by S.R. Cassady
“Apparently.”
“That’s a third of your crew. What I see here are mostly younger members, and if I was to guess from what I observe, they’re not all that proficient in arms. You’re in trouble — this is a new gang and we’re being owned.” We. I guess the guild is still part of my heart — well, Amber is — so this is a “we” thing. “What I don’t get is what Amber’s role is. Why do you think she was with me?”
Tavos releases a giant sigh and deflates within his chair. “It’s nice to have you back, Pinty, though just for this. I miss your quick insight.” He looks to Squints, who simply glowers at me some more. “We got a note. It said that if the guild closes up operations peacefully we will get Amber back unharmed. There’s no way I can agree to fold up the guild, even for my daughter.”
“I see that.”
“So, I looked to who could put together a new guild and came up with you.”
“I’m flattered.”
There is a moment here. It’s obvious that Tavos is coming a bit undone. “So, where does that leave me? Most of my senior members are dead. My daughter is held for ransom. And I have just found out my number one suspect is innocent of all charges. Well, innocent of all but one guild death, but I’m sure you’ll deny any wrongdoing, circumstances and all.”
I clear my throat. I like to do that when I suggest something that could significantly, seriously and permanently, harm me. “How about I resolve this for you. You know, I do this and maybe I don’t have to think that someday my skin will be a taxidermy project on display down here.”
It takes a moment for Tavos to think about it, still concerned that this is all part of a bigger trap on my part, that I’m muscling in on his territory. After that moment he simply nods his head.
I leave, taking Muel — now uncuffed — with me back to the Bottom Up. Halfway there I get him to piggyback me. It’s a hard life, you know.
Chapter 9
Horace is at the bar with the books laid out, tallying up last night’s take in coin and promissory notes. There is a select, very select, group of regulars that I extend credit to: the type of people who are good to have in your debt when favors need to be called. Gloom lounges beside Horace and looks up from a bowl of fresh-drawn milk. A handful of the regular tavern staff go about midday chores.
“First off,” I begin, hobbling to the foot of the stairs and contemplating the pain my ribs are about to experience with every step up, “I want all the bedding burned, the rooms cleaned from top to bottom, and the very concept of flea obliterated from anyone’s vocabulary when it comes to the Bottom Up.” I add a long and witheringly murderous glare for good measure. “I will not have anyone, en-ee-one, make reference that my bar provides hospitality to vermin, even one-bit cutpurses in need of additional scars.”
The staff of the Bottom Up has seen that look before. Horace gives the right response: a short “Okay, no problem.” Gloom simply calculates if this might be the right moment of weakness, with my broken ribs, to take me down. Thankfully the cat comes to the opinion he’s too full of fresh milk to make the physical effort and settles down into a round lump of fur. The rest of the staff keep their distance.
“Second, find Mavis and ask her if she can get my adventuring kit ready for tomorrow morning. That includes a full set of her concoctions in quick-use vials.”
“She’s out back managing the deliveries and giving them hell. I’ll make sure she knows,” says Horace.
“And Horace . . .”
“Yeah?”
“After that, go tear down every temple in this town until you find an honest-to-goodness healer that can channel who knows what — demon or angel, I don’t care, as long as what they do knits my ribs back together by sunrise.”
Horace almost breaks a smile. “So not the one from last time. I kind of liked him.” The last one made me bathe in rancid butter and cat piss for hours while chanting for divine intervention. The only intervention he needed was Muel holding me back while he hightailed it away from me. Even Gloom gave me space for a week after that. The smell was indescribable.
Speaking of which: “And feed Gloom. Constantly. I need my rest. And make it something he likes, maybe flesh.” The round ball of fur lets out a very audible rawr of happiness and gives Horace a look. At least for the next twenty-four hours, it’ll be Horace that will suffer Gloom’s wrath if he goes hungry.
A slightly paler Horace asks, “Anything else, sir?”
“No, that’s all.” I climb the stairs, fall back into my room, and wait for the healer to arrive.
