Wizard of Jatte by Rowan Erlking (librera reader txt) 📕

The pair of them regarded Theissen with growing smiles. They nodded together.

Giving the other apprentices appreciative pats and encouraging advice before leaving the front steps, Theissen then turned towards the north, watching the pull of the flow he knew all too well roll and ripple like a unadulterated tune. He smiled. It was practically calling to him, almost saying, ‘Come on. Hurry it up.’

“Undoubtedly we’ll hear of your fame from over the mountains,” Lordri Carpenter said with a resigned look in his eyes. “I just hope you don’t forget us.”

To that, Theissen raised his eyebrows. “Forget? Is that possible?

The boys laughed, waving as Theissen started down the road. They all watched until the journeyman carpenter from Lumen was out of sight, and they still lingered, almost imagining that the sun moving overhead was him leaving them behind and the world without him would soon be in darkness.

Theissen’s walk to the north through Liptan town turned heads. A couple times townspeople came out and handed him something to carry with him, thanking him for staying as long as he had. Theissen noticed some of his own handiwork around the town. The bookshop had sliding ladders on wheels. The owner had requested them after all, and waved from his shop doorway as one of the clerks passed on a pocket notebook for keeping track of his expenses. The florist hurried out and gave Theissen a miniature rosebush in a wrapped up sack, his wife laying a daisy chain around his neck and kissing his cheek. The hatter nodded as he passed. The shoemaker came outside and tipped his hat. The constable walked with him part of the way, offering advice on how to make a better entrance into a town to avoid any other uncomfortable entanglements so Theissen would not have to resort to magic.

“And most important,” the constable said. “If you go into a city, present yourself to the chamber of commerce and inquire after a guild. Follow everything as legally as possible. You’re already respectable, but using magic to deal with problems that chase you isn’t always the best option. You can use the law to protect you.”

Theissen nodded, feeling somewhat startled that so many in the town were sorry to see him go.

The constable patted him on the shoulder. “Be careful and keep your nose at a friendly level. You’re the kind that can’t help but attract people to him.”

That made Theissen stare, halting where he was. “I’m what?”

Nodding, the constable smiled. “You heard me.”

Theissen turned. “Then why is it that so many people also want to pound my brains into the ground?”

With a laugh, the constable started back up the street. “They can’t help but be jealous. Someone like you is one of a kind.”

Theissen watched him walk away. It took a bit to start again, but when he did, Theissen found it harder and harder to leave. Yet still, once he passed the borders of north Liptan it was like walking back in the right direction. There was a future ahead, and he was now once more free to go and do whatever he liked.

Weeks of walking, and Theissen now wished he had stopped at the cobbler before he had left Liptan Town. The heels to his shoes kept coming off, and no matter how often he reattached them and made the nails hold it together, they just did not want to stay like that. Mostly he wanted to ask what kind of cheap glue he had used because the water was getting in also.

The spring rains had slowed his journey some. Theissen stopped off in a village for a rest, helping with some household mending and even making a cradle for a merchant who was about to have a child, taking some time to write back to the one Undi called Jonis, to at least respond to what he was able to read. Mostly he had one question, was he really a demon?

Theissen had opened up the demon section of the book and reread about Cordrils. What Jonis had written said they weren’t demons but they were treated as such because they had a deadly touch. The rest of it was like a long explanation as to why they had a deadly touch but were not demon, like Jonis was trying to excuse their kind for being like that. However, despite all that, Theissen did notice that Jonis did not skimp on advice on dealing with Cordrils, remarking quite clearly that they were dangerous.

He read: it is best to treat them the same as you would a human being, though I would keep out of their reach.

Theissen had pondered on that often. If this writer was a Cordril, then why tell people that? Further on it said Cordrils are generally smarter than most humans and demons simply because most Cordrils have an enormous memory. It is best not to entirely trust a Cordril, no matter what. Though most Cordrils want to simply be left alone, in the recent years they have become desperate to survive and many of them will do anything to do so.

It was like giving away a secret. It made Theissen feel nervous. Was Jonis a demon? Were the magicians right?

Theissen continued north along the main road, seeing neither bandit nor caravan until he got closer to Shoredge. There he saw both. It looked like bandits robbing a caravan. Since neither group had seen him, Theissen ducked into the underbrush near by and stirred up a sudden windstorm. He waited until the bandits ran off, the caravan struggling on their own to tie down the things that were flung about by the wind. By that time he decided it was best to hitch a ride.

