Battle Mage: The Dark Mage (Tales of Alus) (18 page)

“I will,” he nodded.

Finding the alley empty save for himself, Palose looked at his pack and the unseen stone blade. Such a thing couldn’t be brought into the apartment they shared. He doubted that Atrouseon was so untrusting that he searched his possessions, but should he ever think to try, the blade would ensure his death or a more severe life of servitude at the very least.

Since he couldn’t hide the blade there, the mage decided quickly that it was time to find a place of his own as he had been debating for months. While he had stashed away a small nest egg from both what Atrouseon had given him and a larger amount that the mage had siphoned from the warlock slowly over time, he doubted that it would be enough to buy or rent a place that he could call his own.

His feet led him from the alleyway and Palose soon found his way to a building that wasn’t far from the emperor’s citadel. It was made of the stone that most of Ensolus was and it was large, though nowhere as big as the Breeding Pits that he had visited. It also didn’t carry the stench of that building either. Only the rich visited this place, which meant perhaps a tenth or a little more would ever have need for place simply called the Vault.

After walking up the eight stairs leading to the building’s doors, Palose steered towards a counter barring anyone from a wall of metal bars. Through the bars, he could see four solid metal doors sealed with magically secured locks. Only wizards could open those doors and they needed the spell which could unlock each lock. The imperviousness of such vaults mattered little to the mage. He also had the key to receiving wealth from this place.

He slid a piece of paper to the wizard behind his counter and the man looked at it critically. The signature was that of Atrouseon, who had needed his apprentice to run errands for him before including a few trips to the bank to deposit his money. There were seldom trips made to withdraw any coin as his master had a small safe in the apartment also.

“Two hundred gold coins?” the wizard questioned with a raise of his eyebrow. He looked dubious and Palose knew that he had to play the role of apprentice to a powerful, rich warlock.

Smiling like he hadn’t a care in the world, Palose said brightly, “I heard my master talking about buying a second place to conduct experiments where he wouldn’t need to worry over breaking anything. His apartment is full of treasures that are quite fragile. I’m sure you know what I mean.”

A frown from the man said that he was far from a rich wizard. He worked in a bank helping others amass wealth after all. A powerful wizard would be running the Vault or doing something more important with their time, not serving as a teller for the rich.

“I can imagine,” was all the wizard would say. After a brief incantation to verify that the warlock’s signature looked real, the man retreated through the bars and after casting several spells to open the vault, he disappeared long enough to return carrying two full bags.

The clank of coin as he placed the two bags on the counter led the wizard to lower his voice and ask, “This is a lot of coin. Will you be safe to travel home to your master?”

Placing the two sacks inside of his larger pack, Palose hefted it onto his shoulder like he felt no weight. It was hefty and the coin thumped him solidly on the shoulder with the carefree movement. Taking a slip of paper from the teller telling of his withdrawal, the apprentice replied touching the hilt of his sword, “I am a trained battle mage. Few men could dare try to take it from me.”

He turned and walked across to the doors pushing his way through them, but turned away from the apartment he and Atrouseon shared. His path led him east and the ghetto where most of the humans living inside of the cave city lived if they were not with the military or a warlock. It was there that the next part of his plan to thrive in Ensolus would begin.

Chapter 9- Home Away From Home

Ensolus consisted of a massive cavern covering miles from one end to another with Lake End occupying almost a fifth of the available area. Set on the east side of the city, it limited the land to the east to a sliver that ran north to south for about half a mile. The humans that had settled in Ensolus had made it their home hemmed in by the lake to the north and the military to the west.

Orcs of higher rank held the zone between the higher ranks of military, warlocks and the gate merchants and the lower cast humans of the eastern ghetto. Palose kept his eyes open as the streets changed from those of the nobles, human and elven officers and, of course, the warlocks to those of the orc military families. The streets were surprisingly alive with bodies going to and fro despite the winter’s biting cold.

