A Mage's Power (Journey to Chaos) (23 page)

Chapter 8
Escort
Duty

Before she could say another word, she blacked out. A human
spell scanned her and diagnosed her with Mana Depletion. From inside her lovely
robe, she pulled out a vial of glowing green liquid. Quickly kneeling at the
girl's side, she tilted Tiza's head back and poured the liquid down her throat.
Tiza awoke, coughing and sputtering.

“There, there . . .” The blond-haired woman said, “You'll be
all right now.”

Tiza punched her and scampered backwards shouting, “NO! GET
AWAY!”

“Tiza!?” Eric asked. “What's—”

“GDL! Evil! Keep her away!”

The mage looked to Eric for an explanation. “GDL?”

Eric shook his head. “I'm as confused as you are. What is
that stuff?”

Now the mage was more confused. “You're a mage. Don't you
recognize Mana Juice?” Eric shook his head. “It's mana in liquid form, heavily
diluted for safety. It will restore her strength.”

“You're lying! You always lied! I'm not drinking it!”

“Does she have to?”

The blond-haired mage hesitated. “No, but if she doesn't she
could be like this all day.”

Eric had never seen Tiza so scared before. She didn't calm
down until the blond-haired mage retreated to the back of the royal party and
even then, she hid behind her barrier with her sword forward. Eric told the
guards the rest of their story. At its conclusion, the lead knight stepped
forward and said, “On behalfffff of the royal family, I sssank you, Misss Sssprial
and Msssr . . .”

“Watley. Eric Watley.”

The knight raised their visor and his tongue slithered out.”The
ossserworlder?”

“Erm . . .yes.”

He put a hand on Eric's shoulder. “You have my ssssinceresssst
sssssympathiessss.” He jerked a thumb at Dark Staff. Only with tremendous
effort did his subordinates succeed in cuffing her. Once the sword was removed,
she put up a second fight until she was cuffed further and even then it was a
struggle to control her. “Sssshe's only the beginning. Keep your head up and
you will be ffffine.”

“Uh . . .thanks . . .”

 The party of knights and mages marched Dark Staff out of
the room, which, now that the Dark Fog had lifted, Eric could tell was a
bathroom. Tiza struggled to her feet and brushed past him.

“Let's find Daylra and Tenderfoot. I want to tell them how I
caught Dark Staff.”

They did it together, of course, but Eric felt no need to
correct her.
She
did
do most of the work..
He turned his
attention to a more interesting puzzle: why was Kasile running in the first
place?
She was in the Royal Box, surrounded by guards. If they were overcome,
why was her dress spotless?

The arena for jousters had been transformed into a true
battlefield. Clomps of ground were torn out and blood collected there like rain
puddles. Large swathes of the stands were blown off. Cries of pain and loss
replaced the cheers of joy and excitement. What caught Eric's attention was the
cause of all this damage; the field was littered with monster corpses.

Monster attacks never happened in the capital. The city
walls were charmed specifically to repel them. The ones befouling the stadium
were D-class, no stronger than the Cecri his team killed weeks ago.
There's
no way monsters THAT weak got past the ordercraft runes
.

Tiza ran out of the gate, then stumbled and wheezed. Eric
rushed to her side.

“Are you all right?”

“I'M FINE!“

She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, spreading her arms
in a half-circle, then slowly bringing her fists together in front of her
chest. She held this position for a full minute, breathing deeply. Her body
flashed and she opened her eyes. “They're over there.”

The survivors of the attack were receiving medical attention
from the stadium staff, royal mages, and Eric's teammates. Nolien was tending
to a lady with a broken arm while Basilard patched a guy with a hole in his
gut. Before Eric's eyes, muscle regrew and new skin closed the wound.

“Hey, Daylra!”

Basilard turned from the man, who was thanking him profusely,
to his student. “And where have you two been? We could have used your help.”

Tiza strutted the rest of the way. “Don't worry. We made
good use of our time.”

“Did you, now?”

“Yeah! I made a strategy and everything! She didn't know
what hit her!”

“Well, a lion doesn't expect to be defeated by a pair of
mice,” Eric muttered. Tiza swatted him.

“Tell me about it. Old Man Aaloon will want a detailed
account.”

