“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Lysandra, but I go by Lys.”
Something felt odd about her, but he couldn’t quite tell what it was. He started to focus on her, watching the gold lettering slowly come together.
“You know it’s considered rude to divine someone without their permission.”
Michael raised an eyebrow. “Really? That’s the first I’m hearing of it.”
She shrugged. “I’m guessing you usually did it to people who were going to try and kill you anyway. Or other soldiers that you basically share underwear with anyway.”
“Fair enough. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude.”
“It’s fine.” She smiled. “I was divining you the moment you came down the stairs anyway.”
That’s what it was. He could feel the touch of the divine on her, though it wasn’t as strong as it was on him.
"Rude for me, but not for you?"
"I don't mind being rude, but you seem like a more polite sort." She smiled mischievously. “You have a very impressive list of titles and deeds for someone of your age, even as a taker veteran. What are you twenty? Twenty two?”
He scratched his chin. “That’s actually a very good question. I think I’m about two? Maybe a bit younger. Physically I think I’m supposed to be about seventeen or eighteen? Mentally I’m an old man.”
She nodded. “What strange existences you takers must lead. Sounds like an ideal build for a soldier. A young body and an old mind. I’m stuck in an aging body with an aging mind.”
Michael thought she looked quite good, but held his tongue. His blood was still up a bit from the previous night it seemed. He moved to sit next to her.
“Where is Gemini operating? We’re deserters from Stent so we don’t want to operate in Tusinia or Stent if possible.”
She nodded. “I figured from the Stent gray trousers you’re wearing. We were involved briefly in the northeastern campaign, but Untan was conquered before we’d even reached the front line. We took our pay and got the fuck out of there.”
Michael nodded. He’d been hearing whispers of that for weeks, he’d even heard a bit about Burndan’s war of conquest back in Stent. While it was common for the countries of the Humelands to be at war, it was very rare for one of those wars to be won so decisively that one of the countries conquered another, much less two of them at once.
“For now we’ve got a contract to deal with a number of the rifts near the lake of beasts. Hence why when I heard of a healer I sought you out. Not a lot of diviners with combat experience, not to mention I can tell from your deeds that you’ve sealed one before. You’re like finding a piece of gold sitting upright in the muck.”
She smiled. “If you’d prefer more honeyed words I can manage that. I can also spot you another night at the Velvet Embrace or share a fine bottle of wine.”
Michael smiled, it had been a while since he’d spoken with a headhunter. It seemed that it wasn’t so different on this world. Though he was disappointed in the lack of waterbottles, pens, and coffee thermoses with the word Gemini branded across them.
“Listen, I’m interested, but I assume you’d have a place for my friends as well, not just me.”
She nodded. “They’re takers with Stent knight training including a mage and a dragoon. Even if you weren’t part of the package I’d be trying to recruit them as well.”
Michael nodded. Marcus had mentioned that they’d had a number of offers, but that the largest problem had been that most of the companies were headed to Tusinia, which wasn’t an option for them for a number of reasons. The others hadn’t had favorable offers, or were active in places that were very strict about their rules against Penitents.
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“Okay, I’m not going to lie to you and pretend I’m not interested, but let me go and rally my friends to see what they think and then we can talk gold and silver.”
She nodded, and pulled out some sheets of paper, a quill, and a vial of ink. “Works for me.”
Michael smiled. “You seem very confident.”
“That’s because I am.”
Michael went up and rallied the others, most of whom decided that Marcus should take care of it so that the rest of them could sleep in. Marcus went down with Michael and together they worked with Lys to craft a deal that worked for all of them. As they worked, Lys did ink transfers from different pre-written contracts. She’d take one part from one contract and splice it with another to satisfy Marcus and Michael’s requests until they finally reached a contract that satisfied all of them. Marcus was focused largely on pay, and Michael was focused on the wording and the work they’d actually be required to do as well as what would be provided by Gemini. When they were done, Michael and Marcus went upstairs to bring the others down so that they could all sign their own versions of the contract.
“I underestimated you, man,” said Marcus as they walked up the stairs.
He laughed. “I thought you were too big of a softie to be good at negotiations.”
Michael shook his head. “I’m nice to people for free, but this is business. I spent a long time in my old life realizing the difference. Spent a lot of late nights working for people that didn’t appreciate it. When it comes to who you work for you need to claw every benefit you can out of them.”
“Where was this attitude in Stent?”
“I did get benefits in Stent. I got training, and I got to help a lot of people.”
Marcus shook his head. “Shame we couldn’t get dental.”
“I’m your dental, your insurance, and even your vision benefits.”
Marcus let out an exaggerated sigh. “I really wish I could find a better provider.”
They rallied the others, who had all been awake for some time, aside from Pyotr who seemed to have really exhausted himself the previous night. They all went down to go over the contracts, and signed them though they all mostly gave it just a quick skim since they trusted that Marcus and Michael would’ve wrangled a good deal for them.
Davi let out a heavy sigh as he signed the contract.
“You alright?” asked Michael.
He nodded. “Had a long talk with Francesca last night. She’s found a dwarven caravan headed to the east who agreed to take her with them.” He smiled. “It was nice while it lasted though. Besides,” he looked left and right conspiratorially, “next time I can go to the brothel with the rest of you.”
Michael laughed and clapped him on the back.
“She did ask me to ask you for a favor. She wants you to try and remove the facial tattoos from her face. I told her I wasn’t sure that you could.”
“I’m not sure I can either. The only scars I’ve managed to completely heal were the brands, and that was with divine help. I'm not sure how it'll work with the ink either. Still, of course I’ll try.”
Once they had all signed their contracts and given them to Lys, who carefully folded them and placed them into a leather valet with a smile.
“We’ll leave to head south tomorrow morning. It’ll probably take us a few days of walking to connect with the rest of the company. I look forward to working with all of you.”
Michael held out a hand and she shook it. She had a very firm handshake.
With nothing better to do, they all went their separate ways to say goodbyes to some of the people they’d met since they’d gotten there. Michael made his way straight for his little healing alley between two buildings to find a small line waiting there for him. He smiled as he said hi to each of them and got to work.
He’d gotten more precise with his healing. He’d realized since that last pitched battle in Tusinia that he needed to practice and become more refined. He couldn’t afford to lose consciousness during battle. He had already been working in this direction before, but he needed as much experience as possible so that he could do it in the heat of battle. He was trying to make it so that he could automatically target the most crucial injuries and heal them while ignoring the superficial ones without too much effort. With all the people he’d been healing in town he obviously healed everything from a broken rib to a stubbed toe on a person, but he’d grown better at targeting that broken rib first.
Once he was done he let everyone know he was leaving and asked if they knew of anyone else who needed healing. He was dragged around to some people’s homes where their father’s had just had a bad fall, or a warehouse worker had dropped a heavy box, or even a man who was going blind in one eye. That one he hadn’t been able to completely fix, but he’d made it so his vision wasn’t going to get worse and lessened the pain of it.
He’d enjoyed just being a local healer for a little while. It was a very welcome change to how he’d been treated in Stent. Most didn’t know he was a taker, but he didn’t hide it when asked. It got him some dirty looks, but that was a massive improvement and the local Swandian’s didn’t seem to mind it so much as some mercs from other countries. He’d even gotten used to smiles and warm hellos as he’d passed. Still, he was ready to fight again, and he could feel the pull of the divine. He was meant to keep moving, and he intended to honor the wishes of the gods.