Alric took a deep breath, then found he still did not quite know where to begin.
That was the normal part about worrying. Most of his problems were generous as of late. They arrived loudly, stood somewhere obvious, leaked, smoked, foamed, offended clerks, or required a pipe to bend in a direction pipes had no natural interest in bending. Those problems were not easy, but they at least they could be looked at.
This one had been sitting behind other thoughts all day.
Stromni leaned against the post, sleeves still rolled, beard tied back, one shoulder turned away from the worst of Maggie’s heat. He waited. That was the difference between Stromni and almost everyone else when Alric was struggling to speak. Stromni did not rush in to make the silence difficult.
Alric looked at the nearest barrel of distilled water.
“It frightened me,” he said.
Stromni’s eyebrows drew together. “The water?”
“No.” Alric rubbed at his jaw. “Yes, but not the water. The mistake.”
Stromni looked toward the barrel, then back at him. “The whisky though? Nothing broke.”
“I know.”
“No one drank anything strange. We talked it through before building it into copper.”
“That’s the problem.” Alric gestured toward the barrels, then let his hand fall. “Today it was water. It was me half-remembering something from my old world and letting it stand there like knowledge because everyone else knew less. We caught it because you asked the right question. But I only caught it because it was whisky and water and a day when we had time to talk.”
Stromni’s face changed slightly. The amusement left first, then the craftsman’s pride settled somewhere deeper.
Alric continued, the words coming easier now that the first awkward shape of them had escaped. “Beer can be wrong, well a little, spirits can be wrong. Maggie can be dangerous if we are fools, but there are ways to test her and we are.”
“Aye,” Stromni said waiting for Alric to get to the point.
Alric turned slightly and looked across the still house. The raised platforms cast long shadows across the stone. The places where the washbacks would eventually stand was still empty, but they no longer felt like empty spaces.
“Pavise explained to me about the alchemists, I didn’t really understand them before then,” Alric said.
Stromni’s jaw shifted beneath his beard.
“He told me they are not just expensive potion-makers. Not a city guild with better robes and worse manners. They are old and they are everywhere.” Alric’s voice tightened. “They sell to whoever can pay, because wounded people often only stop bleeding if they have coin. And everyone hates them, but everyone needs them too badly to hate them safely.”
Stromni went very still.
Alric saw it. He had expected the same warning, perhaps, maybe a good dwarven swearword. Stillness from Stromni was rarer than anger.
“That is what I cannot shake,” Alric said. “If I find even part of a cheaper path to something useful, I am not making another product here. Kings and commoners will execute me gladly if someone tells them potions are threatened.”
Stromni looked at Maggie.
For a while, neither of them spoke. The still made a soft click high along the neck. Somewhere near thumper, a drop of water fell from a fitting into a small puddle with a sound far too small for the size of the thought in the room.
At last Stromni drew in a slow breath through his nose.
“I should have told ye lad, I’m sorry about that.”
Alric glanced at him.
Stromni did not look back. He kept his eyes on Maggie, which meant the words were going to be honest and probably uncomfortable. “When I first said ye could sell ta the alchemists, it weren’t really advice.”
Alric waited.
“I wanted ta see what ye did with it,” Stromni said. “Wanted ta know whether ye saw coin first and people after. Truth be told, when I first saw ye method ta make beer, I thought ye were some failed alchemist who’d wandered here with too much knowledge and no sense, or an escaped one.”
Alric considered that.
The strange thing was that he did not feel offended. Maybe he should have. There had been a time when the idea of being tested by someone he considered a friend might have stung. Now, standing in the warm still house beside a machine he had only partly understood before building, he could understand.
He laughed once, quietly. Stromni looked at him then, wary.
“I’d say that’s fair. I use the heat stones and mana so…” Alric said.
Stromni frowned. “Aye, don’t sit right now though, sorry for judging ya like that lad.”
“There is nothing to forgive, I won’t support alchemists though.” Alric said, to which Stromni nodded. “There is something else though, what do you know about demons?”
Stromni gave him a look.
It was an excellent look, the sort that could have been hammered onto a shield and carried into battle under the name ‘Are We Doing This Now’. If Alric could have framed it forever, he would have.
“Demons?” Stromni said.
Alric nodded with a scoff at the look he’d just got.
“After still testing, water mistakes, alchemists, and whatever else is nesting in your head, we’ve arrived at demons?”
