The Demon Sword: Sorataki

Chapter 12: Give & Take

The heart of Coubbleston village was set ablaze with passionate rows of flame dancers that illuminated the cold night sky. The upbeat tempo of skinned drums and the proud dancing of topless men and barely clothed women fills the air with a profound sense of instinctive desire for anyone watched or lost themselves in their rhythm, as if mocking the freezing cold air itself they dance with skin caressed on skin and a lack of worry for tomorrow.  

The large village made up of stone huts mixed with larger houses of thick clay. In its centre laid a great water fountain split into four by a path that ran through the middle. Its large abundance of water in display in the middle of the hottest desert in the world bolstered the great power and wealth of the land for those with an eye for such things. 

The streets ablaze with a giant fireplace near around every street corner where the fire dancers and entranced people would lap around whilst listening to music.

It was a place to come if one wanted to forget about the worries of the changing world and just lose their minds every night. A place to come if you wanted to spend your likely last days drowning in your carnal lusts.

They say that you have not had real love until you've bedded one born from Coubbleston...

A true retreat for the bold. But this was not the reasons why Natalie and Andrew had come here. Standing within a large withering white tent they wait for the owner of this portable office to respond to their scoop.

"You truly saw the lair of the -trap door spider- and returned here safely?" he said in a slight daze, the slightly muffled sounds of the ongoing party seeps through the tent sheets.

He was a partly chubby black man with a rather hairy beer belly that stuck out of his silk green bed robes. He only recently sat across them looking sweaty and panting and if he's went seven rounds with a grizzly bear for some of its chest hairs. It was apparent that he was just done sharing the sheets with some of Coubbleston's finest women.

His name was Zac, an information dealer as well as an owner of a fair number of brothel men and women. 'Trapdoor spider' is what he called a certain area where people notice strange activity from but never come back out alive once they go in to check it. This, however, was not the first time they talked about this issue. You see, a few days before Natalie had the idea to storm the base she was let towards it on the whim of this man in front of her.

Seeing as it was so vague the first time they talked, however, Natalie dismissed it as made up whispers and went onwards without giving it much more thought. But now that she's seen what she saw she could not stop thinking about it since saving the nine kids from what you could consider being a 'trap door'.

The coined name itself and what Epimetheus said to her, it just all felt too coincidental. Given the kind of man, Zac was and what went down last time she did not want to stoop back to such a shady person for help. Just being faced with his unsightly gut was a deal breaker enough.

But again she was in need of answers. Maybe even more so than the first time.

"That's right we met your 'spider'," she said, a hint of anger in her voice. "So I demand to know what made you call him by that title, who coined that name?"

Just then a huge chiselled led man with mighty blond bearded and light leather armour stepped in front of Zac and faced Natalie, trying to stare her down with intimidation. Natalie not being one to back down from those who start a fight looked him right back in the eyes.

There was a dark mark around his right eye that she was compiled to punch. He just looked onwards; his low angered growl's made him seem like a bulldog position to pounce. Having a face that suited one to boot did not help his case.