by Troy Osgood
“Dyson,” he answered, holding out his hand.
“Watchman Kelly’s friend,” Hall said, shaking the offered hand.
“The same,” the merchant answered with a chuckle.
You have become Known to Merchant Dyson. He has been told about you and is eager to learn more as he gets to know you.
“I suppose I should thank you for the ride,” Hall said, watching the man.
Dyson’s behavior in the Inn now made sense. He had thought he recognized Hall from whatever description he had been provided, but had not been sure.
The merchant shrugged in response.
“You helped out Kelly with a little problem so I felt it fair to return the favor. I asked Hart to give you a discount on passage but it is his ship,” Dyson said with a smirk. “What takes you to Edin?”
“Helping a friend,” Hall said after thinking about his response. He saw no reason to not tell the truth. “The Druid has been sent to investigate a Grove that has gone silent.”
“Noble endeavor,” Dyson said, smiling. “Guard Captain Henry and Watchman Kelly are good judges of character. It’s why I brought them into the operation.”
Hall nodded, knowing a sales pitch was coming.
“Most of my work is legal,” Dyson continued. “I only recently started the…” he paused and winked. “Side business when import taxes on certain goods got too high. Finding Kelly and Henry was the hardest part.”
“I would have thought finding a place to moor a ship of this size in the Gray Dragon Peaks would have been the hardest part,” Hall said, catching Dyson off guard with his observation.
The merchant smiled.
“Henry was right about you,” he said, chuckling. “That was actually pretty easy. There are lots of spots on the south face, and no one ever goes there. Even Essec patrol ships pass in front of the mountains.”
“Probably because of the dragons.”
The Gray Dragon Peaks earned their name from the creatures that made them home, nesting in caves mostly on the southern face. Gray Dragons were the largest of dragonkind. Fiercest, too.
“We’re on the eastern edge,” Dyson explained. “Away from their range.” He stopped and shrugged. “For the most part.”
The ship tilted as a wild gust of wind slammed into it. Only a couple inches, but enough to make everyone slide a bit.
“Let’s continue this inside,” Dyson said and opened the door.
Hall stepped into the corridor and moved aside so Dyson could walk in. The merchant led him down the short corridor and into a room on the left. An office, a large maple desk bolted to the floor covered in loose papers some of which had dropped to the floor during the ship’s motions. Shelves lined one wall, a couch against the other next to a small bar cabinet. Two leather backed chairs faced the desk with another behind. Dyson, stopping to pick up the papers first, walked behind the desk and motioned Hall to take one of the seats.
“So, you funnel the goods through Grayhold and River’s Side up to Land’s Edge Port?” Hall asked.
Dyson nodded. He leaned back, staring at Hall, smiling, waiting.
“Why are you telling me this?” Hall asked, figuring that was what Dyson wanted him to ask.
“You helped out my operation,” the merchant replied, still leaning back and smiling.
Here comes that sales pitch, Hall thought, wondering what quest he was about to receive.
“I’ve been on the lookout for some adventurers to bring on board for a while,” Dyson said after a minute or so of studying Hall, who had returned his gaze without moving. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed but you seem to be a dying breed. The riches aren’t there like they used to be. Most of the Great Dungeons have been tapped out, many of the threats put down.”
Hall had not noticed. He was used to dungeons, great or small, respawning, and no threat ever truly put him down for good. There was always pockets of resistance, even after a storyline was over. If what Dyson said was true, it worried Hall and what the future would bring.
“And you have need for services only adventurers can provide,” Hall guessed.
“I do,” Dyson said and fell quiet, saying no more.
Hall waited what he thought a comfortable amount of time. Enough to show that he wasn’t going to get pushed around by Dyson, led to where the merchant wanted him to go.
“What do you need?”
“Nothing yet,” Dyson replied leaning forward. “But you helped me out once and I figured you could do so again. At some point. When you’re ready. No real rush.”
“You need us to level some more, don’t you,” Hall said, a statement, not a question.
Dyson smiled and gave a slight nod.
“I’ll have to check with the others,” Hall said. “They may not want to get too caught up in a smuggling operation.”
“I am so much more than just a smuggler,” Dyson said, a little offended. “But your people will follow you. You are the leader, after all.”
Now it was Hall’s turn to be surprised. The leader? No. He wasn’t. He didn’t want to be. They all made the decisions. He thought back over the last couple weeks and realized that Dyson was right. He had been leading them, without realizing.
Dammit, he cursed silently.
Not a responsibility he wanted but it seemed he was stuck with it.
For now.
DYSON’S OFFER I
Merchant Dyson has made you an offer for future work. Impressed and thankful for how you helped out his operation, he has a job that he would like you to do when you are ready.
Requirement: Level Six
Reward: +20 Experience
ACCEPT QUEST?
Hall thought about it. There was most likely an illegal element to the job that Dyson was proposing, a reason why he had not gone to the Guildhall to get adventurers. Hall had no true loyalty to Essec, it had just been the race and zone he had chosen to start in. He wouldn’t feel particularly bad about smuggling goods illegally into the kingdom. So why would doing something else bother him?
