Everybody would be better then other nobles.
The Unified Theorem (Insert, Warcraft, Science is Golden)
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Chapter 5 – The Angel of Death (I)
Karmic Acumen
Well-known member
A/N: As someone on QQ deduced, Richard Angevin is Duke Lionheart of the dubious Warcraft 3 fame of being the good guy you kill while playing as the good girl. Mercad is the Captain unit.
If you know who in real-life was part of the Angevin dynasty while also being named Richard, things will suddenly make a lot more sense.
Chapter 5 – The Angel of Death
(I)
"-. Mercad Occitanier, Captain of Richard Angevin's Ducal Guard .-"
The average Kul Tiran was expected to do his time in the navy if he had any amount of self-respect, and Mercad had more than his fair share. Which is why it was so vexing that he got sea sick within five minutes of stepping on a ship deck. Every time. The only exception was when the ship listed and his stomach decided it couldn't wait even that long to start making tumbles.
This, unfortunately, meant that he had to settle for the army. The army which was a second-rate backup plan at best and everyone knew it. The commoners were dismissive. The nobility was patronising. The seamen he'd once dreamed of having as brothers were condescending pricks. The eternal navy-army rivalry was a joke that everyone pretended very badly not to know who was always on the wrong side of. And everyone in the army from the lowest grunt to the highest officer had a massive chip on their shoulder because of it.
Mercad lost all hopes of a normal career before his first month of training was even over, when it got out that he only enlisted after the navy didn't work out. That people actually thought hazing would work on him was baffling, people of his size may not be unheard of back home like on the mainland, but he was by no means common so he towered over everyone else in his entire platoon. It destroyed what was left of the respect he had for his fellow man. Which was just a put-upon pretense anyway, one he played by rote because his parents hadn't managed to instil the real thing into him despite their best efforts. Which made it all the more infuriating that putting all his bunkmates in the infirmary was still their victory in the end, as it landed him with a reputation as a savage unreliable brute that he never managed to shed.
He'd had to be very thorough in how he completed his duties in order to secure the barest scraps of advancement, and even then his career stalled well before his tour of duty finished. Part of it was his tendency towards 'insubordination', which was a thinly veiled way to say his superiors were complete morons whose orders could never be fulfilled without very creative interpretation. Also, the Kul Tiran Land Forces had far fewer prospects for promotion than the navy due to the much lower rate of attrition. Worst of all, the sheer state of the corps was such that they would probably fold at the first invasion. For all that they disdained them, the army officers had no problem believing nothing would ever get past their navy rivals, and thus continued to happily grow lazy and fat at their expense.
All of which prompted Mercad to not enlist for a second tour so he could found a mercenary company instead. Only then did his competence and initiative begin getting him actual recognition, until he finally found an employer who rewarded good service with the appropriate amount of confidence, authority and coin. Mercad wasn't one to think loyal service could ever be more meaningful than that, nothing in life was really meaningful at the end of the day. But he could see how people like Duke Angevin might inspire the baseborn to believe there could be such a thing as meaningful death in his service. It helped that his principal didn't mock Mercad for his motion sickness even once. The duke even went to significant personal expense to procure potions that let him finally enjoy being out at sea. For that alone he'd honour his retainer contract no matter how good the counter offers, even beyond the practical considerations of not gaining a career-ending reputation as buyable turncoat.
Mercad would certainly much rather be out there with his principal right now, doing his part in the defeat in detail. He'd been a ranger, he knew woodland warfare better than anyone. Or if not that, then interrogating the prisoners while they were still shell-shocked and he could probably break one or three with just nail or tooth pulling. But the duke told him to stay behind and keep an eye on things because he wasn't as 'emotionally compromised.' Seeing as his principal had left his wife and sister both with unrestricted access to their guest, Mercad was forced to agree that he was the only one between the two of them with full command of his faculties. Especially since the duke was probably also right that their attackers had been after the ladies.
Mercad would play bodyguard if that was his wish. Personal taste rarely determined how he went about his job anyway, regardless of how much it overlapped (or not). Well, beyond choosing who to permanently bind himself with to begin with.
Still though, Mercad never imagined that the highest possible position for someone in his profession would circle all the way back to chaperoning love-struck teenagers. You'd think that just one of the pair being love-struck would soften the blow some, but the one making googly eyes was the duke's sister, instead of the suspiciously providential interloper that was far too good to be true. Mercad was thus cursed to live through that rare occasion where he could only hope for the best from a guest. Hope that he knew better than to put a foot out of line with the little lady. At least.
His principal would be upset if he returned from his mop-up action just to find his little sister tearfully woeful because Mercad was flaying their guest alive.
Divinely blessed or whatever he was.
Which Mercad had far less cause than usual to scoff at, unfortunately. The way this Ferdinand used the Light was enough to move even his black heart. And just standing in his vicinity made you feel more alive. Literally. There was something unnatural at work there, but it didn't feel unnatural. Confound this boy.
"I get the general idea already," Ferdinand told Lady Annari after she finally stopped espousing the grand benefits of being an irresistible magnet to every wild creature under the sun, as if Mercad didn't already have enough trouble keeping her removed from his contempt for the general intelligence of humanity. "You're talking about being in tune with nature. But how exactly do you get the animals to realize you're in tune with nature? Or react positively? Nature is pretty bloody at the end of the day."
The raven cawed in Lady Anna's lap.
"Oh, now you're just being silly. It's not the animals that's important, or the plants even. You're not supposed to care about them any more than you care about gold. They come and go just as fast." Spoken every bit like a girl who never had to worry about gold her whole life. "It's like… like night follows day and winter follows spring. Well, eventually. Everything you see is born, grows and eventually goes back to where it came from. Only the nature of things stays the same. It has endless branches, but you're not supposed to see them any more you can see the thoughts in your mind. As long as it breathes and can grow from the warmth of sunlight or well, fire, you can be part of the growth of… well, anything. Trees, animals, people-"
"Weeds?"
"Yes, weeds too, you jerk," the Lady slapped their guest's arm, decorum was well and truly dead alongside her manners and proper vocabulary. "We all come out of nature and return to nature. But since we people can actually decide when and how to do some of these things, we can learn to extend this control to everything that doesn't have the self-awareness to, well, want things. Especially if it's helpful to them somehow. Want and instinct aren't the same thing, you see."
"Can you do it?"
"… No." Truly, Lady Anna had mastered the art of looking dignified even while pouting.
Ferdinand waited for her to continue. When she didn't, he resumed writing in that notebook of his. Or drawing, now. Something. The raven seemed inordinately interested. Definitely unnatural.
Both of them.
"But I don't need to," Lady Annari declared, she never did have the best patience. "I'm a lady, not a druid. I'll do my part so they can do theirs."
"Your part being lording it over every critter and fowl through song and story?" Mercad carefully didn't react to that, or the way Lady Valeria covered her mouth to keep from laughing where she was sat nearby on a lounge. That was almost word for word what she'd told her sister-in-law, back when the latter's passion for 'becoming a fairy tale princess' proved more than a fleeting whim. "How does it work for beasts that aren't the familiar of a godlike being living in a fortress in the sky?"
Mercad carefully didn't let his mind jump back into that whole other kettle of worms either. Not the least because he couldn't just dismiss it out of hand as tall tales. He'll wait until his principal returned.
"It works just fine!" Lady Annari said hotly, standing up determinedly. "Here, I'll show you-"
Mercad cleared his throat. "Best not to wander off when bandits might still be about, milady."
"You don't need to treat me like an idiot!" The young lady rounded on him next. "I know that. And I know they weren't bandits either." 'So there!' was not thrown in at the end there, thankfully.
"I hope you don't plan to shout it from the rooftops when we get home too, sister-in-law," Lady Valeria said idly. "Your brother has enough things to deal with as it is."
Lady Anna blushed. It made for a striking contrast with her grey eyes, especially on such a pale skin, but she did not seem otherwise cowed.
This time, it was Ferdinand who cleared his throat. "So, plants. Can you make them grow faster?"
Blatantly knowing what the lad was doing, the lady nonetheless played along and sat back down on the hastily carved log bench with a huff. "No. My brother wouldn't let me undergo those rites."
"She means my husband wasn't fool enough to let her drink unknown potions."
Mercad had been there for when Lady Valeria still added 'for a childish fancy' at the end of that.
Lady Annari scowled. "He didn't say anything about the other rites I took."
"Because you made sure he wasn't there when you went and inhaled magic fumes. Fool him once, shame on you. Don't complain that you failed to fool him a second time, if he weren't so observant we both might be dead or captive right now."
"That's emotional blackmail!"
"No, Anna. You'll just have to wait until you're of age and no longer subject to your brother's authority. Then you can be entirely responsible for the consequences of your actions like the rest of us."
"So it does involve expanded consciousness," Ferdinand cut in with that same perfect timing that reversed their ambush. "Well, I've already got that." Obviously. "So what are the actual mechanics?"
Lady Anna tossed her hair in a huff, but nonetheless replied. "It's all about likeness – well, not just likeness. It's like… like every poison or venom usually has the cure somewhere within a stone's throw. It's like herbalism, ever notice how ribwort looks like a ribcage? It's even in the name, and what does it do? It mends injuries even without making a potion out of it. It's the same with a lot of things, beans look like kidneys, sunflowers look like the sun, walnuts basically improve thinking and I saw the druids use them as reagents to heal brainstorms, and guess what walnuts look like?"
Something seemed to dawn in Ferdinand's gaze. "Huh. You're saying it's a mindset, except you use magic to make your view of things override causation by leveraging stuff you have in common. Or you charm spirits to do that for you. It's basically you actively overriding causality with synchronicity, and vice versa as needed. And you can do that because things made by nature look and work like the other things in nature they can best affect. Or be affected by. My herbalism teacher never put it to me like that."
"Your teacher? Is he a druid too?" Lady Anna asked, and Mercad decided to pay very close attention now. "Or an alchemist? A spirit medium of some sort perhaps?"
"She. And no, she's not technically a herbalist herself. She just plays with herbs occasionally, when work on the farm is light."
Wait what? A farm? He had to be joking-
"That's very surprising of you to say." Lady Anna said, looking and sounding exceedingly alarmed as if her hopes were about to be dashed on the rocks. "I thought you were an acolyte with the church at first, but then you wouldn't be out adventuring and killing bandits. Especially not with your method for conveyance and interesting weaponry. I assumed… But surely a powerful man such as yourself can find better prospects than being a farmhand."
"My father's a cobbler," the boy said dryly with not an ounce of shame. "Also, the farm is ours, so it's not like I'm a guttersnipe or anything."
"… Oh." Lady Anna, if anything, seemed like she'd just been shot right in the heart.
Mercad carefully hid his relief. It wouldn't do to show openly how glad he was to find out that his charge's romantic notions were doomed from the start.
"Say, do you happen to have one?"
Lady Anna made a valiant, if ultimately futile, attempt to hide the emotional blow from the sudden and tragic death of her romance. "One what? A spirit? Does Mister Huginn count?"
"A walnut. There's something I want to try all of a sudden."
They did, in fact, have walnuts as part of their provisions. Mercad pre-empted Lady Anna's request and made sure to pick one of the smart-mouthed slackers to get them. One or the other was perfectly fine, clever tongues made for good envoys and the lazy tented to come up with the most efficient ways to get the job done. But having both traits in the same person led all too easily to insubordination, so a good commander never wasted drudgework.
When the boy (farmboy) was presented with his handful of walnuts, he picked one up, brought it close to his eye for inspection and hummed. He then rubbed the walnut between his palms. His eyes took on a golden tint. Then they began to glow outright. Mercad should have tensed, but the Light, frustratingly, only made men feel peace.
Even killers.
"Talk me through it."
Lady Anna was too star-struck to hear him. Again.
"Milady."
Finally, the little lady snapped out of her daze. "I'm sorry, could you please repeat that, milord?"
What did she mean 'milord', he's a-
"Talk me through it. How do you synchronise with a plant? What's the first principle of druidism? How did the folks in Drustvar put it to you?"
The raven hopped out of her lap to watch from the closer vantage of the girl's shoulder. Its dark plumage almost disappeared amidst her tresses.
"…Is a flower more beautiful than the other? Is a spring clearer than the other? Is a blade of grass taller than the other? Everything has its strength, beauty and feat. It is in the nature of things that the forest should have different kinds of trees, grass, flowers and animals. There is no finger from the same hand like the other, but all of them are needed to strike the iron. Is the apple tree wiser than the plum tree or the pear tree? Is the left hand better than the right? Differently sees the left eye from the right?"
"They do, actually." The boy interrupted her with all the rudeness of the common man, maybe his claims as to his origin weren't so outlandish. "But I think I see what you mean. The ones from above have their purpose and the ones below have theirs. The great have theirs and the small have theirs. The quick have theirs and the slow have theirs. The ones that were had their purpose and the ones that come will have theirs."
Anna nodded peaceably. "You can be like the earth and everything it offers you, the sky with its rain that feeds the earth, the sun and its heat that lights your home and your land, the moon that brings peace to your sleep, even the stars who watch over it will heed the call of the spirit."
"Thank the mountain for its teachings and its iron you gather from it, thank the forest for everything you take from there, thank the spring for the water you drink, thank the tree for the works it shows you." Now it was the boy speaking as if repeating some long lost wisdom. "Thank the good man which brings you joy and a smile on your face." Now that might be going a bit far- "I'm starting to remember reading something very similar to this, a long time ago. It's not quite what I was looking for, but I think I know where to start working in the mathematical ratios and sacred geometry now."
Say what now?
"Thank you, milady. I may be some time."
"… Alright?"
But the boy no longer had eyes for anything but the walnut. The walnut which he held right in front of his eyes. Glowing eyes. Intent. Unblinking.
After five minutes of that, Lady Anna huffed in annoyance. "Happy to help."
The boy did not react.
Lady Valeria was at least more pragmatic. "Well, he did say he'd be some time."
'Some time' turned out to be exceedingly accurate. The boy didn't move or say anything for hours, all the way to late evening when the duke finally returned with news of victory. He was accompanied by the bulk of their men, with just four of their force too injured to walk by themselves. There were twice as many prisoners for Mercad to squeeze answers out of as well, later.
"Sir," Mercad greeted him. "Welcome back. I see things went well?"
"Exceedingly."
"And the… far seeing provided by our guest?"
"Not treachery, despite your earnest hopes." Richard Angevin glanced to where their guest was still… doing whatever he was doing with that walnut. Alone, now, save for the raven grooming itself next to him. Lady Anna had joined Lady Valeria under the sunshade. "What have you learned?"
"Our guest refuses to do us the courtesy of being from some lofty church or noble heroic bloodline. He's a farmboy." For all that lady Anna was too easily given to friendship, she tended to entreat information with distressing ease. Easier than even Mercad could when his most effective tools were denied him. It was galling, but all a man could do was cope.
"Ah, so he's not any mere hero, he's a fairy tale hero."
Mercad grimaced. His principal took far too much joy in pretending to have more in common with his sister than he actually did. How would a farmboy even afford such exotic equipment? Those boomsticks could only have come from the dwarves, Kul Tiras had been badgering them to help make cannons a reality for decades to no luck, how did this boy come by them?
"Cheer up, man, by the looks of him he's completely out of it. His willingness to leave himself so vulnerable in your presence should tell you all you need to know."
"… I don't trust it." He'd never forget the way that forcefield appeared between heartbeats and stopped him and all his men without even a blink from the boy. That had been galling as well, to be rendered impotent so completely. Mortifying too, when he realized what kind of ally his principal had gained. What ally he could have antagonised because he acted without orders. Could have deprived him of. Killed out of hand because he lost his discipline.
Today had not been a good day.
Duke Richard went to greet the ladies first, proving yet again worthy of Mercad's service by masterfully persuading them to give them and their guest some privacy without needing to make it an order. When he came back, the two of them approached the young man.
That was when the boy came out of his trance – not as out of it as he seemed then? – looked at them, glanced over the injured, seemingly decided that none of them needed his intervention, and then turned to the bird that had been grooming itself next to him the whole time. Held out the walnut, which he cracked open to reveal a small nut-sized brain. "It's the opposite extreme of what I was going for, but it's something right?"
The raven stared at the child, then slowly began to nibble at the brain, the kid had turned the core of a walnut into a brain, what the fuck?
"I never bought the official story about Odyn and Helya."
The raven snapped its head up so fast Mercad didn't even see it move, only the blur of brain bits scattering everywhere.
Something changed in the world. The weight of some unseen regard descended upon them with the weight of ages. From one moment to the next Mercad felt coiled like a spring pressed under too much weight. Suddenly he couldn't get his feet to move. Distantly, he realised his principal had also frozen stiff next to him.
Somewhere above and ahead, shadows flickered in the air, forming vague shifting shapes despite being out in the sunlight.
The second half of this chapter (1 update) and Chapter 6 (two updates) are available on Patreon (karmicacumen) and Subscribestar (karmic-acumen).
If you know who in real-life was part of the Angevin dynasty while also being named Richard, things will suddenly make a lot more sense.
Chapter 5 – The Angel of Death
(I)
"-. Mercad Occitanier, Captain of Richard Angevin's Ducal Guard .-"
The average Kul Tiran was expected to do his time in the navy if he had any amount of self-respect, and Mercad had more than his fair share. Which is why it was so vexing that he got sea sick within five minutes of stepping on a ship deck. Every time. The only exception was when the ship listed and his stomach decided it couldn't wait even that long to start making tumbles.
This, unfortunately, meant that he had to settle for the army. The army which was a second-rate backup plan at best and everyone knew it. The commoners were dismissive. The nobility was patronising. The seamen he'd once dreamed of having as brothers were condescending pricks. The eternal navy-army rivalry was a joke that everyone pretended very badly not to know who was always on the wrong side of. And everyone in the army from the lowest grunt to the highest officer had a massive chip on their shoulder because of it.
Mercad lost all hopes of a normal career before his first month of training was even over, when it got out that he only enlisted after the navy didn't work out. That people actually thought hazing would work on him was baffling, people of his size may not be unheard of back home like on the mainland, but he was by no means common so he towered over everyone else in his entire platoon. It destroyed what was left of the respect he had for his fellow man. Which was just a put-upon pretense anyway, one he played by rote because his parents hadn't managed to instil the real thing into him despite their best efforts. Which made it all the more infuriating that putting all his bunkmates in the infirmary was still their victory in the end, as it landed him with a reputation as a savage unreliable brute that he never managed to shed.
