Adventures of a Scribe

by Michael Deyhim

  “Galric you are a bit young but I would like you to think about what you want to do in the future. I can begin asking the nobility or one of the guilds if they are in need of a scribe.” Rothgar was going to inherit the shop. As the younger children we had to find our own way but father would definitely help. None of that mattered to be though, I was going to make my own path in the world.

  “I will give it some thought father.” Galric replied.

  “Good. You all better remember this when you have kids of your own. This grey hair comes from somewhere.” He gestured at the white stands intermingling with the black on his head. The rest of dinner past quietly. I ran my hand through my hair hoping I wouldn’t also get a bald patch as well when I was older.

  ***

  I woke up incredibly early the next day, before dawn. Most of the time my siblings and parents woke up with the dawn to start work since they stayed up later to keep scribing. After getting up early to go to the church for ten-days and do my morning chores I was used to waking up earlier. I got my worn out clothes and boots and spent the morning jogging around the back courtyard, stretches, push-ups, sit-up, and squats. I needed to increase my points as much as possible through hard work if I wanted to strike out on my own. Just as the first rays of dawn began breaking in the sky my body was aching and my stamina almost empty.

  I doused myself with a bucket of water and hung my clothes to dry while I got changed. There was no improvement on the status panel but there was still more to do. One of the skills I could work on constantly was Toughness. I went to the water pump in the courtyard and took my knife out. I then held it up to my forearm and made a small cut.

  It really hurt and I noted that my health had dropped by five as blood dripped out and I gained the status effect Light Bleeding which stopped my regeneration. I kept washing off the blood and after a short while the bleeding stopped and I began regenerating my health. That was enough for today, but I would increase the amount I cut myself every day. I had read that sometimes adventurers did this as training and I would take every advantage I could get and unlock all the useful skills I could and I knew about. Unfortunately that list was very short.

  With that done and my shirt hiding the wound on my arm I went out to grab fresh bread for the day. My mother set out the coppers to buy bread every night and I would grab them off the table in the morning to go get some loaves from a couple of streets over. I always loved the smell of fresh baked bread. I grabbed three loaves for eight copper and made my way back.

  Normally it was three copper a loaf of bread, but the baker gave a discount to shops nearby for three loaves for eight copper. It wasn’t the best bakery but my mother counted every copper, especially for long term expenses. The larger shopping she did on her own every five days, but bread was purchased fresh each day.

  I got home to the shop and carefully cut up the bread into equal slices and retrieved the cheese and sliced fruit from the chill box in the kitchen. Next I got a pitcher of water from the pump outside and mixed in lemon pulp. My brother Rothgar was the first down and grunted good morning. None of my family were morning people expect me. We ate in silence as the rest of the family trickled down. Once I was finished I left the table and went to open the shop.

  The good part was that the last person to eat had to clean things up in the kitchen. Normally this was my father since he was always up late working. I unlocked the front door and pulled the curtains away from the front windows. Two older looking men entered the shop just as I was standing up behind the counter. “Mother customers.” I shouted. I then turned to the two customers. “Good morning, what can I do for both of you?” I asked politely.

  It was the rule that if two or more people were in the shop I was to call out ‘Mother customers’. While thieves weren’t common, we had too many expensive items on display so it was the rule to call for assistance if there were more too many people to watch. Also with our prices we needed to provide individual service. This was also important since our shop was frequented by nobles. The few that had come in wanted personal service immediately.

  “Looking for some maps.” One man had come up to the counter to tell me what he wanted.

  “Anywhere in particular? We have maps spanning the entire continent and even some from overseas.” I replied neutrally. By his gruff and worn appearance, plus the fact he was wearing a gold medallion with the number four engraved on it meant he was an adventurer. I had never seen this man before and this presented a unique oppurunity.

  “The Wastes of Nuremar.” The man said. I thought about that for a moment. Azalon was on the east coast of the continent in the kingdom of Aurulian. The wastes were at the south end of the continent and were mostly desert and relatively uncharted.

  Thankfully my eldest brother came into the shop from the kitchen and went to assist the second man who also appeared to be an adventurer. I walked to the map rack and pulled out three maps and brought them back to the counter. “The first one here is of the kingdom of Yorek. The wastes are to the North West but there are a number of surrounding features.” I placed wood blocks that were kept under the counter to hold the map flat.

  “The second map is focused on the central mountains and contains the far side of the wastes compared to the previous one. Not as detailed, but it is hard to get an accurate map with so few people traveling out there. The final map is of the continent, but that has almost nothing about the Wastes of Nuremar itself.” The man carefully looked over all three that had been laid out before him.

  “Better than anything I have seen. Are you sure these are accurate?” He asked.

  “We do our best. The cities and major land marks are accurate. Terrain and small towns are harder. We often purchase local maps from adventurers and compile them into these larger maps. Our shop has maps going back over five hundred years which we use to compare and make sure the maps are as accurate as possible.” I explained.