Alric didn’t trust himself to speak, he pushed the corners of his mouth down with effort and nodded.
Stromni rubbed at his beard, gathering the thought slowly. “Not much is the honest answer. Demons live far south, beyond what merchants bother mapping. I’ve never met one, dunno anyone who has, not anyone whose word I’d put coin behind anyway. Most o’ what people know is what the temple says, old tales, and sailors repeating who heard it from a man who once stood near a ship going south.”
“That reliable?”
“Aye. Practically carved in stone it is.”
Stromni’s expression sobered again. “Their lands are harsh, we’re told, not dead. That’s temple smoke, I think. Folk like saying hated lands must look hated. From what I’ve heard, it’s hot, wet, green, and full of mana. Too much life rather. Forests don’t stay cleared, rivers flood anytime, fever, rot, plants growing over anything if it were ta stand still.”
Alric listened carefully, before asking, “And the people? The demons themselves?”
“Aye, poor I reckon.” Stromni nodded once. “That much seems true, far as rumour can be true. Poor, but not because nothing grows. Poor because everything is hard. Safe roads, big towns, ports, trade, all hard. Monsters are stronger there too, real strong lad, the land is heavy with mana, and mana changes beasts. A northern lord dropped there would spend the first year making brave promises and the second trying ta send letters home faster than the monsters could learn where he slept.”
Alric frowned, trying to understand. A harsh land, but rich in the wrong ways. A place where wealth existed as possibility rather than comfort. Crops, rivers, plants, monsters, mana, all of it present, none of it easy.
Stromni’s mouth flattened. “Then’s the bit priests like saying most. Demons forsook all gods. Not forgot. Not wandered off ta get a drink en visit temple after. Forsook them. Temple say they looked at every god and say no, is how they grew horns if ya believe em.”
Alric’s gaze lifted slightly.
“Why?”
“I don’t know. No one knows, though plenty claim they do. I heard it said they believe mana is the only honest power because it belongs to the one who holds it. Some say they admire strength of mana more than blood, rank, blessing or anything. Some say refusing the gods caused the holy war. Others say the war came first and refusal came after. I’ve never had a demon sit across from me and explain his grandmother’s thoughts on gods, so take all that with the respect it deserves.”
“Not much.”
“Less, priest turn it into a sermon to why ya need to be devout.”
Alric thought of temple of this world, so many gods, priests and rules. The healing that could not march behind banners or lose neutrality, he couldn’t even blame the temple really.
But potions could follow that banner. The difference between mercy tied to a place and survival carried in a bottle.
Stromni interrupted Alric’s thoughts and spoke softly. “But one thing follows plainly enough. No gods means no temples and then no divine healers. No easy healin’ for childbirth, fever, wounds, cuts gone bad, water, broken bones, and every normal cruelty folk endure.”
Alric looked at him. “So what do they use?”
“No idea, herbs, apothecaries I reckon?” he said. “Ya guess as good as mine lad.”
Alric turned the thought over with a frown. “Do they ever invade?” he asked.
Stromni thought long before answering, he stared at the floor, his brow furrowed in thought. Alric appreciated that. It would have been easy for him to repeat what everyone said and be done with it.
“There was one great war long ago we always told,” Stromni said. “Holy war, temple got involved, they claim. Still the kind o’ war people still use when they want ta scare children and get taxes paid without too many questions… But they’re not pouring north, if that’s what ya asking, would ‘ave heard. Keep ta themselves, I think. Pride, maybe? Distance, o course but mostly reaching them sounds like work for an army, and armies like roads that don’t eat wheels.”
“What do you think of them?”
Stromni gave him a sideways look. “Ain’t it matters what I think lad.”
“I asked anyway.”
“Aye, ye did that.” Stromni folded his arms and shrugged. “People be people everywhere. People in harsh lands still want roofs, food, family, and a good drink at the end o’ the day. Some’ll be bastards o’ course. Some’ll be kind. Most will be tired.”
Alric nodded slowly.
Stromni glanced up at Maggie. “I reckon, strangest creature troubling the north right now has no horns, builds copper beasts, and asks about demons in a cooling still house.”
Alric laughed. It was tired, and it did not last long, but it was real enough to help.
The thought that had been bugging him then struck. Then he looked upward with a frown. The ceiling gave him nothing. Alric stared through it anyway, toward a goddess, he couldn’t see, who had given him half a story.
