BrightMoon: Path of a Witch King

Chapter 16

Six days later me and the girls were heading to town. I wanted to find out how much my enchanted items would sell for, along with purchasing some new clothes, I felt that garb was not very witch-like. Mostly consisting of furs and leather.

I brought thirty-one of my one hundred and eleven sprites along with me to guard the ship, with the wall and the tunnels into the house the sprites would be safe, I was actually more scare for any intruders stupid enough to hop the wall.

Sailing along the river always calmed me, a part of me thought of living on the water and just sailing up and down the river, but I would not have enough room for my sprites. Not to mention they seemed to love mining silver and I wouldn't want to pull them away from a life they loved.

We weren't speeding down the river today, just slowly making our way down towards the town. We were about fifteen minutes from town when a large boat started to pass us. I looked up from the clear waters of the river and examined the craft, there were several deck hands on board but they looked on edge, their hands were always near their weapons.

I waved at one of the sailors to get his attention, “What is wrong my friend, your crew is looking a bit on edge.”

The man frowned, “The bandits have been all over the river the past few days, they came up from down near the city, or so I heard. Plenty of boats have gone missing one day and bearing bandit flags the next, and friends of mine have up and disappeared, this is my last trip on this cursed river.”

My brow furrowed as their boat pulled ahead of mine, river bandits were mostly a rare occurrence this side of town though I haven't run into any so far on my few trips I had heard about a few boats getting robbed.

Heck even at the docks thieves had boarded my boat, unfortunately for those poor bastards my sprites were merciless, everytime I found a body on board it was covered in dozens of cuts. 

If bandits were on the river my trips would be far less peaceful, I could bring about sixty sprites before the ship would be about full, with those numbers it would make it hard for anyone to rob my ship.

I started watching the surrounding waters, and sure enough I started to notice a few boats I hadn't seen before, flying off the mast was ablack ratty flag with two knives crossing in front of a coin purse.

The same flag was flying on nearly a quarter of the boats on the water, as we pulled into the docks there were a few of these pirate vessels unloading cargo. That wasn't the only change however, there were guards at the docks now, wearing the M&F logo on their armor it was clear who was in charge of dock security.

M&F wouldn't let the central source of trade be run by bandits, though if things kept up then the only groups moving on the river would be M&F and the bandits. 

As long as they leave me alone then I would ignore them, I had my own problems to deal with, even if my home was secure the goblins surely outnumbered my small group of sprites. We just weren't a problem for them to think they needed to come after us, Indra docked us away from the bandit vessels.

I grabbed my satchel that held my enchanted items, my apprentices followed me off the ship, and waiting for me on the pier was a middle aged woman with two strong men at her back.

“Welcome to the port of Ordanz. How long will you be staying with us sir?” she asked, she was all business as she held a ledger with a pen like item ready to write.

I hummed at the greeting, I thought I had made quite a name for myself, but perhaps not as big of a splash as I had been going for.

“It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, I am the local witch, but you can just call me Brightmoon. I plan to stay in town for a day or two, but I come by at least once a week for a few supplies or news.”

She scribbled down my name, the guards seemed to recognize who I was but the lady just breezed on through.

“That will be five copper disks a day for your spot on the pier.” she said before removing a small lockbox from her own bag, on top was a slot for one to stick either a cube or a disk.

I went with the flow and put in a copper cube, luckily Indra felt it was necessary to bring along a variety of currency otherwise I would only have had silver or gold to pay them with.

The lady never gave her name but she did give me a small piece of paper, on it was the details of my permit to stay docked. I tucked it into my bag and headed into town, my first stop was Gola, I stopped in to discuss creating robes for me and my apprentices.

Surprisingly he turned me down, he said it was beyond his skillset, his wife and him were more for what common folk needed to stay warm and to work the woods. What I needed was an actual tailor that had the material and skills for what I was looking for. I accepted his advice but still decided to buy my furs from him. 

He smiled at the continued loyalty and thanked me for my patronage. He said that he could complete my order of furs by tomorrow. I paid in advance and decided to pick up some slices of bacon from Uran before heading towards the M&F trading center.

I would get an appraisal from both them and the hunters union, I wanted to see how either one would treat me when I brought in enchanted objects.

The trading post was much busier than the last time I saw it, though the clientele seemed a bit rough, they were on their best behavior. A few of them gave me a few not so friendly looks before returning to their own business, I waited until a young man called me over to a counter.

I approached the counter, in front of the young man was a ledge, “Welcome sir to the trading post, what business might you have to share with us?” The boy was chipper and I smiled back at him.

“I need an appraisal on a few trinkets.” I said.

The boy started writing it down. “Alright sir, I just need your name and the nature of the trinkets so we can bring in the best person for the job.” 

I tilted my head a bit to the side while thinking of the best way to respond, “I would have to say magical in nature.” The boy's eyes opened up wide and I saw his pen stop halfway through writing the word magic.

The room had gone quiet, I turned my head to see a few greedy glances my way. “Oh? Go ahead and try to start s**t with me, I will burn this entire town to the ground before you can even blink.” I said back at the quiet crowd while enhancing my voice with mana. I let my mana roll off my shoulder and ignited it into a large flame.

The air vibrated  from my voice and the heat from the flames made the closest guests flinch away from me. My fellow clients decided to step away from me and my apprentices.

The flames went out as fast as I had conjured them, “Excellent decision.” I said to the sweating crowd, I turned back to the boy who was looking at me with his mouth wide open, “Now when might I see that appraiser?”

Five minutes later I sat in a cozy private room with my apprentices on a large couch. I was surprised that the person sitting across from me wasn't the older gentleman in a well tailored suit but a woman. She had dark brown hair and green eyes, she wore a suit like the butler-like fellow but she only wore the shirt, pants, and vest.

She smiled warmly at me before starting, “May I see the artifacts?” she motioned at the black cloth on the table.

I obliged and pulled out three leather pouches. I took out a ring from two and a necklace from the third, they were simple yet if you looked closely you would see runes and symbols etched by mana into the metal.

I placed the rings on either side of the necklace onto the black cloth and let the woman do her thing.

“Oh these look to be in pristine condition,” I heard her say before her eyes glowed slightly, it was obvious she had her own magic. “Fire, earth, and air based enchantments. They are exquisite pieces, but without further testing to know their purpose I can only offer a gold disk each.” she looked up from the pieces and the glow in her eyes faded.

“Oh then allow me to elaborate on their uses, the ring on the left is enchanted with a fireball spell, it will fire a burst of three fireballs at your target there are two charges and each charge takes twelve hours to replenish before being used again.” 

I took a sip of water, “the ring on the right casts a wind barrier around the user, the dome of air can probably shield three or four people inside it for five minutes per charge. This particular enchantment has three charges, and each charge recovers every three hours. The necklace in the center contains a spell called blessing of earth, the blessing itself makes your skin and clothes incredibly resistant to piercing and slashing weapons and can cover up to ten people per charge. The blessing lasts one hour, and only contains one charge, but it recharges in three hours. So what do you think?” I said before taking another drink.