The First World Sphere

Chapter 113

The floating Harbinger was being stripped of its luxury rudiments. Rippon looked at her and muttered, “They do not build them like that anymore. She must weigh twice what the new Harbinger weighs. See that black wood side planking there. Treated dungeon walnut. Hard as steel and twice as heavy. But cheap.”

The wolfsguard in Miaden colors approached and escorted me up to the deck to meet Loriel. She smiled, and I realized she had been keeping tabs on me to meet me here when I came for work. Whether it was general spies on Cilia or Leda, I did not know. She started, “Storme, just when you said you would be here. Even a day early!”

“Well, doing an entire Harbinger ship is a large project, so the reason for the extra day. I even brought help. Your people will have to vacate the ship for three days while we work,” I answered in a neutral tone.

“I don’t want the renovations to fall behind, I am sure...” she started.

I stopped her, “I work with my team alone. No distractions. If you do not like it, then the deal is off and you can keep the warehouse,” I said cooly, knowing she would concede.

“What about when your team is resting? Can my workers get on board then?” she asked diplomatically.

“No, they can return when we are finished. The decision is yours. Let me do the work unmolested or find someone else,” I countered with a slight irritation to show I was serious.

“Ok, it will be as you wish, Storme. I am actually also here to invite you and your entourage to the reception for the Sadians. It is the next seventh day, and as one of our most valued citizens, I want you to be there,” she asked politely.

“How many can I bring?” I asked off-handily. “Because if I can not bring my entire entourage, there is no point in going,” I smiled a little too evilly.

I pretended to do the math, “Eighteen.” Loriel scoffed, breaking her pleasant demeanor.

Her teeth gritted slightly, “Seven and two unarmed guards,” She offered.

I had been joking, but she was serious. I considered my next words because she may just say yes. Did I even have eighteen people to take? “I can do sixteen and two unarmed guards,” I held to my number with a coy smile.

“Will one be Gareth Highguard?” she asked after a pause.

“Yes,” I replied, thinking it would be a deal breaker after how he behaved during the Triumvirate banquet before the coup attempt by the Bricios.

She smiled like she won, “It is agreed then. Bylura will bring the details to you in Aegis City mid-week. I am assuming you will not wear house colors but dress appropriately and no weapons,” she left in a little huff at the concession. Her workers started flowing off the ship so we could start work.

Remy asked, “You have an eighteen-person entourage? How come I have never seen them?”

“You should buy something nice to wear, Remy. You are one of them.” I walked up the ramp, leaving the stunned young man.

I waited on deck till everyone left and then walked the ship. I was familiar with the vessels from doing the artificing for Sebastian. This ship was wider and much heavier than the newer versions of the Harbinger. This ship was a whale and could only stay aloft for a few hours with a normal aether core power core.

I paused in my exploration. Did Loriel find Aelyn? Did she have the Heart Stone? I worried for Aelyn’s safety if Loriel was pursuing her. If she had captured Aelyn, then I assumed Loriel would play her like a chip in a game of cards to get me to do her a favor. She had not even mentioned the teleport information when we just talked... Damn it. Maybe she was going to offer it in exchange for getting me to come to the reception! A missed opportunity, I think. The question was why did she need me there. I did not care much for politics, even if they were forced on me.

I made it to the hold to find one Wolfsguard guarding crates of precious crafting material. I dismissed the guard and checked everything over. It was all here. I pulled it all into my dimensional space. I found Remy and Rippon talking in the main control room. Rippin looked excited, “Storme, I think this is Allister’s Spear. It was the flagship of Admiral Allister some three hundred years back.”

“Other than being a floating museum, is that of significance?” I asked.

Rippon considered the question, “No, guess not. Just a fine piece of history.”

“Let us get to work then,” I said.

Rippin started repairing the wood in the control room with his wood shaping, and Remy set up the schematics on the wall in their proper place for me to reference as I worked. When I started, I laid out the bars of platinum, mithril and gold for ease of access. It took half a day to stage up the control room, bridge, and outlying anti-gravity hubs. Finished with that, we went into the stateroom to eat.