He'd had to be very thorough in how he completed his duties in order to secure the barest scraps of advancement, and even then his career stalled well before his tour of duty finished. Part of it was his tendency towards 'insubordination', which was a thinly veiled way to say his superiors were complete morons whose orders could never be fulfilled without very creative interpretation. Also, the Kul Tiran Land Forces had far fewer prospects for promotion than the navy due to the much lower rate of attrition. Worst of all, the sheer state of the corps was such that they would probably fold at the first invasion. For all that they disdained them, the army officers had no problem believing nothing would ever get past their navy rivals, and thus continued to happily grow lazy and fat at their expense.
All of which prompted Mercad to not enlist for a second tour so he could found a mercenary company instead. Only then did his competence and initiative begin getting him actual recognition, until he finally found an employer who rewarded good service with the appropriate amount of confidence, authority and coin. Mercad wasn't one to think loyal service could ever be more meaningful than that, nothing in life was really meaningful at the end of the day. But he could see how people like Duke Angevin might inspire the baseborn to believe there could be such a thing as meaningful death in his service. It helped that his principal didn't mock Mercad for his motion sickness even once. The duke even went to significant personal expense to procure potions that let him finally enjoy being out at sea. For that alone he'd honour his retainer contract no matter how good the counter offers, even beyond the practical considerations of not gaining a career-ending reputation as buyable turncoat.
Mercad would certainly much rather be out there with his principal right now, doing his part in the defeat in detail. He'd been a ranger, he knew woodland warfare better than anyone. Or if not that, then interrogating the prisoners while they were still shell-shocked and he could probably break one or three with just nail or tooth pulling. But the duke told him to stay behind and keep an eye on things because he wasn't as 'emotionally compromised.' Seeing as his principal had left his wife and sister both with unrestricted access to their guest, Mercad was forced to agree that he was the only one between the two of them with full command of his faculties. Especially since the duke was probably also right that their attackers had been after the ladies.
Mercad would play bodyguard if that was his wish. Personal taste rarely determined how he went about his job anyway, regardless of how much it overlapped (or not). Well, beyond choosing who to permanently bind himself with to begin with.
Still though, Mercad never imagined that the highest possible position for someone in his profession would circle all the way back to chaperoning love-struck teenagers. You'd think that just one of the pair being love-struck would soften the blow some, but the one making googly eyes was the duke's sister, instead of the suspiciously providential interloper that was far too good to be true. Mercad was thus cursed to live through that rare occasion where he could only hope for the best from a guest. Hope that he knew better than to put a foot out of line with the little lady. At least.
His principal would be upset if he returned from his mop-up action just to find his little sister tearfully woeful because Mercad was flaying their guest alive.
Divinely blessed or whatever he was.
Which Mercad had far less cause than usual to scoff at, unfortunately. The way this Ferdinand used the Light was enough to move even his black heart. And just standing in his vicinity made you feel more alive. Literally. There was something unnatural at work there, but it didn't feel unnatural. Confound this boy.
"I get the general idea already," Ferdinand told Lady Annari after she finally stopped espousing the grand benefits of being an irresistible magnet to every wild creature under the sun, as if Mercad didn't already have enough trouble keeping her removed from his contempt for the general intelligence of humanity. "You're talking about being in tune with nature. But how exactly do you get the animals to realize you're in tune with nature? Or react positively? Nature is pretty bloody at the end of the day."
The raven cawed in Lady Anna's lap.
"Oh, now you're just being silly. It's not the animals that's important, or the plants even. You're not supposed to care about them any more than you care about gold. They come and go just as fast." Spoken every bit like a girl who never had to worry about gold her whole life. "It's like… like night follows day and winter follows spring. Well, eventually. Everything you see is born, grows and eventually goes back to where it came from. Only the nature of things stays the same. It has endless branches, but you're not supposed to see them any more you can see the thoughts in your mind. As long as it breathes and can grow from the warmth of sunlight or well, fire, you can be part of the growth of… well, anything. Trees, animals, people-"
"Weeds?"
"Yes, weeds too, you jerk," the Lady slapped their guest's arm, decorum was well and truly dead alongside her manners and proper vocabulary. "We all come out of nature and return to nature. But since we people can actually decide when and how to do some of these things, we can learn to extend this control to everything that doesn't have the self-awareness to, well, want things. Especially if it's helpful to them somehow. Want and instinct aren't the same thing, you see."
"Can you do it?"
"… No." Truly, Lady Anna had mastered the art of looking dignified even while pouting.
Ferdinand waited for her to continue. When she didn't, he resumed writing in that notebook of his. Or drawing, now. Something. The raven seemed inordinately interested. Definitely unnatural.
Both of them.
"But I don't need to," Lady Annari declared, she never did have the best patience. "I'm a lady, not a druid. I'll do my part so they can do theirs."
"Your part being lording it over every critter and fowl through song and story?" Mercad carefully didn't react to that, or the way Lady Valeria covered her mouth to keep from laughing where she was sat nearby on a lounge. That was almost word for word what she'd told her sister-in-law, back when the latter's passion for 'becoming a fairy tale princess' proved more than a fleeting whim. "How does it work for beasts that aren't the familiar of a godlike being living in a fortress in the sky?"
Mercad carefully didn't let his mind jump back into that whole other kettle of worms either. Not the least because he couldn't just dismiss it out of hand as tall tales. He'll wait until his principal returned.
"It works just fine!" Lady Annari said hotly, standing up determinedly. "Here, I'll show you-"
Mercad cleared his throat. "Best not to wander off when bandits might still be about, milady."
"You don't need to treat me like an idiot!" The young lady rounded on him next. "I know that. And I know they weren't bandits either." 'So there!' was not thrown in at the end there, thankfully.
"I hope you don't plan to shout it from the rooftops when we get home too, sister-in-law," Lady Valeria said idly. "Your brother has enough things to deal with as it is."
Lady Anna blushed. It made for a striking contrast with her grey eyes, especially on such a pale skin, but she did not seem otherwise cowed.
This time, it was Ferdinand who cleared his throat. "So, plants. Can you make them grow faster?"
Blatantly knowing what the lad was doing, the lady nonetheless played along and sat back down on the hastily carved log bench with a huff. "No. My brother wouldn't let me undergo those rites."
"She means my husband wasn't fool enough to let her drink unknown potions."
Mercad had been there for when Lady Valeria still added 'for a childish fancy' at the end of that.
Lady Annari scowled. "He didn't say anything about the other rites I took."
"Because you made sure he wasn't there when you went and inhaled magic fumes. Fool him once, shame on you. Don't complain that you failed to fool him a second time, if he weren't so observant we both might be dead or captive right now."
"That's emotional blackmail!"
"No, Anna. You'll just have to wait until you're of age and no longer subject to your brother's authority. Then you can be entirely responsible for the consequences of your actions like the rest of us."
"So it does involve expanded consciousness," Ferdinand cut in with that same perfect timing that reversed their ambush. "Well, I've already got that." Obviously. "So what are the actual mechanics?"
Lady Anna tossed her hair in a huff, but nonetheless replied. "It's all about likeness – well, not just likeness. It's like… like every poison or venom usually has the cure somewhere within a stone's throw. It's like herbalism, ever notice how ribwort looks like a ribcage? It's even in the name, and what does it do? It mends injuries even without making a potion out of it. It's the same with a lot of things, beans look like kidneys, sunflowers look like the sun, walnuts basically improve thinking and I saw the druids use them as reagents to heal brainstorms, and guess what walnuts look like?"
Something seemed to dawn in Ferdinand's gaze. "Huh. You're saying it's a mindset, except you use magic to make your view of things override causation by leveraging stuff you have in common. Or you charm spirits to do that for you. It's basically you actively overriding causality with synchronicity, and vice versa as needed. And you can do that because things made by nature look and work like the other things in nature they can best affect. Or be affected by. My herbalism teacher never put it to me like that."
"Your teacher? Is he a druid too?" Lady Anna asked, and Mercad decided to pay very close attention now. "Or an alchemist? A spirit medium of some sort perhaps?"
"She. And no, she's not technically a herbalist herself. She just plays with herbs occasionally, when work on the farm is light."
Wait what? A farm? He had to be joking-
"That's very surprising of you to say." Lady Anna said, looking and sounding exceedingly alarmed as if her hopes were about to be dashed on the rocks. "I thought you were an acolyte with the church at first, but then you wouldn't be out adventuring and killing bandits. Especially not with your method for conveyance and interesting weaponry. I assumed… But surely a powerful man such as yourself can find better prospects than being a farmhand."
"My father's a cobbler," the boy said dryly with not an ounce of shame. "Also, the farm is ours, so it's not like I'm a guttersnipe or anything."
"… Oh." Lady Anna, if anything, seemed like she'd just been shot right in the heart.
Mercad carefully hid his relief. It wouldn't do to show openly how glad he was to find out that his charge's romantic notions were doomed from the start.
"Say, do you happen to have one?"
Lady Anna made a valiant, if ultimately futile, attempt to hide the emotional blow from the sudden and tragic death of her romance. "One what? A spirit? Does Mister Huginn count?"
"A walnut. There's something I want to try all of a sudden."
They did, in fact, have walnuts as part of their provisions. Mercad pre-empted Lady Anna's request and made sure to pick one of the smart-mouthed slackers to get them. One or the other was perfectly fine, clever tongues made for good envoys and the lazy tented to come up with the most efficient ways to get the job done. But having both traits in the same person led all too easily to insubordination, so a good commander never wasted drudgework.
When the boy (farmboy) was presented with his handful of walnuts, he picked one up, brought it close to his eye for inspection and hummed. He then rubbed the walnut between his palms. His eyes took on a golden tint. Then they began to glow outright. Mercad should have tensed, but the Light, frustratingly, only made men feel peace.
Even killers.
"Talk me through it."
Lady Anna was too star-struck to hear him. Again.
"Milady."
Finally, the little lady snapped out of her daze. "I'm sorry, could you please repeat that, milord?"
What did she mean 'milord', he's a-
"Talk me through it. How do you synchronise with a plant? What's the first principle of druidism? How did the folks in Drustvar put it to you?"
The raven hopped out of her lap to watch from the closer vantage of the girl's shoulder. Its dark plumage almost disappeared amidst her tresses.
"…Is a flower more beautiful than the other? Is a spring clearer than the other? Is a blade of grass taller than the other? Everything has its strength, beauty and feat. It is in the nature of things that the forest should have different kinds of trees, grass, flowers and animals. There is no finger from the same hand like the other, but all of them are needed to strike the iron. Is the apple tree wiser than the plum tree or the pear tree? Is the left hand better than the right? Differently sees the left eye from the right?"
"They do, actually." The boy interrupted her with all the rudeness of the common man, maybe his claims as to his origin weren't so outlandish. "But I think I see what you mean. The ones from above have their purpose and the ones below have theirs. The great have theirs and the small have theirs. The quick have theirs and the slow have theirs. The ones that were had their purpose and the ones that come will have theirs."
Anna nodded peaceably. "You can be like the earth and everything it offers you, the sky with its rain that feeds the earth, the sun and its heat that lights your home and your land, the moon that brings peace to your sleep, even the stars who watch over it will heed the call of the spirit."
"Thank the mountain for its teachings and its iron you gather from it, thank the forest for everything you take from there, thank the spring for the water you drink, thank the tree for the works it shows you." Now it was the boy speaking as if repeating some long lost wisdom. "Thank the good man which brings you joy and a smile on your face." Now that might be going a bit far- "I'm starting to remember reading something very similar to this, a long time ago. It's not quite what I was looking for, but I think I know where to start working in the mathematical ratios and sacred geometry now."
Say what now?
"Thank you, milady. I may be some time."
"… Alright?"
But the boy no longer had eyes for anything but the walnut. The walnut which he held right in front of his eyes. Glowing eyes. Intent. Unblinking.
After five minutes of that, Lady Anna huffed in annoyance. "Happy to help."
The boy did not react.
Lady Valeria was at least more pragmatic. "Well, he did say he'd be some time."
'Some time' turned out to be exceedingly accurate. The boy didn't move or say anything for hours, all the way to late evening when the duke finally returned with news of victory. He was accompanied by the bulk of their men, with just four of their force too injured to walk by themselves. There were twice as many prisoners for Mercad to squeeze answers out of as well, later.
"Sir," Mercad greeted him. "Welcome back. I see things went well?"
"Exceedingly."
"And the… far seeing provided by our guest?"
"Not treachery, despite your earnest hopes." Richard Angevin glanced to where their guest was still… doing whatever he was doing with that walnut. Alone, now, save for the raven grooming itself next to him. Lady Anna had joined Lady Valeria under the sunshade. "What have you learned?"
"Our guest refuses to do us the courtesy of being from some lofty church or noble heroic bloodline. He's a farmboy." For all that lady Anna was too easily given to friendship, she tended to entreat information with distressing ease. Easier than even Mercad could when his most effective tools were denied him. It was galling, but all a man could do was cope.
"Ah, so he's not any mere hero, he's a fairy tale hero."
Mercad grimaced. His principal took far too much joy in pretending to have more in common with his sister than he actually did. How would a farmboy even afford such exotic equipment? Those boomsticks could only have come from the dwarves, Kul Tiras had been badgering them to help make cannons a reality for decades to no luck, how did this boy come by them?
"Cheer up, man, by the looks of him he's completely out of it. His willingness to leave himself so vulnerable in your presence should tell you all you need to know."
"… I don't trust it." He'd never forget the way that forcefield appeared between heartbeats and stopped him and all his men without even a blink from the boy. That had been galling as well, to be rendered impotent so completely. Mortifying too, when he realized what kind of ally his principal had gained. What ally he could have antagonised because he acted without orders. Could have deprived him of. Killed out of hand because he lost his discipline.
Today had not been a good day.
Duke Richard went to greet the ladies first, proving yet again worthy of Mercad's service by masterfully persuading them to give them and their guest some privacy without needing to make it an order. When he came back, the two of them approached the young man.
That was when the boy came out of his trance – not as out of it as he seemed then? – looked at them, glanced over the injured, seemingly decided that none of them needed his intervention, and then turned to the bird that had been grooming itself next to him the whole time. Held out the walnut, which he cracked open to reveal a small nut-sized brain. "It's the opposite extreme of what I was going for, but it's something right?"
The raven stared at the child, then slowly began to nibble at the brain, the kid had turned the core of a walnut into a brain, what the fuck?
"I never bought the official story about Odyn and Helya."
The raven snapped its head up so fast Mercad didn't even see it move, only the blur of brain bits scattering everywhere.
Something changed in the world. The weight of some unseen regard descended upon them with the weight of ages. From one moment to the next Mercad felt coiled like a spring pressed under too much weight. Suddenly he couldn't get his feet to move. Distantly, he realised his principal had also frozen stiff next to him.
Somewhere above and ahead, shadows flickered in the air, forming vague shifting shapes despite being out in the sunlight.
The second half of this chapter (1 update) and Chapter 6 (two updates) are available on Patreon (karmicacumen) and Subscribestar (karmic-acumen).
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Chapter 5 – The Angel of Death (II)
Karmic Acumen
Well-known member
"-. Richard Angevin, Duke of Hillsbrad .-"
When he was young, Richard Angevin wanted to be a priest.
"The story of Odyn and Helya contradicts prior histories and even current events. For another, it contradicts itself. The tale supposedly goes that Odyn needed Helya to do literally everything for him. She ripped the Halls of Valor from Ulduar, she lifted them into the sky, she moved them half-way across the ocean, she was apparently capable of doing the reverse or even crash them into a volcano whenever she wanted. Helya also created the ritual that empowered Odyn to see and act in the spirit world, meaning she was the ultimate authority on death and shadow magic between them. Later, after they became enemies because she became the willing minion of the literal devil, she was apparently capable of trapping Odyn and his entire army of ascended warriors in his Halls for eternity, without any object of power or even access to the place."
Richard had attended service, honoured all the holidays and read all the scriptures cover to cover.
"By any reading, she was always the one with the power advantage in that relationship. Yet we're supposed to believe she was still somehow completely helpless when Odyn supposedly killed her, shattered her spirit and twisted her into the first val'kyr. Took away her free will too, apparently, like that wasn't her specialty as the great sorceress capable of binding even the Loa of Death. All for the high crime of opposing Odyn's supposed plan to turn some of his worshippers into ghostly guides of the dead against their will. Because none of them would volunteer, the chronicle goes, as if the valkyra don't exist. We're talking about the same people who are going to volunteer en masse to 'live as phantoms for all eternity' just because some up-jumped necromancer will tell them to. And worse."
Richard had then gone to whatever lengths a child could think of to entreat his parents to procure whatever apocryphal writings they could find as well.
"That the valkyra order exists is enough on its own to indicate that the writings were tampered with. That Helya has spent the past few thousand years doing everything her side of the story accuses Odyn of doing reads like projection. That only Odyn's side of the story is criticised in the chronicle reads like gaslighting. I'd have had an easier time not assuming slander if they just made Odyn the villain outright. And to truly put the last nail in the coffin of this bizarre story, Helya was apparently able to escape her fate because Loken, of all people, supposedly restored her free will."
What Richard was hearing now wasn't in any of the texts.
"Loken. The minion of Yogg'Saron, the grand brainwasher himself. The one who needed the Titans themselves to imprison him after corrupting and brainwashing the entire world at the beginning of history. The idea that those who brainwashed all the other keepers would turn around and restore the free will of anyone is absolutely laughable."
What he was hearing now made shivers go down his spine at the mountain of history that dwarfed ancient human history outright.
"Thorim only escaped that fate because he's been sitting in the Temple of Storms for ages, contemplating his navel over losing his wife and everything else that happened. I suppose being made of metal and stone could make you lot a tad slow at processing emotions. Or anything else. I admit that immortality is a good tradeoff, but it's sure inconvenient for us normal people when we're the ones who have to deal with all the cataclysms caused by your mistakes."
These names. Some of them made Richard dream of glory while others made his heart squeeze in his chest.
"Now, it's not impossible that Odyn was naive in the extreme – in which case I seriously have to wonder what the Titans were thinking making him Prime Designate – but I think it more likely that his relationship with Helya as surrogate father and daughter was no empty claim. In fact, I'm inclined to believe it was fully reciprocated. I'm not entirely sure that Odyn's version of events is a perfect mirror of reality either. But I'm willing to exclude malice. I'm even willing to exclude knowing lies. With all the aforementioned as the only alternative, I'll err on the side of an agent of the Light any day."
