Chapter 374: Mercenaries and Mice

“Thank you for coming. We’ll send a runner in the next couple of days if we decide to hire you.”

Dys smiled politely at the nervous young man as he bowed his head and muttered farewells in an anxious voice. She was beginning to hate that phrase. It was just so… canned. It made her feel like she was lying, even though she wasn’t really. She really would send a runner if they decided to hire this guy. She just didn’t think it was very likely that they would. However, just out and out announcing that she didn’t think the young guard was a good fit for their mercenary company right to his face felt too rude even for her usual style of bluntness.

“What do you think?” Dys asked as soon as Aila closed the door behind the man.

“His qualifications are fairly average for someone who hasn’t yet reached CLR twenty,” the redheaded arcanist said in her typical cool, business-like tone. “The fact that he has been working as a guard for a private merchant guild for over two years is a good sign. However, he’s a city man. Since he’s never left Eldingholt, he has no real experience being on the road or roughing it. That could make him a liability in many situations, unless he gets the right training.”

Nodding along to Aila’s assessment, Dys turned her head to look at Thea when the redhead finished. Thea had sat quietly during the interview, just as she had for the past dozen or so. She had only uttered a few words, asking a short question here or there, but just as Jadis had expected, the shy woman was sharp in her observations.

“He k—kept looking at you,” Thea said quietly after a brief pause. “The way he was, ah, looking, I think he was m—more interested in you than the j—job.”

“Yeah, I got the feeling he was another gawker,” Dys grumbled in frustration. “The way he responded to some of our questions seemed kind of distracted. Good odds he just wanted a chance to see me in person.”

Aila sighed as she crossed her arms and leaned against the desk they had set up in the office.

“This would be so much easier if you weren’t such a celebrity.”

“Hey, it’s not my fault!” Dys frowned. “I was born this pretty. I can’t help it if people want to bask in my beauty.”

“Considering the nature of your birth, I don’t think you can actually claim that to be true,” Aila smirked at Dys.

“Good point…”

So. Another fruitless interview. Unfortunately, that had been the case for the majority of the interviews so far that day. While Nevan and Orla had done their best to try and find serious candidates for the job, there was only so much the couple could do to filter out the people who were really only interested in gawking at the rumored Nephilim versus those who actually wanted work. And even among those who were truly looking for a job, the pickings were apparently slim.

“Anyway, who’s next?” Aila asked, looking at Dys expectantly.

“Another human man,” she replied. “This guy’s older, though. When he spoke with Gunnar, he introduced himself as Terrance.”

“Ah, the runner,” Aila nodded as she checked a list that she’d written for herself. “A local. Orla said he’s supposed to be pretty well-liked in the community. Hopefully he’s serious.”

Dys nodded thoughtful as her other self observed the man as he talked with Gunnar in the main open hall. While Syd had continued to aid Sabina and the workers with setting up the smithy out back, Jay had come inside and “oversaw” the work that the carpenters were doing on the second floor. In reality, she was just using it as an excuse to loiter on the second-floor balcony and watch the candidates as they came into the building. It was a good way for her to see what the interviewees were like before they got to introduce themselves to her Dys self in the office.

Terrance looked like a plain, middle-aged man with a shaved head and a goatee. He was fit a trim, a bit on the short side, but otherwise unremarkable in appearance. He was supposed to be one of the higher CLR candidates that had reached out to be interviewed that day and was probably one of the oldest as well. Certainly, from the way he moved as he followed Gunnar to the office door, he presented an air of calm confidence that gave Jadis a good impression. If he had nerves, he was doing a good job of keeping a lid on them.

As Gunnar opened the door and introduced Terrance to Dys, Aila, and Thea, a shout out in the yard caught the attention of Jadis’ third body.

“Did you hear that?” Syd asked as she set the large anvil down in the spot where Sabina had directed her.

“Um, yes, I think so?” Sabina responded distractedly, her focus on the complicated series of ropes and pulleys that would eventually make up her forge’s bellows. “Do you mean that dog barking, or the guy singing about big-breasted women, or the little kid that’s crying?”

Syd had to pause and stare at the smith. She’d forgotten that Sabina was a half-elf and thus had much more sensitive hearing than she did.

“The crying child,” Syd clarified.

“Yeah, that one is unusual for where we are,” Sabina agreed as she pulled on a rope that caused her contraption to swing wildly and almost knock a worker over. “Sorry!”

“I’m going to go check on that,” Syd murmured as she left the preoccupied smith to her work.

