A lively crowd of bandits, guards, and the occasional laborer gathered in front of what was usually a row of cages populated by two dozen adult prisoners.
The “cages” were actually a single rectangular cage with six doors. Well, it was more like a frame of bars protruding from the dusty ground, than anything else, but what made it special was its slightly modular construction.
Usually, a series of panels bisected the space into its six sections, which became for all intents and purposes, smaller individual cages. Yes, these panels typically separated the prisoners into smaller, more manageable groups, but they could also be removed to accommodate larger creatures who required more space.
This secondary function had been seldom used since its construction, and yet, today they were all removed, creating one long space for the only two adult prisoners occupying it. Well, one adult human and one teenager-looking not-a-beastkin cambion.
The reason for this was quite clear given the din of the crowd placing bets and cheering as the prisoners made good use of their extra space.
Muzio and the cambion were currently kicking up dust as they rolled on the ground, sometimes clanging loudly against the sides of their cage.
The larger man, despite his chains, managed to pull the cambion into a neck lock. The much smaller beastkin shimmied as best he could, arching his back or kicking against the bars in a desperate effort to get free. All he managed to do was kick up dust.
None of the crowd bet that the beastkin would win. That much had been made clear on the numerous times this show had played itself out. Their bets were on the matter of time. How long would the beastkin last?
It looked like the cambion’s situation was already hopeless. With a twist of his body, Muzio adjusted his position, catching the beastkin’s leg with one of his own, effectively cutting off the smaller fighter’s ability to kip effectively. All the cambion could do was flail wildly, kicking up even more dust with his feet, until it was a small cloud, making it hard to see the two men inside it.
The headlock now firmly secured, Muzio began to squeeze like a constrictor boa and arched his back.
There was no concern in the crowd. Instead, their voices increased in volume and many preemptively celebrated their victory as they called out the time they had predicted it would take for the larger man to submit the smaller.
They had seen these two go at it constantly over the past two weeks. Even if there had been token attempts to stop them at first, the two prisoners' shenanigans were too entertaining during an otherwise boring lull in the Mud Castle’s operations, and no harm seemed to come to either of the prisoners when they were done, despite how aggressively they went at it.
Suddenly, the beastkin slipped from the headlock and was on his knees, in position behind his opponent. There was a startled expression on the veteran fighter’s face and he tried to push himself up and turn to face the beastkin. There was a sudden explosion of volume from the crowd as they witnessed this unusual reversal.
The crowd went into full frenzy when the beastkin seized the moment he had created, and attempted the very headlock he had been in just moments before.
It was a poor copy, as Muzio tucked his chin in the last moment, reached over his shoulder awkwardly due to his chains, but still managed to flip the beastkin over his head and onto his back.
There was a heavy oomph as the beastkin’s back hit the ground. And for a few seconds no one could see him under the dust. That seemed to mark the end of the fight, as after some words exchanged between the two combatants, the larger man helped the beastkin to his feet and they moved to the far end of the cage to talk among themselves.
The dust settled, and after a few minutes of jeering and attempts by the crowd to get the fight to continue, all of which were effectively ignored, the crowd exchanged monies and arguments, and eventually dispersed.
Huddled in their corner, the cambion drank from a jug of water that was a luxury, all things considered, that no prisoner should have.
“You blink teleported,” Muzio said simply while the cambion drank. “It was a good move, but reckless. What if someone in the crowd saw you?”
“Why do you think I kicked up all that dirt? All anyone watching saw was me slipping my little head out from your grip and getting the drop on you.”
“It was reckless.”
“Oh, and regularly training for our escape where anyone and everyone can see it isn’t reckless?”
It was a miracle no one thought to question why the two in the cage fought so regularly when they didn’t act like enemies after they were done. But that was just one in a considerably long list of lucky breaks that allowed the last two weeks to have gone so smoothly with respect to training.
“You’re not wrong,” Muzio said, taking a look around. “I guess it can’t be helped. I don’t think anyone saw, but why did you risk it?”
“I needed to see if I could do it under pressure. I can’t be limited to doing it in meditation when all is quiet in the middle of the night. Oh, and when no one is watching.”
Muzio considered the cambion’s words, then nodded.
“How did it feel?”
“Better than I thought it would,” the cambion said, wiping the sweat from his brow. “I don’t get all that magic theory you keep going on about, but the breathing and visualization exercises helped. Well, mostly the visualization. I couldn’t exactly breathe when you had me in that choke.”
Muzio paused to collect his thoughts, and the cambion had the feeling he was about to be subjected to another bad metaphor to try and help him comprehend magic.
