A liveried servant, who seemed to materialize silently from the deepest shadows of the hallway, approached Val, bowing with a practiced, deferential awkwardness. He informed Val, in a hushed, nervous whisper that Roy nonetheless easily overheard, that the Archduke was now waiting patiently in the main estate's grand receiving chamber to offer a brief, formal, and undoubtedly very ducal, greeting to their honored guests, should they be willing to grace him with their presence. Roy and the others shared quick, uncertain glances, before collectively, silently, deciding they might as well make an appearance and get the inevitable, and probably very tedious, formalities over with as quickly as possible.
The main estate's foyer was a vast, cavernous, and distinctly chilly hall of chipped, discolored marble and faded, threadbare tapestries that depicted heroic, and probably entirely fictional, long-forgotten battles against mythical, multi-headed beasts. Archduke Vol Teyzar Eridian stood near a tall, arched window, his imposing, regal silhouette sharply outlined by the dying, blood-red light of the rapidly setting sun. He turned with a slow, deliberate grace as Roy's group entered, offering a small, almost imperceptible, and impeccably polite smile that did not quite reach his cold, assessing eyes.
His features were undeniably handsome, noble even, in a severe, aristocratic sort of way, but held a certain cool, detached aloofness that Roy found instantly unsettling. Every movement he made was measured, precise, almost unnervingly controlled, as if he were a finely crafted automaton rather than a man of flesh and blood. Val, his earlier nervousness now amplified by his father's imposing presence, quickly introduced Roy and his crew by name, his voice cracking slightly on Warrex's.
"Welcome to Eridian," Archduke Vol said, his voice smooth, cultured, and utterly devoid of warmth. He inclined his head in a short, formal bow that was more a gesture of acknowledgement than genuine respect. "I trust you will find our meager hospitality adequate for your needs. My son informs me that you are considering investigating our town's rather unfortunate, and regrettably persistent, predicament."
Roy tried to read the Archduke's expression, to glean some hint of his true thoughts or underlying feelings about the plight of his people, but the man's face remained a polite, unreadable, and faintly unsettling blank. "We are," he answered, his own voice carefully neutral, betraying none of his own internal reservations. "Val offered us a job, a challenge if you will, and we've accepted."
A corner of Archduke Vol's perfectly sculpted lips quirked briefly, a fleeting, almost invisible shadow of what might have been amusement, or perhaps, disdain. "Indeed. Your anticipated assistance is… noted, and, should it prove fruitful, will be adequately compensated." He paused, his cold gaze sweeping over them once more. "Now, if you will forgive me, I find I must attend to certain pressing, and rather tedious, estate matters. We shall speak again soon, I trust. Val will see to your immediate needs." With that, he excused himself with another polite, almost dismissive nod, gliding away with an unnerving, silent grace that made the hairs on the back of Roy's neck prickle. He vanished into the deeper shadows of the estate, leaving the vast hall oddly, uncomfortably silent and palpably colder in his wake.
Eryndra exchanged a wary, sidelong look with Roy. She leaned in closer, whispering, her voice barely audible above the sudden, oppressive silence, "He's not exactly radiating overwhelming, fatherly concern for the unfortunate plight of his dying town, is he? More like he's mildly inconvenienced by a persistent fungal infection on his prize-winning roses."
Roy frowned, his gaze lingering on the spot where the Archduke had stood moments before, a knot of unease tightening in his own stomach. "No, he certainly doesn't seem to be. Maybe he's just incredibly busy with important, top-secret ducal paperwork? Or perhaps he's just a naturally reserved and emotionally constipated individual. Some nobles are like that. Allegedly."
Val, stepping back to rejoin them, his face flushed with a mixture of filial embarrassment and profound apology, seemed to catch the tail end of their hushed, critical comment. "My father… he has never been one for overt displays of emotion or common concern. It is not his way. But if he authorized such a substantial reward, it means he does care. Deeply. In his own particular, and inscrutable fashion," he said, though the conviction in his voice wavered slightly, betraying his own underlying, and probably long-standing, doubts about his father's true capacity for empathy.
"We'll see," Warrex muttered under his breath, still surreptitiously, and painfully, trying to massage the feeling back into his throbbing, possibly fractured, hand. The memory of Val's deceptively powerful handshake was still unpleasantly vivid.
With that unsettling, and deeply ambiguous, encounter concluded, Val guided them back to the relative sanctuary of the guest building. Outside, the sun had finally, mercifully, dipped below the distant, jagged horizon, leaving Eridian's winding, shadowed streets awash in a deep, unsettling, and almost tangible purplish dusk. Lamps flickered sporadically here and there, casting eerie, elongated, dancing shadows that seemed to writhe with a life of their own. The faint, unsettling smell of damp earth, rotting vegetation, and something vaguely, unpleasantly like decay drifted from distant, unseen homes, carried on the chill evening breeze. Yet, despite the encroaching darkness and the palpable sense of unease that permeated the very air of the village, Roy couldn't shake a persistent, nagging feeling of hushed, anxious tension, as if the town itself held its breath after dark, cowering and waiting for some unseen, unspoken horror to emerge from the deepening shadows.
