text: You skate up the stairs taking three at a time and find a door at the top of the stairs. You pull out your lockpicks and begin to jimmy the door. Within seconds you hear the lock 'click' and you slide inside closing the door behind you. You hear a creak and some sniffling sounds somewhere in the room. It's very dark, all of the windows are shuttered, and you negotiate the room by sound and touch rather than lighting a lamp and giving yourself away.
  
  
  Following behind your sword, you investigate the dark room and try to track the noise before someone or something gets the drop on you. When the sound is made again, you rush to the wall ripping off a tapestry and see a that it hides a small doorway. You open it in a flash, sword back to provide a fatal stab. To your surprise a young girl, perhaps sixteen years in age is in hiding.
  
  
  You look at her frightened face, streaked with tears and the knowledge that none of her family made it through whatever happened downstairs. She screams at the sudden discovery and scrambles as far back in the hidden compartment as she can go. You curse your luck and say, "Be quiet girl! I'm not here to hurt you! Pray you haven't woken the neighborhood!"
  
  
  You quickly move away from the whimpering girl and check the windows. Sure enough two Turric Swordsmen and a Wardog are on the prowl. The dog starts to bark and drag the two soldiers towards the house.
  
  
  "Shit!" You hiss and move back to the secret compartment. Pulling up the tapestry you tell the girl, "No matter what you do, no matter what you hear, do not leave this compartment for the next few hours unless you hear me say 'Defender'." You slide a dagger her way and say, "And no matter what, don't let them take you alive, if this place is discovered, if this flap is opened and they try to take you, slice your throat, plunge this into your chest but don't let them take you out of here. No matter what!"
  
  
  You close the hidden door, drop the tapestry, close and lock the door to the first floor, and hide behind a desk. When those bastards come through they're going to pay dearly.
  
  
  The sound of heavy boots tromping up the stairs follow a barking dog. They try the lock, try it again, and then start trying to bash the door in. The door survives four solid charges before the door rips off of the hinges and the men and beast rush in swords drawn.
  
  
   
  > You kill the men, then the dog.
  You decide that men with swords beat out a hound so you ready your ambush by hiding behind a desk and wait for them to rush in. They do as you predict and you pop up from behind the desk and toss three throwing knives, two at the leader, one at the man following him. The first bounces off the lead man's armor. The second catches him in the neck and he goes down grasping at his throat. The third narrowly misses the following soldier by inches.
  
  
  You draw your short swords which are a good matchup against the wide swinging barbed scimitars the Turric use, at least in confined spaces. Then you leap over the desk ready to take the second soldier out.
  
  
  He charges as you rush to meet him. His swing is wild and you parry it ducking into a tumble and swing low cutting his foot off at the ankle. As you roll into a crouch you are hit from the side by the wardog which barrels into you knocking you off balance. It bites for your throat but you sacrifice your arm instead losing your left hand sword in the process. The short sword rings off of the wooden floor and skitters several feet away as you use your other sword to stab the dog in the ribs.
  
  
  Even as you stab the dog and it yelps, the other soldier levels a boot at your head and kicks you so hard you see sparkles and blackness for a second. The dog rends a massive rip in your bracer and blood spurts from the open wound into it's mouth. You stab it again and it collapses.
  
  
  The second warrior raises his Barbed Scimitar as you struggle to get the dog's dead weight off of your own body. You scream as the blade comes down cutting deep into your skull. Death is instantaneous.
  
  
  YOU HAVE FAILED!!!