Return of the Runebound Professor Chapter 866: What do you want?

“Hold still,” Lee ordered, narrowing her eyes at Brayden. “I’ll miss if you keep wiggling. You’re messing up my practice.”

“Nobody’s gonna stand still during a real battle, you know,” Brayden replied, shaking his head. “And—”

His words trailed into a strangled curse as Lee hurled the strip of jerky clutched in her hand straight at the burly man. It smacked against his forehead before ricocheting away with a hefty thump, twirling down to land on the bed next to Brayden.

“Ow,” Brayden muttered.

“Damn,” Lee muttered, shooting a look at the fallen meat. Brayden tracked her eyes. A brief silence fell over them. Then Lee cleared her throat. “Can I—”

“No,” Brayden snapped, snatching the jerky and lifting it toward his lips. “This one’s mine now. You flung it at me. Finder’s keepers.”

“I was practicing!”

Noah’s eyelid flickered. He perched on the bed just a foot from Lee, legs folded underneath, struggling without success to focus on his runes. Only a few hours remained before they reported for the tournament and got divided into their groups.

He’d pushed himself to ponder the designs of his next runes ahead of time. With his existing 5, merely 2 more stood between him and Rank 6. Odds were high he’d snag them before long.

For all he knew, the tournament’s length was anyone’s guess, but its massive hype suggested it would drag on for days. And considering Aqua Terra’s enormous scale, tracking down rune vendors wouldn’t be tough. An auction might even pop up if he scraped together enough crystals.

Securing those would let him forge his last two Rank 5 runes without much hassle… assuming he pinpointed exactly what he desired for his final pair. More precisely, their construction method. Knocking out the planning phase early would shrink rune creation time to a sliver.

His intense meditations had yielded some progress, but they got constantly derailed by the tiny whirlwind of energy presently coaxing Brayden to surrender her jerky strip—which had somehow stayed uneaten up to now.

“Please?” Lee pleaded.

Brayden chomped down on the jerky strip.

“Aw,” Lee whined, shoulders drooping. “Oh well.”

She dipped into her travel pack and fished out a second piece. Brayden gaped at her. His eye twitched faintly.

“You had another?”

“Of course I had another,” Lee huffed, as if the question insulted her. “Why risk my last jerky on something lame like training? That’d be moronic.”

“This isn’t training in the slightest,” Noah groaned, squeezing the bridge of his nose. “You’re just bored.”

“Yeah.” Lee bobbed her head. “Spot on. Who trains when they’re not bored? You’d pick anything else.”

“Why not stretch or whatever?”

“Done that already,” Lee said. “My bones are flexible. Like trees.”

“Bones aren’t meant to be flexible,” Brayden remarked, frowning lightly.

“Nah, I’m certain they are,” Lee countered, brow creasing. “Yours must be old. They get rigid over time.”

“Old?” Brayden burst out. “I’m not old! I’m in my prime. I—who in the Damned Plains is that?”

Brayden’s alarmed tone jerked Noah and Lee’s heads around to trace his stare toward the window. Noah nearly gagged on his spit.

A face mashed against the windowpane, flattened like a dog glued to a TV chasing a squirrel. It wasn’t a good-looking mug either.

“The hell?” Noah blurted.

“Oh, no,” Lee groaned, tone thick with dismay. “It’s the creepy stalker.”

“The what?” Brayden demanded. He stood, seizing the massive sword propped by the bed as his gaze sharpened. “A stalker?”

“What?” Noah sprang up and invoked his runes. “That dude chasing you in the city where we met? How’s he here? This weirdo tracked us clear across Aqua Terra? I didn’t believe that was feasible!”

The glass groaned as the man smooshed against it attempted speech.

Brayden hefted his sword. “Imbuements protect that window, but I can slice through. Should I stab him?”

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

“It’s broad daylight,” Noah shot back. “But hell, he’s climbing the wall like a lunatic. Nobody’ll blame us for self-defense, yeah?”

“Does it count as self-defense if he can’t enter?” Lee wondered. “The window’s imbued, right?”

A sharp click rang out. Noah stared in faint shock as the window unfastened. The man’s face sprang back into shape as he withdrew a step, and all three watched the glass panel swing open.

“I’m going to stab him,” Brayden announced.

“Wait!” the man cried out, lifting a hand in defense. His other arm was no doubt still pinning him against the building's exterior. “I’ve journeyed far too much to get caught in a brawl right here. It’s all a mix-up. Lower your weapons.”

“You're climbing the wall of our tavern right now, after trailing us across the Empire,” Noah replied in a flat tone. “I doubt there's any real misunderstanding.”

