Chaos erupted in the council chamber of the king as soon as the skinwalker took the visage of their esteemed ruler. Royal guards surrounded the group in every direction while several more guards approached their king’s doppelganger hesitantly.

  “Kill!” Roared the dwarven king.

  His guards shifted into movement, but right before the first spear made contact, thick black smoke rolled up and enveloped the council chamber in the same magical darkness the group faced in the cave.

  All senses were lost within the eerie darkness. Vorin, Prith, and Zuls had huddled together right as the guards moved to attack the skinwalker, and now they were holding onto each other tightly while slowly shuffling towards where the door was. They had no idea where the commander or the other two guards were and Vorin figured they would have a better chance of living than three strange adventurers.

  Bright lights erupted through the absolute darkness dispelling it instantly. When their vision returned, the trio realized they were only a few steps from the exit. Two guards stood in their way and stared at them in utter confusion. Their eyes quickly moved from the trio to the throne which caused the trio to turn around as well.

  Sitting on the throne, there was one King Drawgdar. A few feet to the right was another being escorted by several royal guards. The entire room froze, and eyes flicked quickly back and forth. It was the king being escorted that broke the silence.

  “Kill!”

  “Kill!” Yelled the other one in an identical voice.

  “Clearly, it is the imposter.”

  “We’ll see.”

  Royal guards stood like statues while the two kings attempted to prove themselves the real one until the one being escorted charged at the one on the throne. An axe materialized out of thin air and sliced down through the air. Power was buzzing off the blade, and it made a whistling sound before it collided with an empty throne. The beautiful metal royal artifact was cut clean in half.

  Another axe materialized, this one was from the king being attacked. He dodged the attack by pushing off from the throne into a slide under the other’s swing. His axe was about to slice the other in the flank when several royal guards caught it with their shields before separating the kings.

  “Both of you need to end hostilities until we can figure this out.” Another royal guard stepped between them and activated an ability that produced barriers around both dwarves.

  “Captain! This is ridiculous. You will release me now!”

  “No! Release me! I’m your king!”

  “I will not risk our real king being injured by the imposter.” He turned around and looked down at the group. “Bring those prisoners to me. They have information we need!”

  Royal guards surrounded the group again and started closing in on them. None of them seemed to notice that there was one less prisoner, however. When their attention was on the fight between the king, Vorin had whispered to Zuls to turn invisible with Whimper’s ability to sneak out and find the others. Prith and himself would stay to help smooth over the incident and plead for the original help promised.

  Slowly the five prisoners were led up a small flight of steps towards where the two kings were detained. When they arrived the captain of the royal guard spoke once more.

  “Now, you said these were called Deep Skinwalkers?”

  “Correct! One of their party members was able to identify them.” The commander of the city guard answered.

  “Alright, which one?”

  “It was the real Synexus. The boy that the first skinwalker wore as a disguise.”

  The captain sighed. “Okay, and where is he now?”

  Vorin took the chance to get a word in. “We don’t know. Presumably he is still down in the cave with the infestation.”

  “That’s unfortunate. Is there any way to tell these things apart from the original?”

  If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  “We have it from a dependable source that they can’t copy the soul meaning they can’t use the originals abilities.”

  “That cannot be true. We just saw both King Drawgdar’s use an ability to summon an axe.”

  “That is true and when we checked everyone outside of the mine entrance, Synexus or more accurately the skinwalker wearing Synexus’ visage was able to perform one of his abilities.” Vorin quickly responded.

  “But, Captain, what if he didn’t use an ability, what if the flower and the axe were just extensions of their bodies. We know they can bend their flesh to almost any shape. What if they create more flesh to grow a flower or axe from their limb?” Prith broke his silence to try and make sense of what they had seen.

  “That would make sense, Prith. By that logic then they wouldn’t be able to separate from physical objects since it’s part of their skin. That is where your solution lies.” Vorin turned back to look at the royal guard captain.

  “Hmm. If what you say is true, then one of these kings should be able to drop their axe while the other could not. Interesting.”

  Instantly one of the kings dropped his axe to the bottom of the barrier. It clanged against the green magic of the barrier floor.

