The Long Road to Karn (Realm of Arkon, Book 5)

by Akella, G.

  Apparently, my wife wasn't completely without vanity—why else would she have spent her energy to put on such a show? Then again, maybe she saw an asset in Alsuil's girlfriend? And it was curious that Mirana hadn't preserved her youth. Was she somehow unable or unwilling to drain her partners' life force? But anyway, I had enough to worry about without taking on the problems of others.

  "So that's the story," I concluded, putting away my pipe. "There's no need for you to know any more—I've already said more than necessary."

  "I'll take your word for it," Kort acquiesced. "I imagine you have your reasons to keep mum about certain details. But know that your wife is as welcome in our home as you are." The innkeeper upended his glass, grimaced, then motioned toward the door leading to the living quarters, and winked conspiratorially.

  "Well, are you ready to meet your namesake?"

  "About time!" I exclaimed, finishing my brandy as well. I rose from the table, and nodded to Gerid. "We'll be back soon—keep an eye on these two."

  "I suppose I'll have to," the demon shifted his contemplative gaze from Mirana to Alsuil. "I'll pour them a round—maybe that'll bring them to their senses. Brandy can remedy many an ailment, including lunacy. Go already," he waved at the half-opened door while reaching for the barrel. "I'll get started on their treatment."

  I shrugged and followed after Kort. After climbing the squeaking wooden staircase to the second floor and taking the wide hallway lined with glass shelving to the very end, we stopped in front of white double-leaf doors. Kort knocked three times, peeked inside and said quietly:

  "Wife, we've got guests." With those words he walked into the room, nodding to me to follow.

  Wearing a robe with a yellow floral pattern, Treis was sitting up in a wide bed with beige blankets in the far corner of the room.

  The young woman was fixing aonesie on a baby with a mane of raven-black hair standing in front of her. The sight of him left me speechless. Annat had said that my namesake was born only a month ago! How could he already be standing on his own? Or did all children in this world enjoy accelerated growth? After all, any player was technically "growing" when leveling up, and there was a lot that could be done in a month's time. Or perhaps this was a feature unique to the demon race?

  Upon seeing me, Treis flinched, closed the flaps of her robe, and pulled the child toward her. A moment later, her expression softened as recognition flickered in her eyes, and her eyebrows arched upward. Letting go of the boy, she whispered, "Krian, is that really you?" The child's behavior, unlike the mother's, was entirely unexpected. I'd thought that the sight of my gruesome mug would cause him to immediately burst into tears or start wailing, like any normal child would; instead, he flashed a big smile, made a friendly gesture while looking at his mother, and said something in his incomprehensible child's tongue Well, then! Maybe to him I looked like Santa or Ronald McDonald? Some kids loved that clown, though I still remembered how badly he used to traumatize my fragile child's psyche. Even Max, who was generally considered to be the braver one, was more than wary of him. But Santa? Sure, I was content to be Santa. Heck, I even had a present with me! Though I was neither fat nor jolly, my purple armor hardly resembled red overalls, and I hated milk and cookies, it would have to do! I smiled at the happy mother and took a seat on a nearby chair.

  "Hello, Treis," I spoke in as friendly a voice as I could manage so as to not frighten the child. "Congratulations on the birth of your firstborn."

  "You've changed quite a bit," she said softly. "The Krian I remember was neither an Elder nor a prince..."

  "I'm still the same Krian, believe me," I said. "As for my appearance and the rest of it... Does it really matter? Heck, you can ask Kort."

  "He's the same light one, darling," the demon sat next to his wife on the bed, clasping her by the shoulders. "He's—"

  "You misunderstand," Treis interrupted her husband. "I will always be happy to see you in my home, and I'll always remember what you've done for us," she smiled, clinging to her husband and caressing her son's head. "Whoever you might become, whatever you might do, our attitude toward you will never change."

  At that moment little Krian cowed something in his incomprehensible tongue and started waddling my way relentlessly. Once at my foot, he grabbed onto my pant leg, looked up and flashed a toothless smile.

