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Chapter 14

Oil

Fish oil isn’t lamp oil, isn’t alchemist’s fire. Oh, all of them will burn. But...

“How much for these five kegs here?”

“Ah, sir, that’s not tar.”

“I know what it is. How much for all of them?”

.....

Narces knuckled the back of my shoulder. “What is it?”

The merchant wrung his hands. “Sir, it’s nothing that you want.”

“Oh. You already have a buyer, then. Narces, these are kegs of the Black Blood of the Earth.”

“Wait. You know that, and still wish to buy them?”

“We aren’t alchemists, why do we want that stuff?” Narces asked.

“Because, this substance wants to catch fire. It lights with a torch, sometimes with a twig. And it burns hot as coal, although not for as long.”

“Long enough to fry those little spiders, though?”

“Put this into enough small glass vials, each with a candle wick. Light the wick, and throw.”

“You’ll also want the wooden carriers, and rags to soak up the contents of any vials that break.” The merchant said.

“Indeed we will. So how much would all of that cost us?”

The merchant named a price that was usurious, but not outlandish. After a bit of haggling, I inquired of his costs, and we settled on a thirty percent gain for him.

“We could have haggled lower.” Narces said.

“We might need to do business with this merchant again.”

“That’s why you don’t stab them afterward.” He said. “We could have haggled lower.”

“We don’t need this cheap, we need this right.” I said. “The merchant is correct, the Black Blood is dangerous to harvest, to handle, and to transport. It is also hard to keep in storage. That said, six hundred vials of this stuff will burn a lot of spiders to ash.”

“If it doesn’t burn us first.” Narces said.

“Right. We don’t get lazy with this stuff, or we’ll end up dead.”

“I’d kill you for almost as little as you just paid him.”

“And you’ll kill hordes of little spiders by yourself.”

“Ng. Not if that stuff works the way you say it should. Spiders, centipedes, scorpions, wasps... I just don’t like poison bugs. Especially not once they get large enough to take off my fingers as snack foods.”

“Oh dear.” I said.

“What?”

“I totally forgot what we were looking for when we found those.”

“Torches?”

I clicked my talons together. It was what I did rather than cut myself trying to snap my fingers. “Torches. Where would we find those?”

Narces grabbed my shoulders, turned me. “This guy sells them by the dozen. That’s why we’re here.”

“Oh. We should see what other bargains he has.”

“Yeah, but keep our budget in mind, boss. If we get mercenaries and can’t pay them, that’s worse than not getting mercenaries.”

I sighed. “Thank you, Narces. I didn’t want to hear that, but thank you.”

He shrugged. “Bringing officers back to reality is kinda my thing.”

Really? How did he end up assigned to me, then?

A story for later, I decided.

#

“We should have asked Jaek and Miss Turner what they wanted for supplies.” I said.

“It seems to me we’ve already spent enough to provision a company.” Gamilla said. “How long are we planning on staying there?”

“As long as it takes!” Kismet said.

“A week or two, no more. Remember, we need to be back here to receive our surprise parcel from Yvettesport.”

It was odd, watching Kismet’s face as her plans defeated her other plans.

What, was she counting on me to somehow make both of those things work?

“The important thing now is to find able warriors and hunters, so we can do the most good in the time that we have.” I said.

“I know just the row of seedy taverns.” Narces said.

And they were seedy. Bowed floors, or floors made of straw scattered over the sand, ceilings through which beams of light shone... Seedy.

“Some drunken has-been is recruiting all the mercenaries.” Narces complained. “The lot that’s left isn’t worth the time to sober them out.”

“Doesn’t the Guild have some manner of equivalent in Manoria?” Kismet asked.

“Manora.” Gamilla said.

“In Manora?”

We asked around. There was, in fact, such a Guild of Mercenaries and Sundry Employees. Their rates... were not our rates.

“All in favor of just starting our own guild?” Kismet asked, raising her hand.

“Nah. Too much work, not enough actual fighting.” Narces said.

