The Sorcerer's Path Box Set: Book 1-4
Page 81
Azerick was taken aback by the price Zeb quoted. “Okay, so what makes the ship so expensive?”
“It was a plan that came to me last winter when it got so cold up here. The ship is double-hulled, and the wood twice as thick. The keel and everything under the waterline is hardwood, and the entire bow up to the bowsprit is sheathed in iron and comes to a sharp wedge like a chisel,” Zeb explained.
Azerick scratched his head. “Other than ramming pirates, why would you want that?”
“She’ll cut through ice like a hot sword through butter! Az, all the white furs you see the rich nobles wearing, and you don’t see many, come from animals that live on or near the ice flows. Those winter pelts are worth a fortune, and the only way to get them is an overland trek through the northern tundra and trade with the barbarians who live up there. That makes for a very small supply of an item that has a high cost of acquisition. With this ship, we can sail right up to their front door, hunt and trap the animals ourselves, and make a huge profit!”
Azerick turned back to Simon. “What do you think of the plan, Simon?”
“Well, ah, according to the laws of business, ah, it is an excellent idea, if it, ah, works, and I have faith that, ah, Captain Zeb can make it work,” Simon replied.
“It sounds like a reasonable plan. Do the shipbuilders say they can get the ship afloat this season?”
Zeb nodded. “Just barely, and only because no one else is commissioning ships right now. In fact, the shipwright was quite pleased to get the order so he could hire back the men he had to lay off. You know, you have really been a blessing to this city, son, whether you realize it or not.”
“How is that, Zeb?” He had made it a habit to keep mostly to himself and not get involved in the affairs of the city or its residents.
“How many folks you got employed around here?”
Azerick looked to Simon who immediately gave him a quote. “Six hundred twenty-three as of this morning, Master Azerick.”
“Nearly every one of those people working for you was in dire straits and, with the winter promising to be even worse than the last one, the gold you’re paying out means the difference between life and death for many of them. I was here last winter, and it wasn’t pretty, and this year’s gonna be worse by a long shot from what I hear. You told me you were tired of being an instrument of death and wanted to give life, well you done it now and you done it big, son, real big. You’ve made more than just a home for yourself, you’ve made a legacy.”
Azerick did not know what to say. He knew that the work he provided the people was important, it was why he hired far more than he really required. He did not need all of the outbuildings or the surrounding walls repaired any time soon, but he hired everyone who wanted to work to help them in these tough times. He had no idea that his employment was so critical.
Maybe this is what all his pain had been leading him to all this time, to give him the empathy and ability to help others. Even after living in hardship in Southport, Azerick never really considered how large-scale the problem of deprivation really was. He thought about how a simple attempt to make himself a home had turned into a mass work project, an apprenticeship, and a home for several other people. How far would this go? It was a lot to think about.
***
The summer came and went. To see it off, Lady Miranda, under the suggestion of her mother, put together a summer festival. There were parades, a circus, games, and contests, but no magic show. Azerick had given all his workers the day off so they might attend and enjoy spending a bit of the money he paid them. He also let Ellyssa and Peck go and celebrate with a bit of spending money, but he was in no mood to celebrate. He even went so far as to ignore the Duchess’s invitation to be the guest of honor.
Peck and Ellyssa had a grand time watching the circus performers execute daring acrobatics, performing horses, dancing bears, and a man who stood inside a cage with huge lions and tigers with nothing but a whip and a chair making them do tricks. The two had just left the circus when Ellyssa felt a tug on one of her pouches. Fast as a cat’s paw, she grabbed the pilfering hand and cast a spell that sent a powerful electric shock to whomever she touched.
Wolf let out a yelp of pain as the searing electricity traveled up his arm and through his body.
“Wolf, what are you doing here?” Ellyssa demanded.
“Whew, is my hair smoking? It sure feels like it, and I’m all tingly from my nose to my toes!” Wolf said and laughed at his rhyme when the pain passed.
