When I got up and rolled out from under the bed it was already fairly late in the morning. That left me in something of a predicament. Getting into the Heights was a task better left for the night, so I had the day to fill. Walking about during the day wasn’t in my nature, but I’d need to deal with it if I wanted to make any progress.
I headed to the side of the building most heavily shadowed and dropped down as soon as I confirmed there was no-one in sight. Hell, there was hardly anyone nearby. Most of the residents had left earlier in the morning, boiling out of the woodwork like ants from their great hive of humanity.
It was what had woken me up, but hadn’t let me leave.
I limped out into the alleyway, no more suspicious than any poor sap who missed the morning rush. From what I’d overheard from the departing humans most of them were headed out to work of some kind. Why the humans had built so much housing out away from all the work had baffled me at first, but as I walked along ground level it rapidly became obvious. The sheer concentrated stink of this place was something even a human could notice, so of course the same fuckers who built walls of polished white stone would shove them as far away as possible.
That would also explain why the only businesses here were the kind that would only appeal to the foolish or the desperate. No one from outside the tenements would ever come here to shop, so they had no business wasting shelf space on anything that wasn’t shit.
Still, when I passed a meat seller half-way through packing up his cart I couldn’t resist buying one. It was indulgent when I still had plenty of rations from Garrett, but those things had gotten all the taste preserved out of them.
Besides, I deserved a little something after all that, didn’t I? I’d done more than any mere goblin ever should have been able to accomplish, let alone survive, so what was a little dip into the Garrett’s an Asshole Reparation Fund?
It wasn’t like he needed the money.
The meat skewer was pretty good all things considered. Nice and juicy, only a little rotten, and the rat and raccoon flavors blended nicely with a slight hint of possum. Lost points for skewer construction though, to be proper nostalgic it really needed to still have some bark on it. This one had a triangle shape from a previous life as one of the support beams for one of the buildings.
Smacking my lips as I pulled my raggedy mask back up I turned around from where I’d eaten crouched against a wall to conceal my face. Now I had to find a different sort of business. How to go about it? Humans considered soul magic as a divine gift, so it was fair to say a church would be involved, but hunting goblins was often considered a divine commandment as well. I’d save walking into the lion’s den as a Plan B, thank you very much.
That left libraries as the most promising source of knowledge, books not being known for their ability to stab people. But even with my limited reading ability I’d need to find books with a knowledge beyond most. After all, what the ‘tinker’ had suggested was impossible even in his own words. I would have traveled with him to learn his secrets if he’d seemed any less dangerous. I shivered to think of him even now, unable to shake the feeling that he’d been on to me somehow.
The ‘tinker’s’ solution might not be of any use either, but a part of me couldn’t help but hope the differences would play to my favor for once. My extra soul pressure hadn’t been caused by any change in personality, not as its prime source. The true origin of my condition was my malformed evolution, and the reason why any previous goblins to steal the soul system had died so terribly. I could still feel it pulsing through my body, creating odd tingles and ghost sensations as the magical tools of metamorphosis in my soul were crammed together and fighting against the stasis I’d unwittingly forced on them. Only the ancient knowledge of a lost Dungeon tribe gave me enough control to survive it for as long as I had.
I wouldn’t call it more stable than an emotional change, far from it. Even frozen it still leaked signals through to my body, growing patches of fur or peeling off sections of skin like a snake, and it wanted to grow further. I could only dread what would happen if I failed to stabilize it before it warped flesh and twisted bone. Still, it had the potential for true stability, more so than any part of the human soul system. The ‘gift’ left to us by our fallen gods was supposed to be inexorable, once begun never stopped. If the final result had the same innate weight and in-built resilience it might just be enough to stabilize my newly expanded soul levels and let me survive with the benefits of both. Fitting, as both pantheons owed me at this point.
Only problem was getting to that point in the first place when I didn’t understand half the words the man had used in his ramblings. At least I’d recognized that and memorized them for later reference. He’d suggested a “partial orthogonal multi-classing where you go horizontal”. Partial was easy enough and while directions were difficult to parse in the non-physical realm of the soul I’d been interpreting the soul levels as building up like a tower, so I could probably just take a ninety degree angle off of that to “go horizontal”, which just left me with picking up the technical definitions of orthogonal multi-classing.
Ah, who was I kidding, I would need to double check partial and horizontal too. The only person I’d ever known who could turn otherwise ordinary words into a chain of half-comprehensible gibberish with such fluid ease had been my mother, and you couldn’t trust words to mean what they should with her either.
I missed that. Strange how something that had always been one of her few flaws in my eyes, a genuinely infuriating insistence on strange terms and definitions, would become so fondly seen in my memory. I wished she were here to explain the tinker’s bullshit to me like she’d tried to explain her own. Stars know I could use the help.
I wish she were here so I could hug her, one last time.
I yanked on one of the scarves wrapped across my face, pulling it tight enough to hurt as I set off at a brisk pace. Enough. No time for the past, only for survival.
If she’d learned that lesson I wouldn’t be so alone.
My feet itched for the safety of the rooftops as I padded across the city, but I brought the memory of failed evolutions to the front of my mind whenever my hesitation grew too great. Warped piles of twisted flesh, not even the worst gutter-trash of the warrens was ever willing to resort to that abundant meat. Killing them was a mercy, but there just wasn’t any way of butchering them that let you ignore what they had been. They served the tribe as mushroom fodder only.
