Mad Toffad's Keep

by Zack Finley

  Two of the new warehouses we'd purchased were side-by-side on the Klee docks. Tobron was in his element, designing a huge warehouse complex from the ground up. He was putting the finishing touches on a scale model of the complex and wanted my input before he broke ground. His design incorporated much he had learned recently about reinforcing stone with iron. Tobron was a strong earth mage having spent much of his adult life in construction. He also had many years of combat experience with the Klee King's Guard in his youth.

  When we first met him, he was semi-retired, working part-time as the Klee Mage Guild librarian. Tobron was the one who nominated Mad Toffad's Keep as the ideal location for our fortress. He was also the only one of our group to ever see it.

  When Argon and I first arrived in Klee, a representative of the Klee Mage Guild offered to introduce us to the king's chamberlain. That was the official way these things worked. We’d work through the chamberlain to establish our new keep. Instead, the guild representatives took our money and failed to do anything on our behalf. To add to the insult, they hired a private investigator to snoop on us.

  Everything changed in the past week. The Klee Mage Guild was now fawning over us. Now we no longer needed their help to set up a meeting with the chamberlain, they were falling all over themselves to help us. After we became a friend of the Klee crown, the shady guild representatives began spamming us with calls on our com-cards. The calls had been an unwanted distraction, and Argon terminated their com-cards.

  Tobron took charge of the problem and reestablished a formal business connection between our new business enterprise and the Klee Mage Guild. This time he made sure our new guild contacts were significantly more honorable.

  While I might prefer to kick their butts around the block, our enterprise would eventually need the guild's cooperation again. We needed good relations with the guild, especially once we began recruiting mages to join our keep.

  Argon spent part of this morning with bankers finalizing our business financing. She brought a variety of assets from one of Shala's treasure vaults to convert into Klee cash.

  Tobron nixed Argon's original plan to bring just a pile of gems. He worried it would deflate the local price of gems. He and Argon finally agreed on a mix of precious metals, gems, and several high-value luxury items. The bank brokered the sale of the luxury items for a small percentage. They had fetched significantly more than Tobron had expected.

  Our Klee bank account was now bulging.

  The exchange rate for currency from other locales was heavily discounted so we could not afford to transfer Klee currency to other kingdoms. This was one of the problems to deal with as we expanded trade with other countries and cities.

  In the next few days, we needed to meet with the Klee chamberlain to take possession of Mad Toffad's Keep. While we hadn't completed everything Klee King Ruton asked of us, we had made a substantial down payment. As a minimum, we needed to scope out what work had to be done before moving people to live there. So far Tobron was the only one of our group who had ever been to the keep, and he last visited decades ago. More than 100 years of isolation could cause a lot of damage.

  We also needed to hire a substantial workforce, along with families and livestock, to convert the empty keep into a vibrant, self-sustaining community.

  This emphasized the importance of recruiting talented and compatible leaders with a variety of different skills, from farming and forestry to metalwork and enchantments. We understood our labor needs were too great to pull from one, two, or even three kingdoms.

  At dinner, we were hoping to hear that Inoa and their son Cleon had successfully foiled the plot to foment chaos and destruction in Klee.

  It was fortunate we captured and hadn't just killed most of the mages attacking Augun. Under interrogation, the captives revealed a similar plot in progress in Klee. Forewarned, King Ruton recalled the entire Klee King's Guard and launched a clandestine kingdom-wide search for the culprits.

  Since the Augun plot involved a high-level traitor, the Klee leadership was aware they had a traitor amongst them.

  While cleaning up the remnants of the plot in Augun we had continued sending key captives to Inoa for questioning. After liberating the last Augun slave compound near Asme, Argon had teleported the last captive to Inoa. I was waiting for Argon to return when a slaver mage attacked with a magic spear and for me, time stood still. I still don’t know how I survived.

  I hoped Klee King Ruton and his forces dismantled the Klee coup while I was unconscious. I was also worried about the Augun King’s Guard attempting to hold Augun’s other main city, Flom. Argon refused to update me on what was happening in Augun until I got a clean bill of health from Alba. That was enough to tell me they still needed our help and I would want to go there right away.

  Argon and I still owed Klee King Ruton a trip to the city-kingdoms of Ylee and Kavil once I mended. We learned these two kingdoms were targeted by the assassins, weeks before the Augun attack. King Ruton wanted a status report on conditions there. So, did we.

  Once my healer cleared me to resume duties, my first priority would be to check in with Augun's King Rufix to resolve any outstanding issues with his kingdom. I was hoping the missing members of the Augun Mage Guild had been located.

  I feared a number of the Augun mages, along with thousands of other civilians were killed in the wanton destruction launched by the assassins throughout the kingdom of Augun. The assassins imported roving bands of slavers and murderers into the Augun countryside.

