported harder fights than usual across the first two depth bands. But the groups that pushed deep came back with exceptional loot. Better drops than the registrar has seen in a long time.”
“Harder fights and better drops,” Sif said. “That sounds like the dungeon is being generous to anyone tough enough to earn it.”
“That’s the read.” Bjorna turned to me. “You’re the one who hasn’t been inside a multi-day dungeon. Questions?”
I had questions. I had a lot of questions.
I’d never camped in the field with four women, never portaled out of a dungeon mid-run, never spent two or three consecutive days underground fighting creatures that got worse with every depth.
The Cold Hollow runs had been day trips.
Walk in, fight, walk out, eat at the Hen. This was something different.
“Anyone else need anything from town before we leave?” Bjorna looked around the room.
“I need broadheads,” Liv said. “I’ll hit the fletcher first thing.”
Sif shrugged. “I’m good. Daggers are sharp, leathers are clean, ring is on my finger.” She wiggled her hand. “I’ve been ready since we got back from Cold Hollow.”
Nott closed her book. “I need nothing from town. I’d like to review what the registrar told us about the depth-band ecology before we enter. If the dungeon is running harder than usual, the creature behavior at each band may have shifted.”
“We’ll go over everything at camp before we descend,” Bjorna said. “Full briefing. I want everyone clear on the plan before we step through that portal.”
The room settled. Sif went back to her whetstone, the dagger sliding across the stone with a soft, rhythmic hiss.
Liv pulled her legs up and leaned her head against the wall.
Nott sat with her fingers spinning a glowing crystal and processing something the rest of us couldn’t see.
Bjorna stared at her list and made a note with the chalk stub.
They’d done this before Cold Hollow and they were doing it again now. The Splits would be harder than anything we’d faced, but nobody in the room was treating that as a reason to hesitate. They were treating it as a reason to get ready.
Nott stood and walked toward her bedroom door, then looked back. “Goodnight, Daniel.”
“Sleep well, Nott.”
Bjorna gathered her list and her chalk and held my gaze across the table. She didn’t say goodnight. She just said, “Get some sleep. Tomorrow’s a big day.”
Liv was curled under the east window, her eyes half-closed, her ears drooping. I touched her shoulder and she made a small sound and waved me off.
“Go to bed,” she murmured. “I’ll be there in a minute. My legs don’t want to move yet.”
I leaned over and kissed her on the forehead. “OK, don’t stay up too late. I had fun at the clinic. Do you need me to heal your soreness?”
“That’s sweet, but I’m fine. I actually like it.”
I smiled and shook my head. “Good night, weirdo.”
“You know you love it.”
“I do.”
I went to the window. The shutters were cracked open and the night air came through cold, carrying the last of the forge smell from Larg’s chimney. Nothing moved on the avenue below. A lamp burned at the far end, throwing a circle of yellow on the packed dirt.
The docks came back to me. Vaughn Strom’s face when the [Smite] hit. The sound of his hand breaking in mine. The blood coming through his lips.
I didn’t feel guilty. I’d told Liv that after the docks and I’d meant it. Vaughn Strom was whole but he was surely terrified tonight. Both of those were my doing.
I wasn’t the man who’d walked into Halver’s Reach with a satchel and a lost expression.
That man wouldn’t have done what I did on the quay tonight.
And the strangest part was that nobody in the apartment had been surprised.
Bjorna went to tactics. Sif went somewhere warmer.
Nott asked how the skill worked. They’d looked at what I’d done and nobody flinched.
Tomorrow I was walking into the hardest dungeon I’d ever faced with four women who trusted me to keep them alive, and I was walking in as a man who could take people apart and put them back together and not lose a minute of sleep over it.
I stood at the window until Liv’s footsteps came up behind me, soft and careful, and she put her hand on the back of my arm.
“Come to bed,” she said.
“I thought you were going to stay up a while,” I said.
“I decided I wanted to cuddle.”
I smiled warmly and embraced her. “That sounds great.”