by Noah Layton
She stopped in an instant, turning off her expression like a switch, then smiled between us all devilishly.
‘The same works on women, who occasionally paid a visit to our home,’ Elera giggled. ‘It appears that it works on all of you, as well.’
‘The skills of a nymph,’ Lara chimed, shaking her head, her purple hair quivering atop her shoulders.
‘The nymphs of my old home taught me everything I know. All credit goes to them. If you could see them in their glory you would be on your knees before them…’
‘That’s a pretty tall order,’ Ariadne said. ‘What do you think, husband?’
‘I think handling six women at once might be too much, even for me.’
‘That sounds like a challenge,’ Elera said. ‘Are you afraid?’
‘I’m not afraid at all, but I’ve only got two hands and one dick.’
‘One rather large dick,’ Lara said. ‘And I do not mind sharing, as long as I get a turn.’
‘I feel so objectified,’ I replied sarcastically.
‘Don’t mind me,’ Alorion said sarcastically, sitting on the back of my horse as he tore up a leaf and throw scraps of it onto the trail behind us. ‘I cannot hear a thing…’
From there it was a short ride through the trees until we saw the gap in the fence through which we had first entered.
Even though I was confident the place was now abandoned, the withered grass scattered atop the dried dirt in patches and the general sense of lifelessness set me on edge.
But I wanted to bring my wives - I wanted them to see the first piece of enemy land that we were going to claim.
Initial reviews weren’t exactly great, though.
‘What a dire place,’ Santana said as we hopped off the horses and she hitched them up. ‘Did you burn it down after you killed them?’
‘It’s the mine,’ Lara said, nodding to the entrance at the opposite side of the perimeter. ‘Sucked all the life out of the land.’
‘Could it regrow if we close it up?’
‘In time,’ Ariadne said. ‘Taurem manure, bone meal... We could likely replenish it. It just depends how deep the previous tribe master delved into the earth.’
‘We can check that out in a little while,’ I said decidedly. ‘Right now we need to see what there is of value in this place. I’m pretty sure that the whole tribe is dead, but let’s stick together for safety. Keep your weapons at the ready.’
While the girls retrieved their weapons, I rifled through my inventory and retrieved the flag that I had created in the Map room back at our land.
I paused as a thought came to mind.
‘Alorion.’
‘Yes, Jack?’
‘Weeks ago when we first met you told me that tribal lands reset after the master of the tribe died. Why isn’t that the case here?’
‘Only if a master dies of influences other than those caused by an enemy. If he chooses to kill himself or dies of old age then the land resets, but if the blade of an enemy were to sleigh him, the land remains in its present state. That is why tribal leaders take the land of others in the first place – if the land reset, there would be nothing to claim.’
I crossed to the centre of the land and crouched down upon the dry, cracked dirt.
The girls crossed to me as I planted the flag sharply into the dirt, drove it into the ground, and tapped the claim land prompt.
A blue square, one yard on all sides, lit up beneath me.
Then, another option appeared beneath the square.
Grant claiming abilities to tribe members?
I tapped accept, and the prompts disappeared.
Elera was still watching everything with curiosity as I tapped at the thin air before me.
‘What are you doing, Tall-man?’ She asked. ‘What has happened to the ground?’
I looked over at my wives. The round beneath their feet had lit up with blue squares.
‘You can see that too?’
‘I can,’ Santana said, and the girls agreed.
‘We’re claiming the land,’ I replied, standing and taking a step to my left, another blue square lighting up beneath my feet. ‘I think that I just gave you all the ability to claim land at the same time as me too. We’re going to move in circles from the edge and close in on the centre until it’s all done. That way we can stick together while getting this done a lot faster.’
Alorion kept watch while we began our task.
The whole process was methodical. Once the outer edge was completed, we moved in, walking side by side as the squares filled up much faster than they would have doing this on my own.
‘Do you think there will ever be stories told about us?’ Santana said as we continued in a spiralling circular formation.
‘Stories?’ Ariadne asked. ‘What kinds of stories?’
‘Like the legends of Agraria. Killing monsters, freeing slaves, building a civilisation… Future tribes may even look to us as heroes of the land.’
‘Of course,’ Lara said. ‘Do you think they’ll tell the story of how the brave and mighty Master Jack and his beautiful, deadly wives walked in circles lighting up imaginary squares to reclaim a damaged patch of land owned by an annoying little ass and his sick-minded tribe?’
‘Hey,’ I laughed, ‘This is just the beginning. Everybody has to start somewhere. If you had told me when I first arrived here that within a month I would have my own land, a crop rotation, livestock, a tribe of villagers and four wives as sexy as you girls I would have called you crazy. Now we’re taking over our third territory and looking to establish further settlements. Trust me, our operation is only going to grow from here.’
‘I have no doubts,’ Santana said. ‘Just keep repeating the part about how sexy we are, and I’m sure everything will turn out fine.’
The rest of the girls laughed, and I could only smile and shake my head.
‘Sassy, too,’ I said. ‘Did I mention that part?’
‘What is sassy?’ Elera asked.
‘It’s like… An attitude.’
‘You do not like that?’
