The Quantum Wanderer

As always, our room is clean.  We take a look around, having the feeling of being away for a long time, in spite of it being only around a couple of weeks. We have the feeling of coming back home.  I open the window, and I receive hit on the chest that throws me against the wall.  The girls get prepared for a fight, but I look down it is Muninn.

“I missed you too, buddy!”

He caws at me, and positions himself on my lap, looking away.  I start petting him, and Huginn lands on the other leg.  I start petting her as well.

“How have they been treating you guys?  Have you been fed with the dragon meat I left behind?”

He ignores me.  Huginn leans towards me, and shows me several scenes of them being fed.  Some of them, Muninn is refusing to eat, he stays out on a tree.

“I am sorry, but the air there was poisoned.  I was afraid you might slip and get poisoned.  I don’t think they have something made for your size.”

He lifted a single wing, and did some air splitting magic on me.  I inspired pure oxygen.  Cecilia placed her hand on her chin.

“You could have asked the dwarves to shorten the necklace for the amulets…  We were only using two.”

Muninn lowers his head and hits me with his beak.

“*THANK YOU, CECS!”

I keep petting him.

“I am sorry, buddy, I didn’t realize.  This was actually a good idea, I just wish I had had it then.”

He leaves my leg, and flies to the cupboard.  He caws twice, and Huginn follows him.  I stand up.  I start looking around the room, taking in the ‘back to home feeling, when I notice something weird.  The chandelier on the ceiling has some unusual mana around it. 

Create a writing in the air, ‘We are being listened to.  Let’s keep talking, but only generalities.’  The girls nod.  Opal sighs, like that is too much effort.  Some damage has been done already, in terms of the portal magic, but let’s hope that it is something I can mitigate later.  Let’s just act normal for a while.  I am working really hard to hold my anger in.  My private room.  Someone was here, among my private things, and planted a listening device.

When we get out of our room, we bump into a maid.  She is a new one.  I know that because her level is way higher than the other ones.  Her soul is practically shining when compared to the other maids.  Of course, it’s just a flicker in front of a sun when I compare with the dragonesses, but still, a much stronger flicker than the other maids.  She is around Cecilia’s level, perhaps a little higher.

We go down to the dining room.  Rudolph is there.  His head is down.  This is not a something I have seen in a long time.  He is moving slowly.  I take a look around, and sure enough, there are a couple of listening devices as well.  Those devices are seriously expensive.  There is some serious coin being spent on having these many devices in a place.

“Sir.  You’re back.  Is there anything I can prepare for you?”

“Yes, come with me, please.”

We enter my study.  Another device.  I am counting 4 already.  It is ludicrous.  Anthon only had two.  I sit on the table, in front of Rudolph, and I do the silence spell.

“There, now no one can listen to us.”

Rudolph looks me in the eyes, and then jumps to the floor, kowtowing.

“I am sorry sir!  They have my wife and child!”  He starts sobbing, and shaking violently.  From my position, I ask.

“Is that the new maid?”

He lifts up his head, looking in disbelief.

“Did you already realize it, sir?  I am sorry…  I didn’t…  I couldn’t…  I…  I…”  He is ugly crying, with tears and snoot running down his face.

“Did you have contact with anyone else?”

“No, sir.  At one point, I was going home, and when I got there, it was empty, except for that maid.  She showed me their voices through a Comm Gem, and then told me that they would be listening.  And if I betrayed them…”

I tap his back.  I can understand that.  It’s a good thing I didn’t just get rid of the spy, but then again she was already infiltrated, a lot of damage was already done.  The problem is going to be finding Rudolph’s family.  They could be anywhere.  Any disgruntled noble, any curious merchant.  I go around the table, and I sit on the chair.

I signal to Muninn, and both he and Huginn land on the table.  Muninn scratches it a little bit, I think he is still kind of angry.

“I know, and I am sorry.  But now we have something more important.  Can you help locating a couple of people?”

He caws once, I think this is a yes.

“We have to find Rudolph’s family.”

Both of the crows land by Rudolph, that is still kneeling, with his face close to the floor.  They open their third eye.

