Chương 73: 30-2.Parlay

The two gorges with names that sounded like they'd been designed to chew people up and spit out the bones turned out to contain, as Jessi had vaguely implied, neither roaming monsters nor carnivorous plants of the man-swallowing variety. That did not make them any less frightening. If anything, the opposite. The terror wasn't something that would leap at you.

It was the kind that arrived when you made the mistake of looking down—and began to wonder whether someone who had fallen to the bottom of that darkness could still, in any meaningful sense, be considered alive. The gorge floors were black with depth. Wind came up from below in long cold exhales, pressing against your face like something breathing up at you from the dark.

Jessi had mentioned, with her characteristic cheerfulness, that if you were going to fall in, you'd better have packed a few loaves of bread, because there was a reasonable chance you'd starve to death on the way down before the landing finished the job. Jessi's sense of humor was, at times, more unsettling than the joke itself. In any case: past those two charming landmarks, we finally spotted the lights of Angel's Gate glowing against the darkened horizon.

It wasn't the scattered flicker of a village, or the temporary warmth of a caravan's campfire. It was the kind of light a city produces when it has driven human habitation into the dark by force of sheer density. At this distance, a hard push could get us through the gates within a few hours. We weren't in a hurry. Per Olivia's assessment, we were currently not a caravan. We were a piece of meat that had grown its own legs and was wandering around with its fat on full display. Unpleasant description.

Accurate description. I had Lucas work on making the luxury wagon look like something that had seen better decades, then had everyone make sure the horses were properly fed. That freed up some carrying space in the old flat wagon. The real challenge was Olivia's carriage. By noble standards, it was already understated—but noble standards weren't the relevant benchmark in a city where the constables served primarily as decorative fixtures. I called Lucas and Alvira over.

"Any chance we can make this wagon look less like it's actively inviting people to rob it?" Alvira looked at me, then at Lucas—who appeared to be one moderate breeze away from toppling over—then exhaled with the reluctant air of someone agreeing to do something beneath them. She drew her wand and pointed it at me.

"To be clear. This is for everyone. Not for you." I had been about to say don't worry, even if you wanted to help me specifically, I wouldn't trust it—but I still needed her tonight, so I closed my mouth. Alvira moved to the wagon. She touched the tip of her wand to the door, the wheel frame, and the roof in turn, murmuring something too short and too quiet to make out. No dramatic light. No wind.

None of the theatrical effects that seemed to accompany magic when someone wanted to make sure everyone in the vicinity was aware they were performing it. Just three brief sparks from the wand tip—there and gone, like struck flint—and then silence. I stared at the wagon for a long moment. It still looked like the same wagon. Same wheels, same door, same timber. Nothing visibly removed or degraded.

But on the second look, that quality it had previously possessed—the one that made you think this thing is clearly worth something—had genuinely faded. As though the layer of quiet ostentation it had been wearing had been carefully sanded away.

"... I can't actually tell what changed." Alvira lifted her chin.

"Hmph. I am the inheritor of the Ancient Silver Moon Oath, the Chanter of the Shattered Emerald Stars, Child of the Sunset Forest, self-appointed—""All right, pause." She raised an eyebrow.

"You're very practiced at that interruption."

"I have to be." I pressed two fingers to my forehead.

"If I let you finish, the wagon will still be outside the city and I'll have been crushed to death by your titles." Jessi's shoulders were already shaking. Matthews had quietly turned his face away, applying considerable effort to keeping his expression neutral. Alvira gave a cold huff and put her wand away.

"If you don't understand it, stay quiet. This isn't transformation—it's suppression. Someone who's actually hunting prey doesn't lead with which wagon is prettiest. They lead with which wagon looks like it's hiding something good. Now at least we won't be the obvious first choice."

"So we went from a glowing fat sheep to a slightly less glowing fat sheep?"

"Keep talking and I'll turn you into an actual sheep." This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it"I'll pass." If even Alvira was satisfied, the wagon was at least passable. The person who actually brought everything together properly, though, was Olivia. She hadn't come over to watch the spellwork. She'd been on the other side of the wagon the entire time, quietly reorganizing its contents.

By the time I walked over, she had already stripped the soft interior curtains from the cabin walls, folded them, and pressed them into rough cloth bundles. The cover on the seat cushions had been flipped to show the older, more worn side. Two copper decorative brackets from the wagon shaft had been removed and set aside. Even the placement of the water skins had been repositioned.

I looked more closely and realized that the water skins previously hanging on the outermost position had been replaced with the older, darker-colored ones. The newer ones had been moved inside. She had even split open a bag of concentrated feed and mixed it into the ordinary fodder. My eye twitched slightly.

"... Was that last part strictly necessary?" Olivia didn't look up. She pulled the final rope knot tight.

"Yes."

"People steal wagons, not horses."

"People who look at wagons also look at horses." She said it with complete calm.

"Horses that are too healthy, feed that's too good, water skins that are too new, axles with no wear—all of it is just as visible. A genuinely struggling merchant convoy can't afford to have everything in this kind of condition." Two seconds of silence. Then, with considerable reluctance, I acknowledged that she was right. That was the most difficult thing about her. She wasn't the type to climb to a high place and lecture you. She didn't split a single observation into three cryptic installments.