… Why was Ferdinand saying all this? With them there? Why had he deliberately waited until they were there – until Richard himself was there to hear all of it?
"What I do question, however, is whether Odyn's memory can itself be trusted, and if he is otherwise of sound judgment."
The raven's gaze was far too intense to belong on an animal.
"The simple fact of the matter is that the barrier is still there. The chronicle I've read says Helya used the same magic that was used to seal off the elemental planes, but that's just it – you can't just cast those things. For one, she didn't separate any planes, it's all still here, on this one, so that's already a suspect claim. And secondly, even if she did, the Titans made wards, rites, entire facilities to anchor works like that, none of which she could have leveraged without being there. The only way her spell could work is if it draws power from the Halls of Valor themselves. Or, since this has no doubt been checked ad nauseam, from someone. I trust you see where I'm going with this?"
Richard suddenly wished he could dismiss everything as the ramblings of a boy given to fancies.
"Flaming beards aren't scars, and the taint that the molluscs of yore infested the elementals with is transmissible." What did beards have to do with anything, and molluscs of what? What taint? "More than that, history is rife with champions of the Light and Order being fooled and warped just through proximity to them or their agents until they become slavish minions. The Light works intuitively, so what happens when the intuition itself is impaired? If the Spirit is what nourishes all parts of the self not sustained by the physical form, what happens when it's bled? Poisoned, maybe? Strategically trimmed, perhaps? Could just parts of the mind or memory be deprived of sustenance until they just…. wither and fade so slowly that their passing goes unnoticed? The ritual that empowered you to see into the Otherworld by ripping out your eye was Helya's. Her power has been part of you all this time. What are the odds she even bound the same wraith to help her strike at you after her turn?"
… Richard wished he knew why this had anything to do with them. Should he step in and ask him? Ask something? Stop him? Could he even move if he wanted. The raven… Ferdinand was no longer talking to him like it was some intelligent beast, no, he wasn't talking to the raven at all.
"It's admittedly just a theory, but either you've already investigated it, or it never occurred to you and that says all there needs to be said."
The pressure in the air seemed to spike as if… as if Richard was being stepped on by a giant that had only now put all his weight on the same foot.
Ferdinand regarded the bird. "I've been initiated in Alchemy recently." He did not seem to be tense at all, even as the air grew more and more severe with every word he spoke. "I'm not any good, but the Great Work apparently involves the essences of the ego and the shadow being reabsorbed, unifying the parts of the self. Sounds to me like you and Helya underwent the opposite. Maybe she's not the only one fallen. Or falling."
The sun seemed to dim. Richard's breath stalled. The air filled with wrath.
Ferdinand began ripping pages out of his pocketbook. "You probably know all these staves already but-"
The bird swallowed the pages fast as lightning and then the notebook itself was disappearing down its gullet-
SQUAWK
Ferdinand suddenly had the bird by the throat. "Your pardon but-"
A sword of shadow struck the Light with a gong.
The dimming world came alight. The mountain pass shook with the force of a death knell. The sound rattled Richard's bones. He fell to one knee with a gasp as the voices of his wife and sister and men rose in shock far behind him, the pressure in the air suddenly lifted – no, diverted-
The sword came down a second time. Light met shadow with the ringing of thunder.
Shadow lost.
The Light cascaded outwards across the earth, into the air, over him to soothe his aching lungs, calm his frantic mind, give strength back to his limbs and clarity to his sight and then he could see…
"- I simply had to know if you've a teleportation device or a proper pocket dimension in that craw of yours."
Richard saw…
The Light reveals.
He saw an angel.
"Impudence, indiscretion, hubris, and now you dare even maltreat my Lord's own familiar, how much further will you overstep, boy?"
The Light outlined the shimmering form of an angel glaring down the length of her sword at the back of Ferdinand's head while he was peering down the raven's beak he forcefully held open.
Ferdinand let the raven go. His protective field caused the sword to scrape away from him as he rose. "Indiscretion, bloodthirst, sentimentality, and now you infringe on the realm of the living despite the very strict precepts of your office, should I throw your words back in your face, val'kyr?"
Val'kyr. Slain. To choose. Richard drew his sword before he could think better of it, but didn't know who to aim it between the angel and their guest – he'd given him guest right only for him to… But did that count with angels? Should it? She was a giant, how would a mere man even fight something like that, could mortal weapons even touch her, she was see-through, a spectre of gold and deep sea hues. Choice of the slain? Or was she here to choose who would be slain, who to slay-?
"Stand back, brave men," the woman commanded, though she didn't look away from the boy. "This need not concern you."
"Says the angel of death to the man she's been stalking."
"What?" Richard balked before he could think twice. "She's-you're here for me?"
"She's-"
"Still your tongue, insolent whelp-"
Ferdinand turned and met her eyes.
He flinched and fell to a knee, holding his head as his Shield of Light burst in a wave of sunspray.
The angel reeled back and fell down from the sky with a crash.
Richard stared at the rising dust cloud, blinking rapidly as the light motes cascaded over him, they felt like… not enough to count next to the Light that was already in him from the wave before, blessing him with strength beyond strength and sight beyond the unseen. His sword moved from one figure to the other, not knowing what- who-
"Sir," Mercad rasped at his side, his own sword pointing at the angel without hesitation. "I know you like to extol the ineffable virtues of the Light and its all-pervasiveness, but this is a bit on the nose, isn't it?"
"Nngh…" Ahead of them, Ferdinand grunted. "That's… quite a bit…" The boy climbed unsteadily to his feet with bleary eyes. "Geirrvif. The Watcher. Judge of Valhalas."
"I am not that creature." Across from the boy, the angel woman rose to stand somewhat more gracefully, but her wings stayed lowered and there was no lustre on her spectral skin. "I don't know what you saw or how, Prophet, but I would never be caught presiding over such a poor excuse of an imitation of my Lord's Trials, either alive or dead."
Prophet-Angel-Prophet-Angel-Prophet the world felt strangely thin around Richard Angevin as the only wrath in the air was suddenly his own. "That's it! Enough! What is happening here?" His grip went so tight on his sword hilt that his whole arm shook as he finally found himself at the end of his patience. There was a heat in his breast, a beating in his temples, his lungs felt thick and thin at the same time, and the colours of the world – they were changing, brighter, brilliant like the glory of divinity manifest, how could it be brought so low so easily? Why? "I will no longer be treated as a bystander in my own encampment! Explain yourselves! Both of you!" The world grew gold and bright at the edges and then further inward as he-
"She's-"
"Do not speak of things you have no-"
The raven flew up to caw in the angel's face and she stopped. "Lord Odyn, why would-?" The world rippled around the bird like a veil and Richard couldn't understand her words anymore, he could still hear them but for some reason couldn't comprehend, yet it wasn't a different tongue and he felt instinctively like he should still – the Light reveals – as long as he believed that, he should be able to-
"She's a val'kyr. A chooser of the slain. Her purpose is to reap the souls of those fallen in battle and ascend the worthiest to the Halls of Valor." Finally getting an answer to one of his many questions was enough – barely – to derail Richard's train of thought. "There they will become val'kyr themselves or join Odyn's army of heroes in golden stormforged bodies."
The realisation came over Richard like a splash of ice water. "I was supposed to die today." The warm pulse within him scattered but did not dissipate, coursing instead through him, uneven and raw, unrealised.
Ferdinand was watching him intently now, but did not deny it. "The number of val'kyr is limited, being there for the death of valorous souls would literally have to rely on some form of foresight. Light visions don't necessarily lend themselves to the most accurate coordinates of space and time, but they are very good at leading people to people, down the best path to their ultimate purpose by their own reckoning. If anyone in this benighted land is worthy of ascension to Valholl it could only be you, Duke Lionheart."
Richard Angevin stared at the child. He'd never been called by that moniker in his life. He'd never been called by any moniker. His grip on his sword had not slackened in the least but it was no longer painful, his arm didn't shake anymore as if he'd been brought to the very edges of his strength, he felt brave and mighty but he wasn't – he was barely eighteen, he hadn't been tested yet, in any capacity.
"… My lord."
Richard turned his head to look at his captain. The man was looking down at him with a bizarre mix of consternation and what might have been wonder on literally anyone else.
Away from him, the angel spoke. "… My lord vows He will repay this favour, Prophet, and I will pay mine."
Richard didn't turn. His gaze was stuck on his reflection in Mercad's cuirass.
"I've more to convey to him. Another day. We shall see on which side the debt lies then."
It was cloudy and dull, barely more than a foggy image, but the enamel gleamed with all the fastidiousness of a man who never failed to maintain his equipment.
"Another day, then."
Out of his line of sight, the angel of death took to the sky and finally disappeared from his senses.
On the gleaming face of castle-forged steel, Richard Angevin's own eyes looked back at him shining gold.
Chapter 6 (two updates) is available on Ko-fi and Subscribestar. It's also on Patreon, though the site somehow managed to get itself labeled a fraud by almost all the banks in the world this month, so who knows what's going on there.
Simonbob
Well-known member
Expected to die that day. Huh. But, even with his confusion, I wonder, what will he accomplish with more time?
He was chosen for a reason, after all.
Patreon's been playing politics over the years, banning people on some really flimsy grounds. I'm not supprised they got hit by somebody.
He was chosen for a reason, after all.
Patreon's been playing politics over the years, banning people on some really flimsy grounds. I'm not supprised they got hit by somebody.
Really scummy business practices for a third party funds transfer site. They were withholding funds, and acting as though they were direct employers, making unjustified demands of their users. Multiple lawsuits in multiple countries and evading judgements by using every loophole they could. So the government declared them a fraud and asked the banks to follow suit. When Uncle Sam, Germany and France are involved things happen. I hope they arrest the assholes.
Wow...I haven't heard any of this.
Simonbob
Well-known member
The parts I heard about were them hitting people for apparently political reasons.
Mostly, if you went against the "Narrative", they'd screw you. But, there might have been all sorts of other stuff going on.
Karmic Acumen
Well-known member
Supposedly, this month they moved their payment processing or headquarters or whatever to Dublin, for tax-dodging purposes. This is apparently something a lot of companies do, but they handled something poorly that the banks doing business with them through Payoneer didn't like. The monthly payments from patrons weren't processed as the banks went all 'this might be a fraudulent transaction' so the Patreon creators got screwed over (patrons just got to enjoy a month of content for free). But I've since been able to process a payout, and new patrons seem to be being charged correctly now, so apparently they've now fixed it for at least some banks.
Chapter 6 – The Cozened Chase (I)
Karmic Acumen
Well-known member
A/N: Dalaran goes sleuthing. Results are mixed.
Chapter 6 – The Cozened Chase
(I)
"-. July 11, Year 580 of the King's Calendar .-"
"-. Antonidas D'Ambrosio, Mage of the Advanced Research and Illumination Sect .-"
His findings were sinister.
At first he'd been vexed at being assigned to base sleuthing. His calling lay with the higher mysteries, not the lower, and his specialty was the research of arcane patterns, not human ones. But the Council of Six selected him precisely because of that reputation. He was sufficiently discerning and diligent as to be competent even outside his specialty, the Council told him. More importantly, it would make it less likely that the true purpose of his consignment would be immediately discerned by his fellow mages. His peers that had been entrusted with magical security in Alterac City. The mages he was now investigating while pretending to learn from them for the purpose of taking over one of the Auction House oversight positions later.
Not that they were Antonidas' main concern, anymore.
For all that magical security was a service Dalaran had been providing for centuries, the kingdoms did not much appreciate having to leave such things in the hands of a foreign power. Antonidas didn't blame them, and he would speak in favour of Dalaran gracefully accepting the new status quo when the kingdoms finally gathered the courage to break away from Dalaran's monopoly in favour of home-grown magic organisations. Now that Stormwind had proven the idea viable with its Order of Conjurers, it was only a matter of time. Already many noble scions here in Alterac had studied in Dalaran only to come back and displace the Kirin Tor's own appointees as warders, enchanters, researchers and court mages. It had come to the point where the Auction House security was the only place where Dalaran still had majority.
So it was most surprising that requests for investigation had come from the nobility of Alterac, rather than Dalaran's agents here. What remained of the highest nobility, even. News of the young king's purge had reached Dalaran faster than all other nations, and the Kirin Tor had understandably been keeping an eye on the situation. That no civil war broke out was close to a miracle, and even Strom's reaction was strangely lukewarm. The latter, at least, seemed to be swiftly changing to the point where war might break out this very year, or next at the latest. But what did not change was that the remaining nobility had called on a foreign power to investigate their own affairs. 'Potentially subversive elements' they called them, which had led to 'ruinous information leaks and security failings' at 'all strata of interaction' between Alterac and Dalaran, and even within Alterac itself.
The requests came with so many different envoys, in so many different wordings, and from many enough different sources that even the Kirin Tor didn't know if the nobles suspected incompetence or malice. Or if they suspected it of each other, Dalaran, or the Alterac Crown itself.
Then, to truly throw the fox into the henhouse, a request to do everything requested by the nobles came from the Alterac Crown itself too.
The Council of Six wasn't even sure the nobles and king even knew about each other's entreaties. Or, if they did, they didn't admit it. The only thing they could be sure of was Alterac aimed to use Dalaran as a hammer to get rid of their problems, and by extension take all the blame for the resulting fallout from their rivals and the king, and vice versa.
Asking the Kirin Tor to get rid of subversive mages when those saboteours were most likely blood scions of their peers (if not originating from their own courts or that of King himself) made this a very sensitive issue. Antonidas had explained all this to the King himself, in a secret meeting that the Kirin Tor had arranged for him. Aiden Perenolde was suspicious enough of yet another foreign mage in their midst, despite asking for the job to begin with, however belatedly. The king certainly didn't admit to such, but he couldn't entirely hide his feelings despite his mastery of dissimulation. It made Antonidas certain that the man had only sent the Crown's request after finding out about his nobles' entreaties, in a bid to undermine and supplant them. A bid that was ultimately as successful as it was unnecessary, the Kirin Tor hadn't planned to go around him in any case.
At least the king was mollified when Antonidas assured him his job was not to pull any seams but to find them. As discreetly as possible.
"We will, of course, share all relevant findings with the Crown," Antonidas assured the man as the meeting was winding down.
"Relevant by whose standards?" the king asked mildly. Too mildly. "Go, mage, and try to do a proper job of it, unlike your compatriots."
Whatever could you mean?
Credit to the Council's wisdom, they were right that Antonidas' unwitting peers were reassured by his academic leanings. The Council were also right that he would master this task as easily as all others before it. Once he figured out which principles of research and pattern recognition to conflate and not conflate relative to people's actions – and paperwork – he discovered an area of research that was, at the very least, moderately captivating, if not strictly necessary for his self-attainment.
Unfortunately, captivating became disconcerting and then disquieting within the space of a month. After weeks of shadowing his nominal seniors, circumventing them under illusory disguises to reach restricted areas (often as said seniors themselves), trawling through countless customer lists and transaction ledgers, questioning (or interviewing) various notables and non-notables all throughout the city (whose accounts were as consistent as they were mutually contradictory), and even magically disguising himself as the odd acquaintance or rival of the locals in question, Antonidas was reaching the disquieting conclusion that he was on the trail of himself.
Not literally, rather it was looking as if whoever or whatever was (or had been) at work in Alterac City had used his exact same approach to achieve his nefarious aims. Whatever they were. Or, alternatively, it was an entire unknown group of subversive mages. A possibility that Antonidas had trouble seeing plausibility in, as such people didn't come out of nowhere, especially multiple people with such specialised skillset.
Archmage Krasus, his contact with the Council of Six back in Dalaran, was sceptical. "Be careful not to ascribe magical explanations to what could be achieved with mundane competence." He cautioned him via projection. "Or corruption. Skulduggery can account for much, especially there."
Antonidas could see his point, the Alterac court was more decadent and deadly than anything he had imagined, even after thoroughly reading up on the Magocrats. Additionally, despite the best work and pay incentives, corruption was inevitable in any monopoly and the Auction House was no different. Antonidas, of course, passed on the relevant names for disciplinary action and prosecution to the Kirin Tor or the King's representative as required.
What did not make sense, however, was that too many of the more catastrophic failures of diplomacy had happened in public or semi-public venues. Or, rather, in private venues nonetheless attended by many of the others ultimately doomed to the gallows – balls, hunts, feasts and soirees. Very uncharacteristic of Alterac if they truly were so competent at shadow games, something Krasus and the Council agreed with. For all their decadence, the notables here were usually much more discreet, and their hired help tended towards the proficient or recently deceased. It was why Antonidas had so much trouble with what should have been a simple fact-finding mission. Moreover, many of the stories were conflicting even from the people least likely to be lying.
Not all of the nobles he'd managed to interview were as opaque as they thought. They were certainly skilled wordsmiths and hard to get a hold of, as he only got audiences by leaning hard on the pull of Dalaran (as the King refused to show his own hand), and often only because they were already in the city for other reasons. They were more than willing to gossip and demean their various rivals, but their stories didn't match up more than half the time.
"Even the ones least likely to be lying had differing accounts of the disagreements of the deceased," Antonidas explained to Krasus during their communication. "Disagreements that led to bad blood on top of the inherited one. Someone recalled the then-yet-unhanged outbidding them on the same item. Another would claim someone bribed the Auction House staff to keep quiet about certain items on offer, and they only found out because of convenient information leaks. Other times, it was conflicts of interest over individuals secretly blacklisted." Corruption and leaks which the Kirin Tor should have found out about well before this, even if it was beyond magical purview. "Even for the more personal feuds unrelated to us, some remember ridiculing each other, while the others recall threats. There is even a case where one remembers his compatriot being spat in the face while the other side remembers a brawl. And the times these events supposedly happened are inconsistent between their viewpoints as well."
Looking through the conviction records of the nobles that saw their end at the gallows, the same pattern emerged. While defence testimonies were never going to match witness accounts or presented evidence – otherwise they wouldn't have been convicted in the first place – the character witness accounts told a different story.
"Even their direct enemies seemed disbelieving of their crimes in at least half the cases I could independently verify," Antonidas reported. "Or at least disbelieving that they would be caught, never mind so embarrassingly. The biggest anomaly is House Angevin, who everyone agrees wouldn't be involved in any dark games, though the same number of people – if not all the same people – also agree that it could only have ended this way for the same reason."