Male orcs dressed in leather armor or occasionally even steel, pushed their way through merchants and civilians, while orc women tried to corral their children. Unlike the area of the Breeding Pits, the orcs who lived here procreated naturally in contrast to those grown in tanks. Seeming little different from humans in their needs and even actions, Palose found the change surprisingly comfortable. The biggest difference was that their skins were mostly brown and green. The people were slightly shorter than most humans and powerfully built, but those differences could be overlooked as the pulse of a living society moved about as naturally as any town in Southwall.

“Are you lost, wizard?” a gruff voice asked curiously.

Turning to note an orc carrying a large pack on his back looking at him, Palose gave a slight smile. Orcs hated seeing teeth bared at them, so he kept the gesture tight lipped. “I am just passing through to the human sector on business. It’s quite lively here today,” he added gesturing to the crowds around them.

The orc nodded and added, “Keep your pack close, wizard. Cut purses have been a bigger problem of late. Some say that they belong to the officers to fill their pouches so they do little to harness their activity.”

“Thanks for the warning,” he nodded and they continued on their individual paths.

He had come through the northern part of the orc district closest to the lake and the minimal shipyards that always made little sense to the mage. There were fish in the lake that had been brought to the cave, so there was a little fishing, but the yards had always seemed too much for a lake that went nowhere. He could even see the mast of a ship that looked large enough to ride the North Sea.

His questions pertaining to the odd shipyard were put aside as he entered the human sector. The buildings seemed drab, and the people walking the streets looking for vendors were dressed in similar tan and brown. At least, the orcs had the color of their skin to add to the look of their part of the city. Their buildings were often painted a variety of colors as well and the orcs had various dyes used in their clothing.

In contrast, this was an area that had been beaten down. People glanced at the man in his black and brown, the colors of a falcon of Southwall. Since apprentices had no true dress code in Ensolus, Palose had chosen to continue wearing the colors that he had earned before leaving his country. Simple in color, his black boots and clean clothes still stood out from the people that often looked bundled up in their extra rags. It was winter and few could afford good winter coats or gloves here.

Palose was disappointed as he looked at people that had simply given up on life. They served masters in the city making the walk to earn very little as they worked among wealth that they could not have. Though there were some merchants, many were selling food brought in to keep their plates filled with something. Clothing merchants were probably the next most common and as he walked, the mage wondered where he could find someone who could show him an apartment or building to rent or buy.

A woman of middle age selling clothes seemed somewhat cheerful as he walked up and her wares were better than much of the clothing he could see worn by the residents around them. In a happy voice, she asked, “Are you looking to buy some clothes, wizard? I have the best in this part of town. Dyed clothes of red, blue and green or some more exotic colors could even be worn to the emperor’s citadel.”

Returning the smile though not as brightly, he replied, “While I may come back to look closer when I return, I was actually hoping you could tell me where I might find someone to rent an apartment or maybe buy a small place?”

She looked disappointed, but apparently hopeful that he would return, the woman pointed to the south wall saying, “Take the next street left until you see a large building with a gate. Master Poultus owns several buildings south of the lake. He could rent you a few places since I believe some are empty right now.

“He is my uncle. If you told him that Renelley sent you and asked him to take care of her good customer, he might just go easy on a price for you.”

“Thank you, Renelley,” the young man said as charmingly as he could. “If all goes well then, I will be regularly passing by and will make sure to give you all my business.”

“Tell your friends?” she suggested less than sure.

Chuckling at the notion, Palose replied, “They might be harder to convince, but I will do what I can.”

It was a harmless bit of business to try and make another contact within the city. Merchants could be handy for other things since money often motivated their efforts and sometimes bought their loyalty as well, though the latter was easier to lose for the same reason.

Following her directions, Palose soon found the building with the gate. Compared to those around it, the structure was both larger and more intricately decorated in its stonework. It was the home of someone with wealth, perhaps the richest man in the human ghetto.

