Curselock

Chapter 6: Guild

“So Liontrunk it is?” Jude asked, his lips smacking and his fingers covered in grease.

Both Leland and Glenny watched on with strained eyes, a raw gurgling in their stomachs. Even the adjacent tables eyed the Berserker Legacy, their meals hardly touched.

“Can you eat any cleaner?” Leland asked. “And yes, Liontrunk it is.”

Jude let out a low burp in response, getting more than a few groans. Across the room, the bard frowned and played louder, strumming his instrument with the power of the Legacy of the Tavern. Soon he began to sing, reminiscing about the tale of the Royal Inquisitors.

Leland, Jude, and Glenny all sunk into their chairs.

“We’ll need gold for the trip,” Glenny spoke up.

Jude shrugged, gnawing on another chicken wing. “We can just accept a caravan quest in that direction.”

“That’s true. We should head to the Guild after this,” Leland said, receiving a groan in response from his friends. “Ah come on, it’s not that bad.”

Glenny sighed, slumping his head in his hand. “I could try to slip in undetected.”

Even though Leland said it, none of the boys, even Leland himself, believed they would savor the experience. Each had essentially grown up in the Guild, spending countless hours in the main hall with their parents when they were younger. However, without the protection of their parents, the patrons of the Guild always watched them.

Spreading rumors and whispering about them, the rough and tumble adventurers took the boys’ presence as a challenge. Whether it was puffing out their chests, sticking their legs out, or simply staring at them, entering the Guild was always… fun.

Glenny added, “We’ve got to say bye to Gilbert as well…”

The table went silent again, even Jude stopped crunching down. Simultaneously, they all shivered.

“Do we have to?” Jude asked.

“It’s the right thing to do.”

“But that doesn't mean we have to?”

Leland sighed. “Yeah, we should.”

Jude rolled his eyes.

It took an hour, but eventually the trio reached the Guild. As they pushed open the wooden doors, the smell of roasted hopes, the song of jolly music, and the musk of adventurers hit them like a dust storm. Each cringed from the sudden afront, the clashing smells dancing along the air and blasting their young minds.

“Ugh. It gets worse every time we come in,” Glenny added, his heightened Chameleon senses only adding fuel to the fire.

Abruptly the music stopped and a low rumble sounded as the Guild growled at them. The eyes of every patron in the main hall found the hesitant rookies, more than a few snarls already forming.

They walked through the room to the quest board, finding the atmosphere thick and palpable.

“Ah!” Leland yelped. “Right here, caravan protection needed to Liontrunk. Leaves tomorrow.”

Leland ripped the posting from the board and turned to the main desk. Abruptly a foot shot from a nearby barstool, impeding the path. The murmurs in the room went silent as a hulking man stood from a stained table. He carried a frothing mug, the tattoo of the Lord of Bears prominently on display.

“What do you want, Bjorn?” Jude quickly snipped.

The man smirked in response before nodding to the lone woman still sitting at the table. There, under the guise of black silk and an amber veil, sat Spinne, Legacy of the Spiders. Slowly, she unraveled her long arms, pulling them from her dress but twitching along the way. She eventually stood, removing her wide brimmed hat and setting it methodically on the table.

“You reek of death, sorcerer,” Spinne said, eyeing Leland. “You have killed one of mine…”

Leland only stared back.

“I shall punish you, a spider never attacks unless provoked. You are vile.”

Jude stepped in. “That is not true. Spiders attack all the time unprovoked. Like when they spin webs and then wait for a bug to fly into them. If that’s not unprovoked, I don’t know what–"

Spinne flicked her wrist forward, a vicious string whipping forward. The web collided with Jude’s mouth, ending his words and causing his eyes to narrow. Before the boys could pull at their tattoos, a heat blazed from across the hall.

The webs on Jude melted away, allowing him to finish his sentence.

“-Is.”

Only Leland glanced at his friend, the others having long looked over to the source of the flames. Bright orange fire ebbed and flowed with life, flickering and crackling as the wicker burned. An old man sat alone, pages and pages of documents before him. Idly he sipped his mead before turning to the Spinne.

“Leave the boy alone. I’ve told you before, killing spiders is perfectly acceptable. Praised even. If you can’t handle that fact, your rank as adventurer will be lowered and your pay docked for the say… next twelve quests.”

