Chapter 14: The mayor

Guard Rollo led them to the mayor's house. They were escorted to the mayor's office and the guard left them there. Edwin knocked and from within came a calm voice.

"Come on in," the man said, from within the office.

Edwin opened the door. The office didn't smell of sickness, nor did the beanstalk thin man with his weasel face and patchy brown hair look sick either. Edwin narrowed his eyes.

"We are here to see the mayor," Edwin said.

"That would be me, sir. Take a sit. What brings you to me?" the mayor said. Edwin saw that there was only one chair opposite the desk. He wanted to remain standing, but Hadrian nudged him and looked pointedly at the chair.

Edwin sat down and saw the glass of water in front of him. He pushed it away.

"Do drink. This is filtered, completely clean water. From my very own well," the mayor said.

"The water source for the entire town is contaminated. That is how the disease spreads," Edwin said. The mayor rolled his eyes.

"Oh, I know. The healer told me as much. That is why I had a mana filter installed at my well when the first rumors of the coughing sickness came from Myrna. And that is why I bought the mana filtering company," the mayor said with a smirk.

Edwin gripped the armrests of his chair and snarled.

"You knew your population is going to drop like flies, and yet you did nothing?" Edwin screamed, enraged. The mayor raised his hand. His smirk became wider.

"Boy, Duria's king is using this sickness for population culling, most likely. What better criteria for whatever someone belongs to the slums than if they have a water filter? People are giving me their life's savings for a filter, but, since they are already sick, what can I do?"

"You don't care! You don't care even a bit! I will bring this to the town's council," Edwin screamed. The mayor began clapping. Then he raised his two hands and spread his fingers wide.

"Ten members. That is how many we have. Five of them have shares in the mana filtering water cleaners. The other five have fled the town and are going to Mitestone. We have certain, let us say, assurances, that the sickness won't spread there."

Edwin opened his mouth, but the mayor chuckled and pulled a sack from below his desk. He placed it on the desk. Shiny gold coins gleamed from within.

"You will take this money, the money that our healer would have taken if his hands weren't tied, and you will leave. I, unlike the king, don't want to see the rubble dead. Where is the profit in that?" the mayor said as he leaned back into his seat.

"You can't buy my silence," Edwin hissed. He made no move towards the coin sack.

"I don't need to, hedge healer. You are a second-class citizen. The star pupil of the Mitestone Healer Academy, freshly fallen from grace. With this money, you can buy water filters for the entire town. Or you can get off your high horse and do the smart thing. Settle here, keep my taxpayers from dying, and be happy. Even the thief is welcomed."

"I will not stay," Edwin said, and then he pushed the money towards the mayor. "And you will install water filters for everyone and build an orphanage. In exchange, you can patent the treatment."

"You'll sell me the rights?" asked the mayor, intrigued. "I suppose that will get me more than what I could have gotten from the water filters. Especially if you make a pill or syrup or, better yet, a vaccine."

"A syrup is doable. But the treatment involves physical therapy," Edwin said. The mayor smiled like a shark who was zeroing in on a school of fish.

"I will have to give you a percentage of the winnings. And I will have to fire the town's healer, for his inaction. After all, if a charlatan managed to find a working cure, he should have done so sooner."

Edwin spared a thought to the healer. Perhaps the bitter lesson of becoming a second-class citizen and being jobless will teach him the value of human life. Perhaps Edwin would simply make an enemy. It mattered not.

Through the greed of the mayor, he was going to spread the blood root sludge to those who needed it. Producing it in mass quality and, hopefully, selling it as little overpriced as he could negotiate with the darn weasel before him.

"Do we have a deal, Edwin Roberts?" asked the mayor. Edwin felt like he was striking a deal with the devil, but he extended his hand. Only for Hadrian to grip it and yank it away from the mayor's.

"I know plenty of things about you, Louis Monter," Hadrian said, and the mayor looked at the safe that was next to the window. "Did the Bernard family ever find out who stole their land writ?"

"Now, Hadrian, discretion was something I paid you for…," the mayor said.

"I wouldn't even lose a hand over this. Unlike Eddy, I don't do things the legal way. Once they "lost" the writ, you became the only claimant for the land. I bet they still sharpen their daggers at the thought of getting proof you had the theft arranged," Hadrian said with a vicious smile. His hand found itself on Edwin's shoulder when Edwin tried to speak. The blonde healer lowered his green eyes and let the extortion continue.

"Hadrian…!" said the now sweating mayor. Hadrian placed a finger on his lips.

"You will listen. You will donate the mana filters to me. You will build and upkeep an orphanage with your money, for as long as you are alive. Furthermore, you will make sure that the orphanage will be taken care of by the king before you die. Eddy here will get the full winnings of his blood root barf inducing sludge. You will nominate him for an increase in status."

The mayor took out a handkerchief and began to dry his forehead. He pointed at the door.

"Fine. Now get out."

Hadrian bowed and took the coin sack. He had plans for it.