[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/Y4oTIBx.jpg[/img][/center]

Spook saw them off -- nodded to each one as they said their goodbyes and rushed after the robot that would lead them to safety -- and he turned to face the teeming forest.

The disease -- the Crystalline -- was spreading fast among the wood demons. It drove them crazy, filled them with rage and bloodlust. They swarmed like piranhas at the edge of the forest, screeching and clawing and mangled by dark crystals. Their eyes glowed bright and red. The death of the infected felidrake had spawned the very terror that Spook had been trying to prevent.

All around the expansive perimeter of the wasteland, the demons gathered and screamed: hundreds of them. Maybe thousands. The air was filled with their shrieks.

Spook grinned up at them. The dark crystals crept over his face and tendriled down his arms. He dropped to his knees and, with a knife, began to carve an enormous sigil into the dry ashen ground.

[hr]

A blaring alarm sounded from within the metallic walls, and a voice echoed threatening:

ANNIHILATION. DESTROY INCOMING LIFE FORMS ON SIGHT. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. ANNIHILATION.

With a hurried hiss and a creak, the trundling robot led Lily, Meryn and Emma around the ominous mechanical gates and into a small open side-door. The inside was bare and dark and smelled like oil and smoke; a boiler glowed hot at the far side of the stone room, and pipes hissed along the ceiling.

The robot raced directly toward the back of the room -- but as soon as Emma entered, a guard pointed a bayonet at her chest and led her to an empty side of the hot stone room. [b]"State your name and your business,"[/b] he demanded harshly, with an undertone of fear. They could hear the howling alarms and the rumbling voice on the speakers within the city. [b]"Are you carrying any weapons?"[/b]

Lily was next, and a second guard separated her from Emma at the point of a bayonet, leading her to the opposite side of the room under threat of impalement. [b]"Put the sword down and state your name,"[/b] the guard growled. [b]"Drop all your weapons. Don't think we believe for a second that you're here for 'safe harbor' -- not when you've brought hell down on us. Why shouldn't we just shoot you?"[/b]

Meryn was the last to enter, and the door slammed shut as soon as she'd crossed the threshold. A third guard had been waiting by the door, and shoved her forward into the room toward the boiler. [b]"Please state your name and your business,"[/b] the guard commanded with a tremble of fear. His musket was pointed steadily at her chest. He gave her a moment, and then raised his voice. [b]"TALK. State your name and your business! This isn't a joke!"[/b]

Lily's guard glanced across at his comrade. [b]"Just shoot her if she won't cooperate."[/b]

Outside, on the other side of the door they had just come through, the screeching of the infected demons rose to a piercing pitch. Across the opposite door by the boiler, which led into the city, alarms blared and crowds roared and guns popped.

[hr]

From Ronken's vantage point, he had a front-row view of the swelling angry crowds of dirty workmen and half-crazed addicts and violent gangsters looking for something to kill. The uniformed guards crossed their bayonets and held the citizens back from the door in the wall, where the travelers were being interrogated before they might be let into the city. The people of Cogswall demanded to know what was happening, where the threat was, who these people were -- they called for the travelers to be shot, while some groups screamed that they should be let through for safety, while still others were shoving everyone else in hopes of causing a riot against the government. Some of the guards fired their muskets into the air, but it did little but antagonize the throngs of people.

A huge brassy automaton whirred and creaked as it stepped through the parting crowd; it towered over them, and its driver at its head paid them no attention. The clockwork mecha grasped the edge of the wall and -- with a yank of a few levers and wheels by its goggled driver -- hauled itself up and over the wall.

While the city roiled and boomed, Ronken would feel a tap on his shoulder. Someone slightly shorter than himself -- robed and hidden in a deep hood -- spoke in a grinning, feminine voice: [b]"You look like somebody who doesn't give a shit 'bout what the hell's goin' on. I like you."[/b]

She produced a small bag of newly minted gold coins, which she held out to him with a delicate brown hand. With the other hand, she extended to him a sealed envelope.

[b]"Tellya what. There's one of those Travelers in there with a brass mask. I'll pay you double to deliver a message."[/b]