This Wyrmus Lind reminds me of one of those guys you see standing over a corpse with a bloody knife in hand, then claiming they accidentally stumbled into the person thirty times. Ivar thought as he walked across the market square.
A decent crowd had gathered there by now, following them from the gate and had probably grown even larger due to the typical flow of information in small towns.
In the crowd, he also recognized a few members of the city guard, whom he waved over to him and, ignoring their questions, sent off to look for any stragglers in the village and bring them to the market square.
In the current situation, he would prefer to have to repeat himself as little as possible.
While he waited for the other guards to return, he began to walk across the market square towards the fountain, trying to get a feel for the mood of the crowd.
He saw angry faces, confused faces and a few frightened ones, but most of them were, as far as he could tell, just worried.
It wasn't that they were panicking, being close to a dragon for a long period of time means that groups of armed men can only intimidate you to a certain extent.
Tribute demands for said Dragon were also nothing new either.
However, they never had demanded that much in the past before and even though Schlucht was a city with many adverse circumstances, it had never happened before that a small army gathered outside its gates and demanded everything the inhabitants had.
He waited a while until he saw his guards coming with the last stragglers and then stood on the edge of the well so that he had the water-spouting boar behind him, which he hoped would give him a certain amount of extra authority.
Close your eyes and go for it, he thought to himself, took a deep breath and began to speak.
"Well, first of all, thank you all for gathering so quickly, I'm not very good at public speeches, so I'll keep it short. We have reason to believe that Aodhan is dead," said Ivar, raising his voice loudly.
“What?” he heard the people in the front row gasp in surprise.
“What?” he also heard from the back rows, but in a more questioning tone.
“You can't be heard back here because of the bubbling of the boar,” someone shouted from the back row.
You stupid pig, you're supposed to be supporting me and now I have to shout myself hoarse because of you , he thought angrily and tried to remember a little trick that he had learned during his time in the guard at Dresnost, the capital of the kingdom that, at least according to maps, also included Schlucht.
There he had learned how to make his voice sound unnaturally loud. In a larger city, the occasional “Stop!” or “Hands where I can see them!” had to sound a little more impressive to make a suspect freeze in shock.
Or at some street festivals, to be heard at all.
Ah, what was that again, something with the throat and the air, ah, I think something like that, he finally remembered it and mentally prepared himself. After all, he hadn't had to shout so loudly for a long time.
He muttered a short incantation that his instructor at the time had drilled into him, concentrated on his voice and thought of the rumbling sound of thunder in a storm.
Shortly afterwards he felt the familiar warm tingling in his throat, and he knew that his little spell had worked.
Lets try this again, he thought to himself and raised his voice again.
"Guys, we have reason to believe that Aodhan is dead," Ivar's voice practically thundered over the crowd.
The whispering that had arisen while he was trying to remember the spell died down immediately and he now heard the expected surprised cries from the back rows, which probably confirmed that they had heard him now.
That's better this way, he thought contentedly and began to give those gathered a brief summary of what their guest had just told them and what plan they had come up with.
There was silence for a while, the kind of silence that only comes about when you overwhelm a large group of people with so much information that you can literally watch them try to process what they have heard, both as individuals and as part of the crowd.
This kind of silence is typically interrupted by the person whose mental processing is either the fastest or the least complex, and it should be no different here.
"Are you all crazy? We're not soldiers, you don't seriously expect us to fight these lunatics, dragon or not," a voice familiar to Ivar shouted indignantly.
He looked briefly for the speaker and saw that it was the Gate keeper.
Ah, very good, the shock has sobered him up and he is speaking normally again, thought Ivar, and was just about to answer when another voice from the crowd interrupted him.
"And because a complete stranger claims that he and his buddy Stephan Sturm, which is one of the most ridiculous fake names of all time, poisoned the dragon with, what was it? Dwarf mead, should we now fight these villains or what?" asked someone incredulously from the crowd.
"Has anyone ever seen this Stephan Sturm before?" asked another.
"Uh, yes, I think I saw him, it was probably that strange guy I opened the north gate for this morning," Ben spoke up, which only increased the restless murmuring in the crowd.
"Then someone saw him, that doesn't mean the rest of the story is true," the gatekeeper interjected harshly.
