Immediately he digs into the ground and charges, howling like a madman and frothing at the mouth.
I do the only logical thing: I mind control him.
Yes, he might have resisted my control if he got lucky and was really concentrating but, in his mental state, sliding into his mind takes almost no effort.
Rakatha stops short of Vong and the naked and filthy man he is still holding on to. I make him sit. And stay. Good Rakatha.
Vong collects himself and takes a good look at the man in his grip or, rather, who was gripping him when they became paralyzed. He extracts himself from this fellow’s grimy hands and lays him down.
He is more than half-starved. Naked. Long beard and unkempt hair, all matted and greying. His eyes are wild and his teeth are all but rotted out. Aside from some minor scrapes and the look of terror in his eyes, he is unharmed.
“What do we do?” Vong looks at me helplessly.
“Shall I release the paralysis?”
“Yeah, I want to talk to him.”
I don’t expect this to go well but I oblige. I have Rakatha hold the man down before I drop the last threads of the spell.
“Arblargherlamglphlanoramnr!” or something like that comes spewing from the wild man’s mouth. He gnaws at the air and squirms under Rakatha’s strong grip.
This seems as though it will not be productive.
Vong tries to calm the man with outstretched hands, “Hey guy, we don’t want to hurt you. You’re safe. We are in the Adventurer’s Corps.”
As if that guy would know what that was. He has clearly been out here for years and the Corps is weeks old.
A steady stream of gibberish flows from the man, spitting and straining to be freed.
“Whoa, whoa there. Let’s get you some food and water. How does that sound? Food?” Vong makes a pantomime of putting something in his mouth and chewing, then rubbing his belly.
The man struggles with even more fervor and tries to bite Rakatha.
I release my mind control on the burly warrior because he’s probably calmed down by now and I’m sure he’d want his full wits about him at this moment. Besides, he’ll be too preoccupied to turn his attention to me.
Rakatha’s first reaction with his will returned to him is to let go of the man and exclaim, “Yuck!”
The wild, and clearly insane, man senses his freedom and bolts.
Vong curses and runs after him, tackling him to the ground just a few meters down the path. While Rakatha tries to wipe his hands clean from touching the filthy man, I watch Vong wrestle with a crazy recluse who, becoming overwhelmed by what he perceives to be a life or death situation, soils himself and passes out.
I can’t laugh. It would ruin everything.
Instead I call for Voella’Tien, who jogs in and wonders at the scene.
She has treated countless men in varying stages of health, undress, and injury so she sets right to work checking up on the man.
Vong is sitting on a nearby log and upturning his canteen to clean the piss and shit off of himself. Rakatha comes up to me and gets right in my face. He’s angry.
“What the fuck did you do to me!?” his strange accent making it sound as though there are marbles in his mouth.
Now, the downside of mind affecting magic is twofold. Firstly, the subject, while under one’s control for the duration of the spell, is still aware of their actions and, yes, that they are being controlled. In fact, there is a bond between the caster and subject that allows a two-way bridge. Not of thoughts, but of knowing. Knowing where and who the other is. Since most creatures will resent being mind-controlled, it is likely that they will turn on the caster once the control drops. Because I dropped control when Rakatha was holding the man, he did not immediately turn on me. Plus, we are squad mates. Perhaps that counts for something.
The second reason that mind control is not infinitely useful is because it is illegal almost everywhere. In Elysium, all mind-affecting magics, even the relatively benign ones like love spells, are forbidden. It’s not hard to imagine why. If magus were to simply control everyone, from a lowly shopkeep to a king, we would rule everything. That sounds great at first, until one remembers the first issue: that the subjects will resent it. Nothing would invoke the wrath of pitchforked peasants and imperial soldiers faster than occasional mind-control and, unfortunately there are limits to its range. Even empowered by a limitless artifact a wizard could not hope to control more than a hundred men, and the longer the hold the more likely they will resist it. It only worked so completely this time because the paralysis put Rakatha in such rage that his mind was undefended.
Back in control of himself, Rakatha’s reaction is normal. I can probably talk him down. A thousand men with swords and pitchforks are not so easily swayed. That is why there are no nations being mind-controlled by some terrible wizard; he would be dead.
“You were out of control. I used magic on you to keep you from harming Vong or that raving lunatic.” I leave out the part about placing them between he and I.
Rakatha pumps out his chest and flexes meaningfully, with a look in his eyes of incredulity and, still, anger. He raises a thick hand and taps me square in the chest with a sausage-like finger, “If you do it again, I will crush your head in my hands and pull your brains out through your ears.”
It’s usually good to make some kind of placating gesture in these circumstances, such as holding one’s hands up or apologizing. This is not my style. I would normally prefer to stare him down and impress upon him my size and power, thereby establishing myself as the alpha. If I wish to turn Rakatha into a loyal minion then establishing which one of us is the dominant entity is necessary and can’t come too soon. A savage fighter like him will still roll on his back for the alpha. However, I did mind control him and, even between friends, it is not permitted by Elysium law. There is no obvious outward effect so it is possible that Vong didn’t notice, and Voella’Tien wouldn’t know unless Rakatha were to bring it up, and he may not even know it is illegal.
I analyze the scene. If I diffuse Rakatha quickly, the others may not become alerted to the topic of our discussion. That means that I don’t have to kill them all before they report it to the constabulary force back in town, and I can still get paid and be on my way in a few weeks instead of immediately.
I will need to placate him without backing down, without undermining my status.
In a situation like this, speak directly to the ego. Stoke it and let him be dazzled by himself. Then, basking in the light of his own splendor, he will forget all about me.
It’s a tactic I am all too familiar with and it served me well as a young man in the seedier parts of Ezuram, when I was a simple thug-for-hire. What a wasted period of my life that was, doing all manner of base deeds that the career criminals who hired me wouldn’t lower themselves into doing, for mere coin.
It has never bothered me to let another man believe he is great. Only a fool allows himself to be so vainglorious that he loses sight of reality.
I choose my words carefully in order to thread the needle between assuagement and submission, “It is a wonder it worked at all. A man of your obvious prowess is no doubt resilient to tricks of the mind.”
Success?
Rakatha shrugs deeply and cracks his neck with a sideways stretch that reveals more scars beneath his shaggy, brown hair. He gives me an assessing gaze and the corner of his mouth turns upward in arrogance.
Success.
Taking a deep breath that relaxes him on its way out, he raises his eyebrows and admits, “That’s for damn sure. You should have seen the look on this guy’s face when he tried to charm me in a fight and ended up holding his own arm after I ripped it off and gave it to him.”
‘Charm’ sounds more like ‘sharm’ but I get the meaning.
“You are a man of definite strength,” I respond, finishing off the ploy.
Rakatha puts his arm around me after that and laughs. I guess we are friends now.
I hate being touched, except maybe by a whore who is awaiting my coin, and even then had better keep it professional.
The Wordbearer Chronicles is a dark fantasy web series with new passages on Tuesdays.
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