“You heard about the other team who beat the boss?” Carina asked, joining Tibs and Jackal at their usual table. She waved to Kroseph.
“Finally,” Jackal said. “I can’t believe it took this long for another team to manage it. Now people can go pester them for what it’s like to fight it and how to beat it.”
“Maybe one of them will brag about it,” Tibs said, thinking of the number of times he’d had to remind Jackal they weren’t allowed to say anything about what took place in the dungeon outside of it.
“And they can deal with the consequences,” the fighter said. “This rule was made to torture me specifically, I just know it. It was such an amazing fight. You were amazing in it, I was amazing in it, and I can’t tell a soul.” He rested his head on the table. “We’re going to die in obscurity.”
“I like obscurity,” Tibs said.
Jackal glared at him. “You’re a rogue, you love obscurity. I’m a fighter, I should be able to be famous for my battles. How is that going to happen if I can’t tell my stories?”
“What stories?” Kroseph asked, placing a plate of stew and a tankard of ale before Carina.
“The one about the dungeon,” Jackal said, and Tibs narrowed his eyes at Kroseph.
“Did he tell you?”
“Me?” the server said, acting far too innocent. “I have no idea what he’s talking about.” He hurried away, and Tibs turned his glare on the fighter.
“What?” Jackal asked. And mouthed ‘he’s Kroseph.’
“You realize you’re placing him in danger too, right?” Carina asked.
“Just let me have that, okay?” Jackal asked, then muttered. “At least he likes my stories.”
“Everyone likes them,” Carina said. “That’s just one you can’t tell yet. I’m sure once everyone can beat the golem, no one’s going to care who was first.”
“You see, that’s what you don't understand, that’s why I have to be able to tell the story now, before there's dozen others flying about town all claiming to be the first. We beat it. We should be telling it.”
“We’ll still be the first,” Tibs said, “no one’s going to forget us and the shield.”
“Unfortunately,” Jackal grumbled.
“Sounds like you don’t know what you want,” Carina said, pausing as she ate. “you can’t be remembered for one and not the other.”
“It’s the guard,” Tibs said, “isn’t it.”
“How did it go for that team who beat the boss?” Jackal asked. “Was their loot better than ours?”
Tibs shrugged at Carina’s look. Jackal wouldn’t say anything about the man he’d called Harry Hard Knuckle. Each time Tibs tried, he changed the subject without even trying to pretend he hadn’t heard.
“I didn’t see what it was, so smaller than ours, but with dungeon loot it can’t mean much. There was some arguing at the table, from what I was told the adventurer there tried to convince them the guild would give them a better price for it than merchants, because the guild was fair, and merchants were crooks.”
Jackal choked on his swallow. “Tell me they didn’t believe whoever that was.”
“No. They’re probably doing the rounds of the shops now to see what they can get.”
“They should see Darran,” Tibs said, since their merchant had given them such a good deal.
“Let’s not send too many people to him,” Jackal said. “I’m hoping we’ll get one more run before Hard Knuckle can make the changes he wants to make. It would be a shame if my favorite merchant was out of coins when we bring him the loot, because once the guild starts paying us, we’re going to get screwed worse than Miral on the guard’s payday.”
Tibs shrugged. “It’ll be what it is. We already know the guild’s crooked.” He finished his tankard.
“It’s unsettling how at ease you are with that,” Carina said.
“When you’re Street,” Jackal said, “getting screwed is something you get used to, although the level to which the guild stoops to is still unsettling me. I don’t know how you do it, Tibs.”
Tibs shrugged. “You’re street,” He grinned. “I’m Street,”
The fighter grinned in return. “That you are.”
“Since we can’t do anything about the guild,” Carina asked. “Any thought on the other thing?”
“Actually,” Jackal said, and motioned Kroseph over. “Kro, you remember when you told me about the mountains around your city.”
The server narrowed his eyes. “You remember that?”
“Sure, you described how—”
“I told you about that like the first day we met.”
“Yes, but—”
“I told you about High Wind two days before we were to meet for it.”
“Not that again, I said I—”
Tibs kicked Jackal’s shin as hard as he could since the fighter wore his leather armor and Tibs was sure he kept his earth skin on all the time under it.
Jackal looked at him. “What was that for?”
“You’re about to get in a fight with him.”
“I’m not—”
“Trust Tibs, “Kroseph said, “on things like that he clearly knows more than you do.”
Jackal looked from one to the other. “But…”
“You brought him over to help,” Tibs said during the fighter’s confusion, “so let him help and you can fight afterward.”
“But I don’t want to fight.”
“I know,” Kroseph said, patting Jackal’s shoulder in what seemed to Tibs a pretty condescending way. It was the fighter’s turn to narrow his eyes at Kroseph.
The server smiled innocently. “How can I help?”
Jackal looked like he was about to say something, but Carina spoke. “You said something about a mountain, Jackal?”
“Mountains,” He said, glaring at the sorceress who smiled before sipping from her tankard. He smoothed his face and looked at the server again. “You said something about how there’s a race every year to the top and it’s got something to do with being difficult to breathe.”