  “How much for the first and second one?” He asked. He was definitely interested, I had him hooked. It was time to go for it.

  They were the basic map with no fancy calligraphy. I could tell Galric had done these. They were okay but not great. “Two silver and fifty each. We also sell traveling cases for seventy copper.” I gestured to the leather cases off to the side. I was also over charging on the maps by a silver each, but this guy looked interested and had his money pouch in his hands. I also needed to earn back the money that I had spent on my recent adventure.

  “Expensive, you can’t help me on the price any?” He asked. It also helped he was not a local. I would never get away over charging nobility or regular customers.

  “Four silver and fifty copper for both maps and the case.” I was allowed to take ten copper off the map case for every map purchased. It was one of the few discounts my mother allowed. The rest of it was me marking down my own upcharge on the maps.

  “Three silver and fifty for all of it.” I thought it over for a moment.

  “Four silver and twenty. My mother will beat me otherwise.” I said. He looked at me and gave me a grin with his stained teeth.

  “Hmm. Worse than bandits.” The man muttered. He counted out the money and took the maps and a case. “Come on we are leaving.” The two men left and my brother looked at me. Thankfully he had been far enough away to not see the whole transaction and the extra money I had made.

  “That was painful. So many questions on runes and their uses. Pulling my chain the whole time. Have fun.” He said and went back to the work shop.

  I marked down the sale and kept seventy copper for myself. Traveling adventurers didn’t often come to the shop, but when they did it was always good for some extra money. I cleaned the shop the rest of that morning since Galric couldn’t be bothered to wipe things down the past ten-days and I didn’t want a scolding from mother.

  With that done I grabbed one of the finished manuscripts from the store room and began reading. Normally my father quoted a longer time than was needed to copy a manuscript in
case something happened or there was a rush job he needed to complete. The finished items were kept dry in the store room with carefully marked notes of who they were for and when they should be delivered or expected to be picked up.

  Watching the shop was incredibly boring and I spent the majority of my time reading. Despite unlocking the blue panels I was still stuck here. I set the manuscript I had taken from the storeroom carefully on the counter and began to read. As long as nothing was damaged and the shop in order my parents didn’t say anything. They probably knew their kids would go nuts just standing around all day with nothing to do.

  That night I did everything but jogging until my stamina dropped into the single digits. After rinsing myself off with a bucket of water I went to bed. It took a ten-day before I saw any results.

  When I checked my status panel first thing in the morning, my strength had gone up by one. That was the confirmation I needed that what I was doing was working. I purchased a couple of pieces of parchment from the shop and began to make keep a record of how long things took and what I was doing. I was hopeful that if I could track my progress I would unlock some secret behind the panels to increase my points even further.

  I also stepped up with the stabbing. My left forearm now had a long thin scar from the continual cutting every morning. The best way to lower my health without causing anything worse than light bleeding was to do a long and shallow cut. I had to get up earlier so I had time to do everything before my family woke up but I was confident the pain would be worth it.

  The biggest achievement was finally figuring a way to practice mana. I bought a pot with dirt and planted grass in it. I kept it on a shelf in my room next to the tiny glass window. Every night I would attempt to affect the grass with various chants I made up. The worst part was that I repeated the same chant multiple times before giving up and moving on, since I didn’t know how many times it would take to unlock a skill. I also kept careful track of all the chants I did.

  Mana wasn’t that simple unfortunately. While I could push mana into a rune that didn’t feel like anything. I saw the numbers drop on my status panel and a slight glow around my hand and the piece of parchment but that was it. There was no mana sense that told me it was being used. I wouldn’t have known unless I looked at my status panel. There was no such thing as raw mana manipulation as far as I knew.

  It was right after I turned nine, almost a year later, that I finally succeeded. “By my command of space and time, exceed your limits, advance forwards through time with haste.” I wasn’t expecting anything but the grass suddenly seemed to move in the air for a moment and I could see it glow along with my hand. I quickly checked my mana and saw it had dropped by fifty. I then checked my skills.

  “Yes!” I stopped myself from shouting at the last moment and made my cheer a whisper instead. “Haste.” I said while gesturing at the plant. There was a blue glow around my hand and the grass and it seemed to move in the stillness of my room. I then carefully wrote down the chant in my notes and my observations of what the ability did.

  Chants were used to unlock active abilities that used mana. The priests probably kept up using the chants themselves so as to remember them and pass them on or to confuse people. Mages definitely hoarded their chants and used the short hand the panels provided to use their abilities.

  I still couldn’t get over how I finally had my own mana ability and one I had never heard of. I just needed to figure out the rest of the active abilities. The main issue was that some of them couldn’t be unlocked until the skill was a higher level. That was where prior knowledge was incredibly powerful. Knowing the chants and what one would have to do as a prerequisite would definitely shorten the learning time needed to unlock abilities and level ones skills.