It was a very fancy dining room, and we unabashedly used their plates and utensils. I pulled out a meal for everyone from storage, and we talked about the ship as we ate.

It looked like Loriel kept about a third of the luxury sleeping cabins. The rest were being converted to military usage. Remy guessed this was going to be her personal ship when she traveled to the Sadians or other lowland kingdoms. That did not quite make sense to me as she was the ruler of the Triumvirate and, therefore, ruled Skyholme. She could use any of the Navy ships.

Rippon barked, “You know nothing about status. This black behemoth is imposing and gorgeous, rolled into one. You see someone arrive in this skyship, you pay attention!”

“Does the Maelstrom do that as well?” I asked with a smirk.

“Aye, she does. It is a shame you keep her hidden away in that warehouse. She should be admired,” he said reverently of his masterwork.

“Not going to happen,” I said as we all returned to the Maelstrom to check on the cats, Leda and Cilia. We slept a few hours and then returned to work early in the morning. I did the metal shaping work at this stage under my privacy screen. Remy was cleaning up as I went, and Rippon, the old man, was using his wood shaping until he needed a rest. The work was progressing rapidly by late evening on sixth day we were done.

Finished, Remy asked, “Are we headed back?”

I replied sourly, “No. We will pretend to work all day tomorrow.” Remy nodded in understanding as he understood the magnitude of my metal-shaping spell. He at least thought it was a spell and was not aware it was an ability. We slept long hours on the Maelstrom, and I brought the cats with me for the last day on Loriel’s ship. Instead of doing any artificing, I studied my arcane web spell, and Remy and Rippon played cards. We left late in the evening, telling no one and just taking off in the Maelstrom.

When I returned to the Shiny Platinum, Isla met me in the hangar as we walked down the ramp. She excitedly held up the paperwork for the warehouse. The flight from Stonefell Island to here had only been twenty minutes. It told me Loriel had used a comm stone to tell Isla we were coming back. I was starting to see tigers in the shadows.

I cleared my head at the excited Isla, “Storme, everything was signed over, and Bylura brought by the paperwork. She is staying with me to relay the details of the Skyholme Reception to you.” I just grunted. “What are the plans for the warehouse?” She asked excitedly, changing topics.

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Isla was an architect who had supervised the Shiny Platinum building and done a fantastic job. She also worked on acquiring the materials for the Maelstrom. She was currently being paid to do nothing. I smiled, “We are going to tear it down.”

Her eyes popped, “What are you going to build?”

“A park and some outside dining for the restaurant,” I said with a grin. Her confused expression had me laughing inside. Loriel probably had plans to buy into whatever I turned the building into. A park was not on the possible list. “And Isla, Loriel doesn’t hear about it until it is done. We can add balconies to the apartments facing the new park as well. You can handle all the design work and contracting.”

She flinched a little about not telling Loriel but nodded. She was already off to start on the project. I headed to my room and planned to do my nightly routine, but things never stopped. Mia came and told me about two attempted break-ins to the Shiny Platinum. One was successful, but the infiltrator did not take anything and was only on the first floor. The second was some local kids up to mischief, but they just hoped to get food on a dare. The guards caught them and turned them over to the constables.

Mia explained, “So I want to add a mage for security overnight. The cost is substantial at ten gold a week.”

I waved my hand, consenting, “It is fine. Hire someone with a strong alarm spell and whatever else you think he needs. Do not go with the expected person, though. This all might be a setup to hire a specific person to get on the inside.” I thought to myself that I was getting paranoid.

I was finally in my room alone with the cats. We did their training, and I went into my nightly routine. I was focused on learning the arcane web spell. I had time to study during the spell class, and the instructor was good, not as good as Selina, but good. I looked at my spell list. I had made more progress than most, but my attention had been largely divided recently.

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Once I imprinted the arcane web spell, my spell matrix would be at 30 of 33. I needed another reading from Wynna on my core size to see if it had grown. I was sure it had, and I knew my max could be as high as 110, but it tended to grow with my aether core, and speeding up the process did not allways work. I required eight slots to imprint the tier 5 lightning elemental spell on my aether matrix. That was my goal. But I still planned to imprint the comprehend languages spell next. It was a tier 1 spell and too useful if I planned to explore the Sphere.

