“Gods. I assumed my career was over when I got tricked into signing on with Niln,” Kaitha said.
“Well, that was optimistic of you,” laughed Laruna. “I thought we were all going to die.”
“And look at us now,” said Kaitha. “This was the best thing that could have happened to our careers.” She held up her glass of wine. “To Niln, and to crazy Al’Matra as well, and to whatever god of fortune sent us such an easy and profitable quest while we’re at it.”
Gorm’s brow furrowed as the women laughed and toasted. It was beyond good fortune. A few weeks ago, he’d been trying to survive the adventure, and now he was waiting to split up one of the top ten hauls he’d ever taken in. They’d had more than one spot of trouble, and having a Troll for a bodyguard had made things smoother, but, all told, the quest had been easy. The first interview at the Elven Embassy had given them a tip that pointed them to where Detarr had hidden the Elven Marbles. By the odds, they should still be searching for leads as to the marbles’ whereabouts.
He was still lost in thought late that evening, while Heraldin and Gaist were engaged in their nightly games of thrones.
“You know, my friend,” said the bard, “the key to victory is to know your opponent, to understand how your adversary works. And all these weeks that we’ve been playing this game, every game that you’ve defeated me, I’ve watched for the pattern in how you play. And I think I’ve found it.”
The other heroes watched the game with renewed interest. Gaist didn’t move.
“Your pattern is that there is no pattern. As soon as I figure out how you’re moving, the instant I see what strategy you are employing, you shift to another tactic. You are always where I’d least expect it.”
Gaist looked almost amused as he advanced a bannerman.
“But there is a limit to how long you can hide yourself, my friend.” Heraldin advanced a knight. “No matter what strategies or maneuvers your adversary cloaks himself in, you cannot face him for so long without growing to know the man behind the mask.”
Gaist’s amusement faded. Gorm saw the weaponsmaster hesitate as he moved his king.
“It has been a pleasure getting to know you,” said Heraldin, his eyes sparkling, his grin triumphant. He moved a knight. “I think you’ll find I just won.”
The weaponsmaster stared at the board in front of him. He reached out and stoically toppled his king.
“Oh, come now. Don’t be such a sore sport,” said Heraldin.
“He doesn’t seem upset,” Laruna said from her seat by the fire.
“Clearly, you don’t know him as I do,” said the bard. “Play a couple hundred matches of thrones with him and you’ll recognize a tantrum well enough. I’ve lost two hundred and fourteen times to you, my friend. Don’t begrudge me my first win.”
Gaist said nothing, but he flipped his king back up to standing position. With a slight nod, he began to set the board up again.
“A rematch?” said Heraldin, setting up his own pieces. “You’ll regret it. I’m only down by two hundred and thirteen, and my comeback is on a hot streak. Remember, I know you now.”
The exchange reminded Gorm of something else that didn’t sit well. He knew the Heroes’ Guild well; he’d been their favored son for twenty years, and had then spent more than another twenty exiled from them. In all his decades of service, he’d never seen the guild treat unproven heroes with such respect. A free mercenary escort. A pre-arranged meeting with an arbiter on their return. Deferring to Niln on the distribution of the Elven Marbles.
It wasn’t the Heroes’ Guild he knew.
He brooded until long after the other heroes had gone to their rooms for the night. His bed brought him no comfort, and he spent a sleepless night tossing and turning. The truth seemed like a whisper too low to hear, or a shadow forever in the corner of his eye.
The rest of the party was halfway through breakfast by the time he stamped down to the dining room and slumped into his chair.
“Rough night?” Heraldin asked.
Gorm grunted and quaffed the bard’s coffee in reply.
“Rough night,” said Kaitha, waving to the wait staff.
A pretty barmaid in a plain russet dress brought Gorm his customary pile of bacon and eggs, and a tin carafe of coffee for the whole table. The maid filled Jynn’s mug last, and shot him a wink as she did so.
“Ah, it seems you’ve attracted the attention of one of the tavern’s fine serving girls,” Heraldin told the noctomancer.
“It seems as much,” said Jynn. He quietly attended to his own breakfast of dry toast and poached eggs.
