But banishment meant being expelled from magic society entirely. A magician who’d been given this punishment was forbidden from using magic at all. They were not allowed to cast spells or learn from any master.
“Magical society is a close-knit circle. As soon as you’re thrown out, word gets around immediately.”
“Sounds like a nasty bunch,” I said. That sort of thing was why I never really got along with mages. “So the witch I’m dealing with is an outcast from this Latimer family, huh?”
A lone wolf was easier to deal with, but I wasn’t any closer to their purpose or whereabouts.
“Do you know any creepy old ladies who cackle and stir their giant cauldrons full of bubbling potions?” I asked.
“Well, ‘witch’ can mean many different things,” Cecilia said, taking out her staff and waving it around like a teacher’s pointer stick. “Everyone seems to have their own ideas about it, so things get mixed up. Some are women who just happen to be good at fortune-telling or herbs and medicines. Others are real witches who have made pacts with demons. Some are sluts who have orgies and call them Sabbaths. I’ve heard of some who summoned succubi and mated with them to produce children.”
“Wait, wouldn’t that be a man, then?”
So did the witch have both parts?
“In this case, witch simply means evil magician. It doesn’t necessarily imply a woman.” She went on to explain that it was a misconception that arose from a translation of an ancient foreign language. “But the image has spread too far. It’s hard to correct people’s preconceived notions, and the fact is that most witches were women anyway, so the concept stuck.”
“You’re so smart, Ceci. You know everything,” Beatrice gushed and applauded.
“…I suppose,” Cecilia said, her lips twitching. This was probably just some elementary knowledge about magicians. She put a hand to her mouth. “But whether a witch or a mage, they must have some purpose. Why not ask around if there have been other events with the same clues? You’re in with some officials, aren’t you?”
She was probably referring to Vincent. He was too busy to bother with petty crime, I assumed, but maybe he’d heard something that might be useful. Considering the reactions of his subordinates in the Paladins, however, I wasn’t going to get my hopes up. I didn’t care if the witch was a woman or a man; whatever their intent, I couldn’t let them live.
“But if you’re going to battle a Latimer mage, you’d better be ready for war. It’ll get ugly,” Cecilia muttered. “Their specialty is necromancy.”
The whole “controlling the dead and creating hordes of zombies” bit, then. That would be the thing I kicked. Necromancers would also be able to temporarily revive the dead, speak with ghosts, bring back corpses as zombies, and other tricks like that. Given the subject matter, many people did not look kindly on it.
“I don’t intend to get into a fight. But I’ll take your words to heart,” I said, thanking them and turning to leave. A hand grabbed my sleeve. Beatrice looked pleadingly at me.
“At least use your words,” I said, pulling some raisins out of my pocket. They’d been boiled in sugar water, then dried out. The sweetness was a bit cloying, but they were a perfect snack to drive off hunger. I’d bought them to give to the squirt, thinking she’d enjoy them. I wasn’t expecting to haul in a different catch.
“I told you not to feed Bea any weird things!” Cecilia said.
“Then you should tell her off, too.”
It was starting to feel like I was feeding an alley cat. An alley cat would let you pet it, but this one had a nasty older sister who would take a swipe at you instead.
I thanked them and left the pub. It had been a worthwhile conversation, though I didn’t know if I’d call it a harvest.
Ideally, I’d be able to clean all this up before Arwin left for the dungeon again. Hmm, what to do…? So far, it seemed like this was going to affect her dungeon crawling. It could also mean less allowance for me. This was life and death.
Where was a witch likely to hang around? At an herbalist’s. I decided to cling to my one ray of hope and visit all the medicinal shops in town.
“Hello there, sir,” said a voice, interrupting me. It was Natalie, who had set up a little shop for herself. She had laid down some rags as a surface and placed some crates on top of them. “What do you think? Take a look at my wares.”
I was of a mind to ignore her and continue on my way, but when she set her mind on a target, she never gave up. Plus, it was cloudy. I didn’t want to be embarrassed by getting dragged around, so I crouched next to her crates and reached inside. Herbs.
