The Homunculus Knight

Chapter 42: Predator or Prey?

“It’s a simple enough idea. Dogs, horses and other useful beasts are bred for specialties by those with the time to do so. As nocturnal nobility, we have an incredible wealth of time, so why not use it creatively? After only three hundred years, I’ve bred three successful clans of improved thralls, each cultivated for distinct uses. Those of Clan Otus are loyal, intelligent, eager to please, and taste oh so sweet. They make perfect stewards and servants, being both capable and docile. Clan Bubo’s members are hardy and warlike, obsessed with honor and strength. Each of them would rather face torture than risk failing their master, who better to watch us during the day? Then we have my masterpiece, Clan Tyto, who are beautiful, wise, and blessed with potent blood. It's from this family I select my own scions and sacrifices, which should tell you everything you need to know about their quality.” - Voivode Igori Gens Suillia

It was shocking how quickly the caravan got moving again. Natalie’s warning was barely past her lips and the dwarves started working. The aardigs were packed and shuffling forward before Natalie could even tell if the voice was getting closer. Claws scraping along the cavern floor, the beasts of burden grunted and complained as Olkar and Nolkin drove them forward. Seeing the tension grow among the group with every step, Natalie had a moment of doubt. What if this was an actual call for help? No one else could hear it, and she didn’t know what to listen for.

That quickly growing worry withered away as Natalie fed blood into her ears and listened. Three voices were crying out for help in dwerick, each filled with desperation and panic. As the voices repeated their cry, Natalie sucked in an involuntary breath. Her sensitive hearing had pierced the deception. All three of the voices were identical. There was no variation to their cries. No person sounded like that, especially one frantic enough to scream for aid. It was like some witchery had bottled someone’s last cry. Horribly, Natalie wondered if her metaphor was the literal truth.

Frantically whispering what she just learned to Cole, Natalie glanced behind them at the quickly dimming remnant of their campfire. She half-expected some spindly horror to swallow up the dying embers as it chased after them. Thankfully, whatever hunted the caravan was far enough away that even Natalie’s night vision couldn’t detect it. In fact, with how the lock cave around them echoed, Natalie wasn't certain how far away the threat was. Close enough to detect them, it seemed, but thankfully not within striking distance.

As Cole relayed Natalie’s findings to the dwarves, a rapid conversation in dwerick made its way up and down the caravan. That Cole and the dwarves didn’t bother with silence worried Natalie. She somehow didn’t think abandoning one form of caution while they ran like frightened rabbits was a good sign. Eventually, some sort of agreement was reached and Cole addressed the non-dwarves of the group. “If we are being hunted outside the vault, then they are probably hungry and desperate. Our guides don’t think we can shake our pursuer like in the jungle. But we’re only a few hours away from a safer cave. If we can push forward, then Gurim’s Watch will have protections.”

Brow creased with worry, Mina asked quietly. “Is it okay to talk?”

Cole shrugged his armored shoulders. “Probably not, but Olkar doesn’t think it will make much of a difference at this point. If our pursuers have followed us this far, then our best bet is finding good ground to fight them off.”

Alia winced. “We’ve already been hiking all day. Retreating like this and then fighting doesn’t sound like a good idea.”

Kit tried to gather his breath. “I could use… some… magic to lighten… our loads… Just need to… to pause for a second.”

Considering this for a moment, Cole shook his head. “I don’t know if we have the time, and we might need your spells later.”

Looking at Natalie, Cole hesitated before adding. “When we reach Gurim’s Watch I can hold the tunnel mouth.”

Shaking her head, Natalie said. “Not alone you won’t. Both of us can handle this trek better than the others, we’ll do the heavy lifting.”

A smile flicked across Cole’s face and Natalie was struck by a random thought. “Say… whatever is chasing us, do they bleed?”

Amused snorts and revolted wretches escaped Natalie’s companions, eliciting an annoyed huff from her. “What? They are already trying to eat us. What’s wrong with returning the favor?”

Unsheathing his axe, Cole pondered her question. “I don’t know if they bleed. Shall we find out?”

Nodding, Natalie joined him as they slowed their pace, letting themselves reach the caravan’s end. Seeing Nolkin’s expression as they changed formation, Cole said. “We’ll act as rearguard, we’re better suited for it.”

Glad to not be the one with monsters nipping at their heels, Nolkin jogged up the line, leaving paladin and vampire to make up the caravan’s tail. Glancing over her shoulder, Natalie still didn’t see any sign of the threat, merely hearing the distant calls.

