Going Rogue (Spells, Swords, & Stealth Book 3) Page 5

  On top of all that, though, she just didn’t want to deal with the others if her hunch was off. Tailing someone for information was well and good, but a snatch-and-grab of the wrong adventurers, right from the Hall, would be the sort of thing she wouldn’t live down for years. Pride was not, objectively, the best way to make decisions, yet she felt it at least deserved to weigh in a bit.

  So, without any way to stop them, she needed to follow them long enough to determine if they were the king’s real targets or not. Should they prove to be the ones under bounty, she could ensnare them on the road. Should they turn out to be another in the endless string of false starts, they could fend for themselves in the orchard, and perhaps she would grab a few ildenberries while she was out to make a nice jam.

  It was the smarter plan, the one that set a proper example for the paler shadows. Unfortunately, it also required that she let the others know. The elf was never one for bureaucracy—it was why she’d taken to this line of work in the first place—but someone would need to take over for her when it came to watching the road. While the others would protest, saying she was doing this solely to get out of watch-duty, no one could deny the lead was solid enough to justify following.

  Which worked out nicely for her, because, in truth, she really was doing this partly to get out of sitting at that damn restaurant.

  * * *

  While Thistle and Grumph went to haggle about supplies for the next day’s journey and Eric and Timuscor set about securing the horses, Gabrielle headed up to her room. As the lone female in the party, she was the only one who’d gotten lodging of her own. Truthfully, she didn’t mind doubling up when need demanded it, but the inn only rented rooms with two beds, so with the others pairing together, she was left the odd woman out. It was a kind gesture she appreciated, even if she might have preferred to be a little closer to her axe.

  These last few days were the longest she’d been away from her weapon since Fritz bargained it into her price range back in Cadence Hollow. When Thistle had first pitched his plan, she’d expected to miss her armor the most, yet within a day’s time, her hands were tingling to be near the cursed tool once more. Though she was inexperienced with magic, Gabrielle wasn’t thick. She understood that these inclinations were some side effect of the axe’s magic; it hurt physically to touch, and now she was discovering that it tugged at her mind when she was without it. That was why she hadn’t asked to take it back for the night, hadn’t made some flimsy pretext about protection in case of break-in. This time apart was good; it allowed her to get her head back on straight.

  Once the door was closed and secure, Gabrielle carefully removed the mage robes. Her tenderness with the garments was from equal measures of respect and necessity. While she would need them to continue the subterfuge, they would ultimately be returned to Grumph when the deceit was done, and she knew how much he cared for them. Even if the big lug said nothing, she’d seen the admiration in his eyes when he looked at Dejy, his teacher, and these had been a gift. Until it was time to hand them back, she intended to hold the robes in the same regard as their true owner.

  Finally free of the cumbersome clothes (which were frankly a bit too much like the old formal dresses of her former life for Gabrielle’s tastes), she set herself to the task at hand. In one motion, she dropped to the floor and began to raise and lower herself using just her arms. The Hall had a training area out back, and a fine one at that, but since she was ostensibly nothing more than a spell-slinger, she could hardly just walk out and start hitting targets. Thankfully, Timuscor had long ago shown her the daily exercises that knights used for conditioning. Simple, effective, and needing nothing more than solid ground to work with, she’d incorporated the routine into her daily training. Usually, it came after sparring, which she was unable to participate in thanks to her disguise. That just meant she’d have to work all the harder on her own.

  Since they’d first truly set out on this path—the night Gabrielle had picked up a dead adventurer’s axe during an attack on the goblin camp—she’d worried about her strength. The others had already had talents and skills that suited them well in their new roles; all Gabrielle possessed was a lot of repressed anger and a powerful temper. So she’d trained harder than anyone, using even the smallest moments of time to add a little more muscle to her body, sparring endlessly with everyone in their party who could offer a melee fight. Every day, she worked to be stronger, to be the barbarian her friends needed to survive.