“Unusual winds for this time of year.” The leader of the caravan called out to one of the drivers of the other carriages.

Theissen walked by one of the covered liveries where he saw that it was not a typical merchant carriage, but a banner-covered cage. Inside he heard an unusual sound of what he presumed to be an animal. On the cage was a banner in red and yellow with smatterings of blue, gold, and green declared ‘Amazing!’ in big bold letters. On another one he saw the word ‘Unbelievable!’ all spangled and glittery with dangling metal mirrors to catch the light. Walking in and out of one carriage was a man in purple silk with gold fringe carrying a whip under his sash. An unusually short woman toddled behind him calling out for the whip carrier to hold on a minute. That was when Theissen caught a whiff of a demonic stink.

Frowning, he continued to walk by, deciding that it was a bad idea to hitch a ride with this group after all. He saw a woman dressed in nothing but a flimsy bodice and miniskirt, her long legs accentuated by how high the skirt was and by the spiky heeled boots she wore. Plumes of feathers stuck out from her styled head of hair, tiny beaded braids dangling only along the sides of her face as the rest was gathered up top like a bird’s tail with the feathered cap. Next to her stood a giant of a man, taller than Theissen was and likely three times as broad with muscles as round as tree trunks. The man glared at Theissen with dark beady eyes as he walked past them on the road.

As Theissen attempted to walk by with a polite nod to the gaggle of ladies dressed in matching show gowns with plummeting bust lines and cleavage, trying to keep his eyes on the ground, a man popped his head out of another caravan doorway and peered at him. Theissen gave that one a nod and continued past a lion cage and then another, ducking through the group of trained dogs, keeping them calm with a little urging hush that no one could see but him, then he weaved around the group of funny looking men in tight pants attempting to dislodge the tree branch that was now stuck in the spokes of their lead wagon’s wheel. There he almost stopped to help out. However, after getting one dirty look from the woman dressed all in gold jewelry and the man juggling knives, he decided against it.

The walk to Shoredge was only five hours after that.

Theissen found a room near the docks. It was his first order of business to find a Hann trader. The next was to join a caravan to travel with to go though the forest between the Jadoran and Dondit Mountains. He figured he could get work mending things in the mean time, gathering just enough money to live off of once he got to the other side of the mountains. From there he reckoned he might as well head towards South Town by the Dondit River to visit Milrina.

Well, those were his plans anyway. Reality was a little crueler. Theissen did find a Hann trader, but the man was demanding twenty pieces of gold for the job and was not budging an inch on the subject.

“But I don’t have even ten gold pieces,” Theissen said, to the silk trader.

The Hann tradesman snorted with a glance at Theissen’s carpentry belt. “You can sell that for twenty.”

Theissen placed his hand on his belt protectively. “I wouldn’t sell this for a hundred. It is my trade.”

The Hann man just shrugged and went back to barker up his wares. The Hann man was a well-dressed merchant with a foreign look that always made people distrust him. Rusty tan skinned with amber colored eyes shaped like almonds, Hann were famous for their wares and their lies. The man’s silks were rather good quality, light and breezy but not very practical for most people of Jatte. Besides, most of the colors were cheap and could be purchased in town easier from the weaver at a better price.

“You know what?” Theissen said to him. “I can do something better for you than just twenty gold pieces.”

The tradesman just snorted as he continued to call out to buyers on the docks.

Theissen touched one of the silk fabric bolts. “This color is not very appealing to Jatte ladies.”

He caught the Hann’s eye who was beginning to look ready to toss Theissen into the bay to get rid of him.

“But if it were red, or perhaps a nice rich purple or blue…” Theissen discretely changed the color of the yellow scarf to a deep purplish blue, one of the most expensive dye colors to purchase according to his uncle the weaver, and then he handed it to the Hann man. “…then you just might be able to make a profit.”

The Hann trader stared at the fabric then lifted his eyes to the grin on Theissen’s face. Theissen held out the letter once more.

“Come on, I think we can make a deal? Right?”

Blinking at him, the trader gestured over to his tent. Theissen followed him, glancing back only once at the riverfront market place.