Chapter 2 #2
Braiden noted the distinct lack of surprise in Orora Arcosa’s features, a mild shiver running down his spine.
Her message had been addressed to Augustin alone, but she must have known that Braiden couldn’t resist tagging along.
He kept perfectly still, as if caught in a spider’s web, afraid that the slightest movement would alert the black widow awaiting on its edges.
“It’s good to see you again, Grandmother,” Augustin said, his eyes flitting between her and the stranger. Or was it another elder?
Elder Orora grunted. “You could stand to visit more, now that you live in Weathervale. It shouldn’t take an official summons for me to see my grandson.”
“I’ve been very busy,” Augustin said, his nose raised with a self-important sniffle.
Orora’s eyes traveled from Augustin’s face to Braiden’s and back. “Yes. I can see that.”
Augustin seemed to miss the implication. Braiden did not. He dragged the back of his hand across his forehead, his sweat now a mixture of exertion and the intense heat of sitting under Orora Arcosa’s burning gaze. Like a spotlight, really, a beam of sunshine focused through the end of a spyglass.
“Today was supposed to be the official launch of Augustin’s Effervescent Elixirs,” Augustin announced, smiling as if for a room full of admirers.
Orora pursed her lips, unimpressed. The other elder sat in silence. Was he asleep? Worse — was he dead?
“Yes, your little pet project,” Orora said. “I imagine it must be a most amusing distraction before you return your focus to adventuring and dungeons.”
Braiden opened his mouth to protest, but thought better of it, seeing how Augustin bristled at his grandmother’s words. This was his duel to fight, a battle of barbs, wind wizard against wind wizard.
“It’s not just my ‘little pet project,’ Grandmother, and you know that. I am on hiatus from the business of adventuring. I’m trying something different. Something new.”
“Come now, Augustin. Do you really want to waste your potential waiting on customers, standing behind a dreary counter for the rest of your days?” Orora tilted her head apologetically. “No offense meant, Braiden.”
“None taken,” Braiden answered through gritted teeth.
Augustin harrumphed. “You didn’t summon me here to berate me about my business, did you?”
“Of course, not. Don’t be silly. I meant to berate you about many other things. Starting with this.”
Elder Orora held up a sheet of regrettably familiar paper. It was one of the flyers they’d sent out not an hour ago. More than ever Braiden wished he could be back at the shop. He’d take a whole morning of wistfully praying for customers to come over whatever Elder Orora was about to offer.
“Do either of you have a permit for distributing flyers throughout the city? Some would say that this constitutes soliciting. On an unprecedented scale, I might add.”
“But you taught me that spell yourself,” Augustin said, ruffling his hair in frustration. “We didn’t solicit anyone. This is just — marketing, that’s all. Guerrilla marketing.”
Braiden wrung his hands. He had no time to wonder how gorillas were involved in this.
“It’s littering, is what it is. Gods, Augustin, honestly, is this how I raised you? Scattering parchment throughout your hometown, being a public menace?”
She hadn’t mentioned the confetti, the bits of string, the ribbons, the colorful streamers. For once Braiden was glad that his weaving magic was so temporal, leaving behind no evidence. He could sense what Elder Orora was building up to. The cobweb twanged. The spider silk tightened.
“All is forgiven, of course, provided you pay the fine.”
And there it was. The black widow skittered across the cobweb.
Augustin threw his hands up. “A fine? Fine. Whatever. Is that all?”
Elder Orora’s head turned so slowly toward Braiden, her gray eyes cutting a steely line. Braiden gulped. The black widow lunged.
“Are you aware, Braiden Beadle, that your shop is not zoned for residential purposes?”
Oh, gods. She knew about the wizard in the storage room.
“Well, technically, Elder Orora, I live in the shop’s attic, and I’m explicitly aware that it falls within the Lighthouse’s guidelines. I’m allowed to take residence on the premises.”
He almost stamped his foot in triumphant indignation. Elder Orora’s smile was as sharp as a saber.
“Ah, yes. The living quarters in the attic. Perfectly permissible. But you are not allowed to collect rent for housing a tenant in a commercial space. That would make you into some sort of inn, would it not? A bed and breakfast. And that comes with its own snags and foibles. Permits. Licenses. For serving food and drink, among other things.”
