Unsure what to do with himself, Vidar returned to the far too cramped room. Siv and Erik were sitting right next to each other, their shoulders pressed together by the table, while Siv practiced her writing. Sven was asleep, sitting on the floor and leaning against the wall.

  The two lovebirds' eyes widened when he entered, like they'd been caught doing something they shouldn't.

  "I'm not your father," Vidar grumbled. "Rune scribes' guild tomorrow morning."

  Siv's face brightened into a warm smile, and she nodded while Erik's face darkened. "You shouldn't get involved with those witches."

  "This again? I'm already using runes more than most scribes, I'd wager. Am I a witch?"

  Erik shook his head and narrowed his eyes. "No, you're a wizard."

  Vidar let the comment go and sat down at the table with a tired thud. His whole body ached from numerous wounds and injuries all over. They were healing more quickly than what he thought was normal, but healing and healed were two very different things. Vidar wondered if the new source of essence in his chest was the reason for his quick recovery, but then waved the thought away since it was yet another question he had no way of answering.

  "I have a task for you, Erik," Vidar said.

  "Oh, what might that task entail, mighty wizard?"

  "Knock that off."

  "Fine. What do you want me to do?"

  "We need a house," Vidar said. "A two-story house with a shop front on the first floor and enough room for a workshop in the back."

  Erik glanced to Siv, then out the window, and shook his head. "Don't think you can rent anything like that."

  Vidar held up one of the gold coins he'd looted from the long-dead dragon down in the sewers and jangled his coin pouch with the other. "I don’t want to bleed coin to a landlord. What I want, is to buy. I've come into some gold, and what better way to spend it?"

  "On a house with a shop?"

  "And a workshop where we can create runes. I don't want to walk around in the cold to find customers. Let them come to us instead."

  Siv scribbled a note with impressive speed. "What guild think?"

  "We won't start selling right away, not officially at least. Once we have our writs, we'll be ready."

  "So you want me to find a house to buy?"

  "Yes. And Erik?"

  "Yeah?"

  "I don't want the house to be in Rat Town. We want clients who can afford to pay with coin. Real customers, not beggars."

  Siv began writing something, then stopped and had to think before finishing her sentence.

  Help no money having.

  "You mean the poor?"

  She nodded.

  Erik took the note and held it close to his face, as if trying to decipher it.

  "Helping the poor is a noble goal, Siv, but it's time we help ourselves. I just spoke with Jarl. We won't be getting any recognition or coin for killing the dragon. Like always, we're on our own."

  "Nothing?" Erik asked.

  "Nothing."

  Sven spat. "Bastards!"

  "We'll make money and get right without their help," Vidar promised.

  Once Erik was gone to search for a house, Vidar turned to Siv again. “Why don’t you make some algiz runes when you’re done studying? The secret is out, so we might as well make the best of things and try to sell some. There’s plenty of scared people out there who would pay silver for a sense of security.”

  Siv nodded, then pointed at Vidar with a questioning look on her face.

  “Me?” he asked. “I’m going to experiment a little.”

  He began rummaging through their supplies, then remembered something. “We need to talk to Ida as well about the thieves' guild. The crown, or, well, the steward and Jarl, won’t do a thing to help against them, I’m sure of it. We’ll have to deal with those bastards by ourselves. So maybe. No, not maybe. We need some sort of plan to deal with them.”

  She flashed a sign with her hand, and Eli recognized the signal for danger. “Yes, I know it’s dangerous,” Vidar said, “but it’s even more dangerous to leave them at it. They could attack us at any point. And what if we’re caught by surprise and don’t have any runes with us?” He held up his palm. “I have this, but I doubt it's going to catch them by surprise more than once.”

  The questioning look on Siv’s face made him explain, tracing the lines in the palm of his hand. “I have a rune burned in here. Styrka, the one we used against the dragon to draw essence from it to kill the damn thing. It works against people too. And other runes, but you don't need the styrka rune for that.”

  She signed, "OK."

  He grabbed at the cut on his arm, where he’d hurt himself to imprint the dragon’s secret to its fire-breathing ability. His arsenal of runes gave him power, but Vidar still felt vulnerable. With so many unknowns, the thieves' guild had to go.