“What are you doing here, Wolf?” Ellyssa repeated. “I thought you hated cities.”
“I do, but this is prime urban poaching! You should see everything I got!” Wolf proudly held out a sack that bulged heavily at the bottom.
“Wolf, that’s stealing, and if you get caught they will put you in jail! This is not like stealing food from the kitchen. How would you like to spend all winter in a tiny, cold jail cell without Ghost?”
Wolf’s smile slid from his dirty face. “I wouldn’t like that at all.”
“Then you better leave people and their stuff alone.”
“Okay, hey take a look at this!” Wolf reached into his sack and rummaged around. He pulled out a small bronze statue of an archer affixed to a marble base.
“Where did you steal that?” Ellyssa asked.
“I didn’t steal it, I won it in an archery competition!” the half-elf proclaimed.
“That’s neat, Wolf, good job,” Peck said. ”Where’s Ghost?”
“He stayed home. He likes the city even less than I do. In fact, I better get going. There are too many people here, and Ghost is probably lonely by now.”
Wolf fled the hustle and bustle of the city and went back to his quiet woods. Peck and Ellyssa spent a full day taking in all the sights, sounds, and especially the foods of the fair before returning to the keep, exhausted from their day’s activities. They were so tired they even turned down Grick’s rat chasing invitation, but they did bring him back some of the unique food and a few trinkets from the festival that he quietly but gratefully accepted.
The rains came quickly after the summer festival as if the event itself was the only thing staving off the wet and cold autumn. Azerick decided that a coach would be a prudent purchase once he fought off the pretentiousness he felt about them, a decision he came to terms with the third time he a bitter squall caught him while riding Horse into town and he came down with a nasty cold.
He was able to beat back some of the symptoms, but no potion he knew of would cure the virulent illness. Azerick had even paid extra to have a three-sided cab built onto it to shelter poor Peck who became his coach driver. The first few days were nerve-wracking for both Peck and his passengers as the stableboy became accustomed to this new mode of transportation. But Peck tackled the new task with his usual determination and quickly gained proficiency.
Azerick and Ellyssa were in the herbalist’s shop to restock their supplies for Azerick’s lab as well as those ingredients needed to treat the sorcerer’s cold. Peck waited in reasonable comfort sitting in the cab of the coach wearing a warm jacket as Ellyssa and Azerick did their shopping. It took longer than necessary because Azerick, as usual, turned it into a lecture and quiz on the various herbs that were available.
Peck looked up from his daydreaming and found several scruffy, poorly clothed children were slowly encircling the coach. Most were running their cold-reddened fingers along the glossy midnight blue and black enameled sides and trim, but a few were looking up at him expectantly. One of the boys, who was perhaps thirteen years old, overcame his trepidation and spoke to Peck.
“Is this the magus’s coach?” the sodden, shivering boy asked.
“Aye, it is. He’s in the shop buying stuff to make his potions.”
“Does he turn folks into frogs and summon demons up there in that castle of his?”
Peck laughed at the question. “No, I’ve never heard him do anything like that, but I suppose he could if he had a mind to.”
“No, he never did any such thing like that,” Peck assured the girl.
“How do you know? You’re just a coach driver ain’t ya? Were you there when he beat the ghost?”
Peck shook his head. “No, I wasn’t there, but my friend Ellyssa was, and she told me all about it. She’s his apprentice.”
Another girl, perhaps eleven or twelve spoke up, the proverbial ice having been broken. “I heard all wizardry is black magic, and all wizards are evil. They snatch people off the streets and cast their spells and test their potions on them.”
“No, that ain’t true at all, at least not for Master Azerick. He’s a good man. I was orphaned and he hired me to take care of his horses and drive his coach. He once gave me a gold coin just for stabling his horse when I was a stableboy at the Golden Glade, and now he teaches me how to read and write, and a man named Ewen comes and teaches me how to fight and swing a sword.”
