Chapter 456: I’m the Bait in Question (1/2)

At the Adventure Society dock in the city of Greenstone, Emir Bahadir’s cloud palace had been replaced with a cloud ship that would dwarf an ocean liner. Humphrey, Sophie and Neil boarded via a cloud dock the led directly into the side of the ship where one of Emir's staff led them inside. They were taken to the owner's stateroom, which was less a room and more like three storeys of typical Emir excess.

In an office larger than most homes, Emir was sitting behind a desk under a transparent ceiling that showed off the blue desert sky. The elevating platform deposited the trio as Emir was completing a meeting with the Deputy Director of the Adventure Society, Genevieve Picot. She was an elf whose appearance was uncharacteristically aged for a silver-rank essence user.

Emir stood to shake her hand and she walked away, passing Humphrey, Sophie and Neil as they departed the elevating platform and she stepped onto it. Neil and Humphrey wore diplomatic expressions, while Sophie openly glared. Genevieve has been party to the political machinations that had made Sophie into a pawn, endangered with death and worse.

“Steady,” Humphrey murmured.

“Don’t worry,” Sophie told him. “If I go after her, it’ll be a better plan than jumping her during some random encounter.”

“Sophie,” Humphrey admonished.

“Most people only think it through to the actual killing,” Sophie said casually as they walked across the office that was more like an ostentatious town square. “It’s planning what comes after that matters. That’s where you get caught.”

Humphrey shook his head as Neil snorted a laugh. Behind them, the staff member that escorted them up was descending with the Deputy Director. Emir moved forward to greet the three. The formal office furniture dissolved into cloud-stuff before reforming into a comfortable lounge suite.

“Sit, please,” Emir invited. Despite the appearance of ordinary armchairs and couches, the engulfing plushness of their true nature was luxuriously felt as the group sat.

“The time has come to leave,” Emir said, getting straight to the point. “Jason’s memorial is behind us and the Adventure and Magic Societies are finally done pulling you in for questions.”

“It’s our duty to do everything we can,” Humphrey said.

“Incredibly tedious duty,” Sophie said. “They kept asking the same things, over and over. I know an interrogation when I’m in one.”

“They weren’t interrogations,” Humphrey said.

“Just because they were too weak-willed to pull out the pliers doesn’t mean it wasn’t an interrogation,” Sophie shot back.

“What kind of life choices did you make?” Humphrey asked her.

“They weren’t choices, rich boy.”

“That brings us to the main topic of discussion,” Emir interceded.

“It does?” Neil asked.

“Indeed it does,” Emir said. “Miss Wexler, how much do you remember about your life before Greenstone?”

“Not much more than flashes,” Sophie said. “I was barely more than a toddler when we came across. I remember the shipwreck and being found by adventurers and taken to Greenstone. Things before that are just fragments.”

“Do you even know the name of the city you were born in?” Emir asked.

“No.”

“It was Kurdansk,” Emir told her. “In the People’s Holy Federation of Dreisil.”

Humphrey snorted derision in an uncharacteristic display of contempt.

“People’s Holy federation,” he muttered. “The more they try to make a nation sound free and righteous, the more tyrannical and corrupt it is.”

“You’ve been?” Neil asked.

“I was travelling with my mother, not long before I first received my essences. Our airship docked there to resupply and the port master extorted the captain for so-called docking fees. I wanted to speak up but Mother stopped me. Said that’s just the way it was, there. Bribes and graft, baked right into the civil structure of the city.”

“Have you not been to Old City?” Neil asked, Sophie nodding.

“At least the criminals in Greenstone have the decency to not pretend they’re anything else.”

“Did you not hear the Duke just made the surviving member of the Big Three crime bosses the mayor of Old City?” Neil asked.

“Adris Dorgan’s goal is legitimacy,” Humphrey said. “He needs to go straight in order to fulfil his ambitions. I don’t like it, but it will take someone like him going legitimate to get Old City’s into line after years of default criminal rule.”

“That’s an oddly reasonable position,” Neil said. “Your mother tell you that, did she?”

“No,” Humphrey said, his gaze flickering downward. “Jason did. Well, then Mother said the same thing.”

“Jason and your mother always did think alike,” Neil said. “She was classy, while Jason was… Jason, but behind the curtain, I think his mind worked a lot like hers.”