She just pointed things out, with the same tone you'd use to say it's going to rain, bring the laundry in. And that particular tone made it nearly impossible to find a foothold for disagreement. I crouched down and picked up the two copper brackets she'd removed.

"Where do these go?" Olivia glanced at me—the look of someone confirming that I was, in fact, finally prepared to be useful.

"Not with the dried provisions. And don't let Jessi near them."

"Isn't that second part a little targeted?"

"Not targeted." Her voice was level.

"Preventive."

"Hey, that's a bit much," Jessi called from a short distance away, tossing a bundle of rough cloth onto the wagon without particular urgency.

"I have professional ethics, you know." I looked at her.

"What professional ethics?"

"Information broker ethics. You fleece other people's money beautifully, and you don't let your own team fall apart first."

"... That sentence is not the reassurance it appears to be trying to be."

"That's your problem, not mine." Matthews came over, set a bundle of shortened wooden stakes beside the wagon, looked at the reorganized exterior, and nodded.

"Better."

"Better as in we look more like people who might survive?" I asked.

"Better as in we don't look like the first target worth hitting." The old soldier was nothing if not direct. Fair enough. That was probably the right standard for Angel's Gate. We made camp that night on a sheltered slope not far from the city walls. Too close was a problem. Too far was unnecessary.

Olivia picked the location—a spot backed against a jutting black rock that hid our firelight from the main road, slightly elevated above the surrounding ground to prevent overnight moisture, with a ring of half-dead scrub brush on one side to break the wind. Horses tied on the inner side, wagons on the outer perimeter, enough space between them to move quickly if something happened.

I had been standing nearby watching, and somewhere in the middle of watching, I realized she was adjusting the convoy's outward appearance even in the act of making camp. Erina's outer cloak—the one made of fabric that was too fine for a traveler who wanted to go unnoticed—had been exchanged for a darker travel wrap. Her hair had been simply tied back, losing the neat precision that quietly announced breeding and education.

Olivia herself had tightened her collar and cuffs into something more plain and functional, removed a brooch that had been too conspicuous, and swapped out the pair of gloves that were too delicate for the role she was playing. Without exaggerating: those two women, simply by standing there in their original presentation, had been elevating the convoy's threat profile by a measurable degree. And now, piece by piece, Olivia was pressing that back down.

"Jessi. Don't wear the red one tomorrow," Olivia said.

"Wh—why not? That one suits me."

"Too visible."

"I'm inherently visible."

"Which is why your clothing doesn't need to help." Jessi opened her mouth. Found nothing. Closed it again, made a disgruntled sound, and went to dig through her pack.

"Matthews." Olivia turned.

"Tomorrow inside the city, you should be the one conducting negotiations and speaking to people. You look like someone who's traveled rough roads for years." Matthews nodded.

"And you two?"

"Erina and I keep quiet." She answered without hesitation.

"If necessary, I'm the bookkeeper. She has a weak constitution—doesn't do well with wind or noise." Erina, standing nearby, offered no objection to this arrangement. She simply pulled her borrowed cloak a little tighter. I'd been listening, and at this point I couldn't help myself.

"What about me?" Olivia turned to look at me.

"You speak as little as possible."

"... Is that arrangement not slightly blunt?"

"It's not blunt." She looked at me with an expression of perfect, unhurried certainty.

"The moment you open your mouth, you don't sound like someone who loses. That kind of person draws trouble in Angel's Gate before they've even done anything." I genuinely could not find a rebuttal for that. Jessi laughed so hard she nearly dropped the clothes she'd just pulled out directly into the fire.

"She knows you, Cedric."

"Shut up." Alvira, leaning against the rock with her arms folded, added one final remark.

"She's right." That was the last exit sealed off. I rubbed my hair with mild irritation and gave up, turning back to Olivia.

"And if I absolutely have to be the one to step forward?" She had clearly been expecting this question. She didn't even pause.

"Say you're the head guard—responsible for the cargo. Don't discuss goods, don't name prices, don't step in for anyone. If someone provokes you, look at Matthews first. If someone is probing for information—" She paused for a single beat.

"Look at me first." I stopped.

"... Look at you?"

"Yes." She pushed the last roll of rough cloth under the wagon and stood up, brushing the dust from her hands.

"Look at me first." She said it the way you'd say take the left fork tomorrow morning. And the strangest part was that I didn't find it strange at all. Because if I was being honest with myself—before she'd even said it, that was already what I'd been planning to do. The moment I realized that, I went quiet for a second. Not a large thing, objectively speaking.

She understood provisions, accounts, how to make an entire group of people look like they weren't worth robbing—of course I'd defer to her in that kind of situation. It was entirely sensible. But there's a difference between something being sensible and something becoming so natural that you don't notice it happening until it already has. I'd crossed that line somewhere along the road, apparently. I gave her the only answer that seemed appropriate.

"Understood." Olivia nodded, as though that settled it.