Freelance Heroics (27 page)

“I heard you received a reward for slaying the orck leader,” said the Blue Boar. This time, none of them jumped at his entrance. “Congratulations.”

“Thank you,” said Gavi as she joined the others. She handed her sheath to Mazik, who exchanged it for a towel. Gavi dabbed at the sweat on her neck. “That’s actually what we wanted to talk to you about. We owe you our thanks.”

The Blue Boar shook his head. “No thanks are in order. I didn’t do it to help you or your team, though you fought admirably. I did it for the people of Saffir.”

Gavi smiled. “Actually, that’s not what I meant. We do thank you, but we didn’t just want to say it. We wanted to show it.” She bowed low. “We would like to give you a fourth of the reward for this quest.”

“I must refuse,” said the Blue Boar. There was no hesitation. “A hero should never accept payment for a just cause.”

“Heroes must be real hungry,” muttered Mazik. Gavi nudged him.

“We thought you might say that.” Gavi draped the towel over her shoulder. “In that case, we’re going to donate your portion to the charity of your choice. Which would you prefer? Otherwise we’ll pick one for you.”

The superhero appeared taken aback. He looked between the three of them, one at a time. “You all agreed to this?” he asked, looking pointedly at Mazik.

Mazik glowered. “Yes, we
all
agreed. Even me. I don’t
like
it. I don’t
want
to give a fourth of our pay to a sanctimonious justice freak who runs around in leather pajamas, but you did earn it. We wouldn’t have been paid if you hadn’t vouched for what happened, not to mention how we may not have survived at all.” Mazik crossed his arms. “So yeah, we all agreed.”

The Blue Boar stared at Mazik for a time. Then he smiled. “A hero should not accept payment, but money still has its uses. The Loath’m Orphanage. Donate it to them.”

Gavi nodded. “We will. And thank you again.”

The Blue Boar nodded, then turned to leave.

Gavi stepped forward. “Hold on!”

The superhero turned back, his head cocked to the side.

“I’m sorry, but I have to ask. Um . . . why do you call yourself the Blue Boar? The blue part, mostly. We heard about the boar, how you were saved in the woods as a kid.”

“Oh, that.” The Blue Boar shrugged. “No reason. I just liked the color blue, and I thought the two B-words sounded good together.”

Gavi blinked. After all their interactions with the superhero, she hadn’t expected something so . . . mundane.

The Blue Boar must have realized this, because he smiled. “Keep that a secret, all right?” He tapped his lips with a finger. Then he stepped around the tree and disappeared.

“Huh,” said Mazik. “Well. That was stupid.”

“Yeah yeah.” Gavi threw her towel at him and collected her sword. “Come on. Let’s go make that donation before you change your mind.”

“Can we not do it if I’ve already change my mind?” asked Mazik.

“No,” said Gavi and Raedren.

Raedren adjusted his pack and let out a long breath. He stepped off the path and paused at a crook in the road. The scenery here was beautiful. It was all a jumble of hills, like the folds of a bunched-up comforter kicked to the bottom of the bed. Each hill was covered in rich green foliage, with stark shocks of red rock where the slopes were too steep for vegetation to grow. Birds pinwheeled overhead, their calls adding a peaceful soundtrack to the crisp summer afternoon.

Raedren stood on one such hill. It abutted the small town of Parnl, where he and his friends had first arrived less than an hour ago. Raedren gripped his staff—which now served mainly as a walking stick—and glanced at his companion.

Uard was looking the same direction as him. She smiled. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is,” said Raedren, though he wasn’t talking about the hills. He looked ahead. The rest of their group was getting farther away. “We’d better catch up.”

Uard smiled and agreed. They hurried after the others.

Raedren’s heart tightened as he watched Uard run ahead of him. It had been two and a half weeks since they had met, and he was in love. He just wasn’t entirely sure that was wise.

The two of them had met in Saffir, where they helped put an end to a series of orck attacks that damaged over a fourth of the city. At the time, Raedren had been hesitant to even contemplate a romantic relationship, lest he fall in love with someone he would have to leave once he and his friends moved on. But Mazik and Gavi had convinced him to try anyway, and he had asked Uard out on a date. Which was followed by a second and third.