“Your raw magical power is like a cloudy mist. Meanwhile, intent is that which condenses the mist into droplets of rain.”
Muzio waited patiently to see if this explanation finally cut through the cambion’s thick skull.
“And the rain is our skills and magic?” Felix replied.
Muzio’s frown relaxed. He nodded his approval.
“Felix, I was beginning to fear I was mistaken about you. It’s refreshing to see you’re just slow, and not an idiot.”
“Fuck you,” the cambion said, tossing a handful of dirt at Muzio, who merely brushed it off with a grunt.
The cambion sighed. “It’s still hard for me to get used to that name… It just doesn’t feel like I own it.”
“There has always been power in a name. Once you accept it as yours, your identity will begin to crystallize around it and it will be easier to make use of magic and your abilities.”
Muzio shrugged. “You’ll get it eventually, but lower your expectations. Remember, you are slow.”
The cambion rolled his eyes. He didn’t take his new mentor’s words to heart. While it was true that much of the magical theory he had been fire-hosed with over the past two weeks had been hard to grasp given how it clashed with his fundamental understanding of the universe, his progress had been anything but slow.
“Nope, you’re slow!” The cambion shot back. “As far as explaining that whole intent thing with magic goes, this is the first time you say something that makes sense. That last one about cooking a chicken egg with my brain was not very helpful. All it did was make me hungry.”
The last two weeks had been surprisingly free of danger and awfully productive, despite what their imprisonment might suggest.
It was enough to make the cambion believe that he really was lucky. Well, maybe.
On their second day in the cage together, the prisoners were visited by an unusual man with oily black hair in a bowl cut, dressed in a priest’s black cassock.
The guards called him “Father” and seemed somewhat apprehensive of him. Upon his arrival, he inspected each cage filled with prisoners and then performed a brief ritual. It involved muttering an incantation while holding up a slender rod made of bone, after which a sickly greenish-purple disc appeared in front of him with rotating symbols. The priest then interpreted these for his assistant, a wiry man in black robes with the hood drawn down, who used a glowing stone tablet to jot down the figures his boss gave him.
It was the cambion’s first time seeing something that actually felt like real magic. The kind that was flashy and looked like a small miracle.
It was unclear what the priest was doing as he went from cage to cage, until he reached the one with Muzio and the cambion.
“What is this?” the priest asked his assistant, who shrugged. The priest then turned to one of the guards and addressed him angrily. “Please explain why this cage is practically empty and why that one is in chains!”
The guard in question was none other than snake-pig-nose man, whose right hand was still wrapped in bandages from the cambion’s attack on his first night. He proceeded to bumble over his words, only able to muster a weak excuse regarding the beastkin, but that the human was too strong to be subdued simply with a suppression collar.
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The priest’s anger was quickly suppressed. It had nothing to do with the guard’s words, however. The priest had not waited to receive a response before beginning his ritual.
Something he saw in the floating symbols that appeared in front of him made the oily priest very happy.
“These figures!” the priest exclaimed. “Hehehehehhe! My, what extraordinary potential.”
He began giggling in a thoroughly unsettling manner. Then, he backhanded the snake-pig-nose man across the face when he realized he was still there, who promptly left to tend to his freshly bloodied nose.
The priest leaned in close to the cage and studied Muzio, then the beastkin.
“Who are you?” It was unclear which of them the priest meant. It was possible he was addressing them both, or neither. “What are you? No, it doesn’t matter. Yes, they’re perfect.”
Muzio merely stood at the ready, straining his chains, as he had since the priest showed up and began analyzing prisoners.
The cambion wasn’t feeling particularly chatty, but the priest staring at him gave him the creeps.
“You’re the kind of priest that likes to do bad things with little boys, aren’t you?” The cambion said. “You’re definitely giving off that pervert vibe.”
The priest didn’t even seem to hear him. He just began muttering under his breath, all the while ogling the two prisoners. With the cambion’s enhanced hearing, he had no trouble picking out the intelligible words, if not the full scope of meaning behind them.
“So much magic capacity… yes, but the time… No, I need to prepare a bigger ritual …and the materials? Yes, I can use the others...”
By the end of his muttering rant, he was practically salivating. Having worked out whatever it was, the priest called out to the snake-pig faced guard, who flinched as the priest’s attention fell upon him.
“Inform the rest of the guard! These prisoners will remain apart from the others. They are to be kept watered and well fed, healthy, and none shall harm them until I return for them. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Father Sandra,” Snakepig-face said. Then hesitantly added, “And, uh, how long will that be, exactly?”
