PROLOGUE
The Stage is Set
K'zek shivered with anticipation, dark green scales rippling across lithe limbs as waves during a storm. His prey was so close; close enough for him to feel the fear emanating from the man’s body. Only the myriad trees in the garden separated him from the mortal flesh. His forked tongue flickered around his scaly lips, tasting the air. It was sharp and cool, the autumn frost upon the wind.
His prey was close enough now. K’zek would have smiled if lyzyrds were capable of such facial expression, they‘re reptilian traits rendering facial expression practically impossible, as it was he merely bared his teeth in a satisfied snarl. He started to draw his knife, careful of the razor sharp serrations along one side of the curved blade. He was not afraid of pain, no, he was careful because of the extremely potent poison inside the hollow steel that would discharge at the touch of flesh. A poison that no antidote could be found or incorporated unless by a Healer, or a Spirit Lord, and they had been all but exterminated in the past year, a year of blood.
There was his prey, unaware of its impending death, plate armor glinting with gilt and embossed with a sigil of some sort. The man rounded the corner, passing in front of the oak tree in front of which K’zek was sitting. K’zek shook his head the race of man made itself to vulnerable to attack by making itself more noticeable and cumbersome. He hissed and the man whipped around, drawing its sword with an echoing rasp that would undoubtedly be heard by guards. K’zek hissed in contempt of the human’s audacity, swords were only deadweight, a well-made knife could block a stroke from a broadsword and still have time to slit the opponents throat.
He slipped around the unwieldy weapon, and slipped his knife through armor, flesh, and bone as if they were no more than air. The ease of killing with his knife thrilled K’zek, it was a sweet liquor for which he had an undying thirst. The human made a choking sound, clutching at K’zek’s arm, blood barely seeping onto the scaly hand, that was the poison‘s purpose of course, to crystallize and solidify the blood in seconds. Then he went limp, dead flesh turning cold even as he gave his last exhalation. Like every other prey he stalked.
He let the man’s icy corpse fall to the ground with a sound of clanking armor. Let the sentries come, he did not care how much noise he made, being silent was a better advantage for him over the prey that was all. Once the prey was dead, he could be as noisy as he liked.
K’zek closed his eyes and felt his body ripple as willow leaves in a wind. He felt his arms and legs shortening, his skin contracting, and his muscles shrinking. His head grew smaller and his bones became a fraction of their original size. When K’zek opened his eyes, he was in his imp form, red eyes glowing with malice.
His clothes and light leather armor had vanished, he did not know where it went when he transformed, nor did he care. He leapt back into the oak and launched himself into the miniature forest of the palace courtyard. The damp bark was slick with the mist but K’zek’s rough hide found easy purchase upon the slickest of surfaces. When he reached the wall he quickly found the rope he had left hanging there for his escape. He sighed and shook his head in self-disgust, a rope was too much evidence, and might have caused an alarm to be raised before he could strike. Well the princeling was dead, let the land suffer the loss, he would not be affected.
His assent was quick and unnoticed, his thousand or so years never hindering him as he scaled the rough line, although the uproar behind him would probably indicate a miniature war within the palace grounds, he chuckled, that was what was supposed to happen, the employer would be most pleased.
Then he remembered what he was doing and quickly coiled the rope and bit it, the acid in his saliva dissolving the material into a pool of rapidly evaporating sludge. He staggered and leaned against a grey block of stone.
That much acid would have killed him if he had used it the day before, the stuff hurt K’zek nearly as much as what was bitten. The problem with the acid was that he could not concentrate it, it merely took K’zek’s blood and turned it to acid according to the amount of acid needed to dissolve the target. Still it was useful at times like this. He shook himself and stood, his diminutive height and recent exhaustion no hindrance as he scampered toward the guards-room door, he quickly found and entered the hole he had come through. No more than a rat hole, but it was sufficient to allow him passage in and out of the palace.
His scales rubbed against the rough stone, stronger and more malleable. That was an advantage to being an imp, the scales were harder. He finally managed to get out of the whole on the outside of the wall and jumped onto the nearest rooftop. He quickly sped across the thatch and shingles, occasionally frightening the odd stray cat or sleeping bird. He found the inn where the meeting was to take place and went in through the back door into the kitchen after transforming into his original form.