When my lesser restoration spell had reached level 13, I evolved it to straighten, restore and whiten teeth. I told myself this was for Freya, who was addicted to sweets of all kinds, but in the back of my mind, I knew I would offer the service to Nashima. I had used it on myself, and it had worked remarkably well in the whitening aspect. I probably could have gotten the same effect from an evolution of my cleanliness spell. But this evolution could take a lifelong drunk with rotted teeth and give him a new set.

I didn’t sleep much because my paranoia of what Loriel might be planning was invading my dreams. This just seemed too focused for her not to have something. The unrestful sleep caused me to get up early and do my morning routine early. On the way to the Dungeon Academy, I stopped in an herbalist’s shop for a sleeping draught. He said it would give me a dreamless sleep for five to seven hours.

I then ordered five hundred ingots of steel delivered to the Shiny Platinum warehouse. I planned to try my hand at making some of the long swords favored by the dark elves in Llorth. After my two classes, I returned before lunch to get Wynna and Ennet to give me a new reading.

“Storme! This is the first time you have visited us in our business!” Ennet said with a smile. They both had an apartment at the Shiny Platinum. This was also Ennets reading business as Wynna was retired—mostly retired.

“It is, and I love the place! Do you have time to do a reading for me?” I asked, knowing the answer would be yes.

“Certainly! Anything specific?” Ennet asked for both of them.

“Just wanted to know the growth of my spell matrix. I am getting close, and my meditation can not pinpoint the available space,” I revealed.

Not long before, they got me into their reading room and prepared the paper. The results we good. I looked at the paper and then destroyed it. My available spell matrix was 36. The possible maximum had not changed and was 110. That gave me eight slots for spells.

I was not going to drop the arcane web and comprehend languages plan. But I figured by the end of the year, and I would be able to start learning the lightning elemental spell. Tier five spells were on a completely different level, and having it as a trump card, like my lightning reflexes spell, would make me extremely dangerous. I thanked them both and asked them if they could do readings on Ullmark’s candidates for them. They said they would do it for free, but I insisted on paying. Ennet by herself was one large gold coin. A dual reading was three large gold coins. Ten and thirty gold! Maybe I should have accepted their offer of free readings. I would let Ullmark know the men and women in the training team could get their readings done at the best readers in the Skyholme.

My weekly routine was interrupted on the third day when Bylura knocked with the gold-embossed invitations. Nineteen total. I then had to listen to her for two hours about protocol. My head aching, I had to give out the invitations to an event just a few days away that required a certain dress. I started with my parents, Pascal and Freya. Freya was excited, and my parents nervously accepted. I had a runner send the invitation to Pascal.

The twins, Mera and Fera, were thrilled because I do not think they understood the magnitude of the event. They rushed off for dresses. Mia did not want to attend, but I forced her to in her capacity of working for me. If I got nineteen invitations, I was bringing eighteen people with me. Isla was already attending but gladly would go under my invitation instead of Loriel’s. Cilia and Leda had planned to remain with the Maelstrom but were willing to attend. Ullmark, Rippon, Remy, and Lana thought I was joking, but I told them they had to attend as well.

Wynna and Ennet were going on Callem’s invitation. I sent an invitation to Selina and Talia at the Mage Academy. That left me with three invitations. One was for Gareth, and I just slid it under his door, but I was not even sure he had been to the Shiny Platinum in weeks. The other two invitations went to Namira and Neelan, my advisor. I had just run out of people to ask. They both accepted and would be in the Maelstrom for the flight to the capital.

All this social connection ate up a lot of my free time. At least the sleeping draught was keeping the restless nightmares at bay. When the seventh day arrived, and everyone was assembled on the skyship, including Gareth in a rather stylish suit. Callem still had not talked to him so I hoped he would do it tonight. I sighed as we flew to the capital to meet the Sadians.