Stepping out of the large storage building, it only took a second for Syd to spot the source of the unexpected noise. Mostly because it was coming straight for her.

“My friend!” Tegwyn called out, a bemused smile on his face as he approached her. “I have caught one of our mice!”

Syd stared at the approaching Dryad, a frown deepening on her face with every step he took. When he came to a stop a few feet away from her, she decided to open with the obvious.

“That’s a child.”

Tegwyn looked at the small gnome dangling from his right hand by the collar.

“Yes, I believe she is.”

“Why are you carrying a child? A crying child?”

“Well,” Tegwyn shrugged, causing the little girl to bounce slightly in her coat. “She was one of those little lambs I saw sneaking around the back of the storage yard. There were seven or eight, but she was the one I managed to catch. Probably because she’s a gnome. Small legs, doesn’t move as fast.”

Syd sighed as she shook her head at the Dryad’s explanation. Since it was Tegwyn, it was hard to tell if he was joking or if he really didn’t see the problem with abducting a small child and swinging her around like a fish on a line. Even if the kid was trespassing, this was not what Jadis had expected him to do when he’d promised to root out the trouble-making children.

The child was, as Tegwyn had pointed out, definitely a gnome. The bluish face markings were a dead giveaway. It was hard to tell age since the race was so small, but Jadis guessed the kid couldn’t have been older than ten. Probably closer to six or seven. She was wearing a threadbare woolen jacket and boots that were clearly a size too big for her tiny feet. The hat on her head looked like it had been hand-knit by a family member rather than something bought from a shop. She looked like she probably would have been an adorable little girl, though it was hard to tell since her face was all twisted up and red as she loudly cried.

Leaning forward and putting on her friendliest smile, Syd spoke to the little gnome in an attempt to calm her down.

“Hey there, my name’s Syd. What’s your name?”

Syd jumped back a little as, unexpectedly, the little girl’s face scrunched up in terror as she began wailing even louder. Her terrified scream was enough to cause the workers inside the smithy to come out and see what was happening.

“What’s going on?” Sabina asked with concern as came up next to Syd.

“Teg caught a kid running around our property and she’s freaking the fu—frick out,” Syd answered in exasperation. Holding out her hands, she tried to calm the child down again. “Hey, calm down, no one’s going to hurt you! It’s okay! What—”

Syd’s words were cut off as the tiny gnome somehow managed to cry even louder, all attempts at consolation falling on deaf ears.

“Here, let me have her,” Sabina marched up to the now grimacing Tegwyn. “Let’s take her inside and get her something warm to drink and maybe she’ll calm down enough to tell us her name and then maybe who her parents are. Oh, and maybe some of the workers around here know who she is if she hangs around the area a lot so we should probably send someone to ask around.”

Jadis watched, both impressed and mildly amused, as Sabina took charge of the situation in a way that she normally did not act. Taking the child in her arms from Tegwyn, she held the little girl against her chest and headed towards the back door of the building. For her part, the little girl didn’t throw her arms around Sabina or anything like that, but she did quiet down a little. That may have just been a result of her face being pressed up against the smith’s apron, but it was at least a small improvement.

Once inside, the wailing gnome quieted down slightly, but that seemed to be more an effect of an increase in terror, rather than a lessening of it. When Sabina sat the girl down on one of the seats next to the fire in the half-finished kitchen, she went stiff as a statue, like a mouse that had been caught out in the open by a cat. She still let out the occasional wail of fear, but it was almost as though her mind couldn’t decide which way to respond, crying or freezing.

“Sh—shoot,” Syd grumbled as she folded her arms. “I wish Eir was here. She’d know what to do.”

Eir was still back at the temple district, putting her healing skills to use. While Jadis agreed it was a good use of her time, now that she needed her, she hated not having her cleric lover immediately at hand. Certainly, Eir had to be better with children than everyone else at the headquarters.

“Hans, would you please make something warm and sweet for her?” Sabina asked the man. “I think she could use something like—oh! Oh, thank you, Hans. You’re the best!”

Sabina praised the cook as he pulled a slice of warm fruit pie out from somewhere as well as a cup of honeyed tea. Both of the sweet treats found their way in front of the little girl, which seemed to tempt her. Jadis could see the longing in the tiny gnome’s eyes as she looked at the slice of crumbled pie, but she didn’t take the offered food. Her gaze kept drifting towards Syd, and every time she looked at her, the crying would renew in vigor.

