Of Fates And Fetters Ch 11

Good morning everyone! Last week was rough! But darn, this chapter just flew onto the page if you catch my meaning.

Side story poll ends tomorrow. I've got an idea to discuss so I might end it early, like, tomorrow at mid-day or thereabouts, and post an update with an idea that's tumbling around my brain meats.

Anyways without further ado, hope you enjoy the chapter. Drop me a comment if you do...or if you don't too, I take those as well.

=][=

It had been years since anyone had consistently risen before Lavitz, but over the last few days, Dart had always been through most of his training regimen by the time Lavitz woke from his nightly slumber.

Lavitz walked to the nearest window that saw out into the plaza and indeed saw the self-proclaimed ‘entirely ordinary mercenary’ slowly walking his way through martial arts forms. At Lavitz’s insistence, he no longer trained in the living room.

What kind of strange man practiced martial training in the living room of all places?

The shirtless Dart, as had become usual, had garnered an audience. A good number of the unwed daughters in the district had started rising early to watch him train…alongside their mothers.

Dart finished another repetition of the forms of the Rogue School Martial Arts at speed, the more advanced forms were to put it simply, highly acrobatic, and it made for quite the spectacle.

Dart had never used the more advanced forms in combat, claiming he was too much a novice to risk use of them. But he claimed that his mother did and was a demon in a spar.

As he had ever since he began training in the mornings…or Lavitz guessed it was more accurate to say, resumed training in the mornings, Dart ended his training in the martial arts by repeating the attack he used on Fruegel.

He took the base stance of his school, closed his eyes, and concentrated for several minutes.

By Lavitz’s count, it usually took him between five and twelve minutes standing with his only movement being breathing, before he opened his eyes with a serenity that was somewhat unnatural in the normally boisterous and affable man, his eyes seemingly shining a faintly ethereal blue. Before stepping forward and throwing a blindingly fast punch that created a noticeable gust of wind that knocked dust off a building’s wall.

Rather than do something normal, like celebrating the near supernatural feat of martial prowess, Dart drew his sword and began working through his sword forms.

Taking that as his own cue, Lavitz went to the back, worked through his own exercise routine, with three times as many pull-ups as he used to do, now adding weight by tying rocks to his waist and doing a set of ten one handed with each arm. He then picked up a practice sword and spear, and went to the plaza where Dart stood, breathing deeply and waiting for him.

He grinned. “I see you’re still shy, Sir Slambert.”

Lavitz grinned back and tossed him the practice sword. “I must maintain my royal dignity. It reflects on my liege, I’ll have you know.”

Dart caught the sword and swung it in a fanciful flourish as Lavitz twirled the practice spear.

The weapons were simple, a length of carved wood, and a pole with a bag of sand tied securely to the end to blunt a strike. Connecting with either would bruise, and swung with enough force they would break bone, but both Lavitz and Dart were careful to keep it to bruises.

The two settled into their preferred opening stances, the two sized each other up for a few seconds before Lavitz was falling back, parrying Dart’s attacks and barely managing to keep the warrior from getting past the point of his spear.

A mostly futile effort, as with footwork that Lavitz still couldn’t follow despite having sparred with the man every day, Dart was suddenly inside Lavitz’s guard.

Lavitz twirled the spear, switching to using it as a quarterstaff, halting Dart’s momentum and reversing it. This time not managing to strike the warrior on the side of the head with the staff.

Still, the closer range definitely favored Dart, as any strike with the wooden sword would count as a ‘wound’ while only a sufficiently strong bludgeon or a strike with the blunted tip would count from Lavitz.

Dart suddenly dropped, pushing the haft of Lavitz’s spear up with the wooden sword in his off hand and drove his right into Lavitz’s stomach, driving the breath out of him. A wild swing with his spear kept the swordsman at bay for but an instant before he felt the kiss of the wooden sword’s tip at his neck.