Kroseph stared at Jackal, looked around the dining room, then sat. “You remember the weirdest thing. Back home, which is MountainSea, every year, during the first-ship festival, the tougher men and women of the area, and even from other places will come to run the Mountain Top. What makes the race a challenge, isn’t just that it’s long, the trail can take days to walk, or steep, but the higher you go, the tougher it is to breathe. It’s not going to affect you and me walking there. But when you run, you get tired a lot easier.”
“Hard to breathe you say?” Carina asked.
Kroseph nodded, then looked at the three of them. Tibs expected his thoughtful expression matched Carina’s. “What am I missing?”
“You didn’t tell him?” Tibs asked.
Jackal looked hurt. “That’s not my thing to tell.”
“Before you start a fight with your team,” Kroseph said. “I think I need to clarify something. He doesn’t tell me that much, mostly things about him, and some of the more exciting things you go through in the dungeon. I can’t go in the dungeon, so he tells me about it.”
“Why can’t you go?” Carina asked before Tibs could.
“Pa won’t let me, for one thing, and I’m a server, an innkeeper one day. I’m not an adventurer. I like my excitement in more comfortable surroundings.”
“Kro!” came the call from the kitchen.
With a sigh, he stood. “Dishes got to get washed. Looks like I could help, so I’m glad.”
Jackal watched him leave, then at them.
Carina raised her hand before he could speak. “I’m not giving you advice.”
He looked at Tibs. “What did I do that was going to start a fight?”
“You understand the incongruity here, right?” Carina asked, drawing both their gazes. “You’re asking Tibs, who can’t be older than fifteen, about relationships.”
“In Street time, fifteen is pretty much old age,” Jackal said, grinning.
“So you’re a corpse?” Tibs said.
“Ouch. Tibs, why? I thought you liked me.”
“It’s me liking you,” He answered, “If I didn’t, I’d make sure you were one.”
“No wonder you’re still alive,” Jackal said. “They must all be dead on your street.”
“Only if words killed.”
“In the right mouth,” Carina said, “they can. But how about we address the biggest problem with Kroseph’s help, mainly that we can’t go to MountainSea?”
“It tells us that if we get high enough, we might be able to do it.”
“So, the roof of the rooming house?” Tibs asked. Other than the guild building, it was the tallest one. And he didn’t want to risk going there. Someone might object.
Jackal looked at Carina, who shrugged. “The rooming house’s roof it is, tonight.” He was thoughtful. “Do we want to do something about softening Tibs’s landing?”
* * * * *
Tibs looked at the shop. It was new, the last building in the row of shops. The one opposite was still being built. Behind the counter was a locked box. Bardik had given him an opal to place in it, and he wasn’t to take anything out.
Tibs was beginning to think this was just all some elaborate training thing. No matter how many opals he dropped in just as many pockets, nothing was happening. It was good practice, and maybe it was a guild rogue thing, even if Tibs had been the one to seek out Bardik for knife training and this was supposed to be how he paid for it.
He stepped in. the shop smelled sweet, leather polishing oil, but also sugar and spices. The walls were lined with shelves on which bags and boxes were displayed with writing on them. He couldn’t read them, so what they were about was a mystery, and not what interested him. The counter was a smooth piece of wood, behind which stood a young woman, someone’s daughter, he expected, maybe the shop owner. They all seemed to be owned by older people who used their children or others to work in them.
“Are you looking for something?” she asked.
“You’re new, I wanted to see what you have.”
“We have sweets and goods from all over the world,” She replied enthusiastically, then took in how he was dressed. Tibs wore his armor when he didn’t expect to train. Its weight felt comfortable, and it meant no one took him for one of the worker’s son anymore. “You look a little young to be one of the Runners.”
“I’m the youngest. I’m a Rogue.”
She beamed and leaned forward. He leaned in closer. “Are you here to rob us?”
Tibs stared at her, mouth agape, trying to decide if he should be offended she’d think he’d rob someone in his town or worried she knew he was planning on breaking into the shop.
She laughed. “It would be so amazing to be robbed by a Runner. Daddy says you’re all very good at it.”
He smiled. “I’m not allowed to do it. It’s against the guild’s rules.”
“I won’t tell them.”
He chuckled. “I wouldn’t just lose my hand.” He tried to keep his tone light. She was playing with him. “They’ll strip me of my armor and weapons, then throw me in the dungeon for the rats to eat me.” The shudder wasn’t an act. They couldn’t approach him anymore, and yet the idea of them still sent shivers down his spine.
“They’ll send you in there naked?” She looked him over the same way Jackal looked at Kroseph at times, when he didn’t think the server could see him. On his friend, the expression was amusing, and he knew Kroseph didn’t mind being the subject. On her… it was unsettling.
He left. He’d be back in the night. Bardik said the opal needed to be in before the sun came up.