“Twelve!” demanded Spinne. “That’s absurd!”

“So is threatening violence against a comrade because they killed a spider. Do you see me attacking others for putting out a campfire? No, you don’t.”

“That doesn’t even make—”

“Do you want to make it fifteen quests, young missy?”

Spinne frowned, muttering to herself about old people and something about cruelty. She sat down, placing her wide brimmed hat back on. “No, Gilbert,” she huffed.

Gilbert’s flames snuffed out, but his elderly gaze fell upon Bjorn. He raised an eyebrow, sending the hulking man clambering for his seat. It was then that the main hall decided it was in their best interest to find something else to do.

Gilbert sighed, “Well come on, what do you have?” He returned to reading over the documents, but he held a wrinkled hand out to Leland and the others.

Leland looked around the room, finding only a couple eyes still on his group. That was, frankly, astonishing. The fear of Gilbert’s wrath was something even the most hardened adventurers couldn’t handle. With one last look to Bjorn and Spinne, the group moseyed over to the Guild Leader.

“Gilbert look! I got my Legacy!” Leland had long found that the old man had a heart of gold, playing up the childish aspect always proved effective.

Gilbert slid on his glasses, taking the outstretched hand of the birthday boy. “Hmm, not one I recognize. Lord of Crows? Maybe Lord of Ravens? I always pegged you to follow in your parents’ footsteps.”

“Oh trust me. This is decently close to the Lord of Magic path… just not quite the same.”

“Well, what’s the Lord’s name?”

Leland gave the elder a sly smile. “Hey now, wasn’t it you who would never tell me what your Lord was? I think your words were ‘why would I tell a brat like you.’ Think of this as penance.”

Gilbert raised a bushy eyebrow. “Oh that’s how you want to play it, eh? Fine, I am a Legacy of Flame.”

Glenny interjected at that. “That’s not true! My mom said you were not one of the common fire legacies.”

“Did she now? When did she say that.”

“Well it was before… before…” Glenny went silent.

Gilbert’s face fell. “It’s okay sonny, I know it's tough. But you’re right. I’m not a Legacy of Flame.”

For a long minute the four were silent. Glenny’s mother was a difficult subject for him, especially when it came to conversation with people who knew her.

“Anyway,” Gilbert continued. “Now that you three can team up, what’s your first quest going to be?”

Jude answered this one. “Caravan protection to Liontrunk.”

That caused the Guild Master to lean back. He hummed to himself for a moment before saying, “That would be a prime location for you three during the early months. Monster hunting is a main driving force for the town’s economy. Unless, that is, one of you has taken up alchemy. Buuut, I can’t allow you to accept the quest.”

“What? Why not?” Leland quickly shot back.

“Caravans are too dangerous for the inexperienced. That’s a small caravan as well. It would only be you three. Maybe a fourth, but that’s pushing the gold split – no one else is going to sign up.”

“We can handle ourselves,” Jude scoffed, his chest sticking out.

Gilbert chucked at that. “Your father said the same thing way back when. He said I was a fool to decline them for a quest much like the one you are wishing to accept.”

“Oh yeah? Did he persuade you into allowing it?”

The old man snorted. “Your father? Lord no. If anything, his rambling only told me he wasn’t ready. Alas, in the end, they went on the quest anyway.”

Glenny rolled his eyes. “Of course, a team of six protecting a single caravan is more than overkill.”

“Not so much,” said Gilbert. “Back in those days it was only three. Leland’s mom, Jude’s father, and your mother. The others weren’t around for another year or so.”

Leland nodded. “If I remember correctly, they eventually met another team and combined into six. Soon couples formed and marriages were made.”

Gilbert smiled longingly. “Those were the days. Peace and quiet while they found something other than quests to fall in love with.”

Glenny frowned at that. “Then how did they persuade you to go on the quest?”

“Ah… that would have been Leland’s mom. She proved herself strong enough.”

Leland recoiled. “Against you? As a rookie? How?”

“I allowed her one attack. If she could harm me, then I knew she’d be strong enough to protect a brute and the slippery one.”

“Hey!” both Jude and Glenny yelled.

Gilbert only laughed. “So, do you think you have what it takes to change my mind, Leland?”

Leland deliberated for a moment, making a show out of the gesture. “Oh, I’d say I have a sixty percent chance, yeah.”