And having something lined up for the future could be handy. As well as building up reputation with Dyson and his operation. There were numerous small factions in the game, and it seemed he had just found a new one.
Hall accepted the quest.
Dyson nodded, smiling. He stood up and moved over to the bar cabinet. Reaching inside, he brought out two glasses and a bottle of a dark liquid. He poured a small amount in each glass and handed one to Hall.
Raising the glasses, clinking them together, they both downed the liquid in one swallow. It was hot going down Hall’s throat. A whiskey of some kind.
You have earned +500 Alliance points with Merchant Dyson.
He thinks he can trust you but won’t be sure until you have helped him out more.
“I think we’re going to do some excellent business together,” Dyson said, pouring himself another shot. He offered one to Hall, who declined, setting the glass down.
Hall started to say something but paused. Dyson raised an eyebrow, a question. With a sigh, Hall held out his hand.
“Let me see your map.”
Confused, Dyson pulled it out of his pouch. He laid it on the table, moving some papers out of the way. Hall mentally opened his map, shifting it to Cumberland as it now showed where the airship was between islands. He zoomed in on River’s Side and the camp across the river. Looking down at Dyson’s map, he made a couple quick map on a piece of paper he grabbed off the desk. He handed the map to Dyson.
“There’s a cache of Highborn Wine along with Crag Cat and Dire Wolf furs,” he said, pointing at the map. “Don’t know how well the furs will be by the time you get there but the wine should still be good.”
He described where and how they had hidden the cache and what the features of the land were to find it. Without meaning to, he had created his first Treasure Map.
Congratulations!
You have Created: Treasure Map Level I
Skill Gain!
&nbs
p; Cartography, Rank 2 +2.0
Congratulations!
Your Cartography is now 15.6.
Reward: +1 Intelligence, +100 Experience
You have gained +200 Alliance Points with Merchant Dyson.
He is thankful for the information leading to the hidden cache of contraband.
Hall read through all the prompts. He had gained an Intelligence point for getting Cartography to 15? Plus experience? It seemed that aspect of the game remained the same. He wasn’t surprised that Cartography was associated with Intelligence. All Skills had an Attribute associated with them. Every five levels in the Skill gained an Attribute Point.
Learning that he could make Treasure Maps, really magical keys according to Leigh, was exciting. It made the Cartography skill much more useful. He could envision lots of uses for this new ability. “Thank you,” Dyson said, examining the map.
Hall shrugged. Not like they would have been returning there any time soon, if at all. Better the goods be sold before they were ruined. And maybe Dyson would share some of the profits.
Probably not, Hall thought, walking out of the office and shutting the door behind him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The rest of the flight was uneventful. Dyson insisted they join him for dinner and breakfast each day. Captain Hart joined them as well and kept up his never-ending flirtation with Sabine. The Witch still ignored him, which made Hart try all the harder.
It was late afternoon as the ship approached Auld on the island of Edin. Hall stood at the front with Dyson, watching the large landmass getting bigger. They could see the underneath of the island as the ship rose, jagged cliffs of rock hanging upside down. Dark brown and gray. Far to the south the waterfall could be seen falling the hundreds of feet onto Cumberland.
The Gale floated up, coming level with the edge of the island and then rising above. They got a good view of the island itself. Edin was called the highlands, steep and gently sloping hills of grass dotted with forests and exposed stones. A range of mountains divided the island which was three or four times as large as Cumberland. Beautiful but harsh country.
Auld was set at a low point. A small lake lay to the city’s west, homes and keeps built on the hill to the east. Not a large city, there were still hundreds of small one-and-two-story wood houses. They were spread out, small gardens between them, making the city look bigger than it was. Docks jutted out from the edge of the island, smaller than those at Land’s Edge Port. Auld was a free city, as was the majority of Edin.
No kingdom claimed the island, and none wanted to try. The natives were as tough as their land and would fight beyond death to keep the island free.
Hall had always thought Auld to be an odd name for a town until he had learned of its origins. All the fractured realms in Hankarth were modeled after locations in the real world. Some more closely than others, some just names. The culture of Essec was based around that of medieval Britain while Storvgarde was based on Norway and the Vikings. The Kingdom of Arash had a more ancient Middle Eastern origin. Cumberland took its name from a county in Great Britain, the shape of the island realm even resembling that of the British land. Edin was modeled on Scotland. The island itself was similar in shape. The land of Edin resembled what was found in Scotland, a land that Hall had always wanted to visit but never made it. Auld was part of a nickname for Scotland’s capital city, Edinburgh. Auld Reekie, which had just been shortened to Auld.
“My keep is there,” Dyson said, pointing to the island’s east where the homes and larger buildings ran up the side of a gently sloping hill. There was a wall at the far end, well past the homes, that circled down to the edge and back toward the center of town.
Auld did not have a surrounding wall, just parts of ones that did not connect. Some were visible in the middle parts of the city, showing that it had grown past them. Others, like that around the keep, just stopped. There were towers spaced along the segments, some manned and some empty.