“Yes, maybe Aodhan just wants to test our loyalty to see if we would dare to rebel if we had the chance,” suggested another of those gathered.
“Well, I think he knows that we hate him, I mean, I don’t think loyalty matters to dragons as long as you just do what they want,” argued someone else.
“If you could all just shut up for a minute,” thundered Ivar again and once again the crowd fell silent.
This time, however, he felt a painful sting in his throat, which he knew was unfortunately a sure sign that he hadn’t done the spell right, so he quickly decided to take advantage of the moment while they were still quiet and while his voice was still working.
“As I said, this isn’t a test. That huge black cloud that came from the mountain earlier, what do you think that was? Well, let me tell you, that was the last breath of a dragon, or have any of you ever seen something like this?" he asked the crowd and when there was no answer after a few moments, he continued.
"I know, this all sounds pretty suspicious and after all this time a bit too good to be true, but ask yourself, why would that stranger be lying to us? Obviously, he's not one of the bandits and if Aodhan is still alive, he's just as screwed as we are if the dragon pays us a visit here. No, either they know that their dragon is dead and want to fool us or Bartold is indeed lying to them and want to drive them on one last raid before everyone notices that the dragon's men are now dragonless," he finished his explanation.
After that the crowd went silent again.
“I don’t like what this Bartold said earlier.”
“Exactly, you have my help. If they loot us and take my tools too, I can close my shop and then the whole village is done for.
“Now calm down Gustav, you’re a shoemaker and not a healer or anything.”
I remind you of that when winter comes and are you trying to tell me that healers are more important than shoemakers?”
“Um, yes they are,” the village healer Theodora joined in the discussion.
“Interesting opinion isn’t someone a bit biased,” the shoemaker Gustav turned to the healer, who just shrugged her shoulders.
“Where is our mayor, somebody go and wake Albert.”
“Yes, you said you came up with this plan together, so tell me Ivar, where is Albert? Ivar… Hello Ivar!”
It took him a while to register that the crowd’s focus had returned to him.
Unfortunately, the spell had already lost its effect and without it he had no way of drawing attention to him in the raging debate about without whom the Town would be more screwed.
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Not to mention that his throat now felt as if he had swallowed a razor blade.
"Uh, yes, he is..." he began, croaking slightly, before he was interrupted.
"Right here and he's awake too," Albert's familiar voice interrupted him, echoing clearly over the crowd, loud enough to be heard by everyone, but not thundering over the crowd like Ivar's voice had earlier.
The mayor of Schlucht made his way through the crowd towards the fountain, with people making way for him and bombarding him with all kinds of questions on his way, which he ignored all until he stood next to Ivar on the edge of the fountain.
"Well, my friends, it was hard to miss that Ivar has already explained the situation to you and what we want to do. I just want to make it clear that none of you are expected to fight the dragon's men, we just want to make it look like we are ready to do so. As I said, we know Aodhan is dead, but they don't. Once they realize we are ready to fight back, and then realize their dragon is not coming to help them, they will think twice about attacking us. Remember, these are not trained soldiers, just a group of thugs who think they can do anything because they have a dragon on their side. Without a dragon and you will see, they are no different than any other bandit, a bunch of cowards who know that it is one thing to attack lone wanderers on the road and quite another to attack a fortified city. I mean seriously, people, how are they even going to get in here without a dragon?” Albert ended his speech with a question that no one could really answer, which many of those gathered seemed to like, as Ivar could see from their faces, many of which now looked at least a little more relaxed.
“That all sounds well and good, but what about the people who don’t live in Schlucht, like my family,” Mikal, the eldest son of one of the local farmers who had their farms spread out around the city called towards the fountain.
“For situations like this, I have carrier pigeons from the farmers in the area. I’ve already sent them all out to inform about what just happened. I don’t think they’re in any direct danger, at least not while this bunch is still busy with us here, but still, they’re forewarned now. If something does happen, they can barricade themselves in their old shelters, I know they’re for monster attacks, but that will be enough. I also sent messages to our neighbors in Westfold and Emmertal to inform them. And I also asked them if they could send us a few volunteers or something, even if it is just for show, because to be honest, that's exactly what this is about," Albert finished his explanation, which seemed to have calmed Mikal and many others down at least a little.
