A Debt To Be Paid Part 2

[Sparrow]

Marcus stared at the armed walls of the archive. All the answers he sought were in there. The question, indeed, was how to proceed. What he was looking for was almost certainly locked under high security, and if they alerted the guards before they were ready, this place could easily be their grave. A direct assault was out of the question, and they needed to handle breaking in as quietly as possible. The noise can come later. They needed a distraction for their exit, after all. Draven was in charge of that part of the plan.

He reached for the scrying stone around his neck, closed his eyes, and focused on it, causing it to flare to life as its magics let him see beyond his mortal form. He saw a thick metal door that seemed separate from the rest of the archive, hidden behind a bookshelf. Marcus focused harder on the lock to the door. The image flashed to a key held around the neck of a heavily armored man. Marcus had seen this man in previous visions when he had looked into the archive with his stone. Hopefully, his key would be unnecessary, Aikenn Was quite a skilled lock picker, and Marcus trusted fully in his friend’s ability. If things got out of control, this man might be an issue. The sword he had sheathed on his side had an ominous blue glow that Marcus would rather not see too closely. The last thing he saw was a separate door on a wall outside the archive—a secret passage inside that the Jernigans probably used when they didn’t want their presence. He had used several days of his artifact’s ability to look into this wall. It required a combination that he had seen bits and pieces of throughout the week. He didn’t have the complete combination, but what he had, he had to have Alyssaria help to figure it out. She was much better at that kind of thing than him.

He let out the breath he had been holding and let the vision fade. Now was the time for action. He looked to the friends crouched around him, shrouded in dark cloaks, waiting for his signal to start. He nodded, and they got to work. Ropes were tied to hooks and thrown over walls. A smile formed on his face despite his best efforts to remain stoic. The excitement was beginning to build, and he chuckled softly before scolding himself for making unnecessary noise.

Once they had all reached the top of the outside walls of the archives, they scanned for guards. There we two at the entrance to another three walking the perimeter. They had to deal with those before they could get inside the building. Marcus looked to Alyssaria and gestured to her necklace and then to the two standing at the entrance. She nodded and began to focus on her artifact. It glowed similarly to the scrying stone before she pointed at one of the guards, and the magic faded. The guard she had pointed at scrunched his face in anger, turned to his compatriot and spoke. Marcus couldn’t hear what was said, but it must have been quite vile because a very heated argument broke out between the two. Soon they were screaming their lungs out, and one shoved the other. After that, a fight broke out between the two as they kept screaming. The noise they made caused the other guards who were patrolling to come running to see what was happening, and once they got within proximity of them, the artifact’s effect started to cause them to get involved in the fight as well. They were making quite a scene. That would do. Marcus nodded to the rest and hooked to the side of the wall, and began to make their way down.

As soon as they touched the ground, Marcus started to give instructions. “Bruzog and Aikenn, I need you to stand watch and ensure no guards come this way. If they do, try to knock them out instead of killing them.” They nodded and Bruzog chuckled slightly. “I will try my best to be gentle.” He said with a smirk before they moved to the wall to have some small cover to keep an eye on the fighting mass of people at the front of the archive. Marcus gesture for the others to follow him to the far part of the archive’s wall. He looked at it momentarily before recognizing the part where the secret entrance was.

He looked to Alyssaria and spoke again. “Alyssaria, I need you to help me figure out the combination of the wall. Small stones can be pressed in a specific order to open the wall here.” He gestured to where each stone was before continuing. “Eight inputs are needed to gain access, but I only know the first, third, and final ones. We will need to find out the orders of the other stones. It should just be a simple amount of trial and error.” She nodded and said, “I’ll see what I can do.” She moved to the wall and tried to figure out the correct order.

Marcus then looked to Drandor and Captain Draven. He gestured to the bag Draven had carried around his back. “I need both to set up the distraction. That’s our key to getting out of here. It’ll keep them busy so we can escape. But be careful. If it goes off while you’re handling it, you’ll die. So be gentle.” Draven laughed nervously at the statement while Drandor rolled his eyes and smiled. The two went to the back wall of the archive and began to work.

Lastly, he looked over at Mu’kan. He thought for a moment before looking up to see a barred window on the second story of the archive. “I need you to climb up there and blink into the archive. Keep an eye on what’s happening and report if there’s anything we should worry about. Here let me help you get up there.” He crouched down and held out his hands to give Mu’kan a footrest to help boost her. She kicked off his hands, and he raised her and could barely grab onto the window bars. Once she had her orientation, she blinked from her position outside to somewhere on the inside.

Marcus returned his attention to the wall and began to help Alyssaria figure out the correct combination. He had her keep notes while he tested different inputs on the wall. Marcus tried his best to hurry. He didn’t know quite how long Alyssaria’s necklace lasted. Eventually, he got it right. The last stone clicked into place, the wall rumbled as it shifted positions, and the entrance became clear. Around that time, Draven and Drandor came around from the back of the wall. Draven looked to Marcus and spoke. “We have about ten minutes before that goes off, give or take. So we need to hurry. We ensured it would be hard to spot if you aren’t looking too hard at it.” Marcus nodded and went to retrieve Aikenn and Bruzog. As he approached, he could hear only one person yelling. It sounded like the Commander of these men had finally come to investigate what was happening and was not happen to see his men fighting. Guess that means the effect on the rest of them was up. That was their cue to head inside.

