Tibs winced, his good shoulder to the wagon along with the others, as he pushed with all the unaided strength he had. The effort of attempting to lift it out of the mud strained him all the way to his injured arm.
There were different ways he could make this easier on everyone. He could increase his strength with Earth, use an Air etching to help them push the wagon up, loosened the mud holding onto the wooden wheels with either Earth or Water. But he’d told himself he had to stop making everything go well for the caravan. Rigel’s knowing smiles were getting to be too much.
So, of course, the sky had darkened, and rain poured for the st day. It made the road treacherous for horses and wagons, and this wasn’t the first one which had slipped into the soft mud on the side and that they’d had to push out.
But it was the first to fight back so hard.
“This isn’t working,” the wagon’s owner said, defeat in his tone. The man was older, had been with Rigel’s caravan for years now, he’d like to say. The best of the caravans he’d traveled with.
They rexed with a unified sigh, and the wagon wheel dropped the little they’d managed to lift it. The mud was no more than two hand span from the hub.
He shared the general bafflement as to how this had happened. The wagon wasn’t the first, and followed in line with those ahead. It should have stayed in the tracks the previous had dug. It slowed them, but should have kept it from sliding off the side into the softer soil. The one fortunate aspect to this was that the man was experienced enough to have properly secured his wares, and they had happened to be on the opposite side from how it had slid and kept the wagon from tipping over.
“Ary,” Graiden yelled, “Bring two more horses! We need to get this wagon back on the road and we aren’t waiting for this abyss rain to stop.”
“This is when I wish I had magic,” Jeremy grumbled. The rain had yet to wash the entirety of the mud he’d gained when he’d slipped.
“Never say that,” Filmer warned. “Magic’s a curse. Makes you a creature that only cares for itself.” The woman was a veteran of the caravan, older, and most of the time pleasant to be around.
“No, it’s not,” one of the recruit said, a young man whose name had yet to stick to Tibs’s memory. “Plenty of those back home help around the city.”
“You seen them help?” the veteran replied. “Or you just hear about how they go around helping?”
The recruit closed his mouth.
“The bards wouldn’t sing about them if they weren’t doing good,” Jeremy countered.
“You can’t trust bards,” Tibs said, earning himself a disbelieving stare from the young man. “All they care about is that the songs are interesting, so they’ll change whatever they want to make that happen. You think they’d sing about the bunch of us failing at pushing the wagon out of this mud?”
“They would if one of us used magic to free it,” Jeremy countered defiantly.
“I’d have slit their throats first,” another of the veterans said.
Jeremy looked at the man, horrified. “Why? They’d help.”
The man snorted. “That kind doesn’t help. They’d turn us into husks to feed their power. That’s how magic works, you know. They suck the life out of you until there’s nothing left.”
“I’m with the kid,” Loren said. “Magic’s not bad by itself, and I, for one, would take some of it so we can get moving again. Abyss, I’d want them to make the rain stop.”
The…discussion went on as the horses were brought and attached to the harness. Tibs stayed out of it. He’d learned there was no changing people’s belief about magic a long time ago.
What he’d noticed, and books had confirmed, was that the further from a dungeon someone had lived, the more they believed magic was bad. The ck of exposure, the book had expined, led to people making up expnation for all the bad things they couldn’t expin, and since they also couldn’t expin magic, it inherently became the reason for all their misfortunes. Once gained, such belief was nearly impossible to reverse, it had added, because it was easier for them to expin the good they’d see done by magic, as something done to lull others into thinking it was safe.
People wanted to understand things, Tibs had realized, but few of them were willing to work for that understanding. So they made stuff up and cimed they knew.
Sometimes, even the stuff he read in schor’s book felt like that’s what they’d done.
“What do you think?” Jeremy asked, as there was a test tug by the horses, he was the only one not watching the horses.
“About what?”
“If an adventurer rode by, would they keep going, like Barta said?”
He shrugged, putting his shoulder to the wagon. “It’d depend on the kind of person they are. Even without magic, not everyone helps those who need it.” How different his Street would have been if those who could, had helped? Helped Mama and him?
“On my mark!” Graiden called, then. “Lift!”
They pushed and groaned. The wagon rose, then stuck. The mud sucking at the wheel, feet sliding. There were curses, muttered demands of help from the elements, mostly Earth and Water, and as the wagon began sinking again, Tibs had enough.
They’d have to think the added horses were responsible.
He loosened the mud around the wheel and hardened what was under their feet. With a jerk, the wagon lurched up and forward. Tibs was among those who slipped in the process and fell. Unlike the others, he cursed as pain erupted from the impact of his injured shoulder hitting the ground.
Cheered rose around him.
When his sight cleared, Jeremy’s hand was before him, and he took it.
“I’m pretty sure that someone with magic could fix your shoulder,” the young man said.
Tibs panted from the effort. “You need a cleric for that.” He could sense the damage this had caused his shoulder. How long would he have to add to his wait before healing himself?
The young man’s stare made Tibs realize what he’d said.
“It’s what bards say, anyway.”
“But magic can do anything,” Jeremy protested.
Tibs shrugged, taking his hand out of the hold. “The only pce ‘anything’ can be done is in stories. Out here, we’re stuck with stuff that barely does what we want it to.”
Jeremy looked around dejectedly. “It should be like the stories.”
Only because you don’t bother listening to them, Tibs thought. The endings might be good, most of the times, but the journeys to get there were never pleasant. Uneventful journeys didn’t make for interesting songs.
