The (sort of) Dark Mage (Waldo Rabbit)

by Nelson Chereta

  “Uhm, excuse me?” Alice waved her hand to get their attention. “What happened to the dragon?”

  “I dispelled it.” Waldo said.

  “What does that mean?”

  Roger gave her his full attention, his eyes slid up and down her figure and then halted on her chest.

  “The dragon was an illusion, I was hoping to scare you off. Of course, that was before I got a good look at you. I am Roger the Magnificent, what is your name lovely lady?”

  She crossed her arms and made a point to stand behind Waldo. “My name is Alice Rabbit, and this is my husband Waldo Rabbit.”

  “Husband?” He spared Waldo an envious glance. “You are a lucky man.”

  “I know, being a White Mage.”

  Roger raised a perplexed eyebrow while Alice shook her head.

  “Well since you are both here why don’t you come inside?”

  XXX

  The inside of Roger’s home was no more impressive than the outside. There was a fire pit for warmth and cooking. There was a rickety table with four stools and a pile of furs that served as a bed. The floor was dirt with some straw scattered on top of it.

  The slaves in Castle Corpselover live better than this.

  When the three of them sat down about the table Roger sat as close to Alice as he could. He kept openly staring at her chest.

  “Your illusion was quite good.” Waldo said.

  “Not good enough though obviously. How did you know it was an illusion?”

  “It was a dragon.”

  Roger gave another sour grunt. “Do you even know how to talk to someone without insulting them?”

  “No, comes from being a White Mage. By the way do you know we’re plotting to take over the world?”

  Alice shook her head.

  “You’re a lot more direct than the other whites I’ve met. So is this where you start in about, ‘unity, justice and peace’?”

  “Do you want me to?”

  Roger narrowed his eyes. “I’ve met two White Mages before, and they both tried to convince me to go to Avalon and study with them. All they would talk about was unity, justice, and peace. They went on and on about how wonderful the world would be one day, once everyone was on their side. No more war, no more poverty or crime. Get rid of all the monsters and all the Dark Mages and everything wrong with the world will be fixed.”

  “Why do you have to get rid of all the monsters?” Alice demanded.

  Roger looked at her in surprise. “You’re married to a White Mage, hasn’t he explained their philosophy to you?”

  “I’ve tried but she is not very smart. Honestly I just keep her around to warm my bed.”

  Thump.

  Waldo managed to not shout in pain as he was kicked beneath the table.

  Not noticing Roger nodded. “Lucky man.”

  “Yes, that’s me, I’m drowning in luck.” Waldo tried to rub his shin without making it too obvious.

  “If you’ve come here to try and recruit me the answer is still no. I’m happy right here.”

  “Really?” Waldo pointedly looked about the cramped, dirty interior. “You obviously have some skill. Why not find yourself a patron who can properly reward you?”

  “Because this is my home, and these are the people I’ve grown up with. I like being able to help them. Just seeing them happy is reward enough.”

  “No, seriously, why do you stay here?”

  “That is the reason.”

  “Do you rule over them and make them do your bidding?”

  “Of course not! They are my neighbors, my friends, when they need my help I am there and they pay me whatever they can. When outsiders come here I’ll charge them, but the most important thing to me is the welfare of my village.”

  “So what you are saying is you take care of these villagers without demanding anything more than the bare minimum from them in return? That you see their wellbeing as your true reward?”

  “That’s right.”

  Waldo sighed. “Fine, don’t tell me.”

  “Darling, you’re being rude.”

  “Me being rude? He’s the one lying to my face, and not even doing a good job of it.”

  “You know the other two White Mages who came here were pretty haughty, but you outdo them. I swear you’re almost as bad as a Dark Mage!”

  “Thank you.”

  “Are you mocking me?”

  Alice saw their host was about to throw them out. Though she loathed doing it, she put a hand gently on top of one of Walton’s sweaty paws and smiled sweetly at him while leaning forward just a bit to give him a better view. She was okay with touching men, so long as they did not use it as an excuse to grab onto her.

  “Please sir, my husband meant no offense.”

  Roger’s eyed darted to the top of her breasts and he calmed noticeably. “Well I can forgive him lovely lady, but I am still not going to Avalon.”

  “That is not the reason we came here.” Waldo pulled the soulwood bark and shavings from his pockets and placed them on the table in front of Roger. “I am afraid I lost my spellbook. Would you be willing to sell me a couple pages of velum, along with a quill and some ink, so I can write down the spells I still have memorized?”

  “You lost your spellbook?” Roger asked with a chuckle. “Only an incompetent would do that.”

