Chapter 103: Book 2: Chapter 8 (Part 1 of 2)

 

(My apologies but I'm going to have to split this chapter in two.
Due to a confluence of events, that includes me doing extensive re-writes of earlier chapters, the day job going crazy, and me trying to finish another project I've barely managed to to write 500 words a week on Corsairs for almost two months. Worse, things are unlikely to improve in the next couple of weeks.

My choice is to either skip weeks or split the larger chapters in two until I can get myself back on schedule. I've decided to split them for now.)

 

Muir was only about a kilometre north of Lyons.

Anastasia got back on the ship and sailed it back the way we had just come on the Grand River and then down a tributary waterway called the Maple River that ran to the south of the town.

Boarding, moving the ship through the circuitous route, and then disembarking seventy people would take longer than jogging to the town from Lyons, so I kept the crew with me, and we would make our way up the road on foot.

According to Sam, his mother, Gertie, had set up her base camp in a pair of elementary schools in the centre of Muir. They had a few kids who they used to activate the school’s protection fields to keep spawned beasts out. This showed that despite her greed and the lack of discipline displayed by her people, Gertie Jenson wasn’t completely ignorant.

Unfortunately for them, those shields would be of no help in keeping the likes of us out. Not with the preparatory steps we’d taken.

We were about to set out when there was a commotion behind us that came from the direction of the bar. Striding up the road purposefully was the middle-aged woman who was being abused in the ramshackle bar. Trailing behind her were the two battered bartenders I’d ordered to help her.

To be honest, in my haste to continue with the raid I’d forgotten they had still been in the back of the bar and assumed they had been transferred to the ship along with the rest of the collared Lyonians.

An oversight I mentally vowed not to make again.

What got my attention was mostly the two bartenders trying to quietly convince the woman to come back with them and not remind me that they had been forgotten. However, my Acheronian hearing meant their pleas had the opposite effect and rendered that hope moot.

The woman in question was having none of it anyway.

They had provided her with some clothing that didn’t really fit, some overalls from the bar, but they did the job.

I got a good look at her for the first time as she approached our group with firm resolve and the crew parted at my direction, allowing her to pass. She had brown hair and hazel eyes and looked to be in her mid-forties. She had three faint scars on her left cheek that looked relatively fresh.

 

Susan Trilby (Noble Human)

Baroness (T) 3

Character Aptitude: Moderate

Loot Value: Nil

Threat: None

XP Value: 1460

Current Affiliation: None (Former mayor of Grand Rapids – forfeited)

Fertile Receptivity: 0/120

 

The information fed back to me was eyebrow-raising, to say the least. She had a similar character build as Regina Reynolds, merely lacking pact-making as a path of power. Also, in stark contrast to the two bartenders, her current affiliation was not noted as Shattered Storm – property.

Presumably, killing the Jenson clan members in Lyons had broken her connection to them and as neither I nor any of my people had used the collar to give her any commands, she hadn’t been registered as belonging to us like the others.

“You are going to Muir,” Susan Trilby declared as she came to a stop in front of me.

It had been a statement, not a question. The two bartenders had stopped well short of our group and were now trying to stay out of our eye line, while also not disobeying the orders I’d given them to look after the woman. I’d made the executive decision not to explain the conditions under which we would remove their collars until we got them all back to Stormblade Harbour. It would be easier and more efficient to give them the lowdown as a single large group once we were back.

I nodded in response to Susan’s declaration.

“I am coming with you,” she firmly announced.

I stared at her for a moment. Her voice had been firm but her hazel eyes were red-rimmed and spoke of the pain from her harrowing ordeal. Yet, despite this, she didn’t strike me as the type to buckle easily, but it was also clear the strain on her was immense. Despite the pressures she was under there was steel in her resolve, something more important than giving in to the horror that might otherwise have swept her away.

“You are, are you,” I said neutrally, giving nothing away.

This shook Susan for the briefest moment, her lip trembled, and a single traitorous tear broke free and trickled down her cheek, the slim scar directing the fluid towards her lips.

“Yes, my daughters are being held by that cancerous green cow in Muir. They need me. I’m coming and you can’t stop me,” she said, but her voice warbled a little at the end, confidence overcome by growing desperation.

“Yes, I can. As you are well aware.”

Susan visibly deflated at my simple clarification of the situation and her knees almost gave way. I looked over the top of her head and beckoned at the recalcitrant bartenders. Their faces dropped with dismay, but they rushed over regardless, unable to do anything else. Upon seeing that Susan was unsteady on her feet they flanked her and offered their shoulders for support.

Tears liberally flowed down her cheeks. “Please,” she begged. “I’m all they’ve got left. I’ll do anything you want, but please take me with you.”

That was what I’d been waiting to hear.

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I wasn’t being cruel for the sake of it and my air of callous disregard had almost crumbled when that first tear had broken free.

As soon as I’d analysed her, I knew Susan was exactly who I needed to secure the prison assets. Yes, I felt like a no-good, dirty, son of a bitch for taking advantage of her after what she had already been through. But the stakes were high and indulging sentiment instead of opportunity could doom us all. She might hate me, but she’d be alive to do so.

That she was the former mayor of Grand Rapids would likely be the icing on the cake. Although learning what she knew about Luca and the city would have to wait until later.