“Do you know what to expect from these things?” Natalie asked, drawing her short-sword and wondering if the steel edge or silver tip would be more useful.

Cole grunted. “Unfortunately no. I’ve only heard of them, never fought any. The dwarf superstition about our enemy makes researching them not particularly easy.”

The voices were getting closer; it wasn’t easy to tell with the echo but Natalie was certain of it. “Jagging lovely.”

Monsters on their heels, the caravan fled, moving as quickly as they could through great caverns and winding tunnels. Try as they might, the distance between them and their pursuers barely budged. It seemed both hunters and prey were pushing themselves hard in this chase. Feeling at her reservoir of blood, Natalie almost smiled. She’d fed after leaving Fort Carnum, consuming half a deer herd and what little blood she spent the past few days Cole helped replace. If these mimics expected to corner weary prey, then they’d have one hells of a surprise waiting for them.

After the first hour of flight, signs of exhaustion showed among the caravan. Kit no longer ran, but skipped, his every step sending him bouncing forward; gravity’s grip on him slipping. Masga was puffing, the wiry dwarf red in the face, and hanging onto an aardig’s saddlebags for support. The only sign of exhaustion from Cole was the faint condensation on his armor. Using holy power to keep cool always made Natalie laugh. It made sense, but something about the habit was humorously surreal.

Axe in hand, Cole looked to Natalie and said. “When the fight happens, we’ll need to drop our packs. Can your wolves take them to safety?”

Natalie nodded, understanding the request hidden in the question. Isabelle was in Cole’s pack and he was asking her to protect the skull. “No problem, should I summon the pack now?”

Cole shook his head. “Save your power, we might need it.”

By the second hour of their flight, only Cole and Natalie were still unbothered by the exertion. The dwarf scouts along with Mina and Alia were slowing down, the Priestess and warden wheezing hard. Cole’s decision to have Natalie and him act as the rearguard made more sense with every step. Just when Natalie wondered if they could throw Kit and Masga onto one of the aardigs, Olkar whistled and pointed ahead. Squinting her eyes, Natalie realized what he’d noticed, a glowstone marking a tunnel mouth. They were almost safe!

Feeling the weight of her sword in one hand, and stroking the wolf skull strapped to her belt with the other, Natalie felt a wash of nervous excitement flow over her. As a human, the idea of violence scared her. Now, as a vampire, she hungered for the pure, bloody intensity of battle. Whatever was coming, she’d meet it with bared fangs and sharp steel.

The tunnel mouth grew closer and closer, its dim light a beacon of safety to the exhausted caravan. Rolling her shoulders, a tic she’d picked up from Cole, Natalie prepared to fight. Once everyone was safely into Gurim’s Watch, she and Cole would turn about and hold the passage, using their powers, both fair and fell to do some good. At the head of the caravan, Olkar was the first to make it into the next cave, gesturing wildly for the others to hurry and follow him. Frantically, both humanoid and aardig reached the safety just ahead of them.

When Cole and Natalie passed into Gurim’s Watch the Paladin froze, his body instantly tensed. Eyes wide beneath his helmet, Cole looked around the dome-shaped cave and said. “Something’s wrong, my chest-”

Three things happened before Cole could finish speaking. First the entrance to Gurim’s Watch collapsed, carved stone shattering as some invisible force smashed into the tunnel mouth. Second, the scattered glowstones in the cave went dark, snuffed out like candles in a maelstrom. Last but most horrifically, Olkar died. Something massive and so fast even Natalie could barely track it appeared out of nowhere and turned the senior ranger into a wet stain with a single swing of its clawed limb. The force of the blow was intense, it didn’t stop at Olkar and ripped the aardig next to him in two, the creature's front half skipping along the cave floor, leaving a trail of gore in its wake.

As shock gave way to instincts, Natalie called up her pack, a tide of snarling spectral canines swirling around her; their ghostly flesh glowing in the darkness. It was in that haunting light that Natalie first saw the bone knight. A hulking warrior clad in ivory plate, its joints glowing with green fire, charged Cole from the side. Before a warning could be shouted, Cole spun to meet his new opponent, Requiem shining silver with holy cold. A longsword dipped in witch flame clashed with the halberd and Cole was pushed back slightly.