"Dissent is punished harshly in Alterac, it seems," Krasus noted philosophically, shaking his head. "Especially when that dissent is to the good. Almost as harshly as trying to finally conform after lifetimes of the opposite."
"Which does not seem to truly have been the case here."
"Quite."
Eventually, Antonidas concluded that the Angevin testimony was the only one genuine, and they were the only ones who had been truly innocent in the whole affair. Unfortunately, this also meant they were the only lead he could definitively dismiss, meaning he had wasted all that time chasing geese.
He found a new trail almost by accident, when he took a break from his prime investigation to look into the more recent developments that might be related to his cover. After all, that had to be maintained as well.
"What's this?"
Very closely before the nobles of Alterac began suffering failures of discretion one after another, half the standing mercenary contracts on auction were taken down and replaced with almost identical versions, save the mention that they were 'no longer accepting hits on child saints or their dependents.'
"I must be missing something important."
Thankfully, this was material his cover was fully privy to, so he could just walk up to one of his local peers and ask.
"Oh, that." The woman pursed her lips. "You missed quite the event last year."
Learning that he had missed the emergence of the first non-ordained Light-using human in written history made Antonidas, for the first time, question whether he had perhaps buried himself in his tomes too deeply. His only consolation was that the news was still mostly rumors outside of Alterac, and the people who had since had dealings with this…
"A fourteen year-old boy? Or would he be fifteen, now?"
"Yes. We were all surprised, but the Archbishop himself spent hours of his visit over in Strahnbrad confirming it. He's something of a local legend there now, and here too, though you're not likely to run into him anymore. Last I heard he and his family had moved out to a farm somewhere."
"What is his name?"
"Wayland Hywel. A cobbler's son, if you can believe it."
Quite the local legend indeed, if people knew his name off-hand.
There might be something there.
Antonidas considered the reports of other investigators he'd read in preparation for this assignment. According to normal procedure, now would be a good time to go to the market, perhaps under a nondescript illusion, and casually inquire about this local legend. But he'd already wasted days on a tangent, and there was no reason he would draw suspicion for doing what anyone could do on a whim. He decided to forgo any disguise and instead teleported to Strahnbrad to talk to the local priest.
"The Council knew the full extent of my skills when they sent me here," Antonidas idly told his steed, Hengroen, as he led the gelding out of the stables. "Why didn't they supply this information when they gave me this assignment? Perhaps they were worried it would bias my investigation? I cannot imagine they did not know."
The clerist was surprised at his visit. Most mages did not attend church in his experience. Antonidas himself was not strictly pious, he certainly trusted his mastery of the Arcane over anything else, but he did believe. The priest was inordinately surprised by that.
"Perhaps faith is not the right term," Antonidas mused. "It is merely that the Light is a visible, palpable, quantifiable phenomenon, so it's not so much faith as acknowledging an objective fact."
This, to his surprise, was the best thing he could have said, because it prompted the priest to compare him to his very person of interest. They shared the same viewpoint, it seemed, which the cleric found inordinately remarkable. Antonidas didn't exactly understand why, his view was not exactly rare in Dalaran, but he did not say anything. The Priest turned out to be quite contrite as well, strangely enough.
"I cannot shake the feeling I was in some ways responsible for him leaving the city," the man confessed, an odd turn of phrase for an equally odd reversal of the standard convention when visiting a priest. "I heard rumors of him holding the Light's healing grace for ransom and assumed the worst. I was perhaps too adverse during the annual sanctification of home and hearth. But enough of my maudlin gossip, did you have other questions? Perhaps you require healing?"
Antonidas politely said no and excused himself. There was no point in pushing now that the man had caught himself after his indiscretion. He paid his respects to Great Tyr and Saint Mereldar and left pondering the issue of average cobbler income. What it would take to overcome its limitations in order for a family of three to afford a journey away from Alterac City, never mind settling somewhere else. In the end, after teleporting back to Alterac he still went to the market to make casual inquiries, in disguise of course. He learned that no one had made a business of healing people with the Light, and later questions with his noble contacts confirmed the mysterious child saint hadn't sought patronage among the high and rich either. He did hear enough to prompt a follow-up examination of Auction House ledgers, however, though it took an embarrassingly long time to cotton on to his use of a fake name. They revealed that the child was either a genius inventor or a very good deal-maker. Whatever the truth, the numbers added up to quite a bit of coin steadily accumulating over the course of roughly half a year. Revenue, not one-time payments, though the Auction House was not privy to how these arrangements might have evolved or changed after the auctions were completed.
Most important of all, Antonidas slowly pieced together that all of the nobles that harassed the chid had hung, and a fair few of them even had the King's favour. Though this seemed lost on the people he talked to. All they knew was that the people executed had been convicted of alleged crimes related to national security, and few to none of them actually believed the official story (and, thus, the Crown).
For the Crown to turn on them, their crimes had to have been particularly heinous, Antonidas thought. Or perhaps not, considering the dark things the Crown itself had ordered that weren't as unknown as Perenolde wished. Alternatively, the ones killed knew things that might implicate the royal family in something they didn't want found out.
Following the record trail all the way finally revealed that the 'something' in question passed through the Auction House as well. But the records of 'what' had been expunged in accordance with the highest secrecy protocols. The ones reserved only for items that were later deemed of so high monetary or strategic value that they shouldn't have been put up for auction in the first place. These were the auctions that weren't privy to just anyone, things that dukes or kings might sometimes auction off to refill their coffers… or as bait in some manner of scheme.
For Antonidas, this meant he had neither the position nor the seniority to be privy to such information. And when he resorted to the means he'd been allowed outside his cover, he learned that everyone who had been around for the events had long since vanished or been found dead. And, in the case of the security mages, recalled to Dalaran.
He finally brought it up with Krasus in their communications. That was when Antonidas received his confirmation that the Council of Six had, indeed, sent him into this blind.
"We did not want you going into this assignment with preconceived notions," Archmage Krasus at least had the grace to look apologetic. "Now that we have your independent verification, the Council can deliberate on a proper course of action."
Antonidas did his best to keep his feelings off his face. "Am I allowed to know about the inciting incident now?"
"Very well. I suppose you've earned it."
Finding out that humans had finally cracked the secret of dwarven gunpowder was one thing. Deducing that he could have found this out on his own by shifting some of his investigative efforts to the trade guilds, or even just the local Alchemist…
He'd definitely buried himself too deep in his tomes.
"You will be contacted in a week to discuss new directions."
The end of the communication left Antonidas feeling adrift. It was polite of Krasus to warn him he would be reassigned now that the Council had gotten what they needed out of him. Antonidas tried not to begrudge the Six their manipulations, but…
He felt like he'd been set up to fail.
And… Something in all this felt too neat and tidy.
Someone tries to steal the golden goose, fails so many times – and so ruinously, however it happened – that the hired blades make common cause to unilaterally refuse additional hits on the fairy tale hero. Then, months later, some force takes it upon itself to confect the bloody downfall of all involved, thus avenging the saintly protagonist. It was a plot straight from a fairy tale transposed into real life. It was too neat, too fantastical, almost… scripted.
You could try to explain the conclusion as the king trying to secure an asset, failing, losing face, and then going to extreme lengths to eliminate the nobles who grew boldest in their defiance from thinking him weak. But investigations weren't won through speculation. You could try to explain it as the Crown cleaning house somewhat more easily, except the same Crown was now facing war with its greatest rival while its grip on power was the weakest it had ever been.
I need to re-assess.
Antonidas spent a day and night reassessing all his findings. Unfortunately, his evidence only reinforced his initial conclusion of a different party. A malicious will. A will guiding events towards an even more sinister picture than a nefarious noble or king's plot gone sideways.
By why? For what reason? To what purpose? The highest nobles left were walking on eggshells, attempts to claim or take over the assets of the dead were mired in opposing claims (or never materialised), the bloodletting had all the people spooked, the guilds and freelancers were cutting out the middleman as much as possible instead of using the Auction House as freely as before, there was war on the horizon even as the Crown's grip on power was the weakest since Alterac's split from the Empire in the Fowl War. The last was in no small part because the only noble house of genuine virtue got caught up in the purge as well, somehow. Which, conspicuously, might leave the Crown without naval support or even control of much of its coast in the case of a domestic conflict. Never mind the military strength that a ducal family possessed. It was frankly astonishing that the nation had not devolved to civil war after such a purge. Or worse.
For all that there had been (and still were) so many ambitions and designs at play, none of this had worked out in favour of any of these interests and egos.
Antonidas' thoughts finally made what felt like the right course correction.
There was some sort of overarching agenda here, a single will, a will that could only have done what it did by taking the seeming of at least seven different people, in Antonidas' most conservative estimate, more than half of them high nobility. In the process manipulating the Crown of Alterac into the biggest slaughter of its highest echelons of society in the country's entire history. It was a frankly sinister display of… Antonidas wasn't even sure what to call it. Competence, influence, insidiousness? Individual power? Organisational numbers? Was this one individual or a group?
The common people themselves no longer trusted the King's word, when before the Perenolde family had been well regarded among the citizenry. And that was in great part because the remaining nobles, both from the culled families and not, were purposely allowing leaks and rumors to run unchecked, unlike before. Most of them didn't even seem to be manufactured. In a kingdom like Alterac where everyone thought of themselves first, doubly so after such a bloodletting, this suggested either vengefulness or demoralization. Or both. So extreme that those involved no longer cared about the danger to themselves.
No one had gained more than they lost here.
But.
If the aim was to weaken Alterac from within, it had certainly succeeded.
"Audacious aims beget audacious methods," Antonidas murmured to himself as he thoughtfully skimmed the scattered papers summing up his findings one more time.
Was it foreign meddling? Strom was the obvious culprit, but the kind of magical competence at work was uncharacteristic of the place, and King Trollbane had thus far failed to take advantage of the situation. Lordaeron? Same issues. Gilneas? King Greymane was in the process of negotiating a fosterage with King Perenolde, but nothing he'd heard or seen suggested that the Alterac side was doing this under duress. Stormwind? Too far removed and had practically no conflicts of interest with anyone for the same reason.
Whatever the case, there wouldn't be a need to antagonise Dalaran.
"Who are you?" Antonidas murmured as he beheld his dark materials. "What are you aiming for here?"
And how much of everything was this mysterious third, no, fourth party truly responsible for? Given the attestations of the people he talked to, the clergy and even the Archbishop himself, the notion that the child saint was some kind of ruse could likely be dismissed.
But history was rife with evil actors taking advantage of the workings of the good for their own nefarious purposes. In that light, the delay between the gunpowder fiasco and the noble shadow war – never mind its disastrous conclusion – gained a whole new meaning. Especially since it overlapped with whatever troubles managed to drive the young saint to flee the capital permanently. Almost like they were waiting for it. For him to get out of their way.
Or die.
Antonidas' task was only to find the strings and seams, not to pull them, but… he was reluctant to hand over the investigation now that he had come so far. He wasn't one to fall prey to the sunk cost fallacy, but his superiors wouldn't have assigned him to this task if they didn't trust his skills. They certainly seemed to trust his judgment, even after they themselves impaired it through their manipulations, however well-intentioned.
If nothing else...
He had always been rewarded for initiative.
The rest of chapter 6 (one update) and the very long Chapter 7 (3 updates totaling over 13,000 words) are available on Patreon, Ko-fi and Subscribestar.
(I)
"-. July 11, Year 580 of the King's Calendar .-"
"-. Antonidas D'Ambrosio, Mage of the Advanced Research and Illumination Sect .-"
His findings were sinister.
At first he'd been vexed at being assigned to base sleuthing. His calling lay with the higher mysteries, not the lower, and his specialty was the research of arcane patterns, not human ones. But the Council of Six selected him precisely because of that reputation. He was sufficiently discerning and diligent as to be competent even outside his specialty, the Council told him. More importantly, it would make it less likely that the true purpose of his consignment would be immediately discerned by his fellow mages. His peers that had been entrusted with magical security in Alterac City. The mages he was now investigating while pretending to learn from them for the purpose of taking over one of the Auction House oversight positions later.
Not that they were Antonidas' main concern, anymore.
For all that magical security was a service Dalaran had been providing for centuries, the kingdoms did not much appreciate having to leave such things in the hands of a foreign power. Antonidas didn't blame them, and he would speak in favour of Dalaran gracefully accepting the new status quo when the kingdoms finally gathered the courage to break away from Dalaran's monopoly in favour of home-grown magic organisations. Now that Stormwind had proven the idea viable with its Order of Conjurers, it was only a matter of time. Already many noble scions here in Alterac had studied in Dalaran only to come back and displace the Kirin Tor's own appointees as warders, enchanters, researchers and court mages. It had come to the point where the Auction House security was the only place where Dalaran still had majority.
So it was most surprising that requests for investigation had come from the nobility of Alterac, rather than Dalaran's agents here. What remained of the highest nobility, even. News of the young king's purge had reached Dalaran faster than all other nations, and the Kirin Tor had understandably been keeping an eye on the situation. That no civil war broke out was close to a miracle, and even Strom's reaction was strangely lukewarm. The latter, at least, seemed to be swiftly changing to the point where war might break out this very year, or next at the latest. But what did not change was that the remaining nobility had called on a foreign power to investigate their own affairs. 'Potentially subversive elements' they called them, which had led to 'ruinous information leaks and security failings' at 'all strata of interaction' between Alterac and Dalaran, and even within Alterac itself.
The requests came with so many different envoys, in so many different wordings, and from many enough different sources that even the Kirin Tor didn't know if the nobles suspected incompetence or malice. Or if they suspected it of each other, Dalaran, or the Alterac Crown itself.
Then, to truly throw the fox into the henhouse, a request to do everything requested by the nobles came from the Alterac Crown itself too.
The Council of Six wasn't even sure the nobles and king even knew about each other's entreaties. Or, if they did, they didn't admit it. The only thing they could be sure of was Alterac aimed to use Dalaran as a hammer to get rid of their problems, and by extension take all the blame for the resulting fallout from their rivals and the king, and vice versa.
Asking the Kirin Tor to get rid of subversive mages when those saboteours were most likely blood scions of their peers (if not originating from their own courts or that of King himself) made this a very sensitive issue. Antonidas had explained all this to the King himself, in a secret meeting that the Kirin Tor had arranged for him. Aiden Perenolde was suspicious enough of yet another foreign mage in their midst, despite asking for the job to begin with, however belatedly. The king certainly didn't admit to such, but he couldn't entirely hide his feelings despite his mastery of dissimulation. It made Antonidas certain that the man had only sent the Crown's request after finding out about his nobles' entreaties, in a bid to undermine and supplant them. A bid that was ultimately as successful as it was unnecessary, the Kirin Tor hadn't planned to go around him in any case.
At least the king was mollified when Antonidas assured him his job was not to pull any seams but to find them. As discreetly as possible.
"We will, of course, share all relevant findings with the Crown," Antonidas assured the man as the meeting was winding down.
"Relevant by whose standards?" the king asked mildly. Too mildly. "Go, mage, and try to do a proper job of it, unlike your compatriots."
Whatever could you mean?
Credit to the Council's wisdom, they were right that Antonidas' unwitting peers were reassured by his academic leanings. The Council were also right that he would master this task as easily as all others before it. Once he figured out which principles of research and pattern recognition to conflate and not conflate relative to people's actions – and paperwork – he discovered an area of research that was, at the very least, moderately captivating, if not strictly necessary for his self-attainment.
Unfortunately, captivating became disconcerting and then disquieting within the space of a month. After weeks of shadowing his nominal seniors, circumventing them under illusory disguises to reach restricted areas (often as said seniors themselves), trawling through countless customer lists and transaction ledgers, questioning (or interviewing) various notables and non-notables all throughout the city (whose accounts were as consistent as they were mutually contradictory), and even magically disguising himself as the odd acquaintance or rival of the locals in question, Antonidas was reaching the disquieting conclusion that he was on the trail of himself.
Not literally, rather it was looking as if whoever or whatever was (or had been) at work in Alterac City had used his exact same approach to achieve his nefarious aims. Whatever they were. Or, alternatively, it was an entire unknown group of subversive mages. A possibility that Antonidas had trouble seeing plausibility in, as such people didn't come out of nowhere, especially multiple people with such specialised skillset.
Archmage Krasus, his contact with the Council of Six back in Dalaran, was sceptical. "Be careful not to ascribe magical explanations to what could be achieved with mundane competence." He cautioned him via projection. "Or corruption. Skulduggery can account for much, especially there."
Antonidas could see his point, the Alterac court was more decadent and deadly than anything he had imagined, even after thoroughly reading up on the Magocrats. Additionally, despite the best work and pay incentives, corruption was inevitable in any monopoly and the Auction House was no different. Antonidas, of course, passed on the relevant names for disciplinary action and prosecution to the Kirin Tor or the King's representative as required.
What did not make sense, however, was that too many of the more catastrophic failures of diplomacy had happened in public or semi-public venues. Or, rather, in private venues nonetheless attended by many of the others ultimately doomed to the gallows – balls, hunts, feasts and soirees. Very uncharacteristic of Alterac if they truly were so competent at shadow games, something Krasus and the Council agreed with. For all their decadence, the notables here were usually much more discreet, and their hired help tended towards the proficient or recently deceased. It was why Antonidas had so much trouble with what should have been a simple fact-finding mission. Moreover, many of the stories were conflicting even from the people least likely to be lying.
Not all of the nobles he'd managed to interview were as opaque as they thought. They were certainly skilled wordsmiths and hard to get a hold of, as he only got audiences by leaning hard on the pull of Dalaran (as the King refused to show his own hand), and often only because they were already in the city for other reasons. They were more than willing to gossip and demean their various rivals, but their stories didn't match up more than half the time.
"Even the ones least likely to be lying had differing accounts of the disagreements of the deceased," Antonidas explained to Krasus during their communication. "Disagreements that led to bad blood on top of the inherited one. Someone recalled the then-yet-unhanged outbidding them on the same item. Another would claim someone bribed the Auction House staff to keep quiet about certain items on offer, and they only found out because of convenient information leaks. Other times, it was conflicts of interest over individuals secretly blacklisted." Corruption and leaks which the Kirin Tor should have found out about well before this, even if it was beyond magical purview. "Even for the more personal feuds unrelated to us, some remember ridiculing each other, while the others recall threats. There is even a case where one remembers his compatriot being spat in the face while the other side remembers a brawl. And the times these events supposedly happened are inconsistent between their viewpoints as well."
