Dougal knew that the asura gates were used by the diminutive race, and they would never risk their own lives for something that had not been (mostly) tested and safe. The gates were leagues upon leagues apart, yet simply by stepping through the oval archways, they would be at a similar gate in Lion's Arch. Still, the asura's continual tendency to modify and meddle with their own work gave him pause.
The two asura in front of the plinth of crystals concluded their heated argument and the older of the two walked over to them. The younger stayed behind, shooting sullen looks at his elder.
"Sorry," said the older asura, a female. "Training day. My apprentice has his own ideas about the process of tuning two gates into alignment, and I have to beat some sense into him." She turned toward her sullen apprentice, who immediately brightened, then returned to his black cloud of resentment as soon as the elder's back was turned. Dougal watched the younger asura eye the arcane runes on the plinth and was concerned that the upstart apprentice would suddenly try to prove his point by changing the settings.
"Papers?" said the asura, and Riona presented a folded letter with a purple seal similar to the one she had presented Logan Thackeray in the jail. The asura reviewed it, grunted, and said, "Are you carrying anything from Orr, the Dragonbrand, or any other territory that has been dominated or altered by the presence of the Elder Dragons?" She recited the question with the complete lack of inflection born of repetition.
"No," said Riona.
"Are you carrying any items that are illegal in Lion's Arch or Divinity's Reach? Are you entering Lion's Arch with intent to commit any illegal actions or to flee Divinity's Reach authorities?"
Killeen started to say something, but Dougal quickly said, "No, we are not," and shot the sylvari a look to indicate that the asura really didn't want or need to hear about the Golem's Eye and their recent incarceration.
"Very well," said the asura, returning the document to Riona, "we should be ready to go in a few moments, if somebody"-she turned toward her assistant-"will stop sulking and tune the gate to its correct aetheric frequency."
The apprentice began to touch the various runes and jutting crystals in order, and the bronze light within the archway turned a deep golden shade. One by one, the various travelers approached the golden glow and disappeared.
Killeen stepped through without pausing. Dougal hesitated and looked at Riona. She made an "After you" motion, and it was clear that she wasn't going to leave him alone on this side of the gate. Mentally noting the lack of trust in these dragon-haunted days, Dougal stepped through.
It was no more difficult than stepping through the surface of a soap bubble. One moment he was in Divinity's Reach, the rising sun just cresting the walls ahead of him, the city around him in deep shadow. The next moment he and the others were in bright sunshine, leaving him blinking and raising a hand to protect his eyes. The air itself was different, changing suddenly from the cool, damp morning air to something warmer, fresher, and smelling of salt. The quiet energy of a city awakening was immediately stilled and replaced with the clamor of merchants and townspeople at work.
One moment he was in Divinity's Reach, and the next moment he was here. Dougal did not want to think about where he was in the space in between.
They stood on another low set of earthworks overlooking the merchant district of Lion's Arch. Around them, in a slight arch, were other gates, some with golden energies in their arches, some bronze, and some with a purplish hue. Next to them, three more asura were squabbling about performance issues.
Riona ignored them, passing Killeen and leading them down the steps into the Great Bazaar, following the other travelers.
The Lion's Arch of long ago was gone, its only remaining memory consisting of the battlements that survived the great waves from the Rising of Orr. When Zhaitan, the undead Elder Dragon, brought long-sunken Orr back to the surface, all lands surrounding the Sea of Sorrows were awash in great waves. Lion's Arch was almost utterly destroyed, and in its place was left a swamp of broken ships, snapped trees, and dead creatures.
Out of that morass, the new Lion's Arch arose over the past hundred years. The town was re-established by pirates and corsairs looking for a safe haven, and salvage crews reclaiming the flotsam and jetsam that had washed ashore. It soon blossomed into a cosmopolitan trading center.