  Waldo frowned. “That’s as may be, will you trade me some velum for this soulwood?”

  Roger shook his head. “I have some spare velum, but I also have plenty of soulwood too.”

  “All right, will you sell it to me then? I can pay in silver and copper.”

  Alice sent her husband a sharp look. They didn’t have that much money, and what they had she had earned. She was willing to spend some of it for his sake, but did not like the way he was offering to just toss it away. Later on they would have a very long talk about bargaining and negotiating and about just who would handle the money.

  It would not be him.

  “I don’t really need coin, I have enough. Anyway, the people here supply me with the basics.” Roger said cautiously as his eyes drifted back to Alice and her chest. “I might be open to trade though.”

  Alice had been dealing with lonely men for years and she immediately caught the tone of his words. She took her hand away and scooted her chair closer to Waldo.

  “I have nothing more valuable than the soulwood.”

  “Well there you have it.” Alice said quickly. “We don’t have anything else to trade. How about you sell us this stuff? I’m sure we can negotiate a fair price.”

  Roger swallowed and faced Waldo without meeting his eyes. “Let me have one hour with your wife and I’ll give you five pages.”

  Alice jumped to her feet. “That’s disgusting! My husband would never agree to anything like that!”

  Waldo nodded and stood. “Done, have your way with her.”

  “WHAT?!!”

  “It’s just one hour. Is he asking that much?”

  Alice stood there gaping like a fish.

  “Enjoy yourself.” Waldo gave Roger with a friendly nod, and exited.

  XXX

  He waited just outside the door.

  It took less than half a minute.

  “Eek!”

  He heard a ‘smack’ followed by a loud thump. Waldo went back inside, and was not surprised to find Roger laid out like a rug. Alice was standing there glaring at him murderously; from his connection to her he knew she was furious.

  “Good,” he said cheerfully and went over to the bed and began tossing aside furs. “You search him and I’ll start here. He should have a spellbook along with magical supplies and he said he had some money too. We need to go through every inch of this place as quick as we can.”

  “What do you think you are doing?

  “I am robbing him, obviously.”

  “I don’t care about that! How could you agree? He was going to… to…”

  Waldo sighed. “Alice, I saw what happens to a man who tries to touch
you. I knew what was going to transpire and that there was no chance of anything unwanted occurring.”

  She blinked. “Oh! I understand! You would never actually let another man have his way with me!”

  “Well not for five sheets of velum, he would have to pay a lot more.”

  “WHAT?!!”

  Waldo could feel her rage roaring to new heights. You would expect a succubus to be more open minded. “I am kidding of course.”

  “You had better be.” She growled.

  “Now could you please search him Alice? We need to rob him and be long gone from this place by the time he wakes.”

  As he searched there was a smile on his face. The fearsome legend of Waldo Rabbit had begun!

  Chapter 23

  Stealing For Fun And Profit

  They spent about twenty minutes ransacking the place before fleeing. Waldo had insisted they head into the woods to avoid the locals and any possible pursuit Roger might send after them. Tramping through the woods Waldo was humming what sounded like a funeral dirge.

  “You know darling, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in such a good mood.”

  “Well I never knew just how much fun robbing someone could be.” To emphasize the point he held up his newly acquired spellbook. “We should definitely steal more often.”

  “I’m glad you enjoyed taking everything a man had.”

  “Yes.”

  It had been quite a haul. He had discovered jars filled with mandrake, wolfsbane, lotus blossoms, devil’s grass, sulfur, ground obsidian, and more soul wood. With those he could make a few potions when he had the time. Almost as valuable, he’d found glass vials with wax stoppers.

  “By the way, I still need you to cry.”

  “Not this again. I am not going to cry just because you tell me to.”

  “Don’t be selfish. Do you have any idea how valuable a love potion is?”

  “I am not crying.”

  Waldo stopped and thought for a moment. “You’re fat.”

  “What?”

  “I don’t think of you as my wife. Your mother probably never loved you. I’ve always preferred dark haired women.”

  Alice stared at him.

  “Do you feel like crying now?”

  “No, but one more word and I’ll hit you.”

  Waldo stopped talking.

  He could always make her cry later.

  Along with the jars and vials there had been a coin box. You would never have guessed it, but Roger had actually had a lot of money. Not a one of the coins had been gold; the vast majority were copper traks, but there had also been silver dalters, ribs, and wolves. Alice had quickly and expertly counted and separated the coins. The secret hoard had contained one hundred and eleven silver coins and two thousand two hundred and ninety copper ones. It was the equivalent of six gold coins, thirteen silvers, and ninety coppers. (Twenty silver coins to one gold one and a hundred copper coins to one made of silver.) Alice had then put them all in a separate purse and buried it inside her back pack.