I stepped forward suddenly and Susan tried to step back but was impeded by the two men who had been helping her on either side. I reached behind her head and found the clasp of the slave collar and snapped it open, removing it from her neck and freeing her.

Quixbix sighed in my mind. <You just forfeited the notoriety you had accrued for this raid.>

We’ll get more later. This has to be done. I thought back to him.

Susan Trilby blinked her tears away in surprise and the faces of the two bartenders brightened with the hope that I might do the same for them. They were going to be sorely disappointed. They hadn’t paid their debt to me yet.

The terms of Quinntexxis transfer were clear. Her new porter had to be somebody who had no official link to me. Susan Trilby fit the bill, but only if I uncollared her. There was too much risk that a thoughtless order from me or one of the others could ruin her eligibility. What’s more, she had revealed the means by which I could ensure her compliance even if a certain fairy she would inherit might start whispering treacherous ideas in her head.

Her children.

Yeah, I’d be going to hell for sure if there was such a place but in for a penny in for a pound. I already felt like my veins ran with raw sewage for using Susan and her family in this manner, but this was all a massive bluff.

I knew that I didn’t mean them any genuine harm, but Susan didn’t. Which is why it should work and why I needed to seem capable of anything.

Even if I wasn’t. Our survival might be on the line, but there were some lines that could not be crossed.

“I’m not freeing you out of charity, Susan Trilby.”

Her eyes registered shock that I knew her name.

“You want something from me. I want something from you in return. You will stay here in Lyons with these two and a couple of my men while we deal with the Jenson’s in Muir. When we are done, I will bring you to the town, you’ll do me a favour and I’ll reunite you with your children afterwards. But I’m not taking you with us for the assault, you will have to wait.”

“Yes, thank you…um,” Susan gushed and then stopped when she didn’t have my name.

“Captain Torin Carter,” I supplied.

“Thank you, Captain Carter. You are a good man. A good man,” she repeated.

“No, I’m not,” I told her coldly and turned away dismissively.

She blinked at me in confusion unsure of how to respond. I knew she wouldn’t be quite as happy with me later. I had a good reason for wanting to keep her out of Muir until I was ready for her, and she wouldn’t like it, not at all.

Two of my men were assigned to guard duty and escorted the three of them back to the church. We already knew the building could be secured effectively, and I suspected Susan Trilby would rather not return to the bar.

With that sorted, my attention turned back to Muir and led my forces north at a brisk jog.

 

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The short delay meant that Ana beat us to the small bridge over the Maple River that led into the town. The impatient minx hadn’t stayed with the ship but had snuck over the bridge, which hadn’t been blocked and had lured out the two sentries with her feminine wiles and then swiftly despatched them.

One was dead and the other drained into unconsciousness.

We only delayed long enough for Anastasia to empty her drain pool by healing up the few wounds some of our people still carried.

Once over the bridge, we were in the southwest of Muir and we split into two forces again, with LT leading the second group. Although this time, the teams were of equal size. The paper maps of Michigan I picked up in Mike’s Bikes had come in handy for the planning and gave us a good idea of what to expect once we entered the town.

Running through the southern edge of Muir were railway tracks and we crossed over these and were soon in the blocks of housing that made up the majority of the settlement.

The small town had six streets that ran north to south. The two schools which were all part of the same estate were nestled between the second and third streets from our perspective in the southwest of the settlement. My team ran up Liberty Street, which was the second road and LT’s group kept going one block over and then headed up the third street, Centre, and approached the school complex from the rear, while we would raid the buildings from the front entrance.

Similarly to Lyons, the only people we passed had been collared by the Jenson’s and set to various tasks, mostly scouring the buildings for anything and everything of value. The Jenson’s hadn’t thought to leave their slaves a standing order to raise the alarm if they saw anything untoward, so we wordlessly left them to it as we quickly covered the distance.

There was some evidence that somebody had made a bit of an effort to try and block or fortify the streets with cars and corrugated sheeting at some point. The attempt was patchy and had either been abandoned or wrecked when the Jenson’s came into town. Whatever the truth was, it proved to be a very minor inconvenience and barely slowed our progress despite our numbers.

We only slowed down as we neared the area where the school buildings were situated. Most of the housing in Muir wasn’t fenced, so we could cut across the yards to the school rather than approaching via the road and having to go through the wide-open car park to the entrance. From this point on we crept up quietly staying behind the trees nearby, using them to obscure our approach.

There were four guards idly passing the time out the front of the school entrance. They had an elderly gentleman tied up to a pole in a small play area about halfway from our hiding spot to the main doors of the elementary school. He had a dartboard hanging around his chest and they were taking turns hurling darts at him from all angles.

The unfortunate man had a dozen or more of the darts porcupining him and from the very brief observation time we had before LT’s people arrived, it was clear the players had long since abandoned any attempts at hitting the board. The number of darts dotted around the poor old geezer’s crotch provided ample evidence of what they had been aiming for.

Knowing the back of the school didn’t have the same kind of cover I gestured for half of my troops to shift around from tree to tree, so they faced the school head-on. This way the play area no longer blocked their line of sight. When I saw LT and his group pass by, I gave the order.

“Fire.”

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