Red tried to move past the cost of his acquisitions, but Simon chimed in. “The promise of a living elf bow that you would sing into creation that would be auctioned off for the club’s big fundraiser this summer,” Simon stated.

  “Seems more than fair,” I said.

  “And a silver piece per arrow made.” He added.

  “That’s 1000 gold pieces. An arrow goes for a copper piece each. Maybe.”

  “But they need to be made.” Red insisted.

  I clarified, “An already-made arrow goes for a copper piece each. Maybe.”

  “Well, they did seem keen.” He admitted.

  “I bet.” I agreed.

  “Did I tell you about the Rune Maker’s Club?” He asked.

  “The what?”

  “Yeah, a popular group at the university. It's a way to do magic without being a mage. The shop we were at even had beginner books on the stuff.”

  I kept a straight face. “And what about the club?”

  “Well, they offered to etch whatever rune magic into the bullets that we bought for, well,” He looked at Simon.

  “At a silver per stone,” Simon said.

  “And you have-” I asked

  “Ten thousand of them.” Simon finished with a grin.

  “I’m canceling your allowance,” I said to Red.

  Simon said, “I thought it sounded expensive. But maybe you should skip to the armor and some of your ideas that did not come up at the last briefing.”

  I looked at Red with my arms crossed.

  He said, “Okay. The armor here, which, I admit, has seen better days, is first age Imperial Centurion armor.”

  That got my attention. That was really, really old and was a true piece of history.

  “Interesting,” I admitted.

  Red clapped. “See, I knew he’d like this as soon as I saw it.”

  “How did you get this?” I asked, examining it carefully because of its fragile condition.

  “Ah, yes. I thought we’d get around to that.”

  I looked up. “Around to what?”

  “The museum guard may have been under the impression that we were authorized to remove certain artifacts for special protection in case the city was overrun.”

  I stared at him. “I see.”

  “Yes. But it is all in the name of righteousness.” He added.

  I looked at Simon. “And you went along with it?”

  “He has a way of pulling you along with him once he gets up some steam,” Simon stated.

  Looking back at Red, “And that has more to do with you not going back tomorrow, I suppose.”

  “Well, it is a contributor, I admit.”

  “Red, we work for the Duke. If we embarrass him, it will not go well for anyone.”

  “I get it. It's just I have some ideas and I think this all goes together.”

  “I give you a lot of freedom because I trust you. Please make sure that you don’t play loose with that trust.”

  He lowered his head. “Yeah, sorry, Patron.” He said.

  “So here is what you are going to do. Get with Isaac and ask him for three more sets of limited teleportation to and from the capital. Explain what you did, and that after the fact, I support it, but I am asking for him to draw up a letter from The Tower that requests these pieces for reasons similar to what you said, and in defense of Keelwell. This way, nobody gets in trouble, the poor guard doesn’t get fired for losing valuable artifacts, and Special Services keeps our reputation with the Duke. Understood?”

  He looked hopeful. “Yes, I’ll do that.”

  “And you will lead the groups back and forth tomorrow to ensure everything is picked up.”

  “Got it.”

  “You already committed to the arrows, so we will stand by them. Draw the funds from Bella or Biff to pay them tomorrow, and when I get time, I’ll sing the bow into existence, but it may be after the horde is defeated. Hold off on the sling bullets. I have another plan for them. Leave them with Aldreim below. I’ll explain to her what I plan for us.”

  I started to leave.

  “Wait, I have a few ideas to put to you first.”

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  I looked at Simon, who said, “There are some good ones in there.”

  I sighed again but smiled. “Okay, I’ll give you a little more time.”

  “Do you know the monkey drop game?” Red asked.

  I wrinkled my brow. “The kid’s game with the balloon?”

  “Yes, that’s the one. Well, I stopped by my sister’s and she was having a birthday party for my nephew. And they had the game. And it gave me an idea.”

  “Wait for it.” Simon said with a grin.”

  “What if we made a balloon and launched it from the middle of the city so we could see all around the region. It could be a high lookout. If they had spyglasses in the balloon, they could see even further and make out details such as formations and timing around the goblin horde’s arrival.”

  “Who would be the monkey in the basket who drops?” I asked.

  Simon laughed. “That was my question, which is why he now calls me ‘Monky’ without the letter ‘e’.”

  I didn’t laugh. “There could be something useful in that, Red. We have some flying mounts, although not that many. We also have mages who can fly, and air elementals could be used to defend it. Given the curved nature of our hollow world, if we go up above the trees and surrounding landscapes, we could probably see the army now with a powerful enough spyglass.”

  “So you like the idea?” Red said, somewhat surprised.

  “Yes. Make it happen. In the meantime, I’ll suggest it to the Ranger Commander and suggest that if he uses one of their flying mounts with one of the navy’s more powerful spy glasses, we might be able to get some advance intel without risking our soldiers in close proximity to the army and their scouts.”

  Simon suggested, “Of course, the Levitate spell or one of your magical carpets could also work. A mount has to keep flapping its wings, and it may make it hard to use a spyglass.”

  “And the Levitate or magical carpet would be more stable. Good point, Simon. What else do you have, Red?” I asked.

  “One more idea with several twists to its theme.” He said excitedly, feeling like he had redeemed his earlier actions. “During the Deathlight, a druid in the 6th borough named Sisaya had a brilliant idea.”

  “I know her,” I said. “We fought together around Barricade Park.

  “This would have been just a little after that battle if my information is correct.” He said. “Her companion, a sage named Thorne, created a circular wall of water around them for protection.”

