The Scum Kings: Vol. 9 [Uncut] - Chapters 41-45

The Scum Kings, a Broadsword Studio production created and written by Mike Daltrey. Episode forty one, The War Council. The back room of the Gambling Den was a different place. The calm controlled atmosphere of our first visit was gone, replaced by a thick, ugly tension. Silas was not sitting behind his desk. He was pacing a restless force of nature, his knuckles white where he gripped the hilt of a short sword at his belt. Corvin and his other lieutenants stood grim faced against the walls. The map of the Gutters lay on the table, but now it was surrounded by wetstones and unsheathed blades. This was not a business meeting. This was a war council. They think they can choke me, Silas snarled as we entered, his voice a low, dangerous growl. The cool, calculating man was gone, stripped away by the attacks on his income. In his place was the brutal warlord he had built his empire upon. They burned my stalls, they attack my merchants. They are dogs, rabid dogs, and you do not negotiate with them. You put them down. He stabbed a finger at the map at a section marked as the Red Hands is territory. We end this tomorrow night a single decisive strike. We go for the head. We hit their main compound, We kill their leaders, and we burned the rest to the ground. His plan was a thing of pure brute rage. There was no subtlety to it, no cunning. It was the roar of a wounded animal, and it was my chance. I knew I had to play my part. I stepped forward, letting a look of eager brutality spread across my face. My men are fresh, I said my voice, rough. We are not from this city. We have no loyalties except to the man who holds our leash. Give us the hardest part of the fight, the front gate. My northman stigand will break it down himself. While I spoke, my mind was a sponge soaking in every detail. I saw the way Silas's guards were positioned. I noted which lieutenants he trusted and which ones he didn't look at. I saw the path he was tracing on the map, the route himself would take to oversee the battle. I was gathering the intelligence or so needed, all while playing the part of a loyal bloodthirsty hound. He's lost control. I thought Seligne was right. They attacked his wallet and it broke his mind. He's not a king, He's just a thug with a ledger, and now he's angry. Angry men make mistakes. My performance, my feigned loyal pleased him. He saw in me a reflection of his own rage, A simple tool for a simple job. He clapped me on the shoulder, his eyes burning with a feverish light. Good, he snarled, I like your hunger. He dismissed the rest of his counsel with a wave of his hand, but he held me back. When we were alone, he pointed at the map one last time. Tomorrow night, we burned the red hands out of my gutter for good, he said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial hiss. You and your crew, you will be my vanguard. You will be the first ones through the gate. It was the worst place to be, the tip of the spear, the first into the battle, the first to slaughter. Silas didn't mind if we died. He just wanted us to do the job. But it was also the best place to be, the tip of the spear. He was placing us at the heart of the chaos was about to unleash, giving us the freedom to move and strike as we saw fit. He had just handed me the torch to burn down his rival's house. He had no idea I also planned to burn his own house down to. The scum Kings. A Broadsword Studio production created and written by Mike Daltrey, Episode forty two, The Point of No Return. I returned to our squalid room, smell of Silas's ambition and rage, still clinging to me. My crew was waiting, their faces a mixture of fear and anticipation. They looked to me for answers, for a path. I gave them the intel. I told them of Silas's plan, a full scale assault on the Red Hands compound, with us as the vanguard, the sacrificial tip of the spear. When I was done, the room was silent. It was Orso who finally spoke. He knelt on the floor once again, laying out his crude map of the gutters. He has given us a choice, or So said, placing a dark stone on Silas's headquarters and a pile of twigs on the Red Hands's territory. He looked up at me, his eyes sharp and clear path one. We do as we're told. We lead the charge. We bleed for Silas. We kill his enemies for him. We prove ourselves to be his most effective loyal dogs. We survive, we eat, we collect our share, and we remain on his leash until the day he decides to shorten it. He paused, letting the grim reality of that path settle over us. Then his hand moved across the map. Path too, he said, his voice dropping to a low, dangerous whisper. He is sending his entire force. He swept the dark stones towards the twigs to attack them here, which means, for a short window, he. Will be here. He tapped Silas's own headquarters with only his personal guard. The city will be a storm of chaos and fire. In a storm, no one notices a single drop of rain. We use the attack on the red hands as the ultimate diversion. He looked at me. We strike at the head of the snake. The two options lay before us, a long life on our knees, or one night with a chance to stand on a throne. Or so laid out the risk with his usual brutal honesty. If we choose path too, and we fail, Corvin will make an art form of our suffering. There will be no quick death. My mind was a storm. Orso's logic was a razor's edge between a kingdom and a screaming, endless death. But I was tired of surviving. I was tired of eating another man's scraps, of taking another man's orders, of the shame of the beat down, and the. Weight of the leash. We came to this city to get rich, not to be servants, I said, my voice, quiet but hard as steel. My gut level decision was made. We go for broke. I looked at my crew, my king's challenging them to disagree. Stigand was the first to speak. A slow, savage grin spread across his face, the first real smile I had seen on him in days to hell with Silas, he boomed, I would rather die fighting a king than live my life serving one. I'm in. The risk is