Garner’s sleep was not restful at all. Besides the clarity brought by sleeping after dawn, wizards and mages in distress kept sending new messages that buzzed and shone, disturbing and waking him from time to time. His apprentices sleeping besides him suffered too, groaning as new messages arrived, until they decided to go to the servant’s tent. It kept on until Lowa stuck her head into his tent, and announced that she would take care of it all, in exchange for riding and sleeping on the cart in the day’s journey. That kind of attitude was what made him appreciate the old witch even more.

After some hours of better sleep, Chief waked the camp up at the time they had agreed. Garner groaned and wondered how he had agreed with so short a rest, but though his mood was sour, he knew very well that they could only find a truly good sleep back into the Spire - after it was fortified and trapped to his standards, that was. The servants skilfully dismounted and folded the tents, while the others mostly tried to stay out of the way. As the wizard left his tent, Romer offered him and his apprentices breakfast in a tray.

He smiled at the man and accepted it, sitting down out of the servant’s way by Lowa’s side. He greeted her, and the sleep-deprived witch grunted in response, before starting updating him on what the many messages had brought throughout his sleep.

“So, basically, Leanor’s parents are safe, my Tower is still in one piece… Lord Gilliam has tied up a good number of Lotharians besieging Arburgh, which means less soldiers hunting us and other practitioners,” He summarized her first reports, and then took a bite of his hard-bread.

“Yeah. Some Towers are ill-prepared to resist sieges - I mean, their food reserves… Attacking them would probably be too costly. They are too far away for us to do anything about it, so let’s focus on our situation for now: I have more good and bad news, I’m afraid.” said Lowa, stretching her weary back.

Garner raised an eyebrow at her, and she continued, “The bad news: the Lotharians have gathered up the priests of the Order of Kalidor. The bastards are hammering the Towers to the south mostly, so we shouldn’t cross them, I hope.”

Wizards and mages rarely bothered with religion, but it powered another dangerous form of magic. It was hotly debated whether the priestly powers came from the Gods the priests believed in, or simply from latent magical potential that found a conduit on faith. Most Wizards disdained the idea of gods, but all of them were wary of the power of some Orders, that of Kalidor among them. There were peaceful Orders, and others that didn’t mind the Wizardly Order and other mages. Others, like the priests of Kalidor, abhorred practitioners. Others like the Fidajin were neutral, but could be plied with gold, though they had a lot less priests.

Grimacing, Garner agreed, “Okay, that’s pretty bad. The Lotharians have lots of soldiers, but they normally lack the means to match our magic. But the priests can nullify our attacks, at least”

“Yeah, the priests will be a pain. If it were up to me, I’d gotten rid of those lunatics of Kalidor a long time ago,” She replied, remembering for a moment of bloody times passed by. “And before I go to sleep like a log on the cart, the good news: a number of mages and a couple of wizards decided to accept our invitation and head to the Third Spire…”

Tealdin and Leanor surreptitiously approached to hear the conversation - not that they needed to, as the older mages wouldn’t have opposed their listening in to begin with. It was actually important for both of them to be well aware of the situation they were facing - especially for Leanor, who usually didn’t get out of her room and studies, and barely maintained contact with human beings besides her master.

Tealdin thought so, and complimented her after a dark glare from Romer made them get away from the wizard and the witch, “I’m glad you’re paying attention now, Leanor.”

“Don’t be daft, Tealdin, of course I would. Even my family is in jeopardy,” She replied, a bit offended by his implication.

“Is that so? Why, I imagined you wouldn’t notice anything even if Master’s Tower was burning around you,” He riposted, grinning at her.

“I would! Wouldn’t I?” she paused to think, and wasn’t so sure about that actually. Tealdin laughed at her, and she gave him an annoyed glare, which made him laugh harder. The dynamics of teasing, like many other social interactions, was still a bit beyond her.

Chief joined the duo, catching their attention whistling. “Come now, young wizardlings, I have some mundane skills to impart on you.”

Leanor looked to the skies as if to ask why was she receiving such a gruesome punishment, and Tealdin groaned theatrically, despite finding such knowledge interesting, which made Chief grin if one were to look really hard. The avowed showed his Master’s wards the rudiments of looking after their cart’s horses, and then moved on to riding horses - there were four, two tied to the back of the carts by theirs leads, to the teenagers’ chagrin. The other two were being used sporadically by the scouts.

“Remind me again why didn’t Master buy us all riding horses, Chief?” asked Leanor, who was disgruntled to walk, being an accomplished rider, personally taught by her father. Tealdin, from humbler origins, had never rode a horse before.

“Master Garner, in his wiseness, opted to spend more money on things that would actually be useful once we’re inside the Spire - supplies. More horses would take too much to care for, and it would be harder to hide our tracks. They would also serve no purpose if we were besieged…” He paused for a second, and added, “Well, they would be used as meat, most likely.”

Leanor looked a little rebellious at the notion of slaughtering and eating one of her mounts, while Tealdin nodded agreement. He had no experience riding horses, but eating them? Sure, their meat was cheap, and most people he knew ate it too. He’d eaten a lot of more dubious and worse meats before, and was really satisfied with horse.