“Five or so years of losing money just to establish our credentials?” Gamilla asked. “Hard pass.”

“I don’t think Rakkal left the Guild structure mostly intact in Narrow Valley and Whitehill just to fund a separate branch out here.” I said.

“On that topic, where are we building our embassy?” Gamilla asked.

I pulled out our map of the Isles. “I’ll need to talk with the captaine about where the trade routes are, but I’m thinking somewhere here, toward the center of the isles.”

“Why not here, toward the center of four of the six colonies?” Gamilla asked.

“It makes more sense to place our embassy in Lavin Buscala or Yvettesport, but neither of those is particularly friendly to human-adjacent species such as ourselves.”

Kismet snorted. “Humans are Mwarri adjacent.”

“Okay, picking Neo Esteban, Vernice, or Boadicea’s Girdle is to alienate the other two powers. We just don’t have the staff or funding to open a branch in each.”

“And to pick the Daurian prison island isn’t an option?” Gamilla asked.

“I have a plan to negotiate with the Daurian Empire, or at least their local representatives, but we have to work both our reputation and that of the Red Tide to a certain point before making contact.”

“Everyone in our area of the world knows who we are.” Narces said. “Why not choose Vernice, and curse what they think? As the Empire grows, so will their desire to make paper with us.”

“Treaties?” asked Gamilla.

“I’m a soldier, not a linguist.” Narces said.

#

On the day of our departure, we had one cow (to throw overboard in the waters of the fish-men), our boxes of vials, and Jaek had shown up with seven Norvik warriors, each of whom had their own spear-bearer.

Miss Turner showed up just in time for the third and final longboat, lugging two bags that looked heavy enough to crush a person with.

“Well, don’t help me with these, or anything!” she called out.

“You’re looking for some kind of Might-based hero!” Kismet replied.

“We’d best help her.” I said.

“Why?”

“Well, we can’t just leave her on the docks.”

“Why not?”

But she assisted me in heaving one bag in short spurts, while Miss Turner did the same with the other.

.....

“You’d better have a portable fortress in here.” Kismet complained.

“Tools,” Miss Turner said, “for my profession?”

“As a Gravity Mage?”

“There is no such magic! These are the tools of an archaeologist, a little appreciated Scientific class.”

“There do seem to be a lot of them.” I said.

“It’s a very broad profession.” She said.

But we did eventually get them onto the longboat; getting them back out and onto the deck was a matter of rope and teams of three.

“Jaek, how much was promised to the soldiers?”

“A gold piece each, for the warriors and their spear-bearers.” He shot me a smile as though he had accomplished a lot.

Math never lies. Two men, seven days... cheaper than a silver per spear per day. “I am impressed. To get them for up to two weeks at that rate...”

“What? No, no, that’s daily rate. I assure you, they will each fight with the strength of ten normal men.”

“All right, assemble the men.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea, whatever you’re thinking.”

“I’m thinking of telling them how many spiders normal men can kill in a day, and that I expect ten times the number of kills from them.”

“But... but that’s sixty spiders a day.”

“Okay, what if I expect each team to fight as though they were ten men, say... thirty spiders a day. A silver coin for every three spiders?”

“Well... I...”

“Jaek, did you tell them they were fighting spiders? Hunting spiders?”

“Protecting villagers, perhaps?”

“Jaek, it’s too late to turn the ship around, now.”

“And it will still be too late when we make landfall and you explain to them what they’ve actually been hired for.”

“Oh, I get to do this?”

“Well, you are a diplomat.”

“So your plan is that I tell fourteen cranky warriors they’re getting paid less than promised, and hope they don’t kill me to take the coins off my corpse?”

“Well, that way, it is YOUR corpse and not mine. No offense.”

I reached out, wrapped my left hand in his belt.

“Wait, what are you doing?”

“Well, I’m going to talk to a bunch of Norvik warriors who are hopefully not too drunk. You’re translating.”

“Wait... why me?”

#