“And with that.” Dart said, speaking between great, heaving breaths. “I take, the first match.”

“That’s, a new one.” Lavitz said with a nod, past his own gasps.

Dart grinned and rested the sword on his shoulder. “Can’t be, showing off, all my tricks, all at once! Gotta keep ya, guessing, old man!”

Lavitz huffed a laugh. “Eleven years, is not that big, an age gap!”

Dart took a deep breath and resumed speaking in a more even cadence. “Whatever makes you feel better grandpa. Reset in a couple minutes?”

“Upstart youngsters.” Lavitz muttered with a grin, then more loudly answered. “Yes please.”

The next match ended when Lavitz was able to knock Dart’s sword aside just enough to tackle him, pick him bodily up, and throw him at the ground. Settling the spear point between his shoulder blades before he could spring to his feet.

The tie breaking match was postponed when Shana walked out of the house, holding a pair of towels. “Hey! Breakfast is ready!”

“Hell yeah, food!” Dart said, training forgotten as he drew water out of the well in the center of the plaza and upended the bucket on himself.

Lavitz chuckled at the childlike enthusiasm in the man’s tone, then did the same to rinse away if not all of his sweat, then at least the majority of it.

Dart, as was usual, missed the looks their audience threw at him as he took the towel Shana proffered.

Shana did not and was the very picture of a cat lashing its tail at another cat eyeing its dinner.

Lavitz took the towel she offered him gratefully and went inside for breakfast, he could tell by the spread that the one to cook had been Shana.

It had taken two days for Dart to nag Lavitz’s mother enough that she’d let him cook. As such, Lavitz had given both Shana and Dart free use of his spice box, taking into consideration that the contents of that modest wooden box were worth five times the weight of the box and its contents combined in silver, it was a princely gift that he suspected Shana appreciated the gravity of more than Dart.

As Shana would put it. ‘Dart is just like that.’

Both Shana and Dart had a tendency to cook planer meals than Lavitz was used to at home, the both of them making comparatively miserly use of the spice box. Nonetheless, the meals they made that others of Lavitz’s station would likely deride as being under-seasoned, Lavitz (and judging by the fact that she was beginning to imitate the ‘married couple’s’ approach to cooking, his mother) found that their miserly ways accentuated and enhanced the flavor of whatever they cooked, rather than replaced it, as Lavitz had often found growing up.

Lavitz mentally added ‘culinarian’ to Dart’s eclectic list of abilities.

After breakfast, Lavitz followed Dart to his father’s former study, the once neat room was changed, a chaotic mess of enough paper to make a librarian jealous and various writing utensils and tools, several of which Dart had apparently designed and built himself.

“And here’s the batch I finished yesterday.” Dart said, handing Lavitz a sheaf of papers that, to him, were filled with arcane ancient lore. Full of symbols he did not know, writ in an unknowable language.

He wasn’t uneducated by any means, but when he’d asked Dart to explain them to him, the ‘humble mercenary’ had done so.

At length.

He’d lost Lavitz when he explained the use of letters and made-up symbols to substitute numbers due to it ‘being easier to depict a variable or constant without writing a whole-ass number.’

This had been less than a third of the way into the explanation.

One of the first things he’d finished was a legend, explaining each symbol and its meaning.

The legend was several pages long, sometimes a singular, small symbol, had an explanation that was paragraphs long, and often as not written in a way that, when read out loud, sounded exactly like the man’s rambling, seemingly absent-minded explanations.

The scholars at the Bale Royal Academy had apparently gone into paroxysms of euphoria when His Majesty ordered the papers studied and corroborated, last that Lavitz heard of the whole mess, the legend Dart wrote served to unify various fields of philosophy that were before thought to be completely separate disciplines.

And that was, as Dart put it, ‘merely the necessary foundation for black magic tactical fuckery.’

And the initial highly complex arcane drawing that had given Lavitz a headache?

A hammer.