Braiden froze. Elder Orora leaned her elbows on the table, her hands folding, fingers fitting together like the teeth on a bear trap.
“Do you have a permit for selling beverages on the premises? Inspections must be made, of course, for cleanliness and safety standards. We can’t have everyone in Weathervale selling food and drink willy-nilly. The rules are there for a reason.”
Braiden’s head spun as he tallied Elder Orora’s demands. He should have known not to come. He should have known this was a trap. Ybura preserve me, he thought, morbidly aware that even the gods couldn’t help him now.
“But all of this can be remedied, of course,” Orora said with a wave of her hand. “Provided that the Wizard and Weaver of Weathervale lend their aid to the Lighthouse. And that’s where Elder Bahul comes in.”
Wizard and weaver alike turned to look at the other elder. He still hadn’t moved the entire time. Halfway through Orora’s haranguing, Braiden had considered that the stranger might well have been a corpse propped up in a chair to make the great table, paradoxically, look a little more lively.
The man’s mustachios twitched. A moment later, Braiden realized that the gruff, muffled bark had been the sound of the elder clearing his throat.
“A pleasure to meet you, Elder Bahul,” Augustin said, never one to forget his manners.
“Yes,” Braiden added. “Same. Hello. Hi.”
Still hardly moving, the pile of white hair and equipment quaked with its one-worded answer.
“Pleasure.”
A man of few words, then. A refreshing counterpart to Orora Arcosa, the Lighthouse’s resident windbag. Augustin’s words, of course.
“If the two of you agree to accompany Elder Bahul down the dungeon,” Orora said crisply, “then the Lighthouse may be convinced to lower your fees owed, or perhaps even waive them entirely.”
“So a bodyguard job, then?” Braiden asked.
“In a way. The upper levels are somewhat safer since your little adventure, now that the cube of frost has been dispelled. But Elder Bahul here is most interested in infrastructure and engineering. Why not a shaft for a lift to more easily access the lower levels?”
Augustin folded his arms and cupped his chin. “Hmm. Safer passage for adventurers going down and unparalleled convenience for any burrowfolk coming up for a visit. That does sound like a fine idea.”
“Yes, exactly,” Orora said. “He was telling me all about it before you came, among other ideas. Couldn’t stop talking, in fact. He’s very excited.”
Braiden risked the few seconds it took to assess Elder Bahul’s still statue-like state. The only way this man would look excited was if an earthquake struck at that very moment and tossed him around in his chair.
But life above the dungeon was only truly beginning for Braiden and Augustin — no, for all of them. Their businesses and Craghammer’s employment aside, even the others were just discovering life outside the boundaries that had been built for them.
Elyssandra with her freedom from her royal bonds, temporary as that may be, and Warren discovering the world beyond the Underborough, and Bones all but traveling through time, dying in an Aidun of hundreds of years past, awaking in a new Aidun brimming with places to see and people to terrorize.
Braiden remembered his favorite pincushion tomato, no longer sitting in its sewing tin, now taking pride of place on the Beadle’s Needles counter. They were five little tomatoes trying to flourish outside of their boxes, to see who and what they could really become.
Braiden exchanged a long, meaningful look with Augustin, seeing only agreement in his storm-gray eyes, The dungeon could wait.
“We’re grateful for the opportunity, Elder Bahul,” Augustin said. “And extremely flattered that you would consider us. But we must decline at this time.”
Orora Arcosa sighed as if she’d known this would be the outcome all along.
Elder Bahul’s backpack — backchest? — clattered against the back of his chair as he shrugged. He rose from the table and reached for one of the tools dangling from his harness — a coil of rope. He walked to the closest window and hurled it out into thin air.
Braiden watched in fascination as the rope knotted itself around the nearest wooden pillar, as if sentient, the cleverest tentacle on an octopus. Without uttering another word, Elder Bahul took the rope in both hands and slid effortlessly down the side of the tower.
“Goodness gracious,” Braiden breathed. “That’s one way to make an exit.”
He tried not to seethe with jealousy over something he’d always wanted to conjure — a lengthy coil of sturdy rope — but to make it smart enough to tie its own knots, too?