* * * * *
Tibs looked around at the people assembled in the clearing at the bottom of the hill leading to the crack into the mountain. This was so different from the first time he’d been here. For one thing, he could see the mountain. There was no wooden platform for a fighter to stand on and tell them that their future was to be dungeon food. There were a lot fewer people assembled in groups of two to five people. Teams, and remnants of teams.
He noticed Don in his really dark purple robe with two fighters at his side. When the sorcerer looked around, Tibs moved so a woman was between them. He hoped the sorcerer had forgotten he existed.
“Do you know what this is about?” Carina asked, and the woman turned.
“Just got ordered to be here like you.” She noticed Tibs and startled. “How did you get there?”
He smiled. “I walked.”
“Funny. You’re pretty small for a rogue.”
“Means he can get in all the little places,” Jackal said. “I was wondering where you were. The order made it sound like if we weren’t here there would be consequences.”
“I thought I might get to fill a team, but there was something at the entrance.” He pointed to where adventurers were standing their back to the crack, weapons drawn.
“Looks like they think we’re going to attack or something,” Carina said.
“Did you steal something of theirs Tibs?” Jackal asked.
“No, and I’m offended you think I’d say yes to the question. Rogues are smarter than that.”
Carina leaned in close to Jackal. “He just insulted you.”
Jackal looked surprised. “Oh. I guess us fighters are too dumb to notice those things.”
Carina looked at the woman. A fighter too, Tibs noticed. “See what I have to put up with?”
“I’ll take them if you don’t want them,” she indicated Jackal. “That one’s cute.”
“That one’s taken,” Jackal replied.
The woman looked at Carina, who chortled.
“What’s wrong with me?” Jackal demanded.
“You’re taken,” she replied, “and I don’t even want to think of the kind of food I’m going to get served if I anger Kroseph.”
“He isn’t the cook.”
“But he’s the one who brings it to us. I want him to be on my side.”
“Too bad he’s on mine,” Jackal replied, grinning.
Tibs looked at the woman. “See what I have to put up with?”
“I do kid, I do pitty you.” She grinned. “I’d take them off your hands, but my team’s full.” She looked over them. “ ’Bout time you got here.”
The four looked like they should still be asleep. The rogue had his pants backward and his shirt in his hand. “How are you awake after last night?” He demanded.
“Seems I can hold my ale,” she replied.
“What’s going on,” the archer grumbled. “I thought the rooming house was a safe place. Then we have adventurers banging on the door and yelling to get here or we’re going to be fed to the dungeon.”
“Told you there were going to be consequences,” Jackal told Tibs.
“I was already here.” Tibs crossed his arms over his chest. “You were late.”
“I—” Jackal sputtered and turned to the woman. “You see what I have to put up with?”
She nodded. “Now I see why you three are a team.”
“You’re Tibs,” the rogue said. “You guys are who killed the boss the first time! How did you do it!”
“Well,” Jackal started, “Tibs here—”
Tibs kicked his chin, and Carina slapped the back of his head.
“Sucks not being able to brag, doesn’t it?” the woman said.
Jackal turned to Tibs. “See, someone gets it!”
“She's a fighter,” Tibs said, “of course she feels the need to brag too.”
“See what I’ve had to deal with for the last ten minutes?” she told the rest of her team. “Don’t look at me, you three started it.”
“What did we walk into?” the sorcerer asked, then yawned wide enough Tibs saw to the back of his throat.
Before anyone answered an adventurer walked by and handed each of them a silver bracelet with a yellow gem embedded in it, even the other rogue, who tried to refuse it. The adventurer didn’t answer any of the questions asked.
Carina put the bracelet on and studied how it looked. Jackal smirked and put his on, placing his arm next to hers. “You wear it better.”
“Do you know how many of us are left?” Tibs asked, focusing on the bracelet to see if what it was would appear. Instead, he was surprised to sense water and earth essence interweaved within it.
“I heard four hundred,” the archer said. Tibs noticed his bow was made of a yellow wood as he tried to figure out what the number meant.
“How many teams is that?”
“Eighty,” Carina said.
That sounded like eight, so it was more than seven, less than nine, but in the tens. He rubbed his temple. Why did numbers have to be so complicated?
“Don’t think too much about it, Tibs,” Jackal said. "You can see that a lot of those who were here are gone. Most of them. They said they didn’t care if we all died, and we survived. Just focused on that.”
“Do you think they knew so many would die?” Tibs asked, remembering Ariana, Walter, and the others he’d met and who were gone. Mama.
“I think,” Jackal said, his tone becoming harder. “They didn’t know how many of us would survive. They probably expected all of us to die and leave the path clear for the nobles.”
“Do you know what this is about then?” Carina asked.
“Saphina’s dad researched dungeons, remember? I think this—”
“Alright!” a voice boomed over the field.
“Of course, it would be him,” Jackal muttered.
Harry Hard Knuckle stood at the start of the path leading up to the crack in the mountain. He wore the same dented and scuffed armor he had the first time Tibs had seen him.
