by Drew Hayes
“Forgive me, I don’t quite understand. You just travel around, hoping to come across people who are in need of a potion or enchanted item and willing to pay top gold for it?” Gabrielle was impressed by the way the box was cooking meat, but she didn’t quite see how one could make a living off odd sales of circumstance.
Fritz shook her head. “Those sales do happen, especially when I go through towns with lots of adventurers, but I make a lot of my gold acting as a facilitator. Let’s say a town in Alcatham has a really talented blacksmith-and-wizard duo cranking out quality enchanted weapons. Meanwhile, another town in Solium is seeing an uprising of gnolls, but their entire industry is based on farming. As someone who roams about and knows all the towns, I can connect the Solium town with the crafters in Alcatham. They buy a bunch of those quality weapons, sell them to the adventurers who come pouring through to kill gnolls at a substantial mark-up, and I take a reasonable chunk as my finder’s fee. There are dozens of situations like that popping up every year. A little ingenuity and a lot of travel can make one a fair bit of gold.”
“Industrious.” Grumph sat further away from Fritz than Gabrielle did, and made a point not to make any motions that might come off as aggressive. Elves and orcs, even half-orcs, had a rather storied and bloody history where their interactions overlapped. While the sins of their ancestors certainly weren’t theirs to bear, the fact remained that each race tended to be a bit wary around the other. Since they were the ones invading her camp, it only seemed fitting that he make the show of peaceful intentions.
“Thank you. It took a lot of time to work out the business model to a point of efficiency, but that’s the one resource I’ve got plenty of.” Fritz chuckled at her own joke and checked the cooking meat. Elves were not technically immortal—at least, not so far as anyone knew—but they did tend to measure their life spans in millennia rather than simple years. Only frequent wars and fertility issues kept them from overrunning the world. Delicately, Fritz pulled the slices of elk from her magic cooking-box, laid them on a small metal plate, and handed it across to Grumph and Gabrielle.
Each took a piece and bit into it, unsure of exactly what to expect. It turned out to be exactly what Fritz had promised: hot, cooked meat just like it came from a fire. Gabrielle was barely through her first piece when she reached for a second.
“That’s good. I mean, really good. How much does one of those cook-boxes go for, anyway? It might come in handy with as much traveling as we do.”
“Standard rate is two thousand gold pieces,” Fritz told her. “Though there’s currently a list of people waiting to get theirs that’s about six months long. For an extra five hundred, the wizards will move your order to the front of the line.”
Gabrielle was trying not to choke on her second bite of meat after hearing the words “two thousand gold pieces.” Between the four of them, they had perhaps three hundred left from their winnings at the Appleram tournament. Aside from royalty, who had that much gold? And that much to spend on a useful, but ultimately unnecessary, magical item?
Fritz noticed the look on Gabrielle’s face and smiled knowingly. “Magic items aren’t cheap, you know. Besides, adventurers are always looking for ways to spend their treasure. You don’t drag it all around in coin form, do you?”
“No . . . we don’t.” Sometimes, it still caught Gabrielle off guard to be taken for an adventurer. Even after all the effort to appear as one, and the actual progress in learning the skills needed to survive such a lifestyle, there was a part of her that continued to feel as though she were doing nothing more than playing a game of pretend, that someone would come along and call her out as the mayor’s daughter dressed up like a warrior. “But we haven’t come across that kind of gold in the first place.”
“Ah, just starting out then.” Fritz nodded as she pressed her finger to a spot on the side of the magic box. An instant later, the runes flickered out and the elven woman slipped the device into her satchel, where it seemed to vanish without so much as making a bump. “I’ve seen plenty in that position on my travels as well. Nothing to worry about; once you slay your first evil dragon or mad wizard, there’s bound to be a bounty of gold for you to scoop up. Not quite sure why they always have huge stacks of uninvested income lying about, but they do.”
