Downtown Druid

Traveling through a tree was probably Dantes’ least favorite method of travel. He felt his sense of self momentarily disappear and become one with a kind of primal and natural force, before being flung back into oneness and reality through another tree across the continent. The first time he’d done it, he’d been unconscious, but losing that sense of self while aware was distinctly horrible and uncomfortable to him. So much so that when he landed in an abandoned square in Rendhold and fell onto hard concrete it was a relief to him.

He sat up, and looked at his hands, counting and flexing his fingers as he regained his composure. He could feel that his senses had been heightened by his initiation. He had a general impression of the state of life with his locus, within Rendhold, that painted a distinctly negative picture of rot and misery. He chuckled, he’d known about that without any Druid abilities.

He felt a pull from the tree behind him, and turned to face it. It was an old, ugly and marled thing. The ends of its branches looked like clenched fists and the wood of it was a dark gray-brown, but in spite of the state it was in he felt an enormous presence from it. He sensed the life within it pulsating, but also that it was much faded from what it used to be. As he was focusing on it, a particular pulse of life traveled from its roots and up to a branch near him. It was as thick as his forearm, and just a bit longer. He reached out and touched it, feeling it as the tree cut off the life that was flowing into it, leaving a pocket of itself within the branch. Dantes bent the branch, and it broke off with almost no effort.

He held the branch in his hand. It had a good weight to it. He wasn’t sure what had compelled him to take it, but going with his instincts had been the name of the game that day, so he hadn’t questioned it. He adjusted it in his hand, if it was just a bit thinner on one end, it would make a solid club at the very least.

At that thought, the club shifted, lengthening on the thinner end until it fit perfectly into his palm. He was reminded of how Lorna was able to grow and move the leaves she’d been using as clothing. He focused his will on the branch, this time picturing it becoming thin and malleable, wrapping around his arm.

Slowly, it obeyed his will, wrapped around his right forearm until it looked like a particularly ugly bracer. He realized it was covering his marks, and willed it to make space to show them, which it did.

This…this has nice possibilities he thought. He moved it to his other arm where it would be less in the way. He looked up at the tree he’d retrieved the branch from. He’d sensed it was a gift of sorts. He placed his right palm on the tree.

Thank you

He felt a gentle acknowledgement of the thank you and looked around. It was still night, but the moon was slowly starting to fall. He needed to find a street he recognized and begin making his way back to the Vixen. It was time to start moving things in earnest.

Dantes moved until he reached an area he recognized. He wasn’t in Midtown, but rather had been taken all the way to the southwestern part of the city. It would be more than an hour by foot to get back to the docks. Hard to complain about an hour walk though, when you’d just traveled thousands of miles in an instant. He moved across the still slick streets, seeing the occasional lurker in an alley, but otherwise finding that section of the city deserted. The southwest end was under control of the gatemen, and was where one of the side gates into the city was located. Of course, the city had grown a long way out from the old wall, but it was still one of the major areas through which goods passed on the way to or from the docks.

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Even at that time of day the streets were typically much busier, which set him on edge as he walked. He sped up, cutting through alleys and letting his innate sense of direction guide him until he started to get closer to the edge of the docks. There, he started to notice a number of guard patrols gathered at the intersection of a few major streets. He shifted into ratform and got closer along with Jacopo to hear what was happening.

“- section by section until you’ve cleared your area! The city wants arrests, and we need to give them to it or it’ll be our asses!”

“Not our fault the fucking jail losers couldn’t keep a lid on our prisoners,” muttered one of the guards.

“Your damn right it’s not our fault,” yelled the sergeant who Dantes noticed was at least half-elven which the muttering guard should’ve noticed and muttered more quietly. “But that doesn’t matter. Everyone with a uniform is going to be blamed, and we’ve got orders all the way at the top from Councilman General Krant to round up everyone we can.”

“How will we know if we’ve found a prisoner?”

“Well, a number of them were mages, so they’d have collars around their necks. That being said, it doesn’t matter if you know that the person’s a prisoner or not. The city wants arrests, just assume anyone you find out here looking suspicious needs to get rounded up.”

“Where will we even put them? The Underprison doesn’t exactly seem like an option since they just broke out.”

“We’re packing them into the holding jails for now. Any more fucking questions, or are all of you done with excuses and ready to bust some skulls?”

“Bust some skulls, sir!” yelled the majority of the guards in unison, before they started tearing through the streets.

Dantes stayed in rat form until he was a good distance away from them, then shifted back to his usual self. There’d been another prison break, and a good number of those that had escaped were Collared. That explained the empty streets. Had Wane escaped? Had Merle? His own escape hadn’t prompted nearly this level of response which seemed to indicate to him that more people had gotten out this time, and it was no longer possible for the guard to keep a lid on things. He needed more information, and to start looking for any of his fellow prisoners. He wanted to help those that he knew, but more than that there were opportunities here. He could use his abilities to help smuggle people out of the city for a price. There was also the chance that some of the enemies he’d made had escaped the pit as well. Those he’d want to be able to keep track of as well.

He rubbed his temples for just a moment and allowed himself a single ‘poor me’. Why did these things all seem to happen in waves? If it was one problem at a time it would be significantly easier to manage. He let that self pity go, and started moving again. Whatever was happening, he needed to get back to the Vixen.

He made it there as the sun was rising, frequently changing into ratform to avoid patrols of guards, but truthfully it wouldn’t have been difficult to avoid them even on foot. The city was too big for the guard to control, always had been. The guard were more about projecting the illusion of control and enforcing the will of uptown on everyone else. Sure there were the guard that worked outside the walls and actually did some work to defend the city, but they were practically their own entity.

The Vixen was closed, with only the gentle glow of a candle in one of the windows, but Dantes hesitated. Something felt off, and he could feel the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He shifted into rat form, and began circling the building. He found one man across the street on the roof looking at the entrance. A woman with a crossbow sat in the alley behind the building keeping watch, and a third man he sensed through a roach watching the front door with a wand gripped in his hand. Dantes felt a rage build in him, but held back. He smelled no blood, and could tell that all the women of the Vixen were fine, with Zilly even beginning her cleaning of the main room, ignoring the man with the wand.

Dantes had been found, and likely by Mondego. If it had been the guard they wouldn’t have been nearly so subtle. Still, he couldn’t exactly leave all of the things he had hidden under the floorboards there, and he also needed to make sure Vera and the girls would be alright. Worst case scenario he’d need to kill the thugs and get them to safety. He had a feeling Vera would have other plans.

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