Phantasm

Of all the ways to travel, by carriage was the slowest, most uncomfortable, and almost the most expensive. Nevertheless, that was the way I’d chosen to travel to Dorsay. Well almost. There was no road from Talnier, so we’d taken a boat down to Anchorbury, made a few more purchases, and hired a carriage there. Now though….

“How much longer are we going to be walking for? It’s a little too late in the year for this to be enjoyable.” Despite her complaining, Janie was showing no sign of discomfort. We hadn’t been running, just doing the occasional jog to ensure that we didn’t fall too far behind, and it wasn’t that cold. Even if it had been snowing, I was pretty sure she had a personal heating spell.

“I was expecting the complaints to come from Cutter,” I joked. “You’re being outdone by a kid.”

“I’m not a kid!” Cutter complained. “And I can run faster than any of you!”

I smiled at him. He was probably right, he had the highest [Running] skill, anyway. He lost a bit in stats and Level, but no one else here was focused on [Agility] like he was.

“You doing alright, Maslin?” I asked. He would have fallen behind long ago if we’d been travelling seriously, but at this speed, he seemed to be fine.

“Yes ma’am,” he said seriously. “But I still don’t understand why we didn’t take the carriage.”

“If you’d ridden in it for much longer, you’d understand,” I said, with feeling.

You have defeated Victor de Bargougne in an Intrigue. You have earned 245 XP

“But the real reason just popped up,” I said, eyeing my latest notification. “Let’s pick up the pace, I think it worked.”

We all started running. Unencumbered by luggage, it was easy enough for even the youngest of us to jog faster than a normal human could sprint.

While we had hired a carriage, we’d stopped as soon as we were out of sight of the city, and swapped with another group. Following behind, out of sight, but not too far back, we quickly caught up with them.

Rounding a hill, we found the carriage. I’d expected the attack to come deeper into the hills, but they’d chosen the first available ambush ground. Not that it had done them any good. I could see that temporary walls of stone around the carriage had kept it safe. As for the attackers…

“About time you got here!” Thomas called up as we approached, “We’re almost finished cleaning up!” The black-skinned [Duellist] was dragging two corpses back to the foot of the walls, where I could see three more had been collected.

At his words, two heads popped up from behind the walls, apparently having climbed up onto the carriage. Sofia and Holly, a [Warden] and a [Steel Arcanist], had apparently been waiting there while Thomas did all the work.

“Hello!” Holly said. With a gesture, she dissolved the walls around the carriage and I could see that it was intact. Even the illusion of myself was still clearly visible sitting at the window. “I told you we’d keep it undamaged.”

“Thanks for that,” I replied. “I didn’t want to have to pay for a replacement.”

With the walls down, the final member of the party was revealed. Faruthe wasn’t properly a member of the Steel Rangers, but I’d budgeted for four Level Sixes, and there weren’t any four-person teams of that level in Talnier. He was a lion-kin - one of the tribal adventurers that had come to delve Talnier’s dungeons, but he wasn’t averse to doing work for pay. He was carrying his longbow in one hand and his top-heavy falchion was by his side.

From the look of it, he and Sofia had stayed safe behind the walls while shooting the unfortunate attackers. As a [Beast-speaker], one of the special tribal [Professions], he could sight his shots through his bonded beasts.

“They had an [Illusionist],” he told me, getting up from the ground where he’d been sitting. He shook his mane of orange-blond hair. “But not one of sufficient skill to fool me.”

“Or me!” Sofia called out. Her bow was a much more obviously crafted item, recurved and reinforced in places. Faruthe’s bow looked for all the world like a quarterstaff — much thicker than I was used to thinking of bows — and hadn’t been touched by tools. According to [Identification], it was made of living wood which probably explained how it could be bent at all.

Between the thickness of the bow, and Faruthe’s [Strength], I was pretty confident that he could put an arrow through a tank’s armour — and out the other side.

“I was fooled,” Thomas admitted, “But an invisible person with an arrow in them isn’t really hiding anymore.”

“Which one is he?” I asked, looking at the corpses. They all looked like fighter-types to me.

“I still haven’t gotten him yet,” Thomas said. “He was in the back, and started running early.”

“Arthior is marking the spot,” Faruthe said, pointing towards a hill about three hundred meters away. I looked and was surprised to note that I could clearly see his hawk from that distance.

[Identification]: - Aurelis Hawk - Male - Bonded

Never mind 20/20, this is like 100/20, I thought. I really should have noticed by now, especially with all the outdoor time I was getting, but I just hadn’t really looked at something as distant as that until now.

“Wow, the bandits out here are really something,” I said.

Thomas laughed. “Bandits? These aren’t bandits. There’s no way bandits would have a mage.”

“Or this equipment,” Holly put in. “Nothing but Excellent grade. These were paid mercenaries.”

“Nah,” I said. “I’m willing to bet that by the time we get to the next town, there will be bounty notices up for them, no doubt accused of stealing all this equipment that you found on them.”

“This was an Intrigue?” Thomas spat with distaste. “You got a notification?”

“Who was it?” Sophia asked.

“Someone of high enough rank that you don’t want me to answer that question,” I replied.

“We can narrow it down though,” Holly mused. “There aren’t that many nobles that would be pissed off by your Council enough to assassinate you.”

