“Do you think he’ll be okay?” I asked.

The man could have easily been dead. He was cold to the touch - obviously - and was lying on the floor of the warehouse like a corpse. Every time I checked I found that he was breathing, and yet I kept checking.

“He will be fine, sir,” Ikhamon answered. “Will all respect, sir, I’d be more worried about the other one.”

I glanced at the other man. He was tied to a chair, hands bound behind his back by some rope we’d found.

His face did not look pleasant. I had only flicked my wrist at him once, so the burns were not large or numerous, but still parts of his face were an unnaturally raw shade of pink, and it was clear that, although he was trying very hard to look unphased, he was in quite a lot of pain. His eyes were red, perhaps from tears of agony, and there was strain written everywhere on his visage.

“You have a health potion on you?” I asked Ihkamon. He said that he did.

“You hear that?” I asked the man in the chair. “We’ve got a health potion for you. Should clear up those burns, easy. But before that, I want to know why you attacked us.”

The man didn’t answer, instead looking suspiciously between Ikhamon and I.

“I give you permission to talk,” I said. We’d be quite angry with him a moment before - as you might imagine - and had made him shut up his screaming and yelling and pleading. I imagined he must have been scared to speak again.

He looked between the two of us again, then finally he spoke. “We didn’t know it was you!” he shouted, and then shouted something else, and he was soon once again unintelligible.

Ikhamon turned to me. “Shall I stop his blubbering, sir?”

I shook my head. “No. Or, yes, but not like that. Give him the potion. It’s probably the pain that is making him go crazy.”

Ikhamon asked if I was sure, and when I said that I was, he did as I asked, uncorking the bottle that he drew from some pocket in his robes and pouring the liquid down the throat of the man - who struggled away at first, but Ikhamon held him still.

The potion worked quickly, and although the visible effects of the burns didn’t immediately fade, I could see the tension loosening in the man’s shoulders as the pain was dulled. He quickly stopped his hysterics.

“Better?” I asked. “Let’s try this again. I have just done you a favor, despite the fact that you were about to stab me not too long ago. Now you will return the favor, alright? Why did you attack us? Speak slowly.”

The man breathed deeply before replying. “T-thank you, sieur,” he said, “I’m s-s-sorry, sssieur.” He pronounced the word like that, like it was the French “sieur” rather than the English “sir.”

I don’t know why the feeling of being overwhelmed hit me then, but it did. All of it was slightly more than I’d bargained for, and I couldn’t help but notice how much the scene would have looked like a violent interrogation to any outside observer. Still, what else was there to do but ask the questions? I took a breath and continued.

“Why did you attack us?”

“We did not know w-who you were, sieurs. W-we were stolen from o-o-only a few days past, and w-we have laid in w-w-wait here since, assuming the robbers would strike again.”

“Calm down,” I said. “You’re stuttering. Catch your breath for a second.”

He did. The potion must have been helping.

Many questions came to mind, and I can’t say much thought went into which to ask first. “Who do you think we are now? How do you know we aren’t robbers?”

“You I do not recognize, sieur,” he said. “But the other sieur, I know. We have dealt before. He works for the alchemists, in their manor.”

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“That explains why you attacked me,” I said, “But not why your friend there attacked him, who he should have recognized.”

The man glanced at where his friend still lay. “H-he attacked from behind,” he answered. “He must not have been able to tell from behind.”

I looked to Ikhamon, but he made no indication whether he believed the story or not. I sighed. This was supposed to be a simple job.

“We’re here to collect the shipment,” I said. “Is that what the robbers took?”

“Yes,” he responded, nodding furiously. “Yes exactly, sieur. Only a little remains in those two crates over there,” he motioned with his head.

“And why didn’t you just tell someone that? Why give everybody the run-around?”

The man looked to Ikhamon, then to the floor between his feet. “We thought we could steal back the rest, and then it would all be fine.”

“You still would have been late,” I said.

“Yes,” he said. “Yes sieur, late, but late is better than never, better than delivering less than half.”

“And why did you expect the robbers to return?”

The man stared blankly at me for a long time, and I thought I must have caught him in some sort of lie. But apparently he was just confused.

“You are mistaken, sieur. Not return. They did not steal from here. They stole from us upriver. But we thought they would come back for the rest.”

“Upriver?” I asked. “Like, in a ship? Are we talking about pirates?”

“Yes, just like that, sieur.”

“And why didn’t they take everything, then? Why are you still alive?”

“We fought them off,” he said. “But some of their crew had already stolen much of the cargo before we had noticed.”

“And why would they come here to steal more?”

He stared again. “Why wouldn’t they?”

I turned to Ikhamon. “Well, that’s that, I guess. What now? Take what we’ve got here and report back to Gad?”

“We still have to deal with these two, sir.”

“Oh.” I looked at the two men. They looked pitiful. “What did you have in mind?”

