The silence remained in the air. Raven and Janette understood the gravity of the statement while Arcaea and Kurai, who understood less of magic, were still intuitive enough to read the tensions in the air.
“Is...is that bad?” Kurai asked finally.
“Yeah, it’s pretty bad.” said Raven.
“Indulge me, Raven Of-No-Last-Names.” said Marshal Delona. “Inform us of what you know of hemoturgy.”
Feeling placed on the spot, Raven quickly scanned through her memories to make sure she was remembering everything correctly.
“Right. Well, the most common school of magic is arcamancy. It is what Janette uses and it is also widely used in programming hexware and infusing tech with arcane applications. It is the school of magic that uses arcanum as a fuel source to power spells. Different schools use different ‘fuel sources’ for their spells, some using pagan rituals and divinations to call forth powers of older, more powerful beings like archons while others use more...taboo sources.”
“So...what you’re saying is that hemoturgy uses...blood to fuel spells?” asked Arcaea, horrified.
“Yes. It is the reason why it is outlawed by the Magistry and other independent colonies along the Frontier.” said Raven. “Blood mages tend to be vile people who do not hesitate to sacrifice the lives of others in order to fuel their spells. Some even go so far as harvesting blood from entire families.”
“Which is apparently exactly what’s happening to the north.” said Marshal Delona as she brought out a device and pressed a button on it. The device began projecting holographic images of maps and crime scene photos. “As you can see on this map, the attacks have all been surrounding this colony here, called Pyke’s Crossing.” Delona pointed towards a cluster of red exes. “During some only a single person was killed and drained of their blood. In others...more were harvested.”
“More?” asked Janette.
“Right here,” she said and pointed to a particular X, “a family of five was attacked. The father and one of the children were slaughtered horrifically while the mother and the remaining children seem to have been kidnapped. Those killed were drained of blood.” She then motioned her hand and brought up images of that particular crime scene.
Janette looked away and Kurai recoiled in disgust. Only Raven and Arcaea continued to examine the images although they were clearly deeply troubled by what they were seeing.
“With the increased rate of these attacks we fear the mage’s power might be increasing as well. As Janette and Raven will confirm, a powerful blood mage is bad news for everyone.” explained Delona.
“They can reach storybook villain levels.” agreed Janette.
“That’s torked.” said Kurai, who seemed a little out of her depth on this one.
“It is torked indeed.” agreed Delona. “Which is why we must act fast. We did send a duo of hunters out after this fiend but since then we’ve not heard anything from them. Granted we didn’t entirely realize we were dealing with a blood mage at the time so it’s entirely possible they found out and booked it.”
“Makes sense.” said Arcaea. “Most people would not willingly tackle such a threat. I can understand the urgency now.”
“There’s another reason for the urgency isn’t there?” said Raven. It was a question but it didn’t really sound like a question. It sounded more like a bait.
“Indeed.” said Delona with a smirk. “Some of you might know that the Infinitum Concord and the Magistry have been making a push towards ‘reclaiming’ Old Okuza and they’ve already sunk their claws into a few colonies. Whiteguard being the largest and strongest among them. Although, they have halted their efforts for the moment in order to not appear as the conquering force that they are.”
“And a blood mage would provide ample reason to move into the area to take the Argal region for themselves. All in the name of ‘law and order’.” Raven added.
Delona chuckled. “Very astute, valkyrie. Out here we deal with cryptids and other strange anomalies everyday. In fact things have been getting seemingly worse as time goes on. We have entire communities being forced to abandon their colonies or falling victim to forces we don’t understand. We are battling nightmares everyday and yet a blood mage would only serve to make that nightmare worse. The only thing worse than that would be if an archon decided to settle here in the Midhinnung Valley. Then we’d become entirely overrun by cryptids and other monstrosities.”
There was a silence that hung in the air before she continued.
“Most of us here on the Frontier value our freedom but recent world events have put us on edge. Trade negotiations between Infinitum and Krongard have escalated into violence and there have been recent reports of the Draconic Enclave moving South-West towards the Reclamation Line. If Infinitum’s eyes were not upon us before they sure as tork are now. We don’t want their laws, regulations and censorships. We want to govern ourselves and that means not giving them a reason to come and occupy us. We would fight them with everything we’ve got, of course. But we are no match for them. Their Legion outnumber and outgun us. So we’d like to take care of this blood mage before the Magistry catches wind of him.”
“So this is all political?” asked Arcaea.
“Everything is political.” answered Delona.
“Do you have any other leads on this guy?” asked Raven.
“No. But apparently the locals have all sorts of stories and theories. I imagine they might know more but you would be well advised to take them with a grain of salt.” said Delona.
There was a quiet moment of contemplation.
“Wait, are we actually thinking about this? Are we actually taking this job?” asked Kurai, somewhat panicked. “This is way above our pay grade. I’m not even sure if 2000 lerings is enough to cover this.”
“There must have been some miscommunication.” said Delona. “It’s 500 lerings when you take the job and 2000 lerings when you finish it.”