“I shall return for them in little more than a fortnight.”
The priest had then transferred all the remaining prisoners to a series of covered wagons and left, shooting Muzio and the cambion a greedy look over his shoulder every chance he got.
“Is Sandra a common name for males?” the cambion asked once the priest was gone and no one seemed to be paying them any mind. “I’m not caught up on the cultural differences between my old world and this one. Not that my memory’s all that reliable, but I’m pretty sure Sandra was a girl’s name where I’m from.”
“No, that’s definitely not a male name here either.” Muzio said. “Did that guy really say the pervy priest’s name was Sandra? Maybe you misheard.”
“You thought he was pervy too? I know, right? And yeah, I’ve got crazy-good hearing, mate. I’m one-hundred percent sure these guards are all terrified of that sack of oil, and he’s got a girl’s name. Not sure what to make of that.”
“Huh…” Muzio grunted.
Neither the cambion nor his new companion knew what to make of the episode, but one thing was clear: they had two weeks to get ready for whatever was to come. One thing they agreed on was that, whatever it was, it probably wouldn’t be good.
Muzio began by drilling the cambion with questions to get a picture of what he had to work with.
The cambion related his story in its entirety, putting his trust into the other man. The cambion related the circumstances of his unusual birth. The messages he had received in his vision. The narrow escape from angry villagers and their dogs, who took offense with his demonic nature. The ravenous hunger that led to his compulsive consumption of tree bark, mushrooms, and ultimately a blinkus cat. The memories he seemed to have taken from the things he ate. His battle with large rats, his inability to use his abilities at will, nor understanding his semi-sentient status. Everything was gone over in excruciating detail until at last Muzio was satisfied.
“Basically, you know nothing,” Muzio said when at last they were done. “You’re worse off than a country bumpkin child at the edge of the world.”
“That about sums it up,” the cambion responded cheerily.
“Keep that part about being a cambion close to the chest,” Muzio said. “It’s even more dangerous than being an Outworlder. You should be safe from divination magic that would otherwise reveal your status thanks to being an Outworlder. Felix, I wouldn’t think less of you if you choose never to speak of it again.”
“There’s that name again…”
Despite the ominous warning, the cambion felt surprisingly better after having finally shared his story with someone. It also helped that his belly was full.
Shortly after the priest delivered his orders, both Muzio and the cambion were given flanks of cooked pig flesh, and were allowed to eat until they were satisfied. It was a trend that would continue until the priest came to collect them. The guards evidently feared the priest enough that his orders were obeyed without question, though that didn’t seem to extend to watching the two scrap for fun.
The cambion wasn’t the only one who got to tell his story. Muzio had an impressive background of his own, even if wasn’t of the trans-dimensional variety.
Muzio Attendolo was born to a wealthy landowning family on the outskirts of nobility, which provided a diverse and comprehensive formal education.
When he was thirteen, he met a small party of mercenaries traveling through his father’s land. Muzio had been busying himself chopping wood with an oversized hatchet, something he often did for exercise and as a means of diversion. When Muzio asked the mercenaries their business, they declared they were recruiting members, and scoffed at him when he expressed interest in joining. The thirteen-year-old proceeded to throw his oversized hatchet at a nearby ironbark tree with all his might.
It buried itself halfway to the hilt in what should have been a glancing blow against a superior wood.
Muzio then challenged that if anyone could remove said hatchet, or if it happened to fall before morning, that he would beg off and desist from his intention to leave home and join the company.
“I believe my youngest brothers make a game of it to this day,” Muzio said, his face stretched into a rare easy grin, as his voice grew rich with nostalgia. “Every so often, they take turns trying to pull it out to see which of them lasts the longest before they collapse from exhaustion. The thing is, after all these years, the tree has grown over the steel blade. I doubt I could pull it out myself, but that doesn’t stop them from trying. It’s something of a local legend now.”
That first company Muzio joined turned out to have been comprised of a low class sort of brigand.
He soon abandoned them, hopping from one mercenary band to another, in what became a quest to become stronger and make a name for himself.
After two years of fruitless struggle, he came home wounded, after his company had been soundly beaten in a pitched battle against the hero Sir John Hawkwood, in a forest north of Florence. Muzio returned the horse he stole from his father two years prior, and begged forgiveness.
“Tell me, son,” his father asked upon his return. “What is it that you most desire, which led you away from me?”
“To become the strongest.” Muzio said.
“Now that you have returned, does this mean you have abandoned this quest?”
