Hakon and His Squire Do Battle

[Andros]

It was a beautiful day, and this part of the ride took Ajax and Hakon past some impressive scenery. A deep-blue lake shimmered in the morning sunlight, snow-capped mountains rising behind it. The picture it made was very Radenor: pine and spruce trees, snow-no-matter-the-season, and mysterious lakes bereft of the familiar sea gods of Teos.

Ajax fingered his sunderscrap as his horse climbed a steep hillside. It was a great comfort to him, imbued with Alecto’s power and now, oddly, his mother’s love too. She was so angry when she walked into the house after Hakon’s attack. Her rant about men and their stupidity after hearing of the incident and their plans was truly awe-inspiring. She barely spoke to Ajax over the next few days, but surprised him with a gift on the way out the door.

She’d sewn him a small pouch for the stone and gave it to him as he left, along with a kiss and the admonition that he keep himself safe. It was a rare confirmation that she loved him and worried about him, which meant a lot. So did knowing Hakon wanted to make something nice out of the scrap as a gift to him. That wasn’t forgiveness exactly, but it seemed pretty damn close. He kept the little rock tied around his thigh under his riding pants and smiled every time he touched it.

He needed that comfort, because despite the sun and the scrap and the goodwill leftover from their stay at the inn, Ajax was afraid. The fact was that he was going into a dangerous situation in which the goal was to kill another person who had never hurt him. It was frightening. It was abhorrent. It was a little exciting too, but mostly frightening. And it was an opportunity to prove himself, which was of course a lot of pressure…

Suffice it to say Ajax was a ball of nerves during that morning’s training and more so once they got underway. He filled the silence on the road with chatter that probably irritated Hakon; stories about his trips back and forth to Teos, complaints about his younger siblings, even some nonsense about different breeds of sheep. Eventually he ran out of ideas, which left a lull in conversation that was much worse. There was nothing for it but to speak his mind.

“Hakon, can you tell me what this is going to be like? Who are we going to fight, and what did he do? I’m nervous, to tell you the truth.”

[Hakon]

Hakon could tell something was different about Ajax. He seemed animated and was chattering like a little bird seeing its first Glade. For the better part of the morning, assumed it was because the lad felt more at ease with him, but as the hours wore on, he was fairly certain this wasn't it. There was an undercurrent here, Hakon thought, of something. He wasn't sure what, but he was proud of himself for detecting that there was something happening beneath the surface.

Ajax eventually took pity on him and spelled it out, and Hakon nodded. He was nervous. This was his first engagement of this nature, after all.

"It's everyone's first time sometime," he said reassuringly, then realized who he'd said that to and coughed a bit.

"I've picked Hildegard of Skogen for our first target. She's a fairly straightforward case, a rogue that lives in the woods. She was discovered right at the beginning of Ash using her craft to fashion herself a home. She's a Divide practitioner, which gives her facility over earth and stone and the like. She was reported to the Watch by a villager after she came to town and used her magic illegally. The Watch came to her door and requested that she remand herself into custody to go to a Tower, and she refused, then brutally assaulted them and fled into the mountains. Heavy snows kept anyone from pursuing her for the last few months, but we've had a calm few weeks and I feel confident that we can find her. I've gotten a report that she's hiding in a town at the foot of the mountains, so we won't have to wade into snow that comes up to my chest to do so."

"Normally, if you find a Rogue, they're given a choice: leave the Four Kingdoms, join a Tower, or die. At this point, she's already been given her choice, and she refused, so she is guilty of assaulting people with unauthorized magic and remaining in the country as a rogue mage. The punishment for either of those crimes is death, so she seemed like a good first target for me."

"As for what it's going to be like to fight her: she's a Dividi." Hakon said, as though that explained everything. After a few beats, he realized that perhaps it didn't. "Um. What that means is: she's unlikely to have a weapon in the fight, but she can make one out of basically anything, so don't be surprised if you blink and she's suddenly holding a club made of stone or a shiv made of glass. She will likely favor magically thrown projectiles -- she'll be able to alter their course in midair, so the trick is to deflect any stones she throws. If you dodge them and she's paying attention, she'll correct their course and still hit you. Lastly, keep her off-balance and distracted so she can't use Parch. It's a nasty ability and can be fatal quite quickly, but she needs her full concentration to use it, so hitting her with a thrown projectile of your own or even just a well-timed shout can disrupt it and keep us both alive."