Gabrielle and Grumph both had a pretty good theory about why the piles of gold would be lying about, but neither said a word as Fritz finished putting away her cooking tools. Savvy as the elven trader seemed, explaining what they’d learned about their world and how it was impacted by beings from another one would make them seem crazy at best. Even seeing what happened to Timuscor and experiencing some of the effects from The Bridge firsthand, Gabrielle still wasn’t entirely convinced she believed that story. One could only imagine what Fritz would think, being shown no proof at all.
“Thank you for cooking our dinner,” Gabrielle said. It seemed the safest place to steer the conversation, and it would lead to the point she actually needed to address. “Your help saved us a lot of trouble.”
“Well, we are all stuck hiding in this forest together. Seemed only nice to help one another out.”
“Perhaps we could continue to do so, at least until we reach Cadence Hollow. A third person to share night-watches with will let us get more rest, and help you as well. Plus, it would be better to have a third around, just in case we fail at avoiding the bandits in our next day’s travels.”
“The keeping watch part I can certainly help with, but I wouldn’t count on me to do much in a fight,” Fritz warned. “My specialty is wheeling and dealing, not bashing in heads. That’s why I keep gear that lets me travel unobserved; I win the fight by not engaging in it at all.”
“The best strategy,” Grumph said. Fritz looked at him with a touch of surprise, evidently not expecting a half-orc to enjoy tactics that focused on avoiding violence rather than starting it.
“No question there,” Gabrielle agreed. “Though, you obviously have a few backup tricks up your sleeves, judging by that silver stick you pointed at me earlier.”
“Ah yes, my pre-charged wand, made to let even the most mundane of folks call forth the power of a magical spell.” Fritz dipped her hand into the satchel and pulled out the silver object in question as though it had been resting directly in reach. “This one will do quite a number on whoever I shoot it at, but its magical core is depleted thanks to a pack of rock lions that attacked me. There’s probably only enough left for one or two more uses before I have to overpay some mage to give it a recharge.”
“All the more reason for us to travel together then,” Gabrielle pointed out. “Grumph and I may not be the strongest warriors in all the kingdom, but we’re a far sight better than nothing in a pinch. And we could really use someone who’s as familiar with the area as you are.”
“No argument here; I think working together benefits us all,” Fritz said. “Even if I’m not sure that going to Cadence Hollow is in your best interests. Honestly, you’re probably better off going back to help your friends. Mages are a notoriously self-serving group, and no one knows that better than someone who does business with them. Unless you’re one of them, or there’s some gain to be had, you’ve got a better chance of convincing a dragon to lend you aid than a mages’ guild.”
“But they do help out other spellcasters?” Gabrielle leaned forward, unintentionally signaling her interest so keenly she may as well have lit a signal fire.
“They help out others in their guild, but that only allows in conjurors of a certain level, not just random adventurers. Unless one of you is secretly a sorcerer, I’m afraid you’re probably out of luck.”
Grumph coughed discreetly in his hand, a sound that made a more primal part of Gabrielle’s brain put itself on alert for danger. He looked at Fritz sheepishly—or at least as sheepishly as a half-orc is capable of, which is really more like a wolf swaddled in sheepskin—and pulled out the precious tome from his backpack.
“What about a wizard?”
* * *
It started, as all things ultimately did, in darkness. No light, no sound, not even a sense of self as he hovered there. Then came the noises: shambling, tepid footsteps and the shaking of the earth beneath countless bodies. A moon appeared, casting its weak light through the world, shining down on the battlefield below. The beams reflected off the shining armor of soldiers, marching beneath banners Thistle didn’t recognize. They flowed across the land like a river of steel and determination, all converging on a single point on the plateau. Standing there, waiting for them at the center, stood a single man. His features were impossible to see, but the way the light dimmed as it drew near him told all that was worth knowing.
As the armies reached him, they let out cheers and yells before surging forward, weapons drawn and at the ready. Darkness dripped from his hands as he met their advance. The lucky soldiers were turned into little more than piles of pulped flesh in a single blow. Other poor souls fell into patches of shadow that slipped and whispered between their feet, tumbling into a void that wouldn’t be so merciful as to offer a quick death.