  “So you’ll talk to Ida?” he asked. “Set up a meeting?”

  Siv gave a hesitant nod and slid him a piece of paper. It was a name he didn't recognize and an out-of-place word. "This is a shop of some kind?"

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Pets Eternal.

  Quiver.

  Siv nodded again and signed, "Shop," and something else he didn't recognize.

  "What's that second sign?"

  She scribbled another word on that same piece of paper.

  Code.

  "Like a password? Got it."

  After spending about an hour on rune-crafting, Vidar left Siv and Sven behind in the room. Algiz runes surrounded the young girl and she knew how to use the thrust rune, stakra, as well now. If someone came for her, she could protect herself well enough. Once they were at the rune scribes' guild, the thieves would not dare approach any of them.

  The problem now was finding a quiet spot where he could try some things out. Most of all, he wanted to test using this new rune to produce fire a little more, but people wouldn’t be too happy seeing flames after what had happened just a day before. Some burned-down homes still smoldered, and many citizens were now homeless, crowding into that damn church.

  Since this was still the middle of the day, he had to find a secluded enough spot. Finding no better options, he settled on the half-broken-down building where he and Alvarn had descended to the water-cleaning station, where they discovered the stakra and styrka runes. He didn’t go down, of course, but the house was deserted and out of the way, with few people going anywhere near the long drop into the ocean.

  Sowilo runes kept at bay the biting cold, heating him underneath his coat and in his boots. Vidar’s hands were still cold, but he was getting used to working with them, even without full dexterity. After taking out a fire rune from his pocket, he held it up and away from him, rejuvenating it with his own essence. He pointed it away from himself and shielded his face with his free arm, triggering the rune.

  Fire gushed out from the symbol in a quick flash of warmth that shot away from him to lick the opposite wall, several long strides away. It had been a short but powerful burst, but the dragon managed so much more. It had done it often, with long streams of fire that almost seemed liquid, raining down through the sky and onto its targets. If Vidar wanted to even reach a small part of that power, he needed to add a lot more essence into the rune. More essence than he could spare. Unless, that was, he took from this new source.

  The brilliant, shining, and multicolored essence gathering in a circle around his heart called out for him to use it, to draw upon it. Vidar listened to his inner voice and drew a small amount of the dragon's essence, willing it into the runic circle before his mind's eyes. It filled up to the brim, the circle bulging, barely able to keep itself together.

  Swallowing hard, he triggered it again. The entire room filled up with fire in an instant, burning hot enough to produce a few cracks in the cold stone wall.

  Only a few drops of dragon's essence, but the strength was far more intense than he'd expected. Panting hard, he looked around at the destruction he’d caused. This was genuine power, and he’d need to hoard it and select when to use the only spoils from their battle with the dragon.

  The next morning, Vidar, Siv, and Sven arrived at the main gate of the rune scribes' guild chapter house in Hamstadt. Finding the door unlocked, Vidar pulled it open with effort, its heft forcing him to brace one foot against the wall beside it. The door creaked as it slowly swung open. He had seen the room beyond once before, when he’d come looking for Alvarn, only to be more or less thrown out by an imperious woman who harbored an intense dislike for him from the first moment she set eyes on him.

  This time, no one greeted them.

  “Where is everyone?” Sven asked.

  Vidar walked a few steps deeper into the foyer and peered down a corridor. “I don’t know.”

  Three young students hurried toward them from the opposite direction, heading for the door.

  “Hey!” Vidar barked.

  The students jumped and turned to face him, looking startled.

  “We’re here to get registered,” Vidar said. “Where is everyone? Where do we go?”

  The student closest to him, a girl of perhaps twelve years with short hair like a boy’s, a far from common thing in Hamstadt, wrinkled her nose and gave him a doubtful look.

  “You’re going to become students?” she asked, putting heavy emphasis on “you’re.”

  “Yeah, what about it?” Sven replied, standing tall and trying to look intimidating.

  “You’re so dirty,” another girl said. She looked to be of similar age, with red hair and a swollen, snotty nose that took up most of her face.

  “And smelly,” the first girl added.