He looked over at Ajax. "You got all that, lad?"

[Andros]

Ajax nodded impassively at Hakon’s words but his stomach did a little unpleasant flip. The woman sounded harmless enough, though he understood that the Scarlet Watch couldn’t tolerate attacks on its members. But to find out she’s got Divide like Baba did, that was a rude surprise.

It was impossible to imagine his gentle father doing any of what Hakon described. He’d shown off every Divide trick in the book as father and son spent long afternoons together in the workshop, mostly killing time so the villagers would believe he was making his pots by hand.

Fell would make clods of earth float in the air and spell out Ajax’s name (and sometimes curse words too, if he’d been good and asked nicely). He’d turn sand into beautiful stained glass and then back into sand again as if it had never existed. He’d strengthen a pot and let Ajax exhaust himself trying to smash unsuccessfully. None of it ever hurt anybody. Whatever this rogue did was not that. If Hakon and the Guild said she was a danger, Ajax would accept it and do his best.

“I’ll be careful,” he assured Hakon, trying to take his advice to heart. “I’ll remember what you taught me yesterday.” It seemed like the best he could do would be to stay behind Hakon, keep his eyes open, and look for opportunities to be useful. If he could toss something at her while she was distracted or warn Hakon of an incoming missile, that would be a worthwhile contribution. Hopefully she wouldn’t tackle him.

The two riders crested a hill and saw ahead of them a sloping valley covered in dense forest, mostly deciduous. It was beautiful but, Ajax knew, inhabited by a woman who would be dead by the end of the day if Hakon had anything to say about it.

Ajax was uncharacteristically quiet as they entered the wood and the road narrowed. He felt torn. Loyalty to Hakon was warring with loyalty to his father. How disappointed the man would be not only to see him working with the hated Guild but acting as if his own father didn’t exist. He’d picked his team and he was going to stick by Hakon, but he couldn’t keep silent.

“I know a lot about Divide, Hakon,” he said quietly. “My father was a Dividi. A very good one.”

When Hakon, who was riding ahead of him on the narrow path, turned back to look at Ajax, he reassured the big man.

“He never used his magic to hurt anybody, only to make beautiful things - and to make beautiful music too, he was a Resonant as well. This rogue must be different though. I’ll watch my back with her.”

[Hakon]

Ajax's admission was no great surprise. Hakon had known each bit of information as discrete facts: that Ajax's father was from Oxentide, that he had come to Teos after leaving Radenor and had no intention of returning, and that his father had some dealings with the Guild. He had suspected, therefore, but to hear it confirmed was something else again.

"I suppose he had a letter on his neck, like me?" Hakon asked, voice suddenly soft.

Not that it mattered all that much. The difference between a rogue mage and an iconoclast was mainly that one was exiled from the Four Kingdoms and was allowed their life provided that they behaved and the other was considered criminal, worth hunting down and killing no matter the time or cost. In either case, it was very clear that Ajax's father, Andros' son-in-law, was dead.

Hakon paused, considering. He knew a thing or two about having dead parents. Regardless of if he'd been a criminal, his children in an entirely different country couldn't have known that fact. He'd hidden it from them, made them love him, made them rely on him. Despicable, in its own way. A secondary offense.

"I'm sorry for your loss," he said, because it was the polite thing to say in this matter. He'd been taught that, and manners often carried him through social interactions.

"I'm glad he never hurt anyone that you knew about," he added, then winced. It sounded like he was calling Ajax a liar. "I didn't intend for it to sound that way, lad. Um. I meant --" he tried to think of what he'd intended to say, but all the additional words just sounded worse.

He clenched his fist and let out a frustrated sigh.

"I'm just sorry," he finished.

A change of topic was in order. "We'll be in the little village where she was last spotted in about an hour. Once we arrive, there will likely be a small public house that sells supplies. When we get there, I want you to go in and inquire about her. Make up a story that sounds plausible. You're good at those. See if you can get her location out of the shopkeep, or some information about someone who might know, failing that. Meanwhile, I'll use Ether sight to see if she's been by recently and left an etheric trail."

