“If you think I’m hard to find,” Natalya said with a scoff, “you should try tracking down this idiot. I had to crawl through a sewer to find his trail again.” Annoyed, she kicked the prisoner again. “Do you have any idea how expensive it is to get clothes cleaned magically?”
“Stop kicking me!” the prisoner whined.
“Would you have stopped if the kids you were trying to steal had asked?” She punched him in the face, knocking him out. “Yeah, I didn’t think so.”
“Anyway,” the ignored butler said. “I’ve come to deliver this to you, and then deliver you to the funeral of my master.” He handed her a sealed letter.
She read the letter. “I see. So Petros is dead?” Petros Lorrimor was an eccentric scholar whose life she’d save long ago. She wasn’t sure how he’d managed to anger those guards – in fact, she’d never learned – but she knew that she saw a lone older man of obvious wealth being attacked by several men in poorly maintained light armor.
So she’d intervened. Two men were dead before they had realized she was there. The third fell in single combat. His axe had obviously been powerful, but she was too fast for him to hit.
“Yes,” the butler answered. “Please, we must hurry. Time is of the essence, and we have two others we must collect.” He gestured to the nearby carriage.
“That’s fine,” she said. “As long as we can stop at the nearest Adventurer’s Guild office on the way. I need to drop this idiot off.” Secretly, she was relieved, as it would be much easier to strap him down in a carriage than to try to march him all the way to town, several miles away.
“We have little time to spare, but if that is the condition, it will have to do.” He was obviously annoyed.
“Good. I trust you already know where to find the others?” she asked as the carriage man unceremoniously tossed her prisoner into the cabin.
“One will be easy. The other might prove more difficult to find.”
“If you give me his name, I can ask while I’m dropping off my prisoner. Someone at the guild may have heard of him. That could save us time, since it seems so important to you to make haste.”
“That could be of help. I have his description, if you could ask.”
The drop at the guild went as smoothly as normal, and Natalya took her purse of several dozen gold coins. She then asked about the man that the butler, Stein, was looking for. As expected, while they didn’t know where he was precisely, someone had seen a man matching that description in the previous day or so and was happy to point her in his direction.
She dropped a couple silver coins in the informant’s hand and returned to the carriage. “That’s all you could find?” Stein asked. “A district of the city?”
Natalya shrugged. “You aren’t paying me to bring him in, and I’m not exactly willing to spend much of my money to find him, so that’s what you get.”
Stein glowered. “It will have to be enough, then. Let’s get the other one first. He’s staying at an inn on the way.”
They arrived at the inn to find a commotion outside. There was a man with a bushy red beard wearing a thick black coat and bowler hat standing on the street corner, preaching to any who would listen. Which was pretty much no one. Didn’t stop him from preaching, though.
“And thus, you shall know the embrace of solacing darkness as the Black Butterfly protects you from the evil things that lurk in the depths of the great void. For it is she who stands between us and certain terror!”
Natalya noticed Stein’s eyes narrow. “What?” she asked.
“I think that’s him.”
“Great,” Natalya answered. “Have fun with that.”
Stein sighed, then stepped out of the carriage. “Excuse me, but might you be Heimish Realta?” he asked the strange preacher.
The man appraised him for a moment, then stepped down carefully from the box he was standing on. “Oh, I am Heimish, good sir. And who might you be? Do you seek knowledge of The Silence Between?”
“Please, save your sermons. I’m here on business.” Stein produced another sealed letter. “I work for Professor Petros Lorrimor, who, I am sorry to say, has left us.”
The man took the envelope. “Left? Where did he go?”
“That is up to him and the gods, I suspect.”
“That’s strange. Petros always seemed the sort to let you know where he was going.”
“I do not believe he planned this journey,” Stein said, a pained look on his face.
“I see. Well, I’d best see about this letter.” Heimish opened the seal and began reading. “OH! WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME HE WAS DEAD?!” he shouted.
Stein face palmed. “If that’s all settled, I am supposed to bring you to his funeral. Please, let us make haste.”
Heimish gave a quick nod. “Of course. Let me just get my things.” He then turned and limped inside while Stein slowly walked back to the carriage. Natalya noticed that he had a limp as well, though he was doing his best to hide it. Likely out of pride.
“He sounds like fun,” Natalya said dryly.
“Spare me. And he’s likely not to be the weirdest, if the mistress is to be believed.”
“I see.”
Heimish returned. As he limped past a beggar, he tried to stealthily hand the man a coin, only to slip on a flagstone and accidentally hit the beggar in the face with the coin. Stein just shook his head at the sight.
After Heimish was settled in, he took a seat across from Natalya. “Good morning, miss. I’m Heimish.” He held out his hand.