They finally arrived back at the guest house, the simple wooden door groaning in protest as Val pushed it open. Inside, a meager, unappetizing meal awaited them on the common room table: a few hunks of stale, dry bread, a communal bowl of thin, watery, and suspiciously grey-looking stew, and a chipped clay jug of lukewarm, slightly brackish water. Roy's stomach growled audibly, a low, mournful rumble of protest; the day's long, uneventful, and emotionally draining travel had left him hungry enough to forgive, if not entirely forget, the sparse, unappetizing, and frankly rather depressing, fare.
"Guys, you know the drill," Roy said, sliding his food to Warrex.
The rest of the crew followed his lead, all sliding their food to him which he began eating with a smile. "More for me!" Warrex howled.
The rest of the crew ate meal bars from Roy's bag instead. Eryndra set her bar down with dissatisfaction, glancing at Roy, her expression a mixture of weariness and determination. "We'll start fresh in the morning, then? Begin the investigation properly? Try to get to the bottom of this Eridian enigma? I just hope there is a way to punch our way to a solution..."
Roy nodded, his mind already sifting through the tangled possibilities, the unsettling clues, the pervasive sense of wrongness that clung to this place like a shroud. "Yeah. We'll get a proper lay of the land, talk to more of the townsfolk, especially the older ones who might remember when this cyclical decay first began. See if there's a discernible pattern, a trigger, anything that might point us in the right direction. Sound good to everyone?"
Zehrina and Warrex both agreed with weary nods, though Warrex's eyebrows remained knit in a frown of residual discomfort from his earlier unfortunate handshake. He kept flexing his sore, swollen knuckles, a low growl rumbling in his chest. "Can't help but like that Val kid," he murmured, more to himself than anyone else in the room. "Seems like a decent sort, genuinely wants to help his people. But that handshake of his… man. Kid's got a grip like a damn demon crab. And not in a fun way."
Roy snorted, a ghost of a weary smile playing on his lips despite his own unease. "I didn't assume demon crabs were fun, Warrex. Next time, maybe don't try to challenge every single polite handshake you encounter to a secret, unspoken war of brute masculine strength. Just a thought."
Warrex barked a short, surprised, and slightly pained laugh. "Like you said, Captain, he's a good kid. Seems earnest enough, just alarmingly strong."
Outside, a soft, mournful wind swept through the small, enclosed courtyard, rustling the dry, brittle leaves of a nearby, sickly-looking tree with a sound like whispering ghosts. For a moment, Roy and the others listened as it rattled a loose, unsecured shutter somewhere in the darkened guest house, an eerie, unsettling echo in the growing, oppressive Eridian night. Then Roy rubbed his eyes, the gesture heavy with fatigue, and pushed back from the table with a weary sigh.
"Alright," he announced, his voice carrying a weight of responsibility that seemed too heavy for his young shoulders, "let's try to get some rest. We've got a weird, and probably very dangerous, and almost certainly deeply unpleasant, job ahead of us." The group dispersed without another word, each heading to their own small, sparsely furnished, and distinctly unwelcoming room along the dimly lit, creaking hallway.
Roy glanced out a narrow, grime-streaked window, taking in the dim, shadowy, and utterly deserted shapes of Eridian's nocturnal streets. Barely any movement stirred the profound darkness, just a lone, mangy, and probably flea-bitten, cat darting furtively among the deep, impenetrable shadows. His mind flickered over the unsettling images of the patchy, blighted farmland, the relentless, inexplicable cycle of decay, and the strange, unreadable, almost alien vibe emanating from the enigmatic Archduke Vol. But Val's earnest sincerity, his genuine, palpable desire to save his dying town, tugged at Roy's conscience, a small, persistent hook. Maybe, just maybe, if they were smart, and lucky, and didn't inadvertently awaken some ancient, slumbering horror, they'd manage to unravel this disturbing, insidious puzzle without plunging headlong into even more chaos, destruction, and probable dismemberment.
"Yeah, right," he whispered to himself, a wry, humorless twist to his lips as he rolled his eyes at his own fleeting, foolish, and entirely uncharacteristic optimism. Then, with a tired, resigned sigh that seemed to carry the weight of the world, he closed the creaking shutters, letting the oppressive, suffocating hush of the Eridian night envelop him like a cold, damp grave cloth. One way or another, tomorrow they would begin the arduous, and likely thankless, task of prying into Eridian's dark, deeply buried, and probably very unpleasant secrets, and facing whatever malevolent, sharp-toothed horrors waited patiently for them in its shadowed, decaying, and decidedly unwelcoming corners.