Although of course no one looked like they were happy with the situation.
"And what exactly do you expect from us in this story, in this bluff, as you call it," asked Mikal now, whereupon all eyes turned to the two men at the fountain.
They looked at each other briefly before Albert turned back to the crowd and spoke again.
"Very simply, we want you to grab any everyday stuff that could even remotely pass as a weapon and then wave it around angrily on the northern palisade.
" There was silence for a moment before the crowd broke out into animated conversation again.
"Well That's something!."
"Sure."
“Oh boy, I can finally get my old slingshot out again.”
After a few moments, the crowd finally began to disperse, eagerly discussing which household appliance was most similar to specific which weapons.
“Well said,” Ivar remarked, contorted in pain, and began to rub his throat.
“And yet I can't shake the feeling that I've just done something very stupid,” sighed Albert.
“Oh, as long as Bartold doesn't see it, everything will be fine,” he replied before breaking into a painful-sounding coughing fit.
“What's wrong with you, you sound like you had a roll of sandpaper for breakfast. Oh, let me guess, you messed up the spell to amplify your voice,” Albert remarked, chuckling slightly, which resulted in a dark look from Ivar, who was visibly trying to get his cough under control.
“I prefer my sandpaper for dinner, thank you very much. Come on, let's go to Boris and tell him that we're gathering at the north gate, if he hasn't heard it already from our yelling, maybe he can use one of those oversized holiday tankards as a mace or something. Besides, I need a drink, my vocal cords feel like they're made of old leather," he said in a rattling voice.
"You know, with intrinsic, that means inward-directed magic like what you did with your voice, precision is often more important than brute force. You probably concentrated on the wrong place and then tried to compensate by using more energy, right or am I right?" a smug Albert lectured him as they walked across the square together.
"Thank you for the unsolicited lesson, Archmage," he croaked back annoyed.
"Oh, I'd say that still counts as general knowledge," Albert replied, shrugging his shoulders as they finally arrived at the happy dwarf.
"And how did they take it?" Boris asked curiously as they entered his inn.
"If I heard correctly, you convinced them to go along with your plan," noted Wyrmus, who was still sitting in his seat but now had a plate with a loaf of bread in front of him, which he greedily tore up with his fingers and stuffed the pieces into his mouth.
"Well, they..." Albert began, but was interrupted by Ivar.
“Before we sort this out, by Rüdiger's beard, give me something to drink first,” Ivar croaked urgently.
“My goodness, did someone try to cut your throat or something?” Boris said on the way to the bar, which resulted in another chuckle from Albert and a worried look from their guest, who even briefly interrupted the massacre of his bread.
After a few moments, Boris finally came back with a glass of beer, which he handed to Ivar, who drank it in two gulps.
“And better?” Albert asked with a slight grin.
“As freshly oiled, yes. To answer your question, a few were immediately fire and flame for it, a few others thought we had gone crazy, but Albert was able to convince them all to go along with the bluff in the end,” he answered contentedly, now back to his normal voice.
“Of course nobody is keen on the idea of fighting, but we were at least able to persuade them to act as if they were ready to do so. I have also notified the surrounding farmers as well as Emmertal and Westfold, Albert explained to them.
"Do you think they will send us help?" Boris asked curiously.
"Not really, but it doesn't hurt to ask”, Albert answered after a short while shrugging.
"Well, we can still hope, so what now? Should we all just grab some makeshift weapons and head for the north gate by sunset?" Boris asked excitedly.
"Yeah, something like that, and what do you have in mind as weapon?" Ivar asked carefully.
After this question, the innkeeper looked around his inn thoughtfully for a while before his expression suddenly brightened and he went behind the counter again, where he bent down and rummaged around for a while in one of the many compartments behind the counter where he kept the glasses.
Finally, he straightened up again with a satisfied smile on his face and placed a huge tankard on the table, which seemed to be made of some kind of white stone, but on which a considerable layer of dust had already accumulated, making it appear rather grey.
For a while, everyone present stared wordlessly at the intimidatingly huge tankard that Boris had just brought out, with very different emotions on their faces.