“My name is Harry, some of you will have heard me referred to as Hard Knuckle.” Tibs was certain the man looked in their direction when he said that. “Cross me, and you’ll find out why.” Mumbling rose and Tibs realized maybe Jackal wasn’t the only one who had had a run-in with Harry, although Tibs hadn’t realized he’d still been in town. “You’ve been handed a bracelet, put it on your left wrist.”
Tibs hesitated as Carina switched hers to that wrist. That was where Bardik’s brand was. It was what Alistair rubbed, the memory of his time having one. He’d seen so many of the adventurers favoring or hiding that wrist. Was that how they’d gotten them? Was that what had stolen ranks from Bardik? Was surviving this long worthy of being punished? Except Bardik said he’d reach a point when Tibs would be worth too much to be killed. That meant they wanted him to live. Didn’t it?
He looked around at the adventurers walking among them. If he didn’t put it on by himself, wouldn’t they just force it on him?
He closed it around his left wrist, where it hung loose, and waited with the others. Some looked at the bracelet like Tibs had. Maybe they felt the essence through them too? Alistair had taught him something he shouldn’t have known yet, why hadn’t other teachers?
The pain brought Tibs to his knees with a cry. Grasping at the bracelet he tried to pull it off, but it was tight against his skin. The clasp was gone, leaving a smooth strip of silver. Then he was panting, the pain only a memory. He checked, and the bracelet had shrunk to fit his wrist. The yellow gem glinted in the sunlight.
“You could have warned us, you son of a whore,” Jackal muttered, sounding angry. Tibs hadn’t heard the fighter angry often, and pain didn’t usually bother him.
The other rogue smirked as Tibs stood, bracelet in his hand. Sure, you were the smart one, Tibs thought disdainfully. He helped Carina up, she was pale.
“You okay?”
She nodded.
“how about you?” Jackal asked the other fighter and sorcerer.
“I told you guys, not to put it on,” the rogue said.
“The smart ones among you who haven’t put it on,” Harry’s voice boomed, sounding amused. “Now you know what you’ve got to look forward to because you aren’t leaving this town without that bracelet on. You can try to fake it, but it won’t work, you might as well put it on now and get it over with.”
The rogue looked at the bracelet. His smugness was gone. A woman cried out, and he closed his eyes. The rogue’s hand shook, and he muttered curses. Tibs realize that Harry had done them a favor. The rogue was anticipating the pain, which was a pain on its own.
“I take it back, Knuckles,” Jackal whispered, looking around. A lot more people than Tibs had realized hadn’t put it on. Now they were all fighting their own fears.
Tibs grabbed the rogue’s bracelet and put it on the man, then held him as he cried out. The weight nearly toppled him, but he wouldn’t move, felt the ground harden under his feet as he pushed essence into it.
“You’re an asshole,” the rogue said once he was no longer in pain. “Thanks.”
“I feel that anytime I have to go in the boulder room,” Tibs said. “It’s no fun.” He pulled the earth essence back into him.
“With that out of the way, we can move on to the interesting stuff,” Harry said. “The dungeon is graduating. It means nothing to you, and that’s fine. The only thing you need to know is that once it reopens, it’s going to be even tougher. Yes, I said reopen. It’s closed now. We’re not going to let you try to get in because I don’t have the time to deal with idiots. The stone can’t be moved, melted, broken, or affected by anything. And I’m going to have people guarding it because I know some of you are idiots and won't take the word of someone who’s been where you are. And not those adventurers you’ve been calling guards.
“How long it’s closed, we don’t know. But I can tell you it’s going to be at least two weeks. Could be as much as months. Since I have no intention of dealing with the lot of you in this town while I make the changes I need to make, those bracelets grant you free passage on the transportation platforms. Present it, tell the attendant where you want to go and they’ll take you there. See the world, have fun, enjoy yourself. Do not be in this city until we call you back.”
The gem on Tibs bracelet darkened, became orange, then red.
“That color is what will tell you to come back. When your bracelet turns that color again, you have two days to come back. If you are still wearing it after that, and feel free to try to take it off, it’s going to turn black.”
The red darkened until there was no color left.
“That will mark you for death. Anyone with that on can be killed and the guild will pay for the bracelet’s return, and do so handsomely. I already don’t care what happens to you. Once that’s black, I’ll care even less.”
Grumbling spread and a few people played with the bracelet as the gems returned to yellow. Tibs didn’t understand them. They were able to leave, go anywhere they wanted. He could go find Mama’s killers, make them pay.
Jackal caught his eye and mouth something. MountainSea.
Tibs looked to Carina, who nodded.
He could get his audience.
“Now, one thing you need to know. Before I set you loose on the world. When you come back, there will be people here. Many more. An Upsilon dungeon is open to those who can afford it, not just you lot. We will control how many teams we allow to form, but you will have people competing for the honor of clearing whatever new tricks and monsters the dungeon comes up with.” He turned, stopped, faced them again. “Oh, and the guild no longer considers you dungeon food. So there’s going to be a cleric at the entrance to make sure you’re in good health going in and to heal you as you get out, that is, if you get out. The guild might want you to live now, the dungeon still wants to eat you.”
