“Haddar may not worship Saint Violence or Saint Murder, but he’s been blessed by the gods just the same. The man has a gift for inflicting harm. His time studying magic here made him something of a legend in this city. Which is why the idea that upon finally reaching the tenth rank, so long denied to him by the spineless weaklings of the Council, the fearsome Gaul Haddar would decide to become ateacheramused me so.”
“Maybe he’s becoming more gentle as he’s aged?”
Carcalla turned to scowl at me. “You claimed you were not a liar.”
“Just throwing out a possibility.”
“An unlikely one.” The gang lord went back to his map. “I don’t understand Haddar’s reasoning in granting you this responsibility, but I have decided that you are not a fraud.”
“I appreciate that, sir.”
“You should. If I thought you were trying to rob me, I’d have you horribly disfigured and sent back to live as an example to all what happens when I am crossed.”
Having seen the occasional Slumper missing their ears, nose, or lips for just that reason, I was extra thankful. I took another sip of the loathsome liquor to calm my nerves and managed to not choke that time.
“Except I do not think what you are running is an academy either.”
“What are we then?”
“You’re the living manifestation of Gaul Haddar’s disdain for the Nexus Council.”
That description probably wasn’t too far off the truth. “Well… we’retryingto be an academy.”
“Indeed. Yet with your founder away, you have no resources. You lack knowledge. The only way to advance in rank is through increased aptitude, which requires spells. Real spells, not just the pathetic home-brewed experiments of rank-one amateurs. Learning new spells requires the formula and the magical elements to fuel them. You have neither, nor the money sufficient to purchase any. And there still remains the matter of the rent.”
“Yeah, about that?—”
“By now, you have surely realized your academy has nowhere else to go. Tradition demands the Council respect a rank-ten master’s right to take on apprentices, but that is all they will grant you. They will stymie you in every other way possible for the simple fact Haddar’s promotion offends them, as does your very existence. If the Council’s disdain alone did not render your academy politically toxic, the fact magical experimentation can be dangerous to the property and bystanders would. Even if you could afford to live elsewhere, there would be no home for your rejects in any other district of this great city.”
I could see exactly where this was heading. “Except for somewhere the Council’s already forsaken and ignores.”
“Correct. I am the ruler of your only option. And while you may choose to be kind to those who cannot pay… I do not. Such weakness would set a terrible precedent for my business.”
I’d been a trapper, so I knew a trap when I stepped in it. “You’ve recognized yourself we lack the money to even buy enough element to practice with. We sure as hell can’t swing another hundred Obols a month to keep you from siccing Cutter Joran on us.” I gestured at the image of Ashen Harran. “For how dangerous you say Gaul Haddar is, your man sure don’t hesitate to threaten harm against Haddar’s students.”
“Joran is a valuable servant, because he loves a challenge more than he fears death. I suspect he would enjoy fighting Haddar to the death. He’s defeated rank sevens and eights, but I don’t think he’s ever had the opportunity to fight a nine or ten. I suspect a ten might even be beyond Joran’s considerable abilities to kill. I’d prefer not to lose such a valuable and loyal servant, though. Thus, when your master returns, I will gladly renegotiate a new deal with him. Haddar demands respect. You do not. Therefore, you get the lesser deal. For now, be thankful you receive any courtesy at all.”
Carcalla had me there, because Haddar might not ever return. He’d told me that the elf pirate was incredibly dangerous, so even if Haddar did finally manage to track him down, he might not survive the confrontation. And in the off chance he did, he still might not come back to the Core City ever again, simply because he despised this place and the Council who ran it. For all I knew, he’d already forgotten he’d ever founded an academy at all.
“What do you have in mind, Mr. Carcalla?”
“If you cannot pay your debt with coin, I will allow you and your students to work it off instead. Your options are one hundred Obols, or providing a service of corresponding value, per month.”
“That doesn’t sound like much of a choice.”
“There is always eviction and painful dismemberment.” Carcalla must have threatened so many people over the years that he managed to sound bored as he told me that.
“I believe I speak on behalf of all of our students when I say we enjoy keeping all our limbs attached. What manner of service?”
He seemed amused by my concern. “Simple tasks. Nothing too complicated.”
I really didn’t like what that implied. “There’s other ways we might be able to earn that much money.”
“Indeed. You and a few of your fellow Outcasts have earned a tidy sum fighting in the Slump arenas. It would be dangerous, but if you won enough matches every month, that would more than cover it. However, you forget who those goblin bookies work for. It would be a shame if every Outcast was suddenly and permanently banned from those establishments.”
Seeing as how fighting in the arenas was how we were barely scraping by at all, getting cut off meant being starved of food and element, and then getting evicted anyway. “That would be a shame.”
“Indeed. Come and look at this.”
