Chapter 2: Part 4 - A Chilling Discovery

The ruins of the guild hall didn’t look any better on Erin’s return to Lion’s Arch. If anything, after days of being picked over by scavengers and rained on once or twice, they actually looked worse.

“Couldn’t you have kept the thieves away?” she asked Ivar, when he met her outside.

Ivar gave an eloquent shrug, which said more than words ever could. Erin supposed he was right. The guild hall was now a mess of soggy, blackened wood. There probably wasn’t anything worth stealing.

“You’ve been in there?” Erin asked.

Ivar grimaced. “Once or twice. Darr had a list of papers he wanted me to salvage.”

“Did you find any of them?”

“Not a single one.”

“Then what am I doing here?”

Erin had sent the twins back to the Grove without accompanying them personally; Darr’s note had made her presence in Lion’s Arch sound like a matter of urgency. She was starting to question that, though. There was nothing to see here and absolutely nothing worth hurrying for.

“Let me answer that.” Darr’s voice made her turn. He stood a short distance away, leaning on his cane. “My work here has been most enlightening.”

Erin folded her arms and tried to hide her impatience.

Darr, it seemed, was in no mood to be rushed. “I should start by saying that my inquiries into the financial backing for Yinn’s game have reached a dead end. I can tell you no more on that front than I could before.”

Yinn’s game, to Erin’s mind, felt like a lifetime ago. It hardly mattered who’d funded it, when they had a private war on their hands ‒ and a mysterious weapon on the loose. “So you’re not going to tell me Taria Valpari was involved?”

“In that? No.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Darr walked away without answering, forcing Erin to follow. They made a slow circuit of the guild hall, the smell of scorched wood thick in her nostrils. Darr didn’t stop until they’d reached the building’s rear wall, which was in even worse shape than the rest.

“What do you see?” he asked, with the kind of asura smugness Erin was far too familiar with.

“Darr.” Erin gave him a pointed look. “Just tell me.”

“Oh, very well.” Darr’s tone made it clear she was being no fun at all, but he tapped the bottom of the wall with his cane. “The burn marks in this location indicate it was the locus of ignition.”

“He means where the fire started,” Ivar put in.

Rather than hit her brother over the head, Erin focused on Darr. “Started by what?”

“My question exactly. I have conducted extensive interviews of inhabitants of this area. No-one can recall this alleyway being used for storage, or otherwise blocked in any way. It’s too useful a thoroughfare to the docks. We’re certainly not looking at a spontaneous fire in any improperly stored goods.”

“A different kind of accident, then,” Erin guessed. “An elementalist waving their magic around, or a stray ember from someone smoking a pipe.”

Darr looked stern. “Even the most junior elementalist is taught more control than that. No, what we’re looking at here was far more deliberate.”

Deliberate. The word sank into Erin’s thoughts. She shook her head, wishing she could dislodge it. “Arson,” she said flatly.

“Yes, and of a very particular kind.” Darr gestured with his cane again. “Come with me.”

They were off again before Erin could complain. Darr led them to the front of the guild hall, then through the sagging doors. Inside, the smell of burning was even stronger. Even Ivar looked disgusted.

But a small folding table had been set up not far from the doorway. Darr pointed to it. “See for yourself.”

Erin did, though she wasn’t sure what she was seeing. An array of screws, wires, and charred pieces of metal were strewn across the table.

Finally, she’d had enough. “Darr. If you’re trying to tell me the guild hall was bombed, just come out and say it.”

“Not bombed.” Darr nudged a blackened crystal with one finger. “But your supposition isn’t far off the mark. This device was designed to ignite on its own, at a set time and date. There was enough fuel inside to ensure it reached a significant temperature, at which point the fire spread to the guild hall.”

Erin opened her mouth, then closed it again when it became clear Darr hadn’t finished.

“A chilling discovery, indeed ‒ but more important by far is the place of the device’s manufacture. Parts of the exterior casing were stamped with the name of a foundry in Divinity’s Reach. The interior workings, too, are of human design. And it would have been expensive to manufacture. These timing crystals come from a specific lab in Rata Sum. As far as I know, their work is still in the development stage. They would have required a significant monetary contribution before they parted with even a single crystal.”

For a moment, Erin wanted to close her eyes and let the scorched ground swallow her whole. “You’re telling me Taria Valpari made this. Before we’d even heard of her, she made this and tried to kill us all.”

Darr shrugged. “I doubt the lady herself is an engineer, but it’s possible. You are correct with the rest, though. I think it highly unlikely anyone else was involved.”

“Thank you, Darr.” Erin put a hand on his shoulder, nodding to herself. Taria Valpari. She’d tried to kill the entire guild, including one of her own family; even if she’d known the twins were absent, Marissa had been in the hall that day. And even if murder hadn’t been her goal, the alternatives weren’t much better. What else could she have been trying to do? Distract them? Scare them off? With fire?

Or was this, in fact, not Taria’s doing? Who else might have access to the same resources, but far fewer scruples?

Erin said her farewells to Darr and her brother as quickly as she was able. Then she headed back across the city, almost running. She cut to the front of the queue for the asura gate, not caring who complained. For once, she hardly noticed the strange disorientation that gate travel produced. She was only relieved to be back in the Grove, back outside the inn where she’d left Caolinn and the twins…

The inn that was now in an uproar.

Sylvari weren’t panicky types, but Erin could see their consternation. There was a crowd of them around the front door, with more in the corridors inside. Erin waded through the press and up the stairs.

What she found at the top was both better and worse than she’d expected. There was overturned furniture, gouges in the walls, one door torn right off its hinges. There was no blood, though, and there were no bodies.

Instead, apart from the sylvari babbling behind her, including one very angry innkeeper, there was silence. Too much silence. Caolinn, the Valpari twins, even Ruby… They were gone.