Chapter 32: The Only Option Left

Chapter 32: Chapter 32: The Only Option Left

The first thing Lira noticed was the chains.

The vast majority of workers down in the eastern warehouse of the trade network were fitted with thin chains on one wrist and had an ID tag on the end of each.

Some of the guards checked for the appropriate tags as workers were let in and out of the warehouse, while overseers with large ledgers recorded the time each person worked, their pay, their food, and the tasks that they were assigned to complete.

In many ways, it looked like a proper workforce, but in the end, it still looked like slavery.

Lira came to a sudden stop, watching them as Seris nearly ran into her.

"What the hell is this?" Lira asked. Her voice was quiet and soft. That made it even worse.

Lira’s breathing went shallow.

"No."

Seris didn’t speak.

"No, no, no—"

Her fingers curled into her fists. For a moment, she was back in the dusty cell. A large iron lock creaked and there were orders given. She had to go here and there, at this time, under the control of someone else.

Even the slightest memories made her chest heave up and down.

She knew these people weren’t being beaten. She knew they were getting paid. She knew there were contracts.

But...

It didn’t matter that the people who ruled her weren’t being cruel. It didn’t matter that they were getting paid for their time. It didn’t matter that there were contracts.

"Lira." Seris called as she caught her arm before she could turn and run.

"Don’t, Seris... I need to talk to him."

"I know."

"Then let go. Please!"

Seris glanced up at the office windows overlooking the floor.

"I said let go, Seris!"

"Because you already know what he’s going to say. And you’re going to hate it."

Lira stared at her for a moment before striding off down the stairs.

They found Allan in his office.

The man sat behind his desk with three books laid out before him: the list of the warehouses that House Emberwind had relinquished, the new routes of transport, and the contracts and names of the workers whom Oakwood had taken under its wing.

The door opened wide as Allan looked up. He saw Lira’s face and the quill stopped mid-stroke.

"Okay. Give us the room," he told the merchant.

The man bowed and left the room. The door shut behind him with a gentle click.

Silence filled the room until Lira walked straight to the desk.

"Why?"

Allan set the quill down carefully.

"It’s just new workers."

"Don’t play dumb with me..."

"Lira... Elena was already lining up the charges of forbidden magic, of fake papers, of stolen names and old debts," Allan explained, leaning back in his chair. "Once the city started digging they’d have found enough to throw half of them in cells. The worst offenders wouldn’t have lasted this long."

Lira’s hands were shaking.

"So you bought them."

"I hired them, Lira. You know that. Of all people, you should know that."

"You bought their contracts, Allan."

"Yes."

"That is slavery."

He didn’t flinch. No, he just sighed and gave up.

"It looks like it."

The honesty hit harder than any excuse.

He stands up from the table, walks over to the cabinet where he keeps all of his files and pulls out a stack of papers and begins to lay them out on the desk, one by one.

"Fixed wages, food, medical care, housing as needed, set hours, no physical abuse and no reselling of their contracts after they’ve been bought. And when their term ends, they can leave, every last one of them."

Lira stared at the papers as if they might be poisonous.

"And the chains?"

"ID tags. The city still treats them as risks. Until the records get cleaned up, the ID tags will serve to keep them from being taken by another group or from becoming fugitives and getting sold to another group."

"You could have just cut them loose."

"...and watched Elena’s people take them apart?" His voice remains even, but there’s something tight hidden beneath his words. "I didn’t get a clean option this time."

She looked up.

"You always act like you do. Always doing what you think is best, without even consulting anybody."

That stung. Allan’s fingers closed around the edge of the desk.

"YOU ALWAYS KNOW WHAT TO BUY. WHO TO HELP. WHICH HOUSE TO CRUSH. WHO’S GOING TO GET STRONG. YOU ALWAYS HAVE AN ANSWER READY."

"I... don’t."

"You pretend you do. You... you even went for that noble lady. With your planning and scheming."

"Lira! That’s enough!" Seris shouted.

He looked away. No clever words were there. He could have told her about the System. The numbers. The huge political backlash he would incur by announcing that he was locking down a huge and extremely powerful workforce in order to protect them.

But those were indeed reasons.

All of what she said was true.

None of it changed what she had seen downstairs. "I should have told you," he said finally.

Lira’s anger softened ever so slightly.

"Yeah. You should have."

"Because you would have hated it and I needed to move quickly."

She gazed down at the contracts before her, her eyes traveling from one page to the next before settling on one of the iron bands lying beside them.

"This still feels wrong."

"I know. I know..."

"I won’t forgive you."

"I know."

She met his eyes, looking down at his dark eyes.

"But I’ll live with it. For now."

Allan nodded once.

Lira turned to leave and was halfway to the door before she stopped herself with her hand on the latch.

"Your marriage with Lady Amelia?"

"Don’t worry about that."

She left and Seris stayed.

Allan waited, leaning back on his chair as she kept staring at him.

"You knew," he said.

"Yes."

"Before she did."

"Yes."

"And you didn’t say a word."

Seris looked at him.

"I was not comfortable, but I knew it had to be done."

"You could have argued, like she had."

"I could have."

"But you didn’t. Why?"

Seris’s expression didn’t change, but she shifted posture slightly.

"Because you needed someone to keep this place running while you were off on your latest adventure."

Allan paused.

"What’s that got to do with it?"

"Everything." She stepped closer to the desk.

"The warehouses, the merchants, the workers, the contracts, the adventurers, the allies, the enemies—you leave them all behind the second something BIGGER comes along!