“I noticed that too,” Sophie said.

“You know, Humphrey,” Neil said, “your father might be lucky Jason’s not around anymore. I think we all saw where that thing with your mum was going.”

“Wha…?”

Humphrey puffed up with rage, his eyes going wide. Sophie reached over to place a gentle, restraining hand on his arm.

“Neil, don’t be an arse,” she said, turning to face him so Humphrey wouldn’t see her trying not to laugh. She turned to Emir, who was watching leisurely as Humphrey sat glaring at Neil, who sat with a chastised expression but laughing eyes. She forcibly put the conversation back on track.

“Emir,” Sophie said. “How do you know what city I’m from when even I didn’t?”

“Do you recall last week when I told you that I would like to dig into your background?” Emir asked.

“You’ve been doing it for six months, ever since we went into the astral space?” Sophie guessed.

“I have, yes,” Emir said. “If we’re going to catch the Order of the Reaper by the tail, we can’t just keep following the trail they’re marking for us. We need to find something they didn’t put in our path and you’re the only thing we’re confident about fitting that description.”

“So, what?” Sophie asked. “You want to send me to this city and parade me around until someone tries to kill or recruit me?”

“Our plans are a little more nuanced,” Emir said, “but, essentially, yes. We intend to go fishing, Sophie, with you as the bait.”

Humphrey leaned forward, his hostility switching immediately from Neil to Emir.

“What makes you think we’ll let you use our team member like that?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Neil agreed. “We’ve had our fill of sketchy plans with no margin for error. They’ve cost us enough already.”

“I realise that,” Emir said, “but–”

“I’m not sure you do, Mr Bahadir,” Humphrey said. “You never lost a team member. Your adventuring stories are hilarious anecdotes about fighting monsters with ducks or accidentally kidnapping princes while robbing royal treasuries.”

“Exactly,” Neil agreed, suddenly in lockstep with Humphrey. “Ours are about paying in blood and death so that our homes and families aren’t annihilated by some god monster’s version of a land grab,” Neil added.

“Down, boys,” Sophie said. They both turned to look at her, half out of their seats. She raised her eyebrows at them and they sat back down.

“I’m the bait in question,” she told them. “Let’s at least hear the man out.”

“Oh yeah,” Neil yelled with angry sarcasm. “Let’s all be human bait.”

He was sprinting alongside Humphrey through a maze of narrow alleys, dodging piles of rubbish and old crates as their feet moved rapidly across the rain-slicked cobbles.

“The choice was Sophie’s to make,” Humphrey yelled back. “Also, she’s not human. Neither are you, for that matter.”

“It’s an expression!”

“How about we get less arguing and more speed,” Sophie suggested. She was in front of them, lightly jogging backwards as she went slow to keep pace with the others. “I know you don’t have a lot of experience being chased but yelling loudly is not going to help. I suppose it’s the fault of your upbringing.”

They emerged from an alley onto a busy street, in the middle of a raucous parade. They slowed down and merged into the boisterous crowd, letting the flow take them away.

“What do you mean, upbringing?” Neil asked loudly to be heard over the parade.

“You two were brought up wealthy,” Sophie explained. “You were raised being told that you’d get everything you want by yelling loudly.”

“I believe,” Humphrey said, “that your prejudice against the well-to-do is showing, Sophie,” Humphrey said. “I cannot speak for Neil, but I was raised in no such manner.”

“Well, I can speak for me and I wasn’t,” Neil said.

“Then why is it that rich people always end up yelling loudly about the things they want when they aren’t just given them immediately?” Sophie asked.

“We do not!” Neil yelled, then slumped as Sophie gave him a pointed look.

“Perhaps some discretion?” Humphrey suggested. “We have not escaped yet.”

“It’s fine,” Neil said. “Everyone’s yelling. They’re not going to find us.”

“They found us,” Sophie said and started pushing her way back out of the crowd. Humphrey and Neil didn’t bother to look as they moved to follow.

“Was that strictly necessary?” Neil asked as he and Humphrey poured bottles of crystal wash over themselves. The yellow oil was rapidly purged from their bodies, which were stripped down to simple pants and no shoes. It left their muscular bodies glistening wet, rather than looking like marinated slabs of meat.

“Yes,” Sophie said, her clothes still pristine. “Completely necessary.”