A very small hammer, that, Dart assured him, was extremely important it were made to exacting specifications.

Out of morbid curiosity, he examined what Dart handed him and saw with mounting excitement that he’d finally come around to the instructions on how to build the components of the rifle.

Still… “Why make this long metal bar have six sides? Wouldn’t a square or a circle be easier?”

Dart turned around and in a deadly serious tone said. “Because hexagons, are the bestagons.”

Lavitz opened his mouth to ask a further question but thought better of it. “I see.”

He had things to do today and simply did not have the time to sit through another of Dart’s rambling lectures.

=][=

I put the abbreviated history of the Dragon Campaign down with a scowl. That had not been as informative as I’d have liked. No mention of the moon for one, beyond a reference to the ‘Divine Moon Objects’ and instructions to look at a compendium of the highest treasures of the Three Founding Nations.

A compendium that Lavitz didn’t have. The anthology of stories of the Time of Strife was a wash too. Leaving me no closer to figuring out how to help Shana navigate her waking up to her mystical magic superpowers.

I doubted they were limited to killing giant snakes. And no power came without a price.

I set the book down next to the last of the technical drawings I’d made for Lavitz, stood from the surprisingly comfortable chair in the study, and stretched my back, hearing several loud pops. I groaned and muttered, “Oh yeah, bring on that arthritis.”

“Dart?”

I turned as Shana walked shyly into the study. “Hey Shana, what’s up?”

Her cheeks gained a dusting of comely red as she started fidgeting. “H-Hey just um, just wanted to let you know that lunch is ready.”

“Oh neat.” I said. “Perfect timing.”

“Y-Yeah.” Shana said, the blush on her cheeks going from ‘rosy’ to ‘nuclear’. “Umm…w-we should go, you know? Arm-in-arm, like husband and wife.”

I stared at Shana long and hard.

Lavitz’s mom was surprised by the sight of me walking down the stairs while carrying a complaining Shana, upside down and holding her up by her ankles.

“Good day Mrs. Slambert.” I said with a friendly nod while Shana was rude, wailing, flapping her arms about, and trying and failing to affect change to her situation.

“Oh my.” Mrs. Slambert said, her cheeks turning red. “The youth today sure are bold.”

Lady, I don’t know what you read into the situation, and I’m pretty certain I don’t want to know.

Lavitz came back as we were finishing the meal and I was being run out of the kitchen because I should ‘leave women things to womenfolk’ which just, lady, I will drug your food if you don’t let me take care of my goddamn dishes.

“Yo.” I said trying to decide what drug and at what dosage. “I finished the thing so…yeah.”

“Ah, good.” Lavitz said with a smile. “That’ll be a load off my mind after I head out.”

I blinked. “Head out?”

He nodded. “We believe the Sandorans are massing to take Hoax, the town is critical for our logistics, but it has a sturdy wall. I’ll head there and help defend it, hopefully meet up with what remains of my Knighthood on the way, you and Shana can stay here.”

“The fuck I will!” I snarled, making Lavitz step back in surprise. “I didn’t risk my bacon getting your geriatric ass out of Hellena to let you go off and get captured again!”

His face scrounged up. “That is cutting, Dart.”

“Well good!” I said crossing my arms. “I’m coming with you.”

“You are?”

“I’m an entirely ordinary mercenary.” I reminded him. “You’ll find my rates agreeable.”

He blinked and tilted his head. “Why not just join my Knighthood?”

“And become a government worker!? Excuse you sir, I have a soul!” I snapped back, tilting my head up to sneer imperiously down my nose at him.

“I…do not understand you.” Lavitz said. “But it’ll be good to have a fighter of your caliber at my side.”

“Good.” I said with a nod. “Now I just need to convince Shana to stay an—”

“The hell I will!” Shana screeched beside me, making me jump a full foot in the air.

