Chapter 8: The Witch
"Annnnnnnd I told you so," Dal said as the metal bars to his dungeon cell slid closed and slammed shut with a thunk.
"Forgive me," Prince Erickson said, even going so far as to slightly bow his head. "It's just that we need time to process what you've told us. You shouldn't take this as evidence that we've gone back on our word."
Feeling deflated, Dal took a seat in the only chair in the cell. If nothing else, at least this dungeon was above ground and had both an open window and a bed. It also had an electric-powered light above, which was turned on as they were now approaching the middle of the night. In all honesty, there was a very real level of comfort here. Things could have been so much worse had he been anywhere else.
Most dungeons, especially those outside Ostros, were dark, damp, and torturous places that, by their very nature, had been designed to both spiritually and physically torment those who were unfortunate enough to be locked inside. But this one in particular was bizarrely less harsh. In fact, one could almost describe this holding cell as an inn room with bars. There was even a place to relieve oneself, which a guard had referred to as a "toilet." It was yet another oddity unique to Ostros. When Dal had come here as a child, nothing so sophisticated had existed.
Is this where I'll spend the rest of my days? Dal wondered, feeling a touch of self-resentment. I even knew that this would happen, but what other choice did I have?
He'd told them the truth about himself. Not everything, of course. He'd left out many details regarding his origin, as they were still too painful to think, let alone speak aloud. But he'd told them of his curse, and of how it worked. He'd even told them of the marauders in the Summerglades and the real reason he'd come here. And yet, despite his honesty, look at where he'd ended up! Perhaps it would've been better to simply go down fighting.
Angrily, he stood up from his chair, walked forward, and now, grabbing the metal bars that confined him in this restrictive but admittedly humane cage, he looked beyond them and at the prince. "This is why I've gone my entire life without telling anyone my secret. I should've said nothing."
The prince opened his mouth as if to reply, but Denin managed to speak first. "You're misunderstanding His Highness," the young Priest said.
"Am I?"
"Yeah, you're completely getting the wrong idea here." Denin sighed. "You're not in here because of what you told us—as strange as it was. Nope, you're here simply because we don't know if what you told us is true."
Dal repeated the kid's words in his head, then pursed his lips as he thought them over. "So you're saying if I end up convincing you that I told you the truth, you'd just let me go?" He regarded all four of them with skepticism. "I don't buy it."
At this, the prince moved closer to him so that he stood just beyond the cell such that only a few inches and the bars themselves separated the two. Now, he regarded Dal with a stunningly powerful look of determination and strength in his eyes.
"I can't say for sure exactly what will happen to you if you're telling us the truth. But what I can say for sure is that you won't be stuck in this cell to rot, and you won't be punished or made to suffer for something beyond your own control."
"That's hardly reassuring, Your Highness."
"Hm? And what were you hoping to hear?"
"I don't know. Perhaps something like: 'Sorry about falsely imprisoning you, Dal. You're free to go. Here's a free caravan ride to Nallum for your trouble.' Something like that, maybe?"
Following his words, the prince's gaze turned harsh, but only for a moment. Then he visibly relaxed, and he began to laugh. "That's all you'd ask for as compensation? A free ride? Not even some gold?"
"I don't care about money. Thanks to my curse, I can barely hold onto it. So, yeah, a ride out of here would be sufficient."
The prince continued to laugh for several more moments, but then, slowly, his laughter died off, and his expression became serious. "Unfortunately, I can't do that. At least not without first consulting with the Great Magus in the sky-tower in Ostros. Your story, Dal…if it's true, you pose an inherent risk to people simply by being around them."
Dal frowned. "How so? That's ridiculous."
"Is it? Look at what happened here in Bradford."
"What of it?"
"Well, let's assume for a moment we take you at your word regarding events. What would've happened if my companions and I hadn't been here? You wouldn't have been able to escape. You would've had no choice but to fight your way out. Many people could have died."
Dal felt a knot forming in his stomach. "But I didn't do anything wrong."
"Oddly enough, I'm beginning to believe you, Dal. But that only reinforces my position." Denin cleared his throat, and the prince backed away from the cell and looked at him. "Would you like to try explaining things to him, Denin?"
"I would, Your Highness."
"Go on."