“Don’t pass up an opportunity to enjoy the finer things in life, my friend,” said Heraldin. “And I can say from experience that the barmaids here are—”
“Thank you, Heraldin!” chorused the table.
“I’m merely suggesting that you introduce yourself to her during our stay,” Heraldin said.
“I appreciate that, but I’d rather not,” said Jynn.
“Perhaps you’d prefer to kidnap her instead,” suggested Laruna.
The expectant hush of a crowd before a fight fell over the table.
“I’ve put up with a lot these past few days, and I imagine I shall be forced to endure much more before we can finally disband.” Jynn spoke softly, his voice shaking with restraint. “But I’m not going to sit here and take false accusations. I never kidnapped anyone, nor did my f-father.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Laruna. “Everyone knows that the Ur’Mayans kidnapped Princess Marja to—”
“Bloody ashes to what everyone knows,” snapped Jynn. “If I traded three whiskers for common knowledge, I’d be cheated. Marja was sent by her father, the king of Ruskan. He was the one who proposed the marriage.”
“Why would the king propose a marriage to the son of a necromancer?” asked Kaitha.
“Oh, everyone hates necromancy, except when shrines must be erected or elixir must be brewed, or the dearly departed must be consulted to get the combination for the family safe. Necromancy is half of vitamancy, and we use it every day.”
“Well, yes, but there’s a line that shouldn’t be crossed,” said Laruna.
“And I’d say Project Leviathan crossed it,” said Heraldin.
“Project Leviathan wasn’t even necromancy,” said Jynn. “Necromancy is still weaving High Magic, the warp and weft of noctomancy and solamancy. My father and his peers were searching for Low Magic, the loom that High Magic is woven upon.”
“The magic of the Sten,” sneered Laruna. “Magic that changes destinies and levels kingdoms and brings the dead back. Magic that no mortal should have.”
“Magic that kings and queens cannot resist,” said Jynn. “Who do you think funded Project Leviathan? How do you think my father and his compatriots gained so many artifacts in so short a time? It was secret, yes, but not from the kings of Ruskan or Andarun. They bankrolled the work until Az’Anon grew too powerful, too ambitious, and turned to darker magics. Once the project went sour, the kings sought to bury it.”
“That still doesn’t explain why they would marry Marja to you.”
“Obviously, they never intended us to marry,” said Jynn. “The princess was a false peace offering, a death sentence disguised as a gesture of goodwill. Perhaps Father saw through it, and that’s what turned him to the dark arts. But, at least in appearance, he accepted it. And once she was in our tower, the Kings spread word that my f-father had carried out the kidnapping.”
Gorm jolted so hard that he spilled his coffee. “So the guild could declare him a FOE.”
“Exactly,” said Jynn. “All you need is a perceived threat sitting atop something of great value, and the guild will send in the heroes to wipe out the enemy and loot everything worth a copper from the corpses. Why not send in a false offering? They’ll get it all back with interest.”
And finally, Gorm knew the truth, and saw what had been gnawing at him. His stomach felt like lead. “Get to the horses,” he
gasped.
“What?”
“Now!” roared Gorm. “We need to get to Bloodroot!”
Poldo was surprised to find that Mr. Goldson and Mr. Baggs weren’t behind their desks. The offices had been a maelstrom of frantic activity since yesterday, when the opening of a new dungeon sent the brokers and traders into a frenzy. Poldo had left his own office looking like a blizzard had swept through, with papers piled like snowdrifts in the corners around his desk. It was going to take his staff a week to sort out everything the firm had bought and sold. Yet Mr. Goldson and Mr. Baggs were relaxing in front of their great panel windows, sipping brandywine from crystal snifters and watching the traders and merchants along the Wall clamor in the street below.
“You wanted to see me, sirs?”
“Ah, Poldo, do come in,” said Mr. Baggs, without looking away from the window.
“Pour yourself a glass,” said Mr. Goldson, nodding to the bar.
Poldo measured out two fingers of brandywine, and then added enough to make it an even fist. He gulped half of it down before joining his bosses at the window.
“Look down there, Poldo,” said Mr. Baggs. “What do you see?”