  Trying to keep my breath steady and my movement gentle, I picked up the lad and sat him on my lap. Holding him with my left hand, with my right I reached into my bag and pulled out the poleaxe of the slain Lord of Rualt. The combination of the spear-like tip with a blade shaped like a crescent moon and the tapered butt at the end of a six-foot-long shaft made the weapon look more like a halberd. The upper section of the shaft scintillated a soft cerulean color, with waves of sapphire sparks running down the length of the curved fearsome blade, itself almost two feet long, at regular intervals.

  "This is a formidable weapon, worthy of a great warrior," I said solemnly, placing the little demon's hands on the shaft of the poleaxe. "It is my gift to you, Krian. Learn it, master it. May you never bring disgrace to it."

  There! From here on, the weapon would only be its true self in the hands of this child—in everybody else's hands it would be but an ordinary axe. And the only ones who could handle it until the kid grew up were his blood relatives and me. All this I had learned from Kert prior to setting out for my princedom.

  As the kid clasped at the shaft with his little fingers, the weapon's blades flared with a bluish mist, and the room shook a little. This was a world of magic, after all, and the transference of an item this powerful had to be accompanied by some special effects. Just to be safe, I took my little namesake's hands off the shaft, and the mist immediately vanished; when he clutched it again, it reappeared.

  "It worked," I stated with satisfaction, and looked up at the parents sitting on the bed in front of me.

  Treis' eyes shone with curiosity. Kort, in contrast, seemed petrified.

  "But that's... that's..." he whispered hoarsely. "Lord Yllial's Frost Fury..."

  "Uh-huh," I nodded with a smile. "That's the one. Only now it's Krian's Frost Fury. Yllial hasn't the need for it anymore, but your son might get good use out of it yet."

  "You're mad! Do you have any idea—"

  "Do you remember the sword you gave me? The one you had been keeping for your son when he came of age? I'd left your son without a weapon, so this is simply about restoring justice." With a wink to my namesake, whose reply was to blow a bubble as he kept clasping at the shaft of the poleaxe, I turned back to Kort. "Look how he loves my gift! As for the weapon's price, does it really matter?" I shrugged. "As long as it is owned by someone who's worthy of it. And, with the two of you as his parents, I know that he will be."

  Kort jumped off the bed and began pacing nervously around the room. Every few moments he would stop and turn, as if wanting to say something. And every time, faced with my gentle smirk, he'd stop short and flail his arms with frustration.

  "Is something the matter, dear?" Treis calmly inquired of her husband.

  "He just gifted our son Frost Fury, Lord Yllial's epic axe! Do you have any idea what it is?!"

  "No," the demoness shrugged. "What about Yllial? Did he simply give his axe to Krian?" The young woman nodded at me, then turned her gaze back to her husband, still pacing to and fro.

  "Of course not," Kort rolled his eyes. "Krian killed him and took his axe, and then... then he gave it to Krian!" Kort stammered for a moment, then clarified. "To our Krian, I mean."

  "He killed the Lord of Rualt?" Treis gave me a look of some surprise.

  "You're finally getting it!" Kort literally growled. "Hart, but I could use a drink."

  "But why? And how did you manage it?" Treis continued, just now realizing the absurdity of the situation.

  "It just kind of happened," I shrugged. "He was being rude, and—"

  "Are you mocking me?" Treis looked at her son clutching to the polexae's shaft, then at me, and finally ba
ck at her husband.

  "No, dear," the latter replied, having regained his composure. "Krian really did slay the Lord of Rualt and saved our province from invasion. This is also the reason we'll be moving to Nittal this week."

  "I see," getting up off the bed, she walked over to a wardrobe by the wall, and opened it. "You're still wearing the clothes I gave you," she said without turning around. "I want that to continue." Treis turned around, demonstrating another outfit on a hanger: a fine waistcoat with matching narrow trousers. She took the hanger and walked up to me. "Now this is an outfit befitting a prince," she said solemnly. "The satin was enchanted by Mirana so that you will never be cold while wearing it."

  Carefully taking the weapon's shaft from my little namesake's little hands, I passed it to Kort, put down the boy who was already voicing his extreme displeasure, accepted the gift from the demoness, embraced her and kissed her on the cheek.

  "Thank you," I smiled, holding out the hanger to examine the gift.