Powerful though he was, the armies continued their attack, being replaced as quickly as they were churned through. With sheer, vast, sacrificial numbers, they began to turn the tide, landing strikes and drawing blood with increasing frequency. For every drop of blood they spilled, he took hundreds of their lives, yet they paid that toll without hesitation. At last, a soldier with a blade that shone bright in the moonlight slipped forward in the lake of pooling blood, missing an attack by chance more than skill, and pressed his sword through the lone man’s heart.
A wave of silence burst forth, and every warrior around him fell to the ground, expressions as still as the graves they’d been sent to. The only one who survived was the soldier still shakily gripping the blade sticking out of the man’s back. Slowly, they both sank to their knees, staring into each other’s eyes as the life drained from one of them.
When the deed was fully done, the soldier pulled his sword from the man’s chest, dark blood oozing down its blade. Cheering soldiers gathered around him, quickly dismembering the corpse lest it find new life through some unknown dark magic. As for he who had done the deed, the killer merely stared at the dark stain on his sword. It was impossible to know what was going through his mind, even as the others lifted him high in celebration.
But, for just a moment, there seemed to be slightest flash of grief flickering in his half-covered eyes.
* * *
When Thistle first woke, he thought for a moment he was still on that battlefield, bearing witness to terrible carnage. All he could see was darkness. No moon, no stars, not even the light of a dying fire to guide his eyes. Then, as Timuscor let out a soft snore, reality came rushing back to the gnome, just as the armies had overrun their foe.
A dream, then, that’s what it had been. Unlike any Thistle had ever experienced before, save only for the time he’d come face-to-face with his own god in the land of slumber. It seemed like a fair bet that the two were similar, because they came from the same source: Grumble. That paladins were sometimes given visions from their gods was no great secret, though Thistle had always assumed they were more akin to directions than what he’d received. Go slay this monster, come save this village, that sort of thing.
The dream was still in his mind, clear as a true memory, not disappearing like morning fog as did most nocturnal visions. He could picture the banners of those armies in perfect detail, yet they still remained foreign to him. None of the kingdoms he was aware of used such symbols, save for one sigil he’d seen flying over a smaller unit. That one had looked, at least cursorily, similar to the crest of Solium with which Thistle was all too familiar. As for the others, they were utterly alien.
Either this meant his visions took place in the ancient past, before the current kingdoms had come into being, or it was somewhere Thistle had never so much as heard of. There was also the possibility that he had seen events that were yet to come, but if it was so far off that all the kingdoms would change, then Thistle highly doubted there would be any point in giving him such a dream. The other two were far more likely, not that this fact helped give him any idea of what he was supposed to actually take away from the vision.
A powerful, nearly unstoppable man being killed only under the combined might of several armies and the sacrifice of thousands of lives. Thistle wasn’t certain how the vision impacted what had happened to the people of Briarwillow or why Grumble was keeping him in the town. All he had was a sole hunch, and he didn’t at all care for the implications that came with it. Whoever this mystery man had been, whatever powers he’d been gifted with or tyranny he’d wrought, there was one fact that seemed uncomfortably clear from Thistle’s vision.
That man’s body had certainly had a skull.
Chapter 11
“You’re sure this is the right way?” Eric scanned the landscape around them, searching for even the slightest signs of life. Nothing met his eye besides the worn dirt their horses were clomping across, the thin patch of trees to their left, and the mountain stretching upward in the distance, nearly hiding the morning sun as they rode toward it.
“As a matter of fact, no, I’m not sure at all,” Thistle said, turning his head so he wasn’t speaking directly into Timuscor’s back. With Grumph gone, he’d had to burden himself on the second strongest of their remaining horses, which belonged to Timuscor. Had they been moving at a brisk speed, the extra weight might have been a serious issue, but by keeping to a careful pace, the steed was holding up well, even with a human and a gnome on top. “This whole enterprise is experimental by its very nature. I’m trying to guide us with a strange feeling in my stomach, which I’m only presuming to be a divinely inspired sense that tells me where evil lurks. You should probably prepare yourself for more misses than hits today.”
