There was no fancy sendoff after they finished breakfast, just a runner sent to the stables to get Thor hooked up to the wagon and staged for departure.
Thor was happy to help them with their work, even if they had done a lacklustre job of scrubbing his scales last night. They had at least scrubbed him down, but there was no enthusiasm and no extra attention to the itchy spots, even when he tried to point them out.
So, he was hooked up and ready when Karl arrived with the team, while the grooms pretended that they weren’t intensely curious about the fact that his entire harness rig was made of silk rope.
Normally, the shoulder brace would be wooden, with hemp ropes attaching it to the cart, but Thor’s harness was entirely silk, and included ties for a rider to be securely strapped in place.
Karl checked the cargo, and found that it appeared intact under the net as the others loaded themselves into the wagon.
Guards on the bipedal lizard mounts escorted them through the city streets, clearly not intending to let Karl stop and do business inside the city limits. That actually worked for everyone, as Karl had no intentions of staying in the area.
With a whole group of Overlords and seers here, Karl was looking forward to being out of their sphere of influence. The less likely they were to notice what he was doing, the safer he would be.
Nobody challenged them as they made their way out the gates and into the open farmland that surrounded the city, where the others began to relax a little. They weren’t going to say anything to blow their cover, but at least that feeling of being suppressed was gone, and so was the feeling of being watched.
Inside the fortress, The Oracle, was sitting with a group of twenty Trouble Seers, staring at an image on the smooth surface of a pool of water in a silver pool.
“Are you sure that he’s not going to be back, Oracle?” One of the seers whispered.
“Yes, he is gone. I don’t know what sort of threat he is, but my advice is that we don’t follow his movements directly. If we interfere, it might encourage our soldiers to do something that triggers the danger.
I believe that the one known as Karl said it himself, and it is something that we should have been more mindful of in the past. It is possible for a prophecy to be self-fulfilling. The more people who know about the monster hidden inside that body, the more likely they are to start a chain of events that lead to their destruction.” The Oracle sighed.
“Surely, the danger isn’t that high? I sense threat from his position, but not higher than a military unit. We sensed nearly as much when those mages from the Wilds arrived.” The Trouble Seer asked.
“That was thirty mages. This is one creature. I suspect that he isn’t truly a Troll, but it is unlikely that he’s a human either. It might be a doppelgänger, or worse, an Echo.”
The seers shuddered at the thought. Most of them had seen one of the Echoes when they looked into the distant past during their training. They were constructs created by the Gods to guide and shape societies, but they were terrifying on a level that no living being should be capable of.
Their mere existence was enough to put terror into the minds of those who could see the past.
“Should we not have one person observe him to make sure he really is leaving? He might be posing as a merchant, but that is no guarantee that he’s not scouting for an invasion.” One of the seers suggested.
The Oracle began to cast another spell, watching Karl’s progress as they left the city.
At first, it all seemed normal. But then, two Naga Warriors appeared on the steps of his wagon, without the Oracle even sensing that anyone had cast a spell.
The Oracle didn’t sense a portal, and he didn’t detect the surge of magic for a summoning spell. His first thought was that the Naga Warriors had simply released an invisibility spell that had been cast on them, but the wagon had been in the fortress for over a day.
Someone should have sensed them if they were simply invisible.
He made a note of it among his other visions, and continued to watch for a few more minutes as the group simply travelled past the farms, and called out to those that they passed.
None of it was out of the ordinary, only a merchant trying to sell his Minotaur made tools. But the oddities were enough to put the Oracle on edge and convince him that he had made the right call in telling the others not to do anything to prevent him leaving.
If his guess was right, and he really did have a massive wealth of hidden power, there might be others watching over him from the shadows. Others who would come to his rescue if he were actually in trouble.
That dragon, Orthos, for example.
Karl had mentioned him during their interview, and the Oracle had seen them interact in his visions. He might not know their current relationship, but the anger of an ancient Dragon was not something to tempt.
But in the wagon, Karl and the others knew nothing of these concerns, and they were happy to have simply escaped the notice of the Overlord Council without anything major happening.
They had just passed the first cluster of small vegetable farms that served the fortress, and had passed into what Karl would consider a wilderness area, headed east down the main road.
Karl turned to talk to the others. “You know, this shortcut is actually pretty nice. The road here is all gravel and well maintained, much better than the deep ruts and soft dirt that we were getting on the other sections of the road.
Maybe we can stick with it for a while before we move back to travelling through the wilderness to get to the underserved customers?”
Dana nodded. “That’s not a bad idea. We might be able to make a few good trades along the way, and pick up more than farming tools.”
Tessa nodded. “We might pick up a side quest or two as well. From what I understand, the further northeast we go from here, the more trouble they have with Giants and wild beasts.
If we go that way, we should be able to get some excellent customers, but if we follow the road to the southeast we will get to the capital city of Newbon, and from there we can head east through human populated lands until we get to the wilds, then we’re into more dangerous territory.
The Wilds are almost completely controlled by beasts, but there are a number of towns and one major port there as well.
A pirate port again, but that’s to be expected. Only this one specializes in beast materials, from what I understand, and not slaves.”
“And from there, we can follow this huge river all the way up to Whiton Temple. There are major trade routes along the river, and a road going from there into the Golden Dragon Nation.
It’s a pretty solid route, and we should be able to make sales and purchases at nearly every stop.”
“We might even find buyers for some of Rae’s silk.”