Both Natalie and I had used many herbs back in our adventuring days. These, however, were of poor quality. There were also common weeds mixed into the bunch.
“Where’d you steal these from?”
“Do I have to kill you?”
Hey, don’t flip off your customers.
“There’s a forest south of the town, right? I picked them down there.”
They were probably nice and nutritious. There were plenty of dead bodies buried in the soil to fertilize them. I knew because I’d buried them.
“So why are you setting up shop around here?”
“I don’t have much in the way of traveling money, so I figured I should get busy earning some.”
“Surprised you got clearance.”
It might seem like one could just set up an outdoor shop anywhere they wanted, but the spots were strictly supervised. If a hawker used someone else’s space without permission, they’d fight them over it. If a person was unlucky, the scary fellows who oversaw the area might get involved.
“I’m just watching the shop,” she explained vaguely. There was definitely more to it. I’d be better off not asking.
“You can buy all this for a hundred gold coins right now. Special deal,” she said, shoving the crates of herbs and weeds at me.
“I’ve never seen a worse deal.”
“Fine, how about one gold?”
“You’re basically just admitting you tried to rip me off,” I pointed out. She didn’t even have a sign with prices on it.
Natalie nibbled a cookie. “I haven’t had any customers today. They’re all just window-shoppers.”
“Not surprised.”
She was offering a mound of nasty weeds in a crate. Nobody was idiotic enough to spend a hundred gold on that.
“And all the people who stop by look so gloomy and depressed. I can’t stand it,” she said, taking another bite.
A small figure approached us. It was a black-haired boy, maybe seven or eight years old. His clothing suggested he was a peasant, and he was looking at Natalie’s cookie hungrily. The growling of his stomach asked the question for him.
“Hey.” I nudged her.
“Absolutely not,” she said, hiding the bag of cookies behind her back. What a miser.
“Here you go,” I said, dropping ten or so raisins into the boy’s hands. He looked very excited for just a moment, then gritted his teeth and spun around. There was a little girl behind him, this one maybe five years old. They looked alike, so I took them for siblings.
The boy closed his eyes, turned his head away, and held out the dried grapes for his sister.
What a good kid. I chuckled to myself, reaching to get more for them, but the bag was empty. That was all I had. If I’d known this would happen, I wouldn’t have given any to Beatrice. The sister tried to give her brother half, but he refused.
“Oh, all right,” Natalie said, taking some cookies from her bag. She gave two of her remaining four to the boy. “Eat them right here, before someone takes them from you.”
They weren’t the only people going hungry around here. Plenty of assholes were willing to steal food from children’s mouths.
The brother and sister did as Natalie said and began to stuff the dried grapes and cookies into their mouths. They squeaked quiet thank-you’s and started to scurry away.
“Hey, kids. Do you have anywhere to go?” I called out. The brother thought about it, then nodded. I continued, “Well, if you’re ever in need of a place, seek out the orphanage to the southwest of the Adventurers Guild. Tell them Matthew sent you, and they’ll take you in.”
The boy nodded again, and the two scampered off.
“You think they’re orphans?”
“Happens a lot.”
There were certainly more kids around on the streets than before. The town had been damaged all over. The rich could withstand some pain, but the poor had gotten even poorer. Many people were living day to day. We survived the stampede, but our hell wasn’t over.
“My goodness. How will I make the money to pay for my inn room tonight?”
“You’re not getting it from me,” I snapped.
“I’ve never once borrowed from you.”
“Liar.” Not only had she once used my sword without permission, but she’d also broken it. “And let me warn you: Don’t even think about asking Dez for money, either. He’s barely scraping by as it is, thanks to a certain cheapskate guildmaster,” I said.
“What did I just hear? A parasite who borrows money from Dez at every opportunity is trying to say something.”
“Listen, I’m working to pay him back.”
One time out of every ten, at least.
Natalie rubbed her eyes sleepily. Apparently talking to me was that boring. She wrapped herself in the cloth she kept tied around her head, turned away from me, and lay down on her side.