“No, Father. I simply thought it was time I returned your horse.”
“I see. Well then, I give you my blessing, and you may keep the horse.”
Rather than being angry, his father surprised him by encouraging him to become a proper adventurer and join the Adventure Society. He offered to pay for Muzio’s training, as well as the exorbitant society fees. Muzio refused all but his father’s blessing and a letter of introduction.
When he recovered from his injuries, he set out on foot toward the city of Romulus, where nearby a famous mercenary, Alberico da Barbiano set up his school, the St. George’s Company.
“When we are free men, I’ll regale you with stories of my adventures,” Muzio said once he reached this part of his story. “But, suffice it to say that I am well trained. I bought a fresh horse from my father, paid my own admission into the Adventure Society, and am well equipped to suitably instruct you.”
“Wait, did you tell me your life’s story just so I would trust you as my teacher?”
Muzio’s eye twitched.
“One should know their teacher is competent before submitting to instruction. A poor education is tantamount to entering combat while wearing a noose.”
“It’s not like I have a choice but to trust what you say,” the cambion shrugged. “For what it’s worth, it’s nice to know you’re kind of a badass.”
Even if he made light of it, hearing the breadth of his mentor’s experience did help him trust some of the more nonsensical exercises he was subjected to. There were strange breathing exercises and awkward stretches that he might not have taken seriously. The weirdest drill by far, however, was the one where he repeated “I am Felix” over and over for hours on end, all while reflecting on his past memories, whether they belonged to a tree, the blinkus cat, mushrooms or his life in the before. All were impressions he had obtained after devouring something. Granted, his bark skin and blink teleport abilities were coming along now since he started taking it seriously, but that didn’t make the practice any less strange.
“So I think we should make a break for it tonight,” the cambion said casually. He stretched, massaging the sore muscles on his lower back, then strode to the center of the cage where their fight had ended earlier, then crouched again.
Curious about the sudden mischief in those cobalt eyes, Muzio followed suit and crouched by the cambion.
“Even if we had the keys to my shackles and this cage, I’m not confident I can fight my way out of the castle grounds on my own without my weapons and armor,” Muzio said, his jaw tightening after making the admission.
They had discussed this several times before. After studying their enemies’ habits day in and day out, it was clear that Muzio would have a hard time of it alone.
The portcullis at the bottom of the sloping path was the only way in or out of the castle grounds. It would be dropped at first sign of trouble, and was let down at sunset. Even if the cambion was strong enough to turn the wheel to lift it on his own, (which he wasn’t) that would still leave Muzio exposed and surrounded, facing dozens of enemies and several sloppy crossbow men from on top of the walls. None of his opponents were strong or well trained, but numbers were numbers.
They had therefore decided against a sneaky night-time escape, or a brazen daylight fight to the death. Both required the cambion to blink teleport out of his cage, steal keys and a suitable weapon for Muzio, then free him. All before raising suspicion.
“It’s up to you,” the cambion said casually pawing at the ground. “We can still wait until we’re in transport like you said before. But with one less variable to worry about, maybe we can take another look at our options.”
“What are you talking about, Felix?” Muzio asked, not finding the cambion’s tone amusing.
The cambion winced at hearing his new name, then smiled, gesturing with his eyes toward the spot in the dirt he had just finished uncovering.
Muzio’s eyes went wide, but he instantly made his face neutral and scanned his surroundings for anyone who might be watching. No one was.
“When?” Muzio asked, his voice nothing more than a hushed whisper.
“I saw this little guy glinting at me in that crowd of onlookers during our fight, and I couldn’t help myself.”
“You blink teleported out into the crowd and back that fast without anyone noticing?”
“No,” the cambion said seriously, causing Muzio to look confused. “I missed the first time, so I actually had to do it twice. The second time was when you threw me over your shoulder.”
“But I was looking right at you…”
“I don’t know what to tell you,” the cambion said, putting on a shit eating grin. “You must have blinked.”
Muzio couldn’t help himself from grinning. It was a terrifying thing showing too many teeth, and emanating vicious bloodlust. He shook his head in disbelief, but his eyes told the story of a dangerous man whose mind was suddenly pregnant with possibilities.
There, still half-buried in the dirt, was a metal key ring with several keys of varying length dangling from its end.
“Nicely done, Felix,” Muzio said, who was now studying the cambion with an assessing gaze. “This I can work with.”
He did not mean the keys, however. Certainly, those would prove useful, but it was the cambion he was looking at now, as if seeing him for the first time.
And what he saw was a weapon.