Azerick and Ellyssa walked out of the herbalist’s shop at that moment carrying their purchases of herbs, roots, and various barks. The vagrant children parted to clear the path so the sorcerer and his apprentice could climb into the extravagant coach unimpeded. Azerick was not surprised to see them. Word of his generosity toward beggars and the homeless quickly spread through the city, and they often sought him out when the street grapevine got word that he was in town.
“Magus, have you got any spare coin? We’re very hungry and frightfully cold, milord,” one of the children asked in a pitifully pleading voice that only years of being poor and homeless could hone to such perfection.
Azerick smiled at the wet, shivering faces with noses and cheeks blushed red from the cold. “Are you all together or are you separate?”
One of the larger boys pushed forward. “We’re together, milord. We’re a family, and we share what we get.”
“Is that true, or is he going to take everything if I give it to him?” Azerick asked one of the smaller children.
“It’s the truth, milord. We’re a family, the only family any of us gots. That’s Bruce. He takes care of the coins and food we gets and makes sure we all get a fair shake,” the younger boy affirmed.
“All right then, here you go. Buy yourselves some warm clothes and something to eat.” Azerick took out his coin purse, checked how much was in it, and passed it through the open door of the coach to the young man named Bruce. “You all get out of the rain before you catch a cold or worse.” Azerick blew his stuffed nose into a linen handkerchief. “Trust me, I know what I’m talking about.”
“Thank you, milord, and gods bless you!” Bruce cried as he felt the weight of the purse in his hand.
Even if the pouch contained only coppers, it was a fair bit of money, enough to feed them all for a couple of days at least. Bruce would soon find that there was a good bit of silver and a few gold pieces that would go a long way in buying blankets for the winter.
“You are quite welcome, now get out of the cold.”
The keep was nearly deserted when they returned. Most of the workers had been let go as the weather turned too poor to continue outdoor work. About a dozen workers continued to repair the inner rooms of the keep, but even that was ending as cut stone became scarce, and there would be no quarrying of new stone or cutting timbers until spring.
Azerick, Ellyssa, and Peck made a few more trips into town over the coming weeks, every time running into a group of homeless children. They seemed organized in a manner similar to the thieves’ guild in Southport in that different groups controlled or operated their own sections of the town. Ellyssa seemed contemplative as they rode back to their home.
It had been a week since their last trip into town, and Ellyssa woke to find her room surprisingly cold even though there were still embers burning in her fireplace. She slipped out of bed and gave thanks for the thick throw rug next to her bed as she put on her soft, rabbit fur slippers. She crossed the room, opened the mesh screen in front of the fireplace, and tossed in three handfuls of wood shavings and a thick log before climbing back under her warm blankets.
When she awoke again a few hours later, the room was still cold, but not frightfully so. Her fire was still burning, but the flames were getting low. It did not matter. It was about time to get up anyway and break her fast with Peck and Azerick. A pale, grey light peaked through the curtains covering her small window. Ellyssa crossed the room, her slippers making swooshing noises as she shuffled across the hardwood floors, and pulled open the curtains. She was amazed to see that several inches of snow covered her windowsill.
She looked out past the ice-frosted glass panes and saw that snow blanketed the countryside as far as she could see. Ellyssa had seen snow before, she had lived all of her nine years in North Haven and it snowed here almost every year, but never this early. Fall was only half over. Ellyssa’s mind raced through all the implications that the early snows heralded.
The young wizard trotted downstairs wearing a soft pair of wool-lined leather boots, a thick, knitted shirt, and a fleece-lined jacket. She also wore a pair of expensive silkwool hose and stockings under a pair of soft leather leggings. She found Azerick and Peck already at the table.
“Ellyssa, did you see all the snow? It must be a foot deep! I was afraid I was going to have to use a shovel to get to breakfast!” Peck laughed.
“Peck, it may be best if we set you up with a room inside the keep, at least while these snows are falling,” Azerick told the boy.
