“You... killed our dungeon lord.” The witch who’d spoken stood over the gory soup along with all the other witches and wizards.
“And with a single spell” another quietly added.
“I am very, very sorry” Rum said in a mournful tone. “This is a tragedy. Really. And it’s all my doing. My failure” he put his right hand to his chest, clutching the little pieces of torn-up clothing left on his body. “I could not find within me any other likely victory – not against somebody as powerful as Jorteg. I feared that had things gone even a little differently – had I used any other spell – I would not have survived” he looked about their faces, finding his borther Amez, Darmon, Gilda, and Rulli among them, “and neither would my party.”
One of the younger wizards looked up from the Jorteg-soup in the midst to Glarith, their senior mage. “Does that mean the naked one is now our dungeon lord?”
Rum looked down. Between the strips and patches of clothing still left on him, his body was showing just about everything: his hairy man-tits, his untamed jungle of pubes – and as he turned around – both of his buttcheeks. I thought it was a little drafy in here, especially for the inside of a mountain. Rum was not a shy man of course, nothing about him suggested as much, still, this isn’t an occasion for bringing attention to my body. Not while people are mourning a dead man’s cor... wait, he’s not even a corpse is he? The dead man’s remains, then. He stared at the remains in question, and with what he hoped was respect. He mumbled and cast a couple of spells through his cloth-cluthing hand. “Clean Body. Renew Clothes.” The gore quickly flew off his face, and through a whirling transformation of magic he was soon wearing – Rum’s eyes glanced to himself: a red robe? The adventurer studied his attire for a moment. Did this spell make me to look like the others here? Rum’s eyes went up to study their robes, then back to his own. He glanced like this back and forth a few times before concluding: I DO look like them! Just, a little fancier. “Ehem” he fake-coughed, “I did not intend to wear your outfits. That was purely the spell’s doing. It has a will of its own, you could say.”
“I think you look quite suitable to be our dungeon lord.” Spoke an older witch. “It’s like Jorteg has just been reincarnated. But nicer.”
Rum raised an eyebrow. “I’m not your dungeon lord, I just want to make that clear.”
The older witch’s eyebrows frowned into confusion. “But you beat our dungeon lord. That means you are dungeon lord now. Or do you not want us?”
“Uuuh” Rum hesitated to respond. “Let’s put it like this. I have nothing against you, but, I do not approve of this lord and subject relationship you had going. We can all be friends, of course” he tried to give something of a smile to all their expectant and worried faces, “but I cannot be your master, or anything like that. No, that wouldn’t sit well. And I don’t think you should want a master either, whomever it may be.”
“You won’t teach us magic then?” a younger witch asked with a quiet, innocent voice.
“Eeehm” Rum hesitated again. “Do you need me to?”
“Yes!” a third of the witches and wizards all spoke up. Most of the others followed with affirmational nods and more delayed “Yes!”-es.
“What about books?” Rum querried.
“What about books?” The older witch replied.
“Can’t you learn from reading? Or teaching each other?”
“Aye, we do that already.” The witch replied. “But it’s often difficult to learn without a proper tutor. Who knows more than you do, and have already mastered the subject.”
“I’m not sure I know that much” Rum defended his position, or rather, intentionally sabotaged their – in his opinion – bloated image of him.
“You sure seem to know a lot though” the younger wizard spoke again. “You know enough to even surprise and beat our dungeon lord. That’s pretty good. Overqualified even.”
“And you killed him with one spell” reiterated the witch who’d first remarked the fact.
“Now now, it may’ve been one spell that made the killing blow” Rum said, “but trickery won the fight. I could hardly get near your dungeon lord. Ehm, former dungeon lord.”
“But you beat him” the witch insisted, “and that makes you our dungeon lord, yeh?”
“Eeehm... let’s just stop talking about lords altogether” Rum pushed back. “I’m not a dungeon lord, and I’ll never become a dungeon lord. I don’t even have a dungeon” he gesticulated to their surroundings.