  On Roger’s person they had found a wand. Waldo had seized it and made it disappear into one of his pockets.

  The most useful, and to Waldo the most valuable, thing they had taken was the spellbook. It was bound in sturdy brown leather and its pages were all made of yellow velum. More than a third of it was still blank. There had also been pens and ink. When they stopped to rest for the night Waldo would write down all the spells he still had memorized.

  In the meantime, he was reading it to see what sorts of spells and formulas were written down. Roger’s hand writing was a bit sloppy, but not unreadable. As with most spellbooks it contained not only enchantments but also recipes for brewing potions. Listed were cures for minor ailments and pain relievers, a potion of disguises, and a potion of truth telling that looked interesting. Sadly, there wasn’t one for making love potion.

  The spells themselves were a disappointment.

  There was not a single offensive spell listed, nothing that would harm another person, never mind kill them or slowly drain the life from them. What self-respecting magic user went without combat spells? From what he could see almost all of Roger’s magic was based around illusion, healing, and weather control. The healing spells would be easy to memorize and might be useful. Creating illusions could come in handy as well. But weather control? How utterly worthless!

  Still, since this was the spellbook of a hedgewizard, he was just grateful that it contained anything at all. It would be good to get back in the habit of learning new magic. He would study all of it while he had the time, even the spells he did not expect to ever use.

  “Are you really happy about it?” Alice asked.

  He closed the spellbook and stopped in order to put it in his back pack. “About what?”

  “Stealing. I mean he wasn’t a very nice man, but he wasn’t much worse than most of my old customers. Was it really right for us to just rob him like we did?”

  “I am not sure what you mean. He had what I wanted and so I took it from him. What could be wrong with that?”

  “I mean it’s wrong to steal. Especially when you take everything someone has.”

  “So it would have been fine to only take half?”

  “Well… no, that would still be wrong, but not as bad as taking everything. I mean don’t you feel even a little bit guilty”

  Having put the spellbook away he put the back pack on again and started walking. “You haven’t forgotten who I am because of my brilliant disguise have you?”

  “Trust me darling, that wouldn’t be possible.”

  “Then you should understand that this is what I am here to do. I can’t go home again until I have completed all the conditions of my quest. If robbing someone helps me with that then it’s what I’ll do. Besides, it’s fun!”

  He really did look happier than she’d ever seen. “Don’t you feel even a little bad for Roger?”

  “Why would I? This is what Dark Mages do, we take what we want. The whole point of the First Quest is to prove your strength by doing whatever you please. For us, ‘do as thou wilt’ is the whole of the law.”

  “Darling, I know what you are and what you believe. A few of the things you’ve told me have really worried me, but in spite of that I’ve seen that you’re a good man. Have you ever stopped to think that things would be better if you didn’t do things like steal?”

  “I have a spellbook now, along with a wand, spell components, and all the coins we found. How exactly would I be better off by not stealing?”

  “All right, let me try and explain it this way. In this country thieves get whipped and sent to work in the mines.”

  “Which is why we’re going to avoid the roads for a while, I only intend to do things I can get away with.”

  “Well that makes it all right then.”

  “Exactly!”

  XXX

  The two of them were swinging wide around Bittford. Alice had found them some squirrels and they’d already eaten. They were currently sitting around a fire as Waldo was writing in his new spellbook. He’d already written down the spells and potion recipes he clearly remembered.

  He was writing a final entry under the heading; Love Potion (?). He knew he had most of the formula correct. If one or two ingredients were missing he thought he could ‘improvise’. Even in Alteroth love potion was highly sought after and extremely valuable. In a backward place like this it would be worth even more. Once he got the key ingredient he would definitely try and brew some.

  But how do I make Alice cry?

  “So where do we go now darling?”

  “Middleton. That’s where the next part of my quest is.” Waldo finished the recipe and carefully blew on what he’d written to help the ink dry.

  “So what are you going to do there?”

  Waldo glanced at her consideringly. He hadn’t told her anything about his quest yet. Once they arrived she would have to be told. Since there was no way to keep it secret much longer he thought now would b
e a good time to tell her.

  “Part of my quest requires that I make a contract with three monsters. That was the original reason why I came to Stratford and sought you out. There are two more powerful monsters in Lothas that I mean to find and make a contract with.”