Chapter 10
The ribs still ache but it’s nowhere near the pain one would expect from having broken them the day before. I push back the covers, slide off the bed and stretch. Joints pop, muscles complain, but I should be good to go. I’ll have to commend Horace on the healer and make sure I use him next time. Finding one with actual talent is rare.
On the chest beside me, laid out like a paper doll could just slide into them, are my leathers, cleaned, pressed and mended. Pants, shirt, vest, braces, greaves, gorget, boots, socks, belts, hood, pouches, backup daggers, tools and some coins.
To the right and left of the clothing, on their own display tables, are the real lookers.
On the right, my trusted knife of many years. Well, for me it acts as a sword; maybe more of a dagger to others. Or a toothpick to Muel. It’s nothing special, a little heavy for its size. The edge has been sharpened over and over and on a few occasions I’ve had it reforged instead of sharpening it away to nothing. I know you’re not supposed to forge new steel on top of old, but there are a lot of things you’re not supposed to do and this is my knife to do with as I wish.
On the left is a well-worn metal, reinforced, belt-mounted strongbox. It looks a lot like an extra-large alcohol flask: thin, wide and with the backside curved to wrap around my hip. The top is designed to flip open after pushing the exact latch combination from a series of buttons on the strongbox’s front. Inside are a variety of glass and metal vials. Some are designed to shatter once thrown, others to resist instant corrosion from the dangerous liquids inside. The contents of each vial are Mavis’ specialties, her craft. Every container is hand filled with a concoction of her design.
I dress, fidget a bit with the belts and buckles, and align everything where it should be. The dressing ritual concludes with several practice quick draws with the knives, a couple of tosses with the throwing daggers, and finally running through the latch-popping combination on the strongbox. All good to go, I wander down the stairs into the main room to find Muel geared up and waiting. The remains of breakfast are strewn around him.
“Your face doesn’t look much better than it did when we left the guild house, Muel. You sure you’re okay to join me?”
Muel answers with a huge, yellowed smile of bruises. “No problem here, boss. Mostly just some bumps. Shouldn’t be a problem ’less we need to look civilized or prim or something like that.”
I smile back. Muel is both stubborn and eternally resilient. I actually think he might be part troll — I swear his wounds heal at some superhuman rate. It’s not for me to argue with him though. He’s decked out for combat and I know there’s no way for me to turn down his companionship.
At six-and-a-half feet, Muel absolutely towers over me. He’s also significantly wider and about ninety percent muscle. When adventuring, as he’s equipped now, I am surprised that anybody with a right mind would attempt to stop him from going anywhere he wants.
When I first met Muel, his adventuring gear was mostly metal and iron: a triple-weave chain shirt, giant helm, twelve-pound greaves and an array of clattering weapons. That doesn’t fit my style of art and guile, so we worked on toning down his gear. He still has all that metal stowed somewhere around the Bottom Up, but he doesn’t don it when we safari anymore.
Now his outfit is a multilayered set of leathers with single-link chain mesh sandwiched in between each layer, whether it’s his shirt, breeches, leggings or boots. His forear
ms have additional layers of wood slatting that I sourced from century-old dark wood. It’s not quite iron, but it’s hardy enough for him to block all but the strongest blows and be unharmed. His weapon set is down to three items, not including his fists: a punch dagger with a wide forged blade, a bow with several score arrows ready or packed, and a cudgel so large and thick that to any normal man it would be considered a maul. A metal band with dulled points heads the club. It’s not something I ever want to get hit with.
Beyond his combat gear, he has a utility harness to which he can affix all sorts of bags, pockets and containers. Upon his back is a pack framework that, depending on the nature of the outing, holds camping gear, food, random goods or me. Seriously, I don’t kid when I say I get Muel to piggyback me. He’s like my back-up horse. I just get in the pack, hold on to his headband and point him in the right direction. Did I mention again how exactly hard my life is?
“Alright, then! If you’ve finished your breakfast,” — at which he nods — “then off we go. It’s time that I go sleep with the fishes!”