“Rudolph, focus on your wife’s and child’s faces, really hard.  Focus only on them.”

He didn’t even change the position, he just closed his eyes, and stayed for some time.  At some point, both crows cawed, and left through the window.

“Sir, what do you think…?”

“I have a feeling that we are going to get some answers soon.  Let’s just wait.  In the meantime, we have to pretend that everything is alright.  Avoid any weird subject, just normal stuff.”

“Thank you! Thank you, sir!”  He started cried again, but now it wasn’t such a despair crying.

“Now, you have to recompose yourself, you have to pretend that you are the perfect spy.  Let Muninn and Huginn do their thing.  They are actually good with it.”

We go down, and I suggest the girls to go meet Siratra in the school, and we leave.  Once we are walking towards the other district, Cecilia is the one touch my arm.

“What is going on?”

“Nothing much.  Let’s get to the school, and then we can talk about it.  It is going to feel weird for other people if I pull up a silence spell here.”

We get to the schools, and go to the Command School.  In there I want to let Edward know to keep a low profile towards me in the short future.

Before that, we enter one of the many empty room.  I raise a silence spell.

“Ok, now we can talk.”

“So, what was that all about?”  Cecilia asked.

“We have a spy at home.”

“Why is she still alive?” Shandon asks.

“They have Rudolph’s family.  Once we recover them, then we can start tracking the people involved.  We are in for a cleanup.  I just want to make sure I get whoever is giving the orders as well.  I actually came here to let Edward know.  I don’t know how much they know about us, but I am guessing that Siratra’s studies are a normal fact in the house.”

“How uncivilized!  We should turn them to ashes for the insult.”  Opal says, in her customary pose.

“I agree, but first we have to discover who is ‘them’.  I don’t want just the dog, I want the owner.”

We all nod, and we go to Edward’s office, but it is empty.  His secretary is there, doing a lot of work, though.

“Hi, how are you?”

“I am well.  You are sir Marcelo, right?”

“Yes.  I wonder if the dean is going to come here today?”

She sighs and frowns.

“He should!  A lot of applications, a lot of requests from professors to change shifts and classes.  There is even this one here…”

She shows me a long dissertation by Ambrose, entitled ”Why we should do anything to have Sir Marcelo as a researcher”.  It is around 5 pages long.  Even in the current turmoil, I giggle a little.

“Do you have any way to contact the dean?  You can inform him there is an urgent matter in the schools.  I take full responsibility.”

“I would love nothing more than to make him come to work, but are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Write a short letter, and I will use the school’s messenger.  Only he will be able to read it, it is going to be a mana seal.  If someone else tries to open the letter, it will disintegrate.”

I write a one liner, not disclosing much.  “Hi Edward, I have an urgent matter here at school.  The girls and I are waiting in your office.  Please come fast.”

I handle her the folded letter, and she doesn’t look at its contents, she just seals it with wax and a strange stamp.  I see the wax shining a bit after the process, and I can feel the mana spreading a web around the paper.

“Now we wait.”  The secretary said.  “You are welcome to wait here if you want.  There is also the cafeteria if you prefer.”

“Thank you.”

We leave her office, and we go to Ambrose’s office, to check in on Siratra.  As always, there is some discussion happening there.

We knock on the door, and the discussion stops.

“Who is it?” Ambrose asks, with an annoyed voice. “Can you come later?”

“Ok.” I answer through the door.  Then I hear quick steps, and professor Ambrose opens it, making a deep bowl. 

“Professor Marcelo!  How kind of you to visit!  To what do I owe this honor?”

I scratch the back of my head. “I am not a professor…”

“Why, you should be!  It’s just a formality of stablishing a research within this school…  I am sure that everyone would be more than happy for that to happen…”

This guy manages to make my introversion explode.  I am without word, but Cecilia comes to the rescue.  She stretchs out her head from behind me and shouts in the room.

“Si, We are home.  We are going to the cafeteria for some sweets.  Do you want to come?”

Siratra gets closer. “No, I am good.  We are talking about motions here.  I will join you later.”