  “Just tell us where to go, you little brats,” Vidar snapped.

  The girls pointed down the hallway from where they had come, sticking out their tongues at him before hurrying outside into the biting cold of early morning.

  The three of them had to ask for directions twice more before they stood outside a door marked with a sign Vidar couldn’t be bothered to read. Instead, he knocked three times with a heavy hand, each knock producing a loud thunk on the flimsy wood.

  “You may enter,” a voice called out.

  Vidar pushed the door open and stepped inside, followed by his friends. The interior looked like any other office, with bookcases along the right wall, windows overlooking the street on the wall opposite the door, and to the left, a wide desk, oiled so dark it was almost black. Behind it sat the very woman who had scorned him on Vidar's previous visit. Her nose turned up at the sight of him.

  “I thought I said you’re not welcome here,” she said.

  Vidar pointed a finger right at her. “Your very own guildmistress invited us to become students here. If you want, you can check with Viktoria yourself.”

  The woman blinked. “You’re Vidar?”

  “Of course I am.”

  “Why ‘of course’?”

  “Well, it’s obvious, isn’t it?”

  “You’re not making any sense, young man.” She turned to Sven with the same disdain she showed Vidar, and then her gaze softened as it settled on Siv. “Who are your friends, then, Vidar?”

  Without looking back, Vidar gestured behind him. “This is Sven and Siv. They’re going to become students here too.”

  “That’s three spots, then,” the woman said, scribbling in a ledger. “Two remaining. Are we waiting for anyone?”

  “It’s just us for now."

  The woman gave them each a long look before standing and walking to the far side of the room to retrieve a large ledger from the leftmost bookcase. Despite her thin, frail arms, she carried it back to the desk without complaint. She placed it down with care, opened it to a blank page, spun it around to face Vidar, and pointed at the first empty line.

  “Sign your name here to register as students. Your studies here will be financed by the guild itself. Unusual, but not unheard of. I am Miss Larsdottir, the secretary of the guildmistress. Most of the guild chapter house’s administrative affairs come through this office. You would do well to remember that. Signing your name here,” she continued, pushing an inkwell and pen toward Vidar, “means that you accept our code of conduct.”

  “What does your code of conduct entail?” Vidar asked, grabbing the pen and dipping it into the ink.

  Miss Larsdottir glanced to her right, where a large piece of framed paper hung on the wall. “It’s all outlined there,” she said.

  Vidar shrugged, then signed his name and handed the pen to Siv, who wrote her name in large, blocky letters. Sven took the pen next, swallowing hard and casting a nervous glance at Vidar.

  “I… I don’t write,” he admitted.

  “You don’t know how to write?” Miss Larsdottir asked.

  “I don’t,” Sven replied, looking down. “I’m sorry.”

  Vidar took the pen back and wrote “Sven” on the line beneath Siv’s. Miss Larsdottir pulled the ledger toward herself, her eyes scanning the names.

  “Vidar, Sven…” She looked up at Siv. “Siv. What a pretty name. My granddaughter is right around your age.”

  Siv wet her lips but remained silent. Miss Larsdottir frowned.

  “She doesn’t speak,” Vidar explained.

  Miss Larsdottir nodded. “Can you write, girl?”

  Siv gave a small nod.

  “She’s taken it upon herself to learn, and she’s a quick study,” Vidar said. “I’m sure there won’t be any problem.”

  “We make accommodations for our students when necessary. Don’t worry, dear,” Miss Larsdottir said. “Wait here. I’ll fetch some students who can guide you to your separate dormitories, where you’ll find empty cots and appropriate attire.” She glanced at a clock on her desk. “The morning’s first class will start soon, and I think it’s best if you attend right away. We often enroll students in the middle of the term, so there is a rolling schedule of classes. You’re in luck. This morning’s class is for beginners, like yourselves.”

  She stood and went to the door. “Remember, as students, you now have privileges, but also rules. You will not leave this building without express permission. You will listen to your teachers, and you will act with tact. Do not make the guildmistress regret extending this life-changing opportunity to you. Work hard, and you will be welcomed as full members of the rune scribes' guild. An occupation that is the envy of many. I hope you don’t squander it.”