Beastborne- Mark of the Founder

by James T Callum

  If anything, the sparks Hal gave over to Durvin - collected from Ashera, Mira, and Elora amounting to roughly 100,000 - were enough that if anybody should be concerned it would be Hal.

  That was everything they had between them. Aside from what Hal spent on himself, that was all their earnings from the Contract and the various battles beneath Murkmire. If they had needed it, he could have sold a plot or a building in the Coffin District but that would come at significant risk.

  He didn’t want anybody finding out who the owner was if he could avoid it. At least not until he had a stable base. Considering his new reputation of Malcontent with the Loyalists, he wasn’t keen on taking any chances.

  Durvin already had black market contacts and having the dwarves purchase the supplies needed for their new Sanctum seemed the smart play here. Nobody would bat an eye at the industrious race buying up large amounts of tools and building supplies.

  And without any relation to Hal - unlike the Rangers - suspicion should be averted and the dwarves would only have to deal with many tons of building materials instead of worrying about an ambush or double-cross.

  Any more than they already did, of course. It was a black market deal, after all.

  It was almost dusk by the time Hal’s party made it into Murkmire before the gate closed for the night. Each person was more thoroughly inspected upon entry. Hal once more used his elven guise with bright green eyes and long black hair tied back into a loose ponytail.

  He felt comfortable in it. The façade was close enough to his actual features without being so similar that he might be mistaken for his human self. At the same time, he had a similar build and height that he didn’t feel disoriented just walking around.

  Hal and Noth walked through the front gates together while Mira, Ashera, Rondo, and Elora tagged along with the dwarven group through the secret tunnels beneath Murkmire.

  Considering the added scrutiny at the gate, Hal figured the extra precaution was worth it. The two groups joined up soon after and the six made their way back to the Gone Goose while they kept the tiny gnome in the middle of their group.

  “I’m not going to run,” Rondo squeaked. “Really, this is all quite unnecessary!”

  “Hush,” Mira said. “You heard the boss. We’re going to check in on the Gone Goose, then the koblins, then we’ll drop you off at your shop. No harm, no foul.”

  “Say that to the lump on my head,” Rondo said with a chuckle.

  “I… am sorry for acting so rashly,” Noth said, staring at her boots.

  “Ah, it’s all right,” Rondo said. “I get it, you were trying to help Mira out. She always did inspire quite a lot of loyalty. I accept your apology.”

  “You’re still not coming with us,” Hal said. That drew a grumble from the gnome. “And I don’t want you helping him either, Mira.”

  “Yes, dad.”

  They marched up the emptying streets as night took hold of the Sanctuary. Taverns began to fill up, light spilling out of them on every corner. The sounds and sights of people getting out of work to blow off steam or just enjoy a good time filtered out into the street.

  Hal saw more of the Murkmire Watch patrolling the streets, moving along the unfortunate people sleeping in the gutters and forcing them into alleyways and out of sight.

  It reminded him of the refugees. And as they climbed through each of the Rings of Murkmire, Hal used his [Sending Stone] to talk to Leis, the woman who had given him the thing in the first place.

  He told her them about the koblins and where they were staying. He offered them the same deal as the koblins. If they wanted, they could have homes in the Coffin District. Provided they were okay with living alongside koblins, all they would have to say to them is that Hal sent them.

  The children already loved the koblins, many of them had been asking about the strange creatures ever since the kids were reunited with the survivors from their village.

  When he told them that he would be leaving for a while, he feared they would ask to be taken with him. But the only question that was asked was, “Is it dangerous?” and when he said yes, that was the end of it.

  If everything went to plan, he’d be back in a couple of months – sooner if he could - to offer the refugees and the koblins a new home.

  A better home.

  If everything goes to plan, he reminded himself. Which, he knew intimately, that it would not in all likelihood. Nothing ever did.

  Nobody was surprised when they reached the Gone Goose and found its lights off. The door was shut and a hastily painted wooden sign hung in the window saying, “Gone Adventurin’”.

