The Dreadful Tales of Mr. Dreadful

 …And the next one…

Chapter Two – A Journey Begins

As it transpired I’d signed a pair of contracts. The first pledged me to join Rudi’s adventuring group for a year and a day while the second was a financing agreement which meant I’d give over all my allowance to the funding of the group. I asked Rudi why he’d done this and he laughed.

                “Two reasons, first you were an easy mark: rich, naïve and full of bluster. Second you look like you can handle yourself when necessary and I’m a man down since Boris got eaten by a troll.”

                “But how did you know we’d meet again?”

                “I didn’t! Not for sure anyway, sometimes I know what’s going to happen with complete clarity, most times I couldn’t tell if there’s backside or breakfast round the next corner.”

                “You’re a precognistor?”

                “I wouldn’t go that far, lad… like I said, it’s only accurate a very small amount of the time and even then I get no indication when things will happen.” He tapped the right hand side of his bald head where there was a mass of scar tissue covering a misshapen lump. “Got this last time the Orcs marched on Hemdyall and I reckon it’s what allows me to See.”

                Assuming, in my naivety, that Rudi was actually becoming a friend I reeled off some comment about how Orc women like to play rough, his response was a punch to the stomach which knocked me to the ground

                “Don’t try to be clever, boy.” He stalked off muttering to himself and Harald came scuttling over.

                “You’ll have to forgive my cousin,” he said as he helped me to my feet, “he used to be an officer in the Imperial Militia and knows the value of being friendly to people he doesn’t know to get them on his side… but whatever you do don’t mistake it for actual friendship until he says so.”

                I thanked him for the warning but he just brushed it off, “It’s no trouble, to be honest I think that head wound might have scrambled his mind somewhat. He can be a bit erratic at times.”

 

                The rest of that day went by in a blur, they plundered my purse and bank account and used the money to buy horses and various other sundries they felt they needed, then we travelled to my family’s estate and I explained to my father what had happened (leaving out the apparent drugging), needless to say he was not pleased.

 

                “You have done <I>what</I>?” he roared before resuming his pace around the room.

                “I-I have agreed to become and adventurer, father.”

                He turned to his personal scribe who was minutely examining the contracts, “is there anyway we can put a stop to this.”

                “I’m afraid not,” the scribe replied in his piercing nasal voice, “the contracts are written up in such a way as to obey the laws of not only the Confederacy, but also Bütonia, the Western Empire and even Aridia. I’m afraid there is no way to break it without subjecting ourselves to intense legal scrutiny.”

                “And what of the money?”

                “That one is easier to deal with, simply stop giving Gustav an allowance. It simply states that all money which comes into his possession belongs to the adventuring party, it doesn’t specify where that money has to come from.”

                My father turned to me and spoke in a way which hadn’t scared me since I was a child. “You have always been a stain on this family’s honour. Even Pieter had the decency to marry the bitch he left with child but you…” he clenched his fists and for a moment I thought he was going to undo his belt and thrash me with it. “Get out of my house! All of you! Before I call the guards and have you removed.”

                I wanted to plead, to beg, to tell him that I’d work off any legal fees resulting from breaking the contract but I never got the chance. As Rudi dragged me away I heard my father’s voice for what would prove to be the last time: “let the family records show that Gustav Berthold Ferdinand is no longer a member of this household, I disown him.” I think I let out an anguished wail at this point but can’t be sure, my head was spinning and before we’d even reached the entrance hall I’d fallen into a dead faint.

 

                When I awoke it was late evening and we were in a forest clearing. Harald was spooning some sort of stew into bowls.

                “You’re awake then,” Rudi said disdainfully, “get some food down you. Rich or not, you’re no good to me starved.”

                Harald handed me a bowl of stew and a hunk of dry black bread. It was peasant food, and certainly not the kind of thing I was used to but after the day I’d had it was like a feast. Once I’d finished and could feel the warmth of the food filling my stomach I turned to Rudi.

                “What are we going to do? Without my father’s money I’m as poor as the rest of you.”

                Rudi took a swig of ale from a large tankard and fished a piece of meat from between two of his teeth, “well, the first thing we need to do is train you. Like you said we’ve not got the money any more but the other contract is all nice and legal and I’m a man of my word. If you don’t know how to fight you’ll be a dead weight, and I’m not going to kill you in cold blood.”

                There was a sound of oiled steel being drawn out of a scabbard, Rudi looked sharply at Magpie, “Neither are you Mags. Save your blade for those as deserve it.” Although I couldn’t tell under his hood it almost seemed like Magpie was sulking.

 

                For the next few weeks we trained hard whenever we stopped, Rudi taught me how to fight with fists and improvised weapons and Magpie gave me tuition in knife work. Both of them showed me how to fight with a sword, not the formal displays my tutors had drummed into my but real life-and-death kill-the-other-before-he-kills-you fighting. Unfortunately this still didn’t prepare me for my first real fight.

                We were travelling through the pine forests of Bütonia en route to The Desolation as Hemdyall was known by then (although even back then it was something of an inaccuracy, it had been nearly 15 years since the Last Orc War and slowly but surely Hemdyall was pulling itself up by its bootstraps) when the bandits attacked. Rudi was laying about him with a large sword while Magpie ducked and wove and stabbed. Even Harald held his own, bashing any that got too close with a short staff. As for me, I ran, I hid and I sobbed like a baby. It was nearly two hours before the others found me and despite the anger in his eyes Rudi was surprising sympathetic.

                “The first fight’s always the worst, boy. I’ve seen grown men shit their braies and cry for their mothers at the sight of an Orc charge. We’ll keep on training you and maybe one day you’ll actually do something useful. However, if you run away like that again I’ll kick you so hard your grandmother will feel it.”

                He hauled me up by the arm and offered me a flask of evil smelling alcohol.

                “Get some of that down you, it’ll get rid of your shakes and raise your spirits no end. After that it’s on to Hemdyall and, if we’re lucky, a slice of glory.”