Chapter 13
His past catches up with him
I found a partial answer to that question after we set up camp again. The boots had a magical spell woven into them, something relating to Mars magic as far as I could tell.
"So put them on!" Malachite encouraged. "See what they do!"
"That's not how that works," I told him. "And I'm not putting them on. For all I know they set the next person who wears them on fire."
"So I'll put them on. Tight fit though."
"Oh no." I yanked them away from him as he reached for them.
"I see how it is. They're magic so they're yours?"
"That's not it at all! You're welcome to them, after I'm sure they're safe. The fire thing is just one possible spell it could be. Remember, they were in a chest trapped with some kind of poison gas and surrounded by… Whatever we're calling Gloom infected orcs. Gloorcians? They could easily enough sap your strength, make you more vulnerable to damage, blunt your claws, or worse. But say they make you immune to fire or give you great strength instead. We have no idea how to activate them, or if they're limited to a single use only. We need to have someone study them to tell exactly what spell has been put on them."
"I get it. Okay, fair enough. I'll leave them alone for now."
"Thank you."
"Let us discuss those guards," Hanz said, joining us. "Strange to find them out there, was it not?"
"It's extremely troubling," I agreed. "If the cultists somehow 'infected' those guys with the Gloom, and it stuck around after they died? That's a very bad sign. It's also possible someone else is controlling them, someone we didn't kill that day. But they would have to come back to cast the controlling magic at least once a day, which I suppose they could- oh my goodness we're so stupid."
"What? Who ith?" Snarly demanded to know. "Ith it me? It better not be me!"
"No Snarly, it's not you. We could have just pretended to be the cultists with my illusion magic. Told them we were here for the cache. We saw them, I'm sure I could convince a bunch of orcs under some magical compulsion that we were them."
"Wouldn't have been as fun," Malachite told me.
"Yes, blowing the whole place up was pretty fun," I wasn't sarcastic in the least in telling him.
"Darn right. Still, nothing we can do about it now. They're gone, we may never know how they got there or what the cult did to them."
I pray that's the case. It would mean they were the only ones like that, and this isn't some quickly spreading problem that's going to catch us unaware in a month and kill us all. But on the other hand I worry that's not the case and this is only the beginning. We really should have tried to keep one alive to figure out how they got here and if guarding this small amount of money was really their purpose. It was a lot of manpower for something so simple. I'm worried. If they can throw this many resources at a few coins and some musty boots, imagine what they could set to guard something they actually care about!
We made our way back to town, luckily making it before sundown. As we neared the Sleeping Lion a young man perked up at our arrival and looked us over. "Most of you match the descriptions I was given, you know a guard named Argise correct?" he asked.
"We do," Hanz assured him. "Did she survive the attack? I see the city hasn't burned down so..."
"Burned down? Who would burn it down?"
"Oh, things burn my young friend. Things burn."
"Is that some jab at me?" I asked. "I told Malachite it was a bad idea. Didn't I say it was a bad idea? Didn't I say I shouldn't keep using that spell?"
The boy was looking between us. "Uh, no, message for you." He handed Hanz a parchment.
"Thank you, young master," they replied, handing back some coins. "Sorry if you had to wait overlong."
"That's okay. Thanks. Bye." He took off and Hanz opened the letter.
"Oh I see."
"What is it?" asked Snarly.
"A summons. Come find me at the guard station as soon as you get this."
"That's it?" Malachite asked.
"That is the entire content of the message. Shall we?"
"I suppose we better," I decided. "At least that means she's still alive."
We headed there, following Hanz, and were ushered into her office after showing the note.
So we're doing this out in the open, then? Must have gone well.
"It didn't go well," Argise told us after the greetings were done. "She escaped."
"Of course she did," I mused. "She's a very careful magic user. I'm surprised any of you are alive at all."
"Thank you for that vote of confidence," she replied icily.
"Sorry, I've been on the road for days and I could use a good night's sleep. Go on."
"I get it. Actually I was starting to get worried she had gotten to you too, or you had skipped town or something. It's been days."
"Yes, well, we had something else to do in the area," Hanz told her. "And you did say to lay low while you took care of the situation."
"I suppose I can't say I didn't."
"So what happened?" I asked.
"Long story short? We stormed the warehouse, and tried to apprehend her. We didn't manage it, as I said, as her guards were sacrificed to aid in her escape."
"Oh, tha minotaurs?" Snarly asked. "I liked 'hose guys. Too bad."
"Yes, they're dead now. All we recovered is some information, mostly what you already told us. So at least I wasn't fired, or worse, killed by the merchant's guild. We got the evidence of her spell and her plans. My employers consider the matter closed."
