Cronica Acadia Page 7

  “It could have waited. You don’t even have a wand yet.”

  “The guy was a traveling salesman. Who knew when we’d see him again? Or if we’d see him again?”

  “There’s a reason they have to keep traveling,” said Doppelganger.

  “I know what I’m doing. This is an investment. I’m not spending money frivolously.”

  Nerdraaage noticed a ring that Ashlyn sported. It was a silver spider with a great black stone abdomen. “Cool ring!”

  “It’s an amulet,” she said holding it up proudly. “Dangalf bought it for me.”

  “Dude!” shouted Doppelganger. Dangalf did his best to hide behind the deck’s tiny instruction booklet.

  Tolliver delivered their food, and they ate. Dangalf and Ashlyn ate just a little. But they watched Doppelganger consume mountains of food. And Nerdraaage seemed to match him bite for bite, and they both washed it down with wine. It was clear that they were hemorrhaging coin.

  A bedraggled, white-haired human in a pirate shirt and a wooden leg clopped into the inn. Nerdraaage leapt up excitedly. “Salty! Hey, look, it’s Salty!” The others were surprised themselves to see Cronica’s infamous seadog beggar.

  “Do I know you, sire?”

  “Not really,” Nerdraaage said slapping him on the back. “But we’ve known you for some time.”

  Like most beggars Salty wasn’t too interested in conversation that wasn’t addressing who was going to pay for his next drink. Nerdraaage might as well have said, “We are four men from an alternate universe where you exist as an annoying character in a computer game,” and Salty’s next line would have been the same: “Can you help an old sea dog buy a cup of grog?”

  “Oh, that’s classic!” shouted Nerdraaage slapping the bony beggar on the back. “That’s great!”

  “Can you?” repeated Salty his hand trembling.

  “Huh? Oh, I don’t have any money,” said Nerdraaage.

  Master Tolliver entered from the kitchen and charged directly at Salty. He picked him up roughly and dragged him to the door. Dangalf handed a couple of farthing to Nerdraaage, who caught up to Salty and gave it to him.

  “I will not forget your kindness,” said Salty as he was bum-rushed out the door.

  Nerdraaage returned to the table triumphantly. “That was great!” he insisted.

  “Look at you covered in dirt and hay,” said Ashlyn. “Salty should have been giving you coins.”

  X

  “You’ve been reading that booklet for an hour,” Ashlyn chided Dangalf.

  “Yeah, do a magic trick or something already,” added Nerdraaage.

  “I think I can tell everyone’s future. At least a significant event in the not-too-distant future.”

  Dangalf fanned the cards out and set them on the table.

  “Do we pick a card?” asked Ashlyn.

  “No. If I do this right, the card should pick you.” He waved his hands over the card and whispered some magic words.

  “What?” sniggered Doppelganger.

  And then suddenly a card rose from the deck and placed itself in front of Doppelganger. One card each placed themselves in front of Ashlyn, Nerdraaage, and Dangalf.

  “No way!” said Ashlyn.

  “Shite!” said Nerdraaage.

  “Shite is right,” said a startled Dangalf.

  “What now?” asked Ashlyn.

  “I don’t know,” stuttered Dangalf. He returned to the instruction manual. “Turn them over,” he said after a moment.

  They looked to Doppelganger as they silently decided to reveal the cards in the order they left the deck. He turned over a depiction of a road that forked into two roads forming a Y shape in the middle of the card. One road passed a windmill and the other a tower.

  “Crossroads,” said Dangalf, looking back and forth between the card and the manual.

  “What does it mean?”

  “A decision.”

  “What does it mean to me?”

  “You will have to make a decision about something.”

  “At some point in the future, I will have to make a decision about something,” said Doppelganger. “That’s amazing! Where can I get one of those decks? Oh, that’s right. They guy left town right after he sold you that one.”

  “Not just a decision, a crossroads!” said Dangalf. “Next.”

  “Me,” said Ashlyn.