Using the space, Cole dropped his pack and cloak, giving Natalie the barest glance before meeting steel with the bone knight. Grist ran forward, grabbing the pack and dragging it away from the melee. The rest of the Lupus pack fanned out trying to give Natalie an understanding of what was happening. Alia, Mina, Yara, Kit, along with the two surviving dwarves were clustered together, the remaining aardigs bellowing, their clubbed tails smashing the cavern floor in warning. No… not in warning, the beasts were under attack. A carpet of black furry bodies skittered around the aardigs. Rats, hundreds of them, flowed around the aardigs, trying to sneak through kicking claws and thrashing tails.

Deciding a wolf pack trumped a rat swarm, Natalie sent her familiars forward, letting them feast upon the vermin. Cole’s backpack and Isabelle went with them, joined by Natalie’s own bag dragged by another ghostly wolf. Commanding the wolves to protect her friends, be they skull-bound or otherwise, Natalie turned her focus back to Cole.

Icy vapor leaked from Cole, clashing with the bone knight’s green fire as they dueled. Rushing towards him, Natalie fed blood into her limbs, preparing to strike. The hand of some invisible giant slammed into Natalie then, knocking her to the ground and applying bone-creaking pressure. Laying on her stomach, Natalie struggled against the phantom force, feeling bars of iron-strength pressing her down into the rock. Redirecting her blood to strengthen bones and muscle, Natalie got one hand beneath her and pushed up, the effort straining her body. The invisible cage crushing her shifted slightly, and Natalie managed to roll out from underneath it.

Moving more on instinct than anything else, Natalie leapt towards Cole, dodging another invisible blow, feeling the wind it left in its wake. Right behind Natalie, the stone cracked, as her attacker’s strike hit the ground. Sparing a glance, Natalie’s eyes widened at the mark the impact left on the rock. It was a skeletal handprint, one the size of her torso. She really had been hit by an invisible giant, an undead invisible giant, no less.

Words ringing with arcane power shook through the cave, and lines of earth-brown magic surged out from where Mina and the others were clustered. The lines wove themselves into walls of glowing runes, surrounding the panicked aardigs and driving back the rats. A ball of painfully bright light floated up from the caravan’s position, filling the cave with stark illumination. Flinching away from the blinding light, Natalie felt a firm hand grip her shoulder and pull. She tensed and prepared to strike, before recognition reached her mind, it was Cole, she’d know that hand anywhere. Allowing herself to be guided forward, Natalie’s vision returned.

They were close to the wall of runes now, and just as the last spots left Natalie’s eyes, Cole half-shoved, half tossed her through the magic barrier. Flinching, Natalie was pleasantly surprised that she passed through the runes, with only a faint static shock upon her skin. Regaining her balance, Natalie looked through the shimmering wall and saw Cole clashing with the bone knight, fending off the pursuer with efficient strikes.

Glancing behind her, Natalie found her companions, clustered together around the source of the magical wall. Masga stood tall, his wiry frame a blur of motion as he wove runes into the air, reinforcing his defenses with every gesture. Kit stood beside him, violin bow pointed up at the ball of light that now dimmed to a less oppressive radiance as he whistled. Alia had her blades drawn and was standing protectively over Mina, who worked to close an ugly gash in Nokin’s side. Yara somehow blended in among the cracked stone and nervous aardigs, her panicked expression calming slightly on seeing Natalie.

Commanding her wolves to circle about the wall, and keep the rats away, Natalie joined her friends, finding Grist sitting next to Yara, Cole’s pack in his spectral jaws. Just as Natalie was about to ask questions, the surrounding ward vibrated with a tremendous impact. A huge monster slammed itself into the barrier farthest from Natalie, cracking some of the overlapping runes into red-brown dust. Masga redoubled his efforts and more runes flowed to reinforce the damaged section. In the light of Kit’s tiny star Natalie could now get a good look at the thing that killed Olkar.

Standing taller than Cole despite walking hunched over on its knuckles was a chimera of hideous features. The basic frame of a troll was grotesquely swollen with muscle, and additional limbs. Aside from the tree-trunk-like arms it walked on, a pair of clawed hands with too many fingers, protruding from the creature’s back like wings. A long insect-like tail capped with a hooked spike snaked after the monster, while its bruise-colored body was covered in a mix of half-grown feathers, leathery hide and prickly hairs.

But all of these mismatched features didn’t hold a candle to the blazing fire of horror that was its face. It had eight eyes like a spider, each amber like an owl’s and moving independently, darting around the cave, in every direction. The chimera’s jaw was split down the middle, each half bristling with jagged teeth; somehow resembling both a dog’s maw and an insect's mandible. Thick, clear fluid dripped from the monster’s upper fangs, scoring the rock where it struck.