I sought out the crowds, knowing the paradoxical anonymity of the masses. Once there I found a promising little listening corner, just far enough from the other beggars that they’d not be tempted to make conversation but close enough to blend into my fellow wretches.
The humans were both more and less open about the soul system then I’d expected. I suppose I could blame my well earned paranoia for not learning that sooner.
Solid information might not be easy to come by, but boasts were another thing entirely. Every hawking peddler seemed to have something “caught by a level fifteen Fisherman!” or “crafted by the highest level Smith from here to Ironstreet!”.
Scarce were those who mentioned their own Skills. It showed they weren’t completely reckless, and that the secrecy of the System was real even here in the cacophony of the market.
Better to give away another’s secrets than your own, and that’s if the Fishermen and Smiths were ever more than a marketing gimmick. One of the louder merchants certainly seemed to agree with me.
“Hah! You call that fresh? With moldering rat’s crap like that you’d need more levels in Swindler than Merchant to sell a single bite!”
That piqued my interest, and I wasn’t the only one. Still, the other watchers on seemed a touch more interested in the looming violence than any discussion on the nature of classes.
The accused fishmonger placed one hand on his chest, the very picture of aggrieved innocence. “How could you say such a thing? I learned my trade at my father’s feet and earned my class through honest sweat and toil!”
I frowned and drummed my hands on the cobblestones as I’d seen the other beggars doing. Was that a hint on class acquisition or a perfectly banal exaggeration?
I looked away as the argument continued. They weren’t all that interested in stopping their curses to explain the assumed knowledge underlying their words. Why would they? At least I could puzzle out a few things. Classes were something you had levels in, for example, and seemed to be based on professions. I’d been just having levels this entire time, but they were supposed to be in something? What were the options, did they have to be profession based? They were in my soul, so did classes operate as some sort of superstructure that levels were built inside? Or was the term “in” less literal, like someone with knowledge in poisons. Or did the soul’s nature as the source of knowledge and metaphor render the difference irrelevant?
All this effort and all I had was more questions. That was enough to piss me off, but it was more than I’d had before. I took a deep breath and assuaged my frustration. The questions were there whether I liked it or not, learning they existed was the first step in solving them, not an addition to it.
The best way to learn anything was from another person, and I was rapidly running into my ability to avoid that. I sidled another foot closer to the rest of the beggars. I doubted how much they’d know, but if I had to start somewhere I’d be better off with the least dangerous option. “His stock doesn’t look that bad to me. Is Swindler even a real class?”
The clump of beggars looked askance at my words, and the closest shot me a glare. He was a hardened character, with a face like weathered leather and gimlet eyes. Even his missing hand did little to make him less intimidating given the brutal hook attached in its place.
Possessive, eh? “Sorry to take your corner.” I hesitated, as if thinking over a great sacrifice.
“I…” Hrack. My already trembling hand nearly shook out the pittance of copper it held as an exaggerated cough wracked my body. “I can offer you a split of the take, i—if—if that’s what you need?”
The glare softened and he waved off my offering. “That cough ain’t half bad, but next time you try it on a mark don’t hesitate to lean in a touch more, get in their personal space. Pity may open a lady’s purse, but disgust will open anyone’s. You’ve earned what you’ve made today, just remember what it means to be a team player and I’m sure you’ll do just fine in this city.”
I paused in my questions, trying to piece together which of my questions would fit an ordinary human’s mouth and settling for the obvious. “How’d you know I was new?”
The older beggar shifted his gaze back to the argument in the market, evidently dismissing me as a threat. The handful of other beggars seemed to follow his lead and returned to their wailing. “You might as well wear a sign to ol’ Sal. The flatfoots couldn’t tell an alley from a thoroughfare, but any real slumrat knows the rules down here, and its plain that you don’t.”
That got my attention. There were rules and their were rules, and you could tell which was which from the taste of the word in your mouth.
These rules tasted of iron and blood.
I shifted nervously, getting one foot half under me in case I needed to leave in a hurry. “How does a fellow get to learning these rules?”
The old beggar smiled, gimlet eyes still locked on the yelling merchants across the square. “He keeps his eyes wide and his ears open.”
So he wouldn’t just fucking tell me. Well, I supposed I would hardly have trusted me if he did. I followed his gaze. The slandered merchant had lost more than a few customers, enough to visibly thin the press of people in front of his stall. A gap that the merchants on either side of him were filling, but only one of them looked happy about. The yelling merchant had a grin fit to split his face but the merchant on the other side of him was less happy and more… afraid. Even while handling the influx of customers he kept shooting glances at the slanderous merchant.
It didn’t take long to see that he was afraid of more than words. The victorious merchant’s smile vanished as a drunken dockworker stumbled into his stall. “Hey!”
The dockworker grabbed the stall to keep himself on his feet and pulled himself upright at the expense of the merchant’s wares. Dozens of fish spilled onto the ground as his scrabbling hands searched for purchase.
The merchant was red-faced now. “You’re going to pay for every single one of those you asshole!”
The “drunk” whipped his head around with speed not commonly seen amongst his kind. “What you call me?!”
Spittle flew from his mouth, but the merchant had to time to complain of further damage to his goods before the dockworker’s meaty fist met his face. He’d scarcely stumbled backwards before the dockworker hurled his stall over completely and proceeded across its wreckage to seize him again.