There was a chain attached to a string running out to the doors twenty feet away. Pulling on the chain, Palose could hear the ring of a bell inside of the home. It wasn’t long before an older man in his fifties exited to look at the boy at his gate. A frown, as he looked at the mage, proved that Palose didn’t seem like his normal clientele.

“What can I do for you, wizard? At least I think you are a wizard. Maybe you just work for one instead?” the man questioned as he took in the more militaristic look of his clothes designed for combat more than magic.

“I am both a wizard and work for one, but my business is with Renelley’s uncle, Poultus.”

“That would be me,” the older man announced still appearing dubious as to the mage’s need. “My niece sent you for what exactly? Get to it, boy, I am too old to waste my time in the cold when death could be at my door sooner than later.”

“Renelley told me that you might be able to either rent or sell me a property somewhere south of the lake. It doesn’t have to be too large, but it would be nice to find some place quiet.” He debated on elaborating, but decided he had said enough to begin a dialogue.

Sighing, Poultus held up a hand saying, “Well, let me get my coat then. The cave may keep snow off my roof, but the cold finds us inside and out.”

After the man returned and joined Palose on the street, he asked, “I have three vacant homes or rooms to share in two warehouses, depending on your preference.”

“Probably one the homes would be best. A bedroom, a study area and some storage would be preferable.”

“If you want quiet and privacy then maybe you would like to look at one along the wall. The entry is in front with a garage for a cart, if that would be helpful. There’s a basement, though it has no windows. The upper floor is well lit though I suppose anything within the cave still requires lamp light most of the time.” Poultus sounded less happy with his choice of homes or perhaps his choice to live inside the city where the day could be gray much of the time while the sun passed outside the cave.

They steered for the building and Palose found the house was only a couple blocks from Lake End as the stretch of land shrunk in size. It was exactly what he thought might work. The basement had a table and cabinets. He assumed a woodworker had once used the room to work. With a garage that he could raise to allow a large cart to be stored inside, Palose thought that it would help hide business quickly with such an entry.

Climbing or descending steps from the garage led to the main house or the woodworker basement. The upper floor held a large communal room with a fireplace on one side and a stove for heat and cooking on the other. Two smaller rooms extended from the chamber with doors allowing access for bedrooms. A third door concealed an indoor bathroom, since the warlocks had made sure to be able to remove refuse and bring water magically throughout the city.

Such a place would work, now came the matter of business.
“How much to rent it?” Palose asked casually.

“Three gold.”

“And to buy?”

“One hundred fifty gold,” Poultus answered just as briefly. He sounded set on his prices; but Palose knew that, like most merchants, men looking to rent buildings in this area could be negotiated with easily enough.

“One and half gold a month to rent and we can discuss the purchase after six months,” the mage stated not bothering to look at the owner.

“That is only half of what I want for this property,” the man stated with a frown. It was his job to get the price back up, of course. “Two and half gold would be more appropriate.”

“If we are going to keep playing the game of pricing back and forth we can fight onward or just settle for two gold per month with six months paid in advance,” Palose cut to the chase. While it wasn’t the cheapest he could hope for, the mage had enough for that rate and more. He didn’t want to risk spending most of what he had taken on the building if he didn’t need to since there was the possibility that he would have to leave the city at a moment’s notice. There were too many variables to play such games and the coin being available could be more necessary than owning a building on the poor side of town.

The older man nodded with a slight smile. “You are shrewd and a man that gets to the point. I like that. If you have the gold, then you have a deal.”

Fishing out the gold precipitated receiving a key from Poultus’s hand right away. Now he had a place to hide the knife and a sanctuary where he could practice his magic if need be.

After his new landlord had left, Palose spent time looking around as he worked to find a place to hide both the stone dagger and the extra gold. Since Poultus most likely had his own key and the mage would not be able to watch the place closely for awhile, it had to be a good place. The dagger and scroll he hid in a vent that allowed for heat from the main rooms to enter. It was the only way to ventilate the basement short of opening the doors.