Looking through the conviction records of the nobles that saw their end at the gallows, the same pattern emerged. While defence testimonies were never going to match witness accounts or presented evidence – otherwise they wouldn't have been convicted in the first place – the character witness accounts told a different story.
"Even their direct enemies seemed disbelieving of their crimes in at least half the cases I could independently verify," Antonidas reported. "Or at least disbelieving that they would be caught, never mind so embarrassingly. The biggest anomaly is House Angevin, who everyone agrees wouldn't be involved in any dark games, though the same number of people – if not all the same people – also agree that it could only have ended this way for the same reason."
"Dissent is punished harshly in Alterac, it seems," Krasus noted philosophically, shaking his head. "Especially when that dissent is to the good. Almost as harshly as trying to finally conform after lifetimes of the opposite."
"Which does not seem to truly have been the case here."
"Quite."
Eventually, Antonidas concluded that the Angevin testimony was the only one genuine, and they were the only ones who had been truly innocent in the whole affair. Unfortunately, this also meant they were the only lead he could definitively dismiss, meaning he had wasted all that time chasing geese.
He found a new trail almost by accident, when he took a break from his prime investigation to look into the more recent developments that might be related to his cover. After all, that had to be maintained as well.
"What's this?"
Very closely before the nobles of Alterac began suffering failures of discretion one after another, half the standing mercenary contracts on auction were taken down and replaced with almost identical versions, save the mention that they were 'no longer accepting hits on child saints or their dependents.'
"I must be missing something important."
Thankfully, this was material his cover was fully privy to, so he could just walk up to one of his local peers and ask.
"Oh, that." The woman pursed her lips. "You missed quite the event last year."
Learning that he had missed the emergence of the first non-ordained Light-using human in written history made Antonidas, for the first time, question whether he had perhaps buried himself in his tomes too deeply. His only consolation was that the news was still mostly rumors outside of Alterac, and the people who had since had dealings with this…
"A fourteen year-old boy? Or would he be fifteen, now?"
"Yes. We were all surprised, but the Archbishop himself spent hours of his visit over in Strahnbrad confirming it. He's something of a local legend there now, and here too, though you're not likely to run into him anymore. Last I heard he and his family had moved out to a farm somewhere."
"What is his name?"
"Wayland Hywel. A cobbler's son, if you can believe it."
Quite the local legend indeed, if people knew his name off-hand.
There might be something there.
Antonidas considered the reports of other investigators he'd read in preparation for this assignment. According to normal procedure, now would be a good time to go to the market, perhaps under a nondescript illusion, and casually inquire about this local legend. But he'd already wasted days on a tangent, and there was no reason he would draw suspicion for doing what anyone could do on a whim. He decided to forgo any disguise and instead teleported to Strahnbrad to talk to the local priest.
"The Council knew the full extent of my skills when they sent me here," Antonidas idly told his steed, Hengroen, as he led the gelding out of the stables. "Why didn't they supply this information when they gave me this assignment? Perhaps they were worried it would bias my investigation? I cannot imagine they did not know."
The clerist was surprised at his visit. Most mages did not attend church in his experience. Antonidas himself was not strictly pious, he certainly trusted his mastery of the Arcane over anything else, but he did believe. The priest was inordinately surprised by that.
"Perhaps faith is not the right term," Antonidas mused. "It is merely that the Light is a visible, palpable, quantifiable phenomenon, so it's not so much faith as acknowledging an objective fact."
This, to his surprise, was the best thing he could have said, because it prompted the priest to compare him to his very person of interest. They shared the same viewpoint, it seemed, which the cleric found inordinately remarkable. Antonidas didn't exactly understand why, his view was not exactly rare in Dalaran, but he did not say anything. The Priest turned out to be quite contrite as well, strangely enough.
"I cannot shake the feeling I was in some ways responsible for him leaving the city," the man confessed, an odd turn of phrase for an equally odd reversal of the standard convention when visiting a priest. "I heard rumors of him holding the Light's healing grace for ransom and assumed the worst. I was perhaps too adverse during the annual sanctification of home and hearth. But enough of my maudlin gossip, did you have other questions? Perhaps you require healing?"
Antonidas politely said no and excused himself. There was no point in pushing now that the man had caught himself after his indiscretion. He paid his respects to Great Tyr and Saint Mereldar and left pondering the issue of average cobbler income. What it would take to overcome its limitations in order for a family of three to afford a journey away from Alterac City, never mind settling somewhere else. In the end, after teleporting back to Alterac he still went to the market to make casual inquiries, in disguise of course. He learned that no one had made a business of healing people with the Light, and later questions with his noble contacts confirmed the mysterious child saint hadn't sought patronage among the high and rich either. He did hear enough to prompt a follow-up examination of Auction House ledgers, however, though it took an embarrassingly long time to cotton on to his use of a fake name. They revealed that the child was either a genius inventor or a very good deal-maker. Whatever the truth, the numbers added up to quite a bit of coin steadily accumulating over the course of roughly half a year. Revenue, not one-time payments, though the Auction House was not privy to how these arrangements might have evolved or changed after the auctions were completed.
Most important of all, Antonidas slowly pieced together that all of the nobles that harassed the chid had hung, and a fair few of them even had the King's favour. Though this seemed lost on the people he talked to. All they knew was that the people executed had been convicted of alleged crimes related to national security, and few to none of them actually believed the official story (and, thus, the Crown).
For the Crown to turn on them, their crimes had to have been particularly heinous, Antonidas thought. Or perhaps not, considering the dark things the Crown itself had ordered that weren't as unknown as Perenolde wished. Alternatively, the ones killed knew things that might implicate the royal family in something they didn't want found out.
Following the record trail all the way finally revealed that the 'something' in question passed through the Auction House as well. But the records of 'what' had been expunged in accordance with the highest secrecy protocols. The ones reserved only for items that were later deemed of so high monetary or strategic value that they shouldn't have been put up for auction in the first place. These were the auctions that weren't privy to just anyone, things that dukes or kings might sometimes auction off to refill their coffers… or as bait in some manner of scheme.
For Antonidas, this meant he had neither the position nor the seniority to be privy to such information. And when he resorted to the means he'd been allowed outside his cover, he learned that everyone who had been around for the events had long since vanished or been found dead. And, in the case of the security mages, recalled to Dalaran.
He finally brought it up with Krasus in their communications. That was when Antonidas received his confirmation that the Council of Six had, indeed, sent him into this blind.
"We did not want you going into this assignment with preconceived notions," Archmage Krasus at least had the grace to look apologetic. "Now that we have your independent verification, the Council can deliberate on a proper course of action."
Antonidas did his best to keep his feelings off his face. "Am I allowed to know about the inciting incident now?"
"Very well. I suppose you've earned it."
Finding out that humans had finally cracked the secret of dwarven gunpowder was one thing. Deducing that he could have found this out on his own by shifting some of his investigative efforts to the trade guilds, or even just the local Alchemist…
He'd definitely buried himself too deep in his tomes.
"You will be contacted in a week to discuss new directions."
The end of the communication left Antonidas feeling adrift. It was polite of Krasus to warn him he would be reassigned now that the Council had gotten what they needed out of him. Antonidas tried not to begrudge the Six their manipulations, but…
He felt like he'd been set up to fail.
And… Something in all this felt too neat and tidy.
Someone tries to steal the golden goose, fails so many times – and so ruinously, however it happened – that the hired blades make common cause to unilaterally refuse additional hits on the fairy tale hero. Then, months later, some force takes it upon itself to confect the bloody downfall of all involved, thus avenging the saintly protagonist. It was a plot straight from a fairy tale transposed into real life. It was too neat, too fantastical, almost… scripted.
You could try to explain the conclusion as the king trying to secure an asset, failing, losing face, and then going to extreme lengths to eliminate the nobles who grew boldest in their defiance from thinking him weak. But investigations weren't won through speculation. You could try to explain it as the Crown cleaning house somewhat more easily, except the same Crown was now facing war with its greatest rival while its grip on power was the weakest it had ever been.
I need to re-assess.
Antonidas spent a day and night reassessing all his findings. Unfortunately, his evidence only reinforced his initial conclusion of a different party. A malicious will. A will guiding events towards an even more sinister picture than a nefarious noble or king's plot gone sideways.
By why? For what reason? To what purpose? The highest nobles left were walking on eggshells, attempts to claim or take over the assets of the dead were mired in opposing claims (or never materialised), the bloodletting had all the people spooked, the guilds and freelancers were cutting out the middleman as much as possible instead of using the Auction House as freely as before, there was war on the horizon even as the Crown's grip on power was the weakest since Alterac's split from the Empire in the Fowl War. The last was in no small part because the only noble house of genuine virtue got caught up in the purge as well, somehow. Which, conspicuously, might leave the Crown without naval support or even control of much of its coast in the case of a domestic conflict. Never mind the military strength that a ducal family possessed. It was frankly astonishing that the nation had not devolved to civil war after such a purge. Or worse.
For all that there had been (and still were) so many ambitions and designs at play, none of this had worked out in favour of any of these interests and egos.
Antonidas' thoughts finally made what felt like the right course correction.
There was some sort of overarching agenda here, a single will, a will that could only have done what it did by taking the seeming of at least seven different people, in Antonidas' most conservative estimate, more than half of them high nobility. In the process manipulating the Crown of Alterac into the biggest slaughter of its highest echelons of society in the country's entire history. It was a frankly sinister display of… Antonidas wasn't even sure what to call it. Competence, influence, insidiousness? Individual power? Organisational numbers? Was this one individual or a group?
The common people themselves no longer trusted the King's word, when before the Perenolde family had been well regarded among the citizenry. And that was in great part because the remaining nobles, both from the culled families and not, were purposely allowing leaks and rumors to run unchecked, unlike before. Most of them didn't even seem to be manufactured. In a kingdom like Alterac where everyone thought of themselves first, doubly so after such a bloodletting, this suggested either vengefulness or demoralization. Or both. So extreme that those involved no longer cared about the danger to themselves.
No one had gained more than they lost here.
But.
If the aim was to weaken Alterac from within, it had certainly succeeded.
"Audacious aims beget audacious methods," Antonidas murmured to himself as he thoughtfully skimmed the scattered papers summing up his findings one more time.
Was it foreign meddling? Strom was the obvious culprit, but the kind of magical competence at work was uncharacteristic of the place, and King Trollbane had thus far failed to take advantage of the situation. Lordaeron? Same issues. Gilneas? King Greymane was in the process of negotiating a fosterage with King Perenolde, but nothing he'd heard or seen suggested that the Alterac side was doing this under duress. Stormwind? Too far removed and had practically no conflicts of interest with anyone for the same reason.
Whatever the case, there wouldn't be a need to antagonise Dalaran.
"Who are you?" Antonidas murmured as he beheld his dark materials. "What are you aiming for here?"
And how much of everything was this mysterious third, no, fourth party truly responsible for? Given the attestations of the people he talked to, the clergy and even the Archbishop himself, the notion that the child saint was some kind of ruse could likely be dismissed.
But history was rife with evil actors taking advantage of the workings of the good for their own nefarious purposes. In that light, the delay between the gunpowder fiasco and the noble shadow war – never mind its disastrous conclusion – gained a whole new meaning. Especially since it overlapped with whatever troubles managed to drive the young saint to flee the capital permanently. Almost like they were waiting for it. For him to get out of their way.
Or die.
Antonidas' task was only to find the strings and seams, not to pull them, but… he was reluctant to hand over the investigation now that he had come so far. He wasn't one to fall prey to the sunk cost fallacy, but his superiors wouldn't have assigned him to this task if they didn't trust his skills. They certainly seemed to trust his judgment, even after they themselves impaired it through their manipulations, however well-intentioned.
If nothing else...
He had always been rewarded for initiative.
The rest of chapter 6 (one update) and the very long Chapter 7 (3 updates totaling over 13,000 words) are available on Patreon, Ko-fi and Subscribestar.
Simonbob
Well-known member
Ah, Warcraft.
There really are that damm many dark plots, monsters in the shadows, demons and worse running around. Makes things interesting, the moment you get deeper into the shadows.
I hope Antonidas doesn't get his nose chopped off when he sticks it a little too deep.
There really are that damm many dark plots, monsters in the shadows, demons and worse running around. Makes things interesting, the moment you get deeper into the shadows.
I hope Antonidas doesn't get his nose chopped off when he sticks it a little too deep.
Chapter 6 – The Cozened Chase (II)
Karmic Acumen
Well-known member
A/N: I did say it was a chase.
Antonidas retrieved a particular case from his safe and unlocked it with the key from his spatial pouch, revealing what looked like an amulet made of many faceted pieces of crystalline quartz glued together. The Council had supplied him with a memory stone cluster to record the mystical imprints of the individuals connected to his investigation. The purpose was to have a way to determine if they were under magical duress or otherwise unnatural subjection. Not a particularly easy task since that relied on direct comparison to the Racial Common Denominator of Metaphysical Order periodically updated back in Dalaran, and the method was unable to detect some of the more subtle, long-term influences. Antonidas wasn't high enough in the ranks to know all the specifics yet. What he did know was that the record stone had to be transported there by mundane means. Sufficiently strong arcane exposure, especially teleportation, disrupted the recording matrix. Spirit was finicky, especially the loose traces of it constantly shed by people during those moments when their attention was aimed outwards, which was most of the time. Where attention goes, energy flows.
However, this would work to his advantage. Disruption to the recordings did not bring damage to the stones themselves, so he could always take new ones. He would need days to store new imprints if they were lost, but he had time. He hadn't turned in his findings, and so he probably didn't need to worry he'd be recalled before the deadline Krasus set. And he should be able to make do with the imprints of the individuals least likely to have any control over whatever proceedings these were, who were also the most easily accessible.
Such magic as the one he decided upon usually required reagents of particularly personal bent, such as skin, hair or blood, if possible. And its purpose was usually to exploit an existing a connection, rather than establish a new one based on vague, personal understanding of what they should have in common. Or, in this case, who. It certainly wasn't designed to filter out sympathetic connections in the hopes of finding the one thing (person) they unknowingly had in common in the caster's opinion, regardless of how fact-based. Especially when the 'reagents' were so fragile and the nature and criteria of those connections could be considered mental abstractions at best.
"I, who am avatar of the Order Immanent, am the one whose claim on What Is challenges the claim of the Rulers of Ages."
Antonidas D'Ambrosio had earned the Kirin Tor Sash of Supreme Acumen. For his paper called 'The Ramifications of refined Reverse Time Travel Phenomena into Quantifiable Magical Practice.' When he was twelve.
"The Five Dragons, the Five Masters, the Five Aspects whose Right is the World, whose Might is the World, whose Instrument is the World and whose Charge is the World. I hereby declare: the Right and Might and Instrument and Charge were not Won but Invested by Decree of Order. Let Decree of Order be superseded by Decree of Order. Let my Domain be the Domain of the Ruler of Ages, whose Right is the Present, whose Might is the Past, whose Charge is Fate, whose Instrument is the Entirety of The Passage of Time!"
The magical circle shone. Power flowed like the Sands of Time along lines of mana and chalk overlaid with the tiny spirit stones arranged along sacred geometry. Some dispersed along with the stored energy in a puff of mist, most absorbed them and changed course, overlapping, weaving together, converging on the pedestal upon which sat a crystal ball.
"Let the Truth be revealed to my eyes. Let they be seen, those turning against Mankind's Order, those by whose deceit and artifice did man turn against man, did man turn on himself, devouring the refuse of his lost Dreams, and not allowing Life its free and natural progression across Time, in order that they might supplant Order. Let they be known, that the souls they sought to claim may not fall victim to the Fel Outside."
The words commanded the space beyond space. The light shone dim. The crystal ball filled with mist.
"Let they be seen, that they may not persist in their doing for a cycle longer!"
The mist cleared to reveal a middle aged couple and three men in the middle of breakfast.
"Howard, are you sure you won't wait for-"
"Begging your pardon, Missus, but the Young Master has much bigger things going on than me. 'Sides, it were your husband that hired me on, so it should be fine, right? I left a note with my thanks and best wishes too."
"I don't like it," the man grumbled. "Have them worthies been making trouble for you? Because w-"
"Wish it were that simple myself," Howard – was that even his true name? – interrupted his employer again, he was rather rude wasn't he? "But with all due respect, which I assure you is greater than for literally any other man in the world, I've set my mind. Time on your farm has been more than I hoped for, but there's other things in store for me than tending crops."
"Shame," one of the other men said. "You learned the trade fast, even though you were terrible at the start."
"Thanks," The man said dryly. "Also, fuck you."
"Fuck you too."
"My word," the third exclaimed. "Such foul mouths in front of the missus!"
"I'll let it slide for now," said the missus in question. "But I'll not stand for it once the babies arrive."
"Aye aye, ma'am."
Antonidas had to be very careful connecting the spell matrix to his own mental image of the man rather than the man himself, now that his makeshift anchors were depleted. Given the overreliance on mental abstractions that he'd needed to account for on the fly, he'd had to dispense with most auxiliary scrying parameters. He could tell neither distance nor direction, never mind zoom out to get a bird's eye view of the place, and he wouldn't be able to tell if the man would notice the magic latch on to him unless he reacted visibly. Too high a risk just to get a reaction.
But Antonidas was very good at his craft.
The view in the crystal ball wavered but stayed on target even as the man rose from the table and made his way out of the house. It wavered more and more through the man's brief travel preparations, he'd been ready since the prior day or longer. This was a problem, the spell had barely found its way, if his target changed locations Antonidas might not be able to find him again, not with his spell ingredients used up. He'd seen his face and could scry for it again, but the odds that it wasn't the same one he'd wear tomorrow couldn't be dismissed. He'd caught the man just as he changed covers and he couldn't even decide if this was good luck or bad.
Antonidas barely had time to put on his battle robes, woven by his own hand with the pinnacle of arcane protection exceeding the best full plate, before the man was leaving the property outright. The image in the crystal ball wavered and stuttered the more distance he put between himself and the original spot of the scrying spell. Antonidas reluctantly cut the visual feed in order to divert power to the anchor, but he could make even that work to his advantage. Forming the weave for the Teleportation spell, he used his freed up focus to cast the best spells of protection, finally priming a Paralysis spell before triggering the leap. Arcane symbols surrounded him and the tell-tale whirl of space-time magic moved him across time and space right behind- "AGH!"
