I had always thought that the day I sat down with all the mercenaries at their dinner table, would be a very special day indeed. That’s exactly what I was doing right now, but there was nothing particularly good about it. Almost all the people present there had blood and wounds all over them. Even now, Kaisel was roaming around to heal the people one by one. Sylvia had decided to join him with the little skill she had in that type of magic.

Sitting beside me was Typhen, who did not seem to be paying attention to what was going on in the meeting that Ginzari had arranged. Well, nothing had really happened yet, but he did not look like he would change if something did.

Ginzari and Hess had been whispering to each other for quite some time. Hess looked particularly angry about whatever they were discussing about, while Ginzari, although painted red, still seemed calmer than her. He was maintaining his cool head while handling whatever she had to say. They had known the name ‘Jillesha’. For some reason, I had never ended up asking anyone what it meant before, but it was obvious now. He was the leader of the bandits who had attacked the camp.

“Alright.” Ginzari gruffly declared.

As soon as he did, a few people looked up at the sky. I did too, out of curiosity. There was nothing special there, is what I thought at first. But then I realized why they had been doing that, and why those two had been talking for such a long time. They wanted this meeting to move into the unmonitored time, so that they would put their actual points forward and discuss what to do. I decided not to let them know about the whole thing with the name of the story. It would probably put me into even more of a problem.

“So, I know that most of you probably do not understand what happened today.” He looked at all of us, but his eyes rested on Wellath’s family, “Especially you, who weren’t even meant to be the targets. I cannot apologize enough.”

They had no reply or expression.

He continued, “Jillesha…well, the less we say about him, the better. There isn’t much that you all need to know about him, other than the fact that he is most probably the one who sent those bandits after us. Logically, he is probably also their leader. I am pretty sure that the people who know him would be able to confirm that with a quick look at all of the bodies of the bandits. There must be a few people we know in there. We, however, cannot get caught up in things like that. What’s most important right now is to take action.”

“What are we going to do?” A mercenary with long hair asked.

“Talk, Gurthen. We must talk to Jillesha before deciding if this needs to devolve into a battle between our people. Once upon a time, he used to be a friend, so I cannot imagine that he will be unwilling to meet us and settle any differences that he might think we have. That is primarily what we need to decide things regarding right now.”

He took a quick look up before continuing –

“Also, the last time we met him, his true personality seemed quite regretful of his actions. If we can arrange a meeting in a time like this, where it can bleed into this special time, we might be able to reach a conclusion even faster. That’s what I am betting on right now. Does anyone object? Other than Hess.” The last line was a bit aggressive.

It looked like it was two a.m. now. All the mercenaries also seemed a bit more relaxed. Some began to cry and groan with pain. My eyes turned to Wellath’s family. They were still sitting in the same position, with no expression on their faces. Something like this probably did not matter to someone who had lost a son and a daughter so close together. It wasn’t like they could turn back time and get both of them back. To those three, this freedom was probably more suffocating. I couldn’t keep looking, so I turned back to Ginzari.

Nobody looked like they had any problems with his plan. There was no noise on the table anymore. I looked at Typhen, who looked much more attentive now.

“Alright, then.” Ginzari said, “We will send a few people to Jillesha with the offer tomorrow. Nobody who knows him will go, so as to make sure that he doesn’t get aggressive too easily. If it’s people that he is new to, then he won’t immediately jump to violence. With that in mind, I need volunteers who are willing to communicate my message to him.”

Everyone was hesitating. Not a single person raised their hands. I felt like I wanted to, but something compelled me to not do it. There was no way I would come out of this unscathed if I went in. That was a feeling that I just had in the back of my head. I wished I could tell that to the others too, but that would just be like me asking the entire mission to be stopped and cancelled. The mercenaries weren’t going to do that. Not after what had happened tonight.

Then, one person raised his hand. The one with the long hair, Gurthen. Looking at him, a few more raised their hands. Beside me, Typhen did too, which attracted everyone else’s attraction. A lot more hands went up after that. I hadn’t thought about it much before, but based on how they interacted with people like Ginzari, Hess and Kaisel, the siblings might have been younger than a lot of the mercenaries, but were clearly held in higher regard. They were probably some of the most important members of the band.

I felt a sudden presence behind me and turned. Hess had moved there. She put her hand over Typhen’s and pushed it down. Then, she leaned in close to his ear and whispered, “Trust me, and don’t.”

Typhen did not argue as he brought his hand down. He did not even try to raise his hand after that. A second later, Hess moved away as Ginzari kept glaring at her.

Ginzari took a few names, and some of the people with their hands raised stood up, including Gurthen. Maybe he was a fairly popular person too. I hadn’t interacted with almost any of these people, so I wouldn’t know. At the very least, however, he had been the one to ask the first question, and also volunteer to go right into the enemy’s den and negotiate for peace. He was probably someone who called for trust.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

“You will all go to Jillesha tomorrow evening.” Ginzari declared, “For now, I would recommend going back to your tents and resting for some time. If your tent was destroyed, then find another one. The others will not sleep for now. We will repair the broken tents and clean the camp. Is everyone fine with that?”

The people who were standing nodded before leaving the tent one by one, thanking Ginzari for choosing them for the mission. As they were leaving, one of the people who had been completely quiet for some time now raised his hand, attracting everyone’s attention. He stuttered as he spoke up –

“I don’t think I can handle all that blood, Ginzari.”

The leader nodded, “Go with them and sleep. Don’t worry about it too much. Anyone else who wants to rest up?”

Three other people said that they wanted to, so they left with the first one. Maybe he wouldn’t have allowed the same thing if the time wasn’t right. But that was probably why they had decided to take the chance right now.