Stromni noticed the look.
“Where’s this demon talk coming from, lad?”
Alric let out a long breath.
“I was sent here by a god right.” Alric kept his eyes upward for another moment, then lowered them. “With a sword and armour. She mentioned the demon king specifically.”
Stromni’s expression did not change much, but his attention sharpened as he tilted his head.
“That sounds obvious,” Alric said. “So stupidly obvious, really. Man from another world, given a sword by a god, pointed vaguely toward a demon king. My old world loved that kind of story. It is almost rude how obvious it sounds.”
“And yet?” Stromni said.
“And yet nothing I have learned fits this properly.” Alric gestured south, though south was somewhere beyond walls, city, river, roads, and more ignorance than he liked. Because he wasn’t paying attention he gestured vaguely west but Stromni got the point. “The demons are far away, poor, isolated, mana-rich, no divine healing. They may be dangerous. I’m not saying they aren’t. A people can be poor and dangerous at the same time, gods know this world has taught me that. But they do not sound like the thing already choking the world. The alchemists do.”
The words came out sharper than Alric intended.
“The alchemists are here,” Alric said getting more irritated. “Everywhere. Everywhere at once. Every war, court, adventurer...”
Stromni watched him for a long moment. “Not sure I understand what ya gettin’ ta lad?”
“I don’t know either.” The answer came too quickly, because it had been sitting too close to anger. He forced himself to take a deep breath before he continued, “That is the part making me want to start kicking things. Maybe the goddess gave me a sword because there is a demon king who matters, maybe he is a threat, maybe he is part of the answer. Maybe the demon lands need exactly the kind of medicine the alchemists control. Maybe I am just seeing patterns because I am tired, and from a world that told too many stories about chosen idiots with swords.”
Stromni’s mouth twitched faintly at chosen idiots, but he did not take the bait.
Alric looked at Maggie.
“But there is one thought my mind will not drop,” he said.
The copper ticked, Maggie adding to the dramatic effect.
“This is not something you beat with a sword. The alchemists I mean.”
He stopped himself there, because the sentence wanted to grow into a speech. That speech wanted demons and temples and healing and every poor household that had ever sold its winter blanket for a bottle of hope. But speeches were dangerous because they made men sound more certain than they were.
He tried again.
“You do not solve the alchemists by having one maniac stab another. You solve it, if it can be solved at all, with ledgers, supply, workers, careful recipes, courts, trade, contracts, protection, and prices low enough that ordinary people stop crawling back to the same men who have had their hands around everyone’s throat for generations.”
Stromni said nothing. Alric rubbed at his face.
“That was too much.” Alric finished looking over at Maggie.
“No,” Stromni said. “Ya ain’t wrong lad.”
Alric looked at him. Stromni’s face was unreadable.
“Ye should abandon that thought.”
“I know.”
“No,” Stromni said, looking back at him. “Hear me proper lad, it ain’t wrong, it’s dangerous.”
“I know.”
“The alchemists are not tavernkeepers.” Stromni’s voice roughened. “Old, richer than nations, patient, vicious in ways that don’t need ta look vicious, and everywhere like ya say. They don’t need ta kick down your door. They can touch suppliers…”
“I know,” Alric interrupted he spoke again, softer. “Pavise explained it all to me already, that is why I have not said it aloud until now.”
Alric looked at the floor, where heat had dried old marks into the stone.
“I still want to buy a healing potion before Mara gives birth,” he said.
Stromni’s attention moved fully to him.
“If one can be bought without making the alchemists look too closely at me,” Alric continued. “I do not need a revolution. I just want Mara to live if something goes wrong.”
The words were plain.
The thought of Mara standing in the office, frightened when she should have been congratulated. He thought of Hal carrying a heavy chest without complaint. He thought of Seren arranging rooms and making sure the lower one had no stairs. He thought of the way a household could become family by practical steps, none of which asked permission before mattering.
“That is the whole problem,” Alric said. “What matters is small enough to hold in one hand. A person I care about, a child coming, and the knowledge that fear has a market price.”
Stromni looked down.
“Aye,” he said. “We get a healing potion if one can be got. Whatever comes later, we do that first.”
Alric nodded.
The conversation sat there for a while. Maggie ticked around them. The room smelled of hot copper, old steam, river air, and the faint mineral smell of water that had been forced to become purer than it had ever asked to be.