Tiza told the story this time, with Eric chiming in when she
exaggerated. She was exhilarated by her first bit of “real” work and Nolien
looked happy to do real healing. The only one not happy was Eric. He was still
beating himself up over the fact that a greater mage overpowered him.

“So what happened here?” Tiza asked. “I've never seen so
many monsters in a city.”

“Yeah, it's a mystery,” Basilard said. “When the Dark Fog
appeared, the monsters did too.” His eyes gained an amused glint. “We had a
blast
killin' em off, didn't we, Nolien?”

The healer didn't look away from his current patient. “Oh
yes,” he said dryly. “It was absolutely thrilling.”
Could the monsters have
been a distraction? But it's impossible to control monsters . . .

The king himself appeared to apologize for the break in. If
not for the crown and scepter, Eric wouldn't have recognized him as such. His
free arm was in a sling, his crown was missing, and his clothes were torn and
stained by mud and grass. His entourage was in a similar mess.

One man at his right was in particularly bad shape. His hair
was matted with sweat and his clothes not only possessed mud but blood. He
stood tall in a ready stance, watching everywhere at once. Clearly little of it
was his own. One of the jousters ran up to him and tore his helmet off.

“Dad, are you okay!?” By his shield, it was the same boy
that received Kasile's favor.

“Yes, Siron, I'm fine,” the swordsman replied. “However, I
fear you have forgotten whose condition you should truly be concerned for,”
Siron gasped and spun to the king, kneeling in midturn. Somehow, he didn't fall
over, despite his full armor.

“Forgive me, Your Majesty, in my haste to learn the state of
my paternal sire, I have neglected to inquire the state of my royal sire. Have
you been harmed?”

“I would be more seriously . . .” The king spoke as if
reading a playwright's script. “Without the aid of Duke Selen, your valiant
father.”

Selen modestly bowed. “Your Majesty is too kind. It is the
duty of House Esrah, and my personal pleasure, to be your sword and shield.”

A herald blared fanfare, announcing the return of the royal
guard party. Dark Staff was held on a leash by the biggest among them with
every mage in the group training their staff on her. Her wrists were cuffed,
her ankles were shackled, and a collar glowing an eerie non-light was secured
on her neck.
That seems a little excessive . . .then again, she is an elf .
. .
Without her hood, her golden-brown hair and pointed ears were clearly
visible. The party escorted her to the impromptu royal court and threw her down
at the king's feet. The lead knight gave him a synopsis.

“Elf, though you have done truly terrible things today . .
.” To Eric, the king sounded strangely distant. “You shall receive mercy if you
cooperate and work for me.”

“Go to the Abyss, enforcer!” Dark Staff spat. “You temps can
go there too! You're all so stupid you can't tell that your king is—”

“Chaos has driven her mad!” the king decreed. “Lock her up.”

The guards lifted her to her feet.

“Do you have more to say to us, nonhuman?” Count Darwoss
demanded. “Your insanity has always been amusing to hear.”

 Her eyes focused on him and her whole body shook with
laughter. “So
that's
what he has planned! My role is finished and I
didn't even know it was mine! Then again, maybe it's not! Either way, I can't
wait to see the results!” The guards dragged her out of the stadium.

“What was that all about?” Tiza wondered aloud.

“Who knows?” Nolien said, “Elves are crazy; it's the chaos
in their brains.”

Eric scowled, but said nothing.

Basilard, like a professional mercenary, ignored all that
drama and focused on collecting their pay. His students found him arguing with
the royal clerk in charge of the event's budget; he wanted a bonus for
capturing Dark Staff. Eventually, they struck a compromise.

“What are we gonna do about the princess?” Eric asked.

“
We
are not going to do anything, unless they hire
us.”

Right . . . mercenaries do not care.
It was a
sobering thought, but he couldn't blame them. His chest still hurt from Dark
Staff's mana bolt.

Team Four passed the statues guarding the entrance to the
Red Town of Sword and Staff, and a feeling of forgetfulness nagged Eric. He
walked into the guild and the gold from his cut of the fee intensified it. It
wasn't until he was sitting in the guild's mess hall that he remembered.

I was supposed to meet Annala!

He gasped, which made him inhale the food he just ate. Which
made Basilard do the Heimlich maneuver. Which made Eric spit out half chewed
food on someone else's plate. Which didn't bother the mercenary using it. Which
made Eric turn green and throw up in Top Hat mercenary's top hat. Which didn't
bother him either. Which made Eric wonder what kind of people join this guild
by choice.