“We should kill them, of course, sir.”

The man in the chair started, and I reacted similarly. “What? Why?”

“Perhaps he is telling the truth,” Ikhamon said. “Or perhaps not. But they have failed in their duties. One, at least, should die, sir, as a message to the rest, and because they attempted to kill us, first, of course.”

“Please!” the man in the chair shouted. “W-we didn’t know!”

“Woah woah woah,” I said. “Let’s just calm down here. We don’t need to kill anybody.”

I turned to Ikhamon again. “Is that what Gad would tell you to do?”

“The master does not worry himself with such things,” he said. “I simply handle things, and deliver the results he wishes, sir. He needs not know every detail.”

“Murder seems like a detail he might want to know,” I muttered.

How is it that I always end up around psychopaths? Do I attract this kind of person? Do I need to start dressing differently, or doing my hair differently? Wearing a shirt that says “crazy people, leave me alone?”

“They did attack us,” I said. “But we’re both fine, right? They got the short end of the stick on that one. And even if we did want to punish them for that, shouldn’t we call the police, or something?”

“The police?” Ikhamon asked. “Sir, do you mean the garrison?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Does the garrison enforce the laws here?”

“They do, sir,” Ikhamon answered.

“Well then yeah, the garrison. Let the garrison arrest them, or something. Don’t just kill them. Why do I even need to say that?”

“No!” the man in the chair yelled suddenly. “I swear that I’m telling the truth! Don’t hand me over to the garrison!”

He started thrashing around as if trying to escape his bindings, and he seemed in danger of toppling over.

“Shall I inform the garrison then, sir?”

“Why is he so upset about that?” I asked. “Being arrested by the garrison has to be better than you killing him, right?”

“He doesn’t seem to think so, sir.”

I shook my head. Let me guess. The garrison is full of psychopaths, too. Knowing this dimension, that almost seems inevitable.

Or maybe the prison conditions are so bad here, he’d rather die. I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised by that possibility, either. When I think of medieval prisons, I guess what really comes to mind is dungeons and oubliettes. I have no reason to believe this city runs its prison like a Scandinavian country back on earth, video games and all.

“And we can’t just let them go?” I asked.

“I would not advise it, sir. He could be lying, and then another shipment will be stolen. Our mission here was to collect the shipment, not to lose two, sir. And it is only just that someone pays for the lost cargo.”

“Then we will take them with us,” I said.

“To the manor?” Ikhamon asked, a look of displeasure clear on his face. “Sir, I am sure that the master would not appr-”

“No not to the manor,” I interrupted. “They will take us to where the shipment was stolen, and we will find it, and bring it back. If we find it, then they can walk free, right?”

“I suppose, sir.”

“Then that’s what we will do We were here to fix the problem anyway, and this should fix it,” I turned to the man in the chair. “Do you agree?”

He nodded without hesitation.

“And do you think we will be able to find the hideout of the men who robbed you?”

After a time, he nodded again.

“OK,” I said. “Then I will untie you, and you can wake up your friend and get him to agree, too. I hope it goes without saying that if you’re lying, you’re going to have your face melted off.”

The man nodded again.

“Right. Ikhamon, do you have another potion? Maybe we should give one to the other man, too. He still hasn’t woken up. Or maybe we should get him in front of a fire for a little while to warm him back up. He looks pale.”

-

We didn’t actually end up untying the man. Instead, we tied up his friend as well, and left them.

It was temporary. We had to bring back what remained of the shipment, after all. Couldn’t just leave the crates sitting in the warehouse waiting to be stolen while we sailed upriver. I told the two men to hold tight, and that we’d be back soon to start the trip. The burned one said that we could leave sooner if we untied them and let them prepare the ship, and I told him not to push his luck.

Still, it was a long way back to the manor, and I didn’t want to waste too much time. It would be best if we could reach the site of the robbery before dark - although I hadn’t actually asked how far away it was.

“Is there anyone we could trust to bring this back for us?” I asked Ikhamon as we left, each carrying a small crate. They were surprisingly light, but it made sense once I peaked inside of one - they contained only herbs, from what I could see.

“Not anyone nearby, sir. Not that I’m aware of.”

I wished that Cadoc or Amaia was with us. “Where does the garrison train?” I asked. “Is it far away?”

“Very far, sir. Across the bridge.”

“And a beach?” I asked. “Is there a nice beach anywhere nearby? Nearer than the manor, that is?”

“If we head straight south, sir, then yes, there is a beach there. It is used mostly by the family, and so there is another way up to the manor from there. Why are you looking for a beach though, sir? Aren’t we returning to those men?”

“Yes,” I said. “Just trying to save us some time, if we’re lucky. Is the way to the manor from the beach any slower than the route we took earlier.”

“About the same, sir.”

“Worth a shot, then. Let’s go.”