Chapter Four

Jerome and Hector

Jerome was not a happy man. After two weeks on the road in an uncomfortable carriage, he had spent the last two days running around a part of the capital that makes the slums look like the Noble's Quarter. He was hoping that the body he had run across the day before had been the work of the Awakened that he was chasing and not a rogue mage. Rogue Death Mages were always a pain to run down; a massive effort involving the Temple of Life and the Temple of Death was usually needed to have enough of the proper mages to take one down. He was glad that if it was rogue, he could just pass it off to the Capital Guild and Temples and be done with it.

However, it looked like his persistence in tracking the Awakened may have finally paid off, as whoever had set off his mage beacons was finally standing still somewhere other than a collapsed building. He could have quit, gone to the townhouse, and enjoyed a nice, long bath at any time, and no one would have blamed him. However, his pride and that damn speech he had given the young idiots wouldn’t let him give up. He wasn’t angry, except at the stupid crying plague barrier; he was just ready for this Search to be over so he could get a bath; and a bonfire for his clothes (and maybe that crybaby of a barrier).

Sighing as he rounded the corner of what had once been a broad street, an abandoned warehouse and office lined the street. Ready to face whoever had been leading one very unhappy Duke, who would much rather be at home with his wife, on a merry chase, he was not all that surprised by the sight before him; the dead body had raised his suspicions that he was not the only one on the hunt. Mentally shrugging, he thought to himself, what’s one more complication?

“Well, now, this is not totally unexpected,” he told the man currently holding the girl from the fountain off the ground by her neck. This was sub-optimal, as the hand around her neck was clearly making it hard to breathe. If he killed her and she was whom he was looking for, his remaining life would be painful and long. The Life Mages in the king’s dungeons always liked new subjects for their experiments.

“Back off fucker, this is none of your concern!” yelled the man.

“That is where you're wrong, bad sir, I have spent the past two days chasing one of you thru this stinking, sewage, disease-infested ghetto, and I’m not leaving without my quarry. Now put the child down so I can check which one of you I’m looking for,” replied Jerome. “If it’s her, you may leave in peace. If it’s you, you will be coming with me to the Guild.”

“You ain’t the Guard, ya can’t touch me, so go e’ff yourself with a rusty pole ya mage bastard!” the man replied as he threw a dagger at Jerome.

Jerome sighed again as he tossed up a simple physical barrier between himself and the man; at the same time, he decided he was going to take out his frustrations on the thug, so he kept the barrier invisible so as not to clue the thug that he had done anything.

“I’m supposed to be on vacation!” He yelled at the thug. “So please stop resisting so I can get back to it.”

Knowing how unlikely it was that the thug would give up, Jerome threw a substantial, invisible physical barrier behind the man to prevent his escape and to prevent any friends he might have from joining him. He then began to walk towards the man and the now, unfortunately, unconscious child. The thug pulled a dagger from his waist and threw it at Jerome. Without bothering with any gestures for such a minor spell, Jerome strengthened the barrier in front of himself, just in case the man had some magic to help the throw in some way. He didn’t, and the dagger stuck in the barrier.

The man turned to flee as the dagger stopped in midair, confirming that he had no combat spells if he even was a mage. Jerome, still walking forwards, casually grabbed the dagger out of the air and tossed it aside. Running into the barrier Jerome barrier, the thug pulled another dagger and held it to the child’s throat.

“ BACK OFF OR THE GIRL DIES! ” the thug bellowed.

“No, she won’t,” Jerome replied casually. With a subtle hand gesture, he created an invisible physical and anti-magic barrier around the girl. Having secured the child’s safety, he continued to walk forward. The thug, knowing he had nothing to lose after trying to murder a Magister and having been boxed in, decided to deny the Magister any prize, either himself or the girl. For his part, Jerome had gotten close enough for his beacons light to be shining on the child clearly. As the Duke took his next step, the thug struck for the girl’s heart only to encounter the barrier and have the dagger stop cold. The strike did lessen his grip on the child, allowing Jerome to pull the girl out of the way with his barrier. As he set the girl down, he saw a rusted pole lying on a mostly dry patch of ground. The thug did not like the smile he saw as Jerome raised the pole….