“You heard about the other team who beat the boss?” Carina asked, joining Tibs and Jackal at their usual table. She waved to Kroseph.
“Finally,” Jackal said. “I can’t believe it took this long for another team to manage it. Now people can go pester them for what it’s like to fight it and how to beat it.”
“Maybe one of them will brag about it,” Tibs said, thinking of the number of times he’d had to remind Jackal they weren’t allowed to say anything about what took place in the dungeon outside of it.
“And they can deal with the consequences,” the fighter said. “This rule was made to torture me specifically, I just know it. It was such an amazing fight. You were amazing in it, I was amazing in it, and I can’t tell a soul.” He rested his head on the table. “We’re going to die in obscurity.”
“I like obscurity,” Tibs said.
Jackal glared at him. “You’re a rogue, you love obscurity. I’m a fighter, I should be able to be famous for my battles. How is that going to happen if I can’t tell my stories?”
“What stories?” Kroseph asked, placing a plate of stew and a tankard of ale before Carina.
“The one about the dungeon,” Jackal said, and Tibs narrowed his eyes at Kroseph.
“Did he tell you?”
“Me?” the server said, acting far too innocent. “I have no idea what he’s talking about.” He hurried away, and Tibs turned his glare on the fighter.
“What?” Jackal asked. And mouthed ‘he’s Kroseph.’
“You realize you’re placing him in danger too, right?” Carina asked.
“Just let me have that, okay?” Jackal asked, then muttered. “At least he likes my stories.”
“Everyone likes them,” Carina said. “That’s just one you can’t tell yet. I’m sure once everyone can beat the golem, no one’s going to care who was first.”
“You see, that’s what you don't understand, that’s why I have to be able to tell the story now, before there's dozen others flying about town all claiming to be the first. We beat it. We should be telling it.”
“We’ll still be the first,” Tibs said, “no one’s going to forget us and the shield.”
“Unfortunately,” Jackal grumbled.
“Sounds like you don’t know what you want,” Carina said, pausing as she ate. “you can’t be remembered for one and not the other.”
“It’s the guard,” Tibs said, “isn’t it.”
“How did it go for that team who beat the boss?” Jackal asked. “Was their loot better than ours?”
Tibs shrugged at Carina’s look. Jackal wouldn’t say anything about the man he’d called Harry Hard Knuckle. Each time Tibs tried, he changed the subject without even trying to pretend he hadn’t heard.
“I didn’t see what it was, so smaller than ours, but with dungeon loot it can’t mean much. There was some arguing at the table, from what I was told the adventurer there tried to convince them the guild would give them a better price for it than merchants, because the guild was fair, and merchants were crooks.”
Jackal choked on his swallow. “Tell me they didn’t believe whoever that was.”
“No. They’re probably doing the rounds of the shops now to see what they can get.”
“They should see Darran,” Tibs said, since their merchant had given them such a good deal.
“Let’s not send too many people to him,” Jackal said. “I’m hoping we’ll get one more run before Hard Knuckle can make the changes he wants to make. It would be a shame if my favorite merchant was out of coins when we bring him the loot, because once the guild starts paying us, we’re going to get screwed worse than Miral on the guard’s payday.”
Tibs shrugged. “It’ll be what it is. We already know the guild’s crooked.” He finished his tankard.
“It’s unsettling how at ease you are with that,” Carina said.
“When you’re Street,” Jackal said, “getting screwed is something you get used to, although the level to which the guild stoops to is still unsettling me. I don’t know how you do it, Tibs.”
Tibs shrugged. “You’re street,” He grinned. “I’m Street,”
The fighter grinned in return. “That you are.”
“Since we can’t do anything about the guild,” Carina asked. “Any thought on the other thing?”
“Actually,” Jackal said, and motioned Kroseph over. “Kro, you remember when you told me about the mountains around your city.”
The server narrowed his eyes. “You remember that?”
“Sure, you described how—”
“I told you about that like the first day we met.”
“Yes, but—”
“I told you about High Wind two days before we were to meet for it.”
“Not that again, I said I—”
Tibs kicked Jackal’s shin as hard as he could since the fighter wore his leather armor and Tibs was sure he kept his earth skin on all the time under it.
Jackal looked at him. “What was that for?”
“You’re about to get in a fight with him.”
“I’m not—”
“Trust Tibs, “Kroseph said, “on things like that he clearly knows more than you do.”
Jackal looked from one to the other. “But…”
“You brought him over to help,” Tibs said during the fighter’s confusion, “so let him help and you can fight afterward.”
“But I don’t want to fight.”
“I know,” Kroseph said, patting Jackal’s shoulder in what seemed to Tibs a pretty condescending way. It was the fighter’s turn to narrow his eyes at Kroseph.
The server smiled innocently. “How can I help?”
Jackal looked like he was about to say something, but Carina spoke. “You said something about a mountain, Jackal?”
“Mountains,” He said, glaring at the sorceress who smiled before sipping from her tankard. He smoothed his face and looked at the server again. “You said something about how there’s a race every year to the top and it’s got something to do with being difficult to breathe.”
