Chapter 58: Dead to Rights

Nothing else bothered us on the way back, granting a rare moment of reprieve to mark the end of our search. We’d been going in a large circle, rounding up one group at a time, so we weren’t actually that far from camp, and arrived back where we began in less than ten minutes. The mission tally wasn’t great, from an objective point of view: we’d recovered six horses while losing twelve, lost another three archers to leave only six of the initial dozen alive, and were down a driver to boot. I counted heads several times over on arrival, wary of further illusions, but it seemed nothing had bothered the caravan in our absence.

The six surviving horses had already been reassigned to the carriages, leaving none behind for the archers to ride. Five of six drivers staffed the carriages, leaving one empty, while the archers milled about, performing some semblance of a patrol following a pattern I couldn’t make heads or tails of. As for Harvey, he only took a perfunctory look around, and upon seeing that nothing was on fire, he slumped down by the open campfire, finally allowing his exhaustion to show.

[Loaf of Bread withdrawn.

Salt Pork withdrawn.]

I joined him by the fire, pulling from my dwindling stock of provisions to offer him half a loaf of bread, and a chunk of salt pork. The rest of the loaf I claimed for myself, while passing my share of the meat to Pumpkin, as my stomach was rather unsettled and in poor condition for a heavy meal. My supplies were getting quite low, but that was of no concern, as the carriages had plenty of food and we were already running low on mouths to feed. For his own contribution, Harvey conjured up three pints of beer, setting one down for each of us. Pumpkin was the most eager to partake of us all, and whilst part of me wanted to intervene, the rest of me simply didn’t care enough. The cat helped kill a demon not long ago, if he wanted a drink, he could have one. We ate in silence, both of us harbouring many questions yet neither in the mood to talk. Only once the last of the meal was gone did Harvey turn to me with a questioning look on his face.

“Tell me, do you think the archers are useful?”

I stared back at him, wondering what his angle was: Harvey had an excellent poker face, and he used it now to deny me any insights.

“Do you want a kind answer or an honest one?”

Harvey laughed at that, a short, sharp guffaw that devolved into a hacking cough; the kind that left droplets of beer on the roadside.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

“An honest answer is best, in principle,” he eventually replied. “There’s no kindness in false hope, not in the long run.”

“In that case, my answer is that they provide only marginal benefit. They’re useful, in the sense that they can perform menial tasks, and perhaps could serve to intimidate sentient enemies, by strength in numbers. The problem is, most of what we’ve faced has been mindless, and if it comes to strength?”

My fingers twitched, seeking a coin to summon, only for me to remember that I’d run out. I’d spared a few moments to look for them, after the Horsedra died, but I’d not seen any hint of any that remained intact. Sadly, the velocity needed to inflict serious harm using a coin also tended to leave them unrecognisable.

“The two of us outclass them significantly. Anything that the archers could deal with, so could we, whilst they’re unlikely to offer any use against something we’d struggle against.”

At the end of the day, none of them had shown anything of value beyond their equipment and some basic cantrips. Useful against common wildlife, but doomed against any serious opposition.

“Yeah, that sounds about right,” Harvey sighed, turning his head to consider the remaining archers on patrol. “Eh, fine. This is a bit sooner that I’d originally planned, but it was never going to be hidden forever.”

Harvey snapped his fingers, and six men fell dead on the floor. Rapid decay set in within seconds, faster than even the rot left by my blows, within no more than fifteen seconds, there was nothing left of the archers except a small pile of ashes a piece. I looked at the drivers, who’d taken note of the spectacle: a couple appeared disquieted, one was visibly green with nausea, but none of them looked particularly surprised by what just happened. A faint click drew my attention back to Harvey, who had just removed the Blackened Bracelet from his wrist.

[Harvey Miller - Level 9 Thief of Souls]

“Dead Hand,” I groaned, recalling the name he’d claimed to represent at our first meeting. “Is the name of the entire organisation a necromancy pun?”

“What can I say?” Harvey grinned mirthlessly. “Anybody who lives long enough will turn a bit weird, and looking at the heads of the organisation, there’s not a single one younger than a hundred. I don’t know for certain the origins of the name, but I wouldn’t put your theory past any of them.”

“The drivers are real though,” I deduced, given their far greater command of facial expressions and general behaviour; summoned creatures wouldn’t panic and open up with a fireball, or at least I hoped not.

“The drivers are real,” Harvey agreed. “It’s easy to hire people from civilian backgrounds, freelance animal handlers or merchants can be found in every town and city. Soldiers, though? They get snapped up right after their Class Day: by national armies, to man the Wall, or into the private militia and households of the nobility. Trying to poach them for an illegal organisation draws far too much heat, so we diversified.”

“Fine,” I hummed, removing my own bracelet in a gesture of solidarity, because it wasn’t like he didn’t already know I was a merchant. “I’m not going to throw a fit over a bit of graverobbing. My only question is why?”