“Someone’s a little testy this morning,” Eric muttered. He’d meant to do it quietly, but with nothing around to absorb sound, the words easily carried across to Thistle’s ears.
“My apologies. I had . . . trouble sleeping.” It had taken at least an hour for Thistle to finally grow tired again after waking from his vision, and the rest he did find was fitful and disturbed. Every time he closed his eyes, memories of the dream danced through his mind. Blood-soaked ground strewn with bodies, pits of darkness that seemed to stretch on infinitely, and the fierce eyes of the one man taking on thousands of others. Strangest of all was the moment he was finally felled, that last exchange playing itself out more times than Thistle could count before the sun finally rose.
“If you’re feeling bad, we don’t have to do this,” Eric said.
“I’m afraid that’s where you’re wrong. I have to follow this instinct I’ve been given, no matter the cost that comes with it. That was the bargain I made when I accepted Grumble’s power, and I’ll not go back on my word. Especially not to a god.”
“No doubt such a sturdy moral center is precisely why Grumble chose you in the first place.” Timuscor spoke without turning back, keeping his eyes always on the path ahead. Thistle thought the young man’s attitude had shifted, just a touch, since their discussion on the prior day. Whether Timuscor had given up on the idea of becoming a paladin or was committed to it all the harder, he’d clearly made a choice. Thistle didn’t think it actually mattered which one he’d picked; so long as he was set in some direction, Timuscor would be better off than before.
“That, and I actually ran toward a demon instead of away. We worshippers of Grumble are not known for our bravery, so even such a small act stuck out to him.”
“You know, I keep meaning to ask you about that, but then more important things come up.” Eric steered his horse closer to Timuscor and Thistle, straightening out when he was only a few feet away. “I’ve heard you say that Grumble was just a lowly minion himself, and that when he attained godhood that’s who he decided to look over. How exactly did a kobold minion become a god in the first place?”
“How
does anyone become a god at all?” Timuscor added. “I’d thought they were all formed from the start, like the stars in the sky.”
“Some were,” Thistle said. “Mostly the gods of the races, like Mithingow, god of the gnomes. Or Adamus, god of humans. Legends say that they were born with the world, and they made their people of the land in their own image. From them sprang the sentient creatures that we collectively think of as ‘people.’ There were also primal, powerful gods who ruled over the elements themselves, though most of their names have been lost to history. They neither cared for nor about our kind, working only to ensure their element was in balance with the others. Those were the original gods, as the legend goes, but throughout the years since creation, a precious few mortals have found their way into the ranks of the divine.”
“I know a few of those myths; my mother told them to me as bedtime stories,” Eric added. “Longinus was a great hero who found godhood when he slew a demon that had eaten up half of the hells to increase its power. So much magic poured from its neck that when it rained upon Longinus, he was imbued with the power of the divine.”
“If the demon had enough power to turn a human into a god, wouldn’t the demon have been a god itself?” Timuscor pointed out.
“These are myths, mere stories spread about how the gods became what they are,” Thistle told him. “I wouldn’t expect too much accuracy from them. They’re meant to capture a spirit more than details. None of the gods actually want to share how one climbs the steps toward divinity, for fear that others would follow in their footsteps.”
“Which brings us back to my original question: what’s the legend for how Grumble became a god?” Eric asked.
“Grumble’s tale, like Grumble himself, is a simple one.” Thistle leaned back slightly in the saddle, allowing him to speak without having to keep his head constantly turned. “He was the minion of a great, if overly ambitious, wizard. In the mage’s plundering and research, it is said he came across a ceremony of tremendous power, one so ancient he could not discern its source. Wanting to see what it did, but not willing to put himself at risk, the wizard performed the ritual and threw Grumble in as the target at the last moment. No doubt he believed it was some sort of terrible curse or means to wreak horrible damage, thinking it would be of use against his enemies. We can only imagine his shock when his servant emerged, not only unharmed, but also blessed with divine power. He certainly would have used the power on himself, but Grumble never gave him the chance. Thus, the god of the minions was born.”