  They silently watched her turn over a card depicting a nude man and woman entwined by a serpent. He held a sword with a broken shield at their feet.

  “The lovers,” said Dangalf clearing his throat.

  “What does that mean?” asked Nerdraaage.

  “How old are you?” answered Ashlyn.

  “There’s an uncommon element,” said Dangalf, feverishly thumbing through his booklet. “The broken shield. It indicates a contest.”

  “What’s an uncommon element?” asked Ashlyn.

  “There are fixed cards in the deck that have traditional meanings. But the cards have the ability to introduce uncommon elements with each use that can change or add to the traditional meaning. For example—”

  “My turn,” interrupted Nerdraaage. They watched as Nerdraaage turned over a depiction of a skeleton upon a pale horse.

  “Death.”

  “Death!” said Nerdraaage.

  “Don’t worry,” assured Dangalf. “It is representative of change. It could mean—”

  “That you die,” said Ashlyn.

  “Well, that would be a change,” agreed Doppelganger.

  “But I see an uncommon element as well,” said Dangalf.

  “What’s an uncommon element?” asked Nerdraaage.

  “I’m just going to turn my card over,” Dangalf said in exasperation. His card depicted a rose in full bloom. The stem was covered with thorns, and a single red blood drop hung from the stem.

  “What does that mean?” asked Doppelganger.

  “Well, a rose means different things. A rose in full bloom means love. But the thorns indicate problems or pain.”

  It was then agreed that Dangalf needed more schooling on the use of the divination deck. As Dangalf carefully returned his deck to its box, they discussed what they each needed to do next. It was agreed that today was shot for the Keepers. Hempshire bustled from sunup to sundown, and it was nearly the latter now. But grand plans were made for the next day. Doppelganger and Dangalf would each inquire about their respective training. Nerdraaage would take a job already offered him to clean the stables. He was less than enthusiastic, but it was agreed the group could no longer finance his newfound love of drink. Ashlyn , who ate very little and was so far provided free room by Mistress Tolliver, would assist the innkeeper’s wife for her own spare copper.

  XI

  Early the next morning, Dangalf crept out of Ashlyn’s window and down the latticework and made his way to the Wizened Wizard. It was a small, round, two-story building and outside the front door flew a plain white banner. Dangalf knocked on the solid wood door. A series of clanks and scrapes indicated that a key was turning and a bar was being removed from the back of the door. It opened, and when no person made himself known, Dangalf stepped inside.

  As Dangalf’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, he observed the door closing, locking and barring itself. He was unthreatened by the self-locking door and grinned excitedly.

  The circular walls were covered with bookshelves. And each shelf was full of books with colorful but worn covers in sizes ranging from a yard high to only a few inches and placed upon the shelves in a loving disorder that would take a team of theme park imagineers weeks to replicate.

  On tables near the back were jars of smoking and bubbling and oozing and hissing liquids. Next to these were jars of powders that weren’t doing much of anything at all. And next to these were more books, some of them brazenly splayed.

  And at the back of all this was the eponymous Wizened Wizard. He read from a book that was half as tall as the room, and he used a giant magnifying glass to do that. He wore a
black robe and pointed hat, both inscribed with moons and stars and other celestial objects. The images did not reflect light so much as they seemed to generate their own eerie glow.

  “Magic apprenticeship is two crown and twenty farthing,” said the wizard. “Place the fee on the silver tray if that be your intention.”

  Dangalf walked to the tray and set down his payment. A white cat on the table sauntered over to his coins and moved them around with its paws as if to count them. No, thought Dangalf, it must just be playing with them. The cat looked up expectantly at Dangalf and he suddenly noticed he was one farthing short. He dug into his pocket and placed another coin on the table.

  “Sorry,” he said to the cat.

  “Whom are you talking to?”

  “The cat,” said Dangalf.

  “Wendell does not understand Acadish.”

  “Of course. It’s just for a moment, I thought…”

  “He understands Elvish if you speak that tongue.”

  “Uh, no.”