I looked away from the scene to catch the old beggar moving towards me. My hands were already on my blades, but he just chuckled and sat down again. “Your reflexes will serve you well on the streets, but knowledge will serve you better. Remember what I said: be a team player.”
That settled things. No real beggar went so far to warn off someone else. Whoever ran these streets the beggar was some kind of low level informant for them, if not a full enforcer.
I caught the continuing beating from the corner of my eye. The merchant was screaming for the guards by this point, but even the other merchants were pointedly avoiding listening. “The slandered merchant hired that thug?”
Sal laughed. “What, in the last five minutes?”
A group of guards shoved through the gawking crowd, making liberal use of their truncheons when the crowd failed to clear the path fast enough. The thug left the market at a brisk jog, mysteriously unimpeded by anyone.
“The poor innocent merchant couldn’t possibly have snuck off to hire a thug, not when he was in plain sight the entire time, no? I think the guard will find this to be nothing more than coincidence, the whims of chance punishing a foreign merchant who stepped a little too hard on an honest man’s shoes.”
Deniability was an admirable goal, but only if your mark was gullible enough to fall for it. Either way I was getting the shape of things now. “And if a particularly clumsy dockworker gets a little something from a merchant later, well that’s nothing more than one honest man looking out for another.”
The beggar waved his hand in a so-so motion. “Close enough. But I think you’ll find he doesn’t have to. Such an act of coincidental karma might well find itself rewarded in an equally… coincidental manner.”
So their really was some organization behind the scenes, and they really liked their deniability. That wasn’t something goblins often had, but I was familiar with the concept. Well this wasn’t how I’d planned on getting information, but the life of a goblin on the run didn’t grace me with the social wiles to start a conversation easily and a criminal organization was as likely as anyone to have the knowledge I sought. I might as well take my shot now that I had some chance of making it sound natural. “Any chance of an honest man getting some help with a… particular problem?”
The beggar looked at me more warily after that. This wasn’t where he’d expected the conversation to go and it showed. His whole body closed up, just a little, arms and legs retracting as if to curl up and shield his core from blows. He stopped himself before he completed it, but it told me enough. That stance did nothing against real killing blows and everything to some a beating from cracking your skull. Whatever role he played now, he’d been a beggar for real once.
“Honest men can find all manner of problems disappeared. Even a beggar might hope for such aid, if he can prove he deserves it.”
“I need help with a class.” I kept my words as vague as I thought would lead to anything, glancing away from the beggar as if disinterested in the answer while keeping my eyes locked on him like a hawk.
“Oh, of course.” His relaxation was slight but noticeable, and with it I relaxed too. I’d been vague enough for him to make a favorable assumption. “The priests do tend to bog down such simple requests with all their questions, don’t they?”
“An honest man such as myself would never speak ill of the church.”
“Of course not. One moment.” Sal suddenly broke off to approach a woman, hobbling on his knees to clutch at her skirts. “Please good Madame, spare some alms for the poor?”
The woman flinched away and her face scrunched up as if indecisive on whether to cry or scream. The beggar gazed up at her with tearful eyes. “Please, I beg of you, my little girl’s ill and no boat will take a sailor with broken legs.”
The woman glanced around, finding no friendly faces. She hesitated, then reached for her purse and fumbled the catch. Sparkling silver and fresh polished copper tumbled to the cobbles and sprayed across the cobbles. Even with Garrett’s stolen gold I still felt a faint urge to snatch up such a free prize.
Then the bouncing silver piece I was eying covetously disappeared. I blinked, and already half the spilled wealth was gone. I may have hesitated, but this ecosystem’s natural scavengers had no such reticence. The beggars moved with practiced ease as Sal openly wept at the feet of his mark, bowing down to kiss her very boots for such “generosity”.
The woman stumbled back, yanking her feet up and away to avoid Sal’s adulation. By the time she cleared his filthy hands and reaching tongue her “donations” had vanished. She paused, then turned and fled. “Rhaevestra bless you my lady! I’ll pray for you each and every day!”
Sal turned back and saw the missing silver from the ground. “You scoundrels! Rhaevestra sent her angel to me and you’ve stolen her bounty?! How am I to pay from my little girl’s healing now?”
The other beggars had bundled up both silver and little clay donation bowls into their filthy blankets and were beating a hasty retreat. Sal hobbled after them, but by the time he reached his previous position they were long gone. Seeing salvation so cruelly snatched from his fingers he collapsed on the ground and gave out the great wracking sobs reserved only for those that had lost everything.
Nary a minute later Sal dragged himself up and threw himself on me. The lanky human arms nearly wrapped around me twice as he clutched me like a drowning man clutches driftwood. “At least you haven’t aban—urk—doned me. My one true friend, what did I do to deserve such a gift as you?!”
“Laying it on a bit thick aren’t you?” I said.
I could feel Sal wincing through his hug. The movement wouldn’t do any favor’s to the knife that was tickling his ribs. “Ah, don’t you wanna be a team player? You’ll get a cut, don’t you worry.”
Team player lost a lot of its veiled threat when the man speaking it had a knife three inches from his aorta. Maybe only two, Sal was a bony fucker. Still…
“No hard feelings, just value my personal space.” I withdrew the knife a touch, our bodies hiding it from the crowd.
