Hadrian read the note that had been slipped through their door with a grin.

Harry,

The medical birds are cooking something up. They are moved against the guild. Retrieve the ledger of truth.

Your friend,

Ash.

Finally, his guild master was giving him a mission. The vampire had thought that the crumby woman had written him off as dead. She disliked healers in general, but Hadrian thought she might like Edwin. If only because he was so different from his fellows.

Now, normally it would be going to informants and paying them for half-truths. But he had Edwin now. His necromantic trick could prove down right handy at this moment.

“Hey, Eddy, a minute?” Called Hadrian and Edwin paused from his drawing of what seemed like a heart. Not the romantic version of it, but an organ with veins sticking out of it.

“Found a sweetheart?” Asked Hadrian, nodding towards the heart.

“I got the heart picture wrong on the test. Now that I have some time, I feel like remedying that. Tell me, do the arteries look bigger than the veins?” Edwin held the picture high. So, there were two types of blood vessels on the picture?

“They look the same to me,” answered Hadrian. Edwin sighed and picked an eraser.

“I am shit at drawing,” murmured Edwin to himself. Hadrian grinned and went to his side.

“Your drawings are better than Lucy’s. Anyway, there is a conspiracy that requires your necromantic powers,” Hadrian tried to put some air of mystery in his words, but it came as over eagerness even to his self.

“This better not be about stealing. I won’t help you steal, Harry,” Edwin’s stern voice made Hadrian grin.

“Come on, Eddy. There might be healers involved and another sickness. The note is rather cryptic. Have you heard of something called the ledger of truth?” A confused look was the reaction he got. Hadrian didn’t mind, confusion usually got Edwin to agree with him.

“He is so going to make you steal, puppy,” snickered Daniel from his place at the kitchen counter. His hands were bare, and he had them one over the other. Happy that he was no longer sick.

“Quit calling me that!” Snapped Edwin. He had kept a cool head about the moniker for a long time, but when Daniel refused to stop calling him that, it began to grate on his nerves. And, seeing as the man was no longer his patient, he didn’t see a problem venting anymore.

“Harry, I’ll help. It will be just like that golden hand job,” Daniel smiled, remembering the fight with the orcs over the golden magical hand that lit up when treasure was near. Harry got in the best kind of trouble.

“Eddy, listen. I told Ash not to send me thieving jobs anymore. So, this one is not it. It could be something serious. I wouldn’t have asked for your help if it had brought you trouble,” Hadrian hit Edwin with his best puppy eyes and the man sighed. Victory!

“Fine. What do you need me to do?” Edwin didn’t want to think too much on trying to resurrect an army. If that was what Hadrian wanted, he’d shot him down.

“I need you to spy on shady healers. With your animals. Maybe not with pets this time? Remember what Hafnon told you about poodles?” Edwin winced at his misstep and got thoughtful.

“Well, there is a way to ensnare living creatures with necromantic mana. It will paint fewer clues as to who send them too. But the creatures will need to be caught first. And not a word to anyone that I can do this. It is forbidden in the Surian Theocracy,” Edwin said, and Daniel looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

“Someone is not as goody-two-shoes as advertised!” Grinned the warrior. “How did you start practicing forbidden arts? You needed a cover for when you went out to spy on the bathing houses, puppy?”

Edwin bristled. He pointed a finger at Daniel and began to yell profanities.

“You donkey brained no good stooge! I have had enough of you. You are healthy now, so when are you leaving? You don’t appreciate anything I have done for you, and you are so dung and self-filled that…”

“Chill, Eddy. Dany was just joking,” tried to restore the peace, Hadrian, but Edwin was not done.

“You can only think about yourself! With what have you contributed to this family? You are supposed to be a warrior, yet after you got cured you didn’t even visit the adventurer’s guild! You are a lay about and a leech and…”

“Now listen here, charlatan…” Yelled back Daniel, not one to take insults laying down. “I am still recovering. My skin hurts from all the times you flayed me! If you weren’t as incompetent as you appear, you would have been able to do what some demoness did in a matter of minutes! But you are too busy moaning over Harry to learn something new and…”

Edwin stood up, his chair falling to the ground. Mana gathering around him.

“For the last time, Harry and I are not like that!” Screamed Edwin. They all heard a ball fall on the ground and saw Elidys and Luciano gape at their father figure from the door.

“We are back,” whispered Luciano, too afraid to draw the ire of the adults on them.

“Why bad?” Elidys did not understand why this bad feeling was spreading around Edwin, but he didn’t like it. “You make a boo-boo!”

That was like a wake-up call for Edwin. He had nearly lashed out with his very poisonous mana at a recovering patient. What was he thinking? Once the mana of someone was in the system of another, it needed to be metabolized.

Except, there was no metabolizing a necromancer’s mana. It will stay inside and poison Daniel until he died. Edwin had just nearly killed a man. Not quickly, either, but slowly and painfully.

He staggered towards the door and left without getting his cloak. He descended the stairs as if in a drunken haze and didn’t hear Hadrian calling out to him. Furthermore, he needed to be alone now.