Wizard Tournament: Chapter 7 (Patreon)

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­Five Days before the Conflux

          “You’re late,” Sylnya said when Draevin sat down for breakfast. They were meeting at their usual spot which was an open-air café situated on the West side of the main drag. They came here as much for the food as for the convenient location near both the arena and The Pot. Normally Sylnya just hung out and drank water while mining Draevin for as many details as she could about the potential match-ups. But today was different. Today Sylnya was footing the bill.

          “It’s really more your fault than mine that I’m late,” Draevin replied.

          Sylnya raised an eyebrow. “Oh yeah? How’s that?”

          Draevin closed his eyes and tried to imagine the feeling again. “Two words. Living. Cotton.”

          Sylnya chuckled. “Yeah, that’s their claim to fame. Gotta play to your strengths.” A gnome waiter came by, but Sylnya waved him off. “He just sat down, he’s going to need a minute.”

          “Of course ma’am. Sir?” The gnome handed Draevin a copy of the menu and backed away politely.

          “No, it’s alright,” Draevin told the waiter before he got too far away. “I already know what I want.” 

          “Excellent, sir.”

          “You’re paying, right?” Draevin asked Sylnya even though he knew she was.

          “Yeah, so don’t go overboard.”

          “Right.” He looked at the waiter. “I’ll have your Champion’s Omelet, and can you elf-size that?”

          “We can for an additional fee.”

          “Great, and do you have the option to upgrade to dragon eggs?”

          The waiter nodded. “That can be done on an elf-sized order for a…” He cleared his throat unnecessarily. “Considerable fee.”

          “Don’t worry, she’s good for it,” Draevin said as he handed the menu back. The waiter gave a short bow and walked back to the kitchens.

          “Hey!” Sylnya objected. She was looking at a menu of her own and her eyes looked alarmed. “I said don’t go overboard. Dragon eggs cost more than truffle shavings!”

          “I didn’t get truffle shavings. Besides, they say dragon eggs are good luck. I could use some good luck.”

          Sylnya was still looking at her menu. She jabbed her finger on an item. “Look here. You can get the Two-for-Five combo meal and select the omelet option. That’s two normal plates for five silver. They charge five just to upgrade to elf-size, and that’s usually only twice as big. It’s a rip-off!”

          “Well I already ordered. You should have said something sooner.”

          Sylnya shot up and followed after the waiter. “It’s not too late to change it,” she said. “Sir. Sir!” She disappeared around the corner.

          “Don’t forget my dragon egg…” Draevin stopped midsentence when he saw she was too far away to hear him. Surely she wouldn’t strip away his upgrade as well as change out his order. He turned back to the now-empty table only to find it was no longer empty. That pesky human that had hired Sylnya had pulled up a chair and was now seated to Draevin’s right. He was pretty sure the human’s name was Peyton. “What are you doing here? Are you even allowed to be here?”

          “Why wouldn’t I be?” Peyton asked innocently.

          “They don’t allow humans…” Draevin trailed off while he looked for the sign. There was supposed to be a sign posted at the entrance to the veranda that read Wᴇ Rᴇsᴇʀᴠᴇ ᴛʜᴇ Rɪɢʜᴛ ᴛᴏ Rᴇꜰᴜsᴇ Sᴇʀᴠɪᴄᴇ ᴛᴏ Aʟʟ Hᴜᴍᴀɴs, Gᴏʙʟɪɴs ᴀɴᴅ Oʀᴄs. He’d seen it dozens of times, but suddenly it was nowhere to be seen.

          “Don’t allow humans what?” Peyton asked.

          “I guess they changed their policy…” Draevin made a mental note to find a new place to start getting breakfast.

          “Sylnya told me to meet her here this morning,” the human told him. “I had more questions and she said we could discuss them over breakfast. I did some thinking last night and decided I really want to know how the guild determines the brackets and match order.”

          Draevin waved his hand dismissively. “They have a spell to randomize things.”

          Peyton pushed his glasses further up his nose, then pulled out a loose page from within his notepad. “That’s what I thought they might be telling people, but I noticed some disturbing patterns in the brackets that wouldn’t be very likely to happen by chance. For instance, how come none of the serious contenders are matched against each other? The soonest any of them could potentially fight wouldn’t even be until the quarter finals. It looks to me like they’re saving the more exciting matches until the later rounds.” When he was done speaking, he slid the paper he’d been looking at to Draevin’s side of the table for examination. It was a copy of the brackets with notes next to each of the contestants denoting whether they were a newbie, regular, or serious contender. It appeared he had gotten a lot of information out of Sylnya.