Sal wasn’t so eager to use me in his little charade after that. He certainly didn’t seem to need it, playing the crowd of bleeding hearts around his collection bowls like a true maestro. He was never without a sob story, never without an alibi, never too proud to fall at the feet of a passerby and proclaim them the mortal incarnate of Rhaevestra, Goddess of Mercy. His theatrics spun everyone who approached him into a fantasy, the righteous community rallying around one who had been victim of betrayal most foul.
I, meanwhile, faked a throat disease. Whenever someone neared, seeking to reward the “sole loyal friend” of Sal’s fairy tale, I would eagerly hold out my collection bowl—actually Garrett’s shittiest tin cup that I’d beaten with a brick to give it the proper patina— and grumble out something unintelligible. On a certain level I admired the ferocious waterfall of bullshit that tumbled from Sal’s mouth, but then I thought about all the ways it could go wrong, how even a single little detail could spell disaster, how every new lie was a new chance to collide with another and send this tower crashing down.
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My chest tightened and my breath came short and shallow, heart racing just to keep pace. Everyone was looking at me, why were they looking at me? What did they know that I didn’t was my face showing what did they know howdidtheyknow.
I stood and walked away, not turning, not breaking eye contact on their spying eyes, not even for a second.
The shadows welcomed me and I crouched there, watching as Sal’s theatrics swept away the crowd’s watching eyes.
I took a deep breath and let it out through my nose. They weren’t on to me, weren’t interested in anything more than my momentary role in Sal’s tale.
Still, I remained in the shadows, content to watch the man rather than play my part. Sal kept the game going longer than I would have thought possible, but the sympathy of such a dramatic moment couldn’t outlast the moment for long. His final farewell was no less dramatic for all the breath he’d already wasted, and he was rewarded with one last pass of the donation bowl. The humble bit of clay, which had dutifully stayed half full even receiving rivers of copper pennies, finally filled and Sal gave his tearful thanks to anyone who would listen.
Sal gave a look around as he left before his eyes settled on me. He brightened and hobbled over to my alley. I was somewhat undecided whether his little con was enough of a red flag to merit turning my back on the man, and he reached me before I made up my mind about it.
“Oh my friend, still waiting to help a poor old man to the apothecary? I truly cannot thank you enough.” I rolled my eyes at his words, but at least he wasn’t shouting anymore. The bustle of the city was bad enough without another yelling voice.
I let him throw an arm over my shoulder to act as his living crutch, but I kept an inch of distance between our torsos rather than let him lean on me completely. Our cloaks would obscure the difference from the crowd he cared so much about appealing to, and the dagger at his ribs would be just as hidden.
Sal gave me a crooked smile. “Mugging me already?”
“No, just strongly considering it.” He’d need to do more than piss me off to earn the knife, I couldn’t afford to piss off an unknown faction with unknown resources for such petty reasons.
“Oh yeah, you value your personal space.” Sal stepped to the side to lean on the wall instead, his limp not quite vanishing with the rest of his demeanor as we left the sight of his marks.
“Your take.” Sal held out his final bowl of copper, minus however much he’d been hiding away to prevent his marks from realizing how much they were giving him.
I took the bowl, clutching it against my chest so its contents would not show to any prying eyes. I could hardly shove the whole thing into my extra-dimensional pouches while he watched, but I couldn’t refuse without looking suspicious.
“So, what class are you looking for and why do you reckon a beggar will help you find it when an honest priest won’t?”
I scowled under my hood. “That depends. Are you going to answer my questions or just find another mark to jump on?”
Sal laughed. “C’mon, that lady was such a clear target she was practically throwing away her money. Am I supposed to not take it? Besides, this meets my quota for the day so I can help you with a few… introductions.”
I shrugged. “Fine. But who says I’m looking for any class in particular?”
Sal rolled his eyes at me. “Still playing coy? There’s only so many things you could possibly mean when you say you have a problem with a class. Unless…”
The gangly bastard leaned over to peer under my hood and I let him know what I thought of that with a casual jab of the knife. Sal jerked his head back right quick after that.
“Touchy, eh? I suppose you could be a wanted man. But wanted enough for every priest to know your name? You haven’t done any crimes I’d have heard of have you?”
“Just a couple petty murders.” I answered honestly. Sal had probably never killed someone, but a petty criminal like him was unlikely to stick their neck out for the sake of justice. Better to admit a few sins and let him think he’d figured me out.
“Not a noble, I hope?” Sal’s words were spoken as if in jest, but he couldn’t hide the tension in his voice from me.
I leveled him my best glare. The hood and masking rags took a lot of the bite out of it, unfortunately. “Do I look stupid?” Stel hadn’t technically been a noble.
“Hmmm,” Sal stroked an imaginary beard. “A challenging question indeed. Let me take a minute to mull that one over.” His tone was joking in truth now, relieved not to be facing that kind of heat.
Even I knew to be afraid of human nobility. Adventurers were as easy to fear as any snarling beast, but a smart man knew to reserve the greater fear for the man who held the leash. I didn’t know how the nobility kept their attack dogs from turning on them, but whether it was by strength or by guile I wanted nothing to do with it.
“So what kind of expert is it you’ve got, and how much is it going to cost me?” Not admitting to what I needed was working out well so far, although I knew that couldn’t last forever. Still, every detail that Sal let slip was another opportunity to fine tune my cover story. His initial assumptions offered the most, telling me both that it was relatively common to seek out specific classes and that some classes were viewed negatively by the clergy, likely requiring illicit means to obtain.
