“WET WORK, WET WORK?!” Vellora hissed. “IT’S ZOMBIES AND A NECROMANCER. THAT’S NOT WET WORK; THAT’S HOUSEKEEPING, YOU DAMNED SPIDER!” Vellora snarled as she packed her things.

  As Vellora restrung her bow, her mind caught on the blue iguana’s opinion of the party’s last sneak. She was a slender high elf with a tattoo on her right hand, a set of fangs poking out from a wry grin. They were a hotty, egoistic twat that would always try to get a bigger cut for less of the work. The creepy toy mentioned how despite being hired to pick locks and disarming traps, the elf wasn’t skilled and tended to set off more of them than anything else.

  The consensus ended up being she was a better blade than a sneak; although she was a good cook despite not being able to handle anything spicier than milk, which was blamed on her being an elf. Her thoughts turned to the task at hand as she felt the string notch into place.

  Only fools travel with assassins and she is glad to have found many.

  Vellora left her room key on the bar top as she strolled out of The Wander’s Rest, a soft hum in the pact born’s throat as she made her way to the rendezvous point. Her ear twitched as she heard the morning criers making their announcements, only to stop mid-step as she heard her description shouted out. For a brief heartbeat, she found herself frozen as line by bitter line her description was given, sure a few things were wrong, her eye color for one, but most were scarily accurate. Then she willed herself to move, her pace deliberately casual, as she willed herself to calm.

  It’s a problem for later, right now you need coin, food, and gullible idiots to take the fall for you. With a slow exhale of a breath, she quickly walked the mile to the crypt’s entrance with a slight sigh. She set down her bags and walked around the above-ground graves. The scent of freshly turned soil filled her lungs, her eyes fixed on a small patch of destroying angels as her lips slithered into a wide grin.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Zerrin, Slika, and Doll found Belladana humming a dirge, sat over an alchemy set, and boiled several sliced-up white mushrooms. Her long azure hair was pulled up into a messy bun exposing the back of her neck showing off a row of spikes running down her spine, her face hidden by a thick cloth mask as she looked up at the party.

  “Oh good morning, how’d you all sleep?” Vellora asked warmly as she dumped the mushed shrooms into a small bottle before corking it.

  “I slept well, all things considered— what are you doing?” Zerrin asked as he stared at the cutpurse with mild concern, his keen sense of smell picking up the acrid scent from the bottle.

  “One of my many hobbies, this one being alchemy. I just need to distill this destroying angel and I’ll have a nice bag of coin for my work,” Vellora chirped as she thoroughly cleaned her tools.

  “Destroying Angels, as the poisonous fungus?” Doll asked flatly though still appearing accusatory, the mage even closing her spellbook to study the sneak.

  “It’s a reagent in poisons, yes, but it’s also useful in Dwarven and Vefr cuisine.” Slika countered her red eyes gleaming at the nostalgic thoughts of her people’s food.

  “Wait, Dwarves have a cooking culture I thought they just boiled everything into a flavorless gruel,” Zerrin stated confusedly as he tilted his head in contemplation of the new information.

  “Well, when most of your food contains things that are considered poisonous to other sentients it’s safer to just say ‘fuck it, why memorize shit’ and just nix your spices. I mean, why risk killing your friend with Green Potato stew when you can just boil bread,” Vellora added with a warm smile as she finished packing up her things, her amethyst eyes glanced toward the door of the crypt.

  “I guess that’s fair, still try not ta’ get us dragged down with ya’ Bell,” Zerrin sighed tiredly as he lifted his pack, the Dracin then moved to the entrance of the catacombs and lifted his shield as he pushed in. “Be not left in darkness oh broken soul,” the crusader prayed as his shield glowed with golden light, illuminating the dark room.

  Hmm, he’s also a priest or maybe an oath sworn, good to know. Vellora slunk in behind him, her keen eyes quickly scanned the staircase down to the lower levels only to lock onto a small tripwire. She grabbed Zerrin’s shoulder to keep him from taking another step as she moved to investigate further. Getting on her knees she leaned over the line to check the door frame, only to find that it led up to the top of the alcove where a glass flask was hanging, a brown liquid visible through the clear container.