Kroseph stared at Jackal, looked around the dining room, then sat. “You remember the weirdest thing. Back home, which is MountainSea, every year, during the first-ship festival, the tougher men and women of the area, and even from other places will come to run the Mountain Top. What makes the race a challenge, isn’t just that it’s long, the trail can take days to walk, or steep, but the higher you go, the tougher it is to breathe. It’s not going to affect you and me walking there. But when you run, you get tired a lot easier.”
“Hard to breathe you say?” Carina asked.
Kroseph nodded, then looked at the three of them. Tibs expected his thoughtful expression matched Carina’s. “What am I missing?”
“You didn’t tell him?” Tibs asked.
Jackal looked hurt. “That’s not my thing to tell.”
“Before you start a fight with your team,” Kroseph said. “I think I need to clarify something. He doesn’t tell me that much, mostly things about him, and some of the more exciting things you go through in the dungeon. I can’t go in the dungeon, so he tells me about it.”
“Why can’t you go?” Carina asked before Tibs could.
“Pa won’t let me, for one thing, and I’m a server, an innkeeper one day. I’m not an adventurer. I like my excitement in more comfortable surroundings.”
“Kro!” came the call from the kitchen.
With a sigh, he stood. “Dishes got to get washed. Looks like I could help, so I’m glad.”
Jackal watched him leave, then at them.
Carina raised her hand before he could speak. “I’m not giving you advice.”
He looked at Tibs. “What did I do that was going to start a fight?”
“You understand the incongruity here, right?” Carina asked, drawing both their gazes. “You’re asking Tibs, who can’t be older than fifteen, about relationships.”
“In Street time, fifteen is pretty much old age,” Jackal said, grinning.
“So you’re a corpse?” Tibs said.
“Ouch. Tibs, why? I thought you liked me.”
“It’s me liking you,” He answered, “If I didn’t, I’d make sure you were one.”
“No wonder you’re still alive,” Jackal said. “They must all be dead on your street.”
“Only if words killed.”
“In the right mouth,” Carina said, “they can. But how about we address the biggest problem with Kroseph’s help, mainly that we can’t go to MountainSea?”
“It tells us that if we get high enough, we might be able to do it.”
“So, the roof of the rooming house?” Tibs asked. Other than the guild building, it was the tallest one. And he didn’t want to risk going there. Someone might object.
Jackal looked at Carina, who shrugged. “The rooming house’s roof it is, tonight.” He was thoughtful. “Do we want to do something about softening Tibs’s landing?”
* * * * *
Tibs looked at the shop. It was new, the last building in the row of shops. The one opposite was still being built. Behind the counter was a locked box. Bardik had given him an opal to place in it, and he wasn’t to take anything out.
Tibs was beginning to think this was just all some elaborate training thing. No matter how many opals he dropped in just as many pockets, nothing was happening. It was good practice, and maybe it was a guild rogue thing, even if Tibs had been the one to seek out Bardik for knife training and this was supposed to be how he paid for it.
He stepped in. the shop smelled sweet, leather polishing oil, but also sugar and spices. The walls were lined with shelves on which bags and boxes were displayed with writing on them. He couldn’t read them, so what they were about was a mystery, and not what interested him. The counter was a smooth piece of wood, behind which stood a young woman, someone’s daughter, he expected, maybe the shop owner. They all seemed to be owned by older people who used their children or others to work in them.
“Are you looking for something?” she asked.
“You’re new, I wanted to see what you have.”
“We have sweets and goods from all over the world,” She replied enthusiastically, then took in how he was dressed. Tibs wore his armor when he didn’t expect to train. Its weight felt comfortable, and it meant no one took him for one of the worker’s son anymore. “You look a little young to be one of the Runners.”
“I’m the youngest. I’m a Rogue.”
She beamed and leaned forward. He leaned in closer. “Are you here to rob us?”
Tibs stared at her, mouth agape, trying to decide if he should be offended she’d think he’d rob someone in his town or worried she knew he was planning on breaking into the shop.
She laughed. “It would be so amazing to be robbed by a Runner. Daddy says you’re all very good at it.”
He smiled. “I’m not allowed to do it. It’s against the guild’s rules.”
“I won’t tell them.”
He chuckled. “I wouldn’t just lose my hand.” He tried to keep his tone light. She was playing with him. “They’ll strip me of my armor and weapons, then throw me in the dungeon for the rats to eat me.” The shudder wasn’t an act. They couldn’t approach him anymore, and yet the idea of them still sent shivers down his spine.
“They’ll send you in there naked?” She looked him over the same way Jackal looked at Kroseph at times, when he didn’t think the server could see him. On his friend, the expression was amusing, and he knew Kroseph didn’t mind being the subject. On her… it was unsettling.
He left. He’d be back in the night. Bardik said the opal needed to be in before the sun came up.