****

After working out his frustrations on the thug, Jerome checked on the girl he had just rescued. Thankfully, the girl was still unconscious and breathing easily, giving him a chance to double-check the initial beacon reading with a more accurate tool without her panicking. His magic gauge was another one of his personal tools. It could read magic power to greater accuracy than the standard Magisiter’s gauge. It could also read what types of mana a person could use. He gently parted the girl’s lips and inserted the gauge like a thermometer, and waited for it to get its reading as he started working his way out of the grime and muck toward the Slums and, eventually, the Merchants’ Quarter, where he would meet up with his servants and a Guild Instructor to hand the girl over. He would have preferred to head straight to the Guild or his townhouse to deal with this, but his wife would kill him if he tracked this muck near the house, and despite his rank in both the Guild and Nobility, the Guild guards would unceremoniously hose him down on the street before they let him. Better to annoy an innkeeper that he could just throw gold at until he shut up. Plus, the bath would be hot!

A few minutes passed while he waited for the gauge to finish its readings. While waiting on the gauge, he continued his trek through the grime and muck, using a barrier suspended in the air beside him as a stretcher. When it finally finished, he pulled it to read the results and tripped on something in the muck in his shock at the readings. The plague barrier wailed in distress. The gauge was reading 1000*, indicating that it was not programmed to display the full reading, although it could accurately read her power. After cleaning the disease soup off his face, he sent a message to the Guild to bring a Death Mage to kill all the diseases he had just gotten by getting the disease soup all over himself and in his mouth; he would not call that “water.” He picked up the tool he had dropped to recheck it's reading. After cleaning and confirming his initial look, he turned the dial to check her mana affinities and almost tripped again.

“By all the Gods, girl! Which God decided to mess with your life,” he mumbled.

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After reading all the information the gauge could get, he decided that he would cancel the hand-off of the girl to Guild; he needed time to think. Fortunately, he was high enough in rank in the Guild and nobility that while this would cause minor problems for him professionally, he wouldn’t end up in jail or anything like that. He might lose his position as a Magister, but looking at his filthy, disease-ridden clothes, this might not be a bad outcome.

This girl was something special. The Guild Initiate Class would not be the best place for her age and health. The Guild claimed it treated all Initiates the same regardless of social standing, but the truth was many Noble Initiates lorded their status over the commoners, and the Guild did little to stop it. A young girl, who most likely couldn’t read or write, who could not afford extra food or tutoring to catch up to even the poorest farm kid, would be eaten alive. The Guild Masters would suck her into their power struggles, using her power to their ends, keeping her ignorant of her options while making the Guild seem like the only safe place for her. It was an old, sad story for the poor blessed with power. He didn’t have the power base in the Capital Guild to do anything for her there, but outside the Guild, that was a different story. Slipping a sleeping draught down the child’s throat to give him time to plot, he started off again.

Some time and many, many message spells later, the Duke finally made his way to the outskirts of the Merchants District. Making a few more turns into a less reputable part of the district, he came to an inn that the Magisters occasionally used for sensitive meetings that Guild officials might not like or want to know about. Seeing one of his few allies in the Capital Guild waiting out front, he let out a sigh of relief. The Instructor had bought his story of the target getting killed by the thug. He knew his story wouldn’t hold up for long, but it didn’t have to. He just needed enough time to get her cleared of disease and back to his townhouse.

“Hector, it’s good to see you here. Were you able to wrangle me a Healer and Death Mage?” he asked urgently.

“Duke Jerome, I got a Healer here already, though you won’t like him. He’s a pompous young noble who thinks commoners are worse than rats, but he is fairly strong. And before you ask, he won’t recognize you. He thinks you’re just a Magister from one of the Out Guilds dropping off a kid you picked up on the way into town but wants to make sure she is in good shape first. Sasha is on her way but is about half an hour away still. She was at the palace dealing with something or other. No one else I trust was available,” Hector answered while slowly backing away from Jerome and the girl. The smell was beyond horrendous.

“Fine, fine. Were you able to get a suppression bracer?”

“Yes, though the Quartermaster asked quite a few questions. I eventually had to drop your name to get one out of there. He wanted to give me a standard collar,” Hector said with a shudder.

