Book 3, Chapter 11 - Fishmongers Borough (1/2)

Sandbar Station was rocked with news of the grotesque ‘Angel of Bone.’ In a single night Gabriel went from being a nobody to a terrifying figure, and no one dared cause any more trouble for the emporium. However, this turned out to be troublesome for Cloudhawk.

There was nothing worth sympathizing about how those men died. They deserved that and worse. But why did he have to suffer for it? Clattering skeletons posted in front of your door didn’t exactly do wonders for one’s business. Most were too frightened to walk in. Had he known this was going to happen, Cloudhawk would’ve rather handled the situation himself.

The Warden wasn’t the only one irritated by this.

A gloom had come over the Sandbar’s magistrate as well. Hammont’s job was to keep vigil over the station and report what happened. Murder wasn’t expressly against the law here, but the emporium itself was. Its existence undermined the power of the elysian authority which had taken over the settlement. Now there were ghastly living skeletons and parts of what had to be a dozen corpses spread around the damn place. Apparently, Gabriel only had time to fully complete five works. The remaining ‘materials’ were disposed of and discarded haphazardly through the streets. His methods for culling them were almost as brutal as what happened to the ones he kept alive.

What could he do? Turn a blind eye? But arresting Gabriel was also out of the question.

Gabriel hadn’t broken any laws. What’s more, going after him wasn’t going to put him in Cloudhawk’s good graces. The Angel of Bone had come to the Sandbar with Cloudhawk, and judging by what he’d done he was just as capable a demonhunter as his employer. Hammont certainly wasn’t going to face a pair of demonhunters with nothing but a troop of borderland soldiers. Yet, if they pretended like nothing happened, what would the rest of the town think? He had to consider the reputation of the inspection officers.

This thing could go either way. Hammont mulled over how to gloss it over.

At the same time, his own investigations had seen a breakthrough. When he poured over the report handed to him by a subordinate, the lumpy skin of his flesh quivered. “By the gods… someone get in here!”

“Your orders, sir?”

“Assemble a hundred guards and order them to surround the emporium. Put them under house arrest on the grounds of investigating this Angel of Bone matter.”

His assistants shared a nervous glance. Just days before under penalty of death, the magistrate told them never to trouble the shop or its owner. Now, all of a sudden, they were supposed to surround the place? Anyway, none of the soldiers even knew what Cloudhawk was like. All they knew was no one seemed very pleased with the arrogant newcomer. Their boss’ total change of heart was perplexing.

Before long, a hundred elysian guards were surrounding Cloudhawk’s variety store. All citizens were cleared from the area.

Hammont ordered most of the soldiers to wait outside while he and a handful of trusted officers crossed the threshold. Once they were out of the public eye and Hammont once more faced Cloudhawk, the ingratiating smile returned to his face. “Your humble servant is sorry to offend. I beg you to understand, I come here with information about the Sanctum of Judgement.”

All the fuss and commotion he came with was a cover for the benefit of the people. Nothing but an excuse for him to meet Cloudhawk without arousing suspicion. In this way he didn’t lose any face and he could deliver the information without fear of exposure. Two birds with one stone.

Cloudhawk was taken aback. “So fast? I knew I could rely on you.”

“Sure enough, through our investigations we found that the Sanctum of Judgement doesn’t have many members. They have missionaries everyone but don’t accept many true believers. We suspect about two hundred members in total.”

A frown tugged at the Warden. Anyone could have found that out. What did he need this lard-ass for?

But what he said next proved his worth. “I recently learned that the Sanctum of Judgement is preparing for some sort of ceremony in a place called Fishmonger’s Borough. I’m not sure whether the Crimson One himself will be there. If you’d like, we can send someone to see what they learn.”

The lines on Cloudhawk’s face deepened. “Fishmonger’s Borough? Tell me about the place.”

He remembered Autumn had said some name like that, when she was begging him for help. Was it the same place? What a staggering coincidence!

“We aren’t sure of this outpost’s precise location. Your humble servant only knows its somewhere in the northern barrens.”

The northern barrens wasn’t a place. Like Skycloud, it was the name of the wasteland’s northern sector.

As the name implied, what they called the northern barrens were the wastelands north of Skycloud domain. Cloudhawk’s former haunts were the southern barrens. While both were considered the wastelands, word was there were several more outposts in the north than in the south. Reputedly, several of them were even the size of cities – several times bigger than Sandbar Station.

With a name like ‘borough’ this Fishmonger’s place must be one of the larger ones. Although there were more and larger city-sized settlements in the north, it was still a barbaric place. Tribes and warlords carved out their own territories and killed one another over it. People were raised like livestock, and there were stories of cannibals who feasted on the bodies of their fellows. They were just a bunch of monsters draped in human skin.

There were just as many mutated beasts up there as they were in the south. But no beast could match the savagery of a man’s heart. The general consensus was things were far more dangerous up there.

Cloudhawk was dissatisfied, as it seemed the fatty had only done half the work. “What the fuck do you mean, you don’t know where it is? And you still have the gall to come swaggering in here? Do you think this is all a fuckin’ game!”