  Gabrielle knew all too well that she wasn’t there yet. Her fight with the bandit leader had demonstrated that a little too clearly. That was why she’d been willing to pick up the cursed axe: no matter what it took in return, it offered her the strength she needed. It was a bad deal, but one she was willing to accept... for now. Sooner or later, her work would pay off. She’d keep growing, keep getting stronger, keep turning into a powerful warrior in her own right.

  Her arms eventually gave out, and without pause, she hopped to her feet and began to do the stances meant to strengthen her legs. One day, she wouldn’t need the damn axe anymore. But until then, Gabrielle trained.

  Chapter 6

  “Wait, there’s a central hall where we go to get quests? Isn’t that a little... MMO?” Bert didn’t necessarily appear distressed at the description of the Hall of Adventurers, but he certainly wasn’t as jazzed as Tim across the table.

  “Cart before the horse,” Cheri told him. “Tabletops were around way before video games, and in pretty much every town you go to, the tavern or inn is where you go to get quests. This is just a big ass version of that.”

  “Gelthorn would like to roll a Dexterity check to avoid accidently touching or brushing against anyone as we make our way through the putrid city.” Alexis tossed her dice without waiting for confirmation, which wasn’t too shocking since it was the fifth time she’d made this check since they’d entered Camnarael. By all accounts, the team’s forest warrior was currently curled in on herself, focusing on guiding her horse away from anything that might touch them. “I got a fifteen.”

  “Since its early morning, you can succeed,” Russell told her. “The streets will be packed later on, but right now it’s only a few other townsfolk and adventurers, and most of the latter are heading in different directions, probably off to begin quests of their own. If anyone wants information on them, feel free to roll Vision checks.”

  “I’ll take a crack at it,” Cheri said. Tim and Bert also lifted their dice, but Alexis shook her head.

  “Gelthorn would only be focused on the next few feet ahead of her. She can’t roll a Vision in these circumstances.”

  “Pity, since she has the best scores of the group, but I respect your commitment to the role-playing.” Russell made a quick note on one of his many papers to give Alexis extra experience at the end of the session. It would hardly be the first time she’d earned it; no one committed to a character like Alexis. “Everyone else, throw those dice.”

  The clatter of bouncing D20s filled the room, but when the dice settled, none were showing numbers above a five.

  “Everyone is so focused on riding into town and avoiding hitting people with your cart that they fail to pay more than cursory attention to the other travelers around them.” Russell’s hand, ready to flip to the module’s next page and let them know who else was on the road, relaxed. That was information they wouldn’t be getting, and even if they did, there were lots of NPC groups in the module. There was no guarantee he’d remember the exact composition of warriors his players fought on the day Tim’s dice self-destructed, or that he would recognize that nearly the same party, plus a knight and a pig, were currently riding opposite his players. The low rolls, however, ensured that he didn’t even get the chance.

  “We need to buy some lodging for this thing,” Tim said. “Hauling it all over the kingdom is really slowing us down.” Timanuel and Chalara were both riding horses hitched to a modest-sized cart with a fair bit of cargo inside. Most would be sold as they made the
ir way through the city, but one piece, a treasure chest magically sealed by a wizard’s death spell, was unlikely to be emptied anytime soon.

  “Oh no, fuuuuuck that,” Cheri replied. “You can’t trust anyone in the big towns. We pay for a place to stow a magical treasure chest, and the thing will be gone before we’ve even saddled our horses. After lugging this bastard halfway across Alcatham, I’m not giving up the payday that easily.”

  “Tim’s right, though. We can’t bring it along on some dangerous quest. We’re just as likely to lose it in travel or battle,” Bert pointed out.

  “Look, we’ve got a bunch of loot to sell, and given that a shitload of it came from a wizard’s tower, I’m betting we can fetch a good amount of gold,” Cheri said. “Since we’re in a huge city with tons of merchants, why not see if we can find something to make the chest more portable? A shrinking spell, a sack of containment, anything that lets us keep it close without being slowed down. Then we just pay for it out of our earnings and split the rest.”