It was enough to make you wonder why the gods even allowed such forbidden classes to exist in the first place, but if a goblin like me could benefit from the soul system they’d devised they clearly didn’t have as much control over it as they’d like. In a way it was comforting to think that I wasn’t the first to suborn the system. The way Katturk talked made it seem like whatever anti-goblin measures the system had, they were insurmountable, but if the humans had been warping the system to their own ends since forever that meant there was hope for me to do the same.
None of it was the most critical detail I needed but building up surrounding knowledge like this allowed me to form a negative of the real questions. Questions like how to actually get a class, let alone two, which the tinker’s mention of ‘multi-classing’ implied was not only possible, but necessary to solve my fracturing soul.
It occurred to me, not for the first time, that this was a lot of hope to pin on an offhand comment by a traveler, but I didn’t have a ton of other great ideas and increased knowledge would be useful one way or another.
Sal looked me over, taking in my rags and the limping gait of my misaligned limbs. “More than you can afford… but there might be ways for a clever fellow such as yourself to pay in kind.”
I nodded. I got the feeling that Sal wasn’t the one I’d be negotiating price with, so there was no point in quibbling over exactly how much I could afford. Even if I did end up paying ‘in kind’ I didn’t think I’d have much trouble acting as one of Sal’s assistants or doing a bit of thievery.
The change was subtle as we approached our destination, but not invisible. More and more boarded windows, yet each one held peeking eyes. Sal didn’t appear concerned, in fact I caught him offering a thumbs up to the spying eyes at one point.
Entering someone else’s territory like this raised my hackles, even if I knew that secrecy had been my only real defense from the second I crossed into the city. At least I was only blocked in from four directions. As long as the peeking eyes stayed on ground level I still had a reliable escape route.
As if a laughing luck had heard my thoughts Sal picked that moment to turn and knock on a door. It was battered and stained like any other, with a strong scent of piss, but he drummed on it with a staccato beat I wasted no time in committing to memory.
The door cracked open as soon as he started, revealing one of the beggars who’d ‘stolen’ from Sal. “Enough, I can see its you ya bastard.”
The man had clearly been here for a while, which made sense if he’d headed right here after leaving. The filthy rags he’d been wearing were gone, replaced by well-worn but clean tunic that bore more than a few patches, each well hidden and carefully sewn.
“Could be a shapeshifter, couldn’t I?” Sal bared his teeth and curled his fingers into mock claws to rake across the man’s chest.
The other man winced as he stepped away. “Too soon man, too soon.”
Sal stepped into the building and I followed more hesitantly, trying to scan every corner before I was fully enveloped. “If it was really too soon you wouldn’t be so casual with the safety measures.”
The door slammed shut behind me, swinging so close I had to dodge out of the way. I reached for my blades but the man wasn’t even looking at me. “It never targeted large groups of people and you know it.”
We were clearly in some sort of entrance room, a small space decorated with little more than a rack for our cloaks and a seat for the door guard. “Are shapeshifters a frequent problem here?”
The two men stopped their arguing and looked at each other. “No, no, not at all!” Sal said, “Its just an… isolated incident. Yes, that’s all. The real problem would be humans with illusion spells or disguise Skills.”
“Yeah,” the other man said. “Not a real problem.” He scratched his neck and muttered in a lower voice. “Not anymore.”
“Besides,” Sal said slightly too loudly, “That’s the benefit of making friends and playing by the rules! Its just like I told you with that merchant. Good honest men play by the rules and get protection from those who don’t. Whether they’re a slanderous merchant or a man-eating monster.”
I had trouble imagining the street tough who’d beaten a helpless merchant going toe to toe with a man-eating shapeshifter, but it just went to show that this community of theirs had some real teeth. Shapeshifters were no joke, the kind of threats that Hobs wouldn’t even bother bringing goblins to fight.
Of course having experience hunting monsters disguised amongst them wasn’t a good sign for the health of the city, but at least they didn’t seem to take it too seriously.
The other man rolled his eyes. “You and your euphemisms. Turning a dozen deaths into ‘not playing by the rules’ is a bit much, even for you.”
Sal just shrugged as he pushed past him. “It’s against the rules isn’t it? Or are you gonna suggest we let people get eaten?”
The door man let Sal push past him, rolling his eyes at his back. He waved me through. “Welcome newbie. My name’s Mark.”
“My name’s Zhen.” I stepped through slowly. The alleys were dark enough that my eyes scarcely needed adjusting, but I still wanted to get a good idea of what I was getting into before I crossed the threshold.
There wasn’t much to see, so I went on in against my better judgment. There would be no more escape to the rooftops, I would be protected by my disguise alone. I wasn’t happy about it, but in this city it was bound to happen sooner or later.
Sal picked up a cane from beside the door and strode off down the hall. I followed. There were more than a few doors branching off the hall, but even with my ears twitching under their hood I could tell this wasn’t the front end of the building. There was more sound, more life, echoing from elsewhere than in these cold quiet halls.
Sal forced himself up a staircase one step at a time. It was a cramped and twisted thing, but that just put me right at home. It was the only point where I didn’t have to try at all to keep the pace. Even for a human Sal was a lanky bastard.