* * * * *
Tibs looked around at the people assembled in the clearing at the bottom of the hill leading to the crack into the mountain. This was so different from the first time he’d been here. For one thing, he could see the mountain. There was no wooden platform for a fighter to stand on and tell them that their future was to be dungeon food. There were a lot fewer people assembled in groups of two to five people. Teams, and remnants of teams.
He noticed Don in his really dark purple robe with two fighters at his side. When the sorcerer looked around, Tibs moved so a woman was between them. He hoped the sorcerer had forgotten he existed.
“Do you know what this is about?” Carina asked, and the woman turned.
“Just got ordered to be here like you.” She noticed Tibs and startled. “How did you get there?”
He smiled. “I walked.”
“Funny. You’re pretty small for a rogue.”
“Means he can get in all the little places,” Jackal said. “I was wondering where you were. The order made it sound like if we weren’t here there would be consequences.”
“I thought I might get to fill a team, but there was something at the entrance.” He pointed to where adventurers were standing their back to the crack, weapons drawn.
“Looks like they think we’re going to attack or something,” Carina said.
“Did you steal something of theirs Tibs?” Jackal asked.
“No, and I’m offended you think I’d say yes to the question. Rogues are smarter than that.”
Carina leaned in close to Jackal. “He just insulted you.”
Jackal looked surprised. “Oh. I guess us fighters are too dumb to notice those things.”
Carina looked at the woman. A fighter too, Tibs noticed. “See what I have to put up with?”
“I’ll take them if you don’t want them,” she indicated Jackal. “That one’s cute.”
“That one’s taken,” Jackal replied.
The woman looked at Carina, who chortled.
“What’s wrong with me?” Jackal demanded.
“You’re taken,” she replied, “and I don’t even want to think of the kind of food I’m going to get served if I anger Kroseph.”
“He isn’t the cook.”
“But he’s the one who brings it to us. I want him to be on my side.”
“Too bad he’s on mine,” Jackal replied, grinning.
Tibs looked at the woman. “See what I have to put up with?”
“I do kid, I do pitty you.” She grinned. “I’d take them off your hands, but my team’s full.” She looked over them. “ ’Bout time you got here.”
The four looked like they should still be asleep. The rogue had his pants backward and his shirt in his hand. “How are you awake after last night?” He demanded.
“Seems I can hold my ale,” she replied.
“What’s going on,” the archer grumbled. “I thought the rooming house was a safe place. Then we have adventurers banging on the door and yelling to get here or we’re going to be fed to the dungeon.”
“Told you there were going to be consequences,” Jackal told Tibs.
“I was already here.” Tibs crossed his arms over his chest. “You were late.”
“I—” Jackal sputtered and turned to the woman. “You see what I have to put up with?”
She nodded. “Now I see why you three are a team.”
“You’re Tibs,” the rogue said. “You guys are who killed the boss the first time! How did you do it!”
“Well,” Jackal started, “Tibs here—”
Tibs kicked his chin, and Carina slapped the back of his head.
“Sucks not being able to brag, doesn’t it?” the woman said.
Jackal turned to Tibs. “See, someone gets it!”
“She's a fighter,” Tibs said, “of course she feels the need to brag too.”
“See what I’ve had to deal with for the last ten minutes?” she told the rest of her team. “Don’t look at me, you three started it.”
“What did we walk into?” the sorcerer asked, then yawned wide enough Tibs saw to the back of his throat.
Before anyone answered an adventurer walked by and handed each of them a silver bracelet with a yellow gem embedded in it, even the other rogue, who tried to refuse it. The adventurer didn’t answer any of the questions asked.
Carina put the bracelet on and studied how it looked. Jackal smirked and put his on, placing his arm next to hers. “You wear it better.”
“Do you know how many of us are left?” Tibs asked, focusing on the bracelet to see if what it was would appear. Instead, he was surprised to sense water and earth essence interweaved within it.
“I heard four hundred,” the archer said. Tibs noticed his bow was made of a yellow wood as he tried to figure out what the number meant.
“How many teams is that?”
“Eighty,” Carina said.
That sounded like eight, so it was more than seven, less than nine, but in the tens. He rubbed his temple. Why did numbers have to be so complicated?
“Don’t think too much about it, Tibs,” Jackal said. "You can see that a lot of those who were here are gone. Most of them. They said they didn’t care if we all died, and we survived. Just focused on that.”
“Do you think they knew so many would die?” Tibs asked, remembering Ariana, Walter, and the others he’d met and who were gone. Mama.
“I think,” Jackal said, his tone becoming harder. “They didn’t know how many of us would survive. They probably expected all of us to die and leave the path clear for the nobles.”
“Do you know what this is about then?” Carina asked.
“Saphina’s dad researched dungeons, remember? I think this—”
“Alright!” a voice boomed over the field.
“Of course, it would be him,” Jackal muttered.
Harry Hard Knuckle stood at the start of the path leading up to the crack in the mountain. He wore the same dented and scuffed armor he had the first time Tibs had seen him.