“But this is your dungeon, won by right of conquest, yeah?” The witch wouldn’t let go of the argument.
“N-no?” Rum said, unsure of what to answer.
“Yes” she countered.
“Nnno. This is a dungeon, but not my dungeon. Never a dungeon lord, not for this man” he gestured to himself, “and if the universe is willing, not for anybody else either. Now, if you reeeally need a tutor, I suppose I could be convinced to help you out some. I mean” Rum’s eyes looked away into nothing, “I have helped Veish learn a bit. I’ve even considered taking on another pupil. What more could – wait, how many of there are you?” He looked across them all, trying to gauge their number in his head.
“37” Glarith responded. “Myself included.”
“Oh. Oh” was all Rum managed to say. 37!? That’s too many! But... their faces. The expressions were many, some anxious, some innocent, some expectant. But almost all of them penetrating deeply into Rum’s post-kill conscience. “Well, I suppose I have... 37... more pupils now.”
All around the gory soup of Jorteg, smiles erupted on faces. Two mages even cheered slightly. “Woooh!”
“But I’m not staying here” Rum gestured to their surroundings. “I won’t live in a hole in the mountain, and not on somebody else’s mageland. And that mageland spell is probably vaning as we speak, anyhow. No, you’ll all have to follow me back to Ermos if you want to be my pupils. And somehow, we’ll have to find a place for you all to stay.”
“Don’t you have a big house” one of the witches gestured with outstretched arms, “where we can live?”
“Yeah, you must probably be rich, right?” another added. “Have a big mansion, big bedrooms, large beds.” Her eyes went wide with her own imaginings.
“Weeell...” Rum thought about it. “I suppose you all could stay in Amez’s closet. That’s where Veish’s been sleeping.”
“My what?” Amez retorted, and Rum looked to his brother’s very confused face. “And there’s that name again. Who is this Veish?”
“Uuuuuhhh” Rum began. “Okay brother, this is going to come as a surprise to you, and it seems circumstances has made it inevitable that I will have to come clean about something. I have been keeping a secret from you. You see, the closet in your shop’s bedroom, I have been using it.”
“Using it how?” Amez’ indeed surprised face was entirely wrapped up in the revelation.
“I have magically expanded it, and there now lives a witch there, along with some other creatures.”
“Wha... what are you saying? There are people and creatures living inside the closet?” Amez looked utterly dumbfounded. “But how is that even possible, I checked the closet. Is this something new?”
“No, it was there when you checked” Rum explained. “I’ve just hidden them well. You could still discover it had you been more thorough, but I’ve also had some help from my elven friends. We implemented a passphrased door when we changed the back of the closet.”
Amez’ mouth could do nothing but just hang wide open. The man, apparently, for all his faith in his brother, couldn’t believe what he was hearing, or didn’t know what to say about it.
“Your brother’s closet?” replied a witch with a big confused frown on her freckled face, bringing the topic back to the mages. “You want us to live in a closet?”
“It’s a very big closet” Rum explained.
“How big?” asked a serious wizard with a ponytail brown beard.
“Uuuu-unknown” Rum replied.
“What you mean, unknown?” He asked with confusion. It seemed Rum was great at spreading confusion at this time.
“Yeah” Amez interjected, still midly stunned in his expression, his eyes aimed at nothing, “that I would like to know also.”
The confused wizard let Amez finish his interjection, then added to Rum: “You haven’t measured it?”
“I’ve yet to find a measuring stick remotely long enough.”
Smiles formed several places in the crowd, and a funny mood appeared on a few faces. Amez looked to his brother and still gaped, stunned even, unable to comprehend quite what Rum meant.
“Nah. I can’t stay in a closet.” This time yet another witch spoke up, and her mood was quite the opposite of most others. “If he can’t provide us with proper accomodation, at least as good as we had here – which was terrible, and you all know it – then I will go my own way. I’d be happy to have the rest of you come with me, though. Strength in numbers. And more importantly: I’d miss you all terribly, if I’d have to leave all of you.” She looked about with sadness into the others’ faces, and with what Rum guessed to be the seeds of a heartache.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“I’ll go with you” a new witch said, and went up to the one who’d spoken up, giving her a hug and holding her hand.
