you’ll go around claiming that I’m a troll for real. People would probably even buy it, in Galasia.”
He hit the Not-flyer amulet and floated down the hall backwards, the weapon in his left hand. It wasn’t like he had to be accurate with it or anything. If he triggered it they were all dead anyway. Rolph go the door for him and they both took off towards the palace.
Tor noticed that he was hyperventilating, his breathing shallow and rapid, his heart pounding and the explosive still being pointed as he traveled. He slipped the cord back over his head and tucked it away. Focusing for a few minutes he got himself under control and calmed down.
Rolph looked at him sideways as they traveled along, “You know Tor, you really have to stop doing that.”
“Um, which thing, or set of things, that I should stop, are you talking about?”
The Prince snorted and looked forward again.
“Let me count… First, standing in front of people outwardly calm when you’re clearly going into a combat rage. Do you have any idea how freaky it is to hear someone say “I may destroy half the city doing it” when they claim to be holding a super explosive weapon and are casting out a combat aura like that? I thought poor Kris was going to drop right there. I think the girls and Heather had shields on, but I was seeing spots even through mine.”
They continued on for a while without saying anything. He’d been showing signs of combat rage? Really? He’d certainly been worked up, but who wouldn’t be. The fact that he hadn’t hurt anyone and didn’t blast apart a big chunk of the Capital spoke against the idea, but then again, he’d certainly felt ready to die back there. Well, all he could do with that would be to keep trying to make sure he kept himself calm and in check.
“What if they’d attacked and called your bluff? Checking them for poison wouldn’t have really impressed them, I don’t think.”
“Bluff? Um, Rolph… Not to pretend to be all tough or anything, but… I never bluff. Probably not smart enough for it. I was holding exactly what I claimed I was.”
“Then,” The voice came out as a growl. “May I put forth that you need to find a more subtle weapon with which to threaten people in the future? Maybe fire raining down from the sky or the Earth opening to swallow them whole?”
It… was a good point. He had a force lance, but it wasn’t really good for more than knocking people out. On the good side it worked through most shields, on the bad side, Trice had one of the ones it didn’t work through. Tor had wanted to make sure she was protected so updated her almost instantly. Sara and Rolph had them too. Could he do something about that? The idea was… Well not impossible really. The fields wouldn’t be taken out of the metal easily at all. Really, the only sure way of removing one was to either lock the piece up and wait until the field failed, or melt the metal down. Even cutting it up might just make several copies of a field. It wasn’t that reliable, so it wasn’t generally done for duplication, but it could work, if a person was willing to risk losing the whole field.
But could they be suppressed? Maybe. He didn’t have a clue how. Why would he? In his whole life he’d never heard of anyone even wanting to shut a field off at a distance before.
What he could do was make a combination field that would be part force lance, part explosive field and part shield, so that the forces would be contained to one direction only. If he made it strong enough, it should suffice. He could limit the range, to say, a hundred feet? That way he’d be less likely to take out whole cities as he destroyed individual buildings or, and he really hoped it didn’t come to that, people. If it did though, better he get one person than a thousand, right?
Not that he’d have time to worry about that for a while. Debri would give back the templates, then they could work out how they were planning on giving over what money they owed for sales already made. Then they could call it even and he’d never have to see any of them again. It wasn’t ideal maybe, and he hated going back on a business deal, but they’d betrayed him. What was he supposed to do? Besides, the templates were his property, so he had a right to them, didn’t he? If they refused to pay him and wouldn’t give them back, that was just theft.
Inside the guest house Rolph suggested that he get a snack or something, some fruit or bread to take the edge off and then left to the palace. He didn’t say what it was that he had planned, but Tor figured it was something around the idea of reporting what had happened. It felt a little like he’d gone to tattle on him really, but it probably had to be done. After all, Tor fully intended on taking down the biggest merchant and manufacturing house in the Noram kingdom. Richard and Connie were probably going to have a problem with that. If nothing else it would affect the gear that the military was going to get. He wondered how many units that was supposed to be anyway. No one ever told him that kind of thing.
Sure enough, about twenty minutes later Connie, Rich and Smythe of Westend the military councilor came dashing into the guest house, well, it was more of a quick walk than a real dash, just on the edge of undignified, but not totally frantic. Rolph, he noticed, hadn’t come with them. Hopefully off doing something useful. Then again, since Sara was basically his girlfriend, he was probably trying to figure out a way to keep Tor from taking back all his stuff. He could see that, but Sara and her people had obviously decided they were on Trice’s side in all this. That kind of cut ties already, didn’t it? It wasn’t just him being unreasonable.
Was it?
“I’d feel worse about getting the templates back from Debri, you know, but they were a merchant house long before any of them met me and probably will be long after I’m dead and gone and it sounds like they’ve already made a lot of money without ever paying me a penny. Well, unless they don’t come up with my property, then things are going to get… interesting. But, they’ve decided to side with my enemies, so what else can be done? Say, anyone have a list of Debri locations for the kingdom? I mean I can just go town to town looking for them, but knowing where to go will really speed things up, don’t you think? I just want the templates back, I don’t need to trash every location they have to do it.” That was more reasonable than they deserved, but he could live with it.
The King held up his hands, a placating gesture. “Really Tor, won’t you reconsider? We’ve kind of set the military on a specific course for now, based on your shields and to a lesser extent the flying rigs. If you pull them from Debri now, it will set back manufacturing by months, maybe as much as four months or more. I’d take it as a personal favor.”
Taking a deep breath Tor tried to explain his thoughts on the matter. If they pulled the fields now, they could reestablish a more reliable contract with someone else inside four months, or they could wait for these people to kill him, or whatever their plan had been that day, and then nothing else would be forthcoming from him ever.
A lot of people could make copies from his templates, sure. They were designed to be easy to copy. A few people could even probably make new templates based on the originals given time. All they needed was someone that could make templates and copy fields. Most of the instructors at the school could do it, probably. Master Fines could for certain, Tor was sure. The man was good. But if they wanted his original work, that took having him around, didn’t it?
Smythe didn’t look convinced.
“Your majesties, I must submit that allowing a young man, no matter how accomplished, to run around with a weapon capable of destroying cities is… past ludicrous. Even insane doesn’t quite work here. He’s going to end up turning a single failed romance into the death of thousands or more if we aren’t careful. Worse, someone has already tried to kill him several times, of course he’ll react if it happens again. It’s only natural to respond when attacked. Put that together, and try to remember what you were like at that age sire. I don’t blame Tor but… How many would be dead right now if you’d wielded that kind of power at his age? Or if I had? I dare say the population of the world would be a good bit smaller right now.”
The guy was a pompous ass, Tor decided. He’d seemed nice enough the first time they’d met, but now he was talking about him like he wasn’t even in the room. Jerk. Then again, he’d made some valid points. Was he too emotionally unstable to wield a weapon like the one he had?
Yes.
He’d almost killed god knows how many people not two hours before, just because a girl that had said he was stupid and ugly was in the room with him. Then he’d started planning out weapons that almost had to be used to kill people if they were made, just because his feelings were hurt. Was that the person he’d pick to be in charge of a super weapon? Not a chance. He didn’t want to die, but it was a lot better that he got killed than thousands of others because he couldn’t find true love.
“First, Smythe, from now on, if you’re talking about me, and I’m in the room, please make an effort to include