“My name is Harry, some of you will have heard me referred to as Hard Knuckle.” Tibs was certain the man looked in their direction when he said that. “Cross me, and you’ll find out why.” Mumbling rose and Tibs realized maybe Jackal wasn’t the only one who had had a run-in with Harry, although Tibs hadn’t realized he’d still been in town. “You’ve been handed a bracelet, put it on your left wrist.”
Tibs hesitated as Carina switched hers to that wrist. That was where Bardik’s brand was. It was what Alistair rubbed, the memory of his time having one. He’d seen so many of the adventurers favoring or hiding that wrist. Was that how they’d gotten them? Was that what had stolen ranks from Bardik? Was surviving this long worthy of being punished? Except Bardik said he’d reach a point when Tibs would be worth too much to be killed. That meant they wanted him to live. Didn’t it?
He looked around at the adventurers walking among them. If he didn’t put it on by himself, wouldn’t they just force it on him?
He closed it around his left wrist, where it hung loose, and waited with the others. Some looked at the bracelet like Tibs had. Maybe they felt the essence through them too? Alistair had taught him something he shouldn’t have known yet, why hadn’t other teachers?
The pain brought Tibs to his knees with a cry. Grasping at the bracelet he tried to pull it off, but it was tight against his skin. The clasp was gone, leaving a smooth strip of silver. Then he was panting, the pain only a memory. He checked, and the bracelet had shrunk to fit his wrist. The yellow gem glinted in the sunlight.
“You could have warned us, you son of a whore,” Jackal muttered, sounding angry. Tibs hadn’t heard the fighter angry often, and pain didn’t usually bother him.
The other rogue smirked as Tibs stood, bracelet in his hand. Sure, you were the smart one, Tibs thought disdainfully. He helped Carina up, she was pale.
“You okay?”
She nodded.
“how about you?” Jackal asked the other fighter and sorcerer.
“I told you guys, not to put it on,” the rogue said.
“The smart ones among you who haven’t put it on,” Harry’s voice boomed, sounding amused. “Now you know what you’ve got to look forward to because you aren’t leaving this town without that bracelet on. You can try to fake it, but it won’t work, you might as well put it on now and get it over with.”
The rogue looked at the bracelet. His smugness was gone. A woman cried out, and he closed his eyes. The rogue’s hand shook, and he muttered curses. Tibs realize that Harry had done them a favor. The rogue was anticipating the pain, which was a pain on its own.
“I take it back, Knuckles,” Jackal whispered, looking around. A lot more people than Tibs had realized hadn’t put it on. Now they were all fighting their own fears.
Tibs grabbed the rogue’s bracelet and put it on the man, then held him as he cried out. The weight nearly toppled him, but he wouldn’t move, felt the ground harden under his feet as he pushed essence into it.
“You’re an asshole,” the rogue said once he was no longer in pain. “Thanks.”
“I feel that anytime I have to go in the boulder room,” Tibs said. “It’s no fun.” He pulled the earth essence back into him.
“With that out of the way, we can move on to the interesting stuff,” Harry said. “The dungeon is graduating. It means nothing to you, and that’s fine. The only thing you need to know is that once it reopens, it’s going to be even tougher. Yes, I said reopen. It’s closed now. We’re not going to let you try to get in because I don’t have the time to deal with idiots. The stone can’t be moved, melted, broken, or affected by anything. And I’m going to have people guarding it because I know some of you are idiots and won't take the word of someone who’s been where you are. And not those adventurers you’ve been calling guards.
“How long it’s closed, we don’t know. But I can tell you it’s going to be at least two weeks. Could be as much as months. Since I have no intention of dealing with the lot of you in this town while I make the changes I need to make, those bracelets grant you free passage on the transportation platforms. Present it, tell the attendant where you want to go and they’ll take you there. See the world, have fun, enjoy yourself. Do not be in this city until we call you back.”
The gem on Tibs bracelet darkened, became orange, then red.
“That color is what will tell you to come back. When your bracelet turns that color again, you have two days to come back. If you are still wearing it after that, and feel free to try to take it off, it’s going to turn black.”
The red darkened until there was no color left.
“That will mark you for death. Anyone with that on can be killed and the guild will pay for the bracelet’s return, and do so handsomely. I already don’t care what happens to you. Once that’s black, I’ll care even less.”
Grumbling spread and a few people played with the bracelet as the gems returned to yellow. Tibs didn’t understand them. They were able to leave, go anywhere they wanted. He could go find Mama’s killers, make them pay.
Jackal caught his eye and mouth something. MountainSea.
Tibs looked to Carina, who nodded.
He could get his audience.
“Now, one thing you need to know. Before I set you loose on the world. When you come back, there will be people here. Many more. An Upsilon dungeon is open to those who can afford it, not just you lot. We will control how many teams we allow to form, but you will have people competing for the honor of clearing whatever new tricks and monsters the dungeon comes up with.” He turned, stopped, faced them again. “Oh, and the guild no longer considers you dungeon food. So there’s going to be a cleric at the entrance to make sure you’re in good health going in and to heal you as you get out, that is, if you get out. The guild might want you to live now, the dungeon still wants to eat you.”