“Ok.” I reply.  We turn around and go to the cafeteria.  The girls are really happy with the sweets, after being so long on a place where everything was spicy.  That might happen because the plants are all that way, and that carries up on the taste of just about everything.  It might be related to the odd environment.  Most of the dwarves never tasted any other food, so they don’t even have a word for pepper.  That is all just my guess, though.

After we eat a little, we go back to Edward’s office, to wait for him there.  We sit down, and we don’t wait even five minutes, he comes by.

“Sir Marcelo, how are you?”  He gestures towards his room.

We enter, and I put on a silence spell.  He raises his brows.

“This looks serious.  What is going on?”

“I needed to let you know that we have a spy at home.”

“Really?  Do you have it under custody?”

“Not yet.  They have Rudolph’s family.  I am preparing the field.  The thing was serious, there are four Comm Gem spy devices in the house.  I remember that when I searched the palace, that I only found two.”

“That is really weird.  Those things are expensive, even for nobles.  The guild has a lot of them, if compared to the rest of the humanoids, due to the neutrality in the war.  But even then they are rare.  Do you think it is the Holy Kingdom again?”

“I have no idea.  I just wanted you to know, so that we can keep communication to a minimum, until this is solved.  I will let you know when we have all things wrapped up.”

“Can I ask you to do another sweep in the castle and my home, after this is over?”

“Sure, no problem.”

As we leave his office, Muninn and Huginn are on top of a bookcase.  The secretary is working on her stuff, but kind of shaken by then.  Apparently a lot of people have prejudice because of the whole Wrax thing.

I tap my shoulder, and the crows land on it.  The secretary is shaking even more.  We leave, towards our home.

“Muninn, did you find them already?”

He shakes his beak to the side.

“Do you think you will be able to find them?”

He touches his head to mine.  I see several different, albeit simple, consciousnesses.  I pick one, and it is flying over an area.  By the feeling to it, I feel they are all doing the same.  He straightens up.  I pet him on the chest.

“Thank you, buddy.”

He caws.  Then Huginn caws, on the other shoulder, and I pet her chest as well. 

“Thank you both.”  I turn to the girls.  “Now we have to wait a little bit, see what they come up with.”

We go home, and take a shower.  We get ready for dinner.  During dinner, Roberta comes out of the kitchen.  She is drying her hands on a cloth. 

“Sir, I have to talk to you about a couple of ingredients that we are in need.”

I gesture her to approach, and she whispers in my ear.

“Sir, I think the new maid is suspicious.  I think there is something going on.  The other maids agree that she is strange, and she behaves weirdly.”

“Don’t worry about that.  Everything is going well.  I already checked things with Rudolph.”

 She leaves back to the kitchen, with a worried face.

We get to bed, and go rest for the day.

Next morning, we wake up.  Muninn and Huginn are cawing.  They get close to me, and transmit an image to my brain.  It is a flying view, and down bellow I see huge river, and a boat.  The vision focuses on one of the boats’ window, and I see two female faces, a woman and a girl.

The view changes to a tree, and the bird carrying the view lands there.

“Girls, go down, get close to the new maid, and don’t let her harm anyone.  I just got the location of Rudolph’s family.”  I saw a wide smile from Ruby, and then I added. “We are going to want to question her, so it would be better to not kill her.  Yet.  Ask Rudolph to come up to clean something in the bedroom, Cecilia.  Aquamarine, you are going to stay in the room, besides bringing the hostages, I want to get a couple of kidnappers to interrogate.”

“Cecilia, see that the maid does not use any Comm Gem.”

“Yes, my lord.” The dragonesses answer together.  Cecilia does a salute.

“Aye aye, sir!”

They leave the room.

I open a portal in the forest by the river.  Muninn, Huginn and I go through it.  Obviously, there is a crow perched on the tree.  I enhance all my hole body, and get to the boat.  I side step into the room that has the woman and the girl.  They are chained to floor.  On the other side of iron bars, there is a guy in smelly clothes, sitting on a chair.  I put him to sleep.  I open a portal to home, and throw the woman and child there.  They have a resignated look to them, and everything is happening too fast for them to notice.  I try to be as soft as possible.