  “Then you will have to restrict your conversation to me. Your fee provides for a rudimentary wand, an apprentice robe, and loan of the books you will need.”

  “Do I get a hat?”

  The wizard looked away from his text for the first time and looked at Dangalf. “You have to buy your own hat.”

  The wizard stood and went into a back room through a white door. Dangalf recognized the door as meaning the room was restricted to only members of the White School, of which he was not yet. The wizard returned with a black robe and wand.

  “I am Weyd Salint. I was apprentice to Archmage Ozymandias.”

  “The great and powerful Ozymandias. The greatest of the human wizards.”

  “You know of a greater wizard?”

  “Me? No. It’s just that the troll necromancers are supposed to be quite powerful. They’re well regarded in the, uh, where I come from.”

  “Rubbish.” Weyd was a classic ectomorph and slightly smaller than Dangalf. “Necromancers are the most wretched of creatures. Since you know nothing of magic, and will have to unlearn what you think you know, I will illustrate it for you thusly: It is far easier to burn down a house than it is to build a house. But that does not mean the vandal is superior to the carpenter.”

  “I did not mean to insult you or Ozymandias. I can only aspire to that greatness.”

  “I hope for your sake you do not even approach greatness.”

  “Why?”

  “Ozymandias remains locked in his tower, always peering at the furthest stars or pouring over ancient texts to unlock the secrets of the arcane, unable to bear even for a moment the distraction of mere mortals. Even the humble presence of a former apprentice. And he has lived thusly for over sixty years.”

  “Sixty years! How old are you?”

  “I am old.”

  “How old?”

  “Very old.”

  “Oh. I mean, ’cause you look great!”

  “Thank you. Go ahead and put on your robe”

  Dangalf felt wizardly as he put on his new robe, but he couldn’t help thinking that it was no protection against arrows or daggers.

  “Say, why do we wear cloth robes?” asked Dangalf. In the game magic classes were restricted from wearing metal armor, but he did not know why that would apply here. “It seems to me if we wore adamantine, we would be virtually immune to physical attacks while we cast our spells.”

  “Articulated magic comes from the channeling of the body’s electroplasm,” explained Weyd. Cronica players knew about electroplasm. It was proportional to a character’s intellect and was needed to cast spells. Real-world descriptions of this essence included mana, mojo, od, and kundalini. But it is correctly called electroplasm. “Metals interfere with that channeling,” continued Weyd. “Leather to a lesser extent. Even cloth inhibits this channeling to a slight degree.”

  “So what you’re saying is it would most benefit the wizard class to be completely naked,” said Dangalf.

  “Yes, but then where would we carry our coins? A loose-fitting robe is fine for our purposes.”

  “Druids wear leather though,” Dangalf ventured based on game dynamics.

  “Druidic magic draws mostly from external life forces and is not impaired by flesh and bone,” said Weyd.

  “So why can’t a blackguard or ranger wear metal? They’re not magic classes.”

  “They could wear metal,” answered Weyd. “But metal armor is loud and those classes succeed or fail according to their stealth.”

  Dangalf silently rebuked himself. He could have figured that last part out himself.

  “And you will find even our Red School friends borrow some magic from this world,” continued Weyd. “And what path of the Wizard Class have you chosen?” On Dangalf’s look, Weyd explained that the wizard class was divided into two branches, the pacifist Sages and the combat Mages.

  “Combat,” said Dangalf.

  “Ah,” nodded Weyd in his first, and even then only slight, appearance of satisfaction with Dangalf. He picked up a well-worn tome from his shelf and returned to Dangalf.

  “And are you ready to begin your training?”

  Dangalf straightened himself out in preparation. “I’m ready. What will you do? Say an incantation over me? Tap me with your wand?”

  Weyd presented the book he had picked out. Dangalf took the book and looked at its cover. Elemental Elementalism: Fire and Ice.

  “How does this work?” asked Dangalf.

  “How does a book work?”

  “Yes,” said Dangalf. “When I open it, does a bright light shine out that imbues me with all the wisdom of the book?”