[Andros]

Hakon just couldn’t keep his foot out of his mouth. If Ajax hadn’t polished those big boots himself, he’d suspect they were covered in honey. He almost laughed at Hakon’s fumbling awkwardness. It was sweet. A little mean too, but very genuine. That was Hakon in a nutshell.

But Ajax didn’t laugh, because he wasn’t mean. He simply nodded and stated the plain facts. “Yes. He had a brand. He fled a tower in Northradica. We were raised to hate the guilds, and to fear the Scarlet Watch. Things have changed, obviously. He was a good man, but I haven’t taken on his grudge.”

Ajax didn’t bristle at Hakon’s little dig at his honesty either. If Hakon wanted to call him a liar while acknowledging that lying is a useful skill and he had it, fine. It was true enough. He could lie for Hakon if needed.

The village wasn’t much, Ajax saw as Hakon halted his horse in front of him. One stone building that served as a general store and tavern surrounded by ten or fifteen tumbledown houses, thatched roofs in need of patching. The peasants here has a much higher standard of living than in Teos, but Upper Village was much prettier.

Ajax went about his business without further discussion with Hakon, who couldn’t possibly contribute. He hopped off his horse and rooted around in his saddle bag until he found a tiny cask of wine he’d brought from home. His instruction was to use it to drum up business but this seemed worth it. Ducking behind Hakon so no one could see him, Hakon poured a little wine on his shirt and rubbed it on his hands until he looked a mess, then he handed Hakon the cask and walked into the store.

When he caught sight of the clerk he knew his gambit would work. She was a plain girl a few years older than himself who looked him over, blushed, and then looked down at the needlework she was doing behind the counter. A perfect target for what Ajax called the “lost sheep maneuver.”

There was a certain species of woman all over Radenor who fell for Ajax. He was too small and mild to be of interest to most women, who preferred big bruisers like Hakon, but a few saw his boyish good looks and falsely assumed him to be sweetly innocent. They wanted to help him, to take care of him, and if they could, corrupt him. (He wasn’t interested, sorry ladies. He always took the help though.)

This girl was one of them, for certain. Ajax took off his hat and cast down his gaze so he looked embarrassed to be asking for her help. Then he addressed her with exceeding politeness

“Ma’am, I’m so sorry to trouble you. I’m an apprentice to a merchant and we’re driving a load of wine through the forest. I had the reins and well,” he paused, as if it were painful to admit, “I steered us into a ditch a bit up the road. The cart flipped over. We got it upright but the jugs are cracked. THey can’t be moved as is. One of them shattered.”

He gestured at his stained clothing and hands to underline the point. “My master is furious, and he’s not the kindest man,” he added, glancing out the door at Hakon, who was looking unhelpfully unmenacing, shifting back and forth on his heels and humming. “Is there a potter in the village who can come and seal the cracks for us? We need a skilled artisan.”

The woman opened her mouth excitedly, then shut it again, hesitating. Finally she spoke. “There’s a woman nearby who makes pots. But she’s got a reputation. People say she’s a rogue. That she’s dangerous. I don’t want to send you there.”

Ajax turned his act up a notch, looking back out at Hakon who had much more helpfully started playing with his knife. “Please ma’am. My master, he said if the rest of the jars broke…”He let his voice quiver and allowed her to use her vivid imagination.

She caved quickly. “Oh, alright. She’s up the road about a quarter of a mile. The house has a red tile roof and glass windows, you can’t miss it. Take care of yourself.”

Ajax changed his demeanor, flashing a smile at the clerk. She smiled back, then covered her mouth in embarrassment. “Thank you ma’am. You’re very kind. Perhaps I can talk my master into staying the evening here.”

She giggled at that, which would have been fetching on a prettier woman. Ajax left, winking at the poor girl, then tried to look appropriately scared of Hakon as he gave the man the directions.

[Hakon]

While he waited, Hakon thought through what he remembered. Ajax had said his father was a former mage from a Tower in Northradica, and there was only one tower in Northradica: Demrek. He'd also said his father was marked with Divide and Resonance. It was an unusual combination. Resonance and Divide were more utility magics than combat-oriented ones, although each had their respective offensive capabilities. Generally, mages who picked one like it were more likely to pick something up that had more direct application to defense, if they bothered to pick a second mark up at all. Divide was among the safer ones to choose to be initiated into, though, with death relatively low compared to riskier schools of magic and the consequence for failure merely being barred from being initiated again for the rest of one's life.

