The Worldshift Chronicles: Monday

Chapter 13

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Chapter 13

“He is a pitiable sort,” I teased.

Yet after listening to Thursday’s tale, I couldn’t help but consider the plight of a young boy trapped within a sterilized lifetime over which he had little control. I also thought of the scrolls’ author, and our mystery stork, how they might be one and the same, and how I agreed with Thursday I might enjoy a selection of firm words with whomever they happened to be, if they were still alive at all.

“There’s a mercy I’ll gladly take from the famed gunfighter,” he said, and paused, staring wistful into the sky. “I’m never going back.”

“I didn’t think you would.”

“Why didn’t you apply for official membership to House Cheyenne?”

“I didn’t have to apply. Maddy offered me station when I was promoted from the lines to the courier network.”

“You refused?”

“Not exactly. I didn’t say yes or no. I blew it off. I don’t need to take ranks in any of the four houses. The financial gains are incentive, but joining a guild means abiding by politics, and I hate that stuff. Besides, formalizing entry to a particular faction gains you perks in their respective cities, yet almost always trips you up elsewhere. If I stay freelance, I have more freedoms within trade avenues, even if I’m not granted as much access as citizens. There are plenty of settlements in the Sierra who won’t allow members of House Gammon or House Li inside their walls.”

“Like Washoe?”

“Washoe permits no outlanders inside. Natural born residents only.”

“And House Arroyo?”

“Tiwan doesn’t care about competing factions. It only concerns itself with size of chit accounts. Coin gets you in the gates no matter where you’re from.”

“So…truth. What do you think about the scroll?”

“You mean about who’s who, and what’s what? It seemed like you were more into its possibles than I was. I still think it’s a hash job. I’m willing to explore Bard and Maddy’s concerns to an extent, but I’ll be surprised if any of its prognosties end up gaining traction.”

“You’re such a cynic. What about that pretty little stanza? Let’s look at hypotheticals here. You’re probably the soldier,” he suggested.

“Am I? Why can’t I be the siren? Maybe I’m the mouth of madness. That’s an odds-on favorite, given my participation in this snipe hunt.”

“Ha! Naw, you’re the soldier. You’re a gunfighter.”

“And what does that make you, I wonder?”

“I’m surely no prince. There’s only two titles indicative of gender…the siren, the prince. All five others could be either or. I’m definitely no soldier. I don’t tinker, and I’m no artist. So maybe I fit none of those.”

“Or all of them. One woman’s soldier is another’s assassin. One man’s tinkerer is another’s architect. One person’s artist is another’s vandal. How do you know ‘the artist’ isn’t a reference to the arcane arts?”

“I don’t,” he admitted.

“And since you have no idea where your roots lay, for all you know, you might be a long-lost progeny of King Arthur himself. You could be a prince. I definitely can’t be.”

“How delightful it is, that your raggedy childhood somehow managed to include reading the story of the Knights of the Round Table,” Thursday joked.

“That stupid scroll could’ve been written by any old spooker or scammer, not necessarily a true-blue guardian vested in the world’s best interests,” I replied.

“Or it could be legit. Bottom line is, only a mage could’ve cast that ward on it, and now that we’ve met, it seems probable there’s more out there of like mind and ability, whether the message was written in the spirit it appeared or not. Could be a red herring, could be gospel. We’ll never know unless we discover for ourselves.”

“What did you think about the listed elements?” I posed.

“I’ve been stewing on that. Bard versed you in all nine colleges, yes?”

“You know of the colleges?”

“Only what minimal information teachers were allowed to tell us. And I found a grimoire once, under some rubble at a burned out mall about two clicks east of the dome. All nine colleges were outlined in it, but the tome focused in hydromancy, not a purview of mine.”

“I experimented in eight. I made above average marks in two of them. Force and earth. The ninth college, well, Bard refused to delve into black necromantics with me. Do you know anything about the tenth?” I asked.

“Sometimes in New Angeles there were whispers and rumors of the lost college. They said it was arcana from that discipline which ruined the world.”

“Bard knows little of the tenth college. He speculates it might have something to do with conveyance or clairvoyance, or both, but was limited to eras predating the first age, practiced by Indigenous shamans who never scribed their enchantments for posterity. Though if some aspect of that college is rooted in displacement, Washoe dabbles in a variation, at least,” I said.

“Personality seems to have a good deal to do with what kind of magicks one can wield proper, and from what I’ve gathered, might be why most folks can only learn part of the arcane spectrum and not all of it. The only force charm I can whip up worth a rat’s behind is the contego shield,” Thursday added.

“Yeah, Bard thinks telekinetics are a root base for any arcane-sensitives. It makes sense. It’s hard to manipulate earth, fire, water, atmosphere, light, and chemistry if one can’t apply subatomic force through thought, right?”

“Right,” Thursday agreed, grinning at me. “Maybe you’re less a bored student than you claim to be, gunfighter.”

“Ehh. You, you’re a flamethrower. You must be the ‘fire,’” I pointed out.

“Probably. My ignis and umbra arcana seem to be the strongest among my parlor tricks.”

“I dabble in earth sorcery, small time fauna summoning and minor command. Birds, mutie bears, wolves, and dogs in the Sierra, and of course the dirt stuff, a fair influence on stone and wood and flora,” I said.

“And white necromancy?” he asked, wincing as he tampered with his gut bandage.

“Don’t touch that!” I snapped.

“Sorry.”

“I didn’t pay a lot of notice to white necro. I’ve tried to manifest basic healing charms. They’d come in handy for me on the job. No dice. It’s probably true I tuned out when Bard was going over that stuff, because, well, it was hard. I don’t have the focus for that denser spell craft,” I replied.

“Yep. I can’t proper manifest a cough drop if my life depended on it. What an interesting thing it is, that we may have five other kin with different abilities. I wonder how Bard’s search fares in ‘Frisco,” Thursday said.

“I wonder that myself.”

“Shouldn’t we have tagged along?”

“That’s what I said, but they wanted me to go talk to Cabo in Tiwan instead, rip open that next envelope, hope it has footprints leading elsewhere.”

“You know Lord Diaz personally?”

“I guess so.”

“I mean, you’re on a first name basis with…the Lionheart,” he said in awe.

“Well. Yeah.”

“Is he every bit the warrior the outlands say he is?”

“He’s no slouch with a blade, I can tell you that.”

“I hope Bard finds that next one of us, and saves us some time. Seems like House Li’s sub-T tech warrens would be the place to find a ‘tinkerer,’ though how a young mage type might be thriving in the wet iron of San Francisco is puzzling. They may not even know they’re arcane capable. It’s all so melodramatic, isn’t it?” he posed, yawning as he rolled on his back, shutting his eyes.  It wasn’t long before his breathing became slow and heavy, deep in the slumber of exhaustion.

I was fried, bruised, and broken. My splinted finger throbbed. My wounded thigh burned. I wasn’t sleepy. My mind was lit up with portending futures. I might’ve welcomed a course in clairvoyance, because I’d have paid mad gold chits for a peek into tomorrow.

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