Part of the gold he hid in a cabinet, part in the vent and the last was placed under the stove in a gap between the base and the floor. If someone found one portion, they might not look for more. Who would expect anyone to store that kind of gold in one of the poorest parts of the city after all? Someone rich enough to have two hundred gold was more likely to store it in one of the vaults in the city.

As he went to leave, Palose began to chant a spell. It was one that he had been taught by Atrouseon in fact, as he had become more trusted by the warlock. Turning the key, the spell added a second magical lock. He repeated the process on the garage door lock helping to make sure that those who might think to use a key or pick the mechanism would have to try another way. The windows on the front faced west to gather the light, but were also possible break in points.

Shrugging, he knew that he couldn’t protect everything. Palose had to content himself with remembering that it wasn’t really his money and there was more where it came from though he would need a second slip to pass the wizards guarding the Vault. The apprentice also didn’t want to do it too often or both the wizards watching over the gold and his master would be likely to get suspicious.

Moving closer to the lake as he moved back towards the center of the city, Palose found the place that Atrouseon had suggested he might want to visit, if he was to continue on the path of a necromancer. With the limited room of a cave city, the need to deal with the dead was a very real concern. Not all creatures great and small would be useful to necromancers as the art had relatively few practicing it. Though some races had the practice of burying their dead in cemeteries outside of the city, most preferred cremation when given the choice and then there were those no one cared about that were reduced to mulch for the farms. Some believed that there were even orcs and trolls who paid the undertakers to give them flesh for their stews.

Palose tried to ignore his stomach’s churning at such distasteful practices as he looked over the workers as they returned with wagons covered with canvas. When the cloth was flipped back, the men would pick up the bodies like cords of wood to toss on the fire or feed to the special mulching worms.

“
Watchin’ the dead? You’re either a ‘mancer or a pervert,” a gruff voice stated from behind the mage. Palose found the source in a wide shouldered orc a few inches shorter than the man.

“I am a necromancer in training and I was curious about how easy it would be to get a few bodies to practice with in the future,” Palose stated standing straight and acting as if talk of taking dead bodies was a simple business transaction.

Snorting, the creature shook his head. “You would need to talk to the boss or find someone you can trust on the work detail.”

“If I could pay them for their time and a body they would just burn or mulch anyway,
do you think someone would be interested in giving me first choice?”

Its eyes narrowing deviously, the orc asked, “That would depend on what kind of money you would be
talkin’.”

Knowing that they were both skating around the exact words of a verbal contract to avoid being caught in accepting responsibility, Palose brought himself as close to being culpable as he dared, “Enough to make it worthwhile.”

Glancing around to see if any other ears might be close enough to hear, the orc said quietly, “If it weren’t too often, one could get away with such things for the right money. I might even be able to help you.”

“I am Palose,” the mage offered his name. “For some of my practices, quality will be less necessary, but occasionally I will need as pristine as I can get.”

“I am Wakaraq. If such an arrangement, were to be needed it would be best to meet at the Fat Walker Tavern at the edge of the human and orc district. Though if something were needed quicker, signaling me while at work might be possible,” the orc stated rubbing one of a pair of tusks jutting to either side of his mouth.

Nodding, Palose knew that he could find the tavern mentioned, though he had never been to the place. “I will let you know then,” he finished before leaving the orc to consider their unofficial deal.

It was another piece of a puzzle that looked to help the mage rise above his current standing within Ensolus. If he couldn’t network one way, he would simply have to make his own.

Entering the library, Palose was only slightly surprised to see a couple of his friends occupying the usual table. When he wasn’t there, it was common practice to find a seat on the main floor, though there were times people still chose their usual meeting place.

Taking the stairs, he found Sylvaine sitting across from Holdy with Defrienne sitting closer to her friend.

“You’re running later than normal,” the curly haired apprentice stated as the two girls looked up at his approach. Holdy remained with his nose in the spell book he had raised before his face. When the boy got into his studies, few things could break his focus.