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  “Looks like a Hell’s Fire rigged to drop on any poor sap that stepped on this line,” Vellora said as she carefully stepped over the wire, her right hand moved to carefully take hold of the bottle as she cut the rope holding it up, slowly she lowered the highly combustible liquid down.

  Zerrin stiffened as he heard what was in the bottle, his heart almost stopped for a moment at the thought of being doused in a liquid so volatile that it burst into flames when exposed to air; fire so stubborn that they can’t be put out only starved of fuel. “Th– thank you Belladana, th– that’s not a way I’d want to go out,” Zerrin stuttered and shook his head trying to shake the picture of fat boiling in a hellish inferno, blackened bones crumbling into soot, and steel plate melting into slag from his mind.

  “Oh, trust me, I don’t want to see ya go out like that either,” Vellora muttered as she hung the now more secured glass vile from her hip and started to walk down the stairs. Her posture changed slightly, she was no longer standing as tall as she could, her head crouched, and her foot landed on the ball of her heel rather than her toes. She seemed to shrink a head shorter. Zerrin took up behind Belladonna his footfalls heavy and attention-grabbing as such he kept ten or so feet back from her, his shield still raised and giving off light. Behind him marched Doll their footsteps muffled by the patted shoes they wore, the mage was almost as quiet as a mouse though she looked ready to duck behind Zerrin at any sign of trouble. Lastly was Slika her steps sounded more like someone tapping their nails on the stone, quiet enough that they wouldn’t draw attention with each soft tap or scrape.

  Vellora slowly grew more uneasy with each thunderous step behind her, she felt that at any second she’d round a corner to see a hoard of decayed bodies on the march toward them. As this thought tried to take root she spotted a hunched figure, the sound of meat being torn from bone hit her ears, and she found herself fixated on the shallowest of a hunched figure as it jerked its head back from the leg of a corpse.

  Vellora’s head snapped towards Zerrin as he clunked his armor against a jutted-out stone, the sound was deafening in the silent crypt only to be replaced by the gargled screech of the ghoul as it clambered to its feet.

  “Fuck,” growled Vellora.

  “Fuck,” echoed Zerrin.

  “Damn it,” groaned Slika.

  “Ta-ha lay,” whined Doll.

  Vellora quickly slid her sword from its sheath and darted toward the living dead, her blade lashed out at the walking corpse, only to glance off an exposed bone.

  “Oh hand of fate, I ask thee shield a hopeful soul,” Slika prayed as an aegis of golden webs wove around Vellora’s free arm, followed by the Vefr skittered farther back from the frontlines.

  Doll lifted her right hand as a melancholic purple glow formed at the end of her pointer finger, “Tallic vetterro,” they chanted as three arrows of light spasmed towards the undead. Vellora watched two of the arrows strike the ghoul in the head and neck where they sunk in deep, the last one speared through the ravenous corpse’s right arm.

  “Give your will unto me oh mother of souls, so that I may serve,” challenged Zerrin as he charged into the undead with his shield with the force of a bull, he knocked the ghoul to the roughly hewn stone before he swung an ax down at the prone body, the axe head sunk into the skull like a knife through butter.

  Vellora positioned herself to strike again, only to watch the unlife fade from the monster’s eyes, her stance loosened as she started to look around to verify there weren’t more of those things skulking about. “I think that was the only one here, but keep an eye out,” she said quietly as she knelt next to the dead again body, she noted the fingers were far longer than most species she knew of, they also ended in long curved claws rather than fingernails. Oh lovely, it was a ghoul. Great, it's not just skeletons and zombies but we have some higher-risk undead mixed in too, this could get a lot more dangerous.

  “You saw 'em too huh, looks like we got a stronger Carrion Crafter,” Zerrin said as he kicked the other half-eaten corpse, his axe at the ready for if it moved though graciously it remained still.

  “Yeah, what was the price for this contract again?” Vellora asked in a resigned jesting tone as she made a mental note to come back and collect the ghoul’s paralytic claws.

  “Not enough,” the other three said at once before they formed back up.