  The outfit was indeed spectacular. Sewn from black satin and embroidered with a flowing silver pattern, it wouldn't look out of place at a royal ball. From what I remembered of history, such a waistcoat would typically be worn with breeches and stockings, but these pants were longer, with embroidery on the side of the pant legs, as if continuing the waistcoat's pattern.

  "That's not all," the demoness smiled, content to see my genuine awe. Walking back to the wardrobe, she quickly returned with two fine shirts—pristine white with elegant red stitching. "Here," she handed them to me, then swooped her son up off the floor, who was now bawling his head off. "All this will look splendid on you."

  She wasn't kidding! Giving Treis another kiss on the cheek, I looked over to Kort.

  "Thank you, friends," I said from the bottom of my heart.

  "Oh, please!" the innkeeper chortled as he put away the poleaxe. "Now how do you like that?" He shook his head with a smile, looking at his son. "Screaming his head off that his present was taken away. Don't worry, boy, you'll be playing with it every day when you get older."

  "That's right, don't get ahead of yourself," I chimed in.

  "I'll tell you what exactly our son got for a present later, dear. For now, we should head back down. We have guests, after all..."

  "Go, go," the demoness smiled. "And Krian, don't forget to wear my gift to tonight's celebration."

  "A celebration?" I asked.

  "It's not often our village receives a prince," Treis smiled. "And these two," she nodded at her husband, "have been waiting for you to celebrate their promotions. So, the whole village will be partying tonight, just like last time."

  Kort and I went down to the dining hall, where I noted with considerable relief that the alcohol had indeed had the impact on Mirana and Alsuil as predicted by Gerid. The expression on the succubus' face was no longer that of pure idiotic joy, and the mage seemed his normal self again. We joined them for a drink, after which Kort pulled the mage to an adjacent table to coordinate the terms of the inn's transfer, leaving the three of us to ourselves. Externally, the demoness still looked a bit estranged, staying out of my conversation with Gerid, but sitting quietly and taking infrequent sips of brandy from her silvery glass. Of course, expecting her to have the same attitude toward me as before would be both foolish and futile.

  My mood was beginning to sour, and, having picked up from Kort the key to the room I'd stayed at last time around, I excused myself on the pretense of needing to rest, and started toward the stairs leading up to the guest rooms. Before reaching the foot of the stairs, however, I remember one curious tidbit and turned around.

  "Hey, Gerid," I addressed the demon still sitting at the table. "The locals call your inn 'Candle' due to the white three-foot-high extension, right? I've long been meaning to ask you, but never got the chance: does it have some kind of sacral meaning or is the idea simply to attract customers?" I said with a snicker. "Cause if you ask me, that thing looks like a giant c..." I stopped short, glancing askance at the silent Mirana, then corrected myself: "A very particular male organ."

  Sure enough, no succubus would ever be embarrassed by that word, but it had been a longstanding rule of mine not to cuss in front of the fairer sex. Cussing in combat was acceptable, but in a peaceful situation? No way. On the one hand it might seem like complete nonsense—why would a prince, and an Elder Demon no less, give a hoot about rules of decorum? Yet my mind kept grasping at such vestiges of civility, and I suspected it was thanks to them that I still felt like a human being.

  "Yes, it's a prick," Gerid shrugged, apparently unperturbed by any such notions of civility. "An enormous prick," the demon continued. "I had a dozen craftsmen hewing and gluing it together. The inn was originally called Best Wishes. After my buddies from the century finished installing it on the roof, it took three days to clean it properly. Kort was there, too," Gerid nodded toward the table over which his friend was conversing with Alsuil.

  "And then what happened?" I smiled.

  "On the morning of day three this dandy from the traders' guild shows up and demands that I take down the obscene structure. Apparently, the sculpture was 'ruining the face of the dominion's capital.' At the time the traders were responsible for Nittal's beautification, so..." Gerid finished off his brandy, twirled the glass in his hands, sighed and set it down. "I kicked the huckster out on his ass. My head was spinning after three days of partying, and here comes this haughty twit shaking a stack of papers in my face..."

  "I suppose that wasn't quite the end of that story?"