“Natalya,” the woman answered, not returning the gesture and looking out the window. She did notice his strange brooch that looked like a butterfly made of onyx.
Heimish let his hand fall. “So, where to now?” he asked Stein.
“One more to pick up. You’re sure on where he should be?” he asked Natalya.
“My contact said he’d been seen around there. He also mentioned something about a strange sign the man was carrying. He said you’d know you had the right one when you saw it.”
They searched for a short time before Stein tapped the carriage wall to get the driver to stop. “I think that’s him,” Stein said, pointing down the alley to a man in a dapper suit sitting on a chair next to a box.
Nailed to the box was a sign that read, “Free Babies”.
“That certainly qualifies as a strange sign,” Heimish said.
“I’ll be back momentarily,” Stein said as he stepped from the carriage. Stein approached the man, who seemed to be reading something. “Excuse me, but I believe you might be Santino Clifford?” he asked the man.
“And if I was, what would it be to you?” the man asked, not bothering to look up from what he was reading.
“I have come to deliver this,” Stein answered, handing the man a letter.
The man took one look at the seal and let the letter fall into the box next to him. Stein was more than a little surprised to see several children of differing races crawling around in the box. “So, I guess that means that Petros finally died?”
“Yes. I’ve come to bring you to his funeral.”
“And why would that interest me?” Santino asked.
“You’ve been written into his will.”
“And you think there could possibly be anything he’d want to give me that would make me want to bother?”
“That I cannot say. Please, just read the letter. It explains everything, including the nature of your inheritance.”
Santino rolled his eyes and set down what he was reading. He then leaned over and snatched the letter away from one of the children, who was chewing on its corner. “Filthy, disgusting little things,” he said under his breath as he broke the seal. He read for several moments. “I see. Fine. Let’s go. The sooner we get there, the sooner I can be done with this.” He stood and began making his way towards the carriage.
“Don’t you want to do something about those?” Stein asked, indicating the box.
“If they get hungry enough, they’ll eat the littlest one. They’ll be fine.”
Before Stein could answer, Heimish shouted from the carriage.
“Hey did you get lost in that alley? I thought we were in a hurry.”
Stein just shook his head and got into the carriage.
“Hi!” Heimish said to the new arrival. “What’s your name?”
“Santino Clifford,” the man answered. “You?”
“I’m Heimish,” the bearded man answered.
“What brings you here?” Santino asked.
“I’m an old friend of Petros, so it’s only right that I go to see him off.”
“Ah.” Santino reached in his pocket and pulled out some candy.
“Would you like some?” Heimish took a piece and ate it straight away. Natalya declined.
Stein put his piece in a small vial and mixed it with some strange substances. It turned a bright green color. “No, I think I’ll pass as well,” he said.
The trip to Ravengro would take a few days, so they spent their time in various ways. Santino pried as he could into Heimish’s story, while Heimish deflected him by talking about the Empyreal Lord he worshipped. Natalya learned far more than she ever wanted about the being.
Natalya did her best to stay out of conversation. Being trapped in a box with strange men put her on edge. Even sleeping was difficult. From time to time, she would go ride up top with the driver. He wasn’t very talkative, which suited her just fine.
The morning of the third day, while they ate breakfast in the carriage, Stein brought something up. “I’m glad I was able to find you all. You see, there are some complications with the estate. If you hadn’t all been here, we wouldn’t have been able to open the will.”
“But what if one of us had been dead?” Heimish asked.
“As long as I could account for that, it would have been fine,” Stein answered.
Santino’s brow creased in thought. “So, hypothetically, if, say, my new friend here died on the way, and I remind you this is completely hypothetical, could I still get what I’m due?”
Stein ignored him.
Unfazed, Santino tried a new track to get under the butler’s skin.
“So, which god do you follow?”
“Must I really follow a god?”
“So, you’re saying you don’t?”
Heimish interjected. “If you’re having trouble finding one, I could tell you all about the Black Butterfly!”
Stein looked out the window. “We’re almost there, thankfully.” He tapped the carriage and shouted, “Make haste! We’re behind schedule!”
The carriage driver made a grunt of acknowledgment. Natalya knew how he felt, but it would be good to finally be done with the trip. One more hour having to listen to the others prattle on might have driven her mad.
They arrived at a cemetery, the Restlands, where the town’s well to do were buried. Those without the money to buy such a plot were usually cremated. Fittingly, the sky was grey and a light drizzle blanketed everything in moisture.
A rather annoyed young woman in a black dress and veil approached the carriage as it reached its destination. She was Kendra, daughter of the late Petros. Natalya had never met her before, but he’d mentioned her often enough. “You’re late, Stein,” she called out.
