Chương 42: 33. City Watch

A mail carrier knocked on the door to Captain Ozstin's office at the city watch.

"Deliveries from Lorelark, sir." What got Ozstin's attention was the way the boy said it. Because of the bandit activity to the south, all the mail from Lorelark came by way of Ygg Latten Bay and the coast, where it looped around the hills until it passed through Cisteen to the north. At that point it would get mixed in with all the letters from Cisteen. The carriers didn't care about the source, only that the letters got to their destination. But the boy hadn't announced a delivery from Cisteen.

He'd specifically said Lorelark, making it sound as if the delivery had come directly from the south.

"Did a shipment get through the Lorear Hills?" he asked the boy.

"Seems so, sir. Lots of people all excited about it." With good reason. This was the best news he'd heard all week.

"Do you know who's behind the shipment?"

"Wouldn't know to say, sir. But I picked this lot up from the Seven Songs." Which meant that the source was probably also the Seven Songs. He accepted the bundle and gave the boy a handful of coppers for his trouble. One of the letters was from Hughston, his counterpart in Lorelark. Hughston rarely wrote, and when he did, it was always important. So he read this letter first. The handwriting was rushed, as if Hughston was trying to get it done in time to make the next shipment.

The further he read into the letter, better he understood why. People getting snatched off the streets. A kidnapping and people-trafficking ring. A third-circle demon mage. The situation described in the letter seemed unbelievable. But Hughston was a no-nonsense man. If he said it happened, then it must have happened. Thankfully a hero had risen to the occasion—an archmage with an obsession with a small village called Restford. He'd never heard of that place.

He gleaned from context cues that it must be located somewhere around the Restwood. Everyone knew about the Restwood. It was a major source of alchemical herbs essential for his wife's arthritis medication. With the Lorear Hills becoming too dangerous for merchant travel, the local alchemists had to find alternative sources of ingredients. That had driven up the costs, making it difficult to afford even on his generous salary. When he got to the end of the letter, he frowned. How odd.

It seemed that Hughston had forgotten to tell him the name of this hero. He read through the letter once more and noticed some more oddities. It was completely lacking in any useful description whatsoever. He supposed this was what happened when you tried to write something in a hurry. It was so easy to leave out important details. There was a knock at his door. He looked up to see a young lady.

"Can I help you, miss?" he asked. She stepped up to his desk.

"I want to ask you about the kidnappers."

"Kidnappers?" As he listened to her explain the situation, his mind immediately turned to Hughston's letter. Could this person really be the archmage in question? It seemed impossible. She was too young. But great magical talents always defied expectations.

"What is your name, miss?" he asked.

"Amberlin. What's yours?"

"You can call me Ozstin."

"So can you help me, Ozstin?" He realized that she hadn't called him captain or sir, and spoke with the casual ease of someone who existed naturally at the same level as a figure of authority—or perhaps even higher. This lended credence to the theory that she was an archmage. Those people were known for elevating their own status. At least that's the impression he'd gotten from the few times he had the displeasure of having to deal with Ardark's resident archmage.

And it was hard not to feel like he was being scrutinized by those sharp and intelligent eyes of hers. This was the same sort of pressure he experienced when dealing with Archmage Poshit. But he couldn't get over the fact that she had a silver badge pinned to her cloak. Why would a status-conscious archmage be willing to prominently display such a low rank?

"May I see your guild card, Amberlin?" he asked, hoping to shed some light on the mystery. She fished the card out of her cloak pocket, which was unusual as most adventurers and mages liked to store them in their inventory. When she handed it over, he held it up to the light and examined it closely. It looked genuine and confirmed her status as a silver-ranker. This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work. This answered one question but raised another.

She only wore a silver badge because that was her rank. But why would an archmage be so low-ranked? Then he read the last name on the card. Kalimori. The audacity to claim the name of the world. Adventurers were a superstitious bunch. None of them would dare, even as a joke, for fear of being cursed with bad luck. When you were faced with life-and-death situations on the regular, you needed every bit of good luck you could get.

By choosing this for her adventuring name, Amberlin was making a bold declaration that she didn't fear luck. He could believe such arrogance from an archmage. There was one last little thing that was still bothering him. Usually an archmage exuded so much mana that even someone with only slight sensitivity like him could sense it. He always knew when Archmage Poshit was about to walk into a room. But until she knocked, he hadn't been aware of this lady's presence at all.

"Just to be sure," he said carefully, "where are you from originally?"

"Originally?" The question seemed to make her anxious.

"Before you came to Lorelark," he said, watching her closely. She relaxed.

"Oh. I'd been living in Restford."

"And your reason for coming to Lorelark?"

"I wanted them to send some protection to Restford and keep my friends safe." That was all he needed to hear. This was definitely the archmage that Hughston had written to him about.

"So can you tell me about the kidnappers now?" Archmage Amberlin asked, taking her guild card back.