“Where did you eat it, Chief?” He asked.

“At one of the Atalaïas, Tealdin. The Sea People sent a huge raiding party and they sieged us for more than a month. It was awful, but I was glad we didn’t have to go for dogs, rats or even worse…” Tealdin pailed a bit at the unspoken possibility, but Leanor clearly didn’t and had to ask, ignoring the boy’s shaking head.

“What?”

“The dead, girly, the dead.” the man chuckled darkly. “They say the Elfey love it, tastes just like pork.”

“Eeeew, Chief!” She complained, looking a little green around the gills.

As the checking on the horses devolved to teasing and laughter, the servants under Romer finished breaking camp, and the trio caught the majordomo’s attention as they were parked besides the horses. The man approached them and cleared his throat to catch their attention, and gave them a pointed look as they turned. The students - and even the warrior - sheepishly got out of the way. Though Chief towered over the short and slight majordomo, he knew not to mess with the one responsible for his food and tent.

Lots of annoying little things happened to people who disturbed the man’s sense of order and propriety - or commented on his height. Even Master Garner avoided teasing the man too much as his attention to the preferences of each person was a double edged blade - a great boon when the majordomo was trying to please the individual, and a constant nuisance when a person’s stake was a little too rare, or a soup a little too salted, a wine a little too warm. Everything inside acceptable limits, of course. Romer would never be accused of impropriety, of course.

The efficient little man rounded up everyone and everything, and bowed to his waiting Master. “We’re ready, sir.”

“Very well. Let’s go, people. Two days to the Spire.”

As the group resumed the journey, they took the same positions as last time, but Lowa slept on one of the carts. Master Garner walked with the Chief by his side, while the young ones conversed behind them. They were passing through the territories on the southern-west edge of the Realm, which was a lot less inhabited nowadays than before the Elfey Wars, that hit the region hard. The southern lands had never really recovered, and the north was a lot more populous and important in the grand scheme of things.

As Garner had taught his apprentices, instead of making an effort to reoccupy the south and the borderlands, the kings and the nobles after the wars turned their gazes to the north, seeking valuable minerals and a passage through Yardam’s Folly mountain range to the Northern Sea. Few people came to the south these days, most of them were migrants and veterans from the Atalaïas in the far-east, where raiders and sea creatures took a heavy toll on the Realm each year.

Though they were running, and eventual messages from other practitioners in trouble reached them still, the green plains and woods that grew around the road helped some of them take their minds off things. As they went further and further away from the center of power of the Realm, the woods seemed to get closer and closer to the road, with a lot less care for the pave maintenance noticeable as well.

Master Garner walked ahead of his students and servants, Romer loyally right behind him in case he needed something. The useful man had already handed him his favorite walking-stick, which he happily used. Chief came from the woods ahead, changing places with one of his warriors for a bit, and started walking besides him.

“How are things, Chief?” Garner greeted.

“Alright. But how about what we talked yesterday?” Chief replied.

“About the second stop?”

“Yeah, Master. The guard-post is isolated and they are Army - soldiers learn to appreciate mages, we should try recruiting them.”

“Do you think helping a friendly Wizard would trump their duties to guard the area?”

“The King may not raise a hand to help the Wizards, but he never acknowledged it was legal to strike you. They have a duty to protect the citizens of the Realm, and you are also one of them. And where better to protect from than one of the mighty Spires?”

“Very silver-tongued of you, Chief. Were you a soldier or a barrister?” He provoked, smiling.

Chief laughed at the ribbing. “Gods forbid. And protect us from those hustlers, almost as bad as bankers.”

“Yeah, you should see the interest rates they demanded of me when I borrowed to build the Tower, ten years ago. I finished paying it just the other year, and I could only afford four floors.” His smiled turned a bit yellow when he remembered his cherished Tower, now desecrated by Gods-know-who.

The Chief didn’t let him stew on it, though. “I’m still worried, Garner. Even if my friends join us, and the soldiers decide to go with us, we’ll still be undermanned to protect a Tower as big as a Spire.”

“I’m not a fool, Chief. I’ve done my tours on the Army as well. There’s something you’re not considering.”

“And what’s that?” He asked, skeptical.

“Golems, Chief. Not very versatile, it’s true, but these ones are scary. Relics of the Elfey Wars, they can take a beating, and can be killing machines if used properly.”

“Relics. Are you sure you want to depend on that?”

“Believe me, these are master-crafts. A little maintenance, and they will be up and running.”

“We’ll see. And what about our first stop?” Chief asked, shamelessly acting as if Garner had already agreed to the first one.

Garner chuckled at the usual impertinence, Romer stared daggers at Chief, offended in his stead. “The druids I mentioned? They’ve sent me a message, they will met us at the road further on. Not very trusting of them, but what can you expect of reclusive and secretive people, eh?”

“Please let me know when they are approaching, or my men might be surprised and do something stupid.”

“Oh, there’s no chance your men will see them coming. These are their woods, after all.”

Chief grumbled at that, and went to check on other people in the group.

“We’ll have a little lunch ready in a bit, Master,” said Romer, approaching him. The man was ever aware exactly when to feed his employer.

“Good!” Master Garner was an easily pleased man, and he brightened at that.