  “He’s really gone,” Elora said. “I don’t know… what I expected. That we’d come across him still polishing glasses with the Gone Goose filled with patrons? He died. I know he died and still….”

  Ashera put an arm around her and pulled her close, smoothing Elora’s blonde hair. “It’s only normal to wish for the best. But Hal did say the Matron would track down any living kin and make sure the money from the contract went to them.”

  “Maybe just a quick peek?” Mira asked.

  Hal looked at Elora. “Can you get us in quickly and quietly? At the very least we should get rid of the contraband in that back room.”

  Elora took a shaky breath and steeled herself, scrubbing a half-gloved hand over her face. “Hal’s right. It’s not like being a Tavernkeeper was likely to run in his family. Or that he’d have a twin brother with the same desire to run a tavern that would just show up. We need to get rid of the evidence and make sure any officials looking into the place find nothing to harm Giel’s good name.”

  “Yes,” Mira said with an odd light in her eyes, “that would be totally weird. A twin brother that looked exactly like him and even wanted to go adventuring like he did.”

  It sounded like a few of the Dungeons and Dragons campaigns Hal used to play in. Looking at it from an objective standpoint, a lot of campaigns had an overabundance of twins with the same Classes and skills.

  “That was childishly easy,” said Elora. Before Hal realized what was going on, the door was opened and everybody was filing inside the dark interior.

  They walked within the quiet place like they were in a mausoleum. It felt so wrong. There should be music. Laughter. Cheers ringing in the rafters, drinks being toasted.

  It was such a stark contrast to the last time he was here.

  Mira looked around. “I’ve only been here once or twice… always liked it though.” She placed a hand on Rondo’s shoulder and guided him over to a chair out of sight of the windows. “Let’s park it over here. I have a feeling they have some personal business to attend to.”

  With a nod of thanks, Hal hurried up to the second floor to the bar and the hidden room behind it.

  It took them hours to box everything up and remove any trace of subversive doctrines or rebellious paraphernalia. Hal’s Shifting Mask dropped and he kept it off. No use in wasting MP.

  Noth didn’t know Giel, she knew him even less than Mira. But she helped them without complaint or concern for herself.

  They divided what they could up amongst their inventories, with the agreement that they would leave any non-incriminating personal effects with the Adventurer’s Guild.

  The rest they would put in a chest back at camp and decide what to do with later. Nobody had the heart to flat-out throw anything away. And besides, Giel had a surprising amount of useful items. Many of which were in small, ornate coffers. Though no equipment that they could find.

  Once the room was cleared out, they came out of the back to find Rondo and Mira drinking and carrying a low conversation around a lone candle in the back of the tavern.

  “I’ll go check upstairs,” Hal said.

  Elora followed him while Ashera and Noth went to join the others. Together they searched for Giel’s private rooms. Once found, Elora opened it and even disarmed a small trap.

  As soon as the door was open, they slipped inside. Elora went to the closet door che
cking it for traps while Hal went immediately to the nightstand. The room was well-kept. The sheets pulled tight onto the large four-poster bed and an air of lived-in comfort filled the cold room.

  But the nightstand held a picture that tugged at Hal. He lifted it and immediately slipped the strange photo out from the back. Just as he placed it into the drawer Elora came over.

  “Nothing in the closet, what’d you find?” she asked, looking around him at the opened drawer.

  “Nothing,” Hal said, slipping the photo into his pocket as he shut the drawer.

  Elora looked at him curiously, then shrugged. “All right, keep looking. This is the least we could do for him.”

  Your Deception has risen to Level 6.

  +1% Deception success (+6%).

  +0.5% Deception awareness (+3.0%).

  -0.5% Reputation loss (-3.0%).

  Hal nodded, feeling worse for the prompt that he saw pop up. “He was our friend.”