Raedren looked out at the beautiful scenery as they slowed to a walk. He repressed a sigh.

“Okay, you were right,” Mazik was saying from up ahead.

“What was that?” Gavi cupped her hand over her ear, tilting her head toward Mazik. “Did I just hear what I think I heard? Say it again.”

Mazik gave an aggravated sigh. “Yes, yes. You were right, and I was wrong.” He folded his arms, his robes bulging at odd angles where the multiple daggers he kept about his person were sheathed. “I have no problem admitting when I’m wrong, you know. It just doesn’t happen very often.”

Raedren snorted. Mazik turned around and cast him an offended glare. He had to look through two other people to do it.

“I haven’t known you for very long, and even I can tell that’s bullshit,” said Shava. A friend and guildmate of Uard’s, Raedren and the others had met Shava at the same time they met Uard. A tall woman who wore full plate armor and carried a zweihander, Shava had wide shoulders and a dearth of womanly curves, causing more than a few people they had passed to mistake her for a man, at least when her faceplate was lowered. The main exception was her voice, which was beautiful and melodious, even if she often used it to curse or yell. She wasn’t Raedren’s type, but her voice certainly was.

“Looks like we were right after all,” said the sixth member of their group. He winked at Gavi. Also a friend and guildmate of Uard’s, Hectre, whom they had met the day before they set out for Parnl. A deeply tanned man of Westron descent, Hectre’s family had immigrated to Jihnsruck when he was a child. With wavy black hair, dark green eyes, and an easy, outgoing attitude, Raedren envied how easy it was for Hectre to talk to strangers, and how he seemed to be able to make people like him. This was opposed to the way Raedren envied Mazik, who could just barrel into any social situation and not care if he was liked. Both were skills Raedren lacked.

“Looks like it.” Gavi raised her hand for a high five. Instead, Hectre took it and kissed the back of her hand. Gavi rolled her eyes.

They turned onto a street shaded by enormous trees on either side, and entered a stunningly affluent neighborhood. While Mazik and Gavi stopped at the guard hut, Raedren peered through the ornate (and closed) gates.

He could only see three houses from here, one straight ahead and two on either side. They were all
massive
. Each was a stately mansion, with three floors, multiple wings, and wide swaths of lawn around and beyond their immediate environs. These were not the homes of the rich. These were the homes of the
wealthy
, families so rich they would have had to diligently work their entire lives to fritter away all the money they possessed.

After a few minutes of Gavi arguing and Mazik getting increasingly annoyed, Shava marched forward to talk to the guards. While they were dealing with that, Raedren glanced at Uard. He had an urge to reach for her hand, to hold it, to feel her warmth—but he quelled it. It was too soon for that. He cursed his overly romantic self.

While Shava may not have been Raedren’s type, Uard certainly was. A soft-spoken woman with delicate cheekbones and a tiny nose, her porcelain white skin was accented by her long, midnight black hair. From beneath her hair peeked her pointy ears—she had a habit of tucking escaped strands behind her right ear, which Raedren found adorable. She wore robes of soft pastels, most often greens, blues, yellows, and pale peach, and she was kind, considerate, and a good listener.

Uard smiled up at him. She also had a dazzling smile that gave Raedren’s stomach the butterflies every time. He silently panicked and tried to quell them now.

By then, Mazik, Gavi, and Shava had finished talking to the guards. One of them stepped out of the hut, and the gates slowly cranked opened. Raedren nodded at the three men as they passed, thanking them for allowing them to pass. Uard did the same.

Gavi led the group to the right. It took several minutes to pass just the first house. The road curved to their left, hugging the crown of the hill, and opened up to several other houses along their left side. Raedren admired each one as they passed, though Gavi had her head down as she compared each house number to the one written on the slip of paper Shava had handed her.

“It’s this one,” said Gavi, pointing to the fourth house they had reached. Like the others, it was a legitimate mansion. The tall white columns that surrounded its front door extended through the second and up to the third-floor balcony. Large windows reflected what late afternoon light was filtering through the tall trees on the opposite side of the road. Even from here they could tell that the interior was replete with velvets, fine china, expensive vases—anything and everything that could be used to signal just how rich the people who lived here were.