Poldo peered down at the Wall. “It looks to be stock traders, sir.”
“It’s the free market,” said Mr. Goldson, watching the commotion below. “It’s commerce unleashed, shaping the world more than any war ever has.”
“It’s the way of the world,” said Mr. Baggs. “Pure, unbridled competition. The strong rise to the top, and the rest sink.”
“And do you know how we stay there?” Mr. Goldson asked.
“I couldn’t say, sir.”
“Aggression,” said Mr. Goldson. “Bold, decisive action against those who stand in our way.”
“Quite,” agreed Mr. Baggs. “Take, for example, the matter in the Baetwolds.”
“Sir?”
“An old beet-farming community,” said Mr. Baggs. “Or it was, until it was overrun by Orcs carrying those silly NPC papers. Now Vorpal Corp has a couple of factories there.”
“And we have a majority interest in Vorpal Corp,” said Mr. Goldson.
“Did you know that the pig-nosed blighters had the gall to start a competing company?” said Mr. Baggs. “They were even trying to undercut us! What gives greenskins such gumption?”
Poldo shifted uncomfortably. “Well, sir, they do say that all men are equal in the Creator’s eyes.”
“Do they now?” said Mr. Baggs. “That doesn’t sound right to me.”
“Total nonsense,” agreed Mr. Goldson. He looked down at the brokers and the merchants churning several stories beneath his feet. “If all men are created equal, how can the best man win?”
“I couldn’t say,” said Mr. Poldo.
“Of course you couldn’t, Poldo,” said Mr. Baggs. “That’s what’s wrong with you. You only see problems, never solutions.”
“The field of professional heroics is about to change,” said Mr. Goldson. “There are going to be a lot more foes about for adventurers to slay and loot. But you’ve been too busy making dour predictions to foresee it.”
“Let alone to help us make the change happen,” said Baggs.
Poldo felt like he’d been punched in the gut. “Sirs, I’ve only endeavored to do what is best for the company.”
“Perhaps, Mr. Poldo,” said Mr. Goldson, stroking his thinning snow-white beard. “But Goldson and Baggs measures results, not endeavor; there is no reward for effort here.”
“Well, maybe a small one,” said Mr. Baggs. “Unfortunately, it comes in the form of a severance package. You will put in your notice and letter of resignation by the end of business today.”
“But, sirs,” protested Poldo, panic rising in his voice. “I was only doing my job! Goldson and Baggs faces a serious problem with its portfolio!”
“No, we recently faced a serious problem,” said Mr. Baggs.
“Indeed,” said Mr. Goldson, grinning at the city sprawling before him. “But we solved it.”
“Lord, we are betrayed,” said Dengark, his long mustache blowing in the ill wind that swept over Bloodroot’s ramparts.
Zurthraka grimaced. Below him, the gates rumbled and clanked as the party of professional heroes attempted to batter them down. The bodies of the Orcs’ advanced guard were strewn around the road. A few corpses of gold-hounds lay with them as well; three guild parties had been cut down by the honor guard as they tried to storm the gatehouse. The fourth group of gold-hounds, however, had slaughtered his exhausted men with little trouble, and were now pounding at the city’s great doors.
The gold-hounds at the gates would fall. Zurthraka had many more troops inside the walls. But a fifth party of hired heroes was already polishing their arms a few paces back from the gates, and a sixth and a seventh and an eighth just behind them. And beyond them, the road was crammed with heroes, all armed to the teeth, all waiting to take the city of Bloodroot and its treasures. As numerous as locusts. As certain as the grave.
“Bring me my gaist,” Zurthraka said.
Chapter 18
Gorm spurred his stallion up Haertswood’s main thoroughfare with reckless speed, ignoring the clerks and merchants scrambling to get off the street. It was all the other heroes could do to keep up.
“What about the loot?” Heraldin shouted from somewhere behind Gorm.
“Burn the bloody loot!” Gorm shouted back to them. “They’ll take it and your head as well!”
“But the quest?” hollered Laruna.
“The quest was a sham! Why do ye think it was so easy for us to find the thugs who stole the stones? We were meant to find them!”