A silence hung in the air, as everyone contemplated their possibilities. In the end though, conversations began to spread, and one by one the witches and the wizards rallied around their friend.
“The treasures of the dungeon are yours now” a nearly middle-aged witch said to Rum. “But if you would let us take some of the library books with us, then I would go with them as well. I want to learn magic, that’s why I’m here. But, I don’t want to sleep in a closet either.” She glanced over to the now dozen or so group of independent mages. “And I don’t want to leave my friends.”
“Quite understandable” Rum nodded his head, “I suggest you take all the books with you. I don’t need any. In fact, take any item with you that you want, if it is of personal value to you. I don’t need to take anything from you in particular. Though my party would want some gold, potions, reagents, enchanted items, magic scrolls, weapons, that sort of things. I think my party members would be very mad at me if we did not stake some claims to the treasures, after all.” He eyed Amez, who just returned his stare with a still dumbfounded expression of his own. He moved his stare to Darmon, Gilda and Rulli. The former had his arms around the witch he’d just coupled with, his head leaning against the top of her’s, while his face looked serene; his mind dreamy. The latter two dwarves were still lovebirding, with Gilda’s left hand playing with Rulli’s beard, and Rulli’s arm also around his woman. “At least they will care later, when Gay Aura wears off” Rum added.
In the end, of 37 mages, 31 of them were convinced, either by themselves or by their friends, to join a large group independent from Rum and his. Among these, one of the last to switch sides was Glarith, who by Rum’s understanding had been some kind of matriarch for the others under Jorteg. Although Gay Aura seems to have disrupted some of that hierarchy. Jorteg reinforced the hierarchy by his iron will, that seems most likely. But in his absence would they find a reason to perpetuate old habits, even after Gay Aura wears off? Rum did not know the full lasting effects of his Positive Mind-derived spells, but he knew that breaking open the minds and hearts of a person even once could leave life-altering marks of change. Once the heart starts to grow affections formerly blocked, and the mind starts to work ideas once too scary to consider, one is, in some sense, committed to both. A bond once formed, or an idea once rooted, cannot be easily ignored. Rum left his gaze of the large group, and looked back to 6 mages now stood unmoving, next to Amez, Gilda and Rulli, in a half-circle around Jorteg’s remains. All of them staring intently at Rum.
“Okay then” Rum inspected each one of the mages: 3 of them witches; 3 of them wizards. “You are all to be my apprentices?”
“Yes” a couple of them answered, while the 4 others nodded.
Among these 6 were a few surprises. For one, Darmon’s new girlfriend, if she could be called that, was not among them. Instead, she had lead Darmon over to the new group that was forming, and Darmon seemed non-plussed about leaving Rum. In fact he seemed casually okay with the prospect of leaving the party altogether and running off with the mages. What an interesting twist of fate that would be, Rum thought as he glanced over to the tank. Glancing back he took account of who actually was among this new squad. He recognized some of them from earlier. Buttcake-Woman. Single-Spell-Woman. You-Are-Overqualified-Man. But you woman, and you two men, I don’t think I know you, although I’ve seen your faces.
“Would you like to tell me your names?” Rum opened.
Single-Spell-Woman went first. “Bresh.”
Rum nodded. “Your name? You also from the Tumi kitchens?”
“Yes!” she replied immediately, surprised at his guess. Rum nodded again, and looked to Buttcake-Woman.
“Meti” she answered to his stare. “Not Tumi” she shook her head.
“Where you from then?” He raised an eyebrow.
“Ermos City, in fact. Most of us are from there. Either our mothers and fathers were born there, or we left from that place ourselves. Most of us are from The Raven’s, but some us Ermos folk are from other places as well.”
Now it was Rum’s turn to raise an eyebrow.
“You left Ermos for The Desolate Lands? Why – no – how?”