          A green hand reached out from behind Draevin’s seat and snatched up the page. “This yours Peter?” Sylnya asked. Draevin had a moment of panic when she said the human’s name until he realized he hadn’t actually referred to the human by the wrong name out loud.

          “Yes. My notes so far,” Peter answered. “I was hoping you could give me an idea of what items the contestants might have on them.”

          “He sure is getting his money’s worth out of you,” Draevin commented dryly. “You regretting this job yet?”

          Sylnya stuck her tongue out at Draevin before taking her seat again. “If you only knew how much I was getting paid you wouldn’t be saying that.” She turned to Peter without a hint of irritation. “I can’t tell you what items contestants will be using until they’re announced, sorry. Some of the more regular contestants can be guessed at but even they can sometimes surprise you.”

          Peter frowned to himself.

          “I did hear a rumor though,” she added, “that Ryldryn might be using Tel’Andrid.”

          Draevin was glad he hadn’t been drinking anything, or he might have choked. “You’re kidding! Ryldryn? That hack can barely light a campfire unaided!”

          “Oh please, he qualifies most years. Even a shit regular is still a decent wizard.”

          Draevin rolled his eyes. “I suppose it’s a matter of perspective…”

          “What’s this ‘Tel’Andrid’?” Peter asked.

          “Only the most powerful artifact ever!” Draevin answered. “It disrupts conventional strategies for them to even allow it to count as one item in the first place!” He snatched Peter’s bracket back and gave it a quick look over. “Damn, I guess it’s just going to be Ryldryn versus Ka in the finals this year unless some newbie gets lucky and picks one of them off.”

          Sylnya answered Peter’s question as soon as Draevin stopped griping. “Tel’Andrid is an entire city of powerful wizards sealed inside an unbreakable miniature pocket dimension.”

          “They have their own mana well in there,” Draevin added in a disgusted voice.

          “They do,” Sylnya confirmed. “Mana is the only thing that can go in or out and the wizards inside can force it across the threshold to power whoever’s holding it. A whole city of wizards channeling mana to the wielder… it’s practically a mana-well-in-a-bottle.”

          Peter’s forehead scrunched together. “That sounds unbeatable,” he said.

          “It’s as close to unbeatable as an artifact can get,” Draevin agreed. “I hope that rumor you heard proves false, Syl. Ryldryn doesn’t deserve the status of Champion.”

          Peter took back his page and tucked it back into his notepad. “What are the chances,” he asked with a dark glower, “that Ryldryn would face Unit-17 in the first round?”

          Sylnya shrugged. “The same as for anyone, right? One in thirty-two?”

          A waiter arrived a moment later with Draevin’s food: two heaping plates of omelets. Yellow omelets. He squinted at them suspiciously. “Aren’t dragon eggs black?”

          “You wanted dragon dragons?” Sylnya asked in a facsimile of stupefaction. “Those are just chicken-dragon eggs. Chickens are distant cousins of dragons, right Peter?”

          “They are? I’ve never heard that b—” Draevin heard a rustle under the table. “Oh right,” Peter suddenly continued in a strained voice, “I think I might have read that in a… book or something…”

          Draevin glared at Sylnya, but she just flashed him a winning smile. “See? You won’t even notice the difference.”

          “I definitely will,” Draevin grumbled. He should have expected as much. Getting money out of Sylnya was like trying to milk a cat. “Well at least the portion size is decent.” He grabbed his fork and got ready to dig into the two plates.

          “Yeah,” Sylnya agreed. She grabbed one of the plates and pushed it over to Peter. “I hope it’ll be enough.”

          “Hey!”

          “For me?” the human asked in surprise.

          “I said we’d talk over breakfast, didn’t I? Eat up.”

          Draevin sighed loudly. “No dragon eggs? Normal portion size? I’m going to have to use The Pot after this. You ready to go?”

          “Go?” Peter asked. “We just got our food.”

          “I know. That’s why we can finally go,” Draevin told him. He wasn’t sure what was confusing this human.

          “You’ve clearly never shared a meal with an elf before,” Sylnya told Peter. “Draevin’s the worst I’ve ever seen.”

          “Like you’d be such an expert on eating food, Ms. Sunlight,” Draevin said. He lifted his plate to his lips and started pushing the eggs into his mouth and swallowing. He noticed a creamy buttery taste as it went down. “That was pretty good,” he said, setting down the now empty plate.

          “Did he just…?” Peter said in disbelief. The human hadn’t even touched his eggs.

          “You not hungry, Peter? I could finish those for you.”

          “I don’t think that even took three seconds.” Peter sounded flabbergasted.

          Draevin clapped his stomach. “That’s because I’m a champion.”

