Chapter 5: Pleased to Meet You

Coreene rolls her eyes at Uelten's comment. "Resourceful or not, let us try to not get lost." With a smile she turns back to Erannik. "Lead on."

Yelnar brings up the rear, ready to spring into action if required.

"To be honest..." Eanala begins, and is then cut off by a soft chiming from a small silver bell that hangs in a corner of the room.

The resistance members all look at one another for a moment, then Giran speaks up. "Someone's gone into the smugglers' tunnels," he says to Verrian. "It probably means they encountered a patrol and had to go underground. It's one of the few bits of magic that seems to work any more."

Eanala picks up the explanation. "There's an old network of tunnels beneath this part of the city. I don't know what their original purpose was, but for a long time they were used for smuggling operations. The entry points have... well, sensors I guess would be the best description. They signal these bells when someone enters. A warning originally, now we use it to indicate when someone's had to go under."

Erannik turns over his shoulder to reply to Ember. "It's not bad. It's just confusing unless you know the route. So if you stay still, I can probably come back and find you fairly easily. If you go wandering off trying to find your own way? I make no guarantees."

The tunnels here are solidly built with timber-framed supports and paved with flagstones. Erannik moves forward and deliberately jumps atop a flagstone that's a slightly different color than the others. "That ought to do it," he grunts. "Signaling back to Eanala that we went underground. Probably worried about us by now."

He nods his head forward. "Let's go," he says, and leads the way.

A couple of hours pass, and Wil is mostly left alone. It seems to be the general rule of this sad place; with a few exceptions, people tend to stay away from others. Maybe they're worried about actually caring about someone who's likely to disappear at any moment.

Then, the woman that Wil spoke with earlier, who directed him to speak with the sick man, hesitantly approaches him. "Excuse me," she says. "Do you... have a moment?"

As soon as the words are out of her mouth, she huffs out a bitter laugh. "Who am I kidding? We all have nothing but moments. How about, may I talk to you for a time?"

Verrian frowns. "The Crows have the ability to detect magic. Why would you continue to use tunnels that issue a magical alert when someone uses them? Aren't you concerned that the Crows are using them to monitor your movement?"

Eanala raises her eyebrows. "It's possible, I suppose. Honestly, we hadn't even known for certain they were detecting magic until you mentioned it. It's such a small thing... "

She looks at Livia and Giran, then turns back to Verrian. "I think there's enough reason to go after them ourselves. At least attempt to meet them partway. What do you think?"

Shaking off some slight disorientation at the sudden shift in planning, Verrian sighs and tries to think. "If they've gone into the tunnels to avoid patrols, how likely are we to be able to elude those same patrols? And what if your mole has already alerted the Crows? If my friends are headed for a trap, I can't help them if I'm caught in it, too."

"If we go into the tunnels ourselves, we shouldn't meet any patrols," says Eanala. "Erannik's no mole. I would trust him with my life, and have on several occasions. Timarra lost two family members to the guard. They won't turn on us."

The realization seems to hit Eanala, Livia and Giran all at the same time.

Eanala lets out a string of curses, spewing several manners of creative -- and physically impossible -- violence in at least two languages. "Anders. Stars and moon, how could I be so fucking blind?" Livia and Giran are pale-faced, but wearing resolute expressions.

Turning to Verrian, the elf adds, "If Anders is the mole and he alerted anyone to Erannik and your friends, then we may not have a choice. If it's a trap, we may get caught, but we may also be able to help everyone escape it. Thoughts?"

"Thoughts?" Verrian repeats tightly. "My thoughts are centered around the fact that you've led my friends directly into the clutches of the enemy by sending your mole to 'help.'"

She turns away, puts her hands on her hips, and looks at the floor, then faces Eanala again. "I'm sorry. Forgive my temper. I know you have a lot at stake, as well." Biting her lip in thought, she adds, "We do have the whitestone disks. I could use it to contact my group on some pretext and deliver a coded message to let them know about the mole."

The woman's bitter expression fades at Wil's words, and she smiles. "Spend more than a day here, and you tend to forget that people can still be courteous to one another."