“You’ve been to The Raven’s? Who wouldn’t want to go. As for how, men of The Opportunity Trail invited me to come join a new dungeon lord.”
“The Opportunity Trail?” Rum’s eyebrow couldn’t get a rest, instead they remained perpetually raised high and curious in this situation. “What is that?”
“They are middlers, some call them recruiters.” Her eyes darted to the side, as if uncomfortable speaking of the fact. “They give us gifts, and provide us opportunities in what you call The Desolate Lands.”
“Huh” Rum stroked his beard. “Out of curiosity, what kind of gifts are we talking about? And what opportunitites, besides the one you chose.”
“When I was much younger, they helped teach me to read and such, along with other kids. When I got older, they taught me a spell to defend myself, and told me I could learn more if I came with them; if I joined the dungeon lords. As for other people, I’ve heard some were offered free land to farm in The Three Brothers’. Lots of farmland there is overgrown.”
“Hah” Rum said, not knowing quite what to say. “Interesting” he nodded a few times, “thanks for sharing. Okay” he turned to You-Are-Overqualified-Man.
“Soren” said the wizard. “I’m not from either of those places, I come from the north-west. Crabwalker Port is my hometown.”
“Alright” Rum nodded. “Well, I know the Tumi situation.” He nodded to Bresh. “I know now The Raven’s situation.” He nodded to Meti. “I’m curious: what made you come all the way down here, from Crabwalker no less?”
“Didn’t like the sea that much. Didn’t want to be a sailor, like my mother. Nor a fisher, like my father. I wanted to learn magic, but–” he shrugged “–nobody would pay my tuition. I came where magic is free.”
“You just decided to wander south then?” Rum found that possibility strange, although, that’s exactly what I did. Minus the intention of joining the dungeon lords, of course.
“More or less” he replied.
“Did you just wander into The Three Brothers’, hoping nobody would kill you? Meti–” Rum gestured a finger to the woman, “–mentioned The Opportunity Trail. The Trail found you also, somehow?”
“Not exactly. When I first stepped foot in the land, I was taken into custody by a goblin necromancer. I convinced the man of my intentions. He sent me to a large manor near Mainpipe. It was a place for people with similar aspirations like myself. A bunch of hopefuls seeking apprenticeship to a dungeon lord. They gave us access to a small library of books on magic there, and gave us some basic magic lessons.”
“And then you were offered a position?” Rum concluded, stroking his beard.
“Yes” he nodded weakly.
Rum looked down the arc of the half-circle to the next person.
“Larkoff” said the next man. “Also from The Raven’s. Similar story to Meti.” Larkoff’s eyes glanced over to Meti, who returned his eyes. “In fact I’ve met her before when we were young.”
Rum’s face moved back to Meti, who gave no comment, and he returned to Larkoff. “Splendid” he replied. He stepped over the last man and the last woman.
“Farklend” said the next man. “I’m from Agadeya” he spoke with an accent that Rum was all too familiar with, memories from a few years prodded by the sound.
“Agadeya” Rum mumbled. “The Kingdom of Meya is not even at war with the dungeon lords. Interesting that you should be from the south. What made you come all this way?”
“Didn’t like the village” he responded. “And I like magic.”
“Meeeya” Rum absentmindedly stroked his shortened beard some more. Although he felt a lessened comfort now that it’d been forcibly trimmed, it was better than nothing. And he couldn’t merely conjure new hairgrowth – yet. “Not a lot of magic users there, yeah” he pondered out loud. “And did you just walk as well?” His eyes focused back on Farklend.
“Went with a caravan” the man explained. “One of the dungeon lords sent an apprentice with a Tumi caravan. The witch, I convinced her to take me with back. Ended up at a manor, like Soren. But a different one, near Valorum.”
“Ah” Rum nodded a few times. “I understand. Thanks for the explanation.”
His eyes moving to the last of the mages, and the next woman quickly responded before he could even ask. “I’m Bun.”
“Bun?” The name sounded strange to Rum, like a nickname rather than something she’d been born into. “And where are you from, Bun?”