With the brain enhanced, things are moving slowly.  The guy in the chair is opening his mouth, but I shock him into unconsciousness.  I side step to outside the iron bars.  I check the guy for any Comm Gems, but he only has a scimitar on him, and not even a good quality one.  No poisoned tooth either.  I take his weapon, and I portal him to Piotr’s cave.  The guy is now sitting on his butt, facing me and the cave’s entrance.

I think I woke Piotr up.  He is still in a dark part of the cave, I don’t think the spy saw him already.

“Good morning, my lord.  What do you want done with this one?”

“I don’t think this one is going to be useful to me, but I want to question him later.  Can you watch over and make sure he doesn’t kill himself?”

“As you wish, my lord.”

“I will be bringing additional people.”

“I am here to serve, my lord.”

I portal back to the forest, close to the ship.  Because it is a moving thing, I can’t go back to the room I was particularly in.  I put on my stealth, and land on the deck.  There are some people sailing this ship, in the middle of this huge river.  The river is really wide.  Miles wide. 

The ship itself is a caravel style, with two sails.  There are people moving busily across the deck.  On the observation deck, above one of the sails, there is another sailor.

At the helm, there is someone that looks more important, and by his side there is another person.  The second guy has 2 Comm Gems on him.

“…there?”

“Another week, sir.”

The second man places his hand behind his back, holding them together.  Both of these have a way higher level than the sailors around.  I am thinking on what would be appropriate for the sailors, but I realize that they were not complaining about taking a woman and a child as prisioners.  They had to be in the know.

All the sailors are armed, mostly with daggers and scimitars as well.  I put a layer of CO around the ship, and wait a little bit.  When some of the lower level people start to pass out, an alarm is given out.  I put the one with the Comm Gems to sleep immediately.

The captain is now looking at me.  I am behind his…  customer lying on the floor.  He takes his sword out. 

“I don’t know how you are, but YOU ARE DEAD!”  Three sailors start coming towards us, climbing the stairs to the helm, weapons drawn.

When the captain moves forward to attack, I take out his sword, and portal him to Piotr cave’s.  The other sailors stop on their tracks, seeing the weird magic. 

“WHAT DID YOU DO?  GIVE THE CAPTAIN BACK!”

I look at the female, she has half a dozen levels more than the other sailors.  I reinforce myself, and remove her sword.  She has a dagger too, that I remove and portal it to Piotr’s.  I go after the pirates.  I stab one and throw him overboard.  I wonder if these water have monsters as well, but being this world…

The pirate in the water starts screaming, and the other two forget about the fight to watch what is going on.  Apparently the one in the water is being eaten alive.  I go for the two ones that are up, punch them in the nose, and throw them overboard.

I do the same with the other 15 that are passed out on the deck.

I get back to the customer, and I remove the Comm Gems and the suicide tooth.  This one will definitely know something.  I throw him in Piotr’s cave.

Now the ship.  Bring it to the middle of the river, and I go for a flying spell.  Now let’s burn this thing.  I place a lot of oxygen, and then a firebolt spell.  There is the explosion that I am used to , and it is gone.  It becomes ashes on top of the river.

I get back to my home.  I go down the stairs.  Everyone is at the kitchen, apparently.  I collect the Comm Gem hearing devices, and put them in my bag, so that no sound reaches them.  Then I go to the kitchen.  The new maid realizes that something is off.  Cecilia distracts her, and break her mana path ways at the base of her neck.  She reaches for something in her pocket, it is one of the Comm Gems, while trying to run, but Ruby holds her by her hair.

“YOU DARE INVADE MY CAVE?”

She pulls a knife, and while she tries to stab Ruby, I put her to sleep.  She has a suicide tooth, I don’t want to risk it.  I open her mouth and pull the fake tooth out.

The maids in the kitchen are in the corners.  Roberta is the only one that is not scared among them, she has this somewhat smug face in the whole thing.

I bring the woman to the living room, and I bring the woman to Piotr’s cave through a portal.  I pick up the Comm Gems that the spy has.

Now is the time for some questioning.