While Sabina tried to get the little girl to eat and talk, Syd spoke with Tegwyn.

“Where did you catch her, anyway? And what about all the other kids?”

“The back left corner,” the Dryad hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “It was hard to follow tracks since the pack was running around and making a mess of the snow. But I saw where they ran to this time. There’s a drainage grate in that corner. Much too small for me to fit in, but just the right size for adventurous children.”

So the kids had been sneaking around through the sewers? Or was it a storm drain? Was there even a difference? The drainage systems of the capital city hadn’t exactly been on Jadis’ mind before, so she had no idea how any of that worked. In any case, did that mean the kid was some kind of a street rat, or an orphan maybe? Looking at her clothes, she seemed like she didn’t have a lot of money, but she also didn’t look unhealthy or like she was living in poverty. More like she was just from a poor neighborhood and she was wearing hand-me-downs. There was supposed to be a lower level of the city under the street she was on, wasn’t there? It would make sense if that was the poor side of town.

After many minutes with no real progress in calming the scared child down, Jadis decided the best thing to do was to send Thea and maybe Kerr to see if they could find a way down to the lower level. The interview with Terrance was wrapping up anyway and there weren’t any more candidates waiting in the lobby, so Thea would be free to do some door-to-door searching if that was necessary.

The runner’s interview had gone well. Better than everyone else’s had, certainly. Terrance was a polite man with a good-natured laugh and a humble disposition. He was nearing forty years old and was also close to CLR forty. For someone who spent no time in combat with Demons at all, that was actually pretty good. Terrance wanted to reach CLR sixty before he got too old to make use of a third class and had been considering joining a mercenary company ever since the demonic invasion broke out so that he could get some bonus experience points, though he hadn’t built up the courage to make the transition until Nevan and Orla had approached him about Fortune’s Favored.

When Dys walked with the older man out into the main hall of the headquarters and told him that she’d be sending a runner in a couple of days to let him know if they chose to hire him, she really meant it. They were going to have a final discussion of the candidates before hiring anyone, but unless one of her trusted companions had a reasonable objection, she planned on hiring the bald man.

“Thank you again for taking the time to see me,” Terrance smiled somewhat shyly up at Dys as he firmly shook her hand. “I know you, Aila, and Thea must be busy women.”

“We are, but that’s why we want to hire people like you,” Dys grinned down at the man. “Anyway, thanks for coming and—”

Dys’ words were interrupted by the muffled shriek of the tiny gnome girl as she let out a particularly loud wail.

“Was that a child?” the runner asked as his expression instantly switched from shy happiness to concern.

“Sounded like a cat with its tail caught in a wheel,” Aila exclaimed as she looked in the direction of the kitchen door. “What’s going on?”

Of course, Aila didn’t know about the child Tegwyn had caught, nor would Thea or Terrance. Dys only knew because she was the same person as Syd.

Uncertain as to whether she should reveal her multi-body status to Terrance since that fact about Jadis wasn’t common knowledge among the public, Dys hesitated. Seeing her reply wavering on her lips, Aila spoke up and smoothly covered for Dys’ lapse.

“Whatever it is, it sounds like it came from the kitchen. If you’ll excuse us, Terrance, we’d best see what the rest of our company has been up to this afternoon.”

Aila quickly strode over to the door, Dys and Thea following close behind. When the redhead threw open the door to reveal Syd, Sabina, Tegwyn, and Hans gathered around a crying gnome, she looked genuinely flummoxed.

“Uh…?”

“Tegwyn found her running around outside in the storage yard,” Syd quickly explained. “We thought we’d better bring her inside and ask her where she came from, but she’s been wailing non-stop this whole time and we don’t know what to do!”

The last came out with a little more desperation than Jadis had intended, but her nerves really were starting to get frazzled by all the crying. Jadis liked kids, but her experience caring for them was limited and she’d already exhausted all she knew how to do.

“Oh. Well…” Aila trailed off, clearly having trouble adjusting to the suddenness of unexpected situation. “Did she tell us her name, or…?”

“Fiona?”

Dys and Syd turned to look at Terrance in surprise, as did the rest of the men and women in the kitchen. The runner hadn’t left when Aila had dismissed him and had instead quietly followed behind. Standing at the door, he stared at the little girl with a look of mild surprise.

“You know her?” Dys asked with a raised eyebrow.

Terrance nodded, a wry smile twisting his lips as he let out a soft laugh.

“Yes, I do. No idea how she got up here, but I do know her.”

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