The fir branch slapped him in the face so hard he slipped and fell on the ground – "Ooof!" – or would have if not for the tree trunk right beneath his feet, as slippery as it was full of sharp vestigial branches, including a big one that didn't skewer him through the eye only because his armor spell lasted just long enough under the force of his fall, even on top of the subtle forcefield cast by the weave patterns of his robe. "Ack …" The paralysis spell misfired into a pine tree as he lurched aside. The tree glowed a bit greener than usual and then nothing as he swayed on all fours, cradling his cheek with one eye shut beneath his fingers from phantom pain. "What?"
"The ecological succession that creates a deciduous forest starts with the greed of pines."
"Depelli!" His reflexive mana blast hurled the boughs away, but most of them just whipped back. He managed to shield his face with his sleeve this time, then Antonidas swung – THUNK – his staff caught in the trunks and his robes on sharp branches as he struggled out of… a pine thicket even a toddler couldn't get through, how? He'd targeted the spot right behind his quarry, what was the man doing in there, when, he was bigger than Antonidas, he couldn't have fit, how-? He did feel my spell!
"Fast-growing conifers colonize a suitable area and take it over, suppressing ground cover growth with their light-blocking needles."
The mage whipped his head around, trying to find the voice, both his eyes still worked even if one hurt, but telling direction of the voice was difficult, was this magic – no, echoes just got strange in thick woods, but he could still tell the path, follow him!
"As the pine growth becomes denser, this advantage backfires. The lower branches of the old trees die and infant pines starve in the darkness beneath the crowded sky."
"Vento, viam meam succide!" His staff caught on a trunk again, but the swipe was still big enough to cut a large swath of the forest ahead to ribbons. "Depelli!" The trunks, lumps and branches were blown away in a cone ahead of him, and so Antonidas D'Ambrosio finally managed to break out of the underbrush. "Stop in the name of the Kirin Tor!"
No answer save the wind, he was on a serpentine mountain path but there was no one else – no, down there around the bend, a blur of tan and brown passed beyond the trees. "Hengroen, to me!" A portal of light appeared at his shoulder, from which his steed charged through all the way from the Alterac City stables. With a brief levitation spell, Antonidas jumped in the saddle. "Hya!"
His horse quickly charged down the path and turned the bend to find – there was no one, quick on his feet was he? "Go go go!" Another bend in the path and finally Antonidas could – still nothing!? "Whoa, whoa, boy!" His steed dug furrows into the ground with its hooves as it skid to the halt. "Where did he go?"
Antonidas was half-way through another, short-range scrying spell when the man emerged from the trees on the right, crossed the thin trail and hopped down the slope on the other side to disappear into the brushwood.
The mage stared in shock at the sheer gall of – of – "HYA!" He charged down the path, around another bend just in time to see the man do the same thing just as he got there, he wasn't even running, didn't seem in a hurry at all, why that insolent – Silence Shell, Illusion on his steed's eyesight, Invisibility, Ride the Wind. "Aer semita mea!" With a lashing of his reins, Hengroen galloped on the air down the mountain right over where he'd seen the man jump down. Antonidas couldn't see through the tree cover below, but he made it down to the other path with time to spare and waited unseen and unheard in the middle of the path where the main was sure to emerge. Force Armor, Shield, Paralysis primed – again – now all he needed do was wait. He waited.
He waited.
… Where was he? Because unless he was setting camp in not even one square foot of space or going back up -
Antonidas' heart sank as he remembered a detail he'd overlooked in his rush. The next bend in my path wasn't just a bend, it was a split in the road!
Swiftly, he Rode the Wind back up the mountain, but the spell expired just as he reached the split and so he was forced to land his steed and gallop like any other horseman. He could cast it again, but this was too wily an opponent to waste mana, Invisibility and Silence Shell should still give him the element of surprise as long as the dust cloud behind him wasn't too large, why couldn't it have rained?
He skidded around a final bend in the path, the sand got in his eyes – why was it so hot? – but there he was! Stopped right in the path of an Alterac Footman Patrol, what luck! Drop Invisibility, drop Silence Shell. "Sto-"
"I SURRENDER!"
Antonidas and his proud steed experienced what is known as false start.
"I surrender! I admit it, I did it! I don't know what you think I did but whatever it is, I'll confess! Just don't let the wizard get me! He's crazy! Crazy I tell you!"
The false start ended in an open-mouthed, stumbling halt.
The man – Howard was not his true name, it couldn't be! – held his hands out to be shackled. By normal shackles instead of the mana-dampening ones Antonidas had in his spatial bag. The shackles belonging to a group of bemused and distrustful members of the Alterac Road Patrol. Bemused and distrustful towards him.
"See, he's been staring at me like that since he turned the bend!"
Antonidas D'Ambrosio gaped at the sight, aghast.
… He planned this! Somehow he planned this, all of it, he must have felt the spell watching him and then come up with… but in less than five minutes?!
The man's expression changed then, to something much more distant but somehow still present. Turned to look north. Glancing despite himself in the same direction, Antonidas saw only the mountains on the horizon, on the far side of Alterac Valley which lay far, far down below. That was where he'd been led, he belatedly realized. Those mountains were the last great natural defense behind which Alterac City lay, but what was the man looking at? Did he have allies coming, was this just a ploy to buy time or-?
Above the mountains and beyond, the last specks of morning mist were suddenly dyed in a flicker of gold. A flicker that became a shimmer that lasted for a long, strung-out minute that arrested everyone's attention. Bizarrely, though Antonidas didn't feel anything from so far away, he still had the strange instinct that the Order of Things had just shifted like a sleeping giant after something had tickled its cheek.
He looked back to the man. The man wasn't looking back. He was sitting on a nearby stump, playing with his shackles. His now open shackles. The man promptly snapped them closed around his wrists again when he saw Antonidas looking and smirked at him.
The wizard glared.
The man went back to politely waiting for everyone else to remember they had a prisoner now.
Antonidas sat back in his saddle. His mana coiled tightly with the tension of battle, aimless and unsatisfied. Finally, the patrol remembered themselves. Responsibilities began divvying up between continuing their job and escorting their new prisoner back to their outpost, and from there onwards to Alterac City proper. They were completely oblivious that said prisoner could have slipped away in their distraction. Could still slip away. Only from the patrol of course – wait!
Atonidas drove his steed to catch up and had to use far too much cajolery and even needed to pull out the king's sealed authorisation to get the footmen to swap the man's bonds for his arcane dampeners. He almost wished 'Howard' tried to get away to spare him the frustration. He didn't even try though. He allowed himself to be re-cuffed and led off. Under the Alterac Crown's jurisdiction instead of the Kirin Tor's.
… He'd obviously planned this in advance, but how? Had he known about his investigation beforehand, somehow? From three days' travel away? How? There were few possible answers, all of them sinister, unconscionable! He had to be a mage himself, a wizard, no, a foul warlock, an insidious rogue of some sort, a demon even! Certainly something, he had to be. He had to be!
The alternative was that Antonidas had just been outmanoeuvered by a country hick. He would never be able to live down such shame.
…
What the devil was he going to tell the Council?
The very long Chapter 7 (3 updates totaling over 13,000 words) are available on Patreon, Ko-fi and Subscribestar.
(II)
Antonidas retrieved a particular case from his safe and unlocked it with the key from his spatial pouch, revealing what looked like an amulet made of many faceted pieces of crystalline quartz glued together. The Council had supplied him with a memory stone cluster to record the mystical imprints of the individuals connected to his investigation. The purpose was to have a way to determine if they were under magical duress or otherwise unnatural subjection. Not a particularly easy task since that relied on direct comparison to the Racial Common Denominator of Metaphysical Order periodically updated back in Dalaran, and the method was unable to detect some of the more subtle, long-term influences. Antonidas wasn't high enough in the ranks to know all the specifics yet. What he did know was that the record stone had to be transported there by mundane means. Sufficiently strong arcane exposure, especially teleportation, disrupted the recording matrix. Spirit was finicky, especially the loose traces of it constantly shed by people during those moments when their attention was aimed outwards, which was most of the time. Where attention goes, energy flows.
However, this would work to his advantage. Disruption to the recordings did not bring damage to the stones themselves, so he could always take new ones. He would need days to store new imprints if they were lost, but he had time. He hadn't turned in his findings, and so he probably didn't need to worry he'd be recalled before the deadline Krasus set. And he should be able to make do with the imprints of the individuals least likely to have any control over whatever proceedings these were, who were also the most easily accessible.
Such magic as the one he decided upon usually required reagents of particularly personal bent, such as skin, hair or blood, if possible. And its purpose was usually to exploit an existing a connection, rather than establish a new one based on vague, personal understanding of what they should have in common. Or, in this case, who. It certainly wasn't designed to filter out sympathetic connections in the hopes of finding the one thing (person) they unknowingly had in common in the caster's opinion, regardless of how fact-based. Especially when the 'reagents' were so fragile and the nature and criteria of those connections could be considered mental abstractions at best.
"I, who am avatar of the Order Immanent, am the one whose claim on What Is challenges the claim of the Rulers of Ages."
Antonidas D'Ambrosio had earned the Kirin Tor Sash of Supreme Acumen. For his paper called 'The Ramifications of refined Reverse Time Travel Phenomena into Quantifiable Magical Practice.' When he was twelve.
"The Five Dragons, the Five Masters, the Five Aspects whose Right is the World, whose Might is the World, whose Instrument is the World and whose Charge is the World. I hereby declare: the Right and Might and Instrument and Charge were not Won but Invested by Decree of Order. Let Decree of Order be superseded by Decree of Order. Let my Domain be the Domain of the Ruler of Ages, whose Right is the Present, whose Might is the Past, whose Charge is Fate, whose Instrument is the Entirety of The Passage of Time!"
The magical circle shone. Power flowed like the Sands of Time along lines of mana and chalk overlaid with the tiny spirit stones arranged along sacred geometry. Some dispersed along with the stored energy in a puff of mist, most absorbed them and changed course, overlapping, weaving together, converging on the pedestal upon which sat a crystal ball.
"Let the Truth be revealed to my eyes. Let they be seen, those turning against Mankind's Order, those by whose deceit and artifice did man turn against man, did man turn on himself, devouring the refuse of his lost Dreams, and not allowing Life its free and natural progression across Time, in order that they might supplant Order. Let they be known, that the souls they sought to claim may not fall victim to the Fel Outside."
The words commanded the space beyond space. The light shone dim. The crystal ball filled with mist.
"Let they be seen, that they may not persist in their doing for a cycle longer!"
The mist cleared to reveal a middle aged couple and three men in the middle of breakfast.
"Howard, are you sure you won't wait for-"
"Begging your pardon, Missus, but the Young Master has much bigger things going on than me. 'Sides, it were your husband that hired me on, so it should be fine, right? I left a note with my thanks and best wishes too."
"I don't like it," the man grumbled. "Have them worthies been making trouble for you? Because w-"
"Wish it were that simple myself," Howard – was that even his true name? – interrupted his employer again, he was rather rude wasn't he? "But with all due respect, which I assure you is greater than for literally any other man in the world, I've set my mind. Time on your farm has been more than I hoped for, but there's other things in store for me than tending crops."
"Shame," one of the other men said. "You learned the trade fast, even though you were terrible at the start."
"Thanks," The man said dryly. "Also, fuck you."
"Fuck you too."
"My word," the third exclaimed. "Such foul mouths in front of the missus!"
"I'll let it slide for now," said the missus in question. "But I'll not stand for it once the babies arrive."
"Aye aye, ma'am."
Antonidas had to be very careful connecting the spell matrix to his own mental image of the man rather than the man himself, now that his makeshift anchors were depleted. Given the overreliance on mental abstractions that he'd needed to account for on the fly, he'd had to dispense with most auxiliary scrying parameters. He could tell neither distance nor direction, never mind zoom out to get a bird's eye view of the place, and he wouldn't be able to tell if the man would notice the magic latch on to him unless he reacted visibly. Too high a risk just to get a reaction.
But Antonidas was very good at his craft.
The view in the crystal ball wavered but stayed on target even as the man rose from the table and made his way out of the house. It wavered more and more through the man's brief travel preparations, he'd been ready since the prior day or longer. This was a problem, the spell had barely found its way, if his target changed locations Antonidas might not be able to find him again, not with his spell ingredients used up. He'd seen his face and could scry for it again, but the odds that it wasn't the same one he'd wear tomorrow couldn't be dismissed. He'd caught the man just as he changed covers and he couldn't even decide if this was good luck or bad.
Antonidas barely had time to put on his battle robes, woven by his own hand with the pinnacle of arcane protection exceeding the best full plate, before the man was leaving the property outright. The image in the crystal ball wavered and stuttered the more distance he put between himself and the original spot of the scrying spell. Antonidas reluctantly cut the visual feed in order to divert power to the anchor, but he could make even that work to his advantage. Forming the weave for the Teleportation spell, he used his freed up focus to cast the best spells of protection, finally priming a Paralysis spell before triggering the leap. Arcane symbols surrounded him and the tell-tale whirl of space-time magic moved him across time and space right behind- "AGH!"
The fir branch slapped him in the face so hard he slipped and fell on the ground – "Ooof!" – or would have if not for the tree trunk right beneath his feet, as slippery as it was full of sharp vestigial branches, including a big one that didn't skewer him through the eye only because his armor spell lasted just long enough under the force of his fall, even on top of the subtle forcefield cast by the weave patterns of his robe. "Ack …" The paralysis spell misfired into a pine tree as he lurched aside. The tree glowed a bit greener than usual and then nothing as he swayed on all fours, cradling his cheek with one eye shut beneath his fingers from phantom pain. "What?"
"The ecological succession that creates a deciduous forest starts with the greed of pines."
"Depelli!" His reflexive mana blast hurled the boughs away, but most of them just whipped back. He managed to shield his face with his sleeve this time, then Antonidas swung – THUNK – his staff caught in the trunks and his robes on sharp branches as he struggled out of… a pine thicket even a toddler couldn't get through, how? He'd targeted the spot right behind his quarry, what was the man doing in there, when, he was bigger than Antonidas, he couldn't have fit, how-? He did feel my spell!
"Fast-growing conifers colonize a suitable area and take it over, suppressing ground cover growth with their light-blocking needles."
The mage whipped his head around, trying to find the voice, both his eyes still worked even if one hurt, but telling direction of the voice was difficult, was this magic – no, echoes just got strange in thick woods, but he could still tell the path, follow him!
"As the pine growth becomes denser, this advantage backfires. The lower branches of the old trees die and infant pines starve in the darkness beneath the crowded sky."
"Vento, viam meam succide!" His staff caught on a trunk again, but the swipe was still big enough to cut a large swath of the forest ahead to ribbons. "Depelli!" The trunks, lumps and branches were blown away in a cone ahead of him, and so Antonidas D'Ambrosio finally managed to break out of the underbrush. "Stop in the name of the Kirin Tor!"
No answer save the wind, he was on a serpentine mountain path but there was no one else – no, down there around the bend, a blur of tan and brown passed beyond the trees. "Hengroen, to me!" A portal of light appeared at his shoulder, from which his steed charged through all the way from the Alterac City stables. With a brief levitation spell, Antonidas jumped in the saddle. "Hya!"
His horse quickly charged down the path and turned the bend to find – there was no one, quick on his feet was he? "Go go go!" Another bend in the path and finally Antonidas could – still nothing!? "Whoa, whoa, boy!" His steed dug furrows into the ground with its hooves as it skid to the halt. "Where did he go?"
Antonidas was half-way through another, short-range scrying spell when the man emerged from the trees on the right, crossed the thin trail and hopped down the slope on the other side to disappear into the brushwood.
The mage stared in shock at the sheer gall of – of – "HYA!" He charged down the path, around another bend just in time to see the man do the same thing just as he got there, he wasn't even running, didn't seem in a hurry at all, why that insolent – Silence Shell, Illusion on his steed's eyesight, Invisibility, Ride the Wind. "Aer semita mea!" With a lashing of his reins, Hengroen galloped on the air down the mountain right over where he'd seen the man jump down. Antonidas couldn't see through the tree cover below, but he made it down to the other path with time to spare and waited unseen and unheard in the middle of the path where the main was sure to emerge. Force Armor, Shield, Paralysis primed – again – now all he needed do was wait. He waited.
He waited.
… Where was he? Because unless he was setting camp in not even one square foot of space or going back up -
Antonidas' heart sank as he remembered a detail he'd overlooked in his rush. The next bend in my path wasn't just a bend, it was a split in the road!
Swiftly, he Rode the Wind back up the mountain, but the spell expired just as he reached the split and so he was forced to land his steed and gallop like any other horseman. He could cast it again, but this was too wily an opponent to waste mana, Invisibility and Silence Shell should still give him the element of surprise as long as the dust cloud behind him wasn't too large, why couldn't it have rained?
He skidded around a final bend in the path, the sand got in his eyes – why was it so hot? – but there he was! Stopped right in the path of an Alterac Footman Patrol, what luck! Drop Invisibility, drop Silence Shell. "Sto-"
"I SURRENDER!"
Antonidas and his proud steed experienced what is known as false start.
"I surrender! I admit it, I did it! I don't know what you think I did but whatever it is, I'll confess! Just don't let the wizard get me! He's crazy! Crazy I tell you!"
The false start ended in an open-mouthed, stumbling halt.
The man – Howard was not his true name, it couldn't be! – held his hands out to be shackled. By normal shackles instead of the mana-dampening ones Antonidas had in his spatial bag. The shackles belonging to a group of bemused and distrustful members of the Alterac Road Patrol. Bemused and distrustful towards him.
"See, he's been staring at me like that since he turned the bend!"
Antonidas D'Ambrosio gaped at the sight, aghast.
… He planned this! Somehow he planned this, all of it, he must have felt the spell watching him and then come up with… but in less than five minutes?!
The man's expression changed then, to something much more distant but somehow still present. Turned to look north. Glancing despite himself in the same direction, Antonidas saw only the mountains on the horizon, on the far side of Alterac Valley which lay far, far down below. That was where he'd been led, he belatedly realized. Those mountains were the last great natural defense behind which Alterac City lay, but what was the man looking at? Did he have allies coming, was this just a ploy to buy time or-?
Above the mountains and beyond, the last specks of morning mist were suddenly dyed in a flicker of gold. A flicker that became a shimmer that lasted for a long, strung-out minute that arrested everyone's attention. Bizarrely, though Antonidas didn't feel anything from so far away, he still had the strange instinct that the Order of Things had just shifted like a sleeping giant after something had tickled its cheek.
