19 – The merchant’s mysterious companion

  The carriage sped along the hummocky night road, bouncing every now and then on occasional bump to the annoyance of the young man inside who was trying to get asleep. Above his head, a will-o’-the-wisp he had summoned hovered like a night lamp. Alas, this imitation of his university room’s familiar comfort did not outweigh the hardships of the journey. For several nights, his sleep had been shallow and fitful. For the young man was accustomed to his bed that remained all night exactly where it had been left the evening before, and not rushing through nobody knows where, bouncing on every pothole.

  The dim moonlight filtering through the small window provided scant illumination, barely distinguishing the carriage’s interior and its two occupants: the young man himself and his companion, a broad-faced middle-aged man. Unlike the young man, this one slept soundly, snoring occasionally. It was not surprising considering he spent most of his life traveling to and fro. He might have found it more challenging to sleep in the soft bed of his own luxurious bedchamber than in a carriage. This unfussy man’s name was Geta. He was a merchant of such status and reputation that he was the kind of person whose name didn’t even require to be mentioned when he introduced himself.

  Geta was a friend of the young man’s family and owed his rapid growth in wealth in no small part to their numerous connections among influential families of the Alienated Principalities, and even among some important nobles of the Sublime Empire. After all, the schism had occurred only a couple of centuries ago, while some aristocratic dynasties had ties stretching back centuries, if not millennia. However, Geta himself was a man of remarkable talent and utilized the social capital of his influential patrons in ways they themselves might never have imagined. And so his business connections extended beyond the young man’s family’s sphere of acquaintances, all the way to lands like Elkoas.

  The young aristocrat’s thoughts turned to the two mounted bodyguards who accompanied their carriage like silent shadows. Indeed, Elkoas the mysterious realm—Geta’s tales about that place were so vivid they were hard to believe. If even half of what the loquacious merchant recounted about his adventures there was true, then it truly was a land of unimaginable wonders and even more unimaginable dangers. It would be wonderful to visit it someday, the young man thought.

  He was torn from his reflections—the carriage began to slow. The young man picked up his walking stick and poked Geta in the side with the knob.

  “Huh? What? What happened?” the merchant yelled, startled. After a few moments, when the last lingering dreams left his mind, he finally came to his senses. Looking around, he let out a sigh of relief. “Damn, Aurelius, has anyone ever told you it’s impolite to poke sleeping people in the ribs?”

  “We’re stopping.” Aurelius ignored the merchant’s reproach. “Why?”

  “Was it worth waking me up like this?” Geta grumbled, rubbing his side. “How am I supposed to know why we’re stopping? I’m not clairvoyant, nor can I see through walls.” Caught by Aurelius’ silent expression of displeasure that his question hadn’t been answered, he sighed. “Alright, your highness, I’ll find out right now.”

  Geta took Aurelius’ walking stick and tapped it on the carriage ceiling. A response came immediately—he and the coachman communicated in a coded language of taps. “Corund says there’re adventurers with construct details in their inventory ahead.”

  “Ahh.” Aurelius nodded. “It’s all your scheming to gain the trust of Mirdain’s upper crust.”

  “Watch your language, young man,” Geta grumbled, pointing the stick’s knob at him. “First of all, it’s not scheming, it’s networking. Second, don’t stick your nose too deep in what I do on my business trips, just as I don’t pry into your affairs. For instance, I’m not delving into the details of why you’ve packed for a voyage halfway across the Empire to see your dearest moth-eaten granny. For your information, I’m even helping you with this.”

  “I’m not sticking my nose in,” Aurelius frowned, wrapping himself in his soft traveling cloak, which served him as a blanket. “And I’m not judging you—your tricks are your business.”

  “Tricks,” Geta mimicked him. “Aurelius, my dear. You’re not ten years old anymore to be forgiven for being rude to others and saying whatever’s on your mind. It’s time you learned the rules of high society etiquette. Perhaps I should remind you that your last name is Narmer, one of the ten oldest noble families—”

  “Urgh, as if that’s just what I need to hear right now,” Aurelius rolled his eyes. “Uncle Geta, at least you do not lecture me about this.”

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  “As you say,” Geta chuckled and added after a pause, “Speaking of my tricks, having good connections in Mirdain would be a great asset for a humble merchant, and this contract will certainly open many doors for me. Incidentally, perhaps some of my future connections could be of benefit to you, too.” At these words, his gaze glanced at Aurelius’ leg, which the young man hastened to hide involuntarily in the folds of his cloak.

  “And here someone promised he wouldn’t pry into my affairs,” Aurelius muttered under his breath and turned to the window. The carriage had almost stopped.