Now, Denin approached his cell. "Dal, what the prince is trying to get at," he began, "is that it's not about your intentions or what you did or didn't do wrong. It's about how other people might react to you. Like, don't get me wrong: it's not fair at all, assuming what you've told us is true. But I don't think the guards necessarily did anything wrong, either. Actually, I think they did the right thing. Someone hiding in an alleyway with a magical weapon is something they have to investigate."
Dal squeezed more tightly on the cell bars. "So what are you saying?"
"I'm saying that the unpredictable nature of your class shifting—again, if true—means events like tonight are going to happen again."
At this, Dal shook his head. "No, this was…this was a freak coincidence. I am forty-seven years old. I've been dealing with this curse since I was fifteen, and this is the first time in over thirty years that something like this has happened. It wouldn't happen again. I can learn from my mistake."
Garrick, who was leaning against a wall across from the cell, pushed himself off and strode closer to Dal. "You say that, kid, but have you ever considered you might've just been lucky?"
"Lucky?"
"Yeah. Lucky. Nothing you've told us so far makes me think you could've prevented this from happening in your past." He made a grumbling sound that Dal realized was simply a result of him thinking over the story he'd told the four of them. "This isn't your first time 'shifting' in a town, right?"
"Well, no, but I—"
"But it is your first time becoming a 'Magic Archer' or whatever the hell that was."
"Yes," Dal said, nodding. "But I—"
"So there's nothing that would've prevented this from happening to you in the past other than luck."
Dal closed his mouth, becoming frustrated. The brute of a man had a point, and it was one that Dal desperately needed to argue his way out of. His freedom to live the life he wanted hung in the balance. And so, nodding, he replied, "I take your point, Lord Garrick. So I just won't shift in towns anymore. I'll make sure I'm somewhere desolate."
"And what if a passing patrol sees you?" Garick asked. "What if my men from the 2nd Knight Vanguard are passing by on a patrol and they happen to observe you? What then? You kill my men? Or they kill you?"
"That won't happen."
"You don't know that," the prince said. Then, patting Garrick on the back of his shoulder armor, he stepped forward again as Garrick stepped back. "Look, we're getting ahead of ourselves. Before we even have this conversation, we need to know you're telling us the truth."
"And how would you like me to prove that?"
"Well, how long do you have until you shift again?"
Time Remaining:
1 hour, 8 minutes, 4 seconds
"About an hour."
"Okay. Well, here's what we'll do." The prince pointed to himself. "I'm going to take Denin and Rethi with me and continue our hunt for the demon summoner. For the time being, I'll operate off the assumption that you're not the one who led us here." Once again, he patted Garrick's shoulder. "Garrick here will stay with you. And if he witnesses you shifting into a new class—doesn't matter which one—we'll have a conversation about what to do about it."
Dal's knuckles turned white as he grabbed the bars so tightly that his wrists began to ache. "I want to leave."
"Too bad," Garrick said as the prince and his two cohorts began to walk down the hallway. Now, a ruckus began to form as prisoners inside of various cells seemed to recognize him and began to shout at him for his pardon. And to Dal's surprise, he actually paused to grant quite a few requests, ordering anyone here for brawling or drinking-related offenses to be released once they'd become sober. It was a strange sight, as the prince was clearly the merciful sort, so why could he show none of it to Dal?
I'm not going to be someone's pet!
Garrick, standing across from him, waited for things to calm down, and then he removed his heavy-looking helmet and placed it on the floor before sitting in a chair he'd had brought to him outside of Dal's cell.
"You're really the same age as me?" he asked Dal, his tone harsh but his body language less so.
"Yes," Dal whispered as he released the bars and sat back down. "Well, almost. I'm a couple of years younger, but only three or four. You'll see soon enough."
Garrick released a grunt of acknowledgement but said little else for the time being. Yet with nothing better to do, Dal decided to risk asking him a question of his own; after all, putting aside the awfulness of the situation he'd found himself in, he couldn't ignore the fact that he was in the presence of someone of such magnificent importance. Most people would go their entire lives without ever coming within ten miles of someone a tenth as important as the heavily armored figure outside of his cell.
"Is it true that you were once just a farming boy in northwest Ostros?"
"It is," he said immediately, almost as though he'd expected the question. "I'm originally of commoner blood."
