Chapter 12 The City of Tradition
The City of Tradition
“Valir?! What in the world are you doing here?”
Kraghtol couldn’t help but stare at the noble, his open mouth and wide eyes not making the most clever impression.
“Yes, thank you, I indeed had a pleasant journey, Kragh, thank you for asking. It was a tad long, though. I think next time I’ll take the carriage.”
The noble was enjoying this decidedly too much.
Collecting himself, Kraghtol shook his head.
“You shouldn’t have followed me,” he said, and continued in a whisper. “They are still searching for me, I guess. The thing you did at the docks was dangerous enough, but if anyone sees you here with me, they will assume we are accomplices.”
Valir just shrugged.
“You really have a strange way of saying ‘thank you, Valir, for helping me escape the city when everyone was looking for me not once but twice, three times if we count the new cloak’, but I’ll take it.”
He was the one to talk.
“Right. Thank you, Valir,” Kraghtol said, mimicking the not entirely serious tone.
He meant it, though. Valir had really gone out of his way to help him when he was in deep trouble, and even though he just had three weeks to roll around that thought in his head, he still had not been able to come up with a plausible reason.
“Why, of course, you’re welcome. Don’t mention it, really.”
Kraghtol didn’t bother replying that Valir had just explicitly asked him to mention it.
“To answer your question, though: With the recent political developments in Winterstone, I thought it best to enjoy a vacation abroad. Get my head out of the whole academia. Perhaps visit the famous sights of Bronzebreak. Did you know the city allegedly has more than a thousand steps? Besides, you still owe me a lot of money — don’t worry, I don’t plan on demanding it back anytime soon — and my best bet of getting it back is to make sure you don’t get yourself caught or killed. ”
Kraghtol was far from convinced, but he nodded slowly. He had another hunch, though.
“I see. So, I’m your excuse?”
Valir blinked. “My excuse?”
“You didn’t want to live like this. You had no real friends in Winterstone, and the portrait of your father was always looking over your shoulder.
And you had other dreams for your life. You even told me about them, and when I asked you what you wanted to do about it, you didn’t answer.
So, now I’m the convenient excuse for you to break out and go on a little adventure, dip your toe in the water, so to speak.
But if anyone should ask, you were just after your money. ”
The words bubbled out of Kraghtol’s mouth faster than he could think them. Feeling he should not leave the statement quite as accusing, he quickly added,
“Don’t get me wrong; I don’t mind being your excuse. I’m so deeply in your debt by now that this is the least thing I can do. And I still think you have the voice for it. Being a bard, I mean.”
It was the sincere Valir who answered.
“I… I guess you’re right about this being a bit of a pretense. But I want to make something very clear. You are not in my debt. The loan is just business that we will settle in due time. And you saved me from those kidnapers in Winterstone, so I would say we’re even. Agreed?”
The noble reached out his hand, and Kraghtol took it, the noble’s smaller hand delicate in his own.
It still made little sense to him. He had fought off the kidnapers, yes, but that had been as much self-interest as it had been to save the noble.
What Valir was doing for him went far beyond that simple act of brutality. It was a riddle he could not solve now.
“Agreed.”
“Good. Then let’s find you a bathhouse for fey’s breath. You really do reek.”
Even coming from Winterstone, Bronzebreak was a remarkable city.
It probably held fewer inhabitants but spread farther, at least with all dimensions combined.
The entire city was carved into the mountain and was a labyrinth of stairs and corridors.
Some of them were so small and low that Kraghtol would have needed to crawl, but others, the main veins, were so vast he could imagine a whole regiment marching through them without problems.
Most of the people living here were dwarves, which made Kraghtol stand out even more than in Winterstone, and the general opinion regarding half-orcs didn’t seem to differ much from what Kraghtol had experienced half a year ago.
The only difference was that now he had money.
Well, Valir had. Even though the noble showed no hesitation in using his coins freely for the both of them whenever something had to be paid, Kraghtol didn’t like it very much.
There just was not much he could do about it right now, so he kept his mouth shut.
After a thorough bath, they met again at one of the city’s inns.
Kraghtol was surprised to see that Valir had not chosen a particularly fancy place.
