Four Horsemen: Chapter 7 Part 1 of 2

Chapter 7:

Petor kept one hand close to his dagger as he and Mya walked through Sorelli, hunched against the rain, she looked positively happy under her hat.

Movement caught his eyes down an alleyway, slowing his steps. A muddied girl, barely ten pulled off a guards boots with practiced ease while her father and elder brother relieved him of his purse, armor and anything else of value with quick flashes of their blades.

The boy looked up, barely older than his sister, holding his blade at the ready.

Mya pulled Petor onwards.

“Best we don’t get into a fight with the locals.”

“That girl was still a child I thought this was a holy city?”

“Any city is going to have their own problems. Have to remember that the gods have their own plans and while the poor can make up prayers to them still gods can only do so much to help them.”

“I thought that the gods were good.”

“Did you not hear what I said, they have their own plans. Things like mortality don’t really fall into it. The mortal races are just cattle for the gods, they give some power to them through their lives, but better than that they get stronger and fatter throughout their lives and when they pass on, all that power is then given to their god, making them stronger. Who you think is more likely to get stronger, the people who are poor, or those that have the income to purchase weapons and armor, that can spend time on drawing in essence?”

“Everyone can harness essence though.”

“Yes, but it takes either a feat to do, some alterations to the body or alchemical means.”

“But the runics.”

Mya gave him a pitying look and patted him on the arm. “The runics might not have their own essence, but their creations are expensive. Only those people we fought up the hill,” She jerked her head toward the cathedral. “Had runed gear, and they were all strong sent on an important mission.”

“So you’re saying that the poor are screwed?”

“I’m saying that you can’t save everyone and that if you try then you’re going to be in for a world of hurt. There are many that are good people, but there are also bad people out there.  It is not something that can be done quickly, it takes time and effort. If you are unwilling to do both then it is not worth it.”

“So you’re saying its futile.”

“Be a nice person, help out others as you can, action by action you help the world making it a better place. If you want to change things completely, pick one area, a few problems and tackle them slowly and surely, the fast solutions lead to greater issues.”

Petor grinded his teeth.

“Look at it this way, what would you do if you walked over to that family?”

“I…” Petor closed his mouth.

“Say you went over there, they’d instantly not trust you, they might try to stab you, they might run, leaving that loot behind, loot that might allow them to eat for the next few weeks. They’d hate you. Say you got them to trust you, then what? Are you going to move them into a nicer part of town? Are you going to get them jobs so that they can support that life instead of relying on you? Would they just use you, or would they genuinely work for it? What about the other countless families like them in the city? The ones that don’t have homes?” Mya looked at him.

“If you do something, do it one hundred percent, don’t mess around. It will fuck the situation up even more.”

“So we should just ignore other people?

“Now you’re coming from a place of frustration turned anger, but I’ll answer your question. If people are in danger we should help them out, no questions asked, we should be nice to others, we shouldn’t try to screw people over.”

“What about your haggling and trading?” Petor asked.

“When I trade the aim is that you both come away respecting the other and reaching a fair compromise. Screwing someone over will lead them to distrust you and screw you on every deal you have in the future, instead of enjoying trading with you, they’ll look for every loophole to claw back coins from you.”

Petor sunk into silence.

“Don’t lose your generosity, but don’t give it blindly.” She looked at the warehouses, several damaged in the bombardments. Carts directed by guards flowed into a walled off area as the sun started to rise over the city.

“Hope Valter and Desari are having fun with their crafting,” Mya said.

“If I had some soil then I could work on my farming.”

“Farming is so long and boring though, you have to stay in one place.”

“Gave me spells in altering the ground and I can speed up the harvest.” He grimaced.

“Oh a secret,” Mya’s eyes widened as she stared at him.

“I well. I guess I can draw the vitality of other things into myself.”

“Like lifesteal?”

“Lifesteal?”

“You cast on someone else or use it in a weapon and you draw upon their life force adding it to your own, heals you and de-ages you.”

“I don’t think its called de-aging.”

“Ah so something similar then.” She ran over his argument. “So wait, what are your powers?”

“I guess the whole fighting stuff, then I can draw in the life force of other living things and I can also give it to others.”

“Give it to others?”

