Installment 14 [https://squirrel.dogphilosophy.net/Installment014.png]
The contract was agreed to with no further fuss - that they were getting any investment at all was a far better outcome than expected, aside from Al's ongoing discomfort about the nature of their new recruit.
Melissa had invited them all to her tower to observe as she assembled the promised copy of her current draft of her treatise on gnolls. Naturally, this was produced with flashy wizardry. The party watched - Al with scholarly interest, Wikwocket with amazement and a touch of envy, and Bote with...well, one could never quite tell with them, but they watched attentively nonetheless. Melissa gathered a pile of plain blank vellum sheets, a small roll of darkly-tanned leather, a rather large bottle of ink, a sheet of gold leaf, a small pot of glue, a strip of cloth, and a codex bound in plain black leather labeled:
> On Gnolls
>
> Their Origins,
>
> Habits,
>
> and potential for Domestication.
>
> (DRAFT)
>
> by Melissa Browne
She motioned for quiet and began the work. Her right hand started a long and continuous sequence of complicated multi-fingered movements while her left shifted her spectacles from moment to moment to focus. A muttered chant, rhythmic but not quite repeating, urged the magic through its task.
The sheets of vellum flipped into the air, stretching and shrinking until each was the same perfectly-rectangular shape and size, then shuffled themselves together into a neat stack. The codex flipped itself open to the first page, and a flicking of Melissa's fingers compelled a stream of ink to spurt from its bottle and onto the top sheet of blank vellum, writing out the same words and illustration as the first page of the codex. The first page of the codex and the newly-written sheet both turned themselves over, and the second page was copied out. And so it went for many minutes, the newly-formed pages seeming slightly different, but clearly copied from the original. Finally, a strip of cloth glued itself to the edge of the stack of vellum, and the leather molded itself around the outside. The spell was completed as the sheet of gold leaf tore itself up from its paper backing and pressed itself to the new codex' cover, spelling out simply:
> On Gnolls
>
> (DRAFT COPY)
>
> by Melissa Browne
The chant ended, and Melissa lowered her hands. She picked up the newly-created codex and flipped quickly through the pages, inspecting. She nodded approval and handed it to Al.
"Now that is magic!" an impressed Wikwocket exclaimed.
"You've seen me work magic before." complained Al, surprised to feel just a bit put down by the comparison.
"Yeah, but you only do boring magic, not like this!"
The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Al looked exasperatedly towards the ceiling for a moment, once again entreating whatever deities might be above while making a melodramatic *you see what I have to endure?* gesture towards Wikwocket. Then, he rubbed his forehead.
"Not you too, I get enough of that from Mom." he said.
"I think now would be a good time to start doing something about that." Melissa said, reaching to pull a well-worn book from a nearby shelf. "Let's see what I might teach you."
----------------------------------------
Al was eventually convinced to learn a simple spell for combat-magic, and at Wikwocket's insistence, a literally flashy spell suitable for blinding and distracting enemies. As Al adapted the magic to his own mnemonic needs so he could work them, Melissa encouraged him to incorporate some gestures resembling what he would use to operate a crossbow. By the time they were done it was quite late, and the adventurers spent the night in some of Notamimic Manor's comfortable guest-rooms.
The next morning, after a simple breakfast of cheeses, bread, and smoked meats, they all relocated themselves to the training-field behind the manor. Gruntle arrived carrying a plain round wooden shield, and a flail. Al remembered many of the illustrations in the book he'd found in his home's library had depicted gnolls wielding nasty-looking flails with spiked balls on chains, but what Gruntle carried looked more like a farmer's grain-threshing tool - a large, simple club cut in half, with the heavy end attached to the handle by a very short bit of chain.
It was much larger than Al's mace. Al was having second thoughts about this.
"You wanted to see him fight." Grakthor reminded him, beckoning him forward. "Just a light sparrin' match."
"Yeah, show him how to fight!" Wikwocket shouted encouragingly behind him. Al turned back to look at her.
"Which one of us are you talking to?"
Wikwocket shrugged. "Does it matter? This should be good either way!"
"Thanks a lot." said a sarcastic Al, turning back.
Grakthor reached up to pat Gruntle on the shoulder. "Just practice. Just show 'em you know how to use those."
Gruntle gave a single grunt of assent, and raised his weapon and shield into a "ready" position. The pose looked completely out of place somehow - a mass of bestial violence made into a caricature of a student getting a lesson from a weapons-trainer.
Al took out his mace. He and Gruntle faced each other, motionless. Unsure of what to do, Al aimed a light overhead swing up towards Gruntle's collarbone. Gruntle moved his shield to intercept. The movement was... technically correct and accurately stopped the strike, but it was mechanical and deliberate. Gruntle twisted at the hip as the mace bounced off of the edge of his shield to swing his flail sideways toward Al's head...again, accurately aimed, but slow and without much force. Al crouched as it went overhead, then rose back up to aim a straight shot up at Gruntle's sternum.
And so it went for several exchanges. Al felt like he was back in the army camp, going through the practice drills they had all the new recruits repeat. He half-expected Gruntle to start shouting the little exclamations the trainers had them use to keep cadence. "Ha! Hoo! Hai! Yah!"
Al's brow furrowed as they continued. This wasn't at all what he'd expected - this vaunted creature of violence had clearly practiced how to properly hold his martial tools, but there was no hint he'd ever had any experience in real combat. Al turned to look skeptically at Grakthor.
"Are you sure...?"
There was a sudden change in the tempo. Al's question was cut off by a loud CRACK!, and his hand went numb as his mace was knocked away and sent flying across the field. The eager jagged-toothed maw unexpectedly looming towards him made him stumble backwards with a surge of reflexive fear.
Beady amber eyes glared into Al's own.
"Gottastick." Gruntle said. Then, he lowered his flail and shield, relaxing into a slouch that would have gotten an army recruit yelled at for laziness even after an "at ease." Al tried to look stern and disapproving as he waited for his heart to stop pounding. He ignored Wikwocket's enthusiastic clapping and cheering as best he could.
"You move like someone experienced enough to know not to look away from opponents." Grakthor told Al. Then he gestured across the field. "C'mon, let's go get your weapon."
They walked a few steps in silence, and then Grakthor spoke up again.
"You're not tryin' to kill each other."
"I know, I wasn't...," Al began to answer.
"I mean, you were wonderin' why it didn't seem like he was really fightin'."
"Oh. Right. So, are you sure he'll do okay in a real fight?"
"Seen him do it. He'll be alright. And now you know he can fight like a regular person and he's not just feral."
"Yeah, speaking of that," Al countered. "At the end there, for a second I thought he might try to eat my face."
"Nah, probably not."
"...'probably'?"