6 The Job

A drop of water falls on my face from the morning dew, lightly waking me up. I look around, and the sun has just risen above the horizon I glance down and notice that the horses are still there, as well as my unwanted partner.

"Why the hell did I agree to the Job anyway?" I ask myself. Sure I need money, but I easily could have found a job myself, then I wouldn't have to give Miss Thief down there anything.

I climb down from the branches where I was sleeping from and stand next to Miss Thief as she is still fast asleep. I wonder if a canteen of water would wake her up? I debate whether to use the water or not, then decide it would be a waste.

Instead, I deliver a swift kick to the ribs to wake her up. She darts up gasping, attempting to attack whoever kicked her, but utterly failed to do so while being tied up. In the end she just toppled over into the ground.

"Why you! I am going to kill you for that." She snarls in a vicious manner.

Ignoring the comment I cut her free and untie the reigns of the two hoses from the tree. She holds her hand out, expecting me to hand them to her, but I decide to once again ignore her and tie her horses reigns to my saddle.

"What the hell? I can ride myself." She snaps indignantly.

"I am sure you can Miss Thief." I reply simply.

"Then give me the reigns." She demands.

"Nope." Was my simple reply. This seemed to tick her off even more, but she decides to hop on the horses back without any more arguing.

After riding for around two hours, she breaks the silence. "Did you hear about the attack on the prison camp by the Bristodian's? From what I hear, there is a decent bounty on any escaped slaves."

"Yah, I heard about it, the Bristodian's utterly obliterated the soldiers there. As for any escapees, I doubt any haven't either been caught or escaped into Bristodia by now."

She nods her head, calmly assessing my reactions. After this awkward attempt at conversation we return to silence.

For the next few hours we ride, until finally we reach a small village town by the name of Lute. Miss Thief then announces, "Come my employer is over here." After we place the horses in a stable using two gold coins from the gold purse I stole from the slave master, we head over through the crowded streets to a brightly light tavern called, Rusty Wheel Tavern.

"Come on he's just in here." She leads me into a back room of the tavern, and in the lightly furnished room there is a man around the age of forty. He dawns a set of chain mail armor and has a thick black beard. His hair is oiled back and the sword at his side is of high quality.

"Heya John." She announces happily, "This is my new partner, Tas. He will be working on the next job with me."

He nods his head and looks at me with a slight sign of interest. "Hey Tas I am John the Bounty Master, nice to meet you." He holds out his hand in a welcoming gesture.

After a moments hesitation, I shake his hand accepting the gesture. "It's a pleasure to met you. I was wondering what this job entails and the rewards it offers," I ask with interest. The words Bounty Master caught my attention.

Bounty Masters are few and far between. They were often hunted and killed due to the nature of their work by paranoid mage's. A Bounty Maters job was to take a bounty placed on the head of a target, and then hire combat mage's, assassins, or hunters, to eliminate the target depending on the nature of the mission.

More often then not, bounties were placed on the heads of dangerous animals, such as wolves or bears that have been harassing nearby towns or villages, but occasionally, there would be a bounty on the head of mage or noble. The later of the jobs paid very well.

This interested me greatly, after all now that I escaped I only have one goal in mind. I want to kill every single noble and tester that I meet. I want to destroy the system that stole my magic. I will do anything to achieve those means.

The man smiles, "why yes you may. Currently I have three bounties that need collecting. The first is a troublesome bear that has been killing sheep herds here in lute, the second is about a wild boar that has been causing problems over by the city of Trentson, and the third one, is for the murder of Baron Vice of Trentson city."

Miss Thief, begins asking about the rewards for the bear quest, but i could only think of one thing. My eyes burned of hatred as I ask, "How much for the Murder?" A wicked smile escaping my lips.

Both Miss Thief and John look surprised, but John then laughs and declares, "That's the spirit my boy, as for the rewards, one-hundred gold piece." I smile at the thought. Currently I only had forty-four coppers and two silvers. It took one-hundred coppers to make a silver, and one hundred silvers to make a gold.

With a hundred gold, I could easily expand my fame and improve my equipment. If I wanted to kill all the Nobles and Testers, then I would have to have a good amount of connections and gold. and this would be the perfect place to start.