  “Whoa, a circular wall of water?” I said. “I thought they could only be straight between two points,” I said.

  “Yes, Adriana was fascinated by it and said that nobody, to her knowledge, had tried something quite like that before. She has been practicing it with a thought to make them into protective shields of air and fire for battle.”

  “Sweet idea,” I said.

  “Right, but here is where the druid came in. While Thorne built a kind of partial barrier to limit access to where they were located in order to better defend themselves, she cast a spell that summoned hundreds of dogs to attack the undead, especially the skeletons.”

  I laughed, imagining what that scene had to have looked like.

  “Nice image. But how does that help us?” I asked. “We could use dogs to defend us, but only if goblins got into the city, unless you are suggesting we send them into Undercity.” Which, as I thought about it, both ideas could still be very helpful. “We could use the dogs a bit like we were planning to use the Conjure Snap! monsters.” I said.

  “True.” He agreed. “But later, she used the same spell, but summoned thousands of birds, and they ripped into the undead.”

  “A single bird would not be much, but thousands could really harass them,” I observed.

  Red smiled. “Or bats at night, rats from the undercity, feral dogs/wolves/coyotes, a giant tortoise or two, and even sharks in the bay.”

  I was on board with his idea. “Have you told anyone about this?” I asked.

  “Just a couple of the journeymen.” He admitted.

  “Add your idea to our next meeting and maybe request that a journeyman druid and ranger get added to our team.”

  I imagined the range of creatures we could use to attack the goblins, and then I thought about their march toward us. “I think that we shouldn’t wait for the goblins to get here before we start using some of those ideas,” I said. “If we slow them down and weary them, it could create chaos among their ranks. Every hour we gain is in our favor.” I said.

  Red was standing tall and back in form.

  “Nice work, Red,” I said. “The goblin army will be following the river here for water, and that adds some nasty giant river eels to the mix and other creatures that rangers and druids will know better than we do.

  “In the meantime, since you were thinking about a donation for my dad anyway, check in with my mother and see if she could make a few Single Use Rings for whatever spell it is that was used,” I suggested.

  “The spell’s name is Call Animal, and it comes in various levels such as lesser, greater, and even Call Magical Creature.” He explained.

  “It sounds like a slow spell, but once it gets ramped up, it could be pretty tough,” Simon added.

  “It sure was against the undead.” Red agreed.

  Bella, please send an Irregular to the Elven Sanctuary to set up a meeting with the Ranger Commander here or there at his convenience.

  Toby is on his way. She said with a sigh. Toby was very enthusiastic, and he drove Bella a bit spare at times.

  “Do you have anything else to share, Red?” I asked, trying not to show a smile, thinking about Toby and Bella.

  “Well, we never really discussed my repeating crossbows.” He said.

  “What did you have in mind?” I asked, seeing some possibility, but generally longbowmen could fire more arrows, more accurately, and at more distant targets than crossbows. It was why they have not been used seriously since the longbow was invented.

  “Well, I had read about these in classes and given the chance to, umm, borrow and examine one in person, I thought that first, I would set some of our engineering students and faculty loose on it to see how it works and if we could make it more effective.”

  Simon added. “The subterranean elves have a magical version of this as a repeating hand crossbow that shoots darts.”

  “Okay. Not an immediate win but worth exploring.”

  “Because it is not magical,” Red continued, “unlike the elves’ version, we could replicate them with some of the moderately powered conjuration spells, or if we built it in a modular fashion, we could replicate parts and assemble it using low-level conjuration. That would be much faster than building them from scratch.”

  “Yes, that is an even better idea. Get on it as well.” I encouraged.

  Simon said, “Tell the Patron about your bigger idea around these repeating crossbows.”

  I raised my eyebrows.

  Red said, “Simon is having sport with me. But he is right, I do have a bigger idea. Literally.”

  “What’s that?”

  “If we can get these to work, I wanted to use a growth spell on them to radically increase their size and make a rotating, mounted ballista for the wall towers. If we add exploding runes on those repeating ballistae…” He said.

  “I get the picture. Maybe even bigger booms.” I thought about the book the Rune Master had let me copy. “I may have some different runes to use other than just exploding options. Some trick runes, as it were.”

  Red smiled. “Coming over to my side of the fence, now.”

  Simon said, “It’s greener over there.”

  “Yes, it is.” Red agreed.

  “Because of all the fertilizer.” Simon finished.

  “Hey!” Red said.

  “Okay, gentlemen, I’ll leave you to it. I like the armor and your working ideas. Let’s move them past thoughts and into action.”

  I clasped arms with both and then walked out.

  Bella, unless an emergency arises, I am going to go clean up and put on a fresh robe. I’ll make my rounds after that.

  I’ll let those who were waiting to speak with you know you will be a little while yet.

  Thanks, Bella. I just need twenty minutes or so.

  I went up to my rooms and took a hot shower. Quite a lot of dust and dirt flowed into the drain. I must have looked more of a mess than I had thought. But nobody said anything.

  People respect you for what you say and do, not what you look like. Bella said.

  I laughed. That’s probably a good thing.

  I dried off and got dressed. It was time to make my rounds.

  Who is waiting for me first? I asked.

  Bella responded very quietly. Daniel has some bookkeeping to discuss with you after what he calls today’s spending spree.

  Tell him I’m on my way, please.

  We would need to request more funds from the Duke, but given what we had accomplished, it was all in order.

  I spent a little more than half an hour below making my rounds. I also expected to meet with Isaac soon and deliver to him his commission.