Rather than letting Stein respond, Santino bounded out of the carriage before it had even stopped. He knelt before the woman. “Master, you’ve grown.”
“Cliffy?” she asked. “You’ve gotten much bigger.”
He stood and offered his arm, which she took. With his other hand, he held up an umbrella for both of them. “I must know… is Stein trustworthy?” he asked quietly.
“Father trusted him,” she answered.
“I didn’t ask if your father trusted him. Do you?”
She shrugged. “He’s never done me harm.”
“Naïve child. The white to Petros’ black.”
“If you’re talking about the Tian concept of duality, I believe that you’re mistaken, unless you mean to cast me as the evil. It is the black that represents good.”
Heimish, upon hearing the word “black”, perked up. “Hey! Are you talking about the Black Butterfly? I’d be happy to tell you all about her!”
“Hush, you,” Santino snapped. “So, do you still have his lab?” he asked the girl. She nodded. “Mind if I sniff around.”
“We can worry about that later. We have a funeral to attend to.”
“Of course. After, then. I am curious, but I didn’t want to trespass, since it belongs to you now. After all, YOU have never done me any harm.” His emphasis on the word left little doubt to any who heard what he meant.
Natalya didn’t care. Their past was no concern of hers. She only wished that if they were going to talk privately, they’d do it quietly enough to not bother anyone else.
Kendra led the group to where the casket awaited them. Several local nobles stood, waiting. In total, the crowd waiting numbered fewer than ten, even including the acolytes of Pharasma prepared to lead the procession. Their faces were a mixture of annoyance at the delay and relief that their wait was over.
“Do you think we have nothing better to do?” one of the acolytes asked. “Father Grimburrow has been waiting at the burial site for two hours. We must make haste.”
“Then let us get moving,” Santino said.
“We’ll need volunteers to help carry the casket.”
“I’ll take the right side. Someone else get the left.”
Several onlookers exchanged dubious glances, but were silenced when Kendra nodded that it would be alright. In the end, Heimish and one of the local nobles, Gherin Muricar, took the other side.
Kendra and other nobles went with the acolytes to the front, while Natalya stood alone at the party’s rear.
As the procession crested a hill, a mob of men brandishing farm implements and torches awaited them. One of the men, a local by the name of Gibs Hephenus, stepped forward to confront Kendra. “We’ve been talking. And we don’t want Lorrimor buried here.”
“But we’ve already made arrangements with Father Grimburrow! He’s waiting for us up ahead,” Kendra protested.
“We don’t want no necromancer buried with our kin!” Gibs shouted, with several of the other men voicing their agreement.
“That’s fair,” Santino said quietly, motioning for the others to set the coffin down.
“Necromancy?!” Kendra shrieked. “Are you truly that ignorant?!”
The mob began to charge, but Heimish had already made his way forward. “Please, good folk. I understand that you’re upset, but now is truly not the day for violence.”
The mob hesitated, but Gibs tried to goad them on. “Come on! This is the only way!”
“Gibs, do we really have to do this?” one of the others asked.
Santino stepped forward. “Listen, no one knows what a bastard my father was as I do. But Kendra has done you no harm. Why, then, would you feel justified in harming her?”
“Yeah, this just ain’t right,” one of the other members of the mob said. They lowered their weapons and began to walk away.
“Come back! You know what must be done!”
Santino walked up to Gibs and placed his hand on the man’s shoulder. “Gibs, tell me, do you believe in God?”
“Are you really asking me that?” the angry man growled.
“It’s just that it seems like whether you believe or not, God doesn’t believe in you. He doesn’t care.” Santino leaned in. “I care, because I care what sound you make while bleeding out,” he whispered.
White as a sheet, Gibs turned and fled. Natalya, who had been preparing for combat to break out, took her hand off of Faith.
The procession continued on, at last reaching Father Grimburrow, an old man who could easily have come first place in a Nosferatu Look Alike contest. “Grimburrow!” Santino said cordially as he waved with his free hand. “How’ve you been?”
“What was the commotion?” Grimburrow asked as the procession set the casket down on the harness above the grave.
“Some of the local townsfolk seemed to think Petros was a necromancer,” Heimish answered. “They wanted to stop us from bringing him here.”
“Ignorant fools. Have they no respect for the dead?” Grimburrow sighed. “Now, if we can hurry along, I’ve been waiting here a long time and I’m not as young as I used to be.”
“I can tell,” Santino said.
“Hush, you,” Grimburrow answered.
Everyone gathered for the required sermon. Natalya was glad she had slept that morning on the road, for she just knew that this was going to be one of those long, boring sermons that were the reason she rarely bothered visiting houses of worship.