The city showed its recent origin. Some of the newer buildings were stone, but most of the city was of wood. The original structures were built from the remains of wrecked ships tossed up on the beach, and that architecture so defined the city that even new construction was built along the lines of hulls and keels as opposed to walls and roofs. It was a scratch-built city, a lash-up made permanent, a temporary site that might yet outshine Divinity's Reach or the Black Citadel or even the asuran city of Rata Sum.
The people of Lion's Arch were as motley as its buildings. Before the Rising of Orr, it was a human city, a Krytan city. After the floods uprooted the houses and replaced them with shipwrecks, a transient population took hold, a brotherhood of the coast seeking nothing more than survival in an overturned world. The crews of the surviving pirate ships colonized the wreckage that was Lion's Arch, and their captains became the first leaders. As a result, Lion's Arch was ruled by a council of captains, and its morals and legality were always more flexible than in other great cities.
The new population was also more diverse than anything else seen in Tyria. Here you found humans but also equal or greater numbers of norn, asura, and sylvari. The occasional bloated, amphibian hylek or hunched, bucktoothed dredge stalked through the streets. The castoffs of a half-dozen nations and a plethora of societies all gathered here.
And charr. That was the part that concerned Dougal the most. The humans and charr were still at war in Ebonhawke, yet in Lion's Arch charr and humans lived, if not in harmony, at least within sight of each other without open hostilities. That was something Dougal, who had spent much of his youth hating and fighting the charr, had a hard time understanding.
The term most people used when describing charr was "feline," but beyond a few basic attributes, they were no kin to any cat Dougal had ever seen. They were huge, half again as tall as a man, not as massive as a norn but still towering opponents against a single human. Their faces were elongated muzzles, and their jaws were those of carnivores, filled with long teeth. Both males and females had four horns jutting from the sides of their skulls, the males boasting an impressive set and the females a smaller pair on each side, just behind the jawline. Beneath the horns hung two pairs of sensitive ears. The males had huge hunchbacked and maned shoulders, and while the females were more lithe and swift, they were no less deadly.
When Dougal first came to Lion's Arch, he was stunned by the presence of the charr, including charr dealing with humans and other races. He had a hard time looking at them without thinking of the implacable foes who drove the humans from most of Ascalon and besieged them in Ebonhawke-the creatures responsible for the Searing and the Foefire.
He never dealt with them, preferring a norn or human merchant to a charr one when he could. Even when forced to talk to one, he could feel his skin crawl and the small hairs on the back of his neck stand up. The charr were legendary for their tempers and their violence, and he was unsure what would set one of them off. And while he was fairly certain they could not smell his fear and unease, the charr were excellent observers, and his reticence to deal with them was obvious. He would never go into the crypts with a charr, or want to be left alone with one.
Now, walking down the stairs into the Lion's Arch merchant district, he saw charr for the first time in over a year: none would come to Divinity's Reach, any more than he would go to their main base, the Black Citadel. Already he felt uncomfortable by their very presence, even though the leonine creatures seemed more at home here than he was.
The Great Bazaar occupied a low spot surrounded by hills near the center of town. Great posts were driven into the hills, and from those posts were strung rope riggings and lines, the entire web covered by sheets of sailcloth dyed blue. From above, the patchwork of sails looked like a choppy ocean, and from below the cooler, sheltered market felt like it was cradled at the bottom of a shallow azure sea.
Around them brewed and bubbled the population of Lion's Arch, engaged in the trade that was the lifeblood of the city. There were farmers from the estates to the north and salvagers from the southern bays and estuaries. Asura and sylvari squabbled over the prices of glowing floating platforms and weapons made of twisted wood and butterfly wings. Norn roiled through the crowds like bears fording a stream. And the charr moved around, living their lives and ignoring the three new arrivals just like everyone else.
"Killeen!" came a shout behind him. The sylvari turned, and Dougal along with her. Riona hesitated for a moment, then kept walking.
Wading through the crowd was a heavyset golem, a crude creation of lumber and stone, as temporary as the rest of the city, a flat pane on its headless chest emitting a blue-green glow. One arm was much larger than the other, and both upper limbs ended in claws, making it look like a crude combination of man and fiddler crab. More important was the small asura directly in front of the golem, who became visible only as the crowds parted for the larger golem.