Once all of them were gone, Ginzari sighed and started giving people individual instructions on how what work they needed to do. More strong-willed people were given the job of handling the bodies and gathering them in one place, some were asked to clean all the blood off the ground and the tents. Others were asked to help with fixing the tents and making sure that nothing important was missing.

That was when I suddenly remembered about Prince. Hadn’t they the bandits taken him with them? Why had nobody talked about him, as if he wasn’t important? It made me angry to see him treated like that, even if he wasn’t on the same level as these people. He had been nice to me this entire time, even when nobody was. He had assured me that all my hard work during the past few days hadn’t been for naught.

I stood up and looked at him, “Ginzari! What about-”

“Prince?” He turned to me and asked. Looking at him took some of my confidence away. I just gave a weak nod and sat back down. He smiled and continued, “He can handle himself pretty well, so don’t worry. He is the least of our problems. Jillesha, on the other hand, might have picked the worst possible person to take hostage. All we need to look at right now is how to manipulate Jillesha into believing that we are worried about Prince.”

“What would that do?” One of the mercenaries asked.

Ginzari laughed, “Oh, right. I forget that you haven’t been with us for long! That is a simple trick to scare Jillesha. He’ll be annoyed at what a huge problem Prince is. If we make him believe that we worry about a man like that, he won’t be able to stop thinking about the ones we don’t worry about. The idea of us having people who could be bigger problems than him can make negotiations much easier.”

“Ah.” The mercenary nodded with a smile.

The people started to leave the area one by one to get to the jobs they had been assigned. For now, nothing had been given to me or Typhen. Kaisel had just gotten done with one of the wounded and moved on the last one. Hess was sitting right beside Typhen, in deep thought. Ginzari occasionally kept staring at her for some time before looking away and giving more instructions to the people in front of him.

Soon, all of them except me, Typhen, Hess and Kaisel had gone. Sylvia had decided to help with tent repairs and moved out. The mage took the chance to sit on one of the chairs and breath a sigh of relief. He took off his gloves with a smile and put them on the table.

“I want Typhen and Ryworn to go too.” Hess said.

“What?” Ginzari looked at her.

“Yeah. I need them to stand guard outside the enemy’s hideout to make sure they don’t plan anything in secret while the messengers are in there.” She explained.

“You’re suddenly making a lot of sense.” Ginzari said.

“What happened before?” Kaisel asked, joining the conversation.

Ginzari mockingly smiled, “She thought that it was foolish to even consider negotiating with Jillesha. She of all people, imagine that. After everything that happened, I thought you would like to negotiate more than anyone.”

“If I of all people am trying to tell you not to do it, then maybe you should try and listen to me. I have a good reason that I just cannot tell you right now.” Hess defended herself.

“This is the perfect time to tell us!” Ginzari retorted, “Especially when the sky is in the correct position.”

“Not anymore. We passed it a minute or so ago.” Kaisel corrected him.

“Well, there you go. But you should have trusted me back there. Anyways, it has happened now and it would hurt morale to announce that we aren’t doing it after all.” She tried to end the conversation.

Ginzari nodded, “All right, calm down. What’s it with these two, though? Why them?”

“Think of it as another one of Ryworn’s tests. He’s shown himself to be alright, today, but that doesn’t mean the others will start trusting him. It’s only once that they have put their lives in his hand, and come back alive due to his skills, that they will start acknowledging him as a friend and mercenary. Until then, all of our efforts mean nothing.”

“And Typhen?”

“If something goes wrong, then the blame lies on both of them. Everyone will be willing to discount Typhen because of his contributions, so they would also have to do the same to Ryworn, because they cannot just logically blame one person. Even if they do, then Typhen can calm them down by claiming that he was the one who made the mistake. Think of him as a failsafe.”

“I’m sorry, but I’d never do that, master.” Typhen spoke up, “If it’s his fault, then it just is. That’s the truth. If it’s mine, then it is mine.”

“Looks like you taught the kid better than yourself, Hess.” Kaisel smiled.

Hess sighed, “Fine, I should have known. Well, Typhen, if it makes you feel better, then think of yourself as just a simple support. If something bad happens, just tell everyone the truth. But whatever happens, they need to know that they cannot keep Ryworn out of the group for so long, especially when he is trying to hard to get better.” Hess said.

Typhen nodded and stood up, “If I’m supposed to go tomorrow, then I need to rest.”

“Hmm, yeah.” Ginzari said, “You go too, Ryworn. Get ready and prepare yourself for tomorrow.”

I stood up with Typhen and looked at him. He gave me a soft smile before leaving the area. I looked at Ginzari and he gestured at me to go. I bowed my head a bit before moving out.

I walked with Typhen for some time, but he wasn’t speaking much. Maybe he knew one of the six people who had died very well. Or maybe he was just sad about the situation in general. He had probably been in this camp for a very long time, and seeing it destroyed was probably bad enough for him. I, of course, could not feel anything. I just knew that I was sad about what had happened.

A hand suddenly appeared on my shoulder. My hands went to my sword, but a different hand stopped me. I looked up to see that the one behind us was Hess, who had an arm each on us. The one who had stopped me from going to my sword had been Typhen, who let go of it as soon as I noticed.

“When the sky is right where we want it, the two of you will go inside the base.” She whispered, “And you will tell me exactly how their leader interacts with the people we are sending. I want a perfect description of everything down to his facial movement. I want to know exactly what kind of person he is right now.”

I kept looking, but then she was gone after a blink. If she was willing to give classes on how to be fast like that, then I would sign up in a heartbeat. She probably wouldn’t teach it to me, of course. Definitely not until I got back to a respectable position in her eyes.

“Got it?” Typhen asked.

I nodded.

“Great. Be ready tomorrow.” He separated from me and went back towards his tent, which did not look like it was broken.

I wished him good night before heading back to my own tent, which was also fine. Once inside, I went straight to sleep.