It reminded Raedren of the Tyrant’s Palace back in Houk, though only as a contrast.
I guess someone as powerful as her doesn’t need to prove how wealthy or influential she is
, he thought, remembering the feisty old lady who had given him the heavy necklace that hung from his neck. He reached up and fiddled with it. It was a smooth gold disk with a hole in the center and delicate carvings around the edges, though the etching was so fine it barely registered to the touch.

“It’s been a while since I’ve done something like this,” Uard whispered to him as they followed the others toward the front door. “I usually work with the same few quest givers, or use the board back at the guild hall. This is exciting!”

“It is.” Raedren felt his heart speed up.
Just ask her!
He knew that Uard didn’t travel often, but if their relationship was to go anywhere, he needed to know whether she was open to traveling more—specifically, with him—otherwise he just didn’t see how they could get to know each other well enough in the time they had left. Saffir was back to the north, whereas he, Mazik, and Gavi would be continuing south after this quest.

Raedren tried to force himself to open his mouth and ask, but nothing happened. Anxiety strangled the words in his throat. He silently berated himself for hesitating. He hadn’t known Uard long enough to attempt a long-distance relationship, like Mazik had with Kalenia; he couldn’t imagine being reduced to only speaking by telephonathy with a woman he had only known for a few weeks. He needed to ask, he needed to know, he needed to—

“Good afternoon. How may I help you?”

Raedren startled. They were at the front door. A butler stood in the doorway, his eyes narrowed.

Shava stepped up. “Yes, we’re here for . . .”

Silently cursing his shyness, Raedren followed the others inside.

The six adventurers were ushered into a small office in the corner of the southern wing. Gavi, by virtue of being the one who figured out how to get to the mansion in the first place, was still in the lead. Once they were all inside, the silver-haired butler bowed and excused himself.

The office was opulently appointed, as was everything in the mansion. Yet, unlike the rest of the house, it wasn’t overdone. The room consisted of a dark mahogany desk that faced the door, a low table flanked by two couches in the middle, and a burnished drink cabinet along the right wall. The carpet was still luxurious, the upholstery still plush, and the curtains still lavish, but this room felt like a place of work, rather than a show of conspicuous consumption.

As the door glided shut behind them, the room’s other occupants rose to greet them. They were a couple, a husband and wife well into their golden years. The lady rose from behind the desk and came around to the front, while her husband, who was already standing, turned to face them.

“Welcome, esteemed adventurers.” The woman bowed deeply. Her long black hair, streaked with the first strands of gray, was collected in a loose bun at the nape of her neck, and she wore a simple dress of pale red which covered her body from wrist to ankle. She would have looked sharply elegant, if not for the softness of several kilos of excess weight and smiling wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and mouth. Instead, she looked relaxed and as polite as her bow indicated.

Likewise, her husband was likely once a handsome man, though age made the word “distinguished” come more readily to mind. The same height as his wife, and with the same black hair—though his gray was collected at his temples—he had flushed cheeks and a warming smile. He plucked at his shirtsleeves, which were rolled up past his elbows, and gestured to the couches. “You’re the adventurers from Twilight Sound, I understand? Please, take a seat.”

As the highest-ranking member of Twilight Sound present, Shava stepped forward and bowed. Her helmet was under her arm, revealing her sharp cheekbones and dark brown hair, which had been cut in a line from her brow to the nape of her neck. “Thank you. We’ll take you up on that.”

Gavi settled on the right couch, between Mazik and Hectre. On the other couch, Shava sat nearest the couple, with Uard and Raedren to her right. She set her helmet on the table. “You’re the Di’Culots, correct?”

“We are.” The man tried to smile, though it came out as hesitant, unsure—
and perhaps a touch senile?
Gavi pushed that thought away. It was rude.

“Thank you for coming all this way to help us,” said the wife. Mis Di’Culot leaned back against the desk, clasping her hands on her lap. “I’m afraid Parnl has a lack of people such as yourselves, who may be able to help us with our . . . difficulty.”

Shava nodded. “Understandable. We’d be happy to help.” She shucked her gloves and laid them next to her helmet. She then reached into her backpack and withdrew a folded piece of parchment—the quest notice. She offered it to the couple. “We understand the gist of the job, but would you mind explaining it in detail?”