Shadow at the temple – Chapter 11

Darkness and the earliest stages of night have fallen upon Dezasha as Malkiz and Eyren encroach on the elected complex of their probing. Besides the dimensions of the setting, Eyren wouldn’t judge that this warehouse is any more special than its neighbors. It stands roughly two stories tall, so it has that going for it, but the wooden construction, the tiled roof with the curved corners and the low-lying wall around it doesn’t make it stand out noticeably. Then again, there are a couple of guards patrolling in the region, impressing on her to assume that there must be a valuable interior.

Another attendant attribute of this framework, which she hasn’t wrestled with beforehand, is that she can get an enhanced perspective of Malkiz and his present outlook. Eyeing him up and down, she notes how the feline-traited gentleman is not just clad in his stealthy getup, but carries a weapon at his belt which he hadn’t wielded in their anterior meetings – a one-handed, lightly curved and single-edged blade. Picking up on her gaze, Malkiz’s catlike vision strays at her.
“Anything with my form that has aroused your curiosity, dear knight?”, he wonders in his characteristic half-flirty tone, once more talking to her in Goetejul.

“Uh, well…was mostly fixed on that steel o’ yours.”

The blade sits on Malkiz’s left hip, in order to be drawn by his right natural arm, and he glances there now.
“Oh? Something amiss with it.”

“It’s a zhao, right? A Xilan sword?”

Below the mask which covers half his face, the spy smiles.
“The Rittmark schooled you in this as well, I imagine?”

“Of course. We were drilled in practically every variety of weaponry across the continent.”

“Heh, they are conscientious, then. But you are right, obviously.”

“Are you actually planning on fighting here?”

Malkiz shrugs casually.
“If needs must.”

“Can you?” Shifting his eyesight up again, Malkiz curves his brow at her. “Uh, I mean…not that I doubt your finesse, but due to your…circumstances.”

The spy snickers softly and shakes his head.
“Rest assured, darling knight, I am more than capable in combat.”

“Where’d you study that, then?”

“Here and there”, he hints.

“Right. Very cryptic of you. Again.”

Chuckling lightly, he swirls his hand around a tad.
“I was taught a specific one-handed technique in my youth, which I can swear to you will be productive against our opponents.”

“Huh. Will have to take your word for it.”

Upon coming to a spot adjoining the minor fence to the warehouse, Malkiz nudges his head at those patrolling the region.
“It might be wise to take out the guards.”

“You want us to…kill ’em? That seems drastic. They’re surely just laborers?”

“No killing, but rather knocking them out. I picked up racket from inside earlier, which tells me there are additional guards there. It would be fairly poor of us to be identified by arbitrary sentries whilst we’re taking pains to outmaneuver the more consequential opposition, would you not permit?”

“Very well, but if I just stomp over there, they’re gonna spot me for sure…”

Malkiz snickers and taps her shoulder.
“I am conscious of this. Stay, and I will lead them afield.”

Sticking to what she’s assigned towards, the northerner crouches and holds herself back in the corner by a fringing building, whereas Malkiz takes off into the dusk. In the neighborhood of a minute later, she picks out how the jaguar-eared companion of hers comes practically tripping inside, slipping in past the corner and gesturing with his thumb. Ascending to her feet, Eyren stands poised with a fist, and once the leadoff face of a worker skirts over the threshold, she lashes out and belts him out with a single punch, a guy Eyren would mark as a man in his early twenties, and not a soldier sort in any capacity.

“What the-“, blurts the second man in the proximity, pulling up a club he keeps in his fingers and gears up to swing it at Eyren.

This blow never lands, for in the intervening seconds, Malkiz has swooped in from the flank, pins him against the wall of the structure and presses a pair of fingers up against the neck of the contrasting man. Eyren minds a slight choking noise, prior to the sentry dropping to the ground, out cold.
“…okay”, comments Eyren. “Maybe you are qualified, after all.”

There’s a glimmer in Malkiz’s vision and he bows his head playfully.
“Glad you approve.”

As Eyren tags after Malkiz, the two of them make their way forward and slip virtually soundlessly indoors, expressly with the spy’s cautious treatment of the handlebar. What they breach is a genre of backroom, dusky and moderately dusty. Malkiz marks with his hand at obstacles to their course, which Eyren only faintly makes out, since she is unlikely to have as decent night vision as her partner. Notwithstanding, she can figure out that these quarters are laden with a heap of boxes and other containers.
“Where are we headed?”, she whispers in the end.

Her companion delays his procession to softly propel himself back at her and lowers the frequency of his tone.
“Amid my investigation, I dredged up a diagram for a second level which included an office that should belong to a foreman. I believe Ozdemir may be posing as this role.”

Eyren looks a bit perplexed.
“How’d he get these workers to align with him on that?”

“Bribes and well-placed promises of salvation from the cult. Several of the manpower are members.”

“Huh. Alright…”

“Anyhow, we best head along and get to that second level.”

“After you.”