  We freed nearly 600 slaves before the rogue mage nearly killed me outside of Asme. Liberating the slave camps was intensely satisfying. I just feared there were still many more captives near Flom.

  “I doubt we will have much quiet time to study after Alba declares you fit for duty,” Argon said. “We should use this downtime to improve our survival skills. I prefer it if you block spears with stone rather than with your chest.”

  I winced at the well-deserved criticism. While I had no regrets sacrificing myself to save my mate, it still took me too long to cast emergency spells. I was still reacting as an Earth warrior, not a Jaloan mage. My muscle memory was still grounded on Earth and not Jaloa.

  Argon found a way to get me to study without threats; she reclined on the couch and settled me with my back leaning against her and my head pillowed between her breasts. Then she handed me the text I had barely cracked.

  She carefully avoided any sexual nuance, since sex was off the table until Alba determined I was fit for duty. Instead, Argon enfolded me with warmth, comfort, and encouragement. In that atmosphere, it was actually easy to settle in to study. How I loved that woman.

  The flesh magic primer was short on specifics, but it hinted experienced healers could determine where the magic was actively repairing flesh. This encouraged me to experiment.

  I could tell my shoulder and arm had come a long way since this morning, but they were still badly injured. I directed a healing boost towards them and added a flare to the magic. The flare caused the flesh magic I pushed into the tissues to glow red. Where the magic drained away without finding anything to heal, the red glow faded quickly. Where healing was active, the glow remained for several minutes. Then this area faded, and all the glow was gone. I was surprised how quickly the magic dissipated. I was also shocked at how easy it was to add the flare.

  As an experiment, I hit the area with a much stronger health boost. The red glow started out much brighter than before, but the healthy areas darkened nearly as quickly. The areas of active healing glowed brightly for several more minutes, but they faded away with time.

  I narrowed the scope of the spell to the areas in my shoulder where healing was noticeably taking place and hit it with a strong boost. I configured a series of 10 similar boosts to go off several minutes apart.

  As it was doing its work, I hit myself with a similar general health boost with a flare to identify where I needed to concentrate the rest of my healing regimen.

  No surpris
e, the red glow lasted longer in the lower priority areas I worked on earlier today and my damaged organs.

  I experimented on the organs individually and set up an automated series of healing boosts for each of them. The intense but targeted healing actually used less health magic than the more generalized pulses I used before.

  I checked my healing status at the end of each series and terminated or modified the next series as needed. I kept a close eye on these automated scripts at first, wary of depleting my supply of flesh magic. When the amount of magic used remained low, Argon helped me set an alarm on my healing magic supply to alert me if I started seriously drawing down my available flesh magic. Argon used similar alarms on all of her different magic supplies. I used so little of my magic we hadn’t needed to set alarms on my magic before now.

  We were both excited by my discovery believing this simple technique could revolutionize our healing effectiveness.

  We were eager to share the technique with Alba. Argon forced me to acknowledge research could be worthwhile, especially if it got me a clean bill of health in the morning.

  The healing sessions had restored my injured arm and shoulder by the time we left for dinner. The skin on my chest was still a paler color than the rest of my skin, but it had regained its normal leathery texture. Argon thought the skin area was fully healed and would likely always be lighter.

  My lung-like organ had grown significantly since this morning, but it still didn’t fill the full cavity. It would need continued attention to return to its former size. I set up a series of healing boosts for it to last until bedtime when I planned to reassess the situation.

  The other organs were no longer glowing from my healing boosts, so I discontinued servicing them.

  We took Alba's advice and ate a small snack before teleporting to Tobron's for dinner.

  When we ‘ported in, Tobron embraced us both with big bear hugs. He ushered us into the family room. Inoa swept in from the kitchen to greet us, hugging Argon first before coming to stand in front of me.

  Inoa was a slight woman with a fierce intellect. What she saw must have satisfied her because she threw her arms around me in a diminutive version of her husband's bear hug.

  Jaloan mages typically do not touch each other. Rather than shake hands, they do a head bob to acknowledge one another. Touching reduces the effectiveness of mind shields and can leave one mage vulnerable to another. That Tobron and Inoa were comfortable enough to embrace us, was another sign of the closeness of our friendship.

  "It is so good to see you have recovered. I know we aren't supposed to discuss your injuries tonight," Inoa said, glancing at Argon with a grin, "but we were so worried."

  "Come, come," Tobron said with a gesture toward the kitchen, "First we eat, and then we talk."

  We had definitely moved from guests to family, as Argon helped Tobron put the food dishes on the kitchen table.

  The food smelled wonderful, and I almost regretted having an earlier snack, until I tasted it. I shoved all thoughts about the food into the private mental area shared only with Argon and Allo, no need to hurt Tobron's feelings.