The next morning, Tiza ranted and raved in the guild lobby.
Before anyone asked, she shouted, “There's not a single mention of me in the
paper!”

“What do you mean?” Nolien asked.

Tiza thrust it at him like she would a smelly shoe. “It goes
on and on about the kidnapping, but nothing about me! I captured Dark Staff!”
Basilard coughed. “ . . . With help. Where's my credit!?”

Nolien shrugged. “It can't be helped. The knights were
shamed enough to admit that the princess was taken under their watch. This is
the only way for them to . . . oww!”

Basilard withdrew his hand. “You sound like a conspiracy
theorist. Tiza, the truth of the matter is that your exclusion is part of the
compromise that brought you your bonus.”

 “Huh?”

“Instead of 'Tiza Spiral and Eric Watley captured Dark Staff,’
I offered to amend the event to 'Dragon's Lair security consultants assisted
the Royal Guard in their capture of Dark Staff' in exchange for an additional
consultant fee.”

The look in Tiza's eyes was nothing short of betrayal. “What!?
Why would you . . . oww!”

Basilard withdrew his hand. “My way puts more gold in your
pocket and more guild advertising on the internet.” He showed her the screen on
his scry. “The hits on our website have skyrocketed since the paper came out.” Tiza
grumbled, but said nothing more.

“Mia, what do you have for us today?”

The perky receptionist reached into her desk drawer—Eric
didn't think she actually
kept
anything there—and pulled out a piece of
paper. It was not a mission bill but a tissue. Now that he looked closer, she
looked pale and tired. She didn't greet them. She wasn't even smiling.
She
MUST be sick.
She sneezed and crumbled up the tissue.

“Bless you,” Nolien said and Mia ripped the tissue in half,
revealing the mission bill.

“Ta-da!” she cried. Nolien stared in surprise, Tiza chuckled,
and Eric clapped.

Basilard shook his head in amusement. “Mia, where
do
you
get these ideas?”

“I have a lot of free time,” she said with a shrug. “You
know, since I can't go on missions.”

“Why not?” Eric asked. Basilard and Mia stared at him. “Long
story?” They nodded.

“The Longhorn item shop needs to be repainted,” Mia said. “The
owner will fill you in.”

Tiza continued grumbling the entire way, but by the time she
had a brush and bucket in hand, her mood improved. Nolien's steadily soured. It
reached a peak when Eric accidentally knocked over a bucket and it fell on the
healer's head. No amount of apologizing could make Nolien feel better about
being covered in sticky white paint; Tiza's laughter certainly didn't help. He
shouted the words of a nasty-sounding spell; when he paused, pushed his fists
together at his chest, and took a deep breath. Without looking up from his
dirty book, Basilard waved his hand and all the paint rose off Nolien and
dropped back into Eric's bucket.

“Thank you, Daylra,” Nolien said.

“Couldn't you have done that to the shop?” Tiza asked.

Basilard turned the page. “I don't think the owner wants a
giant paint blob on his front door.”

As calm and poised as an acrobat on a highwire, Nolien
insisted on switching places with Eric. Much to Tiza's amusement, he was later
pooped on by birds flying overhead. Later still, he “accidentally” knocked a
bucket of paint on her head.

 By the mid afternoon, Team Four somehow managed to get the
item shop looking good as new. Basilard accepted their fee and then the owner
did something surprising: he offered the novices a reward from his shop.

“You painted my shop and gave me a show. I feel I've only
paid you for the former.”

“We couldn't possibly—”

 Tiza elbowed him. “Refuse your generous offer!” To Nolien
she whispered, “What are you doing?! You don't turn down free stuff! It's
insane!”

“But it isn't polite.”

“Then don't pick anything. Don't ruin it for the rest of us.”

Stalls and barrels of merchandise were laid across the shop
like a farmer's furrows and more were on the walls. This was a store run of,
for, and by warriors: There were bottles of charmed medicine that quickly
healed injuries, bags of Eric couldn't-tell-what that were supposed to cure
aliments, and even accessories charmed to amplify abilities. What caught Eric's
eye were bottles of glowing green liquid.
This is the stuff that Tiza
refused.
He brought it to the counter. Tiza was carrying a charm of some
kind and Nolien held a bottle of cream.