Clagg. In all his self-involved fury.
Dougal blinked and wondered if Logan Thackeray kept anybody in his jails anymore.
"Betrayer!" said Clagg. "You sold us out! You told the Seraph everything! For this you are going to pay!"
That definitely sounded like a challenge, and an opening appeared in the crowd with Killeen and the two humans at one end, the asura and the golem at the other. Dougal looked around and saw two Lionguard in the crowd. They were curious, but neither was stepping in to take matters in hand. As long as the disagreement didn't threaten any trade or merchants, Dougal doubted they would.
Lion's Arch was a good distance away from Divinity's Reach and its vigilant Seraph.
Dougal stepped forward, hand on his sword, to stand beside Killeen, but Riona put a hand on his shoulder. "He is talking to her, not you," she said, clearly enough for the sylvari to hear. "This is her problem."
"I don't see it as much of a problem," said Killeen. "I suppose you don't want to chat about this first?" she asked Clagg.
The asura responded with a curse and pointed at the sylvari. Emotionless and obedient, the golem lumbered forward. Killeen dropped into a crouch, and bright green motes bunched and flamed from her palms, gathering into swarms of necrotic energy.
She was too slow. The golem crossed the distance between them and smacked her hard with a limb the thickness of a ship's yardarm. She stumbled to one side and a second arm punched her hard back the other way. Killeen lost her footing and fell to the paving stones. Golden blood appeared at the corner of her mouth.
Clagg had apparently chosen to invest in speed over raw strength this time.
Dougal let out a shout and, shaking off Riona's hand on his arm, ran forward, drawing his sword. The blade came out roughly, catching the sides of the scabbard and threatening to pull it along with it, but he got the sword out and closed on the hulking golem.
Clagg shouted a command and the golem changed targets, wheeling quickly from the fallen sylvari and bearing down now on Dougal. The human reversed himself and danced backward a few steps, the heavy arm swinging through the space where Dougal had been seconds before.
The golem overextended itself and Dougal lunged forward, driving his blade into the joint where the huge claw-arm met the rest of the body. The blade dug deep into the juncture, and Dougal heard a very satisfying crack as he loosened the armatures holding the golem together.
The golem flexed its shoulder back, trapping Dougal's blade, and with a sharp snap crushed it in its joints. Dougal pulled back the shattered stump of his sword, stared at it a moment, and cursed.
The golem had regained its footing now. The smaller arm lashed out, its claw-shaped hand closing on Dougal's sword arm, and pulled him off the ground. Dougal let out a yelp as he dangled there, the golem drawing back its arm to deliver a blow that would knock the human into the Sea of Sorrows.
Riona leaped in at that moment, her own weapon jabbing quickly into the gap in the construct's shoulder held open by the shards of Dougal's blade. She was quicker than he had been, so that she pulled the blade out in a cascade of arcane sparks, and the lethal arm hung there, its internal runes and spells grinding to regain control.
Having gained the advantage, Riona did not hesitate but instead struck against the golem's now-exposed chest. The fragile pane at the golem's heart shattered at the blow, and elemental lightning spilled out in a shower of sparks. Dougal twisted in the creature's grasp as the energies played over its body.
The Vigil warrior was not done, and dropped to one knee and lashed out again, this time striking at the joints of the golem's knees. Another cascade of elemental energy spilled out as the crystals within were smashed open with the skill of a chirurgeon with a scalpel.
The golem froze up and let go of Dougal, who dropped the few feet to the ground. Then it pitched backward, leaving a surprised Clagg exposed beyond it.
"Stupid second-rate sword," said Dougal, looking over at Killeen, who was moving now, though not very fast.
Dougal pulled himself off the ground, but Riona was still quicker than he was, and flung herself on top of Clagg like an owl on a rabbit. Grabbing the asura by the throat, she hefted him up and pulled her sword back to skewer him. Clagg made a rattling noise, and his eyes were wide with fear.