The rusted door gave on the third shove, with Yuzu’s good shoulder doing most of the honest work. Beyond it, the channel ran through a Maker trough in a round chamber, glowing the violet of bruises.
"Whoever built this basement owes me a new shoulder, along with a door that opens like a normal door," Ray wheezed, one hand pressed to his cracked ribs.
The tap stood in the trough’s heart, a black root as thick as a man held by four pins.
Each pulse of the root dragged a ripple upstream, the water bending toward it like grass under a wind. Demon runes squirmed along every pin, the same crawling script from the river spike, though older and much hungrier.
"It drinks straight from the trough," Yuzu said, kneeling at the edge with her burned arm cradled against her ribs, "though the water clears for a heartbeat after each pulse."
He crouched beside her, counting the pulses under his breath while the violet light crawled over both their faces.
"Twelve beats between gulps makes it the most punctual damn thing I’ve met in this whole world."
"Punctual things are easier to kill."
Above the trough, carved arches ringed the chamber, each one stitched with Maker runes gone dull under the violet glow.
’I have thirty mana, one charge in the fork and an empty gauntlet, so whatever I try here has to be cheap.’
He drew the pistol anyway, "I’m trying the expensive way first, while you stand back by the door to keep it open for me."
"You’re about to do something stupid."
"I’m about to do something educational, which only looks stupid from where you’re standing."
She backed toward the frame without taking her eyes off him, "Everything you call educational ends with me stitching you, but fine, the door stays open."
"Five mana a round at today’s prices is robbery, though I’d still call it cheaper than a funeral," he said, thumbing the hammer back.
He fed five mana into the round, the infused shot striking the root dead center with a flat crack.
A skin of violet runes flared across the bark, swallowing the shot like a still pond swallowing a pebble. The runes pulsed brighter afterward, fat and pleased like a stray dog that caught a sausage off a cart.
[ AMMUNITION ]
[Rounds Remaining: 42]
’That leaves twenty-five mana, enough for five more shots this thing will happily eat for dinner.’
"Tch, the expensive way is officially closed for business," he muttered, lowering the smoking pistol.
"Then what is the cheap way?"
He holstered the gun to draw the Breaker Dagger from the small of his back, "The cheap way is a knife, a lot of swearing and absolutely no plan B, so stay by that door while I—"
Something peeled itself off the far wall before he finished, a goblin husk grown halfway into the rock.
It came at him with crystal fingers spread wide, moving faster than anything so dead had any right to move. Ray caught the wrist but could not twist with his ribs, so he slammed his forehead into its face instead.
"Gah, your face is made of actual rocks, you ugly bastard!"
The husk staggered back a step, shook its cracked head once, then lunged again with its jaw hanging open.
Yuzu’s rapier slid past his ear and through the husk’s eye socket, pinning it to the wall like a moth.
"You’re welcome," she said, twisting the blade free with her good hand.
"I was handling it... but I’ll admit that was extremely cool."
The husk sagged on the blade, crystal crumbling from its joints until only a small grey goblin remained. It was thin as a child, its ribs showing through skin the water turned the colour of ash.
Yuzu studied it longer than she needed to, her mouth pressed into a line he was starting to know.
"This is what the water does to a body, the same water half the children in Kelford drink every morning."
He knelt beside the little corpse, closing its filmed eyes with two fingers before he said anything at all.
"Then we owe the kids a better cup tomorrow, starting with these four ugly pins," he said, rising with one hand on the trough.
He spat on his palm to take a fresh grip, "Breaker edge, meet ugly pin, and try to be the cheap date I need today."
The first pin was a spike of black iron, its runes skittering from the dagger like startled beetles. He set the breaker edge into the seam where pin met trough, leaning his weight into the grip.
The pin snapped with a shriek, cold racing up his arm as the root sucked mana through his palm.
"One down with three to go, though that one bit me like a loan shark collecting early!" he hissed, shaking out his numb hand.
"Your lips are going grey," she said, her own face pale with strain, "so warn me before you faint on top of that thing."
"I don’t faint, I take dramatic tactical naps."
She pressed two glowing fingers to his wrist, frowning at whatever the pulse told her, "Take your nap after the fourth pin, not one second before."
The second pin came out faster, the third much slower, each biting another greedy mouthful from his reserve. By the fourth his hands were shaking badly, the dagger tip rattling against the seam like a spoon.
