1st month 4th day, 968

  Victor

  I tried to track the raptor, but to no avail - I don’t have any fancy supernatural skills or magic or anything, just what I learned in the boy scouts and honed as a private hunter. Damn it - Maera’s run back to the Darklord, no doubt, but I really hope I’m wrong and she’s actually gone her own way for real. Two whole days and nothing. I’d been outsmarted by a friggin dinosaur - okay I’ll admit that’s kind of an honor, but shoot - what the hell was I gonna do about Maera now?

  “Sir Victor,” Illiana said, holding me tightly.

  Right. I knew the answer. “Don’t lose hope.” That’s what those deep green eyes that had the lustre of finely polished emeralds were telling me. I smiled, of course, and kissed my princess on her lovely brow. I looked in my rearview mirror: Sylfie was in the back seat lookin’ dejected, but Mal and Rayna were tending to her at this time. Guy was riding shotgun, using my binoculars to scan the horizon for any signs of a large black theropod - one who snuck into a camp, cut through a canvas tent, and chewed through magic ropes before sneaking back out.

  Damn it, there was so much I didn’t understand about what happened. Nobody saw them leave - how had they passed unseen?

  We had some of Ramon’s elite defenders watching Maera’s tent, and I had been assured they were trustworthy - otherwise I’d never have just run off on a picnic the way I had done. If I thought them incapable of guard duty I’d have volunteered the night shift myself - yeah I was kicking myself for this, hard. But you can bet I chewed the guardsmen out when I found out what happened; they claimed they hadn’t been drinking, or sleeping on the job, but I’m calling shenanigans. They said that they didn’t see anything, and that the party was so loud they couldn’t hear much either.

  Anyway. After we’d spent a few hours driving a zig-zag northeast, the direction the Dreadmoor is in more or less, Sylfie received an urgent transmission from Nenewyn; so we took Velasco and Detective Eloyd back to Rivercrown and resumed our search. We spent two whole days driving around searching in earnest but today I was working on another project entirely; one we’d promised to do and couldn’t put off any longer.

  There we were at our next destination - some large town in one of the minor kingdoms in Ravendale; yeah, I thought it was a funny coincidence, too. I made it a point to park the car a few blocks away from the main town square, and then I had everyone position themselves around the square while I got up on a nearby hawker’s stage. In one hand I had a stack of papers, a little something I had made in Rivercrown, and the other one was pressed against my cheek - all the better to project my voice.

  “Extra, extra, read all about it!” I cried, yeah, I went there. “War is canceled, Prince Ramon and Prince Marco reconcile without any loss of life! Read all about it!”

  I got quite a crowd gathered around me as I began passing out papers to interested parties. There were many cries of surprise as more and more people began to share their copy of the paper with others. It was written in common, of course, and plainly spelled out a summary in the headline: “Civil War Ends Without a Fight”. But if you thought I set this up without there being some kind of hidden purpose you haven't been paying attention.

  I whispered to Illiana, who was busy at work casting comprehension on people who couldn't read, and healing random sick people. “I marked three, how about you?”

  She nodded, “There was a dejected gentleman wearing an apron, a man in a fancy hat looking rather irritated, and a very nervous man hiding in the alley.”

  Same page, she and I. “Those are the ones. I'll give the signals.”

  With a subtle nod and a very specific hand sign, I signaled Rayna and Mal to go down the alley - as we discussed they went right past the suspicious looking person while flirting, feigning an innocent back alley tryst. To Guy, I pantomimed a hat and a beard; he approached his target with a gregarious greeting. Finally, I tapped my ears in Sylfie’s direction - she immediately sent a transmission, and I informed her who she was looking for in my reply.

  It should be obvious that whenever you tell people that the war they were afraid of ain’t gonna happen, most of them will generally consider it good news. These three guys didn't seem very happy at the moment, I mean sure there were people that look like they didn't believe it, but these three were blatantly bothered. Two of them checked out, but one of them was exactly what we suspected.

  The man with the apron was a disappointed arms merchant, not a nice guy by any means, but not a black order spy either. The man with the top hat was suffering from a rather nasty bout of lower digestive tract distress - Illiana cured him and his mood improved drastically. As for the Third guy, Mal had a lot to say about him.

  “I believe we call this hitting pay dirt, old boy,” he said. “He is a low-ranking member of the black order. What's more, I convinced him to reveal where their local hideout is.”

  “How did you manage that?”

  “Quite simple, really: I used one of Fayd's passphrases. These bumpkins don't even know that the man is dead and, well, how could they?”

  Rayna said, “Meanwhile I pretended to not understand Common because he was looking at me nervously.”

  Mal said with a bow, “To be fair he's probably never seen a warrior-princess of the Northlands before - you do cut a striking figure after all.”

