by Rosie Scott
I followed Nyx down a short hallway and into another room much like the first, with Silas on my heels. I figured he would be uncomfortable in such a place, and to be honest, I wasn't too enthusiastic to be there, either.
I felt a nudge at my side. Nyx leaned close to me and whispered, “He's here. Back right corner. Male human. Hot. Long brown hair, scar on his face.”
I couldn't help but chuckle a bit at her description as my eyes found the man she spoke of. “He's good?”
“He's always one of the first to get hired. I'd go and interview him, if I were you.”
“Noted,” I replied, starting to walk toward the man. “I've got nothing to lose.”
The mercenary noticed my approach and watched me with eagle-like eyes as I made my way toward him, realizing that I wasn't here looking for work. He sat up straight, clasping his hands on the table as I sat across from him.
“What can I do for you?” He asked.
“I've been told you're good at what you do, so I want to know what exactly it is that you do,” I said, noticing it was an awkward statement only after it had come out.
He huffed a laugh. I eyed the scar on the right side of his face. It looked like he'd narrowly dodged a sword swing that had aimed to cut his head in half vertically. He had dark brown hair that hung shoulder length, and his face was full of stubble. Slight creases on his face gave away that he was probably in his early forties, and had spent many days in direct sunlight. His eyes were a few shades lighter than his hair and gave away the man's intelligence.
“You've been told I'm really good at what?” He questioned.
I jerked my thumb back at Nyx. The man before me nodded in understanding. “You get hired before the others. There's probably a reason why.”
He pondered this. “Yeah. Probably.”
“What's your name?”
“I am Theron,” he replied, simply. His eyes lowered to the table, taking in my many rings. “You are a mage?”
“Yes,” I replied.
“What does a mage want with a mercenary?”
“I'm looking to add to my crew,” I replied. “We have an assassin, an archer, and a mage between the three of us, and we're looking to add a few to maximize our abilities before we leave Sera. I have somewhat of a personal quest.”
“Where will you be going?”
“Whispermere,” I replied.
“That is quite far,” Theron mused.
“You will be paid well. We'll split any loot or profits equally along the way, and I am willing to give you a payment upfront and a payment when we return.”
Theron thought about this for a moment. “How long do you think this will take? Once we get to Whispermere, what business do you have to take care of?”
“I am currently uncertain, which I know is inconvenient to hear. If it will take me a long while, I will pay the remainder to you there. It's even possible that if we work well together, I would want to keep you with us for permanent mercenary work. It's an option I, myself, am considering.”
“This seems a bit hard to believe,” Theron said, his eyes judging me. “Why would you offer me this without knowing what it is that I do?”
“I'm not offering it to you yet. I'm explaining my plan because you asked.”
“That's fair,” he admitted. “Well, to answer your inquiry, I fancy myself a ranger.”
“What are your skills?”
“I fight with a bow and dual blades, depending on the situation. I am also a scout, trained in the ways of both prevention of attacks and hunting down targets. I know weather patterns and I can judge landscapes well, figure out the best path to take in the case of trouble. I know wildlife inside and out and can keep you alive if tragedies befall us in the wilderness, though I'm sure your elven friend here is well rehearsed in such things as well.”
“What kinds of survival techniques do you know?” Silas asked from just behind me.
“How to make salves to prevent infections or rid the body of poisons. What types of plant and animal life are poisonous, what kinds are edible. How to keep frostbite from taking a limb. Wound care. That sort of thing.”
Theron sounded extremely useful. I decided to ask him a question tailored to figuring out his beliefs. “Let's say I wanted to hire you to kill a target and I just told you the location. Would you accept the job?”
“Is this a theoretical question, or a real question meant to sound as such?” He questioned.
“Answer it honestly, and I'll tell you.”
“I would be able to complete the job, but I normally want reasons for killing.”
“What if I gave you none?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “It would depend on how desperate for money I was, and I haven't been desperate to eat in a long while.”
I liked the sound of that. “It was a theoretical question, by the way.”
“I respect that,” the ranger replied.
“Are you interested in working with us?” I asked him.
“The job sounds tempting,” he said. “The only thing keeping me from saying yes is not knowing how much you're offering.”
“That's understandable. What are you asking for upfront?”
“A couple hundred gold,” he said, before a hearty laugh.
“Done.”
Theron's smile faded. “Either you're joking, you're desperate, or you're stupid as hell,” he commented.
“I'd hope I was none of those things. I won't be paying you the money until we're ready to set off, which should be in a few days, so I know you can't run off with it.”
“That's not the reason I said that,” he replied. Eyeing me suspiciously, he went on, “Why are you considering working permanently as a mercenary if you have a few hundred to spend on me upfront? You can't possibly be hurting for money.”
“I'm not hurting for money, my friend, but for purpose.”
Theron watched me carefully. He looked back down at my rings, studying them closely. “I don't believe I caught your name,” he said.
“I'm Kai,” I replied. “Kai Sera.”