Sal turned halfway up the stairs, ducking through a crack in the wall that hadn’t been there half a second before. I followed him through the carefully concealed door and closed it behind myself.
Sal turned to ensure the door was closed properly and nodded in approval to find me already closing it. It pivoted silently on well oiled hinges and lined up perfectly with the existing walls of the staircase. In the darkness of the stairs even I would be hard pressed to notice. It was an unpleasant reminder to keep my guard up.
I kept an eye out for any further signs of secret passages, but if there were any they were better hidden than I could pick out so easily. Sal guided me down this new passage at a brisk pace even as hunched over as he was.
Hells, even I was hunched a touch, something I could blame on the extra inches I’d picked up since my failed transformation. I may have clamped down on the Hobgoblin evolution but without the knowledge I was seeking I had only choked the wash of chemicals, both magical and mundane, down to a loose trickle of uncontrolled hormones.
The instability of my soul wasn’t the only deadline I was on. If I didn’t solve that problem and complete my transformation properly the uncontrolled chemicals would warp my body beyond all recognition.
But hey, my soul would be mulch by that point anyway.
The height baffled me at first, but as we went farther with no sign of the boarded up windows of the first floor it became clear. The secret entrance on the stairs wasn’t just for show or to loose tails, this entire floor didn’t have a legitimate entrance, didn’t even have a lamp or a window to light the way. We navigated off the light that seeped through both ceiling and floorboards, thin cracks spreading out into a cloudy twilight.
Sal had to have a vision boosting skill just to walk without hesitation, and he was definitely doing this on purpose. Set the new guy off guard, disorient him and prime him to look to you as a guide. It wasn’t a bad plan, if I had any trust to give.
The light grew stronger as we moved forwards, peaking in a tide of light when Sal opened the final door. I grimaced and readied myself for an ambush, but Sal didn’t pivot aside to expose me to a squad of bowmen, simply stepping through the door himself. I blinked the stars out of my eyes and followed.
Sal was already sitting down when I came through, eyes still adjusting. He had a desk set up in front of the far wall, highlighting himself in front of dozens of peepholes. He placed both elbows on the desk and spread his hands. “Welcome to my humble abode.”
Sal’s soft words floated just above the din coming in through the peepholes. I leaned to the side to catch a peek through the peepholes. His office nestled amongst the rafters of a far larger room, lines of filthy beggars milling about for some purpose. “Security through distraction?” My words were no louder than his, hovering just above a whisper. Plopping your office next to a bunch of noisy assholes was a risky move, but as long as any potential observers approached from the proper direction the sensory difference would hide more effectively than darkness alone.
Sal shrugged with a smile. “Beggar’s can’t be choosers. That still a saying you have where you come from?”
I grunted. Sal hadn’t answered the question hidden within the question, whether he was simply exploiting these beggars for their sound or could truly command their loyalty as he had his conman crew. “The other side of the mountains might be different, but trust me, its not that different. I’m more than familiar with the idea.”
Sal leaned back in his chair. “You displaced by the goblins then?”
It was difficult to give him the kind of glare a statement so obvious deserved while still hiding my eyes, but I did my best. I wasn’t exactly up to date on either the goblin or human side, but what I knew from Stel suggested that Drakul’s warlords were still running amok up there. “No, I felt like stretching my legs.”
Sal nodded in seeming sympathy, but the silhouetting made it impossible to make out the true expressions on his face. “True. It must be rough, with Sunspear cutting off any escape to the north.”
I took a deep breath to control the shiver down my spine and failed. That bastard was to blame for it all, almost as much as Stel herself, though I didn’t find out how until after it was far too late. “You have no idea.”
The words I meant as flippant somehow failed to exit my mouth that way. I hated the way my voice broke in that sentence. Hated that I was so weak as to show weakness in front of these people.
“Yeah.” That single word broke me out of my thoughts, so inadequate to describe, well, anything at all really, but somehow the exhaustion behind it resonated with me.
Sal set a bottle on the desk with a clink, two glasses joining it. He slopped a finger of something strong into each, then raised a glass.
I shifted uncomfortably, then raised the other.
“The strong do as they please, the weak do as they must.” Sal clinked his glass against mine and threw it back. I mimed his motions and let his alcohol splash against my face mask before I set the half empty glass down.
Sal’s behavior baffled me. I knew why I hated Sunspear, the man’s deadly poison fire had indirectly cost my mother her life when she refused to heal it. Even had she lived my heart ached at the loss of Drakul’s dream. He’d been just another chieftain in the end, but it had been so easy to believe in him when he was alive. He’d promised us a homeland the humans couldn’t take from us, a leader strong enough to humble the mightiest adventurer.
The human they called Sunspear had ended those illusions in a single blazing instant. An army consumed in poison fire, miles around blasted to the barren earth, the very spirits of the unburied dead cut off from their rightful rest and left to howl their grief at the night sky.
“Not much for alcohol?” Sal chuckled. “You’re a stronger man than I if you can discuss such things sober, so I’ll do you the favor of moving on.”
I wanted to grab Sal and shake him. No! No, you don’t get to move on until you explain shit, but his matter of fact demeanor made that impossible. If his depressive attitude towards Sunspear was as common and ordinary as he presented it then demanding answers would appear suspicious.
