by Deck Davis
“That wasn’t so hard, was it? But I told you; I’ve been ordered not to talk about it.”
“Got it. More bureaucratic bullshit. Look, I helped you, and I’m worried about her. Just tell me something.”
“Fine, novice, but only because you weren’t completely useless back there. I’ve been ordered not to saying anything, so I’m not telling you that while we were on assignment, a bunch of crazy bastards in robes ambushed us. One was a mage, and he trapped us in a wall of flames. They tried taking Abbie; not killing her, but taking her. A big fella had her on the back of his horse before I ran through the flames and tried slicing the bastard’s back in two.”
“What happened to Abbie?”
“There were three of em, like I said. The mage fella, he cast a spell at me, but hit Abbie instead. Some kind of acid; it burned through the poor girl’s neck.”
Jakub felt sick. That was why nobody was allowed to see her after her resurrection; the spell had scarred her.
Pity welled up in him, thick and bilious in his stomach.
Mason put his hand on his shoulder. “She’s alive, novice. She’s in the land of the living, and there’s worse places to be than here, trust me. You know where warlocks go in the afterlife.”
“Blacktyde.”
He nodded. “The sacrifice every warlock makes; giving up our afterlife so we can summon demons from the Blacktyde. No wonder they say we’re a set of crazy bastards.”
Jakub had spoken about this with Abbie a hundred times when they were together. Normally when people died, they went to the Greylands until their resurrection window closed. After that, they could go to one of seven afterlives, some nice, some nasty.
None were worse than Blacktyde.
In order to get the power to summon demons from the Blacktyde, novice warlocks made a pact for their soul, promising it to the Blacktyde when their time among the living was up. They called it the Grand Sacrifice, and this sacrifice was the reason that warlocks were such a favorite subject for bards to sing romantic ballads about.
Jakub had told her again and again what a batshit crazy idea it was.
“It’s what I’ve wanted to be all my life,” Abbie would say. “It’s my soul, mine to do what I want with. Worry about your own.”
So maybe Mason was right; Abbie was alive, so the Blacktydes wouldn’t have her yet. Even so, she was so beautiful. To know that she’d been disfigured…
No, he told himself. She won’t be any less beautiful because of some bastard mage. And if I ever find him, I’ll tear out his heart.
“We better be going,” said Mason. “I need to get Novice Norris back to the academy and get the necros to bring him back. Take what you want from the bodies.”
“Got it.”
“And listen, novice. They might have banished you from the academy, but that doesn’t mean a damned thing. I was expelled too, once. So, I went away, and I took the warlock skills they’d given me and I got strong enough that one day, they were begging me to come back. They can kick you out of their building, but they can’t take anything else away. Got it?”
“Thanks, Mason. Listen, can you tell Abbie that as soon as she’s ready, I want to see her?”
“Got it. What’s your full name? She’s going to want to know.”
“Jakub Russo.”
“Russo? You’re the kid who Kortho saved from the Imbibists.”
“That’s right,” said Jakub.
“Gods, you haven’t had it easy, have you? Take care then, Jakub.” Mason walked away from Jakub and toward Bendie, who was groaning louder than Jakub even thought it possible to do without dying. “Ah, shut up. You’ll be fine, you big baby. Get up.”
When Mason and Bendie rode away with Norris’s corpse, Jakub was alone in the shrubbery with the brigands, golem, summoner and sniper corpses around him.
It was getting dark, so he needed to loot quickly and then get moving.
He went from body to body, checking pockets, sheaths, bags, and any other crevice or compartment that might hold something valuable.
When he’d collected everything, he pressed his thumb tattoo and let it categorize his loot for him.
*Loot Received!*
Wheel of cheese x5
*Common*
Value: 1 Gold
Alchemical Fire Lythes
*Common*
Once activated by twisting them, alchemical fire lythes will explode on contact with air.