“You say that as if an extra 500 will convince us.” retorted Kurai.
“I think we can do it.” said Raven.
“Of course you think so.” said Kurai, raising her voice in dismay. “You think you’re invincible! This guy is gonna kill us!”
“Not if we play our cards right.” said Arcaea.
“Oh man! Not you too!” Kurai was beginning to nervously scratch her left ear. “Janette. Come on. Surely you’ll see reason.”
Janette thought about it for a moment. “Well…”
“No! No ‘well’! This is a stupid job!”
“There will be more work for you once you manage to finish this one. Safer work. Blood mages are not common but we always have use for reliable talent such as yourselves.” said Delona.
Kurai crossed her arms. “This is stupid.”
“We’ll take it.” said Raven.
There was a quiet resignation in the group once she had confirmed it. It was as if all of them were waiting for someone to take the job but none of them wanted to be the one.
“Fantastic.” said Delona who stood up to make her way towards her door. “Go down to Quartermaster Lindenberg and he will provide you with promised 500 lerings as well as some firearms. Can’t have you running into the fray without proper protection.”
“Oh, uh, thanks.” said Kurai rather surprised. “Firearms would actually help a lot.”
Delona opened the door and waited for them to all exit. When Raven was about to walk out Delona put her hand on the valkyrie’s shoulder.
“Do you mind if I have a private word with you for a second?” she asked.
Raven looked at her compatriots. “I’ll meet you guys downstairs.”
Arcaea nodded, Kurai was already making her way towards the lobby and Janette just looked at her with an expression of worry. Delona closed the door and walked back over to her desk. She then turned around and leaned up against it.
“So.” said Raven.
“So.” said Delona. “Which family do you belong to? One of the lesser ones or...one of the illustrious ones?”
“One of the lesser ones. The Fairfeathers.”
Delona narrowed her eyes. “Do I have to worry about the Iron Lily and the Magistry coming here to find you one day?”
“No. As far as they are concerned I’m dead.”
“You sure? Cause I would hate for you to become another reason for them to come knocking on my door and make demands.”
Raven considered it for a moment.
“You could always kick me out. The Frontier is a large place.”
“It sure is. It’s also a very dangerous place. And dangerous places need dangerous people to defend those who can’t defend themselves.”
“I don’t follow.”
“You’re young. In your early twenties, right? From what I’ve heard you put up quite the show at Mr Beringer’s club every now and then. And that’s without using your powers. Imagine how powerful you will become later on. Keystone could use such a person in its court.”
As she said this her eyes traced the bruises on her face and even though Raven was wearing a jacket her eyes drifted towards where her teeth and claw marks would be. Raven felt uncomfortable with the level of knowledge this woman possessed.
“Something of a long term investment. I find it strange you don’t just kick for frequenting Mr Beringer’s club since it’s not entirely...legal.”
“True, but me and Mr Beringer understand each other and both have Keystone’s best interest at heart. And it would be dumb for me to kick out a valuable asset, especially one who more or less follows all of our laws.” She allowed herself a pause to give a knowing smile, before becoming very serious once more. “Many think a war is brewing between Infinitum and the free colonies of the Frontier and if that day comes I’d worry less knowing a powerful valkyrie was watching over my people.”
Raven said nothing and neither did Marshal Delona. Instead she nodded towards the door and Raven left without saying a word.
She walked down towards the front desk and was led to the armory where the other girls were taking their pick of weapons and other equipment with smiles on their faces.
“You alright?” asked Arcaea.
“Yeah.” Raven nodded appreciatively.
“You ready to hunt a blood mage?”
Raven smirked again.
“Do we have guns this time?”
“Oh, we have guns.” said Arcaea and they both smirked now.
On their way out the peacekeeper headquarters they began organizing themselves for what to do next.
“We’ll need rations.” said Arcaea. “We have no idea how long we’ll be out there.”
“I need components for crafting.” said Kurai. “Give me a couple of hours and I can get everything ready, say goodbye to the family and what not.”
“I’ll join you. I need to swing by the archives and restock on spells and arcanum and you live in that direction.” said Janette.
“Rad. Meet you two by the docks in three or four hours?” said Kurai.
“Absolutely. See there.” said Arcaea as the two of them branched off down a winding alley. “You wanna join me on a food run? Get some good drim for the journey.”
Raven slung her new rifle over her shoulder and gave Arcaea a smile. “Yeah, that sounds cool to me.”
“You need to get anything from home before we leave?”
“Nah.”
“You okay? Did she grill you some more because you’re a valkyrie?”
“A little. But it seems she’s more interested in keeping me on to help out here at Keystone.”
“Look at you. Making friends in high places.”
“That’s what valkyries are often used for. And I seem to be weirdly good at it.”
“You do have a charm to you.”
“Shut up.” said Raven with a smile.
And with a chuckle the two of them continued on their way, soon to embark on a dark journey of horrors and discoveries.
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