“Oh, you’d be surprised,” I said sourly.

“They were after you then,” Thomas mused, “The [Illusionist] was to counter you.”

“They underestimated her then,” Sofia said. “She’s a better [Illusionist].”

I shrugged. “Hard to tell that without a direct comparison to work off, and I doubt their information is that good.”

“If there’s a bounty, we should see about claiming it,” Holly declared.

“How? You want to carry all the corpses into town?” Thomas asked, and Holly’s face went from greedy to disappointed. They both looked at the carriage.

“No way. For one thing, I’m taking that into the capital, and I don’t need it smelling of death.”

“We could—” Holly said, but I kept going.

“For another, we’re not supposed to have met. You were just travellers on the road who happened to get attacked — that’s if anyone asks. It would be better if no one knew to ask.”

I sighed at their puzzled looks. “Look, do you really want the Lord behind this knowing you foiled their plans?”

They all looked at each other. “Um, probably not?” Thomas said.

“Right. So if you don’t claim credit, we roll into Aldwich like nothing happened, and bad guys don’t get to know anything. They’ll assume that we beat their picked team and that we’re a lot stronger than we are. That should scare them off for a bit, at least long enough to put together a better team.”

“But if we claim credit, they know we did it,” Sofia said. “And since we’re not accompanying you to Dorsay…”

“They won’t be as hesitant,” I agreed. “Plus, there’s always the chance that they might come after you guys as revenge.”

“Pfft, let them,” Thomas snorted. I guess at Level Six he was entitled to some confidence.

“But the money…” Holly whined.

“You can still sell the equipment in Talnier,” I pointed out. “Especially if you sell to the tribal merchants, no one should care where you got it from.”

They all nodded.

“I guess you’re right,” Holly said sadly. “We’d better disappear these bodies then. You want to get the last one, Thomas?”

Thomas nodded and started bounding over to where Arthior was still circling. He covered the three hundred metres in what seemed like fifteen seconds, but that was enough time for Holly to finish her hole. She formed a pit three metres deep, extending through the dirt of the hills and into bedrock while Sofia and Faruthe started turning over the corpses.

“Anything interesting?” I asked.

“Nah, that’s mercenaries for you,” Sofia replied idly. “They don’t get in as many weird situations as adventurers, so they just get the basics.”

I left them to it, still not entirely comfortable with human corpses. I may not have killed them myself, but my decisions had led to their deaths, as surely as if I’d stuck in the knife myself. I nodded at the rest of my group and they made their way over to the carriage.

“I think we’re good from here,” I said. “We can settle up and you can get back to Talnier.”

“Money!” Holly exclaimed. She threw the corpse she’d finished searching unceremoniously into the pit and came over. I had a separate bag for each of them, and they quickly glanced inside to confirm the contents.

Man, hiring Level Sixes had been expensive. Easily the biggest expense so far, even if I considered all the new clothes as being one lump sum. At least I got a discount by letting them have the loot.

“You sure you don’t want us to escort you the rest of the way?” Thomas asked. Well, at least they come with professional ethics for the money.

“Nah, I doubt they’ll be able to put another strike team together so quickly,” I replied with a smile. “They’re sure to have someone watching the road though, so best if you weren’t seen.”

“There’s no one close enough to see us right now,” Faruthe reassured me, gesturing to his hawk, which was now flying in a large circle above us.

“Good to know. Then, we’ll part ways here.” I shook hands and headed off to the carriage, leaving them to entomb the evidence.

“Ah, what’s this? The last loose end?” I said when I got there. The carriage driver, a fairly unimpressive-looking man, had been hiding in the carriage until now. I wondered if a [Skill] was a work… I had barely remembered him and I had a [Skill] for perfect memory.

“You can’t kill me! People know where I am! There will be questions!”

“Whoa, relax! No one is going to kill you.” I helped him out of the carriage and up onto his driving seat. Then I jumped up beside him. He flinched, startled. Driving this route, he had to be a Level Four at least, but he was as jumpy as I’d been at Level Two.

“But I am going to impress on you that it would be very wise to not say what happened here to another soul.” I leaned in, just a bit, and let [Persuasion] take hold. Mostly just to calm him down. The problem with using [Skills] is that they don’t last. I could get him to agree to whatever I liked, but a week later, with me in a different town, the effect would fade to nothing. “The person who hired these killers doesn’t want anyone hearing about their failure.”

[Bargain] was a little better, as it told me what it would take for his silence. Someone could always offer more, but only if they knew to ask. A man who’s gotten a fair price should be reluctant to brave danger to seek more, and [Bargain] helped me to tell if that person would stay bought.

In this case… I smiled. “For your trouble,” I said, handing him a gold coin. More than he’d be likely to earn for the trip, but really just a nominal payment. His price was nothing — he knew I was right and was too afraid to go looking for an extra payment. Maybe he’d find his courage later, but for now, we were good.

“Just remember,” I said. “You never saw an attack. When we got here, everything was—” I looked back to where the others had been. They had cleared out already and Holly had filled in the hole like it wasn’t there, even restoring most of the grass.

“—Everything was just as you see it now.”

“R-right you are, ma’am.”

I clapped him on the shoulder and jumped back down. The capital awaited.