Muel nods again, gets up and follows me outside. We grab a couple of horses at some stables just outside the city walls and start riding towards the foothills north of town. That’s where we’ll see if the water witch is in a foul mood or not.
I’m kind of hoping she is.
Chapter 11
A day-and-a-half’s ride from the city and we are well into the foothills that skirt the mountain range ringing the north and northeast part of the region. I’m told the range is short as mountains go, but I maintain that the only thing short in this world is me. Therefore, I declare the mountains extremely formidable.
The travel time does my body well. Though the bumps and roughness of riding for hours on end shouldn’t normally be good for healing, something of the cleric’s power has lingered and my ribs are good as new. Muel, well, is Muel. He was better than new by the first nightfall.
The water witch lives in a natural grotto where the foothills transition into the mountains. I’ve been this way many times before, and we follow the landmarks I remember: the bend in the river here to strike east from, the series of rock formations we need to pass, the correct set of mountain peaks to always be pointing towards.
By early evening of the third day, the foothills have become quite wooded, with no tracks, no path, just the familiarity of being here before. The forest teems with wildlife, hundreds of bird species and a whole zoo worth of squirrels, foxes and other critters seem to stalk us through the undergrowth.
Muel and I come upon an enormous tree trunk fallen years ago, its timber covered with lichen, the branches long since rotted away. Above, the canopy still remains open, the rest of the forest having yet to fill in the sky where this behemoth once stood. The last rays of sun sneak through the opening and fill the space with a subdued silence.
We rein in the horses and wait.
And then we wait a bit longer. I know the protocol. I’ve been here before and waiting is what we are required to do. As we sit, mounted, below the canopy of leaves, the horses begin to fidget. Mine wants to eat, but I shorten the reins to keep it from grazing the grass. Muel takes the hint and does the same for his mare.
A voice somewhere beyond the trunk speaks up. “It’s not good to let your horses go hungry. Every creature needs to eat, especially the ones that bear the weighty burden of man and kin.”
I don’t see where the speaker is, but answer anyways. “If I’m not mistaken, the grass beneath our feet is of the blue blade grassland variety. It’s not too kind to the digestion of horses. I believe it causes them to keel over after eating the stuff.”
A moment later a forest sprite emerges from the other side of the trunk. The sprite is naught more than two feet tall and unarmed. A bright green cap accents his short, straw-colored hair and long, pointed nose.
He makes quite a show of examining the grass in the clearing, finally pulling several shoots from the ground to give them a sniff and then a lick. “Why, so it is! It’s a good thing you don’t let them eat. They would get mighty sick. There’s better grass on the other side of the trunk and through those two trees. Yours as you need.”
“That’s a fine offer, noble sprite. What’s your name?”
“Garriot.”
“Garriot. Okay, then. Last time I was through here, there was a pit trap just within those two trees. Opened up and swallowed both horse and man. At the bottom were sharpened poles. Neither horse nor man screamed for too long after they fell in.”
“Well, silly me! The pit you speak of, and also the bones, are still there! I haven’t really had the will to clean it up.” Garriot looks us over. “You really have been here before, haven’t you?”
“I have, though Muel,” I point over to him just to make it really obvious that the only other person with me is named Muel, “has not. This is his first time. My name is Pinty and I’ve come to once again sleep with the fishes.”
“Oh, then you really have been here before. Her witchiness would love company again. Well, head on in!” And with that Garriot claps his hands and a minor army of other forest sprites emerges from the undergrowth and quickly pull wood slats over the camouflaged pit.
After they finish I nudge my mare forward, give Garriot a nod of the head as we pass, and ride through the two trees. A forest is a very pretty thing, but the water witch’s home is something spectacular.
Chapter 12
We ride through the two trees and enter the dell. Ahead of us a sheer cliff wall is wetted and worn by a gigantic waterfall that arcs into a crystal clear pool. The rest of the clearing is hemmed in with a thick wall of branches, stalks and roots that twine and wrap, forming an impenetrable barrier. The only way I know of to enter or leave is by the one archway we just used.
