Gaius had no doubt that Isabella, or one of the numerous adventurers treating Siembra as their home base, would be able to take care of a single demon.

  Having grabbed the bishop's mushrooms, Gaius ran straight for the temple. He wasn't too fond of Alessia learning more about him than what was strictly necessary, but dealing with her curiosity was a problem for tomorrow. A young witch that lived most of her life in the woods wasn't exactly the toughest mark. He could feed her a dozen stories that would all sound perfectly plausible.

  A few blocks down the street from the store, he came up with his cover. Him being from Mystlund, he bought and sold his fair share of less than savory arcane goods back in the day. That act placed a dark mark on his soul, which was exactly what made him work well together with the imp. The knight sensed that darkness and began sniffing around. To throw her off the scent, he needed an overpowering demonic event.

  The story had holes in it, but Gaius was certain he could sell it to Alessia. He actually felt proud of himself for coming up with it on such short notice, especially considering the mixture of booze in his stomach.

  Siembra, in the meantime, was coming alive. A huge explosion and the subsequent raging inferno were sure to do that to a town.

  The locals were all but falling out of their windows to get a better look at the pillar of flames. Adventurers of all shapes and sizes were rushing to meet the challenge head-on. Realistically, most of them had no idea what that challenge was. For all they knew, this could have been an argument between two wizards that had gotten out of hand.

  Still, all this activity forced Gaius to slow down and stick to the smaller streets and side alleys to avoid suspicion. He didn't want to be the only guy running away from the fire. The prospect of getting accused of cowardice didn't really bother him. He simply had no desire to stand out to someone who might remember him later. Going by his recent luck, that someone would then inevitably tell Isabella all about a local merchant who wasn’t anywhere near his store when he said he would.

  All that skulking about eventually put him into a narrow alley where a ragged-looking figure blocked his path.

  About the last thing Gaius needed at that point was getting mugged by a hobo. He turned around to find another way to the temple.

  Then, something hard and heavy hit him from above, throwing him to the cobbled ground and pinning him there.

  That something was a couple of bulky guys who must have jumped him from the windows on the second floor. These same guys then got him upright. One of them was holding onto Gaius' arms while the other was clutching his jaw.

  The two brought him closer to the guy ahead, who soon revealed himself to be Alejo.

  "You didn't really think we had no way of dealing with mages in these parts, merchant?" the gangster said, savoring every word.

  Even considering the situation he was in, Gaius got annoyed that he still had to explain this.

  Talking slowly, so as not to provoke the guy with a hand over his mouth, he said, "I'm not really a mage."

  "Tell it to someone who cares, asshole," Alejo blew up. "You come here, run Marco out of business, flash some fire like you're hot shit, and then you even dare to steal from my men?"

  "Caught that one, did you?" Gaius knew he would have to deal with Alejo sooner or later, he just wished the timing of it didn't suck quite this much.

  Talking to his men, Alejo said, "It's like he thinks we're all a bunch of morons here."

  One of the guys responded to that by punching Gaius just above the kidneys.

  And as unpleasant as that was, this slight shift in position, combined with the weakened grip on his jaw, allowed Gaius to jerk away from the two and free himself.

  Caught between Alejo and his men, Gaius didn't have the time to grab his weapon or conjure anything nasty. He spun around and threw a blind punch. A good one for a change.

  His fist connected with a nose, producing a meaty crack. But unlike Victor, Gaius wasn't an unstoppable fighter capable of punching his way out of most situations.

  He was taking his next breath back on the ground, with one of the two guys sitting on top of him, while the other was holding onto his bleeding nose.

  After he made sure his man was mostly fine, Alejo treated Gaius to a solid kick. Then a few more for good measure.

  "I think it's time we took this someplace more private, merchant," Alejo said.

  Given his recent performance, Gaius fully expected to get knocked out for the purposes of safe transportation. He braced for impact when he felt a deathly chill settle over the alleyway.

  Cold weather was something unheard of in Siembra. And that chill, it wasn't just a breeze. It felt more like a breath from beyond the grave.

  Gaius felt, more than he saw, a new presence. Then he did see it. A ghostly specter materialized over Alejo and placed its translucent hands on the gang leader's shoulders.

  The specter didn't have any discernible features and resembled a shadow caught in a flickering light.

  The time itself seemed to slow down around the apparition. Alejo appeared to be unable to move, with panic rising in his still eyes.

  His guys, on the other hand, were paralyzed by fear.

  Meanwhile, the specter spoke.

  "Your petty vendetta against this shopkeep left you open, my friend."

  The specter was doing that thing ghosts loved to do where they didn't actually say anything, but you could nonetheless hear their words as if wind carried them from afar.

  "And it looks like our little feud is coming to an end too."

  With that, the specter reached inside Alejo's chest and squeezed. Within moments, Alejo's lifeless body fell to the ground and the specter floated towards Gaius.