“Trailing us? Never. Not at all. I'm conducting research. That's entirely different. Please don't mix them up.” The man shook his head, making his thick fur coat jiggle a bit. “Come on now. Haven't either of you ever climbed a building or two for the sake of something greater? Where's your drive? Your spirit of adventure?”

“I'm stabbing him,” Brayden declared once more.

“Wait,” Noah instructed. “Stab him now, and he'll drop straight to the ground. Total disaster.”

“Fair enough,” Brayden agreed. “I'll haul him inside first. Then stab him. Lee can handle the body.”

“No thanks on eating this guy,” Lee protested, wrinkling her nose in disgust. “He reeks of being off.”

“You consume bodies? For nutrition? Or enjoyment?” The man inquired, his eyes sparking with curiosity. “And how does someone your size devour something much bigger? Does your belly stretch by magic? Or do you compress what you swallow into something smaller?”

“Forget it,” Brayden spat in revulsion. He lifted his sword. “Stabbing him right now. We'll clean up the mess afterward.”

“Easy now. I truly don't want to slay anyone today. The paperwork's bad enough already. Maybe we started wrong. Let me introduce myself properly.” The man wobbled strangely — like he perched on a tall pole instead of gripping the wall. “I'm Mordred. Researcher for the Prophet, here to probe your traveling friend.”

Noah’s jaw tightened.

Noah and Brayden shared a look. No words passed between them. None were needed.

“Sure,” Noah said. “We'd love to have you inside.”

“And out of sight from the window,” Lee added. “That way no one spots us when we do you in.”

“Charming,” Mordred replied, unflinching. He seized the windowsill. Then he wobbled again, grunting softly. His head dipped a foot before snapping back upward. His gaze sharpened as he glared downward. “Stay put, would you? I'm in the middle of talking, you idiots!”

“Hurry it up!” another voice shouted from below. “How long you gonna perch on our shoulders? Whole crowd's gawking at us, you weirdo!”

Noah blinked.

Noah inched closer, magic primed in case it was an elaborate trick. Yet the sight right under the window matched his suspicions perfectly. Mordred wasn't clinging to the wall solo. Two figures teetered in a shaky human tower below him. Adding to the peril, the base man balanced atop a wagon parked against the tavern wall. One gust of wind could topple the whole stack.

To Noah's misfortune, Mordred's absurd break-in method had attracted a sizable audience. If the man truly served the Prophet, dispatching him discreetly was now out of the question. A bunch of onlookers had witnessed both him and Mordred.

“Just a moment, alright?” Mordred yelled down. “I'm— ”

The human stack under Mordred lurched as the wagon's wheel rolled forward an inch with a creak. His eyes bulged; he cursed while toppling backward.

Noah lunged, snagging the man's collar to halt his fall. The sill's edge jammed into his gut, forcing a grunt from him as his muscles burned from the effort. Mordred flailed his arms briefly before latching onto the wall. The pair below steadied their precarious pile too.

“Apologies,” the bottom guy called up.

“You should've dropped him,” Brayden suggested.

“Yeah,” Noah grumbled.

Mordred flashed him a grin. “But you didn't. Much obliged. That would've hurt. Now, about that invite to chat indoors...”

Noah retreated as Mordred hauled himself through the window. In faint astonishment, Noah watched the man land on the room floor with a thud, then stand and dust off his coat. Mordred's gaze shifted to Lee.

Brayden blocked her path.

“Look at me, freak,” Brayden snarled.

“As I mentioned, wrong start,” Mordred said. He held his hands up placatingly. “No ill intent toward your friend. Quite the opposite. Rare kinds deserve safeguarding. I just want to grasp her nature more.”

“He's hounded us for days,” Lee said from behind Brayden.

“Of course I have,” Mordred replied. “Our talk got cut short. I only seek to converse. Nothing beyond that. Not a huge demand, right?”

“Didn’t you claim to work for the Prophet?” Noah questioned warily. “Why would she care about folks like us?”

Mordred cleared his throat. “Well. Ah. To be precise, she doesn’t. This is more of a side pursuit. A personal pastime.”

Noah eyed Mordred suspiciously with narrowed gaze for a brief instant. Then, gradually, he gave a nod.

“Fine,” Noah uttered, refusing to quell the crackling magic surging through his fingertips. Should Mordred make any abrupt motion, he’d face the repercussions of infuriating the Prophet down the line. He motioned for Mordred to proceed. “Talk. But make it snappy. What’s your goal?”

Mordred grinned.