Chương 29: Waste of a Good Sandwich

Paige stared back at Aaron as if he had grown an extra head. It was admittedly an unusual request, but perfectly reasonable if she knew what he had planned. Judging by Paige's bewildered expression, she had no clue.

"Um, why?" she asked, raising an eyebrow and tilting her head slightly.

"I've got a plan to free Cuthbert. I just figured you had a wind spirit or something you could use."

"Hang on a minute, CUTHBERT?" She looked like the only thing holding her back from laughing was her confusion about the sandwich.

"Yes, I can create a small storm spirit and get your sandwich on the roof, but why?"

"I can use the ham to open the cage. I know it sounds stupid, but you'll see for yourself." Aaron felt ridiculous saying it out loud, but he couldn't have been more serious. And the situation was becoming more urgent as Gully worked his way through his potion demonstration.

"Quick, he's demonstrating the next potion. The crowd will be distracted." Paige stared at Aaron for a moment. He couldn't tell if she was questioning his mental integrity or trusted him but thought his plan was stupid anyways. Aaron focused intensely on the sandwich and cast his Manipulate skill. It was effortless to cast it on such a small piece of ham, especially as it was now rank five. Aaron remembered how exhausted it made him the first few times he cast it.

It wasn't as easy as his old healing skills, but he felt reassured that his power was growing.

"Fine." Paige snatched the neatly wrapped sandwich out of his hand and walked off, slipping into the shadows around the crowd. The braziers created an intense focus of light around the show Gully was putting on. The shadows towards the back of the crowd were deep, and it was easy enough to sneak away unnoticed. Aaron watched Paige closely. She walked gracefully with her shoulders back like a noble. It was a stark contrast from how she acted in the infirmary or at Giddon's house. She adapted perfectly.

The guards around the shop didn't seem to notice, or care, that she had left and circled around the back of Gully's apothecary. They were distracted watching Gully and probably bored. If they did notice her, they probably wouldn't have batted an eyelid at a noble woman walking off. It wouldn't have been their place to challenge her. This would probably make her an excellent thief, Aaron thought. Guards wouldn't expect a woman like her to be up to no good.

Aaron could barely see her now, as she was tucked away in the alley next to the shop. She threw the sandwich up with a delicate underarm throw. It hovered up at a gentle speed as if carried by an invisible rope. It arced over onto the lowest edge of the roof and landed gracefully as if cushioned by a pillow full of goose down. He wasn't close enough to see properly, but she said she'd use a storm spirit to send it up. Aaron focused his spirit on the sandwich.

He had already infused the ham with some mana when he cast Manipulate on it, but it was far away and he really had to focus to maintain the connection. Casting on faraway objects was much more difficult and used a lot of mana. Focusing on the ham, he willed it to pulse in smooth waves. It took a while, but he managed to use the movement to wiggle it out of the bread and flop onto the wet roof. Luckily, it wasn't that steep, and he was able to keep it firmly on the tiles. Moving with waves seemed to be effective.

He had seen snakes in the city move in a similar way, zig-zagging their bodies across the dirt in the warmer months. Aaron continued the pattern. [Somatomancy talent improved] Flesh Mastery: Rank 3 That was quicker than Aaron anticipated. Aaron suspected it levelled up quickly because of the difficulty of the manoeuvre due to the distance or the fact that Aaron was practising a different movement pattern. He made a mental note of it, thinking he could test out the best way to improve his skills later.

He needed to focus on the task at hand. Aaron felt beads of sweat collecting on his nose and dripping onto his chin. He had been inching the ham across the roof for fifteen minutes and gained another rank in Flesh Mastery before he reached the apex of the roof from which Cuthbert's cage was suspended. His mana had lasted really well. The combined rank of all the other skills and higher level of Manipulate must have increased his maximum effective mana and made casting with it more efficient.

The braziers projected dark shadows upwards. You could barely see the ham on the roof, even if you were looking for it. Aaron was confident the crowd was far too distracted by Gully's show to notice the pink slab of meat sliding down into the cage. A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. Focusing his mana, Aaron carefully dangled the ham over the rope which was attached to an old weather vane at the apex of the roof.

He connected the sides of the ham together in a cylindrical shape around the rope, stiffening and interlocking the edges, reinforcing it into a tube. Carefully, he edged the ham over the edge until natural forces took over. It slid down the rope and splatted on the roof of the cage. Aaron wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. The hard bit was over, and no one seemed to be aware of what was going on above Gully's head.

He crept the ham along the roof of the cage and attached it to one of the bars, again using the cylinder method. It slid down slowly onto the clip which kept the cage door shut. He folded the ham in half and wedged the long end underneath the clip. A bit of force should be enough to pop it open. Caw caw caw. Cuthbert started to make noise and flap around the cage, clearly disturbed by the intruding artisanal meat.