"Closed? She's a dangerous magic user now on the loose!" I snapped. "Unless those notes on the spell were destroyed," and I hope they weren't it's a terrible spell but it's still a window into how the original magic users, created after the Chaos Moon first appeared, cast magic, "she could get them back and continue her plans."
"She's no longer in the city limits, and so the governor will not spend any more time or resources tracking her down."
"That sounds fairly short sighted."
"I'm glad you agree." She looked pointedly at me, one of her cat ears twitching.
I sighed. "I see. It's like that, is it?"
"Exactly like that."
"What's 'his?" Snarly asked, looking between us.
"She wants us to track her down, before she has a chance to get her revenge," I explained. "And probably for no reward whatsoever." I mean, after all, if she found out Argise here led the charge against her, who do you think she's coming after first? So she's trying to save her own hide just as much as keep the town safe, no?
"If she's retreated to a hidden base, there's probably spellbooks or something there," she mused with a shrug. "You can have them, once she's dead."
I considered. "You're not wrong."
"Excellent, so we're in agreement. I've been preparing for your arrival, I've come up with two sources that might help track her down. There's a wanderer magician somewhere in town that has a good reputation for finding people, you can ask them."
On our own coin, I expect. Do you know the rates the guild makes people charge? I do, because I have to charge them too!
"Or, you can check out the Watcher Mountains. There's a rumor about an old temple up there someplace that houses a spirit that can answer questions. You could ask there."
Uh, forgive me, but if I'm being given the chance to ask a spirit questions, it's not going to be about some crazy lady that was chased out of town. It's going to be how to help the most people, or where to find my soul mate or something. What if you only get one question in your life? And you waste it on this?
"The only other lead I have for you is a sulfur mine that her notes mentioned. I don't know how that relates. You can ask around about that, I made a copy of her notes about it." She rummaged around in her desk and handed me a folded over piece of paper.
"We'll see what we can do," I told her. "Tomorrow."
"Of course. Look, I know it's a crappy thing I'm asking and I, at least, appreciate you even considering it. I really can't offer you anything but my respect and the knowledge you really did make the town safer. If it were up to me I would do more, a lot more. But I can't. You know how it is."
"I suppose."
"Bound ta be loot there," Snarly told me with a slap on the back. "Ow! Something jabbed me." He rubbed his hand.
"You do remember my curse?" I asked with a snort. He must have hit one of my crystalline bits. Argise looked at me questioningly, but I waved her off. "Come on, let's go. Unless there's something else? Oh, all those zombies were destroyed, right? Nothing else interesting found in the warehouse?"
"Zombies destroyed," she agreed with a nod. "Nothing I can give you from the warehouse. Sorry."
"That's fine. Come on."
"There is one 'hing," Snarly reminded us, pulling the dog forward. "We found this dog out 'here. Can you see if it ran 'way from someone 'round town?"
"I can do that," Argise promised him. "It might take some time though."
"We'll watch over 'im till then. 'Course if someone wants 'im, we can't really watch 'im if we're always on tha road. They could keep 'im."
"I understand. I'll take care of it." She took the dog in her arms. "I don't mind looking after a dog and it'll be easier if I can show him around rather then describing him."
"Thanths!"
So the next day rolled around and we sat at breakfast and discussed what our next move was. I had asked my magic about the sulfur mine that morning and if going there would lead us closer to finding Jekserah, but had gotten a no answer. The note had turned out to be a map and some notes about an artifact, some kind of magical drill, that could be found there.
"I wonder if the artifact is simply a product of my time," Hanz mused, "and not something magical."
"Doesn't get us closer to finding Jekserah or the Gloom cult," Malachite said with a shrug. "So her interest was probably the same as ours would be. Finding more treasure. We need to go after her, magical drills can wait."
"Agreed," I told him. "I think we should track down this wanderer. They must have a shop in town, let's head to the wizard shops and just look at the signs." Or ask around, someone must have heard of them. "If they can't help, we still have the spirit temple, so check the closer option first I would think."
"I do calculate that has the best odds of producing a favorable result," Hanz agreed. "In the interest of raising our odds further, I suggest we split up, however. Snarly and I can cover less traveled paths, in case this wanderer has a presence elsewhere, outside the usual guild approved areas."
"Why couldn't Argise jes' tell us where 'his wanderer wath?" he asked. "Isn't 'e the one that suggested the guy in 'ta first plath?"
We all stared at him for a second.
"Indeed, that is why I have suggested this course of action," Hanz told him. "Perhaps she simply heard the name from others rather than having first hand knowledge about the person. She is a town official, after all. She may be sending us to someone she has only heard of, a disreputable sort that she cannot associate with, but could get us the answers we need. The 'lesser of two evils' if you will, 'the ends justify the means' etc.."
"Yer probably right."
"It's fine with me," I told them both. "We'll meet back here when we have something to report. You coming, Malachite?"