Braiden understood that the enchantment of objects and the weaving way were two entirely separate arts, but it was hard not to be sore about it.
But what if he spun some moongrass filament into a coil of existing rope?
Braiden bit his lip, chewing it in his excitement.
All along he’d dreamed up ways to weave moongrass thread into knitted and crocheted articles of clothing.
All this time he was dreaming big when he could have been thinking even smaller!
What magics could he infuse into a single ball of yarn, a spool of thread, or a coil of rope? Would he make a killing at the docks that way, supplying ships with intelligent ropes and fishermen with self-hooking fishing lines? Certainly something to consider for the future.
The back-and-forth staccato of Augustin and Orora arguing snapped Braiden out of his burst of inspiration. “You never listen,” one or the other said, and the other shot back with, “You don’t understand.”
“I’m very sorry, Elder Orora,” Braiden interjected, hoping to keep the peace. “We’re just very, very busy right now. I’m sure Elder Bahul will find plenty of capable adventurers to escort him down the way.”
“Then I suppose you’re prepared to pay the price.” Elder Orora rubbed her hands together gleefully. “That is my job, after all: collecting all the debts and fees and fines.”
Augustin sighed and rolled his eyes. “You can take the pirate off the ship, but you can’t take the ship out of the — no, that’s not it.
What I mean to say is that you’ve always loved your booty, Grandmother.
Doesn’t matter if it’s coffers or treasure chests.
Gold glitters just the same, doesn’t it? ”
Elder Orora grinned. “Oh, Augustin. You know me too well.”
“Is Elder Bahul a former pirate, too?” Braiden asked. “Someone you know from your seafaring days?”
“Actually, I only met him here on the council. He’s a transplant, like me. A smuggler from Il-Venesse.”
Of course, he was. A pirate on the council, and a smuggler, too. That explained the gigantic chest. Well, sort of.
“And speaking of Il-Venesse — don’t think I’ve forgotten about those dragons that you owe me.”
Before Augustin could protest in his favor, Braiden reached into his coin purse, grateful he’d had the foresight to pocket the ancient currency on the way out the door.
This was a good a time as any to return them.
He placed them on the table, the old metal cool to the touch as he arranged them into a little mound.
“I didn’t spend a single one of them. I always meant to give them back.”
Orora’s eyes narrowed into slits.
“Very sneaky of you, Grandmother,” Augustin added, “trying to bribe Braiden like that.”
Elder Orora swept the coins into her lap, lips pursing as they tinkled. She counted them one by one, biting into their rims as she went. “And to think you could have cleared all your penalties in one fell swoop. Shame, really. Bahul isn’t as spry as he used to be. He could have used an escort.”
Braiden glanced from her face to the window in disbelief. Spry was an understatement.
“The man carries a mountain on his back,” Augustin said. “I somehow have to believe that he’s going to be all right.”
“He only takes it off to sleep,” Orora said. “Or so I’ve heard. Perhaps he’ll find the right adventurers to go with him. I’ve never seen him so upset.”
Braiden blinked. How could she even tell?
“I hope the two of you know what you’re doing,” Orora said, still civil after gouging the pair for all they were worth. “The dungeon is here to stay, you know? You’ll go back down some day. You’ll get bored of brewing elixirs and casting out flyers, too.”
Augustin lifted his nose. “If you say so, Grandmother. Now, if you’ll excuse us? We have businesses to run. Can’t pay your exorbitant fees if we don’t make any money.”
The elder steepled her fingers and smirked. “Then I wish the two of you the very best.”
Augustin somehow turned his nose up even higher, grabbing Braiden by the hip and guiding him toward a window. Panic rippled through Braiden’s body. Where were they going?
“What are you doing?” Braiden stammered.
“Just trust me,” Augustin whispered with a wink.
The wizard held Braiden by the waist and stepped out the window.
Braiden yelped as they plummeted from the tower, his heart racing in the terrifying span of seconds before Augustin’s flying spell kicked in. His voice splitting the air outside the Lighthouse, Braiden hung on for dear life.
“Why doesn’t anyone ever use the damn stairs?”