Briggs just blinked once. “As I recall, he’s a Sage. I don’t think he’s obligated to tell you all his comings and goings, DuPont.”

The older man twitched at the dry reply, very much trying to keep his composure in front of the overwhelming brute with the impossibly cultured and magnificent voice. “Yes, but he has been missing for over a week, and nobody knows where he has gone.” He let that drag out, but Briggs’ gaze was unmoved. “You... may be unaware, but the movements of Sages are watched very closely by certain parties, and they are not allowed to simply move about as they please, because of the danger they represent...”

“I am not an uneducated fool, Mr. DuPont. Get to the point,” Briggs’ heavy voice bit off, clearly irked at the presumption.

“Nobody knows where my father is!” Eustace the Fourth finally admitted.

“And you want me to find him?” Briggs asked, voice heavy with irony. “How much time in a day do you think I have, DuPont?” He gestured behind him. “I train some of the finest mercenaries in America, ‘stinking of the Boonies and rotten fishguts’ and all. I employ ‘lackluster no-talents with no hopes and no futures’ into becoming productive citizens with good jobs and pride in themselves. I educate ‘hopeless fools who will never amount to anything’ at an Academy and College with the most advanced curriculum in the country. I oversee production of ‘useless tools that will never rival the ability of a good mage’ to the United States military, including the Healing Potions line that you have been trying to purchase from me for over a year.

“Whereas the majority of the DuPont Family purchases up resources so they can rise in Magery to the point they can shop at Tiffany’s and be invited to parties at the Morgans as full-time occupations, while those who do actual fighting work scrabble for the scraps left over.”

DuPont flushed, vaguely aware he’d said all those insults fairly recently, as they certainly reflected the attitudes of him and his peers. He didn’t want to think about where the brute got his information about such things...

“I am a man who works for a living, DuPont, and I fill my time up with things worth doing and people worth doing those things for.

“The DuPonts are very, very far down on my priority scale. You do not need my help or my attentions, and I don’t believe you are such a fool as to not know that.” His pale violet eyes narrowed dangerously. “That means you either have real business, or you are wasting my time. Which is it, DuPont?”

The Archmage before him swallowed. He glanced around, and was abruptly aware that he could not hear anything around him, only the voice of the towering brute of a man in front of him, and the creaks of Briggs’ Armor accentuating his slightest motion.

It somehow sounded all the more ominous. People just did not wear Armor like that anymore, but it made him look like the killing machine he definitely was.

“There was an operation run against your people recently,” he said under his breath.

Briggs blinked, very slowly. “Be very careful what you say next, DuPont.” His voice was so deep Eustace felt his skin trembling, and the rush of that power breaking over him, leaving him unable to grasp his magic, only made it all the worse.

“A... grand-nephew of mine may have gotten somewhat overzealous and sent out a contract to acquire your Healing Potion formula through, ah, unorthodox channels.”

Briggs’ eyes were so cold that the Archmage, the patriarch of a Family worth tens of billions of dollars, a man used to standing and dealing with the elites of the entire planet, the primary shareholder and controller of the most powerful alchemical company in the world, found himself repressing a shiver at the threat of incipient violence about to erupt. A violence, if the tales were true, he had literally no hope of surviving at the present, when the magic wasn’t coming to him here and now.

“And because the rewards for the formula were too great, you found out, but you let the operation proceed with sufficient cut-outs, not authorizing it, but ready to reap the benefits of it if it succeeded.” Eustace DuPont had never heard iron in a voice like that. Each syllable made him twitch! “You are now wondering if I have heard similar rumors of an operation against your father, carried out by interested parties who I might profit from. Especially since the very quiet rumors of something happening to him has caused the stock price of your Family holdings to tank by over thirty percent in the last week.”

Eustace felt the blood drain from his face. If verified word got out that his father was indeed missing, the status of his Family would fall instantly, from Great Family to a mere Family. While he was a Great Archmage, he was not even a half-Sage, and had not even the inklings of beginning the search for such status, much to his father’s great disappointment. His eldest son Trevor, however, was rising in power, and he had high hopes for the boy... but his missing father had to survive until Trevor seized the status and could shepherd the family.

There were far, far too many ways for the DuPonts to be exploited without a Sage, and he was very familiar with all of them. Other Sages could also make it very difficult for his boy to break through that final barrier, and he preferred not to rely on alliances with other Families and the favors that would end up being owed for their protection if at all possible.

“Your associate, the Lady Fae, has a remarkable income stream, the dispensation of which is watched by many parties. It was noted that a portion of it was diverted into options surrounding short-selling the shares of DuPont and its subsidiaries. By the standards of the Families, it was rather blatant, given how much money was at play,” Eustace pointed out under his breath.

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“Blatant,” repeated Briggs softly, staring at him unwinkingly, completely unmoved by the fact. “I like that word, DuPont. Blatant. I suppose the ten million dollars placed on options predicting a rise in DuPont shares after it was leaked that the Coralost Healing Potion formula had been acquired was... subtle?” he inquired, his rumbling baritone somehow almost inaudible. “And exactly how much money was placed on the opposite side of that equation by the interested parties?”

Eustace could not help flushing, swearing silently and wondering how the brute had found that out. “Ten million dollars...” he admitted weakly.

“Blatant. Subtle. An interesting set of terms to use in that situation, I should think. Ah, of course. You didn’t think that others could ascertain where the bull options money came from, of course. I understand underestimating and giving short shrift to others who are not Family-born is quite the unfortunate condition.”