Blood Draught: Rogue
**Uncommon**
A vial of blood taken from a rogue and retreated with a mana solution to give the drinker temporary low-level rogue skills
Bendeldrick’s Glyphline Grimoire Book
***Rare***
Named the most blood-drenched tome in history, Bendeldrick’s book about those with magic glyphline tattoos and his feeling that everyone should be entitled to one, caused more riots and inner-city damage than any other political book published.
Dragon Ring
**Uncommon**
A ring that bestows a thin layer of dragon-scales over the wearer’s chest, giving them improved defence. Effect can be used for 5 minutes, once every 5 days.
2 Gold
9 Silver
21 Bronze
Jakub put his new loot in his bag, mentally deciding the fate of each item in turn. He’d keep the vial of rogue blood and the dragon ring, since sneak and lock picking skills and dragon scale armor would always be useful.
As for the rare book and the cheese; he’d sell four wheels of cheese and keep one for himself as a treat. He was a little wary of the alchemical fire lythes, though. He’d heard about how dangerous they were, and how they’d been banned from production by a royal decree.
Still, as long as he didn’t activate them and expose them to air, they wouldn’t blow. Maybe he could sell them to a black market trader, or perhaps he’d find a use for them.
He’d find a rare book dealer for the Grimoire tome.
He didn’t want anything to do with it; he’d heard of Bendeldrick’s Glyphline Grimoire book before and had been advised never to read it.
“It’s not magic or cursed, don’t get me wrong,” Instructor Irvine had told the class, “It is simply a treatise against you all – against magic users. Bendeldrick believes we should share our powers; he thinks a tattoo is where the power comes from, he doesn’t understand that we earn our magic before we even get our tattoos. This book is deadly, and thank goodness they let it go out of print.”
Gasputon, a novice necromancer from the Feriloux Isles, had spoken up. “Sir, how can a simple book be so dangerous?”
“This man’s ignorant views have caused hundreds of deaths, from people trying to give themselves their own glyphline tattoos before they’ve even prepared their bodies for the mana influx, to people attacking magic users out of fear and envy. As you can imagine, attacks like that don’t go unanswered, and it is easy for pain and hurt to spread.”
Jakub didn’t want the book, but he wasn’t in a position to turn down loot. He’d just sell it when he got to Dispolis, that’s all.
With that, he gave one last look behind him, where the academy was just a speck. He felt a shudder in his chest when he thought about Abbie and her face, and he promised himself he’d come back to see her when he’d found his feet.
Then he set off limping toward the Royal Road, no longer a novice of the academy.
14
He reached Dispolis the next day, after spending a night in the Ram and Hound tavern between the academy and the capital city. He hadn’t wanted to spend money on a room so soon, but helping Mason D’Angelt had wasted daylight, and his thigh wound, although getting better, had slowed him down.
He arrived in Dispolis tired, hungry, and with a blister the size of a grape on his foot. That’d teach him for being too stingy to pay for a seat on a trader wagon.
The second he walked through the steel gates and stood on the streets of the city, its noise and its smells and its colors bombarded him.
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Dispolis was the city of satin and wood, with its rows of timber houses and shops and lean-to market stalls, and every other wall and roof draped with embroidery showing off the queen’s emblem. Where other cities had earned their prestige through architecture and beauty, Dispolis was the pearl of the queendom purely by its proximity to Blackcobble castle, where Queen Patience lived.
Hundreds of chimneys puffed out smoke, and this twirling scent of burning logs mixed with ale from the inns, spices from the markets, pastry from the bakeries. Rain water dripped from ill-maintained gutters, and mold gathered on walls that hadn’t seen a wash in months.
Jakub had no sooner set foot onto the Royal Mile, the home of most of Dispolis’s shops, before he was sucked into the crowd, becoming one of a hundred people. Chatter, jokes, shouts, it was a medley of noise from the courting couples walking hand in hand, and the drunken teens stumbling from one in to the next. In such a crowd it was easy to lose your sense of self but that was how he wanted it; to be just one in a giant number, inconspicuous and unremarkable.