‘Oh, no, I adore it. Don’t ever change.’
I wasn’t even being sarcastic. I meant it.
In no time we arrived back at the flag, standing around it together.
‘This is where things get risky,’ I said.
‘Why is that?’ Asked Santana.
‘You see, it’s strange,’ I said, running a hand through my hair. ‘When Lara and I cleared this place out-
‘Really it was you who cleared it, Jack,’ she cut in, ‘I was asleep the entire time you were cutting through our enemies.’
‘True, but I’m talking about after that. We cleared the place, Werger’s slave-wives took off into the forest, and we freed the captives. That should have been that, but...’ I bit the inside of my mouth and looked around at the seemingly quiet land. ‘I still didn’t feel safe. I don’t feel safe now.’
‘But we’ve been over every inch of the place,’ Ariadne said. ‘Who else could be here?’
‘Werger’s imp is here somewhere. Considering how he treated anybody who he considered beneath him, I don’t doubt that his imp is probably camping out in the trees. But I’m more interested in rule number two of land claiming right now: all sentient beings on the land that is being claimed will be informed of the attempt. Which means...’ I tapped the flag and began the claiming process, watching the timer begin to tick down. ‘... Anyone hiding here has less than ten minutes to stop us from taking control over the land.’
‘The imp of the land must be loyal to the tribe master,’ Alorion commented. ‘If the imp is around here, they must submit.’
‘Ten minutes gives us plenty of time to start looting until we stumble onto anyone, be they imps or assholes,’ Lara said. ‘So let’s start.’
‘Thank you for making a distinction between those two entities,’ Alorion said.
We made our way around the two constructed houses first. The house above the basement where
the slaves had been kept was empty save for a crate of cheap liquor, but that didn’t mean it was something that had to be left behind.
Anything of any use had to be kept and placed into storage.
We ferried the liquor over to the base of the tree and set the crate down just outside of its shade.
Next was the house by the tree which had belonged to Werger’s goons. I had ransacked the cupboards for food to feed the liberated slaves, but there was still a whole house to explore.
‘When we create a new section of the tribe I don’t want to use these houses,’ I started. ‘We can take the furniture, the resources, anything of value that we find, but I’m deconstructing both this house and the other. I don’t want any record that Werger and his men were even alive, never mind here in the first place.’
It was a stark justice that I was imposing, if it could even be called that, and I expected my wives to confront me with judgemental expressions, but there were none.
They all nodded in agreement, and so did Alorion.
The ground floor was still in a state of complete disarray. The fight with Clay, Jork and Tarek had left blood splattered on the wood panels and everything that wasn’t nailed down was strewn across the floor, broken and smashed. Faintly, the smell of something burning festered in the air.
I tried not to think about the fact that it belonged to Jork after I had used Arcane Blast to set him on fire.
‘So,’ Lara said, ‘who wants to go into the bedrooms of the creepy guards first?’
‘They can’t have been that creepy,’ Santana said as we all looked up the stairs into the darkness of the upper floor. ‘The most we should prepare for is fluid-stained sheets, no?’
Elera laughed highly. Maybe Lara, Ariadne and I would have shot her shocked looks for saying something so out of character, but Elera’s high-pitched laugh kept on going and I couldn’t bring myself to do it.
All I did was smile, but-
‘You were going to give me another look then, weren’t you?’ Santana smiled at me.
‘No, I just-’
‘Look, I know how messy men can be. I have been married to you for weeks now, after all.’
‘You can say that again,’ Ariadne laughed. ‘It is a good thing that you have us around to clean up after you.’
‘Because I’m busy running the place, you know, as tribe master.’
‘Excuses, excuses…’
The girls laughed, and nothing I could say would let me win the argument.
Only then did it hit me that I was dealing with four times the trouble that a regular man deals with in his life. I was outnumbered badly by my wives.
‘Let’s just check this place out,’ I continued. ‘Lara, Santana, keep a lookout with Alorion. Elera, Ariadne, let’s go looting.’
We headed up, weapons drawn, stopping before the dimly lit hallway that gave onto the bedrooms.
I ducked my head out and looked up and down the corridor.
‘No sign of any traps,’ I muttered. ‘Although considering the speed that these guys came down the stairs I seriously doubt that they would have laid any traps. They’d have probably set them off themselves in th the process.’
‘They wouldn’t have,’ Ariadne said.
‘Why not?’
‘They would not need to. Do you not remember the bombs that were sold to us weeks ago, the ones that were set off by the bandits? They can only be activated by individuals who are not members of the tribe. Outsiders. The guards were tribal members, which would make them immune to setting off their own traps.’
‘What the hell would happen I be if I didn’t have you around?’ I asked Ariadne.
‘Dead, probably.’
‘I could argue with that, but... Yeah, probably.’
I couldn’t believe that I had forgotten something so basic about the way that traps worked. I had a lot on my mind and wanted to go easy on myself as a result, but there was no chance of that; stupid mistakes like that would get me killed.
Scanning the hallway further I found nothing that would pose a threat.
We crossed to the first of the three rooms and headed inside.
