Carol was not used to being considered important, up until now she had just been an assistant teacher at the university with dreams of becoming a professor one day. Now she had been invited to a highly official banquet at the king's court. This was because as a tower keeper she held one of Rockhaven's most respected positions, save for guild leaders and the ruler. She had not fully realized her importance until the messenger explicitly told her about it.
Now she was sitting in the ballroom of the royal palace and not at one of the smaller tables systematically scattered throughout the room. She sat at the large curved table where the king sat with his advisors, the guild leaders and guests of honor. In front of Carol was an empty plate with cutlery to both sides, the food and drink would later be served by demons, she knew that much about the royal banquets at least.
At the apex of the table sat King Hadrin Lichslayer of Rockhaven, the current ruler. The "of Rockhaven" was not part of his second name but of his royal title, the second name itself came from Rockhaven's campaign against the lich lord of Threepeak Mountain, he had been the one to kill the lich, thus ensuring victory. Hadrin's clothes were held in black, matching his fairly long hair as well as being representative of his position as the king of Rockhaven. On his head was the traditional silver crown of Rockhaven, serving as both a symbol of his status and protection against mind altering magic. The angular piece of headwear complemented his sharp features well.
Closest to King Hadrin sat his advisors, to his left sat Lady Beatrice, her dress was decorated with black feathers. She was the court representative of the Mage Guild. To the king's right sat Captain Bedrock. Carol didn't know the names of the other advisors, she had heard them once or twice but up until now they hadn't been relevant to her as a mage.
Carol herself sat to the right of a man with a bald head wearing a long leather coat who she presumed to be the representative of the alchemists. Carol most definitely knew who sat to her own right, it was Emilia Spellblade, the current archmage, dressed in purple robes with colorful decorations, indicating her status and mastery of all schools of magic. Normally Carol would have been a lot more nervous in her presence but she constantly told herself that she held an important position as well now.
On the last occupied seats to the left and right sat Fire and Shadow respectively, Carol had heard that the banquet somehow involved them but not how exactly.
She looked around the room some more, she saw some faces she knew from the guild, some of her former colleagues were there as well. On one table she spotted freeZe and the other three apprentices. She usually wasn't quick to make friends but she had gotten along well with her from the start and while she wouldn't really consider freeZe a proper friend, Carol was sure that she would become one if she were to stay in the city for longer.
King Hadrin spoke: "Ladies and Gentlemen, I am sure that you know that we gathered here today for a reason as such is the nature of royal banquets. I am not one for long speeches, I prefer to leave that to my advisors and guests of honor. The reason we are here is that our prized Axe will be leaving us shortly."
A murmur went through the attendants, it seemed that only few outside of the people sitting at the table with the king had known about this.
The king continued: "I have been given very good reasons for giving the Axe away, otherwise I would not be doing it. I was approached by Fire, a diplomatic envoy speaking on the behalf of Drandin as well as a large part of the Mencur-Besh population, both in Rockhaven and all over the rest of the world. Both of those parties have had a significant hand in the prosperity of our city so I was inclined to hear him out. He will now present the arguments he presented to me, to you."
Fire stood up and started moving his mouth but no sounds reached Carol's ears, everything was drowned out by a sudden surge of pain in her skull. The whispers had returned, strong as never before. Carol's brain was assaulted by sensations she could not comprehend, it was as if someone was talking in the demonic language, only much louder and much more insistently. She knew she was the mercy of the whispers, her spell had somehow gotten stuck on the eye and refused to be taken down. She heard red, saw the smell of rotten eggs, felt the concept of abstraction. She would have screamed if she could do anything but clutch her head. She didn't know for how long the whispers persisted, it felt like an eternity to her. Nobody in the room seemed to be paying attention to her since they were all listening to Fire.
Slowly she was able to take in sensations from outside again, she heard a voice: "…the walls from artificial bedrock and were forced to abandon it, I do not claim that we hold any rights to the Axe but it would certainly be safer in our hands than within reach of the traitors that crop up every now and again. We only hold Rockhaven's best interests at heart, since the city itself represents the heart of our culture."