  “Oh stop, Malcolm, I'm no princess; my father’s not even a thane let alone a king.”

  “Come now, watch! I'll even carry you like one”

  At that point the funniest thing happened. Malcolm actually hoisted Rayna up, and struggled to hold her aloft - she laughed her ass off even as he grunted and strained, but eventually she tapped him on the shoulder and let herself down. Another guy called Malcolm had the perfect quote for this, but I ain’t repeating it. A valiant effort, all things considered, but I had a hunch that making her laugh was his actual goal - decisive victory.

  After waiting a moment for Illiana to heal Malcolm’s sprained shoulders, we completed our primary errand and delivered Ramon’s decree to the local magistrate. Then, we drove out into the woods to an old abandoned-looking wooden house.

  “That’s likely the place,” said Mal.

  “Great. Everyone knows what to do?”

  They nodded, Sylfie still looked sad even though she was trying to smile resolutely. Once inside, a man in a black cloak led us into a dank basement where there was some kind of bloody circle inscribed on the ground - the leader of this cell was standing in the center with a kris in his hand. The doors were suddenly shut, my friends feigned surprise - they didn’t realize we were fully armed, our weapons hidden by Mal’s glamers.

  “Master, I brought you some sacrifices!” Mal did a spin, with a mad grin, and sauntered towards the center.

  Rayna cried out something in Nordian while, to paraphrase Hamlet “sawing the air too much with her hands”.

  Then Sylfie placed a hand on her breast and faked fainting onto Illiana’s shoulder. “Oh, Malcolm why?” Her acting was pretty cheesy. “I thought you loved us, your faithful harem, O woe is I for I am betrayed!”

  Ah, yes the sweet tang of Vermont Cheddar - ugh.

  Malcolm spun around, his arms spread wide and a mad grin on his face, “Haha! You fell right for my trap!” He sauntered behind the cult leader and started to prance about. “I lured you all here, sacrifices for our god! Glory to the Mastermind!”

  “You bastard, you were like a brother to me!” Guy said, stiffly “Such despair, ah, I’ve never known it!”

  I sighed internally, trying to look angry rather than how I really felt - like a disappointed drama teacher. I had as lief the town crier had spoke my lines, indeed.

  “Thou art a knave and a faithless coward,” I said, “A viper such as thee can hardly be called a man!”

  Mal grinned and said, “What is a man, if not a miserable little pile of secrets? Yes, secrets! For instance…”

  He did a pirouette, put a hand on the leader's shoulder, leaned in real close, and said to him “...The fact that The Mastermind is dead, and so are you!”

  Mal unceremoniously plunged a dagger into the cult leader’s back. The rest of us sprung into action - it was a massacre. These goons were small fry, not even as strong as the guys I’d flattened with my Cadillac whenever I first got summoned to this world. We took such valuables as could be had, and liberated a pair of prisoners. Once confident that the place was empty everyone started to pile into the car but I stopped Sylfie for a moment.

  “Hey,” I said. “What exactly happened between you and Maera anyway?”

  Sylfie sighed. “You clearly aren’t going to drop it, and, well, I suppose it won’t do to keep anything from you. Let me start out with a question: what do you know about the five archmages who were murdered by way of spellscourge?”

  I said, “Well there was Merlinda who was Mal’s grandma and your teacher, Tarian who’d been Nenewyn’s master, and Gandore who literally shaped the land in Andalon…but come to think of it, I don’t know a thing about the other two.”

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  Sylfie nodded. “One of the others was an eastborn elf woman by the name of Mihoshi; she attended the University around the same time Nenewyn did and was renowned in her homeland, the Dragon Sea.”

  I’d heard of that place a few times already; according to Illiana’s observation from back whenever I was first showing her my phone, Kenny Sakamoto resembles the people from there. I reckon Maera could pass for Japanese, for sure, and Illiana had asked her if she was Eastborn.

  “I’ve heard of Eastborn," I said, “Ain’t Maera’s mom one?”

  Sylfie shook her head. “The darklord claims so, but I’ve reason to believe that was a lie - because his claim is in and of itself absurd.”

  “I don’t understand. What is it about the Eastborn that makes her mom being one absurd?”

  “Then let me enlighten you about them,” Sylfie said. “They aren’t as numerous as Woodborn, or even Highborn - they only live in a very small, isolated area and most of them don’t leave their home country for they have a strong sense of family and rarely would deign to leave their clans. Mihoshi was an exceptional wizard, innovative and beautiful both, wherever she went she was the talk of the town. That a rarity such as her even attended the Grand University of Magic was more than a wonder, it was unheard of. Follow?”