He headed past the bakeries, pausing only for a second to stare at icing glistening off a bun before resisting the temptation and then heading into a shop called Archibald’s Artificery and Magical Items.
The tinkling of a chime accompanied him opening the door. The scent of spent mana hung heavy in the air like tobacco smoke; it reminded him of the alchemy wing of the academy.
Archibald himself was behind the counter, fiddling with a pocket watch that gave off a green glow. Jakub had met him once, years ago when he’d come to Dispolis on weekend leave. He doubted the old man would remember him.
“Buying or selling?” said Archibald.
“I have a few things for you to look at.”
“Come, come. I don’t have all day. Thicky Fenton is coming back for his pocket watch at two, and I didn’t build my reputation on letting people down.”
Jakub emptied his inventory bag piece by piece, laying the items he’d looted from his first assignment in the Killeshi lands on the shop counter.
Archibald picked at them, examining each, holding them close to his face and grimacing as if he was handling raw sewage.
Jakub could tell when he was about to be gouged on price. In fact, he’d anticipated it. You didn’t go into a pawn shop expecting to get what your things were actually worth.
It didn’t matter; all he needed was to get enough gold coins to set him on his way, to pay for a roof for a few nights until he met the Black Cleric. Once he knew what kind of work the cleric had, he’d decide whether to stick around, or whether to go see Kortho.
“Blade of Purge Evil…,” said Archibald, holding one of Jakub’s swords. “Interesting, but I always find magic blades to be so restrictive, no? Most can only be used for one thing. You couldn’t use a magic-endowed knife to butter your bread, could you? In that way, a simple butter knife has more worth. The more valuable an item, the less you want to use it. The less use it is…the lower its value should really be.”
“And if you were selling me this sword instead of buying it, I’m sure its magical properties would suddenly be amazing, and they’d make it worth all the gold of a king’s treasury,” said Jakub.
“Value is like the wind above the Swirling Fields; it can change direction in an instant. I am but a kite flying where it takes me.”
“And where do these swirling winds take the value of my sword?”
“Five silvers.”
“You have to be kidding. You have more front than Queen’s Patience’s nursemaid, pal. It’s gotta be worth more than that. It’s rare.”
“Rare? Chronic Redlung disease is rare, but that doesn’t mean I would pay a dozen gold coins to contract it.”
“Fine; forget the sword. What about everything else?”
“Let’s see…”
While Archibald was busy looking for ways to discount his offers on Jakub’s items, he decided it would be a good time to ask him something.
“Listen, do you know of a man they call the Black Cleric?” he said.
“Witas, you mean? You’ll find him in the Boarhead Tavern most mornings. And most afternoons. I hear he sometimes finds the time to stumble home and sleep, too,” said Archibald.
“Got it. What about the rest of the stuff? How much?”
“I know a man who would want the Boots of Focus; his son is failing in college, and they are already paying a queen’s ransom for him to keep his place. As always, rather than work on their boy’s attitude, they would prefer to use artificed items.”
“And the inquisitor’s belt?”
“A private citizen could hardly be seen walking around wearing an inquisitor’s belt, could they? No coins for that. In fact, as an artificer and an honest trader, it is my duty to report to the guardship anything which may be stolen. I am sure that you didn’t steal it, but all the same…I will keep hold of it, rather than let you get into trouble by carrying it.”
“Since you’re such an honest trader, I’m sure you’re aware of academy policy on looting,” said Jakub, showing him the academy emblem on his overcoat.
“It slipped my mind,” said Archibald.
“I’m sure it did. The exotic spices? The Bracelet of Rest?”
“Folks won’t pay much for a bracelet that merely does what they can do themselves for free every night– artificery is no substitute for a good night’s sleep. As for the spices, well, I can muster a few coins for those. The eastern shipping routes are more blocked up than a soldier who’s eaten a pound of beef. It’s the Baelin Empire, if you ask me. Two gold for the trinket of sleep, one gold and eight silver for the spices.”