Stromni turned his head and looked properly at the still.
Maggie stood proudly, four metres of copper, too much work, too much risk, too much new gathered in one place. A thing that should have fought them harder. A thing that had fought them, then worked anyway.
“Lad, I need ta know something. Do ye think ye can do it?” Stromni asked.
Alric was tired enough that the question simply missed him.
“Do what?”
Stromni did not look at him.
“Beat them, alchemists I mean.”
Alric stared hard but Stromni was facing the still.
The words should have sounded absurd. They should have collapsed there and then. Instead, they remained there, stubborn and ugly.
“Where did that come from?” Alric asked.
Stromni pointed at Maggie then scratched at his beard. “Maybe the world does not need a hero who runs south waving a sword. Maybe it needs someone who looks at a thing everyone insists must stay rare, expensive, and controlled, then builds a large ugly copper answer to it.”
Alric opened his mouth, closed it, then tried again. “That was almost poetic.”
“Then forget I said it.”
“I will not.”
“Then I deny it.”
Alric laughed despite himself, but the laugh faded quickly because the thought underneath had not gone away.
“I am not a hero,” he said.
“Aye, but any who announce they be heroes should be watched around public funds.”
“That is not what I mean.” Alric turned away from Maggie and began walking slowly. He did not go far, the room was too warm, and Maggie still deserved respect. “I have Seren. Mara. Hal. The brewery. The workers. The town. The king’s attention. The queen’s nonsense, whatever shape that takes next. The distillery, which barely exists. Roads. Warehouses. Beer. Casks. Guards who are learning that guarding is not just hitting people near doors. Too many people close enough to be hurt if I decide to become dramatic. I cannot afford to mistake a story for a calling.”
“Aye, but lad, those are all the thing’s ya’d need. Ya even named everything ya would need ta beat em, you’ve thought about it. So, reckon ya could do it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Aye,” Stromni said. “That may be the first sensible thing ye’ve said all week. If I asked anyone else lad, they’d think I’m crazy or say no while glancing around.”
Stromni shifted his weight from the post. “But lad, like ya said, can’t solve this one alone. That is why ye need everyone else, and more mind you.”
“I am not planning to do it at all.”
“Aye, and I was not planning ta spend months building Maggie when I first fixed your beer farter seal ya like, yet here she is, cooling like a copper hill and honestly lad, my pride and joy.”
Alric stopped before he looked at the still again. “Your…”
“Aye lad, I mean it too lad, Redbeards never get ta do this kinda thing.” Stromni folded his arms again.
Alric sighed and looked up again. “The demon king may still matter.”
“He might aye,” Stromni said. “Gods may be vague for divine reasons, or because they’re bad at instructions, or because they enjoy watching us trip over furniture in the dark. I don’t know lad. Maybe the demon king is a threat, maybe demons need healing more than anyone and have been proud too long ta ask. Maybe none of that is true.”
“That is not helpful.” Alric said
“But,” Stromni continued ignoring him, “if trouble ever does come from the south, cheaper potions, better supply, and alchemists not tryin ta cripple nations for it. All o’ it will go a long way.”
Alric lowered his hand slowly. He did not like how reasonable that sounded.
Stromni seemed to realise he had said more than he intended. His shoulders shifted. He looked at Maggie, then at the floor, then at one of the barrels as if it had recently become fascinating.
“Whatever ye decide,” he said, “I’ll support ye.”
Alric recoiled slightly but stared at him.
Stromni looked anywhere else. The floor, Maggie, the barrel again. Then he cleared his throat.
“I’m guessing ya lookin inta how the alchemists do things?”
“I am.”
“Keep doing that. Carefully.” Stromni glanced at him then, and the awkwardness did not leave his face, but something firmer sat under it. “If it’s a puzzle ye can’t solve, none o’ this matters. None o’ it. So solve what’s in front of ye first, is always been ya way, or fail at it properly and we forget it happened.”
Alric took that in and swallowed.
“I will try,” he said. Then, because the words mattered and avoiding them would make him smaller, he added, “Thank you.”
Stromni nodded once, still not quite looking at him. “Aye.”
For a while, they both looked at Maggie.
The sword and armour had once seemed like the dangerous gifts.
Now Alric stood beside four metres of cooling copper and wondered whether they had only been the obvious ones.