20 Tagsibol, 891 ED

Buwan, 16:03

Milagre, Empire of Tyrman

I let out a loud curse of frustration as the elven woman vanished from sight. I hadn’t even considered the possibility that someone else might be actively pursuing Jeremiah Nedden. I mean, I knew it was an open bounty and that there were bound to be a few who were interested in finding him. But I hadn’t expected to have competition in the last few seconds.

I didn’t bother to try undoing the tangled rope around my feet. It was a simple bola, a thrown weapon that consisted of rope weighted on either end by heavy wooden balls. I drew my belt knife and slashed through the entanglement, noting that Gogo was even faster than I. We were both free in a flash and jumped back to our feet, running toward the corner where our quarry and competition had gone.

As I rounded the corner there was no sight of either of them, but I heard a shout from further down the alley and around another corner. At once, I ran toward it, with Gogo hot on my heels once more. We caught sight of them as soon as we were around the second corner, and I lifted one hand, targeting the fair-headed figure that was trying to break free of the elven woman holding his arm with one a firm grasp. I was prepared to try and knock him flat, but then saw magic flaring to life in the elf’s hands, and switched my target at the last instant.

Counterspell: 18 (+3) = 21 [Success]

Whatever magic she was about to use, I didn’t know. But my bolt of destructive magic slammed into the hand grasping the bounty, and the mana fizzled into thin air, canceling whatever she’d been about to cast. She let out a yelp of surprise, then turned, glaring, to see me running toward her.

“Oh, no you don’t!” She exclaimed, raising her free hand to point at me. I tensed myself, preparing for whatever spell she might send my way. Using counterspell had been a stupid plan, I thought. It had burned through three of my precious four mana left, meaning that I had very few magical options left to me. I’d have to dodge her next spell if I didn’t want to get hit by it.

Whether or not I could avoid it was a moot point because at that exact moment, Jeremiah pulled a slim metal baton from under his cloak with his one unrestrained hand. Electricity crackled at its tip, and before she could even see its presence, he’d jammed it painfully down onto her forearm. With a shout of pain, she was forced to release her grip, and he bolted away.

“Now look what you’ve done!” She snarled at me. She threw another of the bolas. “Stay out of my way!”

Dexterity Save: 5 (+6) = 11 [Failure]

You are restrained!

Yet again, the bola snagged around my shins, and the weighted ends quickly wrapped a tight grip around my legs. I hit the ground with another grunt, and Gogo vaulted over me, narrowly avoiding tripping over me. He glanced back as he passed me, clearly wondering if he should stop to help me or not.

“Keep going!” I shouted at him. “I’ll get out of this fast enough.”

He nodded his understanding, then tore off after the two again, quickly vanishing from sight. Well, that’s one person on them at least, I thought with a bitter grimace. Somehow, the second fall to the hard cobbles of the street had seemed to make me slower, and I took a little longer to cut myself free of the ropes. Citizens were standing in confusion around me, looking from the point where three running figures had vanished to me, who was just then picking myself up.

“This woman is getting on my nerves,” I growled, making sure to keep the sound of my voice low. “I’ll teach her a lesson in chasing.”

There was no chance of me catching up now. It had taken me nearly an entire minute of cutting to break free of that last bola, and the three of them were bound to be far enough away that I couldn’t track them. At least, not if I was going between buildings and taking the many sharp turns. So if I couldn’t follow them through the alleys, what could I do?

The answer, which might not have occurred to just anyone, was simple. I took a step away from the wall of the house to my right, moving until I was flush against the wall behind me. There were a number of crates and other miscellaneous objects that could give me a quick run up the wall. Taking a deep breath, I went for it.

Acrobatics Check: 20 (+6) [Success]

I suppose I could have taken pride in the fact that my acrobatics bonus was so high, and I could have probably scaled the wall to the roof of that house without trouble, not to mention sprint across it and jump to the next roof again and again until I caught up with the other. But as it was, I was up the wall so fast that I barely had a chance to think about what I was doing, let alone ponder the implication of what the natural twenty lent to the skill check.

It did seem to carry me far, both figuratively and literally. By the time I’d grown accustomed to the fact that my body was racing along the precarious rooftops, I was already nearly three-quarters of the way to where I could now hear another disturbance. Hoping that Gogo hadn’t drawn his weapon and decided to actually attack the elven woman in earnest. That would cause more problems than I wanted to handle at the moment.

In less than three minutes of running, I caught up. Hearing another round of shouting, in which I could discern Gogo’s voice, I leaped to the final roof and peered down. There, in a slightly wider alley lined with the stalls of Milagre’s tailors, clothiers, and seamstresses, were Gogo, the elven woman, and Jeremiah Nedden. I’d actually managed to pull ahead slightly, and I could see that Gogo was getting within reach of the elf.