  Realizing there was nothing they could do to help their boss, Alejo's men took off, leaving Gaius to face the apparition alone.

  The specter didn't act like your ordinary ghost. And this encounter didn't feel like your ordinary haunting.

  Gaius had an inkling that the specter may have been the Shadow of Mallia he heard so much about. It almost felt tacky that a guy calling himself Shadow was an actual shade.

  While Gaius was lying still, wrestling with whether or not he should make fun of the specter's supposed name, the specter floated up to him.

  "Give my best to Esven, shopkeep," it said. "And now, I have a rival organization to dismantle," the specter added before sinking into the ground.

  The only evidence of the specter's existence was Alejo's still body. With no one there to stop him, Gaius made sure to distance himself from the supernatural crime scene post haste.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  Him being a Mystlunder of constantly exaggerated magical abilities, he would be the prime suspect for a murder where the corpse didn't show any signs of physical injury.

  And as a very much rotten cherry on top of it all, Gaius' brief interaction with Shadow made very little sense to him. Why would he mention any of this to the captain? How did the specter know the two of them were even acquainted?

  These were the questions he would have to ponder some other time. In the here and now, Gaius was determined to finally get to the temple and safeguard himself from being revealed as the relic thief.

  Somewhere between drunk and hungover, dazed and roughed-up to boot, Gaius found himself overlooking the temple grounds abuzz with activity. Word of demonic sightings traveled fast. Naturally, it was up to the priests to battle this threat.

  Gaius' plan didn't account for that. An obvious complication that he overlooked in his altered state.

  Out of sight and across the street from the temple, Gaius watched the guards shuffling about, clearly displeased by having to do their job at such an hour. He could also see quite a few priests dashing between the temple and its supporting buildings as they equipped themselves with armor and what he assumed were holy weapons.

  With Nova and Mallia, and their cycle of rebirth, Gaius wasn't sure how the underworld fit into that self-contained picture. But, it looked like, at the end of the day, Caladonian priests were as well-equipped for fighting demons as any other, more hell-fearing clergy.

  Despite all that apparent zeal, bishop Martinez didn't strike Gaius as the type to lead his brethren into holy combat. This gave Gaius a glimmer of hope. He waited for the priests to march out, using the impressive distraction of their shining auras reflected upon their polished armor plates to sneak past the guards.

  Siembra's temple was as magnificent as the last time Gaius had been there. Only this time, with Isabella on the other side of town, it was just the slightest bit more deserted.

  Gaius could only hope that a tardy priest wouldn't decide to pop in for some last-minute prayer while he was working on the divining pool.

  In the past however many days, he had to frequently insist that he was no wizard. Now, he was actively proving it by standing over the tiny moonlit well, not sure where to begin.

  Desecrating the pool and blowing it up would work of course, but only in the short term. It wouldn't take long for the priests to construct a less fancy conduit for their divinations. And even if Gaius somehow managed to disable that too, Caladonian officials would just send another knight in, one who had a chance to study his visage back in the capital.

  Disabling the pool wouldn't help Gaius. He needed the transmission to come through and prove he was not Isabella's thief.

  Figuring out how to do that, now that was tricky. It wasn't particularly difficult for someone of Mystlund origin to throw pitiful fireballs and create muddy illusions. Doing anything more advanced required a lot of studying. Gaius took pride in having avoided that.

  He had to work with what he'd learned as a kid and what he then picked up along the way.

  From what Gaius knew about divination, it was all but impossible to fool that particular branch of magic with any sort of disguise or illusion. Divination saw right through those straight to your very nature. But at the same time, it wasn't an exact science. Most of all, it had trouble keeping things straight and linear when it came to time.

  Gaius also knew that this pool was connected to numerous others just like it. The one in the Caladonian capital would be the one actually used in the ritual, while this one would simply transmit the results. And just as it was able to receive an image, it could also send one back.

  Having constructed a primitive circle of power, the best he could muster with his limited skill, Gaius channeled his arcane energy into the pool, just enough to open a connection.

  He submerged both his hands inside the pool's chilly waters and started working on two images. Two very real, detailed images. One of Gaius Chanter, the other of Brother Greenleaf, a druid who never actually existed.

  Gaius left these images imprinted in the pool, but in reverse order. If he knew his spellcasters, and he liked to think he did, they were all about conserving energy. Oracles wouldn't conjure Gaius' entire life history. They would only be interested in how the thief who stole from them looked in the now.

  And that was when they would get a crisp and clear image of Brother Greenleaf. Their spell would follow the path of least resistance straight to the imprint left inside the pool. The spell likely would check that this was in fact the thief, but be unable to date the image precisely thanks to Gaius' manipulations.

  It wasn't a perfect plan. A lot could go wrong there, like an overzealous young oracle deciding to dig deeper than necessary, Isabella noticing the similarities between Brother Greenleaf and Gaius Chanter, and who knew what else.

  But it was still the best Gaius could do under the circumstances. He had no other choice but to trust in past Gaius' disguise skills.

