Downtown Druid

Dantes was in a darkness so black that his darkvision couldn’t pierce it. He could hear the sounds of skittering in the dark all around him. He could feel the small steps of a million legs all across his body, his arms, his eyelids. Normally the sensation would make him flail in disgust and terror, but in this case it felt like he’d been tucked into a warm blanket. He stayed still, acknowledging, but not struggling against the sensations that surrounded him.

“You…expected… this,” the voice was a whisper, seeming to be spoken directly into his ear, the words formed with great difficulty.

In spite of the roaches that covered his face, he didn’t hesitate to open his mouth and speak. “I’d hoped to meet you, yes.”

The legs moving across him sped up slightly, the roaches began to dig into his hair, their antennae tickling his scalp..

“You…desire…blessing?”

“Yes,” he said as antennae tickled his lips.

“We…would…be...your…second.”

“Yes. Though I mean no disrespect.”

The writhing became more erratic in a way that Dantes recognized as laughter? Amusement? He wasn’t certain.

“I’m glad you’re a good sport about it.”

“Yes…open…mouth…wide.”

Dantes did so without hesitation. He felt a single massive roach climb up his chin and down his throat. He felt its legs move it down his esophagus as it shifted and tore through his throat, slowly toward his right forearm, right above the ratmark. He began to writhe and scream, his big talk overwhelmed by the sheer agony he was experiencing, but he was held down by the weight of the roaches on top of him, and his voice was muffled as they crawled over his mouth.

Once the roach reached his arm, he felt a searing pain as if he was being branded from the inside. His own screaming woke him.

…

Dantes clutched his throat, still feeling the tearing sensation there, even though his throat itself was fine. He clenched his teeth back together and forced himself to stop screaming, then took several long full breaths and raised his arm up to look at it. The ratmark was still there, all four fangs nearly filled with gold on his wrist. A little lower on the inside of his forearm, were three half circles in the shape of a roach. One for the head, and one for each of their wings. One of the wings glowed gold, and the other two half circles were dark black. He clenched and unclenched his fists several times, getting used to the feeling of the new mark on his skin. If this pattern continued he’d start looking a lot more like his father with all of his sailing tattoos. That was not a prospect he relished.

He stood up from his bed, and noticed Jacopo was awake and standing on his hindlegs, looking at him.

“That seemed very unpleasant,” said Jacopo.

Dantes shrugged. “It’s an easy price to pay.” He meant it, but he was still rubbing the fresh mark on his inner forearm with a grimace on his face.

Jacopo shrugged back and moved next to the food store. Dantes removed the cover and left it. There was no more reason to hide the food, he could simply ask the rats and roaches to leave it alone.

Jacopo grabbed several grapes for himself, and began gnawing into them with vigor. Dantes watered the mossy carpet that now coated his entire cave, then moved to the fungus to feed and water it in the way that it preferred. It was now covering parts of the ceiling, and he felt its gratitude as he had felt the floors. He sat to eat, running his hands along the green strands of moss. As he moved his hand away from it to grab his food the moss shifted slightly. He blinked a few times, and slowly moved his hand back down toward the moss. It was subtle, but the small ends of it seemed to be straining to reach up to his hand. He focused, trying to will the moss to come closer. It seemed to strain for a moment, but stopped and settled back in. Dantes bit into the apple as he gently ran his hand over the moss. Another avenue to look into, there wasn’t a ton of plant life in the Pit, but back on the surface whole parts of the city were completely overgrown, forgotten and abandoned as Rendhold spread ever outward.

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He refocused on the roachmark, and sent his senses out, detecting an enormous amount of roaches in every possible nook and cranny of the caverns nearby. He summoned thirty, testing the amount of favor it would cost. In moments, thirty roaches swarmed across the moss blanket and settled still in front of him, only their antennae shifting to indicate that they were alive. He began moving them in patterns, five at a time, monitoring the favor on his forearm. It trickled down, but far more slowly than the same actions would have for rats. He attempted to look through one of their eyes.

He immediately felt intense disorientation. He could see himself, Jacopo, the other roaches, the moss on the ground, the walls, all of it all around himself. At the same time he could sense movement, pressure, temperature and other sensations through the small hairs on his legs. He broke the connection almost immediately and placed a hand on a wall to steady himself. That would take some getting used to.

He’d noticed some sensory differences with rats, they couldn’t see reds, except Jacopo for some reason, and his sense of smell and taste became stronger, but overall it was relatively close to his baseline. This was much harder however. He gave it a few more tries, but every attempt to orient himself ended in intense discomfort and failure. He decided that it was something he’d need to practice at a later time.

Once his experiments were done the favor had gone down by less than a quarter of what it had started at. He placed the apple core of his breakfast on the ground, and let the roaches know that it was theirs, asking them to leave the rest of his food alone. They swarmed the core, and began eating greedily, shoving others out of the way in pursuit of a sweet taste of it.

Dantes threw on his coat, and began going through his usual daily routine as it had been for the last two weeks. He climbed while practicing his new powers with the rats and roaches. He then harvested fruit, and fed his garden the blood he offered it every day. Once he was done, he took two sacks of fruit and took his regular route to Mez.

“Have the Collared sent for the first collection?” he asked when he reached him, letting the sacks he was carrying drop heavily onto the ground.

“Yes, I had it ready for them. One of the men they sent actually lifted an entire barrel, while the others needed many hands. I was told they enjoyed my brew thoroughly.” He made the last statement with clear pride on his face.

“How many of them tried to offer you a side deal for a bit extra that they could sell on the side?”

Mez smiled. “Just one, Vor.”

“Televor, or Erevor?”

Mez shrugged, “No clue. Your names represent nothing. It makes it difficult to remember them.”

Dantes nodded. They were both blonde half elves, so it wouldn’t do to describe them to Mez for a clearer answer, since he likely hadn’t paid that much attention to their looks in the first place. He also didn’t feel like investigating further because if it was Tel, he’d have to beat him or rob him or something along those lines to keep the tally even. He respected the attempt either way, so decided to leave without pressing things further. If he knew it was him he’d have to do something about it, but as long as he didn’t it meant he wouldn’t have to retaliate. All of this made complete sense to him, but Jacopo who now existed as a part of him, was thoroughly confused as the thoughts moved through both of their heads.

Dantes opened the sacks of fruit for Mez to inspect while they went over a few additional details. Once he was done, he started moving back through the caverns and crevices of the Pit through to the Collared. The trek was uneventful, though he had to avoid a half dozen skitterlings that had taken up residence in one of his usual pathways. He’d hoped to be able to communicate with them as he could with roaches, as they just appeared to be a larger variant, but like with the jumping spider he’d fought, he had no luck.

The collared guards greeted him with much friendlier nods this time. It was incredible what a bit of booze and a business deal could do for people’s moods. He climbed his way up to Tel’s room, noticing that the dice game wasn’t active that day, and smacked the wall a few times to let him know he’d arrived.

Tel peeked out shortly after and smiled.

“Dantes, Undermarket time?”

He nodded.

Tel held up a finger, and went back into his cell. There was some shuffling and other noises, and he reappeared dressed in a freshly cleaned robe with a small pouch on his waist along with a shiv that Dantes didn’t recognize.

Dantes shook his head. “The pouch is a bad idea, too easy to steal.”

Tel smiled more widely. “Pouch is a decoy. Learned from some of the older guys how to do some sewing and made some new pockets in my robe.”

Dantes chuckled. “I know you were a deviant back on the surface, but you're swiftly becoming a true bastard down here.”

“I’ve had good examples to follow. Shall we go?”

Dantes nodded, and they headed into the path to the undermarket.

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