A frontal

Not a soul accosted them as they crossed the warehouse district. The buildings loomed liked ancient stone megaliths, silent and still. They blotted out much of the light from the torch-ring above, leaving the alleys between them shrouded in shadows. The only living things in sight were occasional stray cats, which hissed and ran as the women crossed by.

Teysa kept her mace handy. She let Aliara lead and scanned their surroundings continuously. She was keenly aware of how well-suited this area was for an ambush. Nobody would know about it for days at least. She shivered. "Li, how close are we? I don't like this."

Aliara consulted the map. "Not far now. It's this way." She paused. "Think we should go around? They've got to be expecting something from the Eel. I think they'll shoot first and ask questions later."

Teysa shook her head. "No, there's too many blind allies and ambush spots here. The Eel must have tried her own people first, and she doesn't seem like a front-door kind of person. That's exactly what they'll expect."

Aliara rolled her eyes. "So what? We just kick in the front door?"

The front door splintered under Teysa's heavy boot. She wrenched her foot out and shoulder-barged the doorway. The rotten wood burst like ripe fruit and Teysa bulled into the room. Two lizardmen had been standing guard inside the door bearing crude spears. They were utterly unprepared for her furious ****-- her mace smashed the first off his feet before he could get his weapon up. The second one hissed at her and jabbed with his spear, circling to keep his distance. Aliara loomed behind him and dragged her daggers across his throat.

Teysa had a moment to catch her breath and scanned the inside of the warehouse. It was as barren as the Eel's, with a few scattered cookfires around a massive central firepit topped with an equally huge spit. The walls were draped with moldering red tapestries, and the few open crates left in the corner showed half-rotted textiles. Some unidentifiable cut of meat was roasting over the firepit, and it looked like a few of the lizardmen had already started eating. They dropped their food as Teysa watched and reached for weapons-- stone clubs and axes, mostly, with a few spears that were no more than a sharpened length of wood. A taller figure, draped in a cloak of feathers and crested with a bone helm, shrieked and hissed at the intruders. There were more than a dozen lizardmen scattered around the room, but they were reacting slowly.

The two women made directly for the central pit. Lizardmen were brave and strong, but slow and overproud. They preferred single combat when possible, which suited Teysa fine. They had to get in among them before the lizardmen could make any kind of formation.

A hulking brute with a knapped stone cleaver stepped up before her. His blade was crude but looked deadly sharp as it whistled horizontally at waist level. Teysa barely ducked back out of the way and slammed her mace down on the lizard's arm. She felt something break beneath her blow and the cleaver spun away. The lizardman hissed viciously and lunged at her, jaws open. She swung her mace upward, cracking across his jaw and sending him sprawling in a boneless heap. By that time two more were upon her. She parried one axe-blow, but even the glancing impact sent tremors up her arm. The lizardmen were strong, much stronger than any human, and possessed bottomless reserves of stamina. She stepped past the lizardman's guard and hammered him with a series of blows that put him off balance. He reeled and for the moment she had an opening, but had to retreat as his cohort came at her with his spear. His thrusts were inaccurate and poorly timed but they did the job of keeping her from finishing her first opponent. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Aliara vault past a clumsy strike and drive one of her daggers through a lizardman's jaw into his brain.

She gave ground as the axe-wielder pressed her with a series of diagonal chops. This isn't good. Can't give them time to regroup. She checked the last blow on the steel haft of her mace and then swayed backward, as though she was losing her balance. With a carnivore grin, the lizardman lunged for her and chopped downward with a two-handed swing. Teysa braced herself against the ground and swung upward in a close parry. The tempered mithril head of her mace met the flint of the axe and fractured it into shards. The impact nearly jarred her weapon out of her hands, but the lizardman stumbled back, with only the largest chunk of flint remaining in his hands. Teysa batted it aside, then crunched her mace downward into his skull. The spear-wielder scuttled backward, trying to keep her at bay with his superior reach. She pressed forward grimly. The next time he thrust, she sidestepped the spear and grabbed it around the shaft. The lizardman was much stronger than she was, and managed to tug it back quickly-- but in the process, he overbalanced, and began to topple backward. That was all the opening Teysa needed. She smashed her mace into his chest, sending him sprawling, and wrenched the spear from his limp fingers. With a single thrust she planted it through his chest.

Ahead of her, the feather-cloaked lizardman was retreating, hissing angrily. He moved in a strange kind of hop-skip, pausing to gesture wildly. A pair of bone rattles were fixed to his wrists, so he clattered as he hissed. Shaman. The lizardman shamans practiced a crude but effective form of animism. This one was staring at her with undisguised hatred. A black and white spiraling pattern was painted across his face, and his snout was decorated with heavy gold jewelry. Teysa tried to close the distance between them, but she caught movement out of the corner of her eye. From somewhere behind her, Aliara shouted "Teysa!" She reflexively through herself flat, just in time to feel the air disturbed as something heavy flew by overhead. Craning her neck she was in time to see one of the heavy crates shatter against the floor, spilling musty bolts of cloth across the floor. Teysa rolled to the side just in time to avoid another crate dropping out of the air. The shaman hissed in frustration.

Teysa scrambled to her feet and ran in a low crouch toward the shaman. He seemed pinned in place, unable to move while he worked his incantation. All around her she could see crates hovering and swooping through the air. She ducked one and sprawled awkwardly when a small crate caught her in the stomach. The shaman laughed and Teysa picked herself up just in time to avoid being dashed under a massive box. Up ahead, she could see something shimmering in the air around the shaman. A barrier of some kind? He didn't try to dodge or run as she covered the last few feet between them. He grinned, showing a mouthful of crocodile teeth, and traced a circular pattern in the air.

Teysa's mace swung down like the fist of an angry God. As it caught the edge of the pattern it held, as if caught in a net, for a fraction of a second. Then a wave of gold flared from the point of impact. Teysa felt it-- the power of the sun, channeled through her mortal frame for a microsecond. The shimmering shield exploded, fragments dissipating into wisps of air in an eyeblink. There was just time for the shaman's expression to change before Teysa's mace caved in his skull.

With the **** of their shaman, the other lizardmen squawked in panic. Teysa fought her way to Aliara's side. "Time to get out of here, I think!" the half elf said. She pointed. One of the largest crates had burst over the firepit, and flaming textiles littered the floor. As Teysa watched, the flame crawled up the side of one of the wall-hanging tapestries, spreading voraciously and devouring the scaffolding behind it. Teysa nodded. "Agreed. Let's go!" They dashed for the exit, now completely ignored by the fleeing lizardmen. Behind them there was a heavy crunch as part of the scaffolding detached from the wall and collapsed into the middle of the warehouse.

By the time they were clear of the entrance, the building was an inferno. Teysa stopped to catch her breath and watch the flames lick through the windows. She rested her hands on her knees and wheezed while Aliara patted her on the back.

"Hey, you did good in there, babe. Really." Aliara was grinning. "You still have some of the old mojo, huh? I thought you would."

Teysa nodded. "Agamor would not abandon me. Not even down here." She straightened up. "Let's go."