Startled bannermen dove from the street as the heroes sped through Haertswood’s north gate. The open road lay ahead of them.
“Why have the quest at all, then?” shouted Kaitha.
“We were meant to die in the Myrewood! The mercenaries were there to kill us and pin our deaths on the Orcs as a pretense for declarin’ ’em foes. Detarr must have foiled their plot, but it don’t matter anyway because we went and gave the Guz’Varda Tribe the marbles,” spat Gorm, the words tasting bitter in his mouth. “Now they’re a perceived threat sitting on top of something of great value.”
There was an unsettled pause in the conversation as the grim truth settled in.
“King Handor gave us the quest,” said Laruna.
“He told us what a bloody headache the Orcs were for him. Here’s his solution, may he burn to bloody ashes!”
“That means Johan the Mighty was in on it,” said Kaitha.
“Always hated that smarmy bastard,” said Gorm.
“I know the feeling,” said Jynn.
“You don’t … you don’t suppose Niln knew?”
“No. Niln ain’t the sort for deception. He’s the type to fall for—” Sudden realization struck Gorm, and his heart dropped into his stomach. “Oh no.”
Niln looked down at the dagger. It was a fine weapon, with a silver grip studded with small gemstones. The pommel was wrought into the shape of a dragon’s claw wrapped around a ruby. The blade was hard to see, but Niln was certain it was very sharp, because it was buried to the handle in his chest.
“I don’t understand,” he said. “You … you were supposed to protect me.”
“Indeed we were,” said Mr. Flinn. “Right until your work was completed.”
His work was completed—just as the final words of his scripture had said. Niln had to smile at that, despite himself. He stumbled in the loose gravel of the road, clutching the dagger. His lifeblood ran over his hands.
“And now, I’m afraid, our time together must end,” said Mr. Flinn.
“The … the Seven Heroes …” said Niln. Perhaps he shouldn’t have split the party after all. The thought made him smirk.
“Total nonsense, it seems. But on the bright side, you and your companions can say you were spared Al’Matra’s madness before your deaths.”
“Madness?” The whole world had gone mad
, and sanity looked insane. He could see that now. He could see a lot that he had missed, ever-present signs that had nonetheless escaped the notice of a prophet. It was ironic. Funny. Despite himself, Niln started to laugh as he dropped to his knees.
“Or perhaps not,” said Flinn.
“Wasn’t … nonsense …” Niln gasped, although he couldn’t tell if his difficulty speaking stemmed from the laughter or the blood loss.
“The Al’Matran prophecy?” queried Mr. Flinn. “I’m afraid evidence suggests otherwise.”
Niln’s laughter twisted his mouth until it hurt. A fog was drifting over his vision, yet he saw more now than he had in all his life; revelations he would never have dreamed of as a scribe. He’d been so wrong. So wrong about everything, but just not in the ways that mattered. He grinned at his killer, tears of laughter in his eyes.
“Wasn’t … Al’Matra …” he managed, before he pitched forward and finally, mercifully, fell silent. It was just like Gorm had warned him.
Professional heroics is all a laugh, until it isn’t anymore.
The eyes of Andarun’s shrine to Mordo Ogg flared with crimson light. Ignatius Wythelm, Priest of Mordo Ogg, watched the light with some interest. It wasn’t fading fast enough.
“A fighter, eh?” the old man cackled. “Master hates fighters.”
The light in the skeletal shrine’s eyes grew in intensity and shifted in hue from crimson to purple, and then to a vibrant blue. The air smelled of ozone and ash, and the shrine trembled at a distant roaring sound that was just on the edge of Ignatius’ hearing. The mad priest jumped back to escape any sudden blasts, but nothing happened. A moment later, the azure light suddenly winked out.
“Well, that was strange,” said Ignatius. Given that he was living in a pile of crates next to a shrine to the god of death, his accusations of strangeness carried a lot of weight.
The shrine’s eyes returned to their standard red flicker, and Ignatius cautiously settled back down to enjoy the show. The lights had been coming fast and steady all day. A lot of people were dying, somewhere.
Orconomics: A Satire (The Dark Profit Saga Book 1) Page 33