Faster than Natalie could process, the chimera struck again, driving its full weight into the shield, making the ward ring like a bell. In response Mina, raised a hand and shot a gout of silver fire at the monster. The creature skittered away, its movements jerky and spider-like in contrast to its hulking size. Natalie considered siccing her wolves on the chimera, but decided that would just be wasting blood. This was the type of threat only Cole was equipped to handle, the wolves wouldn’t even slow it down.

Backing away from the shield, the monster was joined by three other figures. The largest of them was clearly not human, instead a figure Natalie recognized from the most disturbing tales teenagers of Glockmire shared with each other. Lamia, the snake women of the south, monsters who offer unspeakable pleasures to their victims before devouring them alive. Besides the serpentine seducer, the other two newcomers seemed positively mundane, that is until Natalie met their eyes. Both were vampires, one a short dwarf with a greasy beard, the other a thin man with dark curly hair and oddly familiar features. Slight and unassuming, this vampire wore bizarre spectacles that refracted his eyes like an insects.

Coming up to the barrier's edge, the vampire with glasses spoke, his voice soft and papery. “Hand over the sage’s stone and we will let you live.”

Mina stood up then, having finished patching Nokin’s injury. “I have no jagging idea what you are talking about, leech!”

Face still impassive, the vampire said. “That is a lie. Give the relic to us and once the homunculus is dealt with, we’ll leave. Otherwise you will die, painfully.”

Genuine confusion went through the group, except for Natalie, of course. Hidden behind the others, no one could see the look of shock and terror that erupted on Natalie’s face. Whoever this vampire was, he knew too much and could not be allowed to walk away from here alive. Then, as her initial panic turned to confusion, Natalie realized the vampire hadn’t mentioned her. How could they know about Cole and the stone, but not about her?

Mina’s eyes started to glow with silver fire. “Listen well, monster. I am a Priestess of Master Time, and with me travels a Paladin of my god! It is you who should run if you seek to steal more nights of unlife!”

The vampire’s expression became almost bored. “I hadn’t thought negotiations would work. Very well. Chillheart 9th, 1434, midnight, the hamlet of Moreb. Hurt your companions the worst you can.”

Even more confused, Natalie tried to understand the meaning behind the Vampire’s words. Then Masga’s skull was smashed by a swinging mace. The bonekeeper fell to the ground like a sack of tubers, blood and brains pouring from his skull. As the rune wall faded with Masga’s life, the mace swung again, striking Alia, sending a spray of red across the cracked stone. A look of incredulity and utter betrayal showed on the city warden’s face as she stared up at her attacker. Voice slurred, Alia rasped. “M-M-Mina?”

Eyes wild with a rage so intense it distorted her face into a rictus, Priestess Mina Vrock turned from her victims and charged Natalie. Vampire instinct compensated for Natalie’s shock and she ducked under the mace, its head coated in bits of scalp. But fast as Natalie was, she was still too stunned to recognize the feint. Mina’s free hand came up, burning with silver light. Words of holy power escaped the Priestess and slammed into Natalie. Skin burnt, blood froze and Natalie screamed at the familiar pain. Falling onto her back, Natalie tried to call upon her blood, finding it slow and unresponsive. The mace fell then, smashing into Natalie’s chest, forcing pointless breath from her.

Looming over Natalie, Mina struck again, breaking ribs and driving them into dead lungs. After the third strike, Mina yelled, “Let go of her Isabelle! Leave her! Don’t make me hurt you more!”

Trying to force her body to heal, Natalie stared up at Mina, her confusion reaching an impossible level. Quickly turning back towards Alia, Mina kneeled down and started to frantically say. “No, no no no, I’ll fix this! You’ll be alright!”

Like some carrion eater descending on a fresh corpse, the lamia slithered forward, twin blades licking out and killing the aardigs closest to her. Slowly, sensuously, the lamia wrapped her coils around Mina. Still frantically trying to fix her girlfriend’s cracked skull, Mina didn’t even react until she was constricted and pulled away from Alia. Screaming in frustration and panic, Mina was bound in ropes of thick scaled muscle. “Isabelle! Damn you! Damn you for this!”

Natalie fought with all her will to crack the ice in her veins, to free the power she needed right now. Whatever was wrong with Mina could be dealt with later. Right now Natalie had to heal, she had to fight! As the mad Priestess was pulled away by the grinning lamia, the thin vampire approached Natalie, the apparent leader of these monsters. Polished boots came into sight as the spectacle wearing leech loomed over Natalie. He stared down at her, examining the horrible burns covering every inch of Natalie’s exposed flesh. “Now who are you?”