  “Gelthorn is trying to fight back a panic attack, so she can’t contribute to this conversation,” Alexis told them.

  “We’re out of character right now; you can still put in your two cents.” Tim already knew the response he was going to get, but it still felt important to remind Alexis of this now and then.

  Sure enough, she shook her head and repeated, “Gelthorn is panicking, so she can’t think very well, which means this sort of talk would go over her head at the moment.”

  “We’ll bring her up to speed once we get some grass and trees around.” Bert flipped through his character sheet, taking careful stock of the remaining supplies. “Wimberly is going to need to do some serious restocking and repairs if you want her gadgets to keep being useful in battle. I’m not against the idea of making the chest portable, but let’s see how much we get and how much it would cost before totally committing to that plan.”

  “I guess that’s a fair point, if a bit of a cheap one,” Cheri replied.

  “Just a basic risk versus loss assessment. Wimberly knows she needs gear to keep doing her thing, and while the chest might have something of high worth inside, it could also be something useless or unsellable. That means any money spent on it has to be seen as a potential pure loss, and taking care of gadget upkeep comes before gambling.”

  “Wow, you have succeeded in making the process of spending loot—which is literally one of the best parts of this game—sound super boring.” Cheri lifted her hands and began to slap them together with purposeful intervals between each strike. “Kudos, Bert. That’s an amazing achievement.”

  “I think it’s smart to manage our finances,” Tim said. “We never know when we’ll need more gold for something else.”

  “Yeah, except we’re walking up to a massive quest-giving center for the whole kingdom. Pretty sure we’ll be able to make back some quick cash,” Cheri replied.

  “That’s a great theory, but you’ll never know if you don’t get off the freaking street and go into the building.” Despite the sometimes overpowering urge to do so, Russell never fast-forwarded his players to where he thought they should go. At the end of the day, no matter how plodding or frustrating they could be, this journey belonged to them. If they wanted to bicker in the street all morning, then that was their prerogative. Though, as GM, he did feel it was within his power to drop occasional hints about the fact that the world around them wasn’t standing still.

  “Russell is right. We have to tackle this stuff in order,” Bert said. “First, let’s see which quests they even have right now. That way we have an idea of what we’re facing and what we should gear up for. After that, we sell off all the wizard tower stuff, figure out what to do with the chest, and do some shopping. That work for everyone?”

  “If you should encounter any sort of magical device that allows Gelthorn to see this awful stone blemish on the world as a more natural setting, please pick it up for her. Otherwise, just get her some more arrows and herbs. She’ll take a room and try to rest.” Alexis didn’t bother looking up from her sheet, her body as bunched up and tense as her character’s. Whatever they decided, they’d need to keep it to a day at the most. Gelthorn, and by extension Alexis, couldn’t handle being inside civilization much longer than that.

  “Wimberly will assure Gelthorn that her needs will be looked after,” Bert said. “Everyone else good with the plan?”

  “Sure, I’ve been itching to see which quests were on the table, anyway,” Cheri agreed.

  “Timanuel is fine with it, though he’ll probably want to steer the group toward a quest that helps people, if at all possible,” Tim said.

  “Freaking paladins,” Cheri grumbled. “I’m at least going to make sure the puppies we pull from trees have gold sacks around their tails or something.”

  “You’ll have plenty of time to bicker once you see your options,” Russell told them. As the rest of the party began the task of tying off their horses and deciding who would guard the cart, Russell flipped a few pages ahead in the module to the first section of a large table that spanned a whole section in the center of the book. Though they didn’t know it yet, this first quest was vital, both in what they chose and how they did. Their performance would influence which quests were “recommended” for them upon their return, and the module made it clear that the clerks would be hard to persuade into offering any quests that were deemed outside the party’s skill level.

  This trial would set the bar for the rest of the module, and if they really wanted to haul in the loot, they’d need to put on one hell of a showing.