It was far from comparable to Calder’s tavern, but given the noble’s attitude, he had expected him to eat and lodge in nothing less than the most luxurious place available.
Now that he paid attention to it, he also noticed that Valir had changed into simpler clothes as well.
Was he running out of money? The thought frightened him. Was he being a burden?
When asked about it, Valir just laughed.
“Don’t be ridiculous. Of course not. I’m just taking a break from being me, like I said.
In a way like you did when you used that potion, just not quite as spectacular.
That reminds me. Not that you would have done so anyway, but please refrain from using my family name if you can help it. Just Valir is fine.”
“So, you’re hiding your identity?” Kraghtol asked.
“I wouldn’t call it ‘hiding’. Let’s say I don’t plan to … impose myself on people. If anyone asks, I’ll be honest, of course.”
Kraghtol nodded. That sounded reasonable and wouldn’t — as far as he understood — affront the noble’s family as much if they got wind of it.
On second glance, the clothes really suited Valir.
The dark, simple linen shirt with short sleeves gave him a less flowery appearance than his usual silk clothes, and provided a stark contrast to his light skin and blond hair.
Despite surely not exercising much, Valir’s body possessed a hint of lean definition, much less than Kraghtol’s own bulky frame, and the half-orc caught himself watching the way Valir’s muscles moved under his skin.
When he realized he was staring, Kraghtol quickly averted his eyes. Luckily, the noble hadn’t noticed.
“So. This is Bronzebreak. We can drink to your successful escape from Winterstone, of course, but what are you going to do now? Do you plan to stay here? That would be quite a sight among the dwarves.”
Kraghtol shook his head with determination. “No. If I’m unlucky, it’s only a matter of time until the guilds here hear about what supposedly happened in Winterstone. I didn’t plan on staying here very long. I just want to do two things before I leave.”
“Seems like you have thought about this a lot. And what are these two things?”
Kraghtol lowered his voice now.
“Well, for one, there is that lockbox Virex hid. I was supposed to take the key too, but I couldn’t find it in time. The lock looks Dwarven to me, so I guess here are my best chances to find someone to open it.”
Of course, Valir asked the obvious question that Kraghtol himself had pondered for a few hours.
“Why would you want to open it?”
The half-orc sighed.
“There are a lot of flimsy excuses, such as Merress not having the key and so on, but honestly? I’m curious.
Curious what might be so important that he gave up any chance of surviving just to make sure the lockbox got to Merress.
I promised Virex to give it to him, so I will. But I also want to know what’s in it.”
Valir thought about it for a moment and shrugged. “Fair. If he told you to take the box and the key, he couldn’t have expected you not to have a peek, or he would have said so. And the other thing?”
“Voldrik. That mentor dwarf the Hawkes mentioned. Apparently, the guilds were after him as well, and perhaps he knows what to do in situations like this. I know I can’t stay here, but I honestly have no idea where to go.
And even if he doesn’t, I can still tell him about Marla and Torven.
They helped me so much, and perhaps he can do something for them. ”
“Hm. Didn’t they say he fled? ‘On the wings of his dream’ or some other peculiar phrase.”
“Yes,” Kraghtol admitted, “but that was forty years ago. Surely he would have come back to his home and family in the meantime? I know I don’t plan on taking so long to return to Mistpine.”
“Perhaps he is dead.”
Kraghtol shrugged. “Possible. But dwarves live longer than humans. And anyway, asking around can’t hurt.”
“You are probably right about that. What about the piece of cloak you ripped from Virex’s assassin? Do you think it makes sense to ask around about that, too?”
Feeling safe enough from spying eyes and ears, Kraghtol took out the piece of fabric. It was cool, but warmed up quickly.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea. If there’s one thing I want to avoid, it’s attention from professional assassins. Besides, we already know it’s associated with that woman who met up with Dean Quenning. And I think I understood how it works on the journey here.”
“You did?” Valir asked.
“Yes. I think — no, I’m fairly certain — it’s alchemy.
Perhaps it has been infused with a potion, or perhaps the fabric has been woven from alchemically treated threads.
It looks like a normal dark fabric in the light.
But in darkness, it becomes cold to the touch and merges with the surrounding darkness. ”