  “No. You read it.”

  Dangalf flipped through the book. “I have a divination deck,” he volunteered.

  “Why?”

  “For divination.”

  “Where did you get it?”

  “From a travelling salesman.”

  “There are many travelers, not all of those well intentioned. Divination is sometimes classified as a black magic.”

  “Oh. I didn’t know that. Why?”

  “The Templars have a saying. You must step into the abyss to see beyond—”

  “Today’s illumination,” finished Dangalf. “The Witchfinder General said that before we killed him.”

  “You killed the Witchfinder General?”

  “Uh, no,” said Dangalf awkwardly. He made some awkward hand gestures but no more words availed themselves.

  “I think I would have heard of it if you had,” said Weyd. He went to another shelf and carefully picked out three dusty tomes. “These books will help explain your divination deck.”

  “I don’t need those,” said Dangalf. “The deck came with an instruction booklet.” Dangalf held out the palm-sized booklet, and Weyd took it.

  “What is your name?”

  “Dangalf.”

  “Dangalf,” said Weyd, balancing the dusty tomes in one hand and the small booklet in the other as if offering Dangalf a choice. “You have to decide just what kind of mage you wish to be.”

  Dangalf sheepishly took the tomes and looked around at the walls of books surrounding him. He wondered if it was too late for him to become a warrior.

  It was about this time, in a field outside the Hempshire compound, that Doppelganger was wondering if it was too late for him to become a wizard.

  He had just been knocked to the ground from a vicious blow of a wooden sword across his neck. Now, still dazed on the ground, the angry face of Alfred the Merciless screamed at him.

  “And now you’re dead! And your head is hanging on some orc’s belt! And do you know why!”

  “Because I let my guard down?”

  “Because you let your guard down! Get off the ground and get into combat stance!”

  Doppelganger stood and towered over the little, angry warrior trainer. He crouched forward with his wooden sword raised for striking and his wooden shield raised for blocking. Alfred charged Doppelganger, who backed away fro
m the spinning fury of the wooden weapons.

  “You fight like shite! You can’t always back up! A warrior needs to use aggression! Attack me! Attack me!”

  Suddenly Doppelganger overpowered Alfred’s blows and charged him. Alfred stepped aside and struck hard blows to Doppelganger’s back and head, again sending him painfully to the ground.

  “If I’d known you would do whatever your enemy commanded, I would have told you to fall on your sword,” screamed Alfred.

  Alfred screamed everything, but the guards spoke of him in hushed and reverent tones. They described in detail the injuries he had received and the battles in which he received them. Doppelganger, when he had a moment of rest, would try to match Alfred’s scars with the stories he had heard. And wherever there was not a scar, and sometimes overlapping, was a rune tattoo, each of them a ward against a different magical spell. But most impressive of his bodily modifications was “C” on the side of his neck. It identified those few heroes, the Merciless, who had killed at least a hundred each of goblin, orc, and troll. Few pretenders would appropriate this decoration because when it was discovered to be false, among other penalties, the disingenuous tattoo was cut or burned off. Doppelganger wanted that tattoo.

  Doppelganger had gotten off on the wrong foot with Alfred with his answer to Alfred’s first question: why did he want to join the warrior class? Doppelganger said he wanted to be a Dragoon, and this inflamed the flammable Alfred. Dragoons were the greatest of all warriors. And here was this hymen that had not one day of training aspiring to be one of those elite.

  How was Doppelganger to know that Alfred himself aspired to be a dragoon and, despite having the requisite Merciless title, he had thus far been overlooked? Overlooked literally, he was sure. Alfred resented that the towering Doppelganger would appeal to that bias of the Dragoon command where humans averaged well over six feet in height. Even dwarf dragoons averaged as tall as Alfred.

  Both Doppelganger and Dangalf were now candidates in their chosen classes. Whereas Dangalf was called an apprentice and had no responsibility beyond his studies, Doppelganger was called guard and was expected to do service in that respect. The upside to guard duty was free training and a pittance of a per diem.