The introduction to my new 7th Sea game

The Explorers and their charge ducked down a tight alleyway just in time to avoid a half-dozen of the Cardinal's men as they rushed past. They were all breathing heavily for running and fighting, but there was exilleration there too. A mad amusement that can only come from battle.

The Montaigne swordsman gestured for the others to follow back out into the streets. "We are almost there," he said with a thick accent, and added under his breath: "I think." The streets and canals of the Vodacce city were maddeningly complex from a foreigner's perspective. Why in the world they would trust boats and stinking rivers to carry their goods and people through town, the swordsman would never guess.

They had only broken cover by a few steps with the cry came out. No one waited to be told, they simply drew their blades and formed a circle, backs together and waited for the press of men that was sure to come. The nobleman who was their charge smiled bitterly. "A raging battle through zee streets was not what I had intended when I asked you to help me put and end to a war." His words were chastising, but his eyes betrayed his amusement. His blade had proven no less eager to taste inquisitor blood.

The first group of inquisition soldiers threw themselves against the group, and for a moment there was too much confusion to hold a real conversation. Never-the-less, it didn't stop them from trying.

"Begging your pardon, your Lordship, but there was really very little choice after the Ussuran decided to take missuer Andres' cloak by wrenching it off his neck." He ducked one blow, caught another with his crossed rapier and main-gauche, and then kicked his assailant backwards to make room for a fatal thrust.

The big Ussuran snorted, and brought his blade down heavily onto the weapon arm of yet another brute, severing it cleanly. "I had no choice. It was a skin taken from brother hinde without permission. The thing screamed for me to set it free."

Their Avalonian companion laughed a bit."Next time someone's garments start yelling at you, could you give us a touch of warning perhaps?" He swung his axe in a tight circle, bringing all the force he could forward onto the neck of the man facing him. His face still bore a look of surprise as his head rolled into a gutter while the body fell back into a canal.

"Enough." The nobleman seemed amused by their banter, but he was on an important mission. A quick riposte and an almost surgical thrust into the heart ended his opponent, and he began to move almost immediately through the breach he had created. "We need to move before half the city is upon us." He glanced into the canal at the boats stopped there to watch the battle. "Follow me." With a smooth motion he dropped down into the canal, stopping long enough to tip his hat to the man whose boat he had landed in, and the leapt from ship to ship until he reached the far wall, and scrambled up it.

With a smile and a shrug the Avalonian followed him, not even glancing back to see his two companions finish off the last of the patrol and run after him. Within minutes they were away from the patrols, their enemies just a cacophony of shouts and alarms well behind them. The next time they ducked into an alley it was because they had arrived at their destination. The Explorers' charge knocked three times in quick succession at the door before them, and a tall Castillian dressed in black answered. "Missuers," Lord Defoe said as he introduced them to their host, "I present you with the Marquis Darius Vilanova de Castille."