Four
The day we were to leave Sera was quickly upon us. Silas, Nyx and I had stayed at the Howling Wolf for the last two nights we were in the city. The tavern keeper had become friendlier and friendlier to us over the couple of nights we had stayed, enjoying his constant stream of room income. He had served us mugs of ale on the house the last night, and after getting to know us on a first name basis, he had told us that the next time we were looking for a room and ale to come see him. We had heartily agreed, though it was unlikely we would ever stay in Sera again.
Silas and I met Nyx in the downstairs tavern, and we left together for the Lounge, where we had set to pick up Theron. I was planning to pay him five hundred gold today, as per our agreement. It was a hefty sum, but the man would be spending at least half a year with us.
The skies overhead of Sera were overcast, and the usually warm and colorful weather of New Moon had decided to be a bit chilly, taking advantage of the bashful sun. I hoped it was not an omen of things to come.
The streets of the city were still crowded, as they often were. My home city rarely slept, and most tourists and locals alike would wait until an absolute downpour was among them to seek shelter. I was leery of most of them today in particular, after Bjorn's warning words and my own suspicion. I pulled my own thick hood over my head to limit others' view of me.
Theron was waiting for us outside of the Lounge, his head under his own hood, leaning back against the building, one boot against the wall. As we approached, I saw him open his eyes, as if he'd been resting. Pushing off the wall, he walked over toward us, a large satchel hanging by his side.
“Good morning, Theron,” I greeted, immediately getting to business and pulling out a coin purse with five hundred gold. I'd counted it multiple times the night before to ensure its accuracy, and I told Theron as such when I handed it over to him. “You can recount it before us, if you'd like.”
He shook h
is head, as if he found that unnecessary. He smoothly put the coin purse in an inside pocket of his satchel. “I can count it later. I can already tell it's more gold than many in the slums will see in a lifetime. I know I will be paid.”
I nodded, relieved to hear he trusted me, at least professionally. I wasn't sure if that had to do with who I was, or not. It had been clear by our conversation the other day that he knew who I was, whether he'd heard of my skills or simply related my last name to that of the city and its university.
“Are we ready to leave, then?” Theron asked, his eyes down the slope of the city and toward the walls.
I nodded, though Bjorn and Terran came to mind. We had said our goodbyes to both, but somehow, it didn't feel like enough. I had never left the city, and while that was mostly a burden to me, it also meant I had never left those I loved.
The city of Sera was meant to be a beautiful and overwhelming sight. I had always known this, and yet once I was outside of it for the first time, it truly hit me. It was a masterpiece of a city, taking up at least half of the mountainside with its tiers of buildings and architecture.
The mountain the city sat upon was the last in a range, surrounded on all sides by valleys of deep green. Lush fields of grass would blow in artistic patterns throughout the day by breezes, a methodical thing to see, and one I'd gotten used to watching with admiration from the window of my bedroom high above the rest of the city. There was very little plant life other than simple grass in these valleys, for the land was a bit of a reach for the seeds of the trees from the bordering Seran forests. Despite this, the valleys were unusually clear of grazing animals. I had once heard that early in Sera's history, dragons and smaller wyverns, once rare, had a population boom, and before that led to their attempts to take over mankind, any animals that saw fit to graze in the valleys around the city were quickly preyed upon by the beasts, with nowhere to hide once the predator's eyes were upon them. It was for this reason that the valleys alone were viewed as just something else magical about Sera, for it was a lush landscape uninterrupted by any animals save for the tourists and caravans that traveled along the main road.
“They say that the building of Sera was commissioned out to the dwarves by the settling humans back in the Golden Era,” Theron spoke up after a long silence between us, as if he knew all of our minds were on Sera's beauty. “Only dwarves could build something so complex and significant, for they can mold mountains like no other mortals.” After a hesitation, he added, “I mean no offense, Miss Sera.”
I knew that the people of Sera tended to look down upon the dwarves for their focus on the earth and hands-on work with mining and architecture, so Theron had a reason to worry. “It does not offend me. I want to learn the truth of the world, not an altered version of it. And anyway, call me Kai.”
“Very well,” Theron replied, his voice a little more comfortable.
Sera was so large and pronounced on its mountain that even after a day's worth of travel, it was still in our sight as we set to camp along the border of the Seran forest. The lights of the city, lights made of both magic and fire, lit the night sky in a halo glow.
“Do you think we'll be able to hunt a deer this close to the valley?” Theron pondered aloud to Silas. The walk through the valleys had been so uneventful and quiet that it was awkward to talk to one another when we'd trekked through them, as if to interrupt the majestic silence would be to wrong nature.
Silas looked deeper into the forest. “We'll find one.”
Theron and Silas had talked amongst themselves from time to time throughout our first day. The two men had similar skills, and had found common ground. I was glad for Silas, as his acquaintances seemed to always coincide with mine, and he had very few people he spoke to regularly that weren't my friends first. Theron, while intelligent and willing to answer questions, was a bit intimidating to me. He had a gruff edge to him, along with obvious experience in his field that made me feel put to shame. He had been a little distant with me thus far. It was probably a mixture of being the only person in our group who was hired by me and not a friend, and me being such an important figure from the city he worked in.