And if you keep doing that, then someone has to stay behind to keep this entire House from falling down around your ears while you’re off gallivanting around wherever it is you’re off to!"

Allan studied her and said nothing as Seris’s voice stayed quiet.

"Lira needs you. Amelia needs you. Oakwood needs you. But someone has to stay behind and keep the walls standing."

She paused at the door.

"So don’t worry, Allan. I won’t argue. I won’t get mad. I will just be by your side."

Then she left.

Allan stayed alone.

He sat down on the chair, and the room seemed to have gotten smaller.

He looked down at the worker contracts. The iron tags still bothered him.

Allan rubbed his tired eyes. Just then, there was a knock at the door.

A servant stepped in with a sealed letter.

"Your Lordship, this has just arrived from the Adventurer’s Guild."

Allan took it.

His face changed when he saw who it was from. He broke the seal and read the letter.

The seal was Kael’s.

Lord Oakwood,

Please report to the Adventurer’s Guild tomorrow morning for an extended expedition.

And, for honesty’s sake, bring the man who has been pretending to be a B-rank adventurer while actually carrying A-rank strength.

I’m getting tired of this.

—Kael

Allan read that last line twice. A short, dry breath escaped his lips as he tried to process what Kael had just written. Allan folded up the letter carefully.

"Prepare my things."

"Yes, my lord."

"And tell Lira she’s coming with me."

The servant hesitated.

"My lord... Lady Seris?"

Allan’s gaze flicked once toward the empty doorway.

The servant bowed and left. Allan leaned back in the chair. Seris was right.

Someone had to run Oakwood.

***

The next morning Allan and Lira arrived at the Adventurer’s Guild.

Kael was waiting and so was Diva.

So were three other adventurers that Allan recognized as A-rank fighters.

There was a huge man, sporting an equally huge spear, standing off to the side of the room. Next to him was a woman dressed in black leather and sporting a long, curved sword at her hip. The final member of the group of A-rank adventurers was an older, heavy-set man who looked to be sporting his fair share of gray hair. Just his presence seemed to make the air feel heavier.

This was not a normal guild meeting.

Kael sat at the head of the table.

"Sit."

Allan and Lira took seats.

Diva leaned in, voice lower than usual.

"Today will be worse," Diva said, her expression serious. "You look like you already know this is going to be ugly."

"I always look like that."

"No. Today it’s worse."

Allan gave a small, non-amused nod of acknowledgement. Diva didn’t push the matter any further.

Kael ignored them both.

"I’ll keep this short."

She set a sealed document on the table.

"The Duke of Virginia has asked the Adventurer’s Guild for help."

Allan’s face turned serious.

"The Duke of Virginia?"

Kael nodded.

The Duke of Virginia is one of the strongest nobles in the kingdom. He rules dozens of towns and countless houses. Most of the major adventurer territories in the north of the kingdom fall under his authority. The whole region obeys him. When the Duke of Virginia calls, the people of the region answer.

"Can’t be that small then," Allan said.

"No." Kael opened the document. "His daughter is dying."

The room went quiet.

"Physicians, court mages and priests have all failed to save her."

Allan’s eyes narrowed. The symptoms were too familiar.

"Recently," Kael continued, "they think they found a cure."

Diva raised an eyebrow. "Then why are we sitting here?"

"Because the cure isn’t here."

A large swathe of the northern part of the map was marked in red.

"The ingredients only grow in the Forgotten Valley."

Lira frowned. Diva too.

"I’ve heard of that place."

"You should have."

Kael tapped the map.

"S-grade danger zone. Not even an S-rank like me would dare to go alone."

Allan studied it. The Forgotten Valley.

He had to admit, though, the place had a rather nasty reputation. It had been a graveyard of sorts for thousands of players who ventured into the place searching for materials that spawned only within its borders. Alas, most never returned.

That wasn’t what bothered him most.

The symptoms Kael described matched the disease slowly but inevitably killing off members of the noble houses.

Amelia’s brother. The Sigilites. Emberwind’s survivors. And now the Duke’s daughter.

Allan’s fingers tightened under the table. The Cult of the Forsaken hadn’t stopped at the lesser houses. They had reached the Duke, or maybe they were after him all along.

"Who discovered this cure?" he asked.

"Royal physicians working with the Duke’s court. That doesn’t matter. What matters is—"

"How sure are they it works?"

Kael shrugged.

"They’re not."

Allan looked at her.

"So beyond a certain point there is no cure for this sickness. You’re saying the cure is only theoretical."

Allan leaned back.

He wanted to tell them the sickness wasn’t natural. He wanted to tell them it was spreading through the noble houses of the land deliberately, weakening the region’s power structure. He wanted to tell them it had already afflicted Amelia’s brother.

He couldn’t. Not yet. Not when he had no proof.

Accusing a cult without evidence would get him dismissed as having gone mad. So he kept quiet.

Kael looked around the table.

"Like I said, we’re getting paid. Your theories aren’t our business. I just need people who can survive the valley."

Her eyes landed on Diva.

"You."

Diva nodded, all previous mirth wiped from her face.

Then the spear-wielder.

"You."

He nodded.

The mage received the same word. Then Kael looked at Lira.

"You too."

Lira blinked.

"Me?"

"You’ve shown unusual magic."

Lira looked at Allan who nodded once. Finally Kael’s eyes settled on Allan.

"And you."

Allan met her gaze without comment.

Kael’s mouth twitched once with acknowledgment and slight mockery.

Kael rolled the map up.

"Okay, that’s the end of the meeting. You leave today. The Duke wants it done fast."

Allan stood.

"Then let’s go to the Forgotten Valley."