  I nodded, and Sylfie continued. “According to Maera, her mother died of an illness; we elves are very resistant to normal diseases. When I questioned her about this, she specified that her father had told her the name of what killed her mother: Spellscourge. Given what you know, now, surely you must realize why this is impossible.”

  “Why? Hmm…” I considered for a few moments. “If one of her folk showing up was a big deal…then one dying would be an even bigger deal. There might be some record of it.”

  She pointed at me, “Precisely! Nenewyn went to the Dragon Sea with my brothers - why is unimportant, but she had the presence of mind to contact me about it and ask if I wanted anything from there…I asked her to enquire with Mihoshi’s surviving relatives - her own grown son confirmed that she’d not left home in almost a hundred years before visiting the university.”

  “So if she never left home for that long, there’s no way she could have given birth to a half-elf way out in the boondocks, not one as young as Maera.” I think I’m starting to see it. “Judging by what you said about rarity and records, am I to infer that Mihoshi was the only eastborn who died back then?”

  Sylfie nodded. “Yes. After Nenewyn was done in the far east I asked her to return to the Grand University of Magic and check the records - she confirmed that not only was Archmage Mihoshi the only eastborn elf to die from Spellscourge, she was and is still to this day the only eastborn elf to ever attend in the first place! I knew it, you see, for I was surprised when I first saw her…right before she…”

  She flinched then calmly took a deep breath through her nose. “Nevermind the ridiculous idea that the high and mighty Eastborn would ever condescend to allow one of their daughters to be a mistress for some human tyrant, and if he’d taken one against her will, there would have been a war of legendary proportions to rescue her. Let me impress this upon you once more: Maera’s mother isn’t an eastborn elf. But even if I’m wrong, the fact that the Darklord made up such a paper-thin lie about the woman dying of such a specific localized event leads me to suspect that he killed this poor woman - whoever she was.”

  I nodded, “So that was a lot of preamble, am I to infer you told Maera all this?”

  Sylfie nodded. “She wasn’t prepared to hear it - that it’s likely that the darklord murdered her mother and has been lying about her identity. She cried, screamed hatred at me personally. I thought perhaps she’d think about it overnight, so I left her alone thinking it was for the best to not interfere further. I brought her breakfast the next morning and she was gone - thanks to my folly.”

  “Folly my ass! Listen, this ain’t your fault; sometimes people have a hard time whenever someone tells them a fact that breaks the lies they've been told their whole lives. Besides who the hell coulda predicted that her dinosaur was gonna bust her out?”

  Now it was my turn to get dramatic, breaking Shakespeare’s rules about gesticulation.

  ”I mean come on! Look at me! I’m usually on top of stuff like that, but did I think to raptor-proof the camp? Did I say get Bob Peck on the phone? No! Because I didn’t even imagine that Misty’d go all Homeward Bound on our asses.” I scratched my head. “Er, that’s a movie - gah, I’ll explain it later. Point is…”

  She said “You’re trying to cheer me up. It’s not unappreciated…it’s just…”

  Once more she cast her gaze down. I scratched my head…Yeah I see where she’s coming from, it doesn’t make her feel any less responsible. Well, me neither - I should have heeded my own damn advice and expected the unexpected; and I call myself a Batman fan! That said, I can’t just not try to help brighten Sylfie’s mood; shoot we may not be legally family yet but as far as I'm concerned "she's just as good as", to paraphrase the best literary mom. Then suddenly, as I was stretching my neck I happened to glance back at the hideout we’d just cleared…and a lightbulb went off.

  “Sylfie, do you wanna blow something up?”

  Her eyes widened and her hand rose to cover her mouth. “Blow something up?”

  I nodded and stuck a thumb backwards, “Look, we got an old abandoned wooden house that nobody’s gonna miss - why don’t you use whatever the most powerful spell in your arsenal is and just blast it to smithereens? Me and Smokey Joe used to purchase toilets and other things at the local junkyard and then destroy them with home-made explosives - it’s a great way to let out some anger, you should try it!”

  Sylfie thought for a moment, and then nodded. “I know just the spell, but we’ll need to be ready to drive away really fast.”

  Shortly, we joined the others in the Cadillac. With Rayna riding shotgun, Sylfie was going to need to sit in her lap, at least for the first stretch of the drive. I turned on the engine, and hovered my foot over the gas pedal. Our pint-sized Mage leaned out of the window and began a long incantation.

  “O flames of creation hotter than the sun,

  Gather in my hand, my will be done,

  Let my foes turn to ash and ‘pon the wind scatter,

  Let mighty towers fall and mountains shatter,

  Let the fools before me face obliteration,

  By the power of my conflagration!

  Fireblast!”