substantial, Selaine said, her voice, a cool, calm calculation. But if we succeed, the entire treasury is ours. The potential return on investment is absolute. I'm in. Geks just giggled, a high, unhinged sound of pure joy. Two kings in one night. It's a festival. Oh, this is going to be so much fun. Brinn gave me a single sharp nod, her loyalty absolute. Cobb and Rat, terrified but seeing no other path, nodded as well. We were united. The rest of the hour was a tense final planning session. We used the details I had gathered to pinpoint the exact moment Silas would be most vulnerable, the precise path we would take through the chaos of the city wide battle. The die was cast. There was no turning back. The plan was set. I looked at the seven faces in the dim light of our squalid room. My killers, my strategists, my monsters, my kings. We were bound together in this single, insane purpose. Tonight, I said, my voice, low and steady, we kill a king. The scum Kings. A Broadsword Studio production created and written by Mike Daltrey, Episode forty three, A Hammer for a King. The night was alive with the sounds of our work, distant screams from the east where the Red Hands compound was under assault shouts, and the sharp clash of steel from the Market Square. The gutters were tearing themselves apart, just as Orso had planned, and in the heart of that chaos, we moved like ghosts toward our own true target. Silas's command post was a large stone and timber warehouse near the river, fortified and protected by his best men. Two guards stood at the heavy iron banded main door, their eyes nervously scanning the chaos in the city. We took our positions in the shadows of an adjacent alley. This was it, the culmination of all our planning, all our humiliation. Brin moved first. She slipped away, a phantom in the dark. A moment later, there was a loud crash of shattering glass from the far side of the warehouse, followed by a convincing, panicked scream. The two guards at the door looked at each other, hesitated, then drew their blades and jogged off to investigate the disturbance. It was the same act Brynn had used earlier, and it was just as effective now, or so, hissed. The moment the guards were gone, stigging to hit the main door not with an act with his shoulder. The sound was like a thunderclap as the heavy bar splintered and the doors flew inward. We poured into the darkness after him. This was not a clumsy brawl, This was an execution. For the first time since the caravan raid, we were working as a single, deadly unit. Balcony left or so barked, and a crossbow bolt from one of Silas's guards whistled over our heads. Bryn, already inside and hidden in some dark corner I couldn't see, loosed an arrow of her own. The guard gave a choked cry and tumbled over the railing Dicks was a blur of terrifying motion. He used the chaos, the stacked crates and deep shadows to his advantage, appearing from nowhere to slit a throat or hamstring a swordsman, before melting back into the gloom, his quiet, unnerving laughter the only sign he had been there. Stiggan was the hammer. He moved through the center of the warehouse, a whirlwind of pure destructive force, his massive fists breaking shields and bones with equal ease. He was the anchor of our assault, drawing the enemy's attention while the rest of us cut them apart from the flanks, and I was the tip of the spear. I moved with him, my own blade, a sharp counterpoint to his brute strength, cutting a bloody path through Silas's elite. We were no longer servants, we were no longer victims, were the scum kings, and we had come to claim our kingdom. The fight was desperate and bloody. Silas's men were good, the best in the gutters, but they were caught by surprise, and we were fighting with the fury of men who had nothing left to lose. We pushed them back through the main floor, up a flight of stairs to the last heavy oak door at the back of a catwalk, Silas's command room. Stiggand I roared. The big northmen needed no other command. He lowered his shoulder and hit the door with the force of a battering ram. The wood groaned, splintered, and after another blow, flew from its hinges. I was the first one through the breach, my sword held ready, my body thrumming with the hot, clean energy of battle. The room was quiet, lit by a single steady lantern, and there he was Silas. He stood alone in the center of the room, turning from a large map on the table, a clean, sharp blade already in his hand. There was no surprise on his face, no fear, only the cold, appraising look of a king who has been waiting for the final challenge to his throne. The Scum Kings a Broadsword Studio production created and written by Mike Daltrey. Episode forty four, The King is Dead. The chaos of the warehouse fellow, the sounds of the distant, city wide battle of faint echo here in this small quiet room. The world had shrunk to the space between me and the man who thought he was my master. The air was thick with the promise of a final, bloody accounting, So Silas said, his voice calm, almost conversational. He gave a slight, dismissive shake of his head. The dogs have finally slipped the leash. I must admit I underestimated your ambition. I thought you were just thugs. My mistake. He didn't wait for a reply. He lunged. He was not a brawler. He was a swordsman. His movements economical and deadly. His blade was a blur of silver, aimed not at Stiggins's bulk, but at my throat. I parried a clash of steel, deafening in the small room. What followed was not a glorious duel. It was a desperate, ugly struggle for survival in a cage. Stigand roared and tried to bring his massive strength to bear, but the room was too small. He swung his axe and a bit deep into the heavy oak table, getting stuck for a precious second. Silas used the opening, his blade, darting out and leaving a long, shallow cut on Stiggins's arm. Dicks was a phantom trying to find an angle in the chaos, but Silas was always aware, always moving, using the table as a barrier, never allowing us to fully surround him. It all came down