  "No, not quite the end," the demon grunted. "Two days later, on the eve of the inn's grand opening, Jerran turns up, our former centurion. A stand-up guy, in all honesty. He says to me that he was sent by Tiranus, who got orders from the lord's own chancellery." The demon put a pipe between his teeth and took a deep drag. Casting a sidelong glance at the ruminating Mirana, he shook his head and continued. "Anyway, it turned out that the sculpture on my roof was visible from the upper windows of the citadel's living quarters, and needed to be removed lest it offended the sensibilities of noble ladies. As if those noble ladies are so chaste!" Gerid shook his head again, clearly vexed, and glanced again at the silent demoness. "Anyway, we had to pick up our tools, climb up on the roof and start cutting and sawing off the most telling elements. I was so pissed off by the injustice that I went and changed the inn's name. What best wishes could there be with that mutilated stump? So, yeah, that's the sad story of my inn's name," he concluded matter-of-factly.

  Well, that's one mystery less, I grunted to myself, turning around to go up to my room at last when suddenly I remembered Gloom who hadn't eaten anything all day. So, I had to go outside instead to feed the boar, accompanied by Gerid and Kort who were dying to get a look at the goddess' present. The goddess' present, in the meantime, was looking mighty satisfied, even if his appearance left little to be satisfied about. Lifting his bulk with a squelch at the sight of me, he presented himself to us in all his glory. Hearing my friends exclamations of awe behind me, I walked over to Gloom, stopping at a safe distance—desperately wanting to preserve the cleanliness of the fine outfit sewn by Treis—dumped a bagful of apples onto the ground, shook my head in reproach, and finally headed up to my room.

  There was a pleasant buzzing in my head, my spirits lifted by Gerid's story. My initial decision to catch some zzz's was overturned as soon as I remembered my yet unallocated fifteen talent points, and yet unexamined vials dropped by the two fallen bosses.

  Sleep will have to wait, I thought with a sigh, putting a pot of coffee on the stove, then peeked into the chest in the far corner of the room. My personal vault, and what a disorganized mess it was! Items filled up slots randomly, without any logic or order. All this had to be sorted, and the nonessential stuff given over to Schen, but I hadn't found the time for it yet. Slightly less than half of the maximum two hundred fifty four slots were taken, but for a person who had always hated extra junk and firmly stuck to the principle of minimalism a la "
if you see an object you don't recognize, trash it without hesitation," all this "treasure" was giving me heartburn. Sure, some of these could be sold in the upper realm, but what purpose was served by alchemical reagents dropped all the way back in the West Wing and the Ghorazm Ruins? Or by reels of cloth? Or by various uncommon quality items on the wrong side of level 100?

  A player's personal vault deserved special mention. As opposed to the inventory bag, which was restricted by the items' dimensions and the character's maximum carrying capacity, the personal vault was restricted by the items' dimensions alone. That is, you couldn't stuff a catapult inside it, try as you might, but ten-twenty tons of iron bars, which stacked neatly up to hundred pieces that occupied just one slot, was perfectly fine. At level one, a player's personal vault comprised ten slots, with that number increasing by one as the player leveled. Accordingly, at the present I had two hundred fifty four slots, but that still wasn't cause to store useless junk. I had no time to sort through it all, and nowhere to transfer the stuff I didn't personally need—the clan treasury was linked to Craedia which was currently inaccessible to me, but I was resolved to deal with the issue at last upon my return to the citadel.

  Satisfied with this promise to myself, I closed shut the lid of the chest, put a pipe between my teeth, poured myself a piping-hot cup of coffee, and took a seat at the desk by the window.

  The stats didn't require much scrutiny, as I threw twenty five points into constitution and another twenty into strength. Then, taking a sip from the cup on the table, I opened the talent menu. Two points of the available fifteen went straight into my main attack skills—that was beyond question. Putting one point into Tongue of Flame and Ice Blade each, the skills' icons blinked, then flashed with changed figures.

  Ice Blade XIII.

  Instant cast.

  Energy cost: 65 points.

  Cooldown: 2 seconds.

  You attack the enemy with a blade of ice, dealing 310% damage on top of the weapon's base damage, slowing the target by 50% for 10 seconds with an additional 10% chance to freeze the target for 10 seconds.