“Like plants I can feed them and they grow in days instead of months, or if someone’s hurt I can heal them. When I use all my essence I can use my own health to heal.”

“So when you use life steal does it increase how fast you gain essence?”

“Yeah.”

“And then when you give that vitality away, is it just healing, or is it essence too?”

“Well,” Petor looked up, half closing one eye to remember the wording. “Once I heal someone completely, then the extra power should turn into essence then I guess.”

“Well fuck a kraken with a peg leg,” Mya shivered.

“What?”

“Is there an upper limit?”

“Umm, I don’t think so? Well like if we take in more essence than we can hold,” Petor’s voice dropped. “Once it is over capacity, then it increases in size and becomes denser, allowing one to draw on more power. So it would increase someone’s essence capacity?” He looked at her. Remembering the feeling of power as his spear drank on the enemy fighters. If he was to have enough powerful targets to kill?

A shiver of fear, or thrill ran up his spine.

“You get their essence and life and I get their soul, perfect, that would have been messy if we were competing for the same things,” Mya laughed. “Is it just humans or can you do it with plants and the like?”

“You consume souls?”

“Well I can, only the bad ones though, you see if you don’t then whatever dark god that claims them gets their power. Can’t have that now.”

Dark gods? Are you really saying that by consuming people’s souls you’re doing the right thing?

“One step at a time and small gratitudes,” Mya waved her finger at him as they reached the gate into the walled off compound.

“Halt!” A guard held up his spear, blocking them. “Papers.”

Mya pulled them out with a flourish. “Just your local adventurer guild laborers.”

The man read them. His fellow guards standing behind the wall, watching the situation but more interested in talking with one another than heading over.

“Checks out, head to the seventh warehouse, if you take anything from the stores or you go anywhere you aren’t supposed to then you’ll be arrested, and I hear that the inquisition is really interested in adventurers right now.” He handed her the paper back with a glower.

“Understood,” It had about the effect as a chicken squawking at her as she took the paper, folded it and put it in her pocket.

They walked past the gate, towers took up the corners, the center filled with numbered warehouses.

“When people talk about the inquisition I get a real punchy feeling,” Mya muttered.

“You and me both.”

“Death to the inquisition,” Mya said darkly. “Those guys I’d consume their souls for free.”

“No killing anyone before we figure just what the hell is going on first,” Petor said.

“Fine,” Mya sniffed, and sniffed again as they passed between warehouses. Priests were filling several carts with crates, guards stood around them and the warehouse.

Mya sniffed harder.

Petor grimaced at the mix of smells caught on the wind.

“You enjoy that?” Petor asked.

“Alchemical supplies,” Mya muttered. “There’s something sinister about those ingredients,” Mya said.

“What you mean?”

Mya shook her head as they kept walking.

Out of sight she drew a pencil and paper, using a warehouse wall she wrote a list of smells. “Old man feet mix with swamp, black oil bones?”

“I don’t know what the ingredients are called, but with the smell characteristics and knowing they’re used for bad shit. I should be able to slim it down.”

“How do you know that they’re bad.”

Mya sniffed a few times and put the paper and pencil away.

“Because it smells similar to the potions I have.”

“Are you sure you’re a good person?”

“I’m a great person, just misunderstood.” She waved her pencil, nodding at the list and put it away. “I only kill those that try to kill me or need some good killing. Or they taste good!”

They passed a guard riding a cart laden with arrows, chests and sacks of gear. They turned the corner the doors to the seventh warehouse opened wide as gear was hauled out and loaded into carts.

“Manual labor, the horror! These fingers aren’t made for it!” Mya raised her hands, pleading at Petor.

“What are they made for?”

“Well, stabbing, shooting, pickpocketing, trading, conversation,” Mya raised fingers.

“You used hands for conversation.”

“Body language is fifty-seventy percent of language and there are people that use just their hands to talk to one another, all secretive like,” Mya pounced on the chat.

“No killing anyone,” Petor sighed. Valter was right, she did have a lot of energy.

She dragged herself forward, to a woman with a clipboard watching everything.

The woman looked down. That hurt more.

“More helpers. That cart there, the guard will have a list, get the items on the list, load up the cart and when a new one comes in, help load that one.” She returned to her clipboard.

Mya turned to Petor, pouting.

This is going to be a long day.

***