  In a furious display of raging fire accompanied by an earth-shaking boom, the house wasn’t just destroyed: it was obliterated. I’m talking nothing left, the whole thing was blasted to kingdom come, it was reduced to burning splinters that turned to ash! My dear future sister-in-law cheered exuberantly as I floored it. I saw through my rear view mirror that she cast another fireball at it plus a fire ray for good measure. Good grief she must have had a lot of pent up frustration! Once she sat back down she was smiling with her eyes closed and humming a little bit - I’d seen Illiana do that too, actually. Did it work?

  “So,” I said, “What do you call that one?”

  “Fireblast. Functionally it's a stronger version of fireball. An expert grade spell that uses, let's see…” Sylfie counted on her fingers,”...Fire, kinetic, and sonic to create a high pressure explosion with more impact than the standard advanced-grade fireball. But as you saw it also has a much longer incantation, and it takes a lot more out of me.”

  She took a deep breath and smiled, "You were right, I do feel better. All right we should probably catch everyone else up on what we discussed.”

  I nodded, and we summarized the gist of it.

  At the end of it I said, “Well I'm just glad the operation went mostly smoothly…”

  Rayna said, “What do you mean mostly?”

  Mal seemed to realize what I was driving at, and grimaced.

  “Don't give up your day jobs.” I said.

  Rayna clicked her tongue. “My day job involves fighting monsters for fun and profit, why would I quit?”

  Sylfie sighed. “Regardless, finding the black order's main stronghold for this region must needs remain our top priority.”

  Guy said, “But still, could we not have found the Fourth Seat's base of operations by questioning them?”

  “A splendid point, Sir Guy!” Mal said, “Unfortunately, no such luck. The location is on a need to know basis, and this particular cell didn't need to know.” He slumped. “If it only were that easy…”

  As soon as we were clear of the woods, Sylfie Vanished in a puff of smoke, leaving behind her clothing on Rayna's lap. Naturally she hadn't really disappeared, because she emerged a few seconds later as a calico cat and jumped on the floor, bracing herself. Time to go 0 to 60 in 7 seconds!

  I said, “Don't worry, we'll nail Mohlda. But before that, we got to get these people home. Hey, how you guys doing back there?”

  Sylfie had given up a seat for the human lady, though Guy had offered first, while the other prisoner was so small that he fit in the footwell behind me - speaking of which, he spoke up first:

  “I'm feeling swell, Master Kirkland! I must say this is a spectacular vehicle you have - marvelous, marvelous! I can't tell you how grateful I am for your rescue! If you ever find yourselves in my home town, I insist you join me and the missus for dinner!” He groaned, “Oh, she is certain to give me the third degree for being away from home for so long…I am in so much trouble.”

  Richard Ralston Rodrizzle was a gnome, the second I had ever met. Some kind of merchant, I gathered.

  The female prisoner said, smiling, “If she is a good and faithful wife, she will understand. Neither of us asked to be captured by those horrible men.”

  Maria, no surname given, was in real bad shape when we found her; but thankfully Illiana was able to heal her. According to her there had been others before, but they were taken away…she could hear their screams in the night. There were empty cells with blood stains, but no bodies…I had to wonder what they did with them.

  Anyways, we dropped Maria off back at her house: she was a resident of the town where we had just been passing out flyers.

  “Thank you,” She said, with a bow. “I’ll be certain to spread the word about Red Lightning.”

  Everyone gave their well-wishes to Maria and we drove into the sunset; well not that it was sunset yet. Our gnomish passenger had switched to riding shotgun to better direct us towards his destination; Sylfie was still a cat.

  “All right Mr Rodizzle, where can we take you?”

  “Well, this town was my destination originally, but as you can see I've lost my wagon and therefore my considerable payload of cheese… oh it's probably too much to ask to take me all the way home so perhaps a trading post along the way”

  “Where did you say you were from again?”

  “Tin City, the greatest gnome city, and don't let any of those know-it-alls from Rockbottom tell you otherwise!”

  This actually piqued my interest quite a bit. “Is Tin City just a name?”

  “Well no, of course not, it's named after the abundance of tin mines in the nearby mountains; why, our main export is tin goods - pure ingots included! Where do you think The Adventurer's Guild gets the tin for their tin and bronze chips?”

  Oh hell yes. I knew what that meant. But wait, I couldn't just assume that I was right. ”Hey, you wouldn't happen to have a problem with wolframite in those mines would you?

  “Name a tin mine that doesn’t have an issue with that wretched parasite of a mineral, and I’ll show you cheese that doesn’t taste even better melted!”

  I grinned, and said, as I slapped on my aviators, “Well I was fixin’ to take you all the way home no matter what, but, now that you’ve told me about the wolfram, I’m more than willing: I’m excited.”

  Illiana said, “Huh? What’s so exciting about junk metal, Sir Victor?”

  “Two words, darling: tungsten carbide.”