Chapter 50 - Schrodinger's Wizard

“And you didn’t see him at all?” asked Jagapan, fixing me with his mismatched stare. We were back in his tent and in addition to Kril and my Fangs we were joined by Sulk, his wife Kayla as well as Jagapan’s wife, Habene.

“It seems a remarkable coincidence,” said Kayla with a faint smile.

“I haven’t laid eyes on him since he left this tent yesterday!” barked Kril. “Jagarnyn manners don’t include accusing guests of crimes do they?” The missing “wizard” and his guards had been noted come the dawn.

“No one said anything about crimes. Perhaps a secret meeting with him out in the plains? He was seen walking out alone last night. Strange, though. He never went anywhere without at least two of his guards,” Habene said softly from behind her mask. Jagapan removed his brass eyeball, put it in his mouth and rolled it around for a moment before spitting it out and slotting it back into his socket.

“I want no friendly dealings with Urkash,” I said firmly. It was a simple truth.

“Fucking shit-sitters,” muttered Jandak from my right.

“Shit-sitters or not I appear to have misplaced an emissary from a mighty southern lord. There may be consequences for my people,” Jagapan glared at me once again. I was getting used to it now. The bronze orb had been off putting at first but now it was just part of who he was to me, despite his method of cleaning it.

“The steppe can be dangerous at night,” Kril said with a shrug and a toothy smile.

“It can indeed. Small bands, let alone a single man, should take care that nothing ill befalls them as they travel,” Habene replied pointedly.

“What about the trade?” asked Kril to change the subject. “We’ve more herbs to exchange. King Mond has taken a liking to the fine cushions you use. If you have some for barter we’d gladly take them off your hands.”

“You can trade when we’re done here. Speak to Gentakal, his family makes the cushions. I’m afraid I cannot allow Sulk to go with you,” said Jagapan flatly. Sulk bristled a little but Kayla put a hand on his shoulder and he stilled.

“I cannot. But if you wish to trade for more metal or can tell me more about your dagger I’d be happy to offer you good prices,” Sulk grumbled.

I glanced at Kril who nodded. Plan B then.

“The offer remains open to you and all the Jagarnyn. If you ever find yourself in need of warriors the Mondyn will come to your aid. We’ll be heading for the Palliat Pass to winter in the north. You would be welcome to join us.” Kril had drilled me on the correct language to use for this possibility last night and I’d repeated it verbatim.

“I’ll remember your offer. I think the Koprigyn will not be happy with you though!” Jagapan replied gruffly.

We exchanged some small talk, during which Kayla caught my eye and winked at me. Was she working for us or against us? I couldn’t be sure but I didn’t want to try and force the issue with Sulk and the king. I’d just have to hope things worked out in the end. My old job had been so much simpler. Get access to someone and kill them. None of this swaying them to my cause bullshit. I sighed as we left the tent and Kril scurried off to do some final trades.

“Let’s get back to camp and pack up. We’ll set off as soon as Kril is back,” I ordered and my captains grinned back at me, happy at the thought of heading home.

“Finally! I need to wed Haylin soon you know! She was pretty pissed off about Lady Fayala getting married before her!” Jandak grumbled.

“I’ll get you a nice wedding gift,” I promised although I had no idea what would be appropriate. I couldn’t afford a thousand Souls to get him a fancy knife! “What about you two?” I asked Mune and Kos.

Kos blushed bright red and Mune cackled in his best impersonation of Kril.

“It might be an idea to keep some of your captains free and easy for the sake of political marriages in the future. There’ll be your sons and any daughters you have in the future but close friends are nearly as good and you don’t have to wait a decade for the union!” laughed Mune. I gave him a flat look but concluded that if they were happy with arranged marriages who was I to judge?

Kril returned with a number of women following him who were carrying large wrapped bundles of things that looked soft. My heart warmed. No more sitting on the cold ground in my tent! If we were going to winter in the north we’d need to look at more furniture and cushions, possibly felt mats would help at least a bit for the prisoners and the poorer freemen, or the chill could begin to cause health problems.

I loaded all the goods into my dimensional pocket inside my tent then we finished breaking camp and rode back towards Mondit. A group of Jagarnyn riders shadowed us for half a day but they turned back eventually and Glimpse made sure none of them turned around to resume trailing us. We were free and clear. I’d failed to recruit Sulk but it seemed we’d made a good start towards a possible future alliance.

We skirted north of Areskit and made camp well out into the wilderness. My bird's eye view assured me we were alone and once our tents were up and the animals hobbled I led the warriors a few hundred metres off to one side. I spent the mana for my storage space and dumped out the corpses of the four bandaged men. I nudged them into a pile with one foot.

“I don’t know if Grell is alive or dead. He’s very much ‘Schrodinger's Wizard’ right now.” They looked at me blankly, not understanding the reference. “I mean I don’t know what to expect when I pull him out.”