With one lung punctured, and her skin practically burned off, Natalie couldn’t respond; she could hardly think. The horrible insect-eyes of the vampire bored into Natalie. “You are kindred of mine, I can tell that much. A strix, and a relatively young one… but of an exotic bloodline. Tell me, what are you doing among the enemy?”

Feeling her skin start to regrow, Natalie could only gurgle as undead flesh fought to put broken ribs back where they belonged. The vampire adjusted his glasses, the lenses clicking and flickering in the pale light. “But more importantly, why did the Priestess call you Isabelle?”

Upon seeing her mistress burn, Yara tried to run to Natalie, but a clammy hand grabbed her and pulled her into the shadow of a still aardig. It was Kit, one hand keeping Yara quiet, the other holding up his occult lantern. Motes of color bled from the lantern, multi-hued specks like the stars seen after a blow to the head. Struggling against Kit, Yara prepared to start breaking fingers when the magi frantically said. “Stop moving! If we want any chance of rescuing them, then listen to me!”

Brandishing the lantern at her, Kit said. “I’m hiding us from them for now, but I don’t know how long this will work. Neither of us stands a chance against these bastards, especially if they can twist Mina like that!”

Yara’s panic faded slightly and she whispered. “They’ll kill Natalie if we leave her!”

Kit shook his head. “She’s too valuable. We need to pull back, get Cole, or find other options to help.”

There was truth to those words and Yara forced herself to look away from the smoking ruin that was Natalie. Running out and dying to another vampire wouldn’t help her mistress. “Let's go.”

Gripping Yara’s hand, Kit quickly exited the circle of worryingly docile aardigs. Looking at where he touched her, Yara recoiled, wanting to pull away. Sensing her distress, Kit whispered. “I’m sorry, but we need to stay in contact otherwise this won’t work”

Stepping past the corpses of rats, moving away from the aardigs, the unlikely pair moved quickly and quietly. Glancing back at those they were abandoning, Yara asked. “Why can’t we grab Alia, or Nolkin?”

Kit winced. “Aside from their injuries? Well, this isn’t even a proper spell, just something I theorized could be done. I’m empowering your abilities as an ancilla and honestly have no idea how this is working so well.”

Yara suddenly remembered something Natalie said, about how she always seemed to slip past people’s attention. This was apparently part of her being an ancilla, Yara was hard to notice when she wasn’t needed. Now Kit had strengthened this magical effect with his lantern, and that was all that kept the pair of them from death or worse.

Back near the entrance to Gurim’s Watch, the Magi and Thrall were drawn by the sound of clashing steel. Ahead of them were two storms, one of frost, the other of green fire. Paladin Cole was wreathed in cold mist, his halberd glowing silver. Facing him was a knight clad in armor of warped bone. Both warriors fought with speed and strength Yara could barely imagine. Each leaving a trail of their respective element as they danced around each other, halberd and sword clashing.

Tongues of blood-red flame lashed out from the Paladin, colliding with emerald witchfire as the two knights dueled. More of the occult fire leaked from the bone knight with every movement, showing in the joints of his armor and the number of cracks Cole had inflicted. But the contest was clearly not one-sided. Ugly scorch marks decorated the Paladin’s plate and Yara was fairly certain a patch of frozen blood covered one of Cole’s legs.

Staring at the brutal fight, Yara imagined her previous master’s final battle must have looked something like this. Until now, Yara had a hard time believing Dietrich lost to Cole. The scarred man who first spoke to her back at Castle Glockmire just didn’t seem a peer to the force of focused destruction she’d once served. She was now disabused of those notions as the bone knight tried and failed to parry one of Cole’s strikes.

Lashing out with his halberd, Cole came from the right, aiming for his foe’s hip. The bone knight deflected the strike with his own blade but Cole adapted, letting the poor parry drive his halberd up and towards the knight’s helm. Fast as the burning undead was, it wasn’t fast enough, and an axe wreathed in silver power tore the top half of the bone knight’s helmet right off. Yara expected the monster to topple over, its skull split, instead it struck back. If Cole was surprised by his opponent’s survival, he didn’t show it, backing away and using his halberd’s extra reach to his advantage.