  * * *

  At first, Eric took the feeling for paranoia; the endless parade of people they passed was triggering his instincts unintentionally. He kept telling himself that it was all in his head, that of course people were watching them. They were heading away from the capital and riding by hundreds of other travelers who were wary of strangers. After all, Eric himself was casting a discerning eye on everything they passed, scanning for threats below the surface in the hopes he might gain a few precious moments of warning before an attack.

  As the day wore on and they began to hit larger and larger stretches of empty road, Eric found himself second-guessing the paranoia. No matter how empty the roads grew, he couldn’t shake the feeling that they were being watched. There was no reason to it; he searched ahead and behind them with every turn of his head and saw no one following. Yet all the same, something in his gut twisted each time he glanced back, as if it were sensing something his eyes missed.

  Eric said nothing to his friends as they rode; everyone else was already tense and on edge. The orchard they sought was two days’ ride out, and while they’d had enough money left to buy supplies for the roundtrip journey, it had been a close call. As it stood, if the quest didn’t go well, they would be unable to afford even one night’s rest at the Hall, to say nothing of buying new equipment. Each of them could feel the pressure, different from battle yet no less dangerous, so Eric resolved to keep his suspicions to himself for as long as possible. That turned out to be only until camp was made on their first night, when Gabrielle reached for the saddlebag containing her armor and Eric stopped her with a gentle grip on the shoulder.

  “Got a problem with me prepping everything for tomorrow?” Gabrielle was being patient, more curious at the interruption than worried, but her eyes darted to the edges of her vision nevertheless, scouring the nearby forest for any signs of movement.

  “Not a problem, necessarily. I... I guess I have a hunch...” Whatever ideas Eric had conjured about keeping the suspicion to himself, they were quickly abandoned as he took in the uncertain looks coming at him from the others. “Don’t ask me to explain how or why, but I think we were followed out of town. I know it’s crazy. I’ve looked all over, and I can’t come up with a single concrete reason for the feeling. Yet still, there’s something in me that keeps insisting we’re being watched. Maybe I’m just losing it.”

  “Aye, that is possible.
Between the constant battles and potential death at every turn, you’d hardly be the first to have the wheels fall off the carriage. However, I’d say the more likely possibility is that you’re beginning to demonstrate the rogue’s legendary ability to sense when attention is on them.” Despite the fact that he was obviously trying to be reassuring, Thistle looked somewhat unsettled as he made the declaration. “Though, if I’m being honest, that’s a trait I’d only heard of among rogues far more experienced than any of us.”

  “Rogues can sense attention?” Gabrielle asked. “How would that even function? Do they get a tingle every time someone glances their way?”

  “As I understand it, and please remember that I’m working from secondhand knowledge, the ability is similar to my power to sense evil,” Thistle explained. “It must be nearby and potent. In other words, someone needs to be really watching the rogue closely. Though my ability is powered by divine guidance, I’ve never heard an explanation for what gives rogues their additional awareness.”

  “Could be divine, as well. There is a god of rogues, you know.” Eric hadn’t actually ever prayed to Tristan, the aforementioned god, but he did know that there was a debate between Grumble, god of the minions, and Tristan over who had possession of his soul after death. Perhaps getting this ability early was Tristan’s way of trying to garner Eric’s favor, although Eric didn’t fool himself into thinking such actions reflected on his talent as a rogue. The issue had been a pissing match between gods, pure and simple. It could have just as easily been about a vase as about Eric.

  “Let’s debate the ‘how’ later on. For right now, how about we all just assume Eric is right,” Gabrielle said. “And if we are being followed, what does that mean?”

  “Bandits, Solium, or unknown threat,” Grumph surmised.

  Thistle hopped up from his seat near the newly-made campfire and began to pace, speaking as he walked. “Normally bandits would be the most likely option; however, these roads are close to Camnarael and have regular patrols, meaning a robbery here is risky. I’m not saying it couldn’t happen, but I have to imagine that any bandit going to such lengths would do so for a grander prize than the paltry amount we have.”