          “Like I told you before, you get used to him.”

          “No wonder he’s already asking to use the bathroom,” Peter commented as he took the first bite of his own food.

          “Bathroom? What are you going on about? If I needed a bath I’d just cast Clean Object, I wouldn’t need a special room to do it in.”

          “Didn’t you say you needed to use The Pot?” Peter asked between bites.

          “Yeah, that’s where we’re going next isn’t it?” Draevin pointed into the distance at a nearby hill with a bright white light emanating from the top of it. “You know of any other mana wells powerful enough to make the air glow like that?”

          “The Pot is a mana well?” Peter asked excitedly. “How much do they charge to use it?”

          “Oh, it’s free for contestants,” Sylnya explained. “You only have to pay if you want to use it more than three times a day.”

          “Okay, hold on,” Peter said. He took one last big bite of omelet and put his fork down. “You can finish this, Draevin. I’m done.” Peter pushed his plate toward Draevin. “It was very good, Sylnya, thank you for thinking of me.”

          “Of course.”

          Draevin wasn’t sure what had the human so excited about a mana well, but food was food. He used his fork to carefully extricate a generous portion of the egg around where Peter had touched it and swallowed the remaining half of the omelet in short order. “I’m ready,” he announced, “let’s go.”

          Sylnya almost ‘forgot’ to pay the bill on their way out, but when reminded she did grudgingly cover it. That settled, the trio departed for The Pot, but on their way they came upon a small procession of four guards in purple Guild livery escorting a short figure in chains between them. Both groups were headed in the same direction.

          This was an unusual sight, so out of curiosity Draevin wandered close enough to get a good look. “Keep away from the prisoner!” one of the guards warned. Draevin stopped approaching, but he was only a few paces away now and he got a good look anyway. It wasn’t just a short dwarf they were escorting; it turned out to be a gnome with slicked back red hair and an eye patch. “Whoa there, lads. Slow down,” Trundle told his procession when he caught sight of Draevin. How the little gnome thought he could make requests of the guards that led him in chains was beyond Draevin, but when Trundle suddenly halted the rest of the guards followed suit.

          “We’re to take you to The Pot and then straight back to your cell,” a guard with a shinier lapel than his fellows said, “this isn’t a social outing.”

          “This man here saved my fuckin’ life yesterday!” Trundle countered. “I just wanna pay my respects.”

          “We’re not supposed to—”

          “You don’t have to, aye,” Trundle agreed. He shook his chains and a rattle accentuated the motion. “Don’t forget I’ll be out of these tomorrow, and I’d consider it a kindness.”

          The guard paused. He looked torn. “Oh look,” he said, “my boot’s come untied. Men, hold fast for a moment.” He made a show of leaning down to fuss with a boot that was in perfect order.

          Trundle motioned with his chained hands for Draevin to step closer. At this point Draevin was just curious what this was all about, so he complied. “Closer, damn you. I’m a fuckin’ gnome, ain’t I?”

          Draevin let out an annoyed sigh, but he lowered himself to one knee just the same. “You wanted to thank me?”

          “Well of course!” Trundle said in a strangely loud voice. Draevin wondered why he wanted him to come so close if he was just going to yell in his face. “They stuck me in a cell for that trouble the other day, but they’re still gonna let me compete.” Then without moving his lips he said something else in a whisper. “Talked to my patron ‘bout that ambush.”

          This kind of intrigue didn’t come naturally to Draevin, but even he could tell that whatever message Trundle was trying to whisper to him was the real reason for asking him to come close. “I’m glad to hear that,” Draevin replied in a normal volume.

          “Well if you hadn’t been there when you were I’d be dead: saber demons are serious business,” Trundle continued in the louder tone. Then again he whispered. “Those demons were under pact from a mortal. Another contestant.” And then louder he finished with, “And I just want you to know that I intend to pay ya back for it.” 

          “And why are you telling me this?” Draevin asked. “We don’t need to start trading favors. I was just defending myself, you don’t owe me anything.” This was exactly why Draevin tried to avoid doing nice things: next thing you know you were getting sucked into some demon politics. He hated politics.

          The lead guard stood up. “That’s enough. Let’s move.”

          “A moment!” Trundle pleaded. He reached up and grabbed Draevin’s collar to stop him from stepping away. Draevin almost blasted a spell in his face just for that, but with four Guild witnesses watching he thought better of it. “You should be more grateful when someone’s trying to do you a favor, you damn asshole!”

          Draevin grabbed the gnome’s wrist with every intention of ripping them off his collar when Trundle whispered one last thing. “They were sent to kill you!”

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