When the cook saw him she shuddered and one of the serving girls screamed and fainted. The cook’s face turned beet red with anger and hurried the other girls out to placate the customers with more ale and orders for the players to strike up a merrier tune. She shut the door and eyes K’zek warily, “ He’s in there.” She said in a thick Kartan accent, and jerked her head towards a side door. "And no more trouble mind you."
K'zek raised his hands, palms outward, "No trouble." his voice crackled like scales on dry leaves, with a wry twist from contempt of the woman's fear. He strode toward the door and placed his clawed hand on the knob. Then he paused, remembering the first time he met the employer five days earlier.
K'zek was walking down a dirt road, purse light and belt tightened, on the way to Heralda. The city itself was in turmoil, the wars having brought the enemy to the city's gates. The siege was still going, but an assassin could find could work in a siege. The enemy generals being prime targets. Getting in would be the only difficulty, and that was no difficulty at all.
He had nearly reached the city when he was set upon by five men in armor. He had smelled their sweat and felt their heavy footfalls, so when they jumped him, he was ready. The men all had swords and were about a head taller than K'zek at the shortest, their armor was dulled and the colors of their tunics were washed out, deserters.
K'zek moved fluidly, serrated blade cutting through armor easily. One man charged him from behind as K'zek finished the first three. K'zek ducked and pivoted, his foot catching the back of the man's ankles, tumbling him to the ground. K'zek's foot came around, up and down on the man's throat, the crack of bone echoing around the desolate trees. Then the fifth man threw his sword at K'zek, the blade whirling through the air faster than he could dodge. K'zek closed his eyes, preparing himself to die. Then sword reversed in the air and flew through the man's chest and pinned him to a tree.
K'zek turned warily, he knew his Spirit Wielders, the war was their fault. But they were powerful, and that was the only thing that gave K'zek pause. Well, that and the fact they were richer than kings. The man, or maybe elf, he seemed arrogant enough, was even taller than the men who lay dead upon the ground, his hair was completely white and his skin black, he looked like someone had taken a normal man and reversed his coloring. But that was not the oddest thing, the oddest thing was the fact that midnight seemed to plague him like a crow would a corpse.
The 'man' opened his, it's? mouth, revealing teeth similar to a sharks, "You are a lyzyrd." Even the man-thing's voice belonged on a corpse, dry, and full of malice.
K'zek nodded warily, "May the Assassin mark you last for her blade." His own reptilian tones sounded normal compared to the others voice.
"And may the Judge consider you a fair man.". K'zek noted the reply, it came from Oulian, destroyed by the war but the people still lived, some of them anyway. But this man was nothing like an Ouliani, they were short and generally kind-natured by instinct. But maybe his guess wasn't to far off, maybe this man had been reversed.
"I have work for you, gold. Half in advance." That scared K'zek more than the man's voice, you only gave people pay before the job if you thought they needed to spend some before they died. "I need you to kill a certain nobleman..."
And now here he was in the prescribed meeting place in The Young Tree inn in the Outer Circle of Heralda. Here to meet once again the reversed man.
K'zek sighed and entered the small side room. The ‘man’ was there all right, but so was someone else. This one looked normal but somehow he disturbed K'zek more than the reversed one.
"Hello K'zek, you have completed the job I take it?" The second man was the one who spoke and seemed to lead.
"Unless he had a twin brother." K'zek said disgustedly, "You men are all such blundering animals, it's a wonder you can survive at all."
The man chuckled and the reversed man bared his teeth in some semblance of a grin, "No, K'zek, he did not have a twin. Now, I know you're name but do you know mine?"
"Do you take me for a fool Daksun?"
"No, not at all. Well here is your pay." Daksun casually tossed a bag on the wooden floorboards, an audible clinking coming from the hardened leather. K'zek moved slowly toward the bag, one had reaching toward the drawstrings, the other on his knife hilt. He never let his eyes wander from the two men in front of him, watching for a sign of betrayal. Daksun and his henchman didn't move, but amusement twinkled in Daksun's eyes. K'zek finally grasped the bag and hefted it, the coins clinking. K'zek backed away slowly, morphing into imp form, the bag vanishing with his armor.
The reversed man suddenly laughed, though it held no mirth, "This makes it much easier!" not waiting to hear more K'zek bolted from the room, but suddenly he began to stiffen his arms and legs slowly transforming into wood. What was left was a small wooden cube, smooth as polished crystal.