He started to peck and pluck away at the ham in the lock, tearing off and eating little pieces, making it very difficult for Aaron to focus and control it. He felt the spell weaken with each peck. Luckily, no one looked up, but it wouldn't be long if he kept flapping around and making noise. Caw, caw, CAW!

'STOP!' Aaron screamed in his mind. The bird was sealing his own demise, and Aaron felt powerless to stop him. Suddenly, his chest went icy cold, and he felt a small chunk of his dwindling mana pool get used up. Cuthbert stopped. He left the ham alone and sat back on his perch in silence. [Somatomancy talent unlocked] Dominion over Undead: Rank 1 Aaron kept staring up at the cage, eyes wide and unblinking as if he had just witnessed a murder. So he could control undead?

It kind of made sense since he could learn the ability to raise corpses, and that could be messy if lacking the ability to control them. In the legends, Necromancers controlled entire armies of them. He didn't even consider Cuthbert to be undead, as he still had part of his soul remaining, but he must be at least partially so. Aaron snapped the thoughts out of his mind and focused on the ham. It was full of tiny holes and dislodged from the clip, but he quickly folded it over and stuffed it back underneath.

He contracted the fibres in the ham to stiffen it, creating a small gap under the clip. He used the extra space to fold another layer of ham inside itself. Now four layers thick, with one final push, he was able to burst the clip open, releasing the door. Cuthbert got up from his perch and flew out from the cage and down towards the crowd. The nobles gasped and ducked as he swooped over towards Aaron. For a moment, he thought the bird was coming to him, but he prayed that wasn't the case.

Thankfully, he swooped over, just barely missing the top of his head and disappeared into the dark town behind him. Paige hadn't said a word this whole time. She was looking at Aaron with her jaw gaping open.

Paige and Aaron didn't hang around to see Gully's reaction. They were halfway across the town by now, only a few minutes from Giddeon's house. The drag of the day was starting to get to Aaron; his legs ached and his steps were sluggish. Using so much mana up definitely wasn't helping.

"That was incredible. And disgusting," Paige said.

"I've never seen anything like it. Mind powers like telekinesis are so rare." Aaron blushed at the complement, even if it was a bit backhanded.

"It's not mind magic, it's a Somatomancy spell."

"Oh, that makes sense." Aaron didn't know how it made so much sense to Paige, because he still hadn't completely figured it out. She must have some background knowledge about his class.

"What do you mean?" He asked. Paige returned with a bemused look, as if this should be common knowledge for a necromancer. Perhaps she didn't know how difficult it was to find information about his class in the city.

"Oh. Somatomancy is the power over the body. It's how Necromancers control their undead minions." Paige spoke so flippantly about raising the dead as if she were talking about cleaning her dishes.

"That's not how I've been using it. It's perfect for healing particular types of afflictions and wounds." Paige folded her arms.

"You can summon undead, right?"

"No," he said, "I resurrected Cuthbert accidentally by restarting his heart."

"What do you mean, no!" She shouted, "We had a deal!"

"I said I could do it with a little practice," Aaron corrected. Paige rolled her eyes. Aaron was getting the sense that she did this a lot.

"You had me believe you could do it, and I risked my safety to help you. That's shameful."

"No, it's not my fault you saw it that way. Besides, it's not a big deal. If I level up my abilities and find enough mana to invest in the skill, I'll be able to do it in no time."

"Do you know how much mana it takes to learn these things? Some gifted spend years training to coalesce enough mana to learn new skills." Paige was misled. He'd managed to upgrade talents every six months or so as a spirit Healer.

"I have vitality draining. I did it before, and it was pretty easy to learn a new skill. Besides, I can feel that my potential mana is almost enough to learn it." Aaron intentionally played down the difficulty of almost draining a guard to death to harvest enough mana remnants. But it seemed to mollify Paige for now.

"We need to find you a corpse then!" Aaron was still shocked by the way Paige could talk about corpses and undead in such a nonchalant way. Not that Aaron had anything specifically against it. The dead didn't need their mana, and he didn't exactly have the luxury of morals when he and Tim's lives were at risk. However, he didn't expect it from this girl he met in a laundry room. Bells started tolling in the distance. They spread and got closer, until they were coming from all directions.

Paige turned to Aaron with fear in her eyes. Had they been found out? Did they somehow know it was them who freed the bird? Were the peacekeepers onto them and alerted to a Necromancer in the town? Thousands of thoughts rushed through Aaron's mind; none of them involved the bells ringing for a positive reason. Paige grabbed Aaron by the wrist. His arm lurched hard in its socket as Paige pulled him into a run.

"Quick, it's the corrupted!"