Still, it sounded familiar. An iconoclast from Demrek, with marks in Resonance and Divide. He'd have to think about it for a while, but it would come to him. He'd spent hours of his time looking through the log of iconoclasts, committing them to memory in case something he found in there helped him identify one while out on a mission. He'd memorized every iconoclast from every tower in the past century. There was little doubt that Ajax's father was one such entry. He just had to think for a while until it came to him. He hummed to himself while he did so, lost in thought.

It was not immediately forthcoming, so he absent-mindedly took out his knife and began cleaning under his fingernails, scowling to find that dirt had accumulated there during the ride.

He was happy when Ajax returned to him with the good news of what he'd found out. He bore Ajax's instructions to look menacing and stern with a bit of confusion but was able to play along. He scowled at the lad.

"Like this?" He asked sotto voce, looking to Ajax to see if his expression was what the boy was looking for.

When he got a nod in response, Hakon let the expression inform his body language: when the mouth is pulled down like this and the eyes are narrowed like that, usually the posture matches it like this. In this way, he was able to provide a fascimile of what Ajax sought.

"I'm glad you found something useful out," he said, his gentle words at odd with his aggressive posture. "My sight did not reveal anything, which means that all we know is she does not frequent this establishment. With your information, we can head further down the road and start to stake out her location. Well done, lad."

He was unable to resist claaping Ajax on the back. With that done, he got back on his horse, waited for Ajax to do the same, and the two rode in the direction of the last known whereabouts of their quarry.

[Andros]

Hakon managed a seriously intimidating face, but at the same time Ajax could see in his eyes that he was having fun putting on a show. It was oddly adorable. Ajax had the urge to get on his tip toes and kiss Hakon on the cheek. Would Hakon make a good actor? And what would it take to get him on stage? How much mead?

He mused about that as they rode towards their target. Coming from an island where police work was handled exclusively by the illiterate and the justice system still included trial by combat, Ajax had no idea what a stake out was, but he followed Hakon’s lead. A plume of smoke gave the home’s location away from a distance and the men dismounted. Ajax tied the horses to a tree while Hakon hunted around for…something. A hiding spot?

Eventually the mage found a large boulder off the side of the road, largely hidden by brush and a low tree. He scrambled up it and Ajax followed. Laying down on their stomachs, they had a clear view of the house but couldn’t be seen.

There could be no doubt that this was the home of a skilled Dividi, though not one as showy as Fell. His home had been his masterpiece, a work of art. The roof tiles were glazed in brilliant colors and speckled with mica that caught the moonlight and mimicked the night sky above. The windows were stained glass that gave privacy and provided a brilliant, colorful light show indoors that changed daily with the movement of the sun. The only concession to local style was whitewash on the walls to keep out the heat.

The builder of this house, by contrast, took pains to blend in. The roof tiles were expertly made but painted a dull gray to resemble old thatch. The windows had discreet shutters over them to hide the fine glass work. And the building was small, likely only one room downstairs and a sleeping loft. This was a hide-away, not a showpiece.

The shutters of one downstairs window were open, however, and Ajax could see inside. The woman was cooking, hence the smoke. She remained oblivious to the hunter stalking her only a few yards away, or was hiding her alarm very well. Ajax whispered for instructions.

“Are you going to walk in and start fighting, or do we try to talk to her first? Should I follow you in or wait for a signal?”

[Hakon]

Hakon tried not to scoff at the suggestion that they talk to her first.

He moved closer to Ajax so he could speak very quietly in his ear.

"The first thing we do, lad, is we watch her. We don't know much of anything right now, other than that we've found our target. Some good things to know would include: is there anyone else in the house, is she armed, has she prepared any traps at the door or similar, are there times when she'll be more vulnerable, etc."

"Not sure if you noticed, but that door is not wood. It's just made to look like it is. So if she notices us and feels threatened, she can lock herself in like a turtle in its shell, and there's no way we'll get in to reach her. When we've learned all we can, my feeling is a distraction will be the way to go. Something to lure her out. It's best not to fit a Dividi on her home territory, as it will be made of the exact material she needs to shred us into mincemeat."