  “Try that, imposter.”

  The other scowled at the first before releasing the grip on his axe. Surprisingly, it fell and clanged against the barrier all the same as the first.

  Without even turning around the guard captain addressed the prisoners.

  “What do you make of this?”

  “I believe you need to drop the barriers and have the two kings move several feet away from their axes.”

  “Very well. Do as he said.”

  Without question the kings started to back up once the barriers were dropped. One was more hesitant than the other, but anyone could be nervous about leaving their weapon with a threat in the room. As soon as they were both five feet from their axe the guard captain turned around.

  “It seems our theory has been proven false.”

  “Not quite.” Prith replied.

  “Whatever do you mean?”

  “Look at the one on the left closely.”

  The captain of the royal guard turned and started to inspect the king that Prith identified. Several moments went by before he spoke once more.

  “Ah I see. I wouldn’t have caught that before.” A second later a glowing spear tip flashed out and went straight through the king’s head. All the other guards in the room dropped their jaws until the corpse bubbled and melted into black flesh.

  “I’m sorry, how did you know? I don’t understand.” The commander of the city guard asked.

  “An extreme thin thread of flesh running from the foot of this creature to the axe. It was the same color as the floor. I only noticed it after a close inspection. A most impressive catch. Thank you, Prith, wasn’t it?”

  “It is indeed, and no thanks are necessary. We did not intend to bring one of those abominations to your king. We were fooled the same way.”

  “If anything, this proves how big of a problem this could be. For all we know, there could be thousands of these within your city. We need to act.” Vorin took the chance to plead once more.

  Drawgdar had been silent since they began the tests. When Vorin addressed him, he stayed silent. Instead of speaking he went back towards his axe and picked it up. With a grip on the shaft, he raised it above his head. The anger burning over his face was Vorin’s answer. They would have their help.

  ***

  Zuls took off running with her invisibility active. She made great time by jumping across the rooftops instead of walking through the congested streets. Her destination was the mine entrance to warn Shell, Yu, and Gene. They needed to find a way to help Kumo and Synexus.

  When she got there, she found no one. The entrance to the mine was how they left it, but there was no sign of the three left to watch it. After a few seconds, however, she got the familiar tingle in her mind of Shell trying to speak through telepathy.

  “Zuls, we are over here in the forest. One second, we will come to you.”

  Moments later Shell, Yu, and Gene came from the direction of the forest and ran over to Zuls.

  “Sorry about that. We were keeping our distance to not make our presence obvious. Where are the others? Did we get the help?”

  “Unfortunately, I’m not sure. The Synexus and Kumo we left with were skinwalkers.”

  All three looked surprised and exclaimed in unison. “What?!”

  “It was a surprise to us as well. He attacked the king. Then Kumo transformed into the king. Vorin told me to leave and find you all before I could see what happened. Right now, we need to make a plan to help Kumo and Synexus. Every second they are down there could be there last.”

  “As much as I think we all would love to go rushing down there to save our friends, I must advise caution. We have no idea how many numbers the skinwalkers have. Splitting up the group with their brand of trickery in play doesn’t seem wise. I feel that we need to believe in Synexus and Kumo to take care of themselves. Even at such a low level, they are both tough opponents.”

  “We can’t just wait here!”

  “I’m not saying we do. I’ll fly into the city and figure out the conclusion of what happened to Vorin and Prith. Then we make plans. If we can’t get the city to help us, then all of us going down there together is better than splitting up.”

  “I agree with Gene in this matter. We need to leverage our intelligence against the enemy.” Yu added.

  “Fine, but if it comes down to it, I’ll flood the entire mine. They will get out of this alive.” Shell clenched her fists.

  “I’ll admit it will be hard to sit here and wait, but it does make sense to give ourselves the best chance. If we run off unprepared then we could end up becoming liabilities. However, I will not wait more than one hour. Me and my bonded will go in alone if we have to.”

  “Trust me, Zuls. You won’t have to.”

  After Shell’s last words on the matter, Gene flew off toward the city. In an hour they would enter the mine once more, with or without help.