Reaching up with one hand, the bone knight gripped the attached half of its helmet and yanked it free. The sculpted bone cracked as it hit the ground and Yara sucked in an involuntary breath upon seeing what lay beneath. A column of crackling green fire came out of the bone knight’s neck, the flames taking the shape of a screaming face, its skin, muscle and bone flickering in and out of existence. Something about the face made Cole hesitate. He stopped and said something to the bone knight. It just roared, a sound like a kiln being stoked, and charged the Paladin.

Kit had gone very pale then, staring at the duel. “That’s a Dullahan. This isn’t a fight we can interfere with. We…we’d only make it harder for Cole.”

Looking at the Magi, Yara hissed. “Then what do we do?!”

Glancing around the cave, Kit swallowed nervously. “Improvise.”

Wolfgang had to admit he’d almost not expected the geas to work. If anyone could resist it, a servant of the Tenth God seemed the most likely, especially one trained by the infamous Hierophant Morri of Vindabon. But in a testament to Spymaster Yezhov’s genius, the spell worked perfectly. Wolfgang awoke the sleeper and crippled his enemy beyond recovery. All that remained to do was capture the homunculus and decipher the mystery of the burned vampire before him.

Seeing the female strix wasn’t going anywhere or even able to speak, Wolfgang looked back towards Thorm and Wulfhild. “Help the Dullahan, if you would.”

Tallclaw moved without hesitation, the bestial strigoi eager for blood, especially in his honestly disgusting war form. Shorttooth glanced over the wounded dwarf and cat blood. “Yes, I suppose they won’t be any trouble.”

Alone except for the dying, the demented, and depraved, Wolfgang continued to stare at the strix lying before him. The lack of restraints and how Mina Vrock attacked her was plenty proof the strix wasn’t a prisoner. She was obviously a member of this motley band, but that made little sense. For a second Wolfgang was struck by the terrible idea he was faced with the new Alukah, but he quickly dismissed it. The Tenth God would never let such a powerful relic escape his temple’s secure custody. Besides, if that was the case, then Wolfgang would have sensed something, or more likely… be dead.

The burned strix’s lung inflated, Wolfgang recognized the noise. In a voice raw with pain the mystery vampire asked. “Why does it matter what she called me?”

Squatting down, Wolfgang watched fresh skin slowly grow across the vampire’s face. “I know what the ‘paladin’ is. That creature is Isabelle Gens Silva’s masterpiece and the one responsible for curing my plague. I seriously doubt you are Gens Silva, considering she’s very dead, but I’m still curious. Did the homunculus take you as some kind of replacement? A pet he’s broken into thinking is his master?”

The false-Isabelle twitched at that, her body still suffering from whatever spell the priestess unleashed. Taking that as confirmation, Wolfgang continued. “This is most unusual, the rumors I’ve heard claim the Paladin keeps the Alukah itself as his paramour, which you certainly aren’t. Perhaps two different prisoners have been blended together by the rumor-mill? The girl from Glockmire, who is probably locked in some Temple oubliette now, mixed with you, the replacement Isabelle.”

Tapping his chin, Wolfgang looked over at the two heavily wounded mortals. The catblood was trying to crawl towards Cleanor and Mina Vrock with little success, while the dwarf teetered on the edge of shock. “That might be too complicated. You couldn’t possibly be the Alukah, but you still might be the girl from Glockmire. Did they rip the ancient’s power from you? Leaving you a husk enslaved to an insane monster? Or was the Alukah’s power contained in something other than a unliving vampire?”

Red eyes stared up at Wolfgang from the healing face. “Your plague? You created the screaming plague?”

Tapping his chin, Wolfgang answered the false-Isabelle’s question. “Yes, my plague. I took the works of your master’s creator and improved upon them. Strange, isn’t it? We’re both successors to Isabelle Gens Silva, aren’t we? You embody her failures and weaknesses, while I’ve claimed her knowledge for myself.”

Wolfgang found himself being unusually verbose. Perhaps the stress of this hunt and the relief of success were influencing him too much. “I don’t need to kill you, ‘Isabelle.’ I’m sure the homunculus has shared many secrets with you and those might be traded for your-”

Only now had the false-Isabelle’s face finished healing, and the sight of it made Wolfgang stop. He knew that face. It had been decades since he’d last seen it but would never forget that face. Slowly, incredulously, Wolfgang asked. “Iona?”

The false-Isabelle… no false-Iona wore a look of shock that Wolfgang guessed matched his own. Speaking in a voice so similar to his niece’s but not quite hers, the strange woman said. “How do you know that name?”