Aodhan seemed primarily surprised that a human had a drinking vessel that was wide and deep enough that he could probably put both his arms in at the same time.
Especially since he believed that even with normal-sized glasses, humanity was always in constant danger of drowning while drinking, a risk that was inevitably increased by such a glass.
Ivar himself had a hard time suppressing the laughter that was starting to arise, while Albert, on the other hand, took a step back, his eyes slightly wide with shock.
“Um, that’s not a weapon, is it?” the former dragon, now known as Wyrmus Lind, finally broke the silence.
“Not exactly, no, that’s an old dwarf tankard,” the innkeeper explained proudly.
“That damn thing counts as a weapon,” Albert grumbled quietly to himself.
“I knew you’d come with that thing,” Ivar laughed.
“Well, it’s only used for special occasions, and I think this counts,” Boris replied, shrugging his shoulders.
“Okay, all jokes aside, are you sure about that thing? I mean, don’t get me wrong, that thing does look a bit intimidating, but I think…” he began, but was suddenly interrupted by Albert.
“Believe me, that thing is more dangerous than any knife or sharp stick that the others will bring, and I expect you not to swing it around anywhere near me, got it,” Albert interrupted, eyeing the tankard suspiciously.
Ivar looked at him a little confused, Boris on the other hand just giggled to himself.
"You know, I do get it out for parties from time to time, but my grandpa, who found the tankard in the mountains before all the robbers had settled there, had a rather less customer-friendly use for it. Drunk guests who caused trouble, didn't want to leave after curfew or, even worse, didn't want to pay the bill, he would give them a little blow on the back of the head with the tankard, you know, to stimulate their thought process," Boris explained to the confused-looking Ivar, with a proud look.
"Little blow? Your grandpa knocked me unconscious with that thing, I was out for nearly ten seconds," Albert suddenly burst out angrily.
For a while Ivar looked back and forth between a grumpy looking Albert and a grinning Boris, before he started to laugh again.
“That's not funny, I had to wear a bandage,” said Albert reproachfully, whereupon Ivar found it increasingly difficult to breathe.
“That's what happens when you're young and drunk and want to skip the bill,” replied Boris, who had started to clean the tankard.
“I was neither drunk nor did I want to avoid paying. I had just forgotten my money and wanted to go home to get it, and I forgot to tell your grandpa why I was going,” Albert explained himself.
“He said something different back then,” said Boris and blew on the tankard, sending up a small cloud of dust in Albert's direction.
“Then he's lying, hey,” Albert wanted to start an angry tirade, but this was interrupted prematurely when he started coughing and began to wave the dust away with his arms.
“Well, if a light slap can knock out a young and fit Albert, you can rightly call that thing a weapon,” Ivar ceremonially declared when he was able to breathe again after his fit of laughter.
“Oh yes, I have no idea what kind of stone that is or how the dwarves made it, but the thing is as sturdy as it can be and if you swing it around by the handle, it's actually an excellent club,” Boris explained proudly.
In the meantime, he had also removed most of the dust from the tankard, so that the white stone it was made of could now be seen again, as well as the small decorations and runes that had been worked into it.
“Don't get me wrong, it's an excellent weapon, I just want you to be aware of how dangerous the thing is and that you must be careful with it. Otherwise, you'll end up smashing one of our skulls with it,” Albert explained in a slightly lecturing tone while he cleaned the dust from his glasses, whereupon Boris saluted him with the tankard, grinning.
“Dwarf tankards huh, shouldn't they be a bit shorter than we are, so why do they have bigger mugs than we do?” Ivar thought out loud.
“Have you ever looked at the gate in the mountain? The dwarves generally had bigger things than we do,” Boris pointed out.
“It's quite an interesting historical fact that a physically small people left behind such large buildings and tools,” Albert also noted.
“Dwarf mead,” grumbled Aodhan.
“What do you mean, Mr. Lind?” a confused Albert asked their guest.
“They built bigger tankards so they could drink more of their delicious mead,” their guest said, looking slightly longingly into the distance.
“That's right, there's something to that,” Boris said thoughtfully, agreeing with their guest, which left Ivar looking confused again and Albert shaking his head to think about those words.