When they continue along and course towards a more medial position in the structure, they overhear clamor from one of the linked compartments, which they would distinguish as arguing. It’s a sticky task to attain every highlight of this pretty heated quarrel between a degree of the warehouse members, but Eyren judges that they’re disputing over whether it’s favorable to join up with the protest against North River or not. Supposedly it hasn’t slowed down, and numerous scores of these drudgers are up for signing on just to beat the crap out of the guards and ‘teach ’em a lesson’. Whatever the case, this is a fairly unintended distraction for the duo to play on, and hence they prevail in their march upwards.
In the interim, Eyren also psychically reacts to an entity in the air. Even supposing she can’t nail down exact coordinates for it, that familiar sensation of the Shadow Herd scurries around in the rear of her head. So, this could be deposit for them, then? She doesn’t speak on it, but etches it in her memory at present.

A flukey gap in security unclasps for the two merely a handful of minutes after they’ve rambled into the shadows and stayed there for a spell, which makes the guard team move their disagreement outside, imaginably on the route towards where the demonstration against North River is ongoing. Malkiz and Eyren takes that chance to prowl through the edge of the chamber and upwards an assemblage of stairs, to a slender secondary floor with nothing but a handful of doors. They explore these entrances hastily, where each of them are locked, but Malkiz kneels and peeks through the respective keyholes.

In due course, the feline-eared man marks one of them with a finger.
“This one appears the most fascinating.”

“Great”, goes Eyren, “and…what do we do about that? Should I smash it in? That might be loud…”

Malkiz is made to giggle at that and impishly strokes his tail across her belly.
“While that would be entertaining to watch, I have a more…convenient approach.”

He digs a hand in under his top and fetches what Eyren judges is a lockpick. Afterwards, Eyren observes as he spends barely half a minute twisting and nudging things around, until the lock gives up with a click. When he gets back on his feet, Eyren shakes her head.
“…soon, I’m gonna wanna hear how many of these special skills you really have.”

“Did I not advise you that I survived in the shadows?”, he comments while hiding the tool back in his clothes. “This art is quite necessary there.”

“Won’t argue with you…”

When they slip to the interior, they note that it’s a reasonably simplified setup, with a number of boxes, shelves and a desk lodged by the far wall. They make a hasty survey of everything, but Eyren doesn’t hit on anything worthwhile. Malkiz, being the more experienced in this strain of errand, crouches down by the desk and searches both inside and under the drawers of it, until he pulls out a stack of letters.
“Here we go.”

“Wow. How’d you land those?”

“Hidden underneath one of these drawers, likely to prevent anyone from seeing the problematic contents.”

“Right.” Eyren nears him and goes through the text of a couple of , seeing that it’s written in Ahteron. “There doesn’t seem to be anything hugely important in ’em, though. Just looks pretty vague.”

“Perhaps for the uninitiated, but this is partially written in code.”

Eyren props up an eyebrow.
“They’d…go that far?”

“Absolutely. These sentences about distinct Shades, for example, is more of an instruction, of what parts of the recipients acts need to be amended. And here”, he goes and points at the end. “It is signed ‘K’. There is no doubt this infers it originates from Khaider. And it will be fairly obvious to North River.”

Eyren shifts slightly to her companion.
“You’re gonna hand these to them?”

Malkiz smiles cryptically and nods, whilst slotting the letters below his outfit.
“Mhm. Suffice it to say, I am not here to oppose them, but specifically to sabotage for those who seek to cause chaos.”

“Is your group…with this Pillar of Concord, then?”

“We are not, but alternately against the disorder which certain people represent, such as the Sun Lord.”

“Fair enough. Not gonna contend with ya on that. Or get involved.”

“Splendid. Then let us withdraw before anyone else takes notice.”

Eyren is about to make a quick reply, but that’s precisely when she’s made to ponder once more that prickling in the back of her mind. Should she bail out now, prior to having looked into it, not solely would she be betraying the gig granted by Minhai, she’d be overlooking her actual vocation’s intention.
“Hold on. Let’s not go just yet.”

Malkiz raises his eyes and his ears flicker when he studies her.
“How come?”

Eyren scowls and glimpses towards the door, trying to pinpoint the rootage of her concern.
“I’m feeling Herdbrand energy in here.”

For once, she does manage to dazzle the agent, whose eyes widen a smidgen.
“…Herdbrand? In here?”

“That’s right. Well, in the warehouse or somewhere reachable.”

“Where exactly?”

“Been tryna narrow that down and I think…” She points down. “It’s erupting from the basement or something similar. That’s what my gut tells me.”

Malkiz’s brow wrinkles.
“Oh, hmm…I wasn’t conscious of there being one. But why would a Herdbrand be underground in a location of this value…?”

Eyren shrugs her shoulders.
“Beats me. Never run into this scenario myself.”

Nodding his head, Malkiz approaches and lays a hand on her arm.
“So be it. I will join you in taking a closer look at this.”