This was less than he’d expected, even from a weasel of a pawn broker. The problem was, he didn’t have a lot of choice.
“I’ll take the coin for the spices. There was something else I wanted to talk to you about, too,” he said.
Archibald raised an eyebrow. “Oh? is this an open shop conversation, or the kind where I should close my blinds and lock my door?”
“Is that a kind of conversation that you’re accustomed to?”
“The guardship know that I like to take naps from time to time. There’s nothing peculiar about me closing the blinds or locking the door of my shop. It’s best to do that when the topic is…delicate.”
Jakub put Henwright’s mana-sealed envelope on the counter. Archibald flipped it over once, twice, then set it down.
“All this secrecy so you can post a letter?” he said. “You don’t need me for that.”
“You’re an artificer as well as a trader, right?” said Jakub.
“My hands are worthy of better work than carrying an envelope to a post wagon, boy. There are scamps on the high street who’ll deliver a weeks’ worth of mail for the price of a hot cross bun.”
“I’ve heard that while artificers can create, they can also take things apart.”
“Yes; only for repairs, and such like.”
“Let’s say I had an envelope sealed by artificery,” said Jakub, “the kind where it only opens when a named person holds it. Is that the kind of magic that can be broken down?”
“It’s a delicate balance, running a shop like this. A balance of things I can do with my blinds open, and things where they must be closed. Do more of one than the other, and the guardship might start to think that actually, it is peculiar that I close my shop from time to time.”
“So you can’t do it?”
“If there’s one thing the guardship and the nobles above them can’t turn a blind eye to, it’s the sanctity of their communications. So many secrets pass hands in Dispolis; envelopes slide from one palm to the next like love notes in a schoolyard. Imagine if just anyone could read their private letters?”
“Fine. I get it,” said Jakub.
“Actually, I’ll hang on to this envelope. Now that I think about it, I’m visiting the post-wagon later; I can make sure it goes to its recipient.”
“I thought your hands were too special for tha
t?”
“A man can change his mind.”
Jakub drew his overcoat back and touched the hilt of his sword. “A man better change it back,” he said. “Put the envelope down.”
Archibald didn’t look worried, but then being a pawn trader, he’d probably seen more than his fair share of dubious clientele, the kind that might act angrily when he pulled his valuing routine. Jakub guessed Archibald had had dozens of blades drawn on him over the years.
“So tetchy,” said the trader. “You wouldn’t draw your sword so near the high street, surely? One word will bring the guards in,” said Archibald.
“And if you want to gamble on having the time to speak it, go ahead.”
Archibald pushed the envelope over to him.
“Good choice,” said Jakub. “Now give me the coins for the spice, and we’ll finish this trade.”
15
He found the Boarhead tavern two side streets away from the Royal Mile. He ducked into an alleyway and then, after making sure it was deserted, he took his Vagrant Blade from his inventory bag.
After holding the blade for a few seconds, his clothes began to transform. The blade’s magic seeped over him, changing his black necromancer coat into a vagrant’s tunic, and ripping holes in his trousers. It dirtied parts of his skin, and then spread a stench of tobacco and sweat over him.
It was the third time he’d used the Vagrant Blade, and the third time that he’d asked himself why someone would spend the time and money to create a weapon that transformed the holder’s appearance into that of a vagrant. If Jakub could afford to have an artificer meld magic onto his blade, he’d sure as hell make it cooler.
Whatever the reason, whoever made it, the blade had helped him on his first assignment. Today, it would help him ask questions about the Black Cleric without people seeing that it was him. If you were asking questions in a place like this, it was best not to let people put a name to your face.
When he went inside, it was easy to see why the Boarhead tavern got its name - there was a giant, stuffed Boarhead above the hearth. Its stare unnerved him, since it seemed to have the knack of following him around the room.