“Valorum” she answered softly. “My great grandparents were survivors of the siege.”
“Hah. That’s interesting. I think you might be the first ever native of The Three Cities I’ve ever met. And what drove you to join the dungeon lords?”
“Magic. Like everyone else” she shrugged. “I didn’t want to be stuck in the ironworks of the city like my parents, or farm on the countryside, like my aunt.”
“And you weren’t stuck here?” Rum gestured to their surroundings.
She sighed. “Heeeh. Maybe. But it’s more exciting than city life would’ve been. I think.” She didn’t look entirely sure of herself.
“Hmm” Rum stroked. “Whether it would’ve been or not, we can’t know, unless of course today counts. But you don’t mind moving into Ermos City? If you want excitement, you are going to one of the biggest and most diverse cities known to Aclima, I could truthfully say as much.”
“Oh yes! I’m ready for change!” She gave a strong affirmative nod.
“Good” Rum smiled.
“Excuse me!” Rum turned to see Glarith come up to him. The witch pointed a finger down into the Jorteg-goo, but was looked straight at Rum. “Do you mind if I take him?”
Rum glanced down into the goo, and up again to Glarith. “Why?” He frowned his eyebrows. It was now his turn to be confused.
“I just...” she became mute for a moment as her expression looked a little strange, as if afraid to sound weird.
“I mean” Rum quickly added, “you can have him. I wouldn’t dream of stealing his corpse off the fingers of those nearest him. But–”
“I’d like to raise him!” Glarith mustered. “As a skeleton follower.”
Rum looked back down again at Jorteg. The skeleton was very much intact, and perfect for necromancy in fact, at least as far as he could guestimate. He looked back up. “That request is... I’m not sure what that is, in fact. I think I have to ask again: why?”
“It’s just...” the old woman blushed and her eyes looked away. “I just, kinda, think it would be like... a memory of him, and...” she stared down. She took a deep, slow breath there, and looked up again, meeting Rum’s eyes with determination. “He was my boss for many years, and he was kind of awful. I want to be his boss now.”
Rum’s mouth opened thoughtfully, and remained open while he considered this admission. She wants to boss around the skeleton of her former boss? Now, is this therapeutic, or some victim’s insanity? After a short while of thinking, he was able to formulate his concerns. “I’m okay with you raising him as a skeleton, but, I’m not quite okay with you abusing his skeleton. Unless I have misunderstood you, and it’s not revenge that you’re after.”
“Oh, no” she shook her head. “Not revenge, per se. I just...” her eyes rolled away from eye-contact.
“You just want to feel like you are in charge now” Rum offered.
Her eyes came back to him and, hesitating for only half a second: “Yes, that. I’d like to feel like I am in charge now.”
Rum thought some more, considering the situation. “Hmm” he stroked his beard. “What if I offered you something more, but also different?”
She raised an eyebrow. “What could that be?”
“During the fight I made a copy of his soul, or you might call it that. I let it go, but it might be possible for me to recapture it, and” he looked thinkingly into the air, “if I mix it with another spell of mine, I could use it to bring back some of Jorteg. Not the original Jorteg, of course, but it would be almost like pieces of the former Jorteg.” He glanced at Glarith whose eyes were widening with surprise. “However, if I do that, then you have a new sentient being on your hands. And in that case: it is necessary of me to add a couple of important conditions.”
He paused to let her surprise fall. “What conditions do you need?”
“I need that you respect and care for this new Jorteg. You cannot be his boss. No, you will have to be something quite differet. A guardian, like a mother, or big sister. You must give him a good life, or whatever best passes for the good life of a skeleton.” Rum gazed into the blue. “After all, he won’t need to sleep or eat...” He looked back at her. “Still, make him a full, free member of your community. Not your subordinate, but your special child. If you can meet those conditions, I will bring back a Jorteg that you might recognize as something much more, than this mere assortment of bones.”
“Wait–” Amez spoke up, “–brother, are you really about to make a second White Rose?”