  He carefully removed all traces of tampering with the pool, disposed of the excess reagents, and went straight to the bishop's private quarters.

  A lesser thief would at that point forget all about that whole mushroom song and dance. After all, he managed to remain undetected without having to use the bishop's name as a shield. Not Gaius.

  He liked his plans to have layers. And, even beyond all this divination business, with him staying in Siembra for a while, being on friendly terms with the local head-priest could come in handy. For a moment, he even considered exchanging the mushrooms for a promise of a favor instead of hard coin, but then discarded that idea. A merchant would never willingly give up easy coin. Plus, with all the recent expenses, he was nearly broke again.

  Bishop Martinez' quarters were surprisingly modest, almost admirably so. A bed, a solid desk, and a bookshelf stacked with what Gaius could only assume were Caladonian religious tomes.

  Gaius found the bishop overlooking the town with his arms crossed behind his back.

  "You have peculiar timing, my good man," the bishop said after inviting Gaius in.

  Gaius approached the open window and looked out, showing signs of belated concern.

  "Yes, I heard something was going on, but I've never been one to pay attention to panicked rumors. I figured it was probably a drunken brawl between a few wizards, not a demonic invasion like the blabbermouths out on the streets suggested. And I've made you wait on your delivery long enough already to be dissuaded by mere gossip."

  "Well, the truth, as always, is somewhere in the middle, my boy," the bishop said. "I'm glad you got here alright. I would be worried about you bringing any unnecessary attention to our harmless transaction, given the tight security, but seeing how you weren't dragged in here by one of my men, you're no stranger to confidentiality."

  Gaius nodded and presented the bishop with a pouch full of mushrooms. The bishop didn't attempt to haggle and went straight for the plump coin pouch sitting in one of his desk drawers.

  "On your way here, did you by any chance run into that hag? I mean the noble knight that's been staying in our town the past few weeks?" bishop Martinez asked while counting the coin. "You know the one. She's hard to miss."

  "I take it there's no love lost between the two of you?" Gaius asked. "Don't like outsiders encroaching on your territory? I can understand that."

  The bishop glanced at the open pouch in front of him. "It's not that. It's the stress. You would think that having someone like her around would at least be easy on the eye, but that couldn't be further from the truth. That Order of the Moon of hers, they're just too erratic. One minute she offers you a drink, the next she condemns you for accepting it. When she's here, it's like she's judging everything you do. Very unsettling." The bishop sniffed the mushroom pouch. "Well, at least now I have something to take the edge off. Thanks for that."

  Gaius could at the very least appreciate the bishop dropping his righteous routine and being honest about what and why he was purchasing in such a surreptitious manner.

  The bishop rubbed his chin, his gaze focused on the window now. "Still, it would have been nice to have her here today of all days. I may not like her order much, but there's no denying that they're good at fighting evil. Even at her age, she could probably take on half a dozen of my hardened priests."

  "Well, you shouldn't worry about it too much then," Gaius reassured the bishop. "I think I did see her running in the direction of that mess," he gestured towards the slowly subsiding flames over the town.

  "That's nice," the bishop said. He then hid his mushrooms behind a stack of holy books. Following that, he handed Gaius the coin. "I think you should go now. And if I need something procured in the future, I'll keep you in mind. Pleasure doing business with you, Gaius."

  Gaius pocketed the money just as he was bowing to the bishop.

  "Just one quick question," he said standing by the door. "That knight of yours. What's the deal with her garments? Why a toga? And more importantly, why is it so tiny?"

  The bishop hesitated for a bit before his wrinkled face melted into a grin.

  "Don't tell anyone, but this is how some of my ancient predecessors tried to discourage womenfolk from joining our holy orders. Pointing to the numerous depictions of Nova and Mallia, they posited that if women wanted to become knights and priests, they would have to respect the image of the goddesses and dress accordingly. No one would willingly dress that way, those priests of old thought. Well, they were wrong as you can see. Driven into the corner by their own cunning."

  "I see," Gaius said. "But how come they weren't allowed to join in the first place?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "Well, Nova and Mallia are goddesses. And their divine nature aside, that makes them women. I would assume women would be at the forefront of your faith."

  "Ah, but that's where you're wrong. Yes, Nova and Mallia are goddesses and we owe everything to them. But take you, for example, I presume you have a mother and you probably love and respect her. But that alone doesn't mean you would let just any wench decide your state policy in Mystlund, am I right?"

  "But you do have women in your ranks now and your fine kingdom is still standing," Gaius pointed out.

  "Well, maybe our forefathers were misguided in their fears. But in the end, we landed on those alluring togas, and that alone, I would say is a win for everyone."

  "If you say so. See you around, your excellency."

  Gaius left the bishop's quarters, thinking that the more he learned about Caladonia and its customs, the stranger the place seemed. Perhaps the Old Empire was right to leave them alone.

  Story Facts - Chapter 16