This talking slime ball is weird and almost definitely dangerous. I am not sure what to make of it, but if it moves wrong, I will finish it myself. Rion had been staring at this blob of goo since he had made his threat earlier. He also had no intention of letting it out of his sight.

After discussing the plan, they had almost reached Marteen’s folks home on the other side of the village. It was a lovely farmhouse, by Rion estimation. He hadn’t grown up in nearly as nice a place. But then, people that grew up on the streets of Pravwell rarely had things to brag about when it came to living conditions. Then again, it was a hovel compared to the palace, so it was hard to judge it objectively.

Rion shook his head and refocused on the immediate threat present, that disgusting lump of talking slop in front of Master Haemish in the saddle. It was enough to make his skin crawl, and Sir Haemish was a braver man than he for starting a conversation with the creature. The monster was a master of espionage.

Rion reflected on the chase. It had seamlessly camouflaged with the surrounding clouds and sky. He had been able to see clear through it, the gelatinous creature seemed made of water with the consistency of jelly. A simple shimmer was all there was to discern its passage. Catching the slippery creature had been like chasing an eel through the water. He was sure that if they hadn’t had the advantage of those glasses of the senior Alchemist’s, then it would have slipped away. Dangerous, he thought. At some point, Rion was going to put the thing down, conscious or not. Rion did not want to expose the King to this devious creature so apt at disguise and deception. It could be working for any number of other governments. The perfect spy, hard to detect, able to act deceptively weak, even Rion had been surprised when it couldn’t break out of Haemish’s grip. He was an Alchemist with no combat profession.

Rion had developed Ax Mastery and Bodyguard classes to make sure to round out his Alchemical role. It turned him into a jack-of-all-trades. He could navigate and protect and fight and brew all on his own. Not having to rely on anyone else was the way he liked it. He would never rely on anyone else ever again, that got you killed.

Rion’s mind went back to his youth, to the moment he learned that you could not rely on anyone but yourself.

Rion was seven years old, face smeared in dirt from the streets of Pravwell. His mother stood behind him, dragging him back from a brawl that had broken out ahead. Members of the gang that ruled their part of the city, the Macha, conflicted with members of the Renfay. Idiots! Another stupid fight for turf, stupid people are killing other stupid people!

“Rion, come on, we need to getaway. It’s not our fight. Come on, little one.” A knife flashed past his left ear, nicking it. “Co-“ a choke followed by gurgling and then a thud behind him. Rion crouched and spin. It never paid to be a standing target. Everyone in Pravwell learned that at an early age or you didn’t stay alive long. Rion had lost a couple of friends that way already. He had hatred and angry in his eyes as he turned dispassionately to see what was behind him. Another idiot dead from getting involved with a fight between gangs!

His face broke. It was his mother on the ground, not some idiot. His mother, or maybe his mother, was the idiot. No! Why weren’t you crouching? Why hadn’t she crouched like everyone else? She was supposed to crouch! Rion’s young mind reeled as he tried to make sense of the situation. She had always taught him, move through the city head down and not look around. It was the safest way. Stay away from the fights. You’ll only get killed.

But he had come, he had heard the noise and sneered at the idiots fighting, and then he had come to see the fight, maybe to fight himself or perhaps just to see what idiots looked like. It was all so pointless now. Why had he even come? She had chased him. He had to keep her head up to see where he was going. The dirt on the roads made it perpetually slippery, and the blood from the fight and death had made it more so this time.

Rion came back to his forty-two-year-old body. One fist clenched, the other hand rose in an unconscious motion to touch his left ear; the cut was gone, nothing but a brutal memory of mistakes made and regrets borne. The healing had been quick and painless, but the mental damage had not been so easy to fix. Now he had to live with the memory of his mother’s death on his hands. No! It was not your fault. You were seven years old, and those gangs were to blame! But as it was each time he thought back to that time, the blame did not shift from his shoulders. It was still there, as it always would be.

He had lost focus. How had he even ended up spiralling like that, was the slime doing something to him? He hadn’t thought about that night. He couldn’t even remember how long. Good riddance! He thought he was done with that, long done. Not, Rion took in a deep breath and then let it out, slowly steadying his nerves. It was a warrior’s trick to calm the mind and improve focus, taught to him by none other than Lori Kvar, the current weapons master of Darf. I owe that woman more than just this focusing trick. Focus Rion, now is not the time to be reminiscing.

Rion had been staring straight through the slime ball and into the distance. To the dumb creature, t would have looked like he was scrutinizing it. That worked well enough for Rion. No need to show his distraction. An eyebrow from Marteen said he might not have been as inconspicuous as he thought he was. Oh well, fingers crossed that Marteen is the only one that noticed. As if in defiance of his wishes, Taler raised an eyebrow at him as well. Taler saw me daydreaming!? The man couldn’t see a dragon if it blew fire in his face! A bit of exaggeration, of course, something he wasn’t prone to speak out loud, but in the safety of his mind, he made some allowances.

The trip had turned into just another bodyguard assignment, his Bodyguard Class was great for assignments like this one. Fenwin hadn’t needed him and it felt good learning from a master of Alchemy. Protect Haemish and the rest from a potential threat. A ball of sludge in this case. How hard could it be? He returned to burning a hole through the damn thing with his eyes. If he had something like Fire Sight or Lightning Vision, that might have worked too.

He wasn’t a fire mage, though, nor any other type of mage. He had chosen a different path because magic and mageing was for pansies like Taler. He would never utter those words out loud to anyone, but he couldn’t help how he felt. There was another reason he didn’t want to use magic, though. Being in the thick of things was where a warrior could shine. Laying about him with weapons to hand and looking an enemy in the eye, human or monster and seeing them fear your power. That was what fighting was all about. He knew that people found him unsettling at times when he fought, but none doubted his ability. It was the way it was supposed to be.

Master Haemish is talking to the thing quite a lot. I will never understand pure academics. Take everything strange in stride. In some way, I envy his easy trust. I see suspicion everywhere. But most likely, that will get him killed one day. In Pravwell, every child knew, if you wanted to survive, you took anything you could from anyone you could, and then you held on to it. Otherwise, you lost it again pretty quickly. And there had been many children n the streets of Pravwell. I wonder why the king doesn’t do anything about it? He brought me out of there, but he didn’t any of the others. Why? Rion knew the king had more power than anyone else in Darf, or as close to it as didn’t much matter. He could have waded into that cesspool centuries or decades ago and cleaned up the place. Why hadn’t he?

It was not easy to get an audience with the king, but Rion had a question burning a hole in his mind.

A question for a king.