“I’m gonna tell my mom you cursed.” Was the first thing that slipped between my lips the moment I landed. And I felt my face heat up at the deadpan stare both Shana and Lavitz gave me. “Shaddap.”

“I let you leave last time, only to not get to see you for five years!” Shana said, stomping her foot. “I won’t let you leave me behind again!”

I opened my mouth to protest, then remembered that she was the magical girl of the world and was destined to rule. If I left her alone here, I’d probably come back to her having been kidnapped in the night by ninjas. But everyone knows a ninja can’t kidnap you if you punch them in the face, and I wouldn’t be around to do the punching if I didn’t have her nearby.

Hell, even if we end up somehow losing a defensive battle with a wall, Shana’s main love interest will likely show up and save the day, and I can retire into obscurity.

“Alright fine.” I said with a sigh.

“Besides, I can fight too!” Shana said passionately.

“Shana.”

“I’m eighteen! I’m no longer a child!”

“Shana.”

“I can and will be useful!”

“Shana.”

“So even if you leave me behind, I’ll follow on foot an-owie!”

I lifted the Knife Hand Of Justice from the top of her head. “Now that I have your attention.”

She looked up at me with a teary-eyed pout.

“I said you can come with me.”

Her face split into a beaming smile.

“Ep ep ep! I have conditions!” I said, waving a finger under her nose. “You’ll do what I say when I say it. We’re headed for an active combat zone, and this is something you don’t have experience in! Understood?”

Shana slammed into me, squeezing hard enough to pop my back. “Thankyouthankyouthankyou!”

“I’ll take that as unconditional agreement.” I gasped.

Lavitz sighed as I tried to peel Shana off me. “I have my misconceptions, but I’ll defer to your judgment. I’ll…go break the news to my mother.”

“Ask her if I can do my dishes!” I gasped after him.

The rest of the day was a whirlwind of readying supplies, having tons of perishable and nonperishable food hoisted on me by Lavitz’s mother because of my handy sack, last minute purchases, as well as a true bounty.

A Burnout, a replacement Frost Spear and a Spark Net. As well as three healing potions and a new jar of my poultice.

Apparently, these were a bonus that came straight from the King.

Hell yeah.

Before I knew it, I’d spent my last night in a mostly comfortable bed, Shana promising to stick to her side of the bed this time, and just like every other night, I woke up with her sprawled haphazardly on top of me and drooling onto my chest.

I tried waking her up gently, and when that didn’t work I pinched her nose closed, reapplying the seal every time she slapped my hand away without waking. Then finally got ready for the day.

Lavitz’s mom made us a hearty breakfast, and we set out for the fort, considering the distance, it would take quite a while for us to get there, which would hopefully be enough time for me to prepare Shana for what she was signing up for to some extent.

Also set up contingencies for my very possible defeat. The Sandorans had not proven to be gracious or levelheaded in victory.

As we reached the edge of the city, it was horror that crawled up my spine as I realized my mistake. I was used to traveling, I would not shirk at a days long march, I had done it often enough in my travels. Hell, I’d purposefully carried the most I could while traveling purely to serve as strength training, because my endurance began to suffer after I received my handy sack.

I had assumed that we would march along one of Basil’s admittedly adequate roads and mostly walk all the way there.

But my calculations had failed to account for a very important detail.

Lavitz was, literally, a noble.

A knight at that.

Directly favored by his liege.

“You know.” I said, stopping and taking a few steps back for safety. “Maybe this is a bad idea after all, and I should stay and guard your home. Lavitz. Bad things can happen on the road an—”

“Dart. When will you get over your fear of horses?” Shana asked with a sigh.

“Pure distilled evil, Shana!” I snarled.

Lavitz sighed. “Dart, don’t make scene and get on the horse.”

“There is nothing you can do to make me get on that blasted beast!”

“Last chance Dart, or I will utter the word that will make you.”

I scoffed. “Hit me with your best shot grandpa. Nothing you say could possibly—”

“Taxes.”

“HISS!”