“Tyborg,” Graiden called and pointed to the wagons behind them. “Sarnita. And don’t argue. I saw that fall and heard you scream. You’re an idiot for helping here, and now we’re going to all pay for it if there are bandits around. I said no arguing.”
Tibs closed his mouth. He silently cursed himself for the cry. He hadn’t realized it had happened among the pain and the cheering.
“I’ll see to it he gets there,” Jeremy replied.
Instead of earning him approval, the chief narrowed his eyes suspiciously.
Too damned eager, Graiden had said. And it was still true.
* * * * *
Tibs made a show of favoring the shoulder as he tightened the saddle on his horse. A week ago had been when Sarnita’s estimation of when the added damage might be healed, so Tibs had finished the process. But natural healing didn’t fix all the problem associated with an injury, such as the tight and weakened muscles. Now, all that was left was for him to act as if his arm and shoulder were stiff, and go through stretches so they would loosen.
“Give it back,” Loren demanded in his tone that promised violence. The protest was youthful, and a gnce showed Tibs the man shaking Jeremy by the arm. “I know it’s you.”
Tibs grabbed the man’s arm as he raised it. “Don’t.”
“Stay out of this, Ty, unless you want your arm broken again. It’s time this thief learns not to take what isn’t his.”
“I didn’t take anything.” Jeremy’s protest was bright.
“If he stole from you.” He didn’t let go of the arm. “You take it to Gray.”
“And watch him be soft on him like he is on you?”
It wasn’t Graiden who was soft on Tibs, but the caravan guards rarely interacted with Rigel. They saw the fact that Tibs had been kept on even if he’d been injured as the guard chief’s decision, while he’d fought against it with all his might.
“You don’t like how he does things. You need to find another caravan to work with.”
“I’ll fucking do what I want,” Loren snarled.
“You do what Gray says to do. And you know he doesn’t tolerate infighting. You hit him, and Gray throws you out.”
“You’re going to tell him?” The man’s tone defiant.
“Yes.” He let the arm go.
Loren gred at him. “You fucking better keep you man away from my things.”
“I’m not his man,” Jeremy protested.
Loren snorted. “Sure. That’s why you aren’t at his side all fucking day long.” He turned and headed for the assembled guards. It was where Graiden would be, which meant Tibs had a decision to make.
He faced Jeremy.
“I’m not your man,” the young man stated.
Tibs studied him, looking for clues that would help him decide what to do. Knowing Jeremy had lied about not stealing from Loren didn’t give him a way to address it. Not without questions being raised.
Then he noticed the hand in the pocket, clutching a metal item. He couldn’t make out the shape from the essence alone.
“What are you holding?”
“It’s mine.” The protest was bright again.
Tibs narrowed his eyes. “Don’t make me pull your hand out.”
Jeremy tried to out gre him, but ended up looking away. He took his hand out and opened it. In the palm rested a tarnished bird in flight. He’d seen the pin on Loren’s jacket occasionally. It didn’t look impressive, and seemed to be made of pewter, but Tibs knew that appearance or value weren’t always important to a thief.
“Give it to me.”
Jeremy pulled the closed hand away. “It’s mine.”
“No, it’s not. Abyss, do you have any idea what Gray’ll do to you when he finds you have it?”
The young man smirked, and Tibs fought the urge to sp common sense in to him. His mood must have shown, because the smirk vanished.
Tibs motioned, and Jeremy handed the pin over.
“Why?” he demanded, and didn’t wait. “Loren and the others are your brothers in arms. You need to depend on him to fight alongside you, not worry about getting a knife in the side.”
Jeremy looked at his feet and whispered, “I’m sorry.” He seemed so much younger, then, than the man he was. “Thank you for—”
“I’m not doing this for you,” he snapped, fighting the urge to hug him; to make him feel better. He wasn’t going to learn about the world through being cuddled. “If we can’t trust each other, we can’t survive.”
Jeremy’s snort was mocking. “Loren hates your guts.”
“And I don’t like him either, but I know that when we’re attacked, he’s going to kill the bandits instead of looking for an opportunity to pnt a knife in my back.”
The young man rolled his eyes.
Tibs wondered why he’d left the city. What was he looking for out here, if he didn’t understand the wild was only survived by depending on others? “I don’t care about you, Jeremy. You aren’t my man. You aren’t my friend. You’re someone I work with, nothing more. Someone who could have made things bad for everyone else, just because you can’t keep your fingers to yourself. Loren hates thieves, you know that. When he’d found this on you, he would have cut off your hand.”
Jeremy swallowed. “Doesn’t it mean that you having it means you could…”
Tibs snorted. “No, because I’m smart enough not to have this on me for it to be found. Get back to work. And if you steal from anyone in the caravan, Jeremy, I’m letting Loren do whatever he wants to you. Am I clear?”
Jeremy nodded and left.
Fortunately, Tibs knew where Loren’s horse was, and that it would be unattended while he spoke with Graiden. He didn’t know which satchel the jacket usually was in, so he couldn’t avoid the man’s suspicion. But Loren wasn’t an idiot. Without proof, Graiden wouldn’t do anything.
The chief would trust that if Jeremy was the kind of thief Loren cimed he was, he’d steal again, get caught, and be brought before him to deal with.
If Jeremy was that kind of thief, Tibs would let it happen.
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You can read the previous arc in Tibs story here
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