“I had errands to run,” he replied as the mage drew out a book on portal magic. Atrouseon seemed to think refreshing his memory for portal magic was important and he had been reading more on the touchstones used by some to travel between points quickly.

“Busy day?” she asked with a bit of a bemused smile.

“Productive,” the mage remained vague.

Defrienne shook her head barely disturbing her short brown hair. “You two sound like an old married couple when the husband comes home from the fields. How was your day at work? Indeed.”

“They could always kiss again,” Holdy stated from behind his book.

Eyes lighting up, Defrienne asked, “Again? They’ve been kissing when we aren’t around?”

“I think that it’s pretty obvious since they like to hold hands and touch each other’s arms. It’s a short step to them kissing,” the boy stated peeking over his book to look at the three sitting on the opposite side of the table from him.

Sylvaine’s face darkened and she looked ready to call wizard’s fire down on the boy as she complained, “Obvious? What does a thirteen year old boy, who spends most of his time reading books, know about relationships between boys and girls?”

“I don’t always read about magic,” Holdy grinned. His blue eyes seemed to light up even more in his pudgy face as he managed to get under Sylvaine’s skin.

Looking excited, Defrienne looked between the two and asked, “No really, have you two kissed?”

Palose looked up from the portal magic book and stated to the girl. “A kiss is hardly anything. A spell could make you kiss Holdy without you even realizing what you had done.”

Sylvaine’s shoulders drooped slightly at his dismissal of her attention while Defrienne looked positively fearful of the idea. The apprentice replied, “But that is coercer magic. Your people don’t teach that to battle mages and I have never seen you read any tomes about their magic since I have known you.”

His eyes locked on hers and Palose informed the girl, “I don’t have to read about that spell. It is more about will than a set of gestures.”

Turning white as Holdy started to look interested, Defrienne glanced at the pudgy apprentice looking squeamish. “Please, don’t demonstrate then,” she waved him off as she picked up her book to hide behind.

Holdy looked a bit disappointed, but Sylvaine sighed, “It would have served her right if you did make her kiss him.”

Hunching down a little bit more, Defrienne avoided any eye contact with the battle mage.

Sylvaine ignored her and tapped the cover of his book. “Is Atrouseon pushing the portal magic again?”

“We get put on portal duty all the time and now that his current experiments are done, it happens more often. The fortress workers and Garosh use the portal to the mountain to resupply and change out workers regularly.

“Aside from that I do find certain points about it interesting.”

“Like what?”

Pulling a corrinut from his pack, Palose held it up revealing a piece of stone driven into it. “A touchstone hidden within a corrinut can be left anywhere drawing a warlock to it so he can return home or jump to a distant point with a simple cast of a spell. Smaller jumps like these avoid the notice of the gate wizards of the south. If we need to send bigger forces, it can send that warlock ahead to set up a stronger gate between the points.”

Sylvaine nodded while Defrienne looked less impressed. Holdy had returned to his reading again ignoring the mage’s words. Trying to be gentle in her words, Sylvaine replied, “We have read the ideas on portal magic also. Touchstones are useful, but I am surprised that you are rereading that again.”

A tight smile, as he reached his point, crossed Palose’s lips as he said, “If I were to enchant a touchstone and make it into a ring or necklace, I could portal to the person I gave it to in an instant. Two way directional rings can even be used in conjunction to alert the holder of a second ring to come when there is trouble.”

The girls looked surprised at the information. While the books had stated similar ideas on touchstones, no one had thought to write about using them as a way to communicate or travel to people in need of help. Ensolus’s warlocks tended to think more about their own concerns than other people, Palose had noticed.

Defrienne’s eyes suddenly lit up with another realization. “You could send someone on a trip while remaining at Ensolus letting them walk or ride for days and join them in a blink of portal magic. Now that is thinking. I can sleep in my bed every night while some soldier rides to the gates of our enemies, never having to sleep on the hard ground or having to eat travel rations! Now that’s the way to travel.”