I ordered everyone but the Fangs and Kril to form into three blocks, carefully positioned around the circumference of a circle so they could shoot arrows into the centre without risk of misses hitting a comrade on the far side. Once I was happy with the positioning I moved to the next phase.

“Draw!” I yelled and arrows were knocked and pulled back, all of them aimed at the pile of zombie flesh in the middle of their formation. I stepped forward into the kill zone and pulled Grell out, letting him fall onto the remains of his guards.

He spluttered awake as he landed and rolled to the side but I was on him in a flash. A single blow rang his bell to knock the sense out of him as I snatched off his rings and tossed them towards Kril. I moved backwards slowly as he regained his senses. He glanced around frantically and his eyes went wide as the realisation that he wasn’t in his tent anymore sank in quickly.

“Urkash will take revenge for anything that happens to me!” he snapped angrily. I waved a hand and conjured a ball of blue-white fire near his head that made him shy away and stumble over the zombie bodies. As the realisation his undead guards had been returned to their natural state hit him he swallowed convulsively.

“Have you got any more enchanted items on you, ‘wizard’?” I asked coldly. His eyes flashed to his now bare fingers and he grimaced.

“I am a mighty wizard trained by Haskat the Wise in service of the House of Mortimer of Urkash. I demand guest rites and the return of my possessions.” He narrowed his eyes at Kril who was currently juggling with half a dozen of his rings.

“I thought old Morty would have had a sense for talent. Maybe you’re just an idiot who managed to slip through. Rich parents maybe?” I asked.

“My family is one of the wealthiest in Urkash! A handsome ransom will be paid for my safe return. It was an honour to be chosen to attend the magical academy the King has established and had nothing to do with my birth right,” he blustered.

“How many? Students I mean,” I snapped.

“More than the stars in the sky! More than-” I blurred forward to punch him just as a bolt of orange fire appeared and slammed into my chest, ruining my green tunic. I pulled the burning scraps away noting most of the damage had been cancelled out by my Resist All bonus from the Life tree. I’d lost a whopping two hit points. I had missed an item on him somewhere…

I spent twenty mana and launched a bolt of my own to the ground just to his right. A ball of white hot fire exploded, showering him with dirt and leaving a glassy depression in the soil like something had taken a metre and half wide bite out of the earth. That was nice. I hastily spent one hundred and sixty Souls to boost the diameter of the detonation up to six and a half metres cubed and launched another bolt, considerably further away from the man, to his left.

This new bolt was like a mini sun had opened up to devour a chunk of soil and air. A volume the size of a small house was encompassed in the white fire, leaving a deep dish-shape of glowing dirt and glass when it vanished.

“Hand it over. Now.” My voice was laced with death, if he didn’t obey he knew it would be his end. He jerked a necklace over his head and tossed it at my feet.

“How many students?” I asked again, in a more friendly tone this time.

“About three hundred, lord,” he stammered, clutching his night robe around himself like a girl caught changing clothes.

“So there are three hundred fake wizards working for him?”

“No lord. Three hundred per year. This is the second year since the founding,” he replied quickly. Shit. By the end of winter there could be nearly a thousand of these bastards running around with shit tier trinkets.

“How does he keep control of you? Giving you trinkets and letting you run free… It would be impossible to keep track of you all.”

“How does anyone keep control of someone? Hostages, lord. My family will be killed if I don’t return within a year. My children…” his lip began to quiver and he stuttered into silence.

“Jandak, strip him to check he’s not hiding anything else then give him a tunic and hold him prisoner,” I said flintily. I didn’t want his family to be killed but there was fuck all I could do about it now. He had tried to kill me a moment ago so my code was happy enough. “I’ll have more questions for him. Kril, if there’s any you can think of let me know.”

“Are we giving him to the women when we get back?” asked Kos in a bloodthirsty voice.

“Maybe,” I muttered. I had no intention of letting the poor bastard be tortured to death. I’d kill him cleanly if I had to. Grell was led away under guard to be strip searched and I eyed the dead zombies. We’d need to identify all the trinkets. The raise dead ones would be kept aside but the others could be shared among my warriors.

“I’ll grill him over these,” said Kril, showing me a pouch with Grell’s trinkets mixed together within. “The undead summoning ones are going in the fire. Klip can reforge them into something useful.” Kril spat to one side of me.

“Fine. I’m looking forward to getting home,” I said with a slight smile. Another fireball removed the dead zombies from existence.

“I want a trinket to do that and you’re still thinking with the wrong spear!” Kril chuckled, slapping me on the shoulder.

Shortly after noon two days later we crested a ridge and looked down on Mondit. As soon as we became visible one of the three columns of horse archers doing exercises in the area, each of which was fifty riders strong, peeled off and galloped towards us. They slowed as they spotted the chariots and waved as they drew close.

“Mond!” called the leader of the troop. “Hakubin has sent a trader! His new Dreamer is trying to drive a hard bargain! Klip tried to kill the man last night!”

“Who’s the new Dreamer?” snapped Kril as he whipped our horses and we rattled down the slope towards my little town.