The whispers died down to where Carol was able to completely ignore them. It seemed that she had only heard the tail end of Fire's speech, it still had been enough to tell her what he wanted. Honestly, from what little she had heard she couldn't find anything wrong, the Axe probably was safer with the Mencur-Besh. She had to admit to herself, the Mencur-Besh in general were much better than humans when it came to trustworthiness. The ones she knew always kept their promises and sometimes even went beyond what they promised. While they were certainly nosey as a whole, she had never heard of a flat-out malevolent Mencur-Besh. Mercenary Mencur-Besh existed but she couldn't hold that against them, human mercenaries usually accepted much dirtier work than Mencur-Besh.
It seemed that a lot of the people in the room had similar thoughts, indicated by the applause that the speech was met with. Though Carol still didn't know what Shadow had to do with all of this, her best guess was that she was affiliated with the Mencur-Besh seeing that she was a product of their experiments to enhance magical abilities and was here to support Fire's claims. Carol shook her head, still somewhat dizzy from the assault on her mind.
King Hadrin spoke again: "It seems that most of the invited population agrees, I have already talked this over with my advisors and the guild leaders and we have all come to the conclusion that having the Axe here in Rockhaven is a risk we do not want to tolerate for any longer. We have been lucky that so far any plots have not thought of utilizing the axe. Or have come far enough to make use of it for that matter." He paused and cleared his throat. "Now that that's done with, let's get to the part that most of you actually came for, the feast."
As he spoke the demon waiters were already bringing in plates with various foods and drinks, they were wearing many different types of clothes, some wore street clothes, others wore robes, one that tended to the curved table wore a pure white cloak. Carol was served a large side of beef that she hungrily eyed but didn't touch yet, she waited for everyone else to receive their plates before she began.
A few minutes into the feast, Fire stood up once again, this time with his goblet of wine in hand. "I would like to toast to King Hadrin, his court, the guild leaders and to the population of Rockhaven for allowing us to make Rockhaven a little bit safer than it already is."
With those words he raised the goblet to his lips and took a gulp. Everyone else raised their beverages as well but just before they were about to drink, Fire suddenly fell over onto the table, the rest of the wine spilling out of the goblet and leaving a large red stain in the tablecloth.
Absolute chaos broke out. A poisoning at the royal court! People threw away their drinks in fear that there might have been poison in them as well. Some even stood up and fled towards the exit.
A few seconds later a thundering voice filled the room: "Everyone stay where you are and calm the hell down! That is an order!"
Even without looking Carol knew that this voice belonged to Captain Bedrock, everyone knew and everyone respected his authority, even through the haze of panic.
Slowly order returned to the room, everyone went back to their seats. Meanwhile the few Mencur-Besh present at the banquet had gathered around Fire. They lifted him onto a gurney and carried him off. Carol had only seen this happen once before. If a Mencur-Besh died they would be carried to a building near the edge of Rockhaven so that they could burn up safely without endangering anyone. This was less than common knowledge and Carol only knew because she had looked into Mencur-Besh traditions for a while.
As the Mencur-Besh closed the doors behind them, King Hadrin spoke again, at first quietly: "Thank you Bedrock." He then raised his voice so that everyone could hear him. "A diplomat and former Guard captain was poisoned. Rockhaven is now on indefinite lockdown! Captain Bedrock will see to it that nobody can enter or leave the city. Emilia Spellblade will tune the wards above to block any magical attempts of escape. Anyone still attempting to leave will be captured and questioned. Furthermore the Royal Guard will start investigations into this matter, citizens and visitors alike are required to cooperate to the best of their ability. Anyone giving information that leads to the apprehension of whoever is behind this is welcome and will be rewarded after the fact. Any visitors to the city that are forced to stay longer than they anticipated will be compensated accordingly. The feast is cancelled, everyone go home and get some rest, you'll most likely need it."
Carol looked around, even as the attendants slowly got up and left, their faces still had fear written on them. Fire's and Shadow's apprentices were no exception to that. Shadow herself wore an expressionless mask. At the edge of her vision Carol noticed something, all of the demon waiters had lined up at the back of the room, save for one. The demon with the white cloak was leaving through a side door.
Before Carol had any opportunity to say something, the whispers returned in full force.