Eustace was now absolutely sure the man in front of him knew something. He wanted to think the brute was gloating, but if anything, Briggs only seemed to be getting angrier! “The profit on such a move should have been over two hundred million dollars,” the Archmage pointed out carefully. It was indeed a fine reward and profit from such an operation by any standards.

“And if it was Lady Fae making that move, it represents less than four days current income to her,” Briggs retorted with an uncaring flatness that dismissed the sum of money as basically irrelevant spare change, so unmoved that even a DuPont had to admire how easily the amount was dismissed. “As you said so wonderfully, it was blatant. As I pointed out, it was in counterpoint to the ‘subtle’ move on the other side. It is like you are saying that pocket change is important to someone?”

Eustace breathed deeply to maintain his composure. This was a man to whom two hundred million was pocket change, which meant a great revision in how to approach him! “Is there something you are seeking for your help, Commander Briggs? The resources for my family are deep, and I may be able to provide what you are looking for.”

“That fourteen billion dollars of revenue from the Spellhouses can’t meet?” Briggs responded with just the right touch of grim disdain, and Eustace couldn’t hide his internal wince. That money was pure profit, no expenses related, the envy of every Family in the world! “Your reserves are deeper than I expected. I must be just a poor common-born soul that doesn’t understand what money can buy.”

Eustace found his resolve crumbling. “You... are not willing to help me get my father back, are you?”

Briggs just stared at him for a long moment. “You didn’t press your grand-nephew on this matter now, did you? Have you confirmed it with him?” he asked with just the right amount of schadenfreude.

Eustace paused, having another terrible foreboding. Just where did this brute get his information? “He... does not have need to be apprised of this...”

“Indeed, just a little... pawn. Floated out to make a move, something that might benefit the family, and jump his own status. And if he was caught, no great loss. Perhaps a financial penalty, a slap on the wrist, and consignment to some management position for the rest of his days in a tertiary holding somewhere.”

Eustace stared at the man, easily able to read the allegory.

Pawns had masters. Eustace himself had not ordered the move, he had only allowed it to happen. His son Trevor could have ordered or suggested the move, but Trevor didn’t get along with his aunt Julianna’s husband Philip, and had nothing to do with their children or grandchildren. Neither Philip nor Julianna had the authority to risk that level of funding on a covert operation without approval, being in the management side of the side businesses of the Family, while their boy Brenton was involved in... magical operations, such as it was, and commanded more leeway in certain ways.

That narrowed the number of people who could approve such an operation considerably, and his own wife Florence made no such moves that did not have social implications. Florence had never met Briggs, Lady Fae, or that hag Sama Rantha, nor had the trio had any interactions or words distant or otherwise about the DuPonts, keeping out of the media save for incessant fan-postings on multiple venues, he’d been informed by careful and thorough investigators. That little dust-up with the Dows had been entertaining but minor, in the end...

“My father green-lighted the operation,” he murmured softly. It was so like the old man, wanting to keep moving pieces and being involved, despite being at the level where simply existing was the single greatest contribution he could make. This was something easy and light to do, on the magical side of things, testing out an upstart with dangerous new ideas who was refusing to cooperate with how the world worked...

“I don’t know what happened to your old man, DuPont. Truly. I didn’t ask, I didn’t inquire, and I’m not going to. We’re walking away with two hundred million dollars, which is going to go to some charitable cause somewhere, as kind of a thumb in the eye to whoever thought to take advantage of us. Maybe it’ll buy all the basic spells for every student in Michigan for perpetuity when the one-year clocks start expiring in a month. Yeah, that’s a good idea. We’ll just call it the Blue Ox Foundation and roll with it,” Briggs rumbled absently.

“My father... is a Sage!” Eustace protested. “He is one of the great protectors of Humanity! He, he cannot die for something so minor!” the patriarch of the DuPonts protested loudly, the silence around them eating his words so no others could hear.

“DuPont, do you forget how the game is played?!” The roaring steel in that voice came crashing down on his rising anger, and ate it in the pressure of an invisible wind that again denied him his magic, the force that could tame and command this brute before him, and Eustace DuPont IV was once again abruptly aware that he stood a step from death, and the man before him would certainly do it.

His father had already paid the price, he was sure!

“YOU tested US!” Briggs snarled, hands quivering, ready to pound Eustace’s skull into bloody gore on the stones of the Boonies, and Eustace had the distinct impression that nobody would say anything other than that he deserved it if it happened. “If we let you get away with it, what are all your PEERS going to do to us?!” Veins popped out on the crude head of the brute in front of him, his anger making the air shake and Eustace’s legs quiver. “The SAME DAMN THING!!!” Briggs bellowed at him, driving him a step back at the unmitigated fury in that voice, the emotion having actual physical force.

Eustace stared at the hand in front of his face, the heavy gauntlet that could easily wrap around his own skull, and the death in the eyes of the man behind it, clearly restraining himself from reaching out and just crushing the patriarch of the DuPont in his grasp.

“We don’t have a fucking Sage watching over us and telling others to get lost or pay the price.” Briggs’ hiss was more like a truck engine rumbling, but it conveyed his attitude perfectly. “YOU made us act. YOU fucked with US. We played the game. You pay the price for fucking with us, we did not make a move on you. That is how the game is played!”