Peck’s face displayed a crestfallen look at losing his own little room with the horses. “I have a stove, Master Azerick, and my room stays real warm.”
“What if your stove burns out in the middle of the night or, worse yet, started a fire?”
“All right, Master Azerick,” Peck complied.
Agnes bustled in from the kitchen, passed around the plates full of food, and took a seat behind her own meal.
“Peck,” Ellyssa asked between bites, “where did you sleep when it was cold and snowy out?”
Peck swallowed his food before answering, a lesson Agnes taught both children very quickly. “I slept in the hay loft at the Golden Glade. When it got real cold I got to sleep by the big hearth inside.”
“What would have happened if you were not allowed to sleep inside?”
Peck’s face took on a look of fright. “Oh, that would have been bad it would. Even with my blanket and curling up under the straw, it got real cold, and I never had to stay out at night when it was at its worst.”
“Did you know other kids who were homeless like the ones we saw outside of the herbalist’s and the clothier’s?”
“Oh yeah, we hung out a bit when I wasn’t workin' but, since I was almost always workin', I didn’t see them much. But before I got work at the Golden Glade I was on the streets myself, but luckily I got the job at the Glade before my first winter.”
“What do you think the other homeless kids did in the winter, where did they live?”
Peck cocked and scratched his head as he often did when forced to think hard. “Hm, I don’t rightly know.”
Ellyssa turned to Azerick who began following Ellyssa’s line of questioning. “Azerick, what will happen to all the kids with a winter this bad?”
Azerick set down his fork and folded his hands under his chin. “I do not know, little one, I really do not know.”
Peck perked up his head. “Hey, anybody know where Wolf is? He’s not one to be late for a meal.”
“Oh no, Azerick, he could be frozen to death out there in all that snow!” Ellyssa cried.
“Are you kidding? I’m wild not stupid,” Wolf said as he walked in from the kitchen with a sausage in one hand and a warm loaf of bread in the other.
“So what do you want to do, Ellyssa, bring all those city kids here?” Wolf asked sarcastically as he fed the remains of the sausage to Ghos
t.
“Hey, I was just joking!” Wolf shouted as Azerick grabbed his cloak and bolted out the door. “Me and my big mouth. Well I’m not sharing any of my food,” he told Ghost.
CHAPTER 8
Azerick rode Horse down the snow-covered road, which was made tricky by the fact that he could not actually see the road, and there was little visual difference between it and the ditches or small drop-offs on either side. Horse plowed grumpily but dutifully through the thick powder and soon made the gates of North Haven.
“Good morn to ya, magus,” one of the guards hailed. “Heck of a day for a ride ain’t it?” The guards wore long heavy jackets over their armor, and puffs of fog erupted from inside their hoods.
“It is a heck of a day for standing around atop cold wall is it not?” Azerick shot back.
“Well, we soldiers got to do what we got to do, comfort be damned.”
“Same goes for sorcerers.”
Azerick was not sure where to start looking. North Haven did not have an entire district of abandoned buildings inhabited by the homeless as Southport did. Not that it was bereft of failed and abandoned businesses; it was just that in North Haven they were spread out. The city tended to tear down old buildings to prevent the build up and spreading of urban decay and to reduce the risk of fire.
The few abandoned buildings claimed by squatters were almost all held exclusively by those strong enough to defend them. The occupants usually formed a sort of gang that protected their property and each other, often with the backing of the thieves’ guild who used the homeless as their eyes and ears out on the street. That left those too young or weak to defend themselves to take shelter in doorways or old shipping crates discarded or dragged into one of the many alleyways of the poorer sections of the city. But in weather like this, such humble shelter was grossly insufficient, and those unable to find better often did not live to see another season.
The city did have a large central park and a second, smaller park that had been built over the site where a large number of abandoned warehouses had been torn down two decades before. Azerick decided to check Haven Park, the large manicured park near the center of the city, first.