Lord Garrick's story was told so often and by so many people that it was difficult to know if it was the truth or simply a myth brought to life by commoner fantasy. Supposedly, Lord Garrick had been assigned the Farmer class at the age of 15, and he'd been good at it, too: to the extent that everyone in his village had claimed he'd class-promote to Agriculturalist before he turned twenty. But then, amid a civil war around 30 years ago that had nearly succeeded in ripping Ostros apart, his family and fellow villagers had been slain down to the last man, woman, and child during a nearby battle that had raged out of control.
Remind you of something? the sound of his own voice whispered in his head, causing pain to shoot through Dal. He quickly suppressed it.
"What's going on with you?"
"Nothing, sorry," Dal said.
At any rate, as the story went, only Lord Garrick managed to survive. His parents had hidden him inside of a cellar that stored various grains, only for him to later emerge and find that everyone he'd ever known was dead. And so, rather than flee to the safety of the nearest town, it was said that he'd instead buried every soul in his small village all on his own before picking up a pitchfork and practicing the use of it as a weapon in the fields outside the small cottage where his parents raised him.
Day after day, he would hone his skills with that pitchfork, stabbing at scarecrows and later training dummies that he'd built himself. And this, supposedly, he'd continued to do all alone, year after year, until finally earning something that very few Farmers ever managed to achieve: a promotion to Field Defender.
Though stories varied slightly, most of the tales Dal had heard in pubs seemed to agree that Lord Garrick spent the next few years protecting crops and small villages from bandits and marauders, who'd used the backdrop of the civil war to take advantage of lesser-defended areas—a lot like now, actually. Through this, he'd managed to rise even higher, going from Field Defender to Caravan Guard right around the end of the war, whereupon he'd spent his days guarding cargo for wealthy merchants while learning how to use a sword.
His trajectory from there was like a straight line, though once again, there were different variations regarding the specific events that had taken place. But the majority of stories Dal had heard suggested that it was during a trip from Ocanna to the capital city of Freewind that a caravan he was guarding fell under attack by an entire band of marauders. Supposedly, Lord Garrick had single-handedly defeated and slain each and every marauder, and it was on that day that he'd at long last promoted from Caravan Guard to Soldier, ceasing to be a Commoner.
And now? Now, he was one of only seven known Dragon Knights in the realm of Ostros, and by far the most powerful. He was also the only Dragon Knight to have risen all the way up from a Farmer, as the other six had become Soldiers upon their 15th birthday—a far easier starting point.
"You've gone quiet," Garick said after about thirty minutes had passed. "Not that I mind the silence."
Dal offered a polite smile. "I was just thinking, sorry."
"About?"
"It's impolite. I shouldn't say it."
"Say it," he demanded with a growl.
"It'll probably offend you."
"Say. It."
Dal sighed. "Fine. I was just wondering if it's technically even true that you're the first Dragon Knight in the history of Ostros who was born a commoner."
"I'm pretty sure it's true. At least if we're only talking about Ostros. No one else has done it."
"That's why I said I'm wondering if that's technically true."
"Huh?"
Dal pointed to himself. "I was a Dragon Knight at the age of 17. So, I guess I did it first, right?"
Rather than take offense, Lord Garrick lifted his head and released a mighty laugh. "I suppose so," he said. Then he narrowed his eyes. "Assuming you've been telling us the truth. How much longer must I wait until I find out?"
Time Remaining:
36 minutes, 14 seconds
"Only about half an hour."
Garrick, still seated, cracked his knuckles. "I'm looking forward to seeing this with my own eyes."
Dal chuckled darkly. "I'm glad my life-destroying affliction amuses you, Lord Garrick."
"You'll get over it."
As the minutes and seconds counted down, Dal turned his thoughts to what might come next. But more importantly, how he was going to escape.
*****
Her crimson robe the color of the child's blood that she'd used as ink, Majula sprinkled just a touch of incense into the pentagram she'd drawn on the concrete floor of this ale cellar beneath a popular pub. Then she scowled as the owner had the gall to disturb her. She could hear his boots thudding against the stairs as he made his way down here.
"What do you want?" she asked him.
His eyes were puffed up, likely from crying, and he was joined by his wife. "We've done everything you've asked us to do."
"Your patrons have all been dismissed?"
"Yes."
"Good. Why have you disturbed me, then? You do not need to report to me every time you accomplish a basic task."