"Of course, the least dangerous way to do this would be to wait for her to fall asleep and kill her then, but she'll lock herself in and any attempt I make to reach her will most certainly wake her up. So I'm thinking distraction for this reason. In order to figure out what will work as a distraction, though, we need to know more about her. So for now, we watch, we keep our heads down, and we stay quiet."

All of this was said in the same casual, matter-of-fact tone Hakon used for just about everything, like he were discussing something perfectly normal and mundane. To him, this was rather normal. He'd been at it for the majority of his life.

[Andros]

Hakon was in his element, and very obviously so. He knew what he was doing. He watched and watched, stretched out quite comfortably on the warm rock. He reminded Ajax of a lion, powerful and dangerous but l capable of waiting all day for the right opportunity for lunch to walk by.

And wait they did. By the sun they’d arrived around noon and several hours had passed, at least. Nothing happened. What Hakon could be learning, Ajax couldn’t imagine. The rogue cooked, stirring a pot periodically. Then she moved out of view and there was nothing to see. Occasionally she’d step in front of the window for a moment, usually with her back turned, then walk away. Once she came outside and Ajax got excited, but she was only emptying out ashes from the fire and was back inside before anything could happen.

As the sun started to go down, Ajax wondered if Hakon planned to spend the night on this rock. They hadn’t brought any food from their luggage, and the horses must be getting thirsty. He’d planned to keep his mouth shut for as long as it took but apparently that could be days, if not weeks. So he caved and spoke up.

“Hakon,” he whispered. “This isn't’ getting us anywhere. Can we just get a move on?”

It sounded whiny and he was ashamed of himself. Before Hakon could respond he made a suggestion. “Why don’t I try to get her outside? I can use the same story I used on the clerk, tell her we need a skilled potter to help us with some cracked jugs down the road. Give me some money, I’ll pay her now and you can get it back…after you do your thing. I’ll lead her to where you want me to and then you can jump her.”

He teases, just a bit, as his boredom swamps his fear.

“Don’t get too jealous if I flirt though. That’s just how I do things. Promise I don’t do it with rogues. Or women in general, but especially not rogue ones.”

[Hakon]

Hakon considered Ajax's proposition. It was a gambit, to be sure. It could either flush her out or she could decline to assist Ajax and his non-existent Master. If she were fearful enough, she might even attack him. It would have been nice to see her interact with someone before making this call, to see if she was reserved or friendly, trusting or paranoid.

All he'd determined this afternoon is that she was almost certainly alone, and that she was either unaware of their presence or very good at pretending otherwise. Normally, he'd wait for a few days, at least, before making a move on his target, unless there was an opportunity where the benefits truly outweighed the risks. Since the benefit was inevitable and the risk was death, it was rare that an opportunity that good presetned itself. It had only happened once or twice.

Still, working with Ajax was changing things. He'd gotten information out of the barmaid easily enough, something that Hakon would have struggled with or been unable to do at all. What tipped him over the edge in favor of the plan was the dagger Ajax wore at his belt. They couldn't hope to ambush a Dividi with any metal on their person; a single use of Parse and she'd sense a dagger in the woods and, at the very least, be on her guard. The element of surprise would be gone. Better to send the dagger, and the man wearing it, to reveal themselves as benign.

"Very well," he said. "Stay here and count to thirty. I'm going to create an advantage for myself."

So saying, he left the rock, rolling off of it and using that as an opportunity to give his stiff shoulders a roll, too. Now in a crouch, he went around behind the house and hoisted himself up on to the roof. It was easy enough to do when the single story structure likely had a clearance inside that would barely let him walk around without hitting his head on the roof. Even if she hadn't been a Dividi who had made her structure out of material she could use to her own purposes, that would be reason enough to avoid fighting in there if he could help. He used both hands to do so, jumping from the ground and using the momentum to swing up onto the roof, extending his leg so that the whole of it hit the roof at once, distributing the weight and muffling the noise of his ascent. Then he rolled onto the roof, his other leg coming along for the ride after spending a few second dangling awkwardly off of the eaves.

Now on top of the roof, he crawled the span to the peak, avoiding the ice that was still clinging like lichen to the lee side of each tile. The descent was harder, as gravity tried to propel him back down off the roof, so he took his time. He was positive Ajax saw him getting in to position, which was good. The lad needed to know where he was so that he could position their quarry properly.