54th of Aneal
Maxwell and Grendel stared at the wand as the literal magic smoke began to come out. Max almost shouted the command word for stop, and the wand fell dead in his hand.
“So, there’s something in the sewer?” Grendel asked, eyes still on the wand.
Max mumbled a string of curses, then replied, “Apparently, yes.”
“Is the wand actually broke?”
“I hope not.”
The pair silently walked back to the shop.
-
55th of Aneal,
Finally made a new wand. And gave a lesson to Grendel. Boy needs to grow up a bit, but he also needs to live the life of a kid for a while longer.
-
It had taken three shops and 18 hours, but finally, as the last rays of the sun trickled in through the window, Max looked down at the new and improved elemental identification wand. “I sure hope this thing works the way I want it too.”
Grendel, sitting on a stool just out of arm’s length, replied, “Me too. That was an expensive set of ingredients.” He let out a long sigh. “You should have let me filch those from the merchant. He was overcharging us.”
Max narrowed his eyes as he slowly spun towards Grendel, “What have I told you about stealing?”
“Only steal from the rich, then give most of it to the poor?”
“Exactly. That merchant had the most run-down shop I’ve seen for years.” Max inhaled deeply, then let it out slowly, “We were some of his first customers in weeks, and I can handle a little price gouging.”
“See! I knew you knew he was gouging us!”
“And what do you do when a rich man walks into your “shop”?”
“I take him for every last… Fine. Good for the goose, good for the gander, and all that.” Grendel muttered.
“Good.” Max smiled. “Especially when you are tired, poor, and haven’t eaten for a few days.”
“I get it, I get it.”
“Good, now take some of your moth- Bri’s stew over to his shop and leave it on his doorstep.”
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“Fine.” Grendel departed.
-
56th of Aneal,
The midwinter festival took up all of today. It was very subdued what with all that has been going on of late. There is some good news, no new murders and people were at least thinking about the coming spring.
1st or Arah, Second month of Winter,
Part One of Maxwell’s entry for the day.
I spoke too soon. A man was found dead this morning, near a sewer entrance. No marks on the body, asphyxiation. We started looking for the culprit there.
-
Max and Grendel stood at the entrance to the sewer. It was a simple grate on the side of the street, a simple lock keeping it closed. The watch having already moved on, Grendel made short work of it, and they climbed down into the darkness.
“Why do sewers always have to stink.” Grendel said, more than asked.
“Well, you see-”
“It was a rhetorical question, old man.” Grendel snapped.
“I see you woke up on the wrong side of the bed.”
Grendel sighed, “Sorry. I kept having strange dreams about kittens in armor last night. I almost woke up screaming a couple of times.”
“That sounds abysmal.”
“It was.”
Max activated the new wand, and the pair wandered in companionable silence for a while. The sewer was laid out in a fairly straightforward manner. Long tunnels under the main streets, and smaller ones under the lesser streets. Except for the for the slums, the entire town had sewer service. They walked, the occasional splash of rats, or steady drip of sewage the only sounds.
After most of an hour, the wand began to tug, and its “dials” spin. “Took it long enough. It would seem that the stone is blocking the magic to an extent.” Max said, breaking the silence.
“Are we going to surface at the next grate, then another after that?” Grendel asked. “Use that triangle method you were talking about yesterday?”
Max smiled, “So you were listening, not just drinking your pilfered goods.”
“I paid for that bottle.” Grendel growled. “Well...I paid in a bruise on my butt, anyway.”
Max sighed at him, then turned away. “You have money now. Some of it you actually earned. You should spend it.”
“He wasn’t going to sell it to me.” Grendel griped as they climbed up the next ladder. “I did leave the price on the counter before I took off running.”
Max nodded his approval, “That’s better.” He brought up the wand, and slowly spun until he found the greatest pull. “Looks like South-by-South East.” He noted their location and direction on a small pad of paper, then they dropped back into the sewer.
“Why aren’t we doing this from above ground?” Grendel asked.
“Partly to test the wand, and partly to get the lay of the sewer.” Was Max’s quick response. “I didn’t want to come down and find the signal completely blocked by the stones, and I didn’t want to get down here and find giant rats or worse living here when we had a time crunch.”
Grendel nodded.
Several minutes of travel to the West later, they climbed up another ladder, and took a reading. “South East by East. Let’s go home and get cleaned up. Then we can pull out a map and get a good fix on this thing’s location.
-
A good cleaning (because neither wanted to brave Bri’s wrath), A hearty lunch of a creamy fish stew with bacon alongside a loaf of bread, and a good look at a map later, the pair headed to the point where the lines had crossed.
The route they followed ended in a back alley, just above what the sewer map had called “Johnson’s Hole”.
There was no ladder that led into the hole, so they had to backtrack a ways to find an entrance. Once down the pair slowly followed the wand towards the hole. As they crept closer, Grendel pulled a knife with deeply inlaid runes from his belt, and Max, holding the wand in his left hand, placed his right on the hilt of his short sword. They entered the Hole.
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