  Despite the food, there was plenty of animated conversation over the meal. Tobron brought us all up to date on most of the business happenings he’d been covering while we were out of touch. We still agreed not to bring anyone into our inner circle unless all four of us approved, but we needed to add more people. Our new hires would be on probation until we could give them a complete shakedown.

  We stood on the brink of scaling up our nascent organization from just the four of us to thousands. Despite this, we hadn't even discussed what the organization needed to look like to give us the best chance of success.

  We congratulated Tobron on doing a great job keeping our new business afloat on his own while Argon, Inoa, and I were off doing other stuff. We also agreed Tobron needed a lot more help to move forward.

  While military organizations were scalable and worked well for command and control, they stifled innovation and came with their own baggage.

  It finally hit me, our enterprise would soon have a life of its own. The decisions we made now and the foundation we established during the next few weeks could determine our success. Or our failure.

  We urged Tobron to hire anyone he thought could help. We now had sufficient funds in the Klee bank and access to what he needed to manage any regional trading.

  For now, we agreed to keep the prophecy secret, between the four of us. Tobron reported there were plenty of young mages and mundanes interested in hiring on with a new keep. While the youthful recruits exuded excitement, he worried they would require a lot of oversight and training.

  To bolster their enthusiasm, we needed a core of experienced staff to help manage the business. The four of us could not be everywhere we needed to be.

  “I’ve had several inquiries from experienced people, but so far no one has applied. High performing people already have good jobs. They don’t need to change jobs and risk everything on a new enterprise. We may have to rely more on recruiting family and close friends, at least until we have something concrete to offer those watching from the sidelines,” said Tobron. “Cleon and Alba are ready to join, we just need to get past this current crisis in Klee to make that happen. I’ve got feelers out to the rest of my children and my siblings.”

  “What about retirees? Any success there?” Argon asked.

  “Many of my old cronies are bored with retirement, but most are reluctant to jump into something that will take away all their leisure time. At least so far.”

  "What if we hire them to mentor one or more apprentices? They can make the youth do the heavy lifting while they provide guidance?" I asked. "We can work around their schedules and be creative about their pay."

  “I’ll suggest this compromise to some who seemed interested but were reluctant to commit to something this big. I know a number who would get on board full time if we told them about the prophecy. They would insist on bringing in their entire family if we let them," said Tobron.

  While tempting, we agreed the risk of revealing Shala's prophecy and our designated mission, would be too great right now. We could easily find ourselves fighting against guilds and kings should they feel threatened.

  Our aim to hire only honorable people could backfire on us when we finally told everyone the full truth. We needed to share the main goals with those who signed on, without turning the existing powers against us. We agreed this could not be resolved until after we moved our main headquarters to the new keep.

  Tobron suggested telling new recruits one of the gods gave Argon and me the sacred task to build a keep. Anyone with truth sense could tell we thought it was true. Since no one could predict why a god did anything, that part of the mission shouldn't bother guilds or kings.

  That would leave the apocalyptic prophecy as our most closely held secret. Our own people would still feel some betrayal whenever they learned the full secret. If they learned too late to save their families, it could destroy our keep from within.

  We nearly adopted Tobron's suggestion right away, but Inoa urged us to think it over carefully. She reminded us once we shared the information, it couldn't be taken back. We tabled the decision for now.

  Tobron cleared the dishes during the discussion and suggested it was time to move to the living room. I assured everyone I wasn't tired and pleaded to know anything Inoa could share about the current situation in Klee.

  "We have the traitor," Inoa said without preamble. "The king gave me permission to tell you this because you provided the key information that led us to him. While the traitor has a death geas protecting his bosses, it didn’t protect any of his confederates. Now we have them, too."

  Squads of Klee King's Guard bolstered by mages from the Klee Mage Guild staged simultaneous raids on the 19 subordinate mages involved in the Klee coup attempt.

  The guard killed two of the enemy mages along with more than 100 slavers and pirates staged at the docks.

&nb
sp; The squads bagged the 17 other mages. Inoa and her team questioned the captured mages. Each mage also had a death geas. That did not hide the identities numerous Klee citizens hired for key roles in the assassination plot.

  Squads of vetted members of the Klee King’s Guard arrested about 40 active members of the Guard implicated in the plot, along with a growing list of Klee residents. Inoa said so far none of the residents knew details about the plot and the Klee King's Guard Commander expected to release most civilians who hadn't committed crimes in the next day or so. The arrested guards would not be so lucky.

  The traitor was a Klee King’s Guard captain in charge of supply and logistics for the realm. He cherry-picked most of a company of troops under his command, planning to assign them as secret police once the assassination unfolded. His choices were providing the guard commander with a veritable who's who of troops with shady morals. The traitor's entire command was under house arrest as the commander assessed their fitness to remain part of the king's guard.