Chapter 31 - Who Can It Be Now?

“Sir!”

The purple skinned demon walking through the castle’s halls saluted Xorn as he approached the Guard Captain.

Xorn lazily returned the salute, wondering why someone who was obviously not a soldier would salute him at all. He looked the demon in front of him over.

Long hair, neatly pulled back into a tight ponytail. Crisp lab coat. Impeccably polished knee length leather boots.

His attention to his uniform and grooming made him a good candidate for one of Xorn’s soldiers, but he looked to be a scientist of some sort. Xorn wasn’t sure he’d ever seen him before.

“Can I help you?” Xorn asked somewhat impatiently.

“Yes sir!” The crisp response was a little too loud. Xorn was used to people overdoing it around him. He tended to scare many people. But right now he mostly just felt exhausted after getting little actionable intelligence out of the prisoner and failing to find any evidence except a single dried peach slice that anyone had infiltrated the castle.

He just wanted to go to bed.

“Do you know where I can find Taia sir?”

“Why?” Xorn’s eyes narrowed.

“I have a report about the attack outside of town. She insisted that the report be given to her personally.”

“I’m the Captain of the Guard. I’ll take it.” His words came out more like a snarl.

“Uh, sorry sir. I’m under strict orders to provide Taia with the report.”

The growling of his words intensified. “And I am telling you to give it to me. I will bring it to her afterwards. Or do we have a problem…whatever your name is?” He moved closer to the much shorter and more lithe man.

“Ardus sir. But, are you sure that’s ok?”

“Are you suggesting that the Captain of the Guard cannot be trusted to deliver a report to his…colleague…Ardus?” His tone was downright menacing now.

“Of…of course sir.” He passed Xorn a loosely bound sheaf of papers in an open leather satchel. The paperwork was rather thick looking.

“Just tell me the highlights.” Xorn, more weary sounding, asked.

“Alright sir.” Ardus backed up slightly to give himself some space and stood a little taller to make his report.

“We believe the carriage and some surrounding areas were burned using the same fire bombs that the rebel group attacked the city with recently. We believe they are similar to an ancient forgotten recipe called a kafsi bomb, but we have no idea how they are made. The technique has been lost.”

That caught Xorn’s attention. “The same bombs that were used by Warlock’s insurgents?”

And here I was beginning to believe that group had nothing to do with the attack like the prisoner said.

“Yes, the same types of bombs sir.”

“But we didn’t find any such materials on the prisoner or in his packs?”

“No sir. It’s possible they used up their entire stash just before our soldiers arrived. Or maybe his accomplices fled with the supply?”

Xorn considered the possibility. It couldn’t be discounted. He wondered what else they had found.

“Tell me about the bodies found. Who was travelling in that carriage?”

The soldier looked much less confident. Almost visibly deflating.

“That’s just it. We don’t know sir. We didn’t find any bodies.”

“No bodies? That’s absurd! Even if the occupants fled they would have found their way to us by now. And we know the rebels didn’t have any prisoners when our soldiers arrived.”

“That’s true sir. And that’s why we were so confused as well.”

I can’t just believe the prisoner. But it doesn’t make sense that the driver and the passenger just vanished. But the burning is the same as the bombs used before…

Ardus waited patiently while it appears the muscular demon exercised his mental faculties.

“I suppose there’s nothing else of interest that tells us who did this?”

Ardus raised his finger like he was about to make a point, then lowered it like he thought better. “Um…”

“What?!” Xorn barked.

“There is one more thing sir. But I don’t think it will tell us anything about who did this. But it might tell us about who was travelling.”

“Really? Go on. Who do you think it was?”

“Well sir, I think it was an art merchant. Or at least an artist of some kind.”

Xorn stared blinking. The answer was nothing like he expected.

“An…artist? Why would rebels attack an artist?”

“I don’t know sir.”

“Why do you even believe it was an artist or art merchant? I thought everything was burned away.”

“Almost everything was sir. But there was some residue in some places. It was the material that burned your soldier’s hand.”

“Art burned my soldier? My demon soldier?” It was clear to Ardus that Xorn didn’t believe him or understand the point he was trying to make.

“Um, not exactly sir. The residue was quicklime. It can melt other things like an acid. And when it mixes with any water, even moisture from your hand, it can get really nasty.”

“So the fire bombs were not the only things used to destroy the carriage? They also used some kind of acid attack with this quicklime? How does that mean the envoy was an artist?”

“We wondered that at first too sir. But the more we looked into it the more we realized that the quicklime wasn’t intentionally put there. More likely the intense heat from the fire bombs caused some limestone that was already there to turn into the quicklime.”

“So the carriage was actually just a shipment from a quarry? Does the castle need repairs?”

“Um, no sir. The carriage was gilded in gold leaf. We found the residue. The best we can guess is that the person in the carriage was transporting limestone art.”

Xorn looked confused.

“Who makes art out of castle brick materials? Were they…decorated bricks of some kind for Our Lord the Viscount?”

“Our best guess is that they were statues. Based on the amount of residue there were two statues about the size of a person. And one much larger statue, maybe of some beast or of a scene. The pieces were ruined so we’ll never know.”

Statues. Two statutes. The size of people. The other the size of a beast…

Xorn spun on his heel and immediately left Ardus behind and head back towards his office.

“Uh, sir! Excuse me! You’ll give that to Taia won’t you sir!” Ardus called ineffectually after Xorn but eventually gave up. Something had caught the ash skinned demon’s attention and the sheer bloodlust on his face made Ardus quite certain he did not want to follow the Captain right now.

Xorn arrived in his office and slammed the door shut. He immediately tossed the papers in his hand across the desk and began to spread them out so he could get a proper look at the results.

“Statues. Statues. Of course…that is the only thing that makes sense.”

He muttered to himself as he thought.

“I only know one demon around with the power to turn someone to stone.”

“Euryale...”

His knuckles ground into the top of his desk as he leaned onto his fists.

“But why? What would she have to gain with killing…an accountant!”

He pushed the documents off his desk and pulled open a drawer so roughly it came entirely free of the desk in his hand. He turned the drawer upside down to pour the contents onto his newly empty desk.

Seizing the document he was looking for, he scanned the paper. His finger traced the pattern his eyes followed.

“Gradually reduced staffing. Missing supplies…missing…money!”

The papers on the desk crumpled as he crushed them into his fists. But he let go quickly, as he had another realization.

“Where does Taia fit in? Why was she there? Was she helping? Why would she? Or did Euryale trick her?”

Question after question came to mind.

“No. That bookworm would never get one over on Taia. It must be the other way around. What is that witch’s game?”

He sat in the chair at his desk finally and began to collect all the papers strewn across it. Trying to find some semblance of an order that would make the information make sense.

“I’ll need to watch the bookworm. And Taia too. And when they don’t expect it…”

He barred his fangs as he imagined all the ways he could pay Taia back for the attitude she always gave him.