They quickly made their way into the corridor. It was well-lit, with glowing stones lining the walls. A handle was on the opposite side of the entrance’s door so Bruzog could shut the door behind them. Hopefully, they could use this passage again on the way out. Before long, they reached the end of the path, and Marcus grasped the handle and pulled the door open. He glanced into the interior of the archive, and it was filled with bookcases and filing cabinets. The secret passage’s entrance blended perfectly to the environment.. Everyone exited as quietly as possible. Marcus took a moment to orient himself and started to go towards a shelf on the far end of the wall. It was the one they were looking for. While they began to sneak their way over, using the large bookshelves as cover, Marcus glanced up at the second-floor railing to get a view of Mu’kan when she suddenly blinked by him, making him jump. He took a moment to breathe as he looked at his snakelike friend. “What did you see?” he asked quickly. She chuckled at his reaction and replied. “Most guards went to the front to see what was happening. A few started arguing, but that didn’t last very long. A man in plate armor went to the front and yelled at them for a few minutes. Whatever you had Alyssaria do must have worn off, and they’re returning to their duties. We’ll have eyes on us soon unless we hurry up.” Marcus nodded and looked at the rest of his friends. “We’ll need to double-time it; guys, let’s go. They started to duck around corners of bookshelves until they arrived at where the door they were looking for.

Marcus moved some books aside to show where a lock was. He looked over to Mu’kan. “Could you dispel this to ensure we don’t get surprises when the door opens?” Mu’kan nodded and started to focus her magic, and she touched the lock and nodded to Marcus. He looked over to Aikenn. “Alright, you’re up.” Aiken cracked his knuckles, pulled out his tools, and started on the lock. He frowned for a second and looked at Marcus. “This is a tricky one. This thing is going to take a second.” His attention returned to the task at hand.

The rest of the team had no choice but to wait until he finished. Marcus glanced around one bookshelf to look glance in the direction of the entrance, and he saw the armored man from his vision heading this way. He whipped his back and looked at this friend still working on the lock. “Aikenn, I don’t mean to rush you, but we need that lock open NOW.” Aikenn didn’t look up from his task as he responded. “I just about have it. Just a second.” with that, an audible click could be heard, and the right side of the bookshelf opened slightly. They opened it up and rushed inside. Loud footsteps could be heard approaching before they shut the door behind them. The room looked like a miniature version of the archive as a whole. So this is where the most significant secrets of House Jernigan were kept. Marcus wished he could read through all of it but was on a time crunch. They needed to get the information they came for and leave quickly. He looked to his friends and said, “Start looking for whatever you came here for; I have my information to find. With that, they split to look under different sections.

All he was looking for was a name. His father’s name. John Tamaril. As he searched, he found mentions of himself, of all the times he’d come in to pay off a part of his father’s “debt,” which confirmed to him that house Jernigan was specifically keeping ties on him. Still, he couldn’t find anything on his father. He kept going through different shelves to find anything about his father. Nothing. He was his friends slip letters and pages of information into their pouches, and he went to recheck over what he had seen. He must have missed something. Before he could start his search over, he heard the door swing open.

He whipped his head to see the armored man he had seen from the stone step into the room, followed by several other guards. The man looked around, studying everyone inside before finally speaking. “You know I might not have even known you were in here if I hadn’t felt you dispel the ward. Do you think we wouldn’t have ways of knowing if someone disrupts the magic here? Stupid. My name is Captain Sloan ” He glanced over at Marcus and smiled. “You. I know your face. You’re a wanted man—quite a bounty on your head. It’s a shame that they want it attached. You can come quietly or after I kill all your friends. Which is it going to be?” Marcus growled in response. He turned to his friends and said. “Being quiet is no longer an option. Bruzog, I want you to introduce this man to your axe; hold them off while I search.”

Bruzog charged in, lifting his axe to swing down on the Sloan. Sloan responded by unsheathing his sword, glowing with magical power, and deflected Bruzog’s axe with a flick of his wrist. He swung his sword to take advantage of Bruzog’s momentary stun from being knocked aside so easily. Aikenn was there to block Sloan’s blade with one of his own. The rest of his friends joined the fight except for Alyssaria, who came to help him look through all the files. He could hear the battle become quite fierce behind him and glanced over to see a guard with a hammer get a clean hit on one of Aikenn’s knees. Aikenn flinched from the blow but didn’t stop fighting. Marcus gritted his teeth and returned to searching when he heard Alyssria call his name. He looked over and saw her point to something on the back of the shelves they had been looking at. It looked like the edge of a letter. Marcus scrambled to grab it and looked it over. It was an old letter. The paged had weathered from time, and the edges had been burnt, but the letter was fully intact. It read, “To Mr. Tamaril.” This was the only thing that had that name that he had found that wasn’t about himself. It had to be enough. He tucked it into his pouch and pulled his sword to join the fight.

Then the distraction went off.

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