Like Land’s Edge Port, Auld was far larger than he remembered. Which was fine. The city was one of his favorite places, as was the entire island.
“Neither Henry or Kelly said you were a Cartographer,” Dyson said after some silence.
Hall shrugged.
“They didn’t know,” he said. There was no need to point out that he didn’t know at that time or still didn’t fully understand what it meant.
“Makes me even more glad to have met you,” the merchant said, clapping Hall on the shoulder. “Cartographers are rare, especially unguilded ones.” He glanced sideways at Hall. “You are unguilded right?”
Hall nodded. It seemed like the correct answer. He had no idea what guilded versus unguilded even meant.
Dyson smiled. “Good, good.”
The Gale aligned with a set of docks, the Essec flag flying from a pole in the middle. The ship was registered out of Essec and had to land at the docks assigned to that kingdom. As wide as two wagons, there were four berths with two to a side. Only one berth was occupied, a Passenger Airship out of Spirehold judging by the flag flying from its mast. Settling into the berth opposite, the Gale floated as sailors and dockworkers attached mooring lines.
Hall felt the vibrations through the hull cease as the engines shifted to low power. The propellers still spun, slowly, to keep the ship level. The ship bobbed up and down with the motion of the propellers and the wind blowing across the docks.
He could see the others gathered at the gangplank which was being lowered. Leigh was scratching behind Angus’ ears, Pike perched in what was now becoming his customary spot on the cow’s back.
“Don’t forget,” Dyson said as Hall started to walk away. “I look forward to seeing you again soon.”
Hall nodded.
Captain Hart walked up as Hall took his packs from Roxhard.
“My dear,” he said to Sabine, reaching out to take her hand. She fought at first but relented and let him take it. He pulled it up, leaned over and kissed the top. “I will miss you and regret we did not get a chance to learn more about each other.”
“Maybe next time, Captain,” she said, taking her hand back. She smiled at him but turned quickly to follow Hall down the gangplank.
“What do you mean my reputation isn’t high enough? Since when has any airship been rep controlled?”
Hall stepped from the Twisted Gale’s gangplank onto the wooden dock built out from the edge of the island, out over the nothingness below. He looked toward the speaker, across the dock. Two guards in Essec armor and uniform stood at the bottom of a gangplank that led up onto the Passenger Airship, a vessel with Wales Beauty written across the bow, more guards roamed the deck while some guards at the end of the dock in the colors of Auld showed interest.
The speaker was a Duelist, level one or two probably, judging by the armor and weapons. Bodin. A Player, most likely. Three feet or so tall, brown hair with green streaks wore long and loose, skin the color of bark with no tattoos on the parts of the arms that were exposed. The Duelist was starting to get angry, facing off with an armed guard that controlled access to the ship.
“You have not proven yourself to be a friend of Essec. You’re Unknown to us. We cannot allow you to board the airship to any island in the kingdom.”
“But I took that same airship from Cumberland to here,” the Bodin Duelist complained in an angry whine.
“You chose to leave Essec. That was your choice.”
“I need to get off this island,” the Bodin said. “Now.”
Hall watched other guards approaching, moving to surround the Duelist.
“You can try to book passage with any of the merchant ships,” the guard said, pointing at the Gale across from him.
“I don’t have the money,” the Bodin grumbled.
“That is not my concern.”
The Duelist tensed up, hands straying toward the rapiers sheathed at his waist, but then noticed the other guards stepping closer. Gritting his teeth, angry, he muttered a curse and turned and left, walking
toward the end of the dock and the city’s crowd.
Hall turned to look back at Roxhard and Sabine, who had not stepped off the gangplank yet. He did not want to get stuck on Edin.
“What’s your Essec rep at?”
“Friendly and Known,” Roxhard replied. Sabine, and even Leigh, nodded.
“Good,” Hall said and led them away from the airship.
Once off the docks, the crowd was thick, passengers coming and going, merchants leading wagons to their warehouses or stacking goods to wait for ships. They pushed their way through the crowd, emerging out the other side in front of a broad road that cut straight through the town. The road was hard-packed dirt, most of the buildings set off the ground by a step or two. They rested on stone foundations or wooden piles set deep into the ground.
Glancing at the sun, it was late afternoon, Hall thought they could get a couple hours of walking in before settling down for the night. No need to pay for an Inn. Leigh had told him there were two or three small villages between Auld and the Grove along the road. There should be plenty of places to rest for a night to regain any lost Vitality before finding out what awaited them at the Grove.
Heading down the street, Hall noticed the Bodin from the dock was leaning against one of the buildings. The Duelist’s head was down, his posture appeared bored, resting. Completely different from how he had acted on the dock only minutes before. Hall could see the small flickers of movement as the eyes darted back and forth, searching and studying. The Duelist was anything but bored and resting. It was an act. He was looking for something.
A mark, most likely, thought Hall. Someone to pickpocket to get the coin needed to get back to Cumberland. He wondered how many other Players, after waking up in Hankarth, had made the same mistake. Just headed out at random and now found themselves unable to return because they hadn’t done the starting Reputation quests.