“Standard penny-pinching bureaucrat, curse Gordon and all his works, no help for that. I can afford it when they fine you for misappropriation, so just pass me the bill. Has Nadia arrived yet?”

“No, she hasn’t. I can guess why you want a Life mage here, but not why you wanted one from your household instead of the Guild, but I’m sure that unconscious child floating beside you has something to do with it. While I would never dare question your exalted Ducal will, would you mind telling me why I’m risking my neck for you this time?” Hector asked with a faux plaintive quiver in his voice.

“Not here; let’s get her in a bed and that bracer on. I was vague in my messages for a reason; you never know if the artificer put in an eavesdropping function. Trust me when I say she’s odd, and I’m certain at least one God is involved,” Jerome said, attempting to grab Hector’s arm. Hector deftly dodged the hand with a slight chuckle.

“Nope, I won’t touch you until Sasha cleanses you. I don’t want…. well, I guess you have everything if you’ve been in The Wet for two days. Why didn’t you back off when you saw the trail was heading into The Wet like everyone else? You know that place is Outlaw; we don’t have to chase people who go there.”

“I know, but that answer will have to wait until we are secure. This may be nothing, but I don’t think it will be. I do know that the chances of me keeping my Guild Rank are slim when the fallout hits, though. I won’t forget this, Hector; let me know if you get hit with any fallout. The least I can do is give you a job if you lose yours,” Jerome told his friend.

They entered the inn, and Hector led Jerome past a few curious patrons and up to the third floor he had rented. Going thru the door into one of the rooms, they met a wiry, thin man whom Hector introduced as Devon, a Journeyman Healer. Jerome nodded in acknowledgment but didn’t offer a hand due to his disease-covered hands.

“Hector, clear off the blankets. The innkeeper will probably burn everything anyway, but there is no reason to waste them if we can save them. Healer Devon, after I set her down, please fix what damage you can. She probably has some head and neck injuries. I’m going to grab a quick bath and a change of clothes while we wait for the Death mage,” he said. Jerome gave Hector a subtle signal not to use any names the Healer didn’t already know. After laying the child on the cleared bed, he stepped out.

****

“I am not touching that thing until the Death mage gets to it,” Devon declared with a sniff. “It’s nothing more than a street mouse; why even an Out Guild Magister is wasting his time on it, I don’t know.”

Hector rolled his eyes, “Do your job, Healer, I’m no more happy being around her than you are, but we have our duty,” he replied while grabbing the suppression bracer out of his bag.

“I know my duty, Magister, and it will be healed after it is cleansed. And just what are you doing with that bracer? Scum gets collared. Only nobles are supposed to get the bracers.”

Hector chose to ignore him and, with a grimace of disgust, pushed up the arm of the girl’s dress to apply the bracer when he slid it over her arm though it did not adjust but simply glowed red.

“Don’t ignore me, Magister, even though you outrank me in the Guild, I am a noble and will punish you if you continue to insult me!” shrilled Devon.

Still ignoring the Healer's ranting, Hector simply got up and grabbed the water pitcher and a towel to clean the girl's arm so that the bracer could attach itself to her. Jerome reentered the room in fresh clothes as he turned to kneel back down beside the bed. While not what anyone would call clean, it was clear he had at least washed his face and arms.

“Try not to wake her, Hector; if she’s startled too badly, she might instinctively lash out, and she might be a Death mage,” Jerome stated in the tone of voice one uses to announce the sun is bright. Hector and Devon both slowly turned toward the Duke in horror.

“Sir, you know the protocol. You should not have brought her around people without a Life Mage once you suspected she was a Death Mage,” Hector stated.

“WH…..” Devon tried to scream but was muffled by Hector quickly.

“Quite you fool; we don’t want to wake her before I get this bracer on!” Hector growled out.

“I’m not a fool; I dosed her with a sleeping draught. She should be out for a few more hours. Now clean her arm and get that bracer on,” Jerome stated dismissively.

While Hector returned to the girl, he heard the Healer try to start an argument with Jerome about bringing an untrained Death mage into the city near his vaunted noble self. Hector ignored them and gently grabbed the girl’s arm to start washing her arm. Then the girl stirred.