"Sure thing!" he announced, pushing his chair back. "Let's go find this person."
So we headed our separate ways. Malachite and I headed to the familiar streets where the wizards had their shops, but we didn't actually make it there. He suddenly tensed up and flattened himself against a building.
"What? What's up?" I asked him, scanning the crowd for danger. He looked like he wanted to hide but there wasn't much around that was taller than he was.
"Those guys over there!" he hissed. "I recognize them from my home village. I don't want them to see me here!"
See you here, as in here or see you here with me? I glanced over, and yes, there were three driag over there with their backs to us. It looked like they were asking about something, holding up a drawing of some kind."That's not a problem."
"It is, they'll turn any second and see me, there's no place I can hide!"
I cocked my head, raising an eyebrow, but wasted no more words. I gathered mana, hoping to counteract the magical drag I was already under disguising myself and cast on him with a touch. He now looked like a regular old human.
"Oh, right," he realized, looking down at himself. "You use that spell all the time, I should have-"
"Morvis?" shouted someone, and I looked over that way. One of the three was looking over at us. Aw, crapbaskets. Wait what?
Malachite of course looked the other way, as if looking for the person the driag was shouting at. The other two heads turned.
"Let's maybe go?" he suggested, giving a shrug and heading back the way we came.
"Are you sure they want you?" I asked, falling in beside him. "I could swear they said Morvis."
"Just keep walking!"
"Okay, okay..."
"Morvis!"
"Great, they're not going to give up." He looked behind and the three were now shoving past everyone, hurrying to reach us. "Better try to head them off, or they'll trample everyone." He tried to put on a questioning look.
The three made it to us, but two looked confused. "It's just a human," the one said. "You do remember who we're looking for, right? Morvis? Green scaly fellow like ourselves?"
"No, I'm telling you I saw him," said the other. "This woman put a spell on him."
"Can I help you gentleman?" I asked, putting my hands on my hips. "We're right here."
"Excuse me, miss," said the third. "I'm sorry to bother you, but did you happen to see a green draig around here? His name is Morvis."
"I don't know anyone by that name," I told him honestly.
"So what is your name?" demanded one, looking at Malachite.
He looked panicked. "You'll have to forgive my brother," I told them. "He's been unable to talk for years. Trauma, I expect. Ever since that farm incident he hasn't, you know..." I tapped my head and leaned forward to whisper. "Been quite right in the head."
The three looked at him suspiciously, but he was gazing off into the distance now.
"Why I remember the night well," I begin. "There we all were, watching the sun go down on our porch. My father was there, smoking his evening pipe. A number fourteen blend if I recall correctly. My mother was there, oh she loved to natter on my mother, God rest her soul. She was yacking on and on about how we weren't going to bring in enough crop that year and how did he expect to feed his family when he was a lazy, good for nothing nobody and how she could have married Mr. Jones all those years ago. She had been pretty heavily into the family wine, that was part of our business you see, so really it was more her fault than my father's if we had less product to sell in a given year given how she used to drink. Oh goodness could my mother drink! I remember one time several years before the incident-"
"While this is all very fascinating," said one, "we don't have time for this. Come on, these people are not going to be of any help to us."
"I'm telling you, it's him. I saw him plain as day," the one continue to insist.
"You saw what you wanted to see. Happens all the time," I told him. "Why one time, back on the farm, I clearly saw my mother slip from the loft, catch a rope around her neck by sheer coincidence, and off it popped! Oh what a joyous day I thought it was going to be, let me tell you. I ran to get a shovel, to bury the old biddy before it turned out she could put her head back on. Turned out to just be a bit of hay blowing down, our barn wasn't that sturdy you know. In the dark the mind plays tricks, don't it? That reminds me of the time where are you going?"
The three made a hasty retreat and it was all I could do not to burst out laughing, but somehow I managed it. But when they were out of sight I bent over laughing.
"That was… I don't even know," Malachite told me. "Are you going to be okay? What was all that?"
"That was me keeping you safe, boy!" I roared, earning me some dirty looks as I started laughing again. "Come on, let's get off the street," I managed, pulling him along. "Poor old Pa! How did he put up with us all those years?"
"Not that I don't appreciate it but are you okay?"
"Sorry, I just needed that," I told him. "Oh man, I'm glad they left I couldn't think of what horrible thing scarred you so badly. Maybe a rabbit attacking you? Chicken? The family cow kicking our old, broken down Pa at the end right in front of you and our mother swearing off drink?"
"If you're quite finished, can you change our disguises?"
"I guess. Why?"
"We have to follow them. They've come a long way, maybe it is something important. Maybe my parents died or something. I'd like to see if they'll let slip why they're asking around for me."
"But are they asking for you? You're not Morvis."
He sighed. "Actually, I am."
Dun dun dunnnnnn.