She whipped around without warning with another bola, but Gogo jumped over it with ease, his red coat billowing out with the wind of his passage. Then his feet were back on solid ground once more, and he thrust out with his spear. For a moment, I was worried that he was attacking her, but then I saw that it was the blunt end. He stuck the shaft of the spear between her running legs, and, with a powerful twist, tripped her.

“Nice!” I shouted, startling several merchants nearby with my voice. The elven woman had just managed to trip Nedden as the same moment, slowing him down. I didn’t want to waste time climbing down from the roof, knowing that he’d be out of sight before them. So instead, I chose the fastest route down. Trying to judge the point at which he’d be when I landed, I jumped from the roof, dropping straight down.

Acrobatics Check: 18 (+6) = 24 [Success]

I landed without difficulty or spraining my ankle, but I misjudged the distance, actually landing right in front of Nedden. He barreled into me at once, letting out a yelp of surprise at my reappearance. I let him hit me, wrapping both arms around his torso, turning in mid-fall to slam him to the ground.

Grapple Check: 13 (+6) = [Success]

I quickly spun the situation around, grabbing one of Jeremiah’s free arms and twisting it back, ending up with my weight on top of him. I pressed one knee into the small of his back for good measure and pinned him down. Behind me, Gogo had also pinned the elven woman, who was swearing fluently under her breath, realizing that she wasn’t able to break free from his strong grip.

“Well, then,” I said, breathing heavily as I stopped another attempt from Jeremiah to break free. “That was fun. But it looks like he’s my bounty after all, doesn’t it?”

The elven woman glared up at me through the strands of her blonde hair that had broken free of its binding. Frustration was never more evident than when it was compounded by helplessness. It was a lesson I’d learned early in life and many times. Particularly during wrestling matches. I knew that frustration, but while I could sympathize with her, I wasn’t going to pity her and let my victory go.

“Fine,” she said, after a moment’s hesitation. “It’s only eight gold.”

I grinned and shook my head at her. “That’s a lot of money. I’ll be happy to split it with you.”

I looked between her expression of stunned disbelief and the rolling eyes of Gogo, then laughed. “Hey, can you blame me? The money’s not my goal in this.”

“If you don’t care about the money,” came the voice of Jeremiah below me,” Then you can let me go, and I’ll pay you what my bounty’s worth.”

“I don’t think so,” I said firmly, putting more pressure on his arm. “Even if you had that money, which I seriously doubt, I’m still going to drag you to the barracks. You stole from people in wartime, idiot. I’d be committing a crime to even consider letting you go.”

The arm not pinned to his back made a feeble scrabbling gesture, and I knew instinctively that he was reaching for that baton he’d used to stun the elven woman. I stopped the movement at once, then reached under his cloak to pull it out myself. “Not a bad toy you’ve got here. But it’s mine now.”

Looking back toward Gogo, I noticed that the bounty hunter had given up fighting. “I think it’s safe to let her up now.”

Gogo did as I asked, watching her carefully for more signs of a fight. She made none, only rubbing her shoulder with a pained grimace and taking a clear step out of Gogo’s reach. “I’ll stick with you to make sure I get my gold.”

I nodded my understanding. “That’s only fair. Do you have anything to restrain this guy with?”

Her eyes widened at that. “You went through all this trouble to beat me to a bounty, and you don’t have cuffs?”

I laughed. “Somehow I forgot to get some. I could use this rope, but he’ll eventually find a way out of that. At least with some cuffs, we can slow him down.”

Shaking her head in amazement, she moved toward us, retrieving two sets of cuffs from a pouch at her waist. The first pair, thick and reinforced with a small chain between them, were put around the man’s ankles. It didn’t restrain him enough to prevent him from walking, but he sure as hell couldn’t run without tripping. Then she used the second pair on his forearms. They kept the arms in the position I had forced them into, albeit without the painful pressure. As long as one of us kept an eye on him, he couldn’t easily slip out of those.

I hauled Jeremiah to his feet, then dug into my coin pouch and fished out my gold coins. I counted four of them into my fingers, then held them out. Looking surprised, as though she hadn’t expected me to really share, the elven woman took them and squirreled them away into her own pouch.

“Never met a bounty hunter that was willing to share,” she said with a grin. She extended a hand. “But hey, if I get money just for being here, I’m not going to complain. I’m Gaurse, by the way. Gaurse Silver.”

“Tuck,” I replied, reaching to shake hands with my left, as my right was currently holding Jeremiah still. “We’re going to be going after a lot of bounties here in the near future. If you want to work together, I’d be more than happy to.”