The man and his wife regarded one another briefly, and then the man spoke to her. "Can we please take our daughter upstairs so she can be with us?"
Majula looked down upon the child, whose blood had been used to draw the pentagram. She was asleep, and she would not wake up without Majula releasing her from her slumber. The magic used was far too powerful to rouse her by any other means.
"When I am finished, I will wake her and return her to you." The woman began whispering to her husband, and Majula snapped. "Speak up so that I can hear your words!"
"I…I'm sorry. I didn't mean to—"
"Whatever you have to say, speak it so that I can hear it. Now!"
The woman, whimpering, said, "I just wanted to know if she's okay."
"She's fine," Majula said. "I did not take much blood from her. It looks like more than it is."
In truth, the child's soul had already been consumed, and even if Majula woke her, she'd only be about as alive as a vegetable, but that was typical, as most of the magical abilities she had came at a cost to human life. After all, she was a high-level Witch in disguise as a respected Sorcerer. The curse, Deceive, allowed her to change her class title in such a way that it would fool anyone whose Identify skill was less than tier 3, which was almost everyone. Thanks to this, her coven had been able to go undetected for centuries to the extent that the Witch class was no longer publicly known to exist.
Staying secret had not been easy, however, nor had it been painless, as even with rigorous preparation and training, not every girl would become a Witch and not every boy would become a Shaman on her or his fifteenth birthday. Those who were assigned something else, such as her sister, who'd become a librarian, were slain in their sleep.
But the need for such secrecy would end soon enough, for Majula was on the verge of ushering in a new era with the return of the old Gods—but only if these fools stopped distracting her! Not ten minutes after she'd dismissed the parents, they returned yet again, though this time, it was warranted. "What is it now?" she asked.
In addition to the pain in their eyes, there was now a great degree of surprise. "The…the prince is here to see you."
"The prince?" she asked. "Surely you don't mean…"
"Yes. Prince Alain Erickson."
Standing upright and grabbing her staff, Majula stormed her way right past the terrified parents and up the steps into the pub, which had been emptied of customers. Then she walked across towards the entrance, opened the door, and sure enough, there the whelp was: him and his two prodigies.
"Lady Majula," he said with a smile, stepping forward to embrace her.
"My prince!" she replied sweetly, hugging the boy. "It has been so long."
"I'm so glad you're here in town. I'd almost forgotten you were stationed here. Have you had any luck finding students?"
"None yet," she said. "But I am keeping a diligent eye for any sign of potential. In fact, I may have finally found someone."
"Is that why you're staying at this pub?"
"Exactly," she said with a smile. "The owners have a daughter who just turned fifteen, and she's been assigned the role of Apprentice."
The young, beautiful Rethi appeared delighted by that. "I remember when I was discovered," she said. She extended her hand, palm open, and briefly, a ball of fire appeared above her hand, floating in place for just a moment before she snapped her hand shut, gripping it into a fist and causing the flame to disappear. "Teach her well."
"Of course, of course. So, are you stopping by just to say hello?"
"Unfortunately not," the prince said, his expression darkening. "Have you…encountered any other sorcerers in your time here?"
"No, not at all," she said, the smile lingering on her face. Internally, she felt the first bout of alarm.
What does he know? Has he had a vision? Was my face in it?
"I didn't think so." The prince sighed. "If you see anything strange, please let me know."
"Do you mind telling me why? Perhaps, if I knew more, I could be of some assistance to you, my prince."
The prince's body seemed to become tense, and his tone took on a note of dread. "I believe there may be an attempt to summon a demon in the very near future. As soon as tomorrow morning and as late as in the early afternoon."
An explosion of fear erupted inside of Majula, but she kept none of it from showing on her face. "That is preposterous."
"I knew you'd say that. Nobody believes me. But I…I saw it."
"In a vision?"
He nodded. "Yep."
The smile still on her face, she spoke to him with confidence. "Be cautious, my young prince. It is easy to misinterpret the visions. Allegory can often be confused as something literal, and vice-versa."
"I know," the prince said, shifting on his feet as though uncomfortable. "But I strongly believe I'm right about this. At any rate, if you see anything unusual, please come find me."
"But of course."
"Thank you."
She bowed to him. "And to you as well." Then she shut the door, turned around, and breathed out a sigh of relief.
The summoning would continue.