She takes the offered place on the cot, looking carefully around to see if anyone would overhear their conversation. Finding no one nearby, she says, "You're new here... what's the city like outside? What's happening?"

Wil stops to think for a minute.

Well, I am new here, but it's not good. Mr. Crow's men seem to be running things with the help of a few townspeople who are probably helping for fear of their life or the lives of loved ones.

He sighs and shakes his head.

I can't blame them, it is hard to risk everything.

Anyone showing any magical talent are brought here. No one looks anyone in the eye. I assume some people are settling old grudges by turning neighbours in.

He smiles and looks around.

There are still many good people in your town. Some of them will surprise you with their bravery. They only need a spark.
I have seen it before. One thing can fire people up and put the run to these thugs.

Wil chuckles.

Look at me rambling on about things. Tell me about how your town was before all the troubles. And your name. I hope we can be friends, and madam seems so formal.

Eanala's face grows hard at Verrian's initial response. "I do have a lot at stake. And I sincerely hope that you are not implying that I either sent your companions into danger on purpose or by carelessness. There seems to be a great deal coming to a head all at once, and I have just as much reason to be suspicious of your timing as you do of mine. We seem to be at an impasse, unless we want to agree to trust one another."

She breathes in and out audibly once. "If they are in a situation where they need to be quiet, would your disk create problems for them?"

The woman smiles at Wil's optimistic response. "There are many brave people in this city. I even know some," she replies quietly and extends her hand to Wil. "Call me Vesina."

She moves a bit closer, though she manages to do so while looking as if she's merely shifting her weight. "I won't lie. It's never been easy, not after the war. Alcave was so involved in researching the boundaries of magic, and Hara was the center of much of it. Entire districts were leveled, many are uninhabitable. There are rumors of strange, twisted beings created out of arcane fury gone mad. No one's ever seen any... at least not verifiably... but the rumors persist, so one has to wonder. But at least we were building toward something together, until..."

She glances around meaningfully at the guards and their colleagues. "Those of us still hoping to work for the betterment of all... it was challenging. More so of late."

She shakes her head. "It makes a small vibration, mostly inaudible. If we don't make noise on this end, no one else will hear anything. As for what to say... I can come up with something that will clue in my friends about Anders, but Erannik and Timmara will be in the dark and likely will side with their comrade. Is there any kind of code I could use that will let Erannik and Timmara in on the situation?"

Eanala considers for a moment, and the room falls quiet around her. Finally, it's Giran that speaks up. "If they've gone underground, ask them if they've encountered any moles. Or if they've had to deal with the mole infestation."

Livia shakes her head. "Too obvious," she grunts.

Giran protests, "I don't hear you coming up with anything!"

Livia glares back at him silently, until he finally shrinks back a bit. It's a powerful force, that glare.

Eanala says, "Actually, there might be something to that. Tell them who's still here in the room, and how Giran got spooked by something crawling around under the table, and how it turned out to be a mole, but it ran away. Maybe they've seen one where they're at, underground?"

This seems to restore Giran's good spirits, and he looks hopefully at Verrian to see what she thinks of the idea.

Verrian's assessment of the idea is that it's ridiculously complicated and hard to make sound natural, but Eanala knows her people better than she does. She smiles at Giran and says, "Sounds good."

She pulls out the whitestone disk and activates it to call the one held by her friends.

At the end of the first corridor, Erannik waves everyone by and then stops to fiddle with a small crank set into the wall at about knee level for an average-sized human. He cranks it several turns counterclockwise, and you can hear faint mechanical clanking sounds from farther down the corridor. "Just a little surprise for anyone that might decide to follow. Anyone who doesn't know their way around, anyway," he says with a smirk and a twinkle to his eyes.

A short distance farther into the tunnels is enough to understand why Erannik was so concerned about people staying together. There are enough twists and turns and ups and downs that without a good map (written or mental), it would be easy to get lost.

It is at this point that the whitestone disk you carry begins to gently vibrate.