  “Thank you for doing this, Hal,” she said. In a rare display of tenderness, she placed a hand gently on his arm. “I know we’re risking a lot coming back into Murkmire… but this is important to me.”

  “I wanted to help. This is the right thing to do.”

  Together they scoured the rest of the room but found nothing of note. At least, nothing that would suggest Giel was anything more than an upstanding Tavernkeeper.

  Elora went to the door, looking back at Hal. “You need a moment?”

  “I’ll be down in a second,” he said softly.

  The Ranger gave him a comforting smile that made him feel a little guilty and then slipped away noiselessly out into the hall. He needed a moment, but not for the reason she thought.

  Alone, he took out the photograph. Standing next to the window he stared at six smiling faces all cheering and waving at the camera. It was like one of those old sepia-toned photos from the wild west. Except the people in it were moving around, waving and strangely alive.

  Like the photograph captured a tiny slice of their vital energies. This wasn’t a simple looping video or a GIF, it was something much more. Thirty-seven stared back at him waving and sometimes ruffling young Giel’s hair.

  Little Giel clung to his mother or sometimes was passed to his father who looked like a smaller version of the man Giel would grow to be. Tormand, he thought his name was.

  On the other side of Thirty-seven was a beautiful woman who he instantly recognized as a younger Matron Madrasil. And barely in the shot, almost always trying to hide behind her mother’s skirt… was Ashera.

  He was sure of it. The photo was old but lovingly cared for from the lack of damage. He wondered when it was taken but when he flipped it over to the back, he didn’t find any dates. Only a note scribbled, “The New Dawn. L7-R8-L9-R4.”

  When he flipped the photo back over, the child form of Ashera was gone. Matron Madrasil, obviously her mother, was shaking her head. Her shoulders bobbed with silent laughter as she walked off the photo and disappeared.

  A moment later she had little Ashera up in her arms as she walked back into frame to stand beside Thirty-seven. There was a familiarity there, a longing in the way the pair looked at each other that made Hal feel more than a little uneasy.

  He put the photo away, deciding he couldn’t throw it away. It was weird seeing his own face on Thirty-seven smiling and laughing, waving at the camera. He had so many questions.

  When Hal came down the steps ten minutes later, he had donned his elven disguise once more.

  They left soon after. The group wove through the streets as the nighttime crowds began to clog the avenues leading up to the Cloud Ring, where the Coffin District and the koblins were at.

  A pair of guards were posted at the entrance to the district, and right beside each of them were two koblins imitating them as best as they could. It melted Hal’s heart. Even the stoic guards seemed to have a slight grin.

  Koblins had a way of doing that.

  But it wasn’t enough for Hal. Thirty-seven’s memories of the corruption within Murkmire and his own experiences made him worry for the kind-hearted koblins.

  He needed to be sure. There was no way he would be able to leave them in Murkmire without personally looking in on them to make sure they were settling in okay and that Qalmor was true to his word.

  Hal barely made it within fifty feet of the entrance before the two koblins shouted with glee, startling the two guardsmen. They sprinted on their little bandy legs toward him.

  Hal sank to a knee to get on their level and greeted them. Thankfully, none of them called him by his name and after a short but fervent greeting, they promptly dragged him toward the entrance.

  If Hal ever had any thoughts of sneaking in, they were completely abandoned now. The rest followed behind, each trying not to laugh at the scene. Hal imagined it looked like two exuberant children pulling their idolized big brother along to show them something they were proud of.

  And they indeed had a lot to be proud of.

  The koblins were barely in Murkmire for half a day when Hal came back but the changes they made already were unbelievable. He barely recognized the Coffin District.

  As he was escorted in, Hal saw several homes and businesses were already cleared out. Tall poles festooned with nets of glowing stones served as makeshift street lamps.

  Every koblin was busy doing something. Some were cleaning, others were repairing with tiny hammers, nails, or using a trowel and mortar to repair cracks in the stone structures.

  Where did they get tools?

