Downtown Druid

Chapter 18: Dead Man Walking

Chapter 18: Dead Man Walking

Dantes looked over the rats arranged before him. They ranged from black to white, with a few having the same brown coloration as Jacopo. Some were large and well fed, others slim and starved. All of them primarily focused on him aside from a few glances around the cavern.

He focused on a corner of the chamber.

Move

They obliged, all scrambling there without a second thought, moving over one another like a shifting pool of liquid fur. He checked the mark on his arm again and while the black line had widened, it was still slimmer than a fingernail. He experimented a bit more, dividing the rats into separate groups, having some of them harvest the fruit from the trees that were ready to be eaten, while he had the rest attack a nest of roaches hed noticed on his way into his budding plant nursery. As he did this, he watched how each action impacted the gold mark on his wrist. The less complicated actions, single word orders to move, had little impact, while complex requests cost more. Even having the rats attack something cost him little, unless he ordered them to do it in a specific way. When he was done experimenting he still had three fourths of his mark filled with gold.

He pointed to the pile of fruit and roach corpses that the rats had put into a pile for him.

Thats for you. The rats, freed from his control when he made the gesture, tore into the pile of food with gusto, and Dantes watched as the gold mark refilled ever so slightly. He looked at Jacopo, who was perched on a rock next to him.

Could you go and get one of the mirror shards out of our cave for me?

Where are Jacopo cut off for a moment, and Dantes could feel the connection between them quiver for a moment.The source of this content nov(el)bi((n))

Nevermind. He hopped off of the rock and scurried away.

While he was gone, Dantes pricked a finger on one of his tusks and squeezed a drop of blood onto the root bed of each of his plants, noticing as he did so that the roots were starting to break through the stone that surrounded them, causing it to crumble even more than it had already. When he was done he could feel the plants' satisfaction, as well as the rats who, after eating, had begun scurrying around the room, some of them leaving, some copulating, and a few climbing into the blood red leaves to have a nap with a full stomach.

Jacopo came back with a single mirror shard.

He took it from him and frowned. Im going to need to cut you with this.

What?

Wanes eyes widened as he saw him. Dantes! What are you doing here? You shouldve found the deepest hole you could and buried yourself in it. Reivare already had it in for you and then you steal one of their mirrors and try to sell it to the dwarves? He shook his head. I dont think now is the time to have a little visit and gamble.

I appreciate the warning, but Im not just here to gamble. I need to meet with Merle.

Merle? Listen man, he cant help you. You know the Collared cant afford to protect someone against the Kings.

Im not looking for protection. He sighed. Ive given up. Im out of options. I cant buy protection, they wont stop looking for me. I want Merle to contact them for me, let them know Ill turn myself in if they grant me a quick death.

Wanes expression dropped, and one of his eyebrows raised. Really?

Dantes nodded, theyd gambled together many times, and he was certain that Wane couldnt tell that he was lying.

Wane sighed. Okay. Ill take you to him. Come on. He gestured with his head for Dantes to follow.

Dantes knew where Merle was of course, but there was a process, a ritual to this kind of thing. Merle lived in the largest of the cells in Collared territory, as was his right as their leader. He had held that position for a long time, in fact as Dantes had been told, hed been the one who banded the Collared together in the first place, more than fifty years ago. Up until that point, theyd been divided by race, old gang affiliation or left to survive on their own.

Dantes got a number of looks as he followed Wane through the winding passages, and past the pipes carrying fresh water throughout the cells. He was grateful that he didnt see Tel, he had no desire to see the sad expression on his face that hed left him with last time theyd spoken.

Wane led him into Merles room and they stepped inside. The walls of the it were completely covered in alchemical formulae, cryptic writing in what looked like elvish script, strange diagrams, lists of ingredients, and a number of other things written too small for Dantes to recognize. Merle was laying on a bench of stone. He had a long metal rod across his chest, gripped by both of his hands. On either end of the rod was a massive square block. They stood there in silence watching as he slowly brought the bar to his chest, then lifted it up, then repeated the motion five more times. When he was done he tossed the bar down and it hit the ground with a heavy thud.

Merle sat up and fixed them with a look. Dantes had always found his appearance disconcerting. He had a long white beard, and a heavily wrinkled face, both showing his advanced age, but after his neck the effects of aging seemed to have ceased. His muscles would make most Orcs jealous, Wane who was by no means small for his race, was roughly half as wide as Merle was. Merle had started to exercise when hed first arrived in the Pit to compensate for his lack of magic, and had somehow gotten even bigger even in his old age. He kept his mind and body sharp, and it was the threat of violence that he, and those Collared that had adopted his training as their own, posed that gave the Collared what little power they had.

He grabbed a pair of delicate glasses and placed them onto his face, squinting. He smiled the kind of smile only a wizened old wizard could.

Well Wane, I see youve learned a bit of necromancy. Been a while since Ive seen a dead man walking.