But Grimburrow surprised her. “People are born. They live for a while. Then they die. That is the proper way of things. Today we bury Petros Lorrimor. I now stand aside to allow those of you who knew him to say a few words.”
Never hesitant to jump into the spotlight, Santino immediately bounded forward. “The day this man took me in was one of the worst days in the history of everything ever. But I cannot say I didn’t learn much from him. Humans are fragile, so very fragile, like glass. I’ve spent a lot of time around children recently.” Natalya noticed Stein’s face blanch at that statement. “Which has made me well aware just how fragile they really are. Human lives are precious, and I thank my father for showing me this. Even now, he’s showing us that even those who prepare can be taken from us. Live well, all of you, so one day I can tell your grieving children what I learned from you.”
A young woman, perhaps Natalya’s age, whistled lustily at the man as he finished speaking. From her clothing, she was likely the daughter of a local noble, but Natalya couldn’t tell.
“Thank you for that… most interesting speech,” Grimburrow said.
“Who is next?”
Heimish stepped up, his lame leg obviously troubling him in the cool, wet weather. “I’m saddened for the loss of my friend,” he said. “I haven’t much to say, but I have one promise to fulfill.” He walked up to the casket, and touched the brooch on his chest. A starknife made entirely of ice appeared in his hand. He opened the casket and gently placed the blade inside before closing the lid once more. “Goodbye, old friend.”
Once Heimish rejoined the crowd, Natalya was suddenly aware that several people were looking at her expectantly. She sighed and walked up to the front. “Petros was a fool who never learned to pay attention to his surroundings. But he was a good man.” At this, both Stein and Santino chuckled. “He’ll be missed.” Courtesy satisfied, Natalya returned back to the rear of the crowd.
Stein walked forward. Just as with Heimish, the weather seemed to be bothering his leg. “For better or worse, Petros Lorrimor made me who I am today. I’ve gained an appreciation for things beyond what I normally would be able to see. And for that, I’m grateful. Rest well, Petros.”
As no one else stepped forward, Kendra took the final speech. “I’d like to thank everyone for being here, even if some of you were a bit late. My father would have appreciated that. He worked for the betterment of others, even if they didn’t always understand him. He sought to understand evil, that he might fight it, but that caused many to mistrust and fear him. So, thank you, all of you, for being here, and for being his friends. Please, everyone, extend a warm welcome to his guests for their time here in Ravengro. Thank you.” And then she began sobbing.
Stein and Santino both walked up to assist her, and brought her back to the crowd. Grimburrow nodded and the acolytes of Pharasma began lowering the casket into the ground.
It took several minutes, but by the time the acolytes began shoveling on the dirt, Kendra had regained her composure. She called over Natalya, Heimish and Santino. “Please, all of you, I would like to offer you food and lodging for the duration of your stay in Ravengro. It will be nice to have someone else around the house for a bit.”
“We’d be happy to stay, so long as we’re here,” Heimish answered. Santino had obviously assumed that would be the case, so he didn’t correct him, and Natalya was glad not to have to find a reputable inn out in the rain, so she readily agreed.
They took the carriage back to the manor. Stein showed them to their rooms, then told them that supper would be served in a few hours, likely after Councilman Vashian Hearthmount arrived to deal with the reading of the will.
Which left some time for Natalya to change into her spare clothes and hang her others to dry. She was annoyed to find that one of her socks had a hole in it, and would likely need to be replaced.
Meanwhile, down in the parlor, Heimish and Stein were having a drink. Up on the landing above, they spotted Santino and Kendra walk by, talking. “Those two seem to have a history,” Stein said.
“Appears so,” Heimish agreed, taking a sip of his whiskey. “Can’t say I ever met the lass before today.”
About an hour later, Vashian Hearthmount finally arrived. “Pardon the delay,” he said. “Political business.”
“Oh, I know all about politicians,” Santino said. Natalya thought she saw him wink.
“To business,” the councilman said, placing a large scroll case on the table. “As per Petros’ instructions, the seal is intact, as stipulations were that it could not be opened until everyone in this room was present. As we’re all here, I will break the seal now.”
A key fell out of the case as it was opened, and Heimish caught it before it tumbled to the floor. The councilman opened the scroll and read it.
““I, Petros Lorrimor, being of sound mind, do hereby commit to this parchment my last will and testament. Let it be known that, with the exception of the specific details below, I leave my home and personal belongings entire to my daughter Kendra. Use them or sell them as you see fit, my child.