He looked back to the man. The man wasn't looking back. He was sitting on a nearby stump, playing with his shackles. His now open shackles. The man promptly snapped them closed around his wrists again when he saw Antonidas looking and smirked at him.
The wizard glared.
The man went back to politely waiting for everyone else to remember they had a prisoner now.
Antonidas sat back in his saddle. His mana coiled tightly with the tension of battle, aimless and unsatisfied. Finally, the patrol remembered themselves. Responsibilities began divvying up between continuing their job and escorting their new prisoner back to their outpost, and from there onwards to Alterac City proper. They were completely oblivious that said prisoner could have slipped away in their distraction. Could still slip away. Only from the patrol of course – wait!
Atonidas drove his steed to catch up and had to use far too much cajolery and even needed to pull out the king's sealed authorisation to get the footmen to swap the man's bonds for his arcane dampeners. He almost wished 'Howard' tried to get away to spare him the frustration. He didn't even try though. He allowed himself to be re-cuffed and led off. Under the Alterac Crown's jurisdiction instead of the Kirin Tor's.
… He'd obviously planned this in advance, but how? Had he known about his investigation beforehand, somehow? From three days' travel away? How? There were few possible answers, all of them sinister, unconscionable! He had to be a mage himself, a wizard, no, a foul warlock, an insidious rogue of some sort, a demon even! Certainly something, he had to be. He had to be!
The alternative was that Antonidas had just been outmanoeuvered by a country hick. He would never be able to live down such shame.
…
What the devil was he going to tell the Council?
The very long Chapter 7 (3 updates totaling over 13,000 words) are available on Patreon, Ko-fi and Subscribestar.
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Morphic Tide
Well-known member
He was digging at fuzzy-logic abstractions to find the common factor of the conspiracy, which seems to have turned up one of the farmhands:
Unless the name, number of men outside the middle-aged couple, and more than one not-currently-present-but-expected child are laying on the red herrings thick.
MC is still off in the distance, with Plans:
That's a pretty clear signal being given, by what is pretty clearly Light.
Chapter 7 - The Hereafter Does Wait for Some People (I)
Karmic Acumen
Well-known member
A/N: To everyone confused about 'Howard', you met him in 'The Seamy Truth (II)'.
This three-parter is the last alternate PoV for a while. Wayland does return here to take over the story, but we'll be listening to him specifically again for a while starting in Chapter 8 - The Dark Triad, when he finally meets the king.
Chapter 7 - The Hereafter Does Wait for Some People
(I)
"-. Orsur Kelsier, Alterac Trade Magnate (Embattled), Merchant Adventurer (Former) .-"
Light, let my spirit be keener and my heart be bolder as my strength grows less.
The priests often chided people for only praying when they needed something, but Orsur Kelsier never understood that, even as a child. Most people hated being carped at, especially by people they never met before and much less for literally nothing. He couldn't imagine divinity appreciating having their time wasted any better. The virtues preached by the Church were all about solving your own problems, didn't that mean you were supposed to keep your praying to a minimum? The Light itself was supposedly impersonal too, by that logic it cared for useless begging even less, didn't it?
Look at me having a crisis of faith.
Orsur paid his respects to Great Tyr and Saint Mereldar, and left pondering how the Light seemed to lack the vicissitudes and vagaries of its agents. The Light's agents were kind, wrathful or what have you depending on the story, but the degree to which they supposedly intervened in the world was inversely proportional to the canonicity of whatever scripture you happened to be reading.
The priests were at least real people, and their claims to power rooted in moral decency weren't empty boasts. At least for those that actually got the Light to respond. Unfortunately, none of that made it any easier to know what to expect of the Young Saint. A very unfortunate predicament when fate seemed determined to force him to throw himself at his mercy.
The Fel Void curse all the 'bandits' and their 'noble' masters to the Twisting Hells.
You'd think that the purge would have them 'worthies' less prone to pillaging their own country, but apparently not. In fact, it was the opposite. Before the king's… lapse, you could at least trust 'bandits' not to venture too far from their camps, never mind sack trade convoys above a certain size, especially those with commensurately armed protection. After all, their on-and-off patrons needed the country's trade to continue functioning in order to make all the gold they needed to waste on hidden blades and power plays.
This went doubly as long as you had enough noble banners on your wagons. Or Dalaran's. Even the most infamous 'bandit' lords tended to leave you alone then, bribes and tolls notwithstanding. It was why even merchants of high means like himself still preferred to attach even their biggest and best defended wagon trains to high profile caravans where possible. Sure, it was expensive, but the extra coin was actually less than having to pay all those aforementioned 'tolls.'
Even the king's men had been especially invested in the safe delivery of his alchemical shipment, and not just because of the usual concerns about volatile substances. He got favourable rates not just because of how large it was, but also because it fell under Crown priorities, now. It was enough to confirm all those rumors about actual war preparations that the nobles had been so badly pretending to suppress.
Orsur even managed to consult with his old acquaintance that he accidentally helped catapult to the high echelons of the assassin's guild, back during his adventuring days when he didn't know the Ravenholdt name from Thoradin, and even he said all the retinues and shipments in the caravan were legitimate.
Imagine his shock when he learned that the highest-profile caravan of the year got sacked by 'bandits' despite having not only all the aforementioned identifiers, but also that of the king. Oh, how Orsur cursed his past self for not heeding his gut instinct not to toss in every last scrap of liquid funds and collateral. And to think all he'd wanted was to pay it forward.
Here I am talking smack about my past self. Well, joke's on me, he ruined my life!
The safest bet of his merchant career had turned into a disaster, he didn't know who was responsible, he didn't know how many attacked, he didn't know who all survived, and he certainly didn't know any specifics. Like any lives or goods that were conspicuously prioritised or ignored compared to the other noble or guild cortege that had attached itself to the same expedition. Never mind the king's! How Master Narett didn't hold it against him for wasting his greatest sale since before Orsur even entered the trading business, Orsur had no idea.
And all at such a terrible time! The trade expedition was supposed to finance our new enterprise, not bring me to the brink of bankruptcy!
All his attempts to stave off bankruptcy – or worse – were failing one after another. The goods and properties he'd put up for auction were seeing lacklustre response. The information bounty he posted on the notice boards attracted people that were either lying or complicit. All at a time when he didn't have the coin to keep bodyguards because he needed every scrap to pay his agents' legal fees instead.
Half his agents outside of Alterac City didn't respond to their communication, despite the high expenses he'd incurred over the years to buy Dalaran transmission stones. The other half had been arrested on suspicion of fraud and their possessions confiscated, it was absurd, corrupt magistrates everywhere, damn them and their buyers! None of his other sources could get him details on what happened either.
And now the others in our little conspiracy are eyeing me like a rash to divest themselves of.
He'd expected it of those who thought he was trying to undermine them, to pay coin for a stronger control of their future enterprise. But even the ones he expected sense from were looking askance at him now. He could understand disdain at request for handouts, Orsur certainly disdained asking for them. But he did not expect the turnaround in attitude to be quite so farcical.
They certainly appreciated me spreading false rumors and otherwise confusing the whole city about our little golden goose. On my own coin no less, toadies aren't cheap when all you can get is whatever dregs didn't pass muster with the highborn.
Orsur tried to understand their suspicion, craftsmen and their guilds had a low opinion of merchants for not actually producing anything, while most merchants – and especially merchant guilds – tended to respond to that contempt with equal amounts condescension. But understanding and accepting were vastly different things.
And it seems the Young Saint is suspicious of my best intentions as well.
The lodgings he had rented for him had gone unused. The only reason the innkeep had anything useful to say was because of how tall the young man was now. The only person who knew the right things to say to claim the lodgings was a 'big lad' that only stopped by to inform the innkeep he wouldn't be using them, thank you kindly and please reimburse my benefactor, before wandering off. The 'big lad' had been joined by a shorter but heavily armed, cloaked companion as he turned the corner, but that was all the innkeep knew.
The man had been thoroughly distracted afterwards by 'that little spot of bother a few days past.' A very quaint way to describe a certain duke and his ridiculously long procession of captured 'bandits' personally delivered to the gallows. Orsur appreciated the refund, but he would have appreciated a one-on-one with their saintly patron a lot more, even if that wasn't why he rented the quarters originally.
At this point I might be better off not attending the meeting at all.
But he would. He still had his pride.
Finally, he arrived. The city's newest and rawest building. Gloomy too, by virtue of them deferring on whitewash and panelling – and most walls – until they could consult with the mastermind behind all the new features. The well-to-do from nearly every trade in Alterac wouldn't normally gather in a construction site, especially for the sort of discussion that could change the face of their country. It was why they decided to hold it there and now regardless.
Orsur thought it was foolish, the others weren't half as discreet as he was, it was too much of a risk. But his latest woes meant the others made the final decision without his input. Because it wasn't their fault he was too busy elsewhere, they later said.
That he was only 'busy' keeping his innocent people out of prison made no seeming difference. Orsur wondered if they even cared enough to find out. He hadn't asked, because if it turned out they knew, he might have switched out one of their coins with one of his. The resulting fall from on high would have been tragic and impossible to blame on him, but he was not that sort of man no matter how often he contemplated it. The merchant's trade was a cutthroat business, but he took pride in his self-control.
He never killed anyone except in fair turnabout when the law failed. That was what his years as a merchant adventurer taught him.
He climbed the stairs up to the first floor where the only finished room was. Orsur greeted the others, who were all present already. They showed varying amounts of caution, suspicion, and very little sympathy. Orsur wore his face stony, but inside was absurdly relieved. Their attire was mostly what people would dismiss as them dressing down for inspection at a dusty worksite, especially with the uncreatively named foreman Mason Zidar there to 'show them around' in absence of the crew on their day off.
More importantly, while the room looked recently swept and dusted, and the chairs and tablecloth were new, they were also foldable and lightweight. This was the room where the construction crew ate and rested, that it still looked the part meant there hadn't been a whole army of servants and delivery people coming in and out of the place for days.
Since everyone looked terribly eager to get back to what they were doing before he arrived, even if that something was literally nothing, Orsur dragged a chair over to the wall and sat down to review the latest paperwork from the magistrate's office. The others were doing well in waiting for the golden goose to arrive before sitting down at the table, but tacit approval was all they seemed willing to accept from him. If that.
How am I supposed to work with these people long-term? You're only supposed to compete with your competitors, not your business partners!
Well, prospective ones in this case. They clearly didn't expect to work long-term with him, anymore. The hedging of bets was so painfully blatant, it made Orsur wonder how they got as high as they got in their guilds. This behaviour was what self-fulfilling prophecies were made of.
Dare he hope they all belonged to that atrociously lucky sort that had only precipitated the good kind of self-fulfilling prophecy up to this point? If nothing else, that was definitely the sort of blind luck he would like to see rubbing off on him right now.
"He's coming," said Gavin Slipknot. As a Master Fisherman, Orsur had no idea what the man thought he could contribute to their nascent enterprise. But as the first person to ever enter a business partnership with their young patron – for a new fishing line spun form oil, somehow, that had catapulted him to the forefront of his trade – he had arguably the greatest right to be there. "Quick, everyone get ready."
To Orsur's astonishment, almost everyone stopped what they were doing and began straightening their clothes and hair. Oh, what a change this was from the suspicion and condescension that everyone once treated the Young Saint with! Had it only been a year? Not that he himself had been much better, despite being the only one of this lot who did have a background that should have made him more open-minded.
But how could any of them have known that the Light had sent down a once-in-a-century genius, back then? Most people still didn't, even the whole 'make people think the Young Saint is three different people' ruse required very little effort on their part, at the end of the day.
Madam Seamstress Tayer was still disbelieving of her assistant's reassurances that yes, your grey hairs really are all out of sight, madam, when the knock came.
Master Builder Zidar adjusted his blue collar and tugged on his cuffs one last time – you came just as dressed down as the rest of us, man, get a grip – and opened the door. "Master Hywel! Come…" The man gawked at their patron's height – when did he get so big? – before mastering himself. "Come in, come in, we've been expecting you!"
Making him think he's running late is not the best start.
"Master Zidar, hello. I hope I'm not running too late."
Case in point.
Also, Wayland Hywel's voice had grown deeper too.
"Not at all, not at all, we just happened to arrive early." Obvious lies are even worse. "Had to make sure the place was tidy and all, you know how it all goes I'm sure."
Wayland Hywel had to stoop to get through the door, they already had the first item on the 'things to fix as soon as possible' list. "Well, this is quite the gathering. Greetings all." Orsur stiffened when the young man's gaze passed over him, it felt… extensive, somehow, had the Light been so self-evident in his eyes before? But they still looked the same, blue with not a hint of gold, although his hair- "Hello to all the new faces, and to the old I'm glad to see you're all doing… actually only mostly well, Master Keyton, you've been injured recently."
The Master Blacksmith went from gaping at the lad's size to gaping at his insight. "Erm… Aye, I suppose so, Young Master, but it's all handled, I've always got me some potions nearby."
"Well, whatever you took wasn't quite enough. Small cuts, big bruises, a recently broken femur that hasn't fused right, something heavy fell on you along with a bunch of smaller but sharper things, an accident unloading a crate of weapons or some such I assume?" Wayland Hywel waved down with a finger on the way to the table and the Light came down on Smid Keyton like a column of gold. "There, it's fixed. Please stay behind after the meeting, though, so I can finally do something about that black lung you're developing from all the metal flakes and smoke you breathe every day. If anyone else has someone with degenerative diseases, please stay as well so we ca discuss it. I've developed my skills some."
Clearly, Orsur thought breathlessly as the overflow from the spell washed over the rest of them, making him feel like he'd just gotten out of bed after the best night's rest of his life. Does that mean he can actually cure such things, instead of merely ease their burden like the priests?
Visibly shaken now, Zidar showed the Young Master to one end of the table, lingered strangely in place for a moment and… didn't take the other end as Orsur was sure had been the plan.
Well I'll be. Orsur rapidly reassessed the situation as he waited with everyone else for the Young Master to sit, before following suit. Orsur knew they'd taken pains to make sure they wouldn't be sitting higher than their holy patron, pointless though it now turned out to be. The lad was bigger than them by a head. At least.
But this…
Zidar was a master builder, foreman, technical owner of the building – at least until the work was finished – and ultimate instigator of their little scheme. He was also the only guild master among them, on top of being a master of his chosen craft. Orsur had been certain he would claim the head of the table. Either there was more than one decision made absent of my input, or he only changed his tune right now.
"Right then," Zidar cleared his throat, and Orsur had to actively remind himself that this suddenly deferential man was the same one that could make army sergeants feel inadequate with how he ran his work sites. I'm missing something. "Introductions first. You know master Slipknot already of course, Young Master Hywel."
"Glad to see you well, young sir."
"Likewise."
"Please be also known to Master Chef Ademar Burch, the one responsible for the food spread you see before you. On his left is, of course, Master Blacksmith Smid Keyton. Next to him is Madame Tayer, senior supervisor of the Fowl Feather tailor guild, next is-"
"-The young lady standing behind her?"
"Right, of course, my apologies, her assistant, the young miss…?"
"Ava, my darling keeper of all things stationery," the matronly woman graciously filled in. "I'd be thoroughly lost without her."
The girl pretended indifference. Surprisingly well too. "You exaggerate, missus."
"Quite," Zidar cleared his throat. "On her left is Melissa Blackthorn, head of the Blackthorn merchant house. Her specialty is in trade abroad."
The long-haired woman, the only person besides himself who didn't fret over her pristine own appearance while preparing to welcome their guest of honor, inclined her head. "A pleasure. Behind me is my nephew, Albert. He will be my contact at those times when I am not in the city." Not 'when I am unavailable' but specifically 'when I'm not in the city', a statement of commitment if ever there was one. "Alas, I expect it to be the case quite often. I am considering a partial shift away from foreign trade to the more domestic arena."
Ah, the vulture is already pecking at my corpse, and I'm not even dead yet!
"There on your right you have Mark Tarren, representative of the miller's guild over in Tarren Mill."
The young man nodded, face stony. "My father wanted to come himself, but he bid me ask your forbearance while he finalizes his part of the legalities of your new partnership." At just over twenty, Mark was the youngest person there, after the Young Master himself. "He is happy to convey that the waterwheel-powered hammer has proven a monumental success with the local smithies. He has named you equal partner in the endeavour. He conveys he is most eager to explore any other ideas you might have, and has an additional proposition for you, one which he assures you will have no bearing on your existing arrangements whether you accept or refuse-"
"And which can, of course, wait until we see to today's agenda," Madam Tayer interrupted, not entirely idly. "At the very least it can wait until we've finished introductions."
Getting ahead of yourself there, boy. Also, am I the only one who remembers Hywel is the only one who doesn't know what we're here for?
"Quite right," Master Zidar hastened to move past the impropriety. "Next is Jace Brakelond, a senior in the Horologe Clockmaker's guild."
"An honor." The man had several 'bandaids' on his face – another of Hywel's creations, and currently the major source of Tayer's income, at that – a testament to how thoroughly and often he shaved despite being one of those unfortunate men whose blood ran perilously close to the surface of his skin. "I also count a fairly able jewelsmith among my friends. I am actually representing him today as well, as he is working on an unexpected high-profile commission."
Good thing he didn't drop it, or we really wouldn't be able to call what we're doing 'discretion' even in our dreams.
"You know Master Orsur of course, the owner of the Merchant Adventurer merchant house. He's our current authority on domestic trade."
I'd thank you for not tossing my woe out or leaving me for last, if I didn't know the real reason. "Embattled, currently, but I'm willing to defer on my personal drama until it becomes relevant."
"Something I'm sure we all appreciate," spoke Master Burch before Melissa could. The man's diplomacy skill left much to be desired compared to his cooking, but Orsur appreciated the thought all the same. Even if he would have preferred to find out now if he should expect more than passive aggressiveness from Blackthorn.
"And finally, next to me is my son, Beran. You'll be delighted to know that he's now the world's first creator of a working oil distillery!"
"Fractal distillery." Seeing as Zidar himself was nearing his fifties, his son was actually thirty himself. The man stood and nodded at Master Wayland. "Your design worked just as you described. Samples have already been delivered to our local alchemist of mutual acquaintance for testing. I foresee much business in the future, regardless of how today goes."
Finally, everyone was seated. Quiet. Watching. Waiting. The empty seat at the head of the table loomed strangely in the lull.