“So how can the Guild help you? You’ve proven you’ve some use at least, but I’ll have an easier time talking my way into the Guild coffers if I’ve some idea of what you need.”
I pursed my lips. How much to tell him. Not everything naturally, but I weighed the odds of death by Sal against death by soul collapse and found Sal to have a healthy lead. “I need knowledge of advanced soul techniques. How to obtain specific classes, but also more than one. I need to multi-class.”
Sal sat back. “Well. You don’t do things by halves. Why couldn’t you have something simple, like a spiritual parasite or a demon curse?”
I set the bowl full of change that Sal had deemed my ‘take’ from his little con on his desk. “You don’t have to be the end of the line. If all you can do is point me towards someone else that will still be more than I had before.”
I nudged the bowl across the desk. “And as you’ve said, help will be… reciprocated. With more than silver if you can provide real aid.”
Sal frowned down at the coins on his desk. “Zhen, why don’t you take a look out my windows over here.”
I glanced at the peepholes. They were hardly wide enough to merit the term ‘window’ and getting a good look through one would require quite an awkward position. “Is this important?”
“Very.”
I obliged him, albeit in my own paranoid way. I stepped around his desk and leaned over just enough to get a better look out the side of one eye while the other stared Sal straight in the face.
The hall beneath us was much as I’d seen, but the better vantage made it obvious what the beggars were doing. A deep sniff confirmed it, even through the reek of so many unwashed bodies. They were eating. No money changed hands, just countless bowls of thick gray gruel.
“A bunch of beggars eating?” I turned to face Sal, “How kind of you. Get to the point.”
I was even with Sal now, both of us cast half in light and half in shadow. “A full meal earns loyalty that silver can’t. The point is that there are currencies worth more than gold, and if you want to multi-class you’ll need to spend heavily in more than one.”
Unsurprising. Anyone who had the solution to my problem could demand whatever they wanted from me after all, there was no point in wasting such leverage on mere money. “Tell me what you want and I’ll see it done.”
I meant no such thing of course. I’d make that decision when I knew what he wanted. The infinite leverage of holding my life in his hands only mattered if I couldn’t steal that life back.
“It isn’t about what I want.” Sal spread his arms. “Nothing in these gutters happens without my knowledge, but it isn’t often any gutterborn reach a level where they can dream of multi-classing, let alone achieve it.”
“So I’d have to cross the walls… wait, is it level or Levels we’re talking about here.”
Sal grinned. “Yes.”
I looked at him.
“Oh come on, forgive an old cripple his eccentricities. The answer is both, if my little joke failed to inform you. You can’t multi-class until you reach a certain level, and you need at least a few connections if you want to learn a reliable method instead of just guessing.”
Sal’s stone told me all I needed to know about ‘guessing’. It didn’t sound like improvisational soul magic had a high survival rate. Bad sign for me, considering the very idea of exploiting the human soul system as a goblin demanded I figure shit out on my own.
“I don’t suppose the Adventurer’s Guild is an option?” Sal continued. “They’re the only organization that openly offers that kind of information, though I think you might have to hit silver before they give up the goods.”
I shuddered at the very idea. I didn’t consider myself to have a weak stomach, but something about the mental image of turning in the ears of some poor fuck for a fistful of silver made my stomach roil.
Sal gave me a calculating look. “Yeah, I figured. No worries, not many of us want our names written down either. It just makes your job more difficult.”
Sal held up his hands. “Not so difficult that you have to cross the walls. Not necessarily anyway. There are other people in the city who might know the secret. At least they have the levels for it. Might be they’re looking for the trick too.”
“And who are these people.”
“The kind of people who value their privacy.”
I scowled. “So that just brings us back to what I have to do to get you to cough up that information.”
Sal laughed. “This is more one of those ‘we’ll get in touch with you’ scenarios. A lot of these people are my… business associates. It’d hardly be gentlemanly of me to gab about them to just anyone.”
“But not all of them.”
“No. Not all of them.” Sal gave me an appraising look. “There are a handful of folks without that sort of connection down here, but not many. You didn’t here this from me, and you’d best remember that they’ve managed without connections for a reason before you try and cross them.”
“People say Lorgan the Blue knows many things and has made a study of things he shouldn’t. Whether he knows anything about the soul system or is just a second rate scholar too stupid to get tenure I don’t know, but either way he maintains the only mage tower in the Docks.”
“The Dockside Scrivener’s Guild could always have some secret document tucked away, but even if they do good luck finding it. The best you’re likely to get from them is normal class advice and shipping records.”
“Old man Luam might know, assuming you don’t have the same problems with less… conventional priests. But the Tidefather isn’t as talkative as the younger gods, so who knows? Aside from those three you’ll just have to wait.”
That wasn’t good. Only two real options, one being just another kind of priest, but if Sal had underestimated my issues with the gods I wasn’t going to correct him. “What about the Heights?”
Sal winced. “Anything more than the basest knowledge I am powerless to share. My kind aren’t welcome there you see. Anywhere else in the city and my ears are wide open, but on those marble streets I am quite blind.”
I grunted. “I’ll take base knowledge.”
“Then know that any institution of influence hoards knowledge like dragons hoard gold. The major noble houses, Prince-Elect Jerrain, the Ducal Archives, they all hold something close to their chest. Whether multi-classing is one of those things only they can say, and you might be better off not finding out. If you piss off someone important enough to draw the wrath of the nobles down on our heads you’d best hope they catch you before we do.”