  The entire district felt alive in a way Hal never expected to see it. The koblin guards pointed out what each of the buildings was being used for.

  It warmed Hal’s heart to see a couple of refugees already among the koblins and more than a couple of the Murkmire Watch patrolling the streets. Each person Hal saw had a look of astonishment on their face. Hal couldn’t begin to imagine the progress they’d make with the rundown district in a week, let alone a month.

  Though he hoped they wouldn’t be here much longer than that. Unlike before, the koblins did not mob him. They cheerily waved or came up to show him what they were working on but immediately went back to work.

  Sparkspox was in one of the first buildings, a general store that they cleared out and placed crudely fashioned tables out of rotted planking scavenged from nearby buildings. On the tables were several hastily scribbled architectural drawings.

  From her table, Sparkspox was instructing a group of koblins on what building they were to renovate next for use as a communal home. Rather than entertaining the koblins as Hal assumed Altres would prefer, the tiefling staggered out of a back room carrying a very heavy set of crates.

  Unfortunately, he had no time to talk aside from a simple - and fond - greeting, before Sparkspox told him where to take the materials.

  Already little accents were placed to make the district and its few cleared buildings more like homes. The koblins were good at that.

  “Thank you,” Hal said to the two guards as they escorted him out. Sparkspox gave him an exuberant wave but she was so busy she immediately went back to work. “I guess I was worried for nothing. You’re all so busy.”

  He felt a warmth swell in his chest. A sense of pride that the koblins were doing so well. He had been so needlessly worried that they were all shivering and holed up in a broken-down shack without any idea what to do.

  This was better than he could have ever hoped for.

  Every koblin seemed to know their place and what they were supposed to do. It was rather amazing to watch them rush around talking and sometimes singing their silly koblins songs as they worked.

  Even Hal’s arrival did little more than pause their tasks for the time it took to greet him before they resumed their work.

  Hal had never seen them so single-minded.

  “Psshkosh,” the koblin on his left said as they guided him back toward the exit. “Hal-savior furrow-brows muchly for nothing! Kobbies make Hal-savior heart-swell.”


  “Heart-swell?” Elora asked at his side.

  The other koblin looked up at her. “Psshkooh… is like ‘proud’!”

  “I already am,” he said with a smile. “Thank you for escorting me inside. You’re both doing an excellent job guarding.”

  With that, they left for Rondo’s shop. The whole time the gnome had been silently shaking his head in wonder. “Amazing,” he muttered. For once at a loss for words.

  Hal walked taller and prouder on their way through Murkmire. A massive weight was lifted from his shoulders. He felt confident there was nothing to worry about now. Despite how well the koblins were doing, Hal felt reassured that he was right to trust Qalmor.

  Maybe he’d like a promotion, he idly wondered. His Sanctum could use a man that managed to stay honorable and fair in a place like Murkmire.

  When he saw the koblins again, it would be to take them to a new home. A place he hoped would deserve their kind little hearts.

  “Did you see that koblin with the stick pretending it was a spear like that guard had?” Mira cooed. “Nobody ever told me they were so adorable!” She gripped the purple and gold-hem of Hal’s [Shaper’s Coat] sleeve and shook him. “They’re so precious, we must protect them at all costs!”

  They swung by Rondo’s shop on the way out of town, bidding goodbye to the gnome while Hal watched to make sure somebody didn’t try to sneak him into a sack and smuggle him back to camp.

  He had no idea why the gnome suddenly wanted to join them so badly or why Ashera or Elora seemed keen on helping. Noth and Mira were suspiciously quiet about the whole affair. Maybe he was being irrational about the whole thing and Rondo really did have good intentions.

  In the end, he didn’t quite know how he felt on the matter anymore.

  If the gnome had asked him once more to come along, he might have said yes. Perhaps it was the effect the koblins had on him, the optimism and friendliness they evoked in others was infectious.

  But Rondo didn’t and the little gnome merely said his goodbyes and slipped inside his shop looking a bit forlorn.