"I'll tell you everything I know, though I'm afraid it isn't much. As you're probably already aware, the knights have been called out to Ygg Latten Bay, and the watch has had to take over their duties, leaving us severely understaffed. But we have an additional problem that Lorelark doesn't have. There's a merchant cartel."

"The Song guy was talking about that."

"You spoke with Alder Song?" he asked.

"I came with the caravan his brother sent from Lorelark." So it was the Seven Songs who'd managed to get a shipment through the hills. And little wonder that they'd be willing to try, with an archmage on their side. He'd been hoping that the route would become viable for merchant traffic again, but now it seemed like it might have been a one-time opportunity.

"Since you're already aware of the merchant cartel, that saves me the trouble of having to explain it," he said.

"They've somehow become very influential in our city's politics, to the point that our tax laws were changed to suit them. As a result, public services have been cut, and I'm afraid that the watch was stretched thin even before the summons came from Ygg Latten Bay. Otherwise I assure you that we would have been doing a lot more about the highwaymen plaguing the Lorear Hills."

"It sounds like you're preparing me for disappointment about the kidnappers," Archmage Amberlin said. He shook his head.

"I'm afraid all I have are rumors and a handful of unsubstantiated reports."

"But you do have reports."

"It isn't that simple. The kidnappers, as far as they operate in Ardark, are astute enough not to draw attention to themselves. If they've been taking people, they've been carefully avoiding locals. Our city receives many visitors, you see."

"When a visitor disappears, everyone assumes they've just moved on," Archmage Amberlin said thoughtfully.

"And as safe as our roads are—outside the Lorear Hills, that is—nowhere in the world is ever completely safe," he added.

"Who's to say that a disappearance, rather than being connected to a conspiracy, isn't the result of an unfortunate encounter with a run-of-the-mill criminal?" Archmage Amberlin sighed.

"I was hoping you'd have something more useful for me."

"I am truly sorry," he said.

"In truth, I wasn't aware of the seriousness of this trafficking operation until moments before you arrived. I will ask my officers to keep an eye out and relay any possible leads back to me."

"This is going to be harder than I thought," she muttered.

"Is there..." he began and then faltered. It felt shameless to request the archmage's assistance after he'd just failed to render any in return. But the city needed help, and it was his duty to ask.

"Is there any chance you can help us with the highwaymen plaguing the hills?"

"The kidnappers are my top priority," the archmage replied definitively. Maybe it was too much to hope.

"But maybe there's something you can do that will help us both," Archmage Amberlin continued.

"On the way here, we apprehended four of the bandits and found one of their hideouts. If you could do me a favor and interrogate them, find out anything they know about the kidnappers?"

"Yes, of course, I can—" He halted when his mind caught up with all the words.

"Sorry, you found their hideout? You captured four of them?"

"Well, my apprentice did most of the work. He's pretty handy to have around, you know. That's why I try not to load him down with burdens." Did the letter mention an apprentice? No, it didn't matter. There was something more important to get on with right now. He rose excitedly from his seat.

"I'll get on it right away. Is there anything else you need from me?"

"Just tell me what you learn," Archmage Amberlin said, following him out of his office.

"Oh! Now that I think of it, there is one thing."

"Anything," he said.

"What's the best cake shop in Ardark?"

After leaving the trading house under Lady Amberlin's orders, Havlo took Maelle and the cat around the city in search of a place to stay. They found a cozy little place called the Witch's Hearth Inn not far from Baker's Row. His master would surely be pleased to wake up in the morning to the aroma of fresh-baked bread wafting through the window. After helping Maelle get settled, he handed her some money to get something to eat from the diner downstairs while he went out alone to the adventurers guild.

There he immediately went over to check out the quest board. It was a quick way to get a measure of a city's health. Naturally a bigger city would have need of a bigger board. But all the quests listed there were mundane, and none paid particularly well. Unlike the board in Lorelark, there weren't any missing-persons posters. In fact there was nothing related to the people-traffickers at all. As for the bandits who'd made their base in the Lorear Hills, he only found one bounty notice, issued by the Seven Songs.

But the reward wasn't high enough to attract the sorts of adventurers who'd be up to the task. He spent some time speaking with the guild attendant, hoping to glean some further insights. While the attendant was keenly aware of the bandits, he was completely clueless about the traffickers. It turned out that the city didn't have the funds to put out a bounty on the bandits, which was a surprise to hear.

Even if the city itself didn't do it, he would have expected the trading companies to pool their funds together to deal with a problem that was affecting their bottom line. His next port of call was the captain's office at the city watch, but he was turned away because the captain was already in a meeting with someone else. Rather than wait, he decided to pay a visit to a city council member. He recalled how in Lorelark, Captain Hughston had to appeal to the council for approval of the patrol to Restford.

Maybe this way was for the better—go straight to the primary decision-maker. The problem, of course, was figuring out how to wrangle an audience.