"I'm glad to meet everyone," Wayland Hywel finally said when the bizarreness of the situation had been sufficiently indulged. "Now could someone please tell me why we're all here?"
Yes, could someone please do that?
"Quite." Mason Zidar finally did what a host should have done via their original invitation. "Master Wayland. As the ultimate source of all our best and newest breakthroughs, we would like to hear your thoughts on establishing a new guild."
The other two parts of Chapter 7, as well as Chapter 8, are available on Patreon, Ko-fi and Subscribestar.
This three-parter is the last alternate PoV for a while. Wayland does return here to take over the story, but we'll be listening to him specifically again for a while starting in Chapter 8 - The Dark Triad, when he finally meets the king.
Chapter 7 - The Hereafter Does Wait for Some People
(I)
"-. Orsur Kelsier, Alterac Trade Magnate (Embattled), Merchant Adventurer (Former) .-"
Light, let my spirit be keener and my heart be bolder as my strength grows less.
The priests often chided people for only praying when they needed something, but Orsur Kelsier never understood that, even as a child. Most people hated being carped at, especially by people they never met before and much less for literally nothing. He couldn't imagine divinity appreciating having their time wasted any better. The virtues preached by the Church were all about solving your own problems, didn't that mean you were supposed to keep your praying to a minimum? The Light itself was supposedly impersonal too, by that logic it cared for useless begging even less, didn't it?
Look at me having a crisis of faith.
Orsur paid his respects to Great Tyr and Saint Mereldar, and left pondering how the Light seemed to lack the vicissitudes and vagaries of its agents. The Light's agents were kind, wrathful or what have you depending on the story, but the degree to which they supposedly intervened in the world was inversely proportional to the canonicity of whatever scripture you happened to be reading.
The priests were at least real people, and their claims to power rooted in moral decency weren't empty boasts. At least for those that actually got the Light to respond. Unfortunately, none of that made it any easier to know what to expect of the Young Saint. A very unfortunate predicament when fate seemed determined to force him to throw himself at his mercy.
The Fel Void curse all the 'bandits' and their 'noble' masters to the Twisting Hells.
You'd think that the purge would have them 'worthies' less prone to pillaging their own country, but apparently not. In fact, it was the opposite. Before the king's… lapse, you could at least trust 'bandits' not to venture too far from their camps, never mind sack trade convoys above a certain size, especially those with commensurately armed protection. After all, their on-and-off patrons needed the country's trade to continue functioning in order to make all the gold they needed to waste on hidden blades and power plays.
This went doubly as long as you had enough noble banners on your wagons. Or Dalaran's. Even the most infamous 'bandit' lords tended to leave you alone then, bribes and tolls notwithstanding. It was why even merchants of high means like himself still preferred to attach even their biggest and best defended wagon trains to high profile caravans where possible. Sure, it was expensive, but the extra coin was actually less than having to pay all those aforementioned 'tolls.'
Even the king's men had been especially invested in the safe delivery of his alchemical shipment, and not just because of the usual concerns about volatile substances. He got favourable rates not just because of how large it was, but also because it fell under Crown priorities, now. It was enough to confirm all those rumors about actual war preparations that the nobles had been so badly pretending to suppress.
Orsur even managed to consult with his old acquaintance that he accidentally helped catapult to the high echelons of the assassin's guild, back during his adventuring days when he didn't know the Ravenholdt name from Thoradin, and even he said all the retinues and shipments in the caravan were legitimate.
Imagine his shock when he learned that the highest-profile caravan of the year got sacked by 'bandits' despite having not only all the aforementioned identifiers, but also that of the king. Oh, how Orsur cursed his past self for not heeding his gut instinct not to toss in every last scrap of liquid funds and collateral. And to think all he'd wanted was to pay it forward.
Here I am talking smack about my past self. Well, joke's on me, he ruined my life!
The safest bet of his merchant career had turned into a disaster, he didn't know who was responsible, he didn't know how many attacked, he didn't know who all survived, and he certainly didn't know any specifics. Like any lives or goods that were conspicuously prioritised or ignored compared to the other noble or guild cortege that had attached itself to the same expedition. Never mind the king's! How Master Narett didn't hold it against him for wasting his greatest sale since before Orsur even entered the trading business, Orsur had no idea.
And all at such a terrible time! The trade expedition was supposed to finance our new enterprise, not bring me to the brink of bankruptcy!
All his attempts to stave off bankruptcy – or worse – were failing one after another. The goods and properties he'd put up for auction were seeing lacklustre response. The information bounty he posted on the notice boards attracted people that were either lying or complicit. All at a time when he didn't have the coin to keep bodyguards because he needed every scrap to pay his agents' legal fees instead.
Half his agents outside of Alterac City didn't respond to their communication, despite the high expenses he'd incurred over the years to buy Dalaran transmission stones. The other half had been arrested on suspicion of fraud and their possessions confiscated, it was absurd, corrupt magistrates everywhere, damn them and their buyers! None of his other sources could get him details on what happened either.
And now the others in our little conspiracy are eyeing me like a rash to divest themselves of.
He'd expected it of those who thought he was trying to undermine them, to pay coin for a stronger control of their future enterprise. But even the ones he expected sense from were looking askance at him now. He could understand disdain at request for handouts, Orsur certainly disdained asking for them. But he did not expect the turnaround in attitude to be quite so farcical.
They certainly appreciated me spreading false rumors and otherwise confusing the whole city about our little golden goose. On my own coin no less, toadies aren't cheap when all you can get is whatever dregs didn't pass muster with the highborn.
Orsur tried to understand their suspicion, craftsmen and their guilds had a low opinion of merchants for not actually producing anything, while most merchants – and especially merchant guilds – tended to respond to that contempt with equal amounts condescension. But understanding and accepting were vastly different things.
And it seems the Young Saint is suspicious of my best intentions as well.
The lodgings he had rented for him had gone unused. The only reason the innkeep had anything useful to say was because of how tall the young man was now. The only person who knew the right things to say to claim the lodgings was a 'big lad' that only stopped by to inform the innkeep he wouldn't be using them, thank you kindly and please reimburse my benefactor, before wandering off. The 'big lad' had been joined by a shorter but heavily armed, cloaked companion as he turned the corner, but that was all the innkeep knew.
The man had been thoroughly distracted afterwards by 'that little spot of bother a few days past.' A very quaint way to describe a certain duke and his ridiculously long procession of captured 'bandits' personally delivered to the gallows. Orsur appreciated the refund, but he would have appreciated a one-on-one with their saintly patron a lot more, even if that wasn't why he rented the quarters originally.
At this point I might be better off not attending the meeting at all.
But he would. He still had his pride.
Finally, he arrived. The city's newest and rawest building. Gloomy too, by virtue of them deferring on whitewash and panelling – and most walls – until they could consult with the mastermind behind all the new features. The well-to-do from nearly every trade in Alterac wouldn't normally gather in a construction site, especially for the sort of discussion that could change the face of their country. It was why they decided to hold it there and now regardless.
Orsur thought it was foolish, the others weren't half as discreet as he was, it was too much of a risk. But his latest woes meant the others made the final decision without his input. Because it wasn't their fault he was too busy elsewhere, they later said.
That he was only 'busy' keeping his innocent people out of prison made no seeming difference. Orsur wondered if they even cared enough to find out. He hadn't asked, because if it turned out they knew, he might have switched out one of their coins with one of his. The resulting fall from on high would have been tragic and impossible to blame on him, but he was not that sort of man no matter how often he contemplated it. The merchant's trade was a cutthroat business, but he took pride in his self-control.
He never killed anyone except in fair turnabout when the law failed. That was what his years as a merchant adventurer taught him.
He climbed the stairs up to the first floor where the only finished room was. Orsur greeted the others, who were all present already. They showed varying amounts of caution, suspicion, and very little sympathy. Orsur wore his face stony, but inside was absurdly relieved. Their attire was mostly what people would dismiss as them dressing down for inspection at a dusty worksite, especially with the uncreatively named foreman Mason Zidar there to 'show them around' in absence of the crew on their day off.
More importantly, while the room looked recently swept and dusted, and the chairs and tablecloth were new, they were also foldable and lightweight. This was the room where the construction crew ate and rested, that it still looked the part meant there hadn't been a whole army of servants and delivery people coming in and out of the place for days.
Since everyone looked terribly eager to get back to what they were doing before he arrived, even if that something was literally nothing, Orsur dragged a chair over to the wall and sat down to review the latest paperwork from the magistrate's office. The others were doing well in waiting for the golden goose to arrive before sitting down at the table, but tacit approval was all they seemed willing to accept from him. If that.
How am I supposed to work with these people long-term? You're only supposed to compete with your competitors, not your business partners!
Well, prospective ones in this case. They clearly didn't expect to work long-term with him, anymore. The hedging of bets was so painfully blatant, it made Orsur wonder how they got as high as they got in their guilds. This behaviour was what self-fulfilling prophecies were made of.
Dare he hope they all belonged to that atrociously lucky sort that had only precipitated the good kind of self-fulfilling prophecy up to this point? If nothing else, that was definitely the sort of blind luck he would like to see rubbing off on him right now.
"He's coming," said Gavin Slipknot. As a Master Fisherman, Orsur had no idea what the man thought he could contribute to their nascent enterprise. But as the first person to ever enter a business partnership with their young patron – for a new fishing line spun form oil, somehow, that had catapulted him to the forefront of his trade – he had arguably the greatest right to be there. "Quick, everyone get ready."
To Orsur's astonishment, almost everyone stopped what they were doing and began straightening their clothes and hair. Oh, what a change this was from the suspicion and condescension that everyone once treated the Young Saint with! Had it only been a year? Not that he himself had been much better, despite being the only one of this lot who did have a background that should have made him more open-minded.
But how could any of them have known that the Light had sent down a once-in-a-century genius, back then? Most people still didn't, even the whole 'make people think the Young Saint is three different people' ruse required very little effort on their part, at the end of the day.
Madam Seamstress Tayer was still disbelieving of her assistant's reassurances that yes, your grey hairs really are all out of sight, madam, when the knock came.
Master Builder Zidar adjusted his blue collar and tugged on his cuffs one last time – you came just as dressed down as the rest of us, man, get a grip – and opened the door. "Master Hywel! Come…" The man gawked at their patron's height – when did he get so big? – before mastering himself. "Come in, come in, we've been expecting you!"
Making him think he's running late is not the best start.
"Master Zidar, hello. I hope I'm not running too late."
Case in point.
Also, Wayland Hywel's voice had grown deeper too.
"Not at all, not at all, we just happened to arrive early." Obvious lies are even worse. "Had to make sure the place was tidy and all, you know how it all goes I'm sure."
Wayland Hywel had to stoop to get through the door, they already had the first item on the 'things to fix as soon as possible' list. "Well, this is quite the gathering. Greetings all." Orsur stiffened when the young man's gaze passed over him, it felt… extensive, somehow, had the Light been so self-evident in his eyes before? But they still looked the same, blue with not a hint of gold, although his hair- "Hello to all the new faces, and to the old I'm glad to see you're all doing… actually only mostly well, Master Keyton, you've been injured recently."
The Master Blacksmith went from gaping at the lad's size to gaping at his insight. "Erm… Aye, I suppose so, Young Master, but it's all handled, I've always got me some potions nearby."
"Well, whatever you took wasn't quite enough. Small cuts, big bruises, a recently broken femur that hasn't fused right, something heavy fell on you along with a bunch of smaller but sharper things, an accident unloading a crate of weapons or some such I assume?" Wayland Hywel waved down with a finger on the way to the table and the Light came down on Smid Keyton like a column of gold. "There, it's fixed. Please stay behind after the meeting, though, so I can finally do something about that black lung you're developing from all the metal flakes and smoke you breathe every day. If anyone else has someone with degenerative diseases, please stay as well so we ca discuss it. I've developed my skills some."
Clearly, Orsur thought breathlessly as the overflow from the spell washed over the rest of them, making him feel like he'd just gotten out of bed after the best night's rest of his life. Does that mean he can actually cure such things, instead of merely ease their burden like the priests?
Visibly shaken now, Zidar showed the Young Master to one end of the table, lingered strangely in place for a moment and… didn't take the other end as Orsur was sure had been the plan.
Well I'll be. Orsur rapidly reassessed the situation as he waited with everyone else for the Young Master to sit, before following suit. Orsur knew they'd taken pains to make sure they wouldn't be sitting higher than their holy patron, pointless though it now turned out to be. The lad was bigger than them by a head. At least.
But this…
Zidar was a master builder, foreman, technical owner of the building – at least until the work was finished – and ultimate instigator of their little scheme. He was also the only guild master among them, on top of being a master of his chosen craft. Orsur had been certain he would claim the head of the table. Either there was more than one decision made absent of my input, or he only changed his tune right now.
"Right then," Zidar cleared his throat, and Orsur had to actively remind himself that this suddenly deferential man was the same one that could make army sergeants feel inadequate with how he ran his work sites. I'm missing something. "Introductions first. You know master Slipknot already of course, Young Master Hywel."
"Glad to see you well, young sir."
"Likewise."
"Please be also known to Master Chef Ademar Burch, the one responsible for the food spread you see before you. On his left is, of course, Master Blacksmith Smid Keyton. Next to him is Madame Tayer, senior supervisor of the Fowl Feather tailor guild, next is-"
"-The young lady standing behind her?"
"Right, of course, my apologies, her assistant, the young miss…?"
"Ava, my darling keeper of all things stationery," the matronly woman graciously filled in. "I'd be thoroughly lost without her."
The girl pretended indifference. Surprisingly well too. "You exaggerate, missus."
"Quite," Zidar cleared his throat. "On her left is Melissa Blackthorn, head of the Blackthorn merchant house. Her specialty is in trade abroad."
The long-haired woman, the only person besides himself who didn't fret over her pristine own appearance while preparing to welcome their guest of honor, inclined her head. "A pleasure. Behind me is my nephew, Albert. He will be my contact at those times when I am not in the city." Not 'when I am unavailable' but specifically 'when I'm not in the city', a statement of commitment if ever there was one. "Alas, I expect it to be the case quite often. I am considering a partial shift away from foreign trade to the more domestic arena."
Ah, the vulture is already pecking at my corpse, and I'm not even dead yet!
"There on your right you have Mark Tarren, representative of the miller's guild over in Tarren Mill."
The young man nodded, face stony. "My father wanted to come himself, but he bid me ask your forbearance while he finalizes his part of the legalities of your new partnership." At just over twenty, Mark was the youngest person there, after the Young Master himself. "He is happy to convey that the waterwheel-powered hammer has proven a monumental success with the local smithies. He has named you equal partner in the endeavour. He conveys he is most eager to explore any other ideas you might have, and has an additional proposition for you, one which he assures you will have no bearing on your existing arrangements whether you accept or refuse-"
"And which can, of course, wait until we see to today's agenda," Madam Tayer interrupted, not entirely idly. "At the very least it can wait until we've finished introductions."
Getting ahead of yourself there, boy. Also, am I the only one who remembers Hywel is the only one who doesn't know what we're here for?
"Quite right," Master Zidar hastened to move past the impropriety. "Next is Jace Brakelond, a senior in the Horologe Clockmaker's guild."
"An honor." The man had several 'bandaids' on his face – another of Hywel's creations, and currently the major source of Tayer's income, at that – a testament to how thoroughly and often he shaved despite being one of those unfortunate men whose blood ran perilously close to the surface of his skin. "I also count a fairly able jewelsmith among my friends. I am actually representing him today as well, as he is working on an unexpected high-profile commission."
Good thing he didn't drop it, or we really wouldn't be able to call what we're doing 'discretion' even in our dreams.
"You know Master Orsur of course, the owner of the Merchant Adventurer merchant house. He's our current authority on domestic trade."
I'd thank you for not tossing my woe out or leaving me for last, if I didn't know the real reason. "Embattled, currently, but I'm willing to defer on my personal drama until it becomes relevant."
"Something I'm sure we all appreciate," spoke Master Burch before Melissa could. The man's diplomacy skill left much to be desired compared to his cooking, but Orsur appreciated the thought all the same. Even if he would have preferred to find out now if he should expect more than passive aggressiveness from Blackthorn.
"And finally, next to me is my son, Beran. You'll be delighted to know that he's now the world's first creator of a working oil distillery!"
"Fractal distillery." Seeing as Zidar himself was nearing his fifties, his son was actually thirty himself. The man stood and nodded at Master Wayland. "Your design worked just as you described. Samples have already been delivered to our local alchemist of mutual acquaintance for testing. I foresee much business in the future, regardless of how today goes."
Finally, everyone was seated. Quiet. Watching. Waiting. The empty seat at the head of the table loomed strangely in the lull.
"I'm glad to meet everyone," Wayland Hywel finally said when the bizarreness of the situation had been sufficiently indulged. "Now could someone please tell me why we're all here?"
Yes, could someone please do that?
"Quite." Mason Zidar finally did what a host should have done via their original invitation. "Master Wayland. As the ultimate source of all our best and newest breakthroughs, we would like to hear your thoughts on establishing a new guild."
The other two parts of Chapter 7, as well as Chapter 8, are available on Patreon, Ko-fi and Subscribestar.
Simonbob
Well-known member
In the Kingdom of Stupid Evil, the honest merchant suffers.
What a mess. I'm wondering how many people have just.... left? Worked for their passage, sold everything and paid for an escort, etc.
It's not going to be easy, sure, but I'd walk a mile on broken glass to get out of that shithole.
What a mess. I'm wondering how many people have just.... left? Worked for their passage, sold everything and paid for an escort, etc.
It's not going to be easy, sure, but I'd walk a mile on broken glass to get out of that shithole.
Karmic Acumen
Well-known member
That's the thing, you'd think they'd be many, but even if they did get past the ACTUAL bandits that have to settle for the outskirts (and will never see repercussions for preying on these very people), where can they go? Dalaran only accepts mages, Strom would refuse or discriminate against them from being from Alterac, that leaves Lordaeron. Some do go there, but this has been going on for so long that Lordaeron isn't at all gung ho about 'refugees' from a country never oficially at war anymore. If you can contribute to their country, sure, but there's no such thing as welfare or pensions in these economies. That's considered matters of savings and family. Also, feudal lords tend to have opinions about having to take in people without land to go with it.
Stormwind is the only place with unsettled frontier left, and that's not a task for the weak or elderly.
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