I dismount from my steed and look back to Muel. “I’ll need you to stay with the horses and keep them safe. No matter what happens, if I’m not out of here in a couple of hours, you need to up and leave. No waiting for me.”
“Sure, but what’s here that can threaten us?”
I pause, thinking how to frame what is about to happen. Behind me I hear some spatter from the pool and turn to look. On the bank an immense koi, more than a hundred pounds in weight, white with a beautiful orange speckle, has leapt from the lake and beached itself.
A series of subtle changes in the fish make way for a rapid transformation. Fins fatten and lengthen into arms and hands. The tail splits to form legs and feet. Giant bulging fish eyes recede and a head and neck take shape as fish form gives way to a human one.
A few moments of this and the transformation is complete. Where once there was fish, now stands a woman. Her hair, a mane of deep orange that falls far down her back, is absolutely stunning. So is the fact that she’s completely naked. If I was tall enough, I would reach out and cover Muel’s eyes.
Her voice is a mixture of falling rain and crystal chimes. “I still cannot fathom how land creatures can survive in such a warm climate. I feel as if I’m completely drenched in sweat already. I much prefer the temperature of my mountain-fed pool.” The water witch looks us over as she walks forward.
“It has been quite some time, Pinty. Young as you may be, I can already see that the years have not only made you more of a man, which I like, but has added weight to your body. Are your reflexes as quick as they have always been? Are you still able to sate me? Have you come back to take me up on my offer of an eternal life spent here with me? I’m still yours if you wish.”
That last line is accented by her running a hand down my cheek.
Ah, crap. I can see where this is going already. She’s drop dead gorgeous, knows it, and knows what it’s doing to me. I am, admittedly, entranced. “It’s been a while, Mirabel. You look like you haven’t aged a year.”
“Flattery will get you everywhere with me. It’s always been that way with you.” She does a little stretch for me. Parts of her body move in just the right way to make it even less possible to think with my brain
. “I wasn’t lying about the eternal life, Pinty. It’s still available if you wish. A life here would suit you well. The sky would shelter us and the basin would be our welcoming home.” She wiggles just a tiny bit. Arrrrgh.
“Uhhh, right, yeah. About that, I hate to say this, but sorry, I still have to pass on that offer. You know, wanderlust. I’m just not a ‘stay-at-home husband’ kind of guy.” I take three quick breaths to focus on why I came here. “What I was really hoping for was some information, like last time. I’m looking for a human woman.” This piques her interest.
“You seek a human woman when in front of you I stand, having just pledged all eternity? You are as daft as always with that little brain of yours. Pinty, I am all the woman you would ever need.” Mirabel steps back and then considers my request. “Say for a moment I agree to help you. Would you be willing to pay the same fee as last time, a simple hour in my bed?”
I certainly would! That experience was amazing — one moment Mirabel and I were wading into the pool, hand in hand, and in the next moment we were both freaking fish chasing each other and playing hide-the-caviar.
“Oh yes, Mirabel. I enjoyed it quite a lot.”
“I’m so glad. You know there was a while after they hatched that I was the happiest person in the world.”
“Excuse me. Sorry, what? Did you just say hatch? As in, I’m a daddy? This is a bit sudden, maybe you could have, uhh, I don’t know . . .” she’s looking directly at me and there is a smile growing ever so slowly on her face , “told me?”
“But I just did, my love. Plus, I didn’t think it was all that important after a few weeks. I found them the most unworthy of spawn, so I ate them.” The smile on her face is an outright grin. It’s not cute anymore. I can see all her sharp pearly whites. And there are a lot of them, more than there should be for a normal human.
“ . . . . . .”
“Seriously, the great Pinty is wordless? Not even some sort of witty retort?”
I think I’m recovering from the shock. At least my voice is coming back. I pick my words carefully. “Mirabel, did you just say you ate your children?”