I frowned. “Seagri has a Duke?” I was only loosely familiar with human organization, but I knew that their lords were dangerous and the higher the title the more dangerous they were.
Duke was pretty high.
Sal just chuckled. “No, we killed the last Duke centuries ago. Buildings just don’t die as easily as men.”
“Then it must belong to somebody, surely? A noble house, or Jerrain.”
“It belongs to the city.” Sal raised his hands placatingly. “And yes, I know that doesn’t answer your question. It has its own Grand Librarian to manage its affairs, the most important of which is brown nosing whatever noble looks likely to make a hefty donation next.”
“But it might know how to multi-class?”
“Oh, it definitely knows how to multi-class. The trick is finding it. Gods only know how that place is formatted, the only way you’re finding anything is with a librarian to show you the way.”
I’d chalk that up as Plan C then, somewhere in between breaking into Lorgan’s tower and kidnapping a noble scion to torture it out of him. Whatever books they have on the subject would be more academic than instructional, but if all else failed I’d take what I could get.
“Sounds like you’ve been.” Nobody had strong opinions on library organization without personal experience.
“In another life. Cost me a pretty penny too.”
“Wait, I can just buy my way in?” This was rapidly shifting Plan: Read up the plan hierarchy.
Sal shook his head. “Nobody buys their way into the Ducal Archives. Its open to the public and completely ‘free.’”
That was too good to be true even if it didn’t blatantly contradict his last sentence. “I’m sensing a catch.”
“Well of course the Librarians need to protect their charges from the common rabble. So there’s a hygiene standard. And a dress code. And a strip search if they don’t like you. Its a miracle that they don’t look up your ass for smuggled scrolls.”
“Ah.” That made more sense. There was no way things would just come up Zhen like that. Sill… “That doesn’t explain the pretty penny.”
“Ah, come from a small village do you?”
I constricted my suddenly racing heart with sheer force of will. Hiding something so simple aroused suspicion from the wary and curiosity from the ignorant. Nonchalance was a shield only penetrated by the truly paranoid. “Yeah, it wasn’t exactly the sort of thing that graced many maps… not even before.”
“Yeah,” Sal winced, good, social awkwardness would discourage digging deeper. “Well maybe it works different in places like that, but in the city proper its different. The rules can say whatever they like, but we know what they really say. Anything as vague as ‘dress code’ just means ‘kick out the poors’.”
A certain part of me found that puzzling, why bother with the pretense? The rest of me wasn’t surprised. Human nobles were too cowardly to do their own dirty work, why not be so cowardly that they couldn’t even admit the obvious?
“So the money is for bribes?”
Sal shrugged. “Bribes. Disguises. Forgery. The world runs on such things.”
“How much money are we talking here?”
“For you? Too much. Being a respectable member of society is far more important than pure money. You need connections.”
“You just told me you paid money.”
Sal winced. “Yeah, well lets just say my connections were very fiscally minded. I only needed a few gold to make them admit they knew me, but for a complete unknown like you? I can’t tell you if its even possible.”
Things were looking dangerously close to making robbing a mage tower being a good idea. I didn’t know shit about human mages, but if they were anything like goblin shamans then robbing a mage tower was never a good idea.
At least I had a source that I could read through without exposing myself through dumb questions. The records at the Scrivener’s Guild could ask no questions.
“Well I suppose no one lives forever. Thank you for your help.” I’d already been stuck in Sal’s territory for too long, it was beginning to make my shoulders itch.
“You don’t have to sleep on the street you know.” Sal interrupted me as I turned to leave. “Criminal or not I do run a real shelter. The food may be bland but it’s hot and we watch each others backs here.”
I looked back at him. In rags he might be garbed, but he lounged behind his desk as if it were a throne. “No thank you. I’m going to take another look at the Heights. Those walls might be high, but they have to let the sewage out some how.”
I left before the conversation could drag on further. I stepped with authority as I retraced my path along the dark halls, just a few steps shy of running.
I palmed an incendiary in my hand. This was the most critical time in any negotiation. Treason during was always a possibility of course, but tempered by curiosity. A source of intel was too valuable to kill, but that all dropped the second you turned your back.
I loosened my ears and puffed up my hood just enough I could get a bit of movement under it. The clamor of eating beggars might drown out a lesser pair of ears, but not mine. My rotating ears picked up the slightest sounds echoing off hard wood and through thin walls.
Only one pair of footsteps on this level, a good sign. Better yet, they were heading towards Sal, not me.
The temptation to eavesdrop floated by, but I let it float on. If it was anything bad enough to merit it I was better off running anyhow.
The footsteps didn’t pause for more than a second at Sal’s location before they reversed course.
Wonderful. Still, it was only one man. A tail then?
I could lose a tail, but the easiest way to lose something was to never have it.
I transitioned into a light jog, as fast as I could without my feet pounding out my location to any fool who cared to listen.
I darted down the stairs in a run bordering on a controlled fall, scarcely even touching the stairs. I hit the ground hard, the packed dirt floor absorbing the impact without a sound.
I stood up, straightened my getup to ensure I didn’t have any holes in my disguise, then stepped through into the exit room.
The door watchman turned to look at me. “Done already?”
“Yep,” I walked past him without a second glance. “We’re done.”
I stepped out the door.