“Yet beyond the bequeathing of my personal effects, this document must serve other needs. I have arranged for the reading of this document to be delayed until all principals can be in attendance, for I have more than mere inheritance to apportion. I have two final favors to ask.
“To my old friends, I hate to impose upon you all, but there are few others who are capable of appreciating the true significance of what it is I have to ask. As some of you know, I have devoted many of my studies to all manner of evil, that I might know the enemy and inform those better positioned to stand against it. For knowledge of one’s enemy is the surest path to victory over its plans.
“And so, over the course of my lifetime, I have seen fit to acquire a significant collection of valuable but dangerous tomes, any one of which in the wrong circumstances could have led to an awkward legal situation. While the majority of these tomes remain safe under lock and key at the Lepidstadt University, I fear that a few I have borrowed remain in a trunk in my Ravengro home. While invaluable for my work in life, in death, I would prefer not to burden my daughter with the darker side of my profession, or worse still, the danger of possessing these tomes herself. As such, I am entrusting my chest of tomes to you, posthumously. I ask that you please deliver the collection to my colleagues at the University of Lepidstadt, who will put them to good use for the betterment of the cause.
“Yet before you leave for Lepidstadt, there is the matter of another favor—please delay your journey one month and spend that period of time here in Ravengro to ensure that my daughter is safe and sound. She has no one to count on now that I am gone, and if you would aid her in setting things in order for whatever she desires over the course of this month, you would have my eternal gratitude. From my savings, I have also willed to each of you a sum of one hundred platinum coins. For safekeeping, I have left these funds with Embreth Daramid, one of my most trusted friends in Lepidstadt—she has been instructed to issue this payment upon the safe delivery of the borrowed tomes no sooner than one month after the date of the reading of this will.” ”
Finished reading, the councilman took his leave, citing further business. Kendra fetched the chest the will spoke of and set it on the table. “Open it if you will,” she asked Heimish.
He yanked on the lid, but it wouldn’t open. “It’s stuck,” he said. Then he winked at the exasperated expressions on the others’ faces. “Just pulling your leg.” He inserted the key and opened it properly.
Inside were five books. On the top was what appeared to be a journal, with a note that read, “READ ME IMMEDIATELY!” Santino snatched it and began taking a look.
Beneath that was a purple clad book sealed with a bronze scarab. There was a place for some kind of triangular key. No one was sure how to open it, but it did have a note tucked into it with instructions to deliver it discreetly to Embreth Daramid, a judge at the Leipstadt courthouse. Natalya noted that she was the one who had their money, so keeping this tome safe was likely paramount.
The other three were books dealing with terrors in the world. The first was called “On Verified Madness”, and it was a collection of information about terrifying creatures with ties to the dark void between the stars. The second was a book sacred to worshippers of Urgathoa, goddess of undeath, called “Serving Your Hunger”.
Likewise, the third was a translation of the unholy book of Zon-Kuthon, god of torture, called “The Umbral Leaves”.
Natalya had no need to read through any of those. She had far too many nightmares as it was. And while the purple-clad book piqued her curiosity, she hadn’t the skills required to try opening it. For all she knew, it was booby trapped.
But there was one book that she was both interested in, and could open. “So, what does it say?” she asked Santino.
The man shrugged, his monocle shifting slightly. “He appeared to be looking into some cult or other. They were after something in Harrowstone, the old prison. At least, that was his conclusion.”
“Perhaps we should look into it?” Heimish asked. “We are stuck here for a month, after all.”
“Eh, maybe, if I get bored,” Santino answered.
It wasn’t likely there would be much of value lying around the old prison, so unless it posed a danger to her charge, Natalya tended to agree. The cult was more worrisome, of course, as they were likely more mobile than an old building. Perhaps she would find out their name tomorrow and see if the professor’s library held any clues.
But for the night, it was time for bed. Stein and Heimish had another drink, Santino and Kendra chatted more, but Natalya went straight to bed. Comforted by the soft tones of her music box, she went to sleep.
In the morning, there was some commotion in the town. Natalya dressed quickly and joined the others as they went to investigate.
There was a statue, a monument of some kind. It had been spattered with blood. Whoever had done it had also marked a large “V” at the base of the monument, also in blood. Nearby, there was a dead rat, likely the source of the blood used.
Natalya was troubled. Who had done it? Was it the cult? Or someone else? She wasn’t sure. But if she was supposed to keep Kendra safe, then she was going to have to find out.
From the look in his eyes, Heimish had come to the same conclusion. Natalya couldn’t tell what Santino was thinking. And Stein just frowned.
One thing was clear. It wasn’t going to be a nice quiet month of babysitting. They were going to earn their pay on this one. Which was just fine by Natalya. Better than sitting around getting fat.
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