The stench of mead and smoke hit me immediately. Before me was a messy bed with the covers strewn about, and a box covered by unkempt clothes, as well as a few pieces of armor.
I checked the box first:
Leather rags x1
Peach x2
Rusted Blade x1
Rope x5
The chest at the end of the bed was the thing that caught my attention most.
After our escapades over the last few days I had no skeleton keys left, but skeleton keys were designed for making as little noise as possible.
Right now there was nobody around to stop me.
With a few strikes of my broadsword against the padlock it eventually snapped.
I cast it aside and searched within.
Emerald imbued axe x1
Moonseed x5
Smoking pipe x1
The smoking pipe I dumped, but the moonseed could be sold or used, and the emerald imbued axe could probably be sold for a decent price, too.
In the other two rooms we found more junk, although within the last I did stumble on a long-blade dagger and, for some reason, a vial of poison.
God knew what he was planning to do with that.
We left the guard house, meeting up with Lara, Santana and Alorion, and looked to Werger’s treehouse.
‘The guardhouse may not have had any traps,’ Elera said. ‘But if that’s the boss’s domain I would bet my life that there will be something in there waiting to kill us.’
‘Bombs, animal traps, swinging contraptions...’ Ariadne said. ‘If this man was as self-obsessed as you claim then I have no doubt he will have filled his home with devices that would destroy it if an outsider attempted to get inside.’
‘We had such a system in the home of my sisters,’ Elera added.
‘I thought you just enticed men into falling headfirst into water,’ I said.
‘We did, but before our woodland hideaway was destroyed by the storm that created the Black Patch we had a wonderful little home to ourselves. The forests were beautiful but they were filled with over-confident sailors and pesky creatures that wished to intrude on our home. Our leader, Cari, devised a collapsing perimeter line that would skewer anything that tried to cross it. If that didn’t work there were several spiked logs that swung from the trees, impaling anything intelligent enough to get past.’
‘Jesus,’ I muttered. ‘Why aren’t you devising our perimeter defenses?’
‘I can, if you would like to put me to use.’
‘I’ll sleep on it. In the meantime we have to get inside this place.’
‘I have a sneaking feeling that the moment we open that door the same thing that happened to the bandits will happen to us,’ Ariadne said.
‘Nothing happened when we traversed the land last time,’ Lara said. ‘But we never went up there.’
We all looked back to the front door of the treehouse. It was standing just off its hinge. I hadn’t gone near it after slaughtering the tribe, so any mechanism that could blow us all to pieces had yet to be triggered.
‘How am I supposed to do this?’ I said to myself quietly, staring up at it. It was just loud enough for the girls to hear.
‘We could go in from above,’ Elera suggested. ‘I doubt he will have gone to the trouble of putting any traps up there.’
I turned to look at Alorion.
‘What?’ He asked, then his eyes went wide. ‘Oh, no, you are not expecting me to go up there, surely?’
‘It’ll take you seconds, and you can get a decent view inside.’
‘I have no desire to be blown up.’
‘You won’t be.’
‘Assuming that this other imp has not laid any traps up there.’
‘You’re an imp. Would you do that kind of thing?’
‘It I was asked to. Otherwise, no.’
‘This
Werger guy was smart, but not smart enough to do something like that. Go check it out. If you see or hear anything, get out of there. I’m fine with blowing up the contents and resetting the land, but I’d never be okay with losing you.’
‘See, it is when you say things like that that I appreciate you as a master. I mean appreciate you as a Jack. I mean-’
‘I know what you mean, bud.’
‘Indeed.’
He gave me a nod and made for the tree, clambering up the side of the trunk with the speed of a squirrel and disappearing among the low-hanging branches.
‘Forget the five of us,’ Lara said. ‘If they ever do write stories about the Orakin Tribe it won’t be about the tribe master’s undying love for his wives, it will be about the forbidden love affair between a man and his imp.’
‘What?’ I said jokingly. ‘Alorion’s my right-hand man. He’s my best friend.’
‘None of us are your best friend?’ Ariadne said with wide eyes, the large, furred ears atop her head twitching.
‘Oh, no, I’m not getting dragged into this,’ I said sternly. ‘That’s a loaded question. He’s my best male friend.’
‘So who’s your best female friend?’
‘I didn’t mean to say that.’
‘What did you mean to say?’
‘Oh my god,’ I groaned sarcastically. ‘I can’t win. Ever since I dropped that Master title you’ve been grilling me way more than usual.
‘I don’t think that that is it,’ Santana said. ‘I think it is Elera’s behaviour rubbing off on us. Your new wife is quite the practical joker.’
‘I’m aware of her work.’
‘It is in my nature,’ my nymph-wife said. ‘I cannot help it. But what is this about Tall-man, I mean Jack, lying with an imp?’
‘Oh, god...’
My three other wives laughed hysterically.
‘What is so funny?’ Elera said, looking around obliviously.
‘Only the greatest love story of all time,’ Ariadne laughed.
‘I can see inside!’
My wives calmed themselves as we all looked to the tree in reaction to Alorion’s call.
‘What can you see?’ I shouted up.
‘A rather large explosive wire by the door, I think. It is far too dark, but I can make it out.’