“We'll set up camp,” Nyx offered the two. “You guys go ahead and get dinner.”
Theron and Silas wandered off together into the woods, bows in hand. The two seemed to be happy to get out of helping to set up camp. Once alone, my best friend and I started unpacking supplies and preparing to settle for the night. Though it would have been easier to use my fire magic to start a campfire, Nyx was kind enough to start one the old-fashioned way. I didn't want to use my magic unless I had to in battle.
Before long, Nyx and I sat on a makeshift log bench, our eyes gazing over the miles of the Seran valley we'd trekked through thus far and to the beautiful skyline of the city. A light evening breeze whistled low over the valley grasses, rippling them like the waves of an ocean, the sides of the long grasses reflecting the moonlight of the double moon.
This was so peaceful, so relaxing. It was also the first time I'd ever felt a true taste of freedom. In Sera, I wasn't being held hostage by any means; that didn't mean being held down by obligations never felt restrictive. Perhaps I had never known just how restrictive it was until I was actually free. I wondered what Bjorn, Terran, and my father were doing right now, and if they were thinking of me. Maybe it was a selfish thought, but I was thinking of them.
“How's it feel to be out on your own for once?” Nyx asked, leaning back on her arms to get a reclined view of the landscape before us.
“Beautiful,” I replied, my voice whimsical. I glanced over to her, where she had taken off all of her armor save for an undershirt. In the darkness of late evening and without strangers nearby, I knew she felt comfortable enough, herself.
“Normally, I'd argue with you that beautiful isn't a feeling, but I get what you mean,” she mused. “I'm so glad to be out of Sera. I'm also glad you decided to actually leave. Part of me thought you never would.”
That surprised me. “You know how tied down I felt. I needed to get out of there.”
“Yes—but you also felt, as you said, tied down. Some never break out of their ties. I'm glad you did.”
“And I'm glad you're here with me,” I admitted, my eyes focusing on some blinking lights in Sera. I wondered if one of the illusionists was having trouble lighting the street lamps with a spell. I wasn't able to tell from this distance.
“Wouldn't have missed it for the world, my friend.”
My mind floated back to the subject of the letter, and something that had been bothering me about it that I'd wanted to ask Nyx, particularly when we were alone. “My mother said in her letter that many would make an attempt on my life because of my powers, and that she was happy to hear none had succeeded.”
“I wouldn't worry about that. You're surrounded by people who can fend off pretty much anything,” Nyx replied, seemingly taking my statement in a different way.
“Well—I'm glad for that, but the reason I'm bringing it up is because you were sent to assassinate me.”
“Oh.” Nyx chuckled. “I'm aware.”
“Do you remember anything about why you were sent to kill me?”
“I thought we'd talked about this before. You're not second guessing me, are you?”
“No,” I answered quickly, because I wasn't. I fully trusted Nyx with my life. Other than how we'd met, she had never shown anything but gratefulness for my keeping her from execution, and genuine selflessness when it came to looking out for me. “I just thought that now that all of this has come about, you might have new perspective on it, looking back. Maybe you could remember...something. Anything.”
Nyx didn't like to talk too much about the life she had before she'd been sent to kill me. I knew she had her qualms with the culture she'd been raised in, but in another way, I knew she felt she'd betrayed her own people by settling for a life above ground. Her past didn't come up very often, because it was a source of introspection for her, some
thing Nyx wasn't fond of.
“Assassins are raised to be as cold-blooded as possible. When we were given a target, we weren't told why. To tell us why would be to give us a reason to form an attachment to the target. I knew nothing about you but your name and your general location. I figured out as I was working that you were very important, given how hard it was to get to you and your location in the tallest building of the most pretentious human city known to exist. That is all I knew. Anything else I knew about you I found out as we became friends.”
“You didn't know who ordered my death?”
“No.” Nyx hesitated. “The only thing I figure is that whoever ordered it had a lot of money, because the harder the target is to kill, the more our guild would charge. You were the hardest target I'd ever had, just to reach. And then, of course, I failed at my mission.” She turned to smile at me. In the darkness, her teeth were almost the only thing visible on her dark face. “Your mission was the only one I ever failed, but I was glad I did.”
“Because you formed an attachment to your target,” I teased, using her own words from earlier.
“Exactly.” She relaxed again, gazing off into the distance. After a second, she sat up, as if remembering something. “Oh! Speaking of forming attachments, do you have the map to Whispermere that the messenger gave you?”
“Yeah.” I reached down next to the log, grabbing my bag and pulling the folded map out of it. I was curious as to what Nyx had to tell me, and handed it over to her eagerly.
She unfolded it, turning it slightly so the light of the fire allowed her to read it. “Ah! I was right!” She finally exclaimed, looking quite pleased with herself.
“About what?”
“Whispermere...” She trailed a finger across the map, to the northeast, where two large mountains were drawn, a path going up between the two. “...is here.” Moving her finger to the left, along the coastline of the Servis Ocean, she stopped at a small section where the messenger had drawn a couple tiny buildings, with one word underneath, which was currently unreadable to me from my distance. “Thornwell is here.”