She held a sunleaf vial to his lips without asking, "Drink this, since it buys you one more minute of steady hands."
"It tastes like a lawn somebody set on fire... but thanks."
"This last one is going to hurt like hell, isn’t it?"
She wrapped her good fingers over his on the grip, "Last one together on three, with no arguing from you."
"Partners on the last pin is either very touching or a terrible—"
"Three."
They threw their weight down as one, the fourth pin breaking with a sound like a bell cracking.
The root tore loose from the trough, dragging the last of his mana out through the dagger as it went. His vision swam grey at the edges, a dull ache settling in behind both his eyes like a bad hangover.
[ MANA ]
[Current: 0 / 50]
[Reserve Depleted]
Violet light drained from the trough in one long exhale, the water beneath it running clear at last.
Every rune on the arches dimmed with it, the whole chamber going quiet as his HUD flooded to life. The dead root shriveled into a black husk of bark, curling on the floor like a burned-out candle wick.
[ TAP #01 SEVERED ]
[Kelford Channel: Clearing]
[Contaminant Flow: Falling]
[ REMOTE ECHO LOGGED ]
[Bearing: North]
[Source: Unregistered]
’Something up north just felt that, which means it now knows somebody cut its line.’
Far off through the rock, something answered with a single pulse before going still.
[ FEAT RECOGNISED ]
[Contractor: Ray K]
[Feat: Tap Breaker]
[STR +3]
[AGI +2]
[VIT +3]
[PER +2]
[MANA: 50 → 90]
[Title Earned: Siphon Breaker]
[Blueprint Points: +10]
Heat ran down both arms like a hot bath poured over his shoulders, the shake leaving his fingers.
"Your hands just stopped shaking faster than any tincture of mine could manage," she said, frowning at his fingers.
"Ninety mana of brand-new capacity with exactly zero of it in the tank is the most me thing that ever happened," he wheezed, flat on his back beside the trough.
He rolled onto one elbow to dip his fingers in the water, watching it run clean between his knuckles.
"Holy hell, it’s actually clear, though somebody still owes me a very large drink for this."
"You’re squinting again, which is your worried face."
"I’m not worried, I’m only doing math on how many more of these roots are out there drinking."
"There’s something under where the root was," she said, crouching at the lip.
In a niche below the waterline sat a key of sea-dark bronze, dripping steadily though nothing around it was wet. When she lifted it out, his HUD framed it in a cold blue border kept for things older than kingdoms.
[ RELIC ACQUIRED ]
[Relic: The Drowned Key]
[Function: Opens Any Maker Lock]
[Limit: Once Per Day]
’A key that opens any Maker lock once a day is the kind of thing people bury whole families over.’
"Oh, hello, gorgeous, you’re coming home with me to live in your own little pocket."
"You’re flirting with a key now," she said, dropping it into his palm, "and even for you that is a new low."
He turned it over in the dim light, water beading on his fingers and running down his wrist.
"It’s wet without ever touching water, which is either a miracle or a plumbing problem... and I’m too tired to care which."
"That is Maker bronze, the kind the guild will want in a locked case."
"The guild can want in one hand and spit in the other, considering finders keepers is the oldest law there is."
He tucked the key into his inside coat pocket, where it soaked a cold patch through his shirt at once.
He lay by the trough through the rest of that day and most of the night while Yuzu kept watch.
He tried to stand until his knees voted otherwise, folding him down onto Yuzu’s good shoulder.
"I’ve got you," she grunted, bracing her feet, "so lean on me and try not to bleed on anything important."
"Everything I own is important, Doc, so that’s a very big ask."
"Then hold still, since you’re heavier than you look and I’m down to one arm."
They limped back through the vault, past the dead chieftain sprawled where it fell with its plates gone dull.
She half-carried him up through the galleries, his arm slung across her shoulders, her burned forearm held clear. Dawn was breaking grey over the northern bluffs when they stumbled out, the river below already running clearer.
"That sunrise is the first thing in two days that hasn’t tried to bite me or drink me dry."
He grinned against her shoulder, "Carry me like this through town and I’m telling everyone I rescued you."
"Heh, tell them whatever you like, since nobody in Kelford would believe it anyway."
She steered him down the bluff toward Kelford, the key dripping quietly in his coat pocket the whole way.