  I made sure my mana never dropped below seventy and practiced haste whenever I had enough mana not to drop below my self-imposed limit. I didn’t know what would happen if I didn’t have enough mana and tried to use an ability, but it ranged from nothing happening to very bad. I kept observing the grace to see if there were any ill effects from my mana.

  My oldest brother Rothgar was about to get married to the daughter of a fairly well off merchant. Also my other brother was becoming a scribe of the Merchants Guild since he had reached Experienced in terms of being a Scribe. He would still live at home for the next couple of years, but would not be working at the Illumination during the day.

  This meant my parents were hiring someone to watch the store while I learned from them full time rather than on and off. They had decided I was mature enough to handle simple tasks. I had asked a couple times during the past year for more instruction or work and was glad I would finally get the opportunity.

  My joy was a contrast to my sister was giving my parents no end of grief. Everyone was unacceptable to her and the word on the street was that she would be a spinster before she was married. There had been some shouting matches during dinner which never ended well.

  ***

  The wedding finally came and the ceremony was incredibly boring just like all the others I had been to. The ceremony was a simple affirmation to the Gods of Light and Order and between the couple themselves. The one thing I hated was wasting time not improving my skills and this was the kind of situation that fit into that category. I let my mind wander on various chant combinations I could try during the ceremony.

  The reception, held in the dining hall of the church complex was a bit more engaging thankfully. I was at the main table along with the rest of my family and the bride’s family. Once the meal was finished and people began to mingle and dance I saw my father speaking with one of the few nobles that had attended the wedding.

  Baron Hartsforth, that was his name as I recalled based from a couple of visits he had paid the Illumination. He was fairly young and his line only went back to his father who had earned his peerage for valor in combat as a knight. This Baron had recently been doing very well in mining for a town he controlled out west and had been commissioning my father for a number of jobs. I also had noted his servants buying up quite a bit of parchment and other supplies from our shop.

  I stayed nearby quietly sipping my drink. I made sure that I was looking at the dancing and not staring at both of them. While I wasn’t normally prone to intrigue, any conversation my father had with a noble would be interesting and definitely informative.

  “A fine wedding Gelric.” The Baron said.

  “Thank you Baron. Reminds me of my wedding day.”

  “Have you given any thought to the matter I discussed with you?”

  “Yes. I am loathe to do it. She is so wild, I don’t know where she gets it from.”

  “All women are wild, they just need guidance.”

  I walked away so it wouldn’t be obvious that I was listening in. So my sister was going to be forced to marry. It was unfortunate for her, but there were a lot worse options than Baron Hartsforth. He was fairly young, still in his early twenties. He had a slight belly but his face was smooth and clean shaven. He was also a noble which basically outweighed everything else. Clarissa really should just accept the match instead of being so difficult.

  That thought made me smile since I was planning to run away once I became of age. It would probably be a minor scandal, not as much as if Clarissa did something like that, but still a scandal. I could only hope she didn’t kill the Baron in his sleep.

  I didn’t talk to anyone as I walked around the hall. I needed to work on my charisma a lot more based on my points but I had a hard time relating to kids my own age. I ran into other kids during the morning or when I was running errands but I never spent time with anyone specific. While I had increased everything else on my status page, charisma was still stuck at four. Well there was no time like the present.

  I kept chanting to myself, no fear, no fear, as I walked up to a group of kids. “Hello.” I said. They all looked at me for a moment. “I’m Edward, but you can call me Ed.”

  “I’m George this is my sister Helen
and then there is Terrance, Jake, and Hern.” I looked at all the kids.

  “You work at the butcher shop right?” I asked Jake.

  “Yep, hack and slash all day.” He grinned.

  “At least you get to do something. I get to watch the shop all day.”

  “Scribe right?” Hern asked.

  “Yeah, the Illumination.”

  “I really like the light runes.” Helen said. “I can do my hair early in the morning.” She did have very nice hair.

  “You are always doing your hair too much. Can’t wait till I am of age, I am going to be an adventurer.” George said with excitement.

  “Our parents will skin you alive before that happens.” Helen said and sighed at her brother. “Most adventurers die, I don’t want to lose you big brother.” She grabbed onto him and fake sobbed. He looked a bit embarrassed at her antics.

  “I think I would like to be an adventurer also.” Everyone stared at me like I had grown a second head. “Traveling, seeing the world, it seems much better than staring at maps every day and reading books about places I will never travel to.” What I didn’t say was that people grew much stronger and improved their skills far faster against monsters than studying. I was not going to waste my life sitting around.

  “A companion for my journey.” George said with a grin.

  “Oh Gods preserve us, another one.” Hern muttered.

  “Sword, bow, or mana?” I asked George.

  “Bow probably, my aim is pretty good. It also helps my parents are fletchers.” He grinned.

  “Sword for me.” I said.

  “You any good?” He asked.

  “Not terrible, but I won’t be winning any prizes.” I replied.

  “Your parents will skin you alive also.” Helen said.