  “I’m not prying. I just know that ruddy young men don’t suddenly acquire walking sticks without reason. Well, as far as ruddy can be applied to you, my sweet little bookworm.” He smiled and tousled Aurelius’ already shaggy hair. There were taps on the ceiling—a message from Corund. “Ah, three Small Steel Spiders. Not bad, not bad.” And he stepped out of the carriage.

  Aurelius could not help but being impressed by Corund’s versatility. Truth be told, he didn’t know many constructs, but this one was impressively intelligent: it wasn’t just a coachman, but a multi-functional personal assistant. When needed, Corund performed rather delicate tasks for Geta, be it espionage or surveillance. Now, the construct scanned the surroundings and discovered a commodity potentially useful to its master.

  Corund could do many things, but it couldn’t speak. More precisely, Geta had specifically instructed the construct master who crafted it that his assistant was to communicate with him only in the code language he had personally taught it. As the merchant joked about this, for once he would have a servant who would carry out his orders, instead of questioning them. But Aurelius believed Geta did this to prevent anyone from discovering his secrets he shared with his mechanical aide-de-camp. How suspicious one would have to be to distrust even the loyalty of constructs, Aurelius wondered. However, he concluded that was none of his business.

  What worried him now was his leg, his upcoming visit to his grand-ancestor Maxent, who even within the Narmer family had a somewhat complex reputation. But Aurelius personally maintained a good relationship with his grand ancestor. The young aristocrat was also concerned about another person, who was currently sitting on the box next to Corund, doing what they had been doing since their arrival in this world—studying it. Flavius ??or Falstaff, depending on who was currently in charge, was Aurelius’ thesis project for a Magister Magica degree: the subject of his pride, his peers’ envy, his major headache, many philosophical reflections, and simply questions about who this creature was now—a companion, a child, a friend?

  He was soon distracted from his thoughts by Geta climbing back into the carriage.

  “Funny little fellas,” he chuckled, rummaging through the drawer under the seat. “Total pipsqueak, but not without some potential. Taking down three sneaky constructs-scouts with just three of them wasn’t easy.”

  “What level are they?” Aurelius asked as he watched Geta almost half-hidden in the drawer, like a dog digging a hole to hide a valuable bone.

  “Fourteenth, but that’s the highest, the boy’s. The girls are even lower. Here it is!” Geta straightened up, satisfied, holding a heavy rune-shaped artifact in his hands.

  Aurelius immediately recognized a construct compass. “Are you going to make them hunt constructs?”

  Geta nodded cheerfully and got out of the carriage again.

  This whole thing with the constructs was odd, Aurelius admitted, once again left alone in the carriage. Even he, buried deep in his studies within the walls of the University library, had heard news of an unusually high number of constructs that recently went through the process of dedomestication, as they called it. Some professors were interested in it purely out of scientific curiosity, while others believed it had way more far-reaching causes. There were even rumors that it might somehow be connected to the disturbing rumors coming from the distant south, as ominous as they were—

  The door suddenly opened again, and Geta darted inside. This time, as soon as he closed the door behind him, the carriage sped forward so much that the force made the merchant lean back in his seat. Drumming his fingers on his knees, he hummed something to himself.

  “Successful trade?” Aurelius remarked.

  “To say the least! The kids have cleared three out of the seven in the valley, so perhaps soon I’ll have a third cleared region on my hands. And I wasn’t even planning on working on this area during our current trip. See how well things are going! I’m helping my beloved nephew, and my own affairs are going well. Ain’t I a genius?”

  “Isn’t it risky for them, given their level?” Aurelius tilted his head.

  “Oh, come on,” Geta waved away his doubts as if they were pesky flies. “What kind of monsters-constructs could be in this shithole? Just some meaningless crap.”

  “You said it yourself, three scouts.”

  “So what? They dealt with them. And if they don’t again, at least I’ll have a precise location for where to go with my lads and clear out the last constructs in the area. Surely, the compass and my gold will be lying around near the frenzied constructs. None of the locals will go there, and if they do, it will be their last venture.”

  “Your gold?”

  “I intentionally paid them through the nose for their stuff so I could foist my signature unexchangeable coins on them. There’s definitely no merchant in this valley with the charisma enough to exchange them. Investments, as they say, need to be insured.”

  “So if they clear the valley, you’ll gain a squad of construct hunters, but if they die, you’ll come and finish off the remaining constructs with a compass signal, looting their pockets along the way?”

  “Exactly! As you can see, it’s win-win for me.”

  “Not for them though.”

  “Who cares?”

  “Uncle Geta, has anyone ever told you that you’re a cynical, greedy asshole?”

  “That’s called business acumen, my dear.”