to me. This was my fight, My humiliation at the crooked keg, the memory of Kle's pathetic death, the shame of taking this man's orders. It all boiled up in my gut as a hot, cleansing rage. Every time my blade met his, it was a repayment. Every block, every perry was me taking back a piece of what he had stolen. He was better than me, a more skilled swordsman. Hell, he was a more skilled fighter. His movements were precise, Mine were fueled by raw fury. He cut my arm, a deep gash that sent a jolt of fire to my shoulder. He pressed his advantage, driving me back against the wall. His face a mask of cold concentration. But he didn't have my desperation. With a roar, I kicked out, not at him, but at the leg of the heavy map table. It tilted, unbalanced and slid toward him. He side stepped, his balance, thrown for a fraction of a second, it was all I needed. I didn't try to meet him with skill. I crashed into him like a wild animal, a pure act of brute force. We went down in a tangle of limbs, my sword knocked from my hand. It was no longer a fight of blades, but of teeth and nails and raw strength. We wrestled on the floor, two beasts, trying to tear out the other's throat. His fingers clawed at my eyes. I smashed my forehead into his nose. His blade was still in his hand, and he tried to bring it to bear, to drive it into my gut. I caught his wrist, my muscle screaming with the effort. With my free hand, I fumbled for the dagger at my belt. I pulled it free and drove it once hard into the soft flesh of his neck. His eyes went wide with shocked surprise. A wet, gurgling sound escaped his lips. The strength went out of him. The King of the Gutter was dead. A look of shock surprise still on his dead face, his own blood pooling on the floor of his command room. I had won. I pushed his body off me, my chest heaving, gasping for breath, a triumphant roar building in my throat, ready to savor the victory. But Stiggand wasn't savoring anything. His fight wasn't over. He was a storm of fury that had not yet broken. He looked around the room, his eyes wild, landing on the legs, the maps, the crates of fine goods, everything that Silas had built, everything that had been used to control us. It wasn't enough that the man was dead. He wanted his entire world unmade. He strode to the map table and seized the heavy oil lantern, the room's only light. I saw the madness in his eyes and scrambled to my feet. Stiggant, I roared my voice, raw, no stop, the gold, the supplies, It's all ours now. But it was too late. He had already thrown the lantern at a pile of crates full of spirits that had been stored against the wall. The triumphant roar in my throat died, replaced by a choked gasp as a wall of fire erupted with a deafening whoosh, and the room was suddenly impossibly as bright and as hot as the sun. Our prize, our victory, all of it was now being consumed by a fire lit by our own hand. The Scum Kings, a Broadsword Studio production created and written by Mike Daltrey, Episode forty five, The Reckoning Fire. The heat was a physical blow. It seared the air from my lungs and cooked the skin on my face. The triumphant roar in my throat was choked off by a wave of black, oily smoke. O our victory, our prize, The entire world we had fought to conquer, was being consumed by a beast born from Stiggan's rage out. Find a way out, I roared, my voice, lost in the deafening thunder of the growing inferno, fueled by packing straw and alcohol. The main door we'd entered through was a solid wall of flame. The room was a death trap. The heat so intense it felt like the air itself was on fire the window. Or So yelled, his voice a raw bark. He pointed to a small barred opening high on the back wall, barely visible through the swirling smoke. It was our only chance. Stiggant, his face a mask of horrified regret. Acted without thinking. He shoved a heavy crate against the wall, used it to launch his massive frame upward, and gripped the hot iron bars. With a scream of pure desperate effort, he tore the entire frame from the crumbling mortar and stone. Go, he bellowed. Or So and I shoved the others through the opening. Celaine cob gix before scrambling through ourselves Brin right behind us. We dropped ten feet into the alley outside, landing hard on the slick cobblestones. The smoke was everywhere, a thick, choking black cloud that turned the night into a blind maze. I could barely see my hand in front of my face. I grabbed Selaine's arm, pulling her along this way, Stay together, I yelled into the chaos. A scream cut through the roar of the fire. It was thin and terrified, full of a boy's panic. Rat I turned trying to peer back into the smoke filled alley we just left, but there was only a wall of roiling blackness and the sudden, sharp crack of a collapsing roof beam. Drey, he's gone, Orso's voice was a harsh command in my ear, his hand gripping my shoulder. We have to move now. He was right. There was no going back for him. Rat, the boy who had survived on scraps and fear, was now just another victim of the fire we had lit. His death was a pathetic footnote in the disaster we had created. We fought our way through the alleys, the world around us a hellscape of burning buildings and screaming people. The fire, fed by the dry, cheap timber of the shanties, had leaped from the warehouse to the surrounding blocks with terrifying speed. The gang war we had started was over, forgotten. We had created a new, hungrier war, a war of flame against the entire city. We finally spilled out of a narrow alley into the relative open of the market square, falling to our knees, gasping for air that wasn't pure smoke. But there was no safety here. The whole world was fire and embers, and then through the roar came the new sound. It started faint, then grew louder, cutting through the chaos with a cold, sharp clarity. Horns not the chaotic bleeding of a panicked mob, but the clear, disciplined, coordinated blasts of real soldiers. The sound of the city guard mobilizing from behind the main walls, the sound of the cage door slamming shut