The Divine Druid: A Contributed Effort - book 3, page 15
Tinker searched through the bag until he found a thumb sized garnet gemstone then resealed that pouch and put everything back within his backpack and put it back next to the wall. Now with the gemstone in hand he returned to the table and sat down. Both Hendle and his grandfather were looking at him as he placed the green garnet upon the table in front of him. Tinker first envisioned one of the elven forest waystations that had a small waterfall and creek running by it and all of the vine fruit flowers and fruit trees around it and focused upon it being seen as if he was standing in the middle of it.
Then he placed the image into the garnet while also tying it there with mental magic with his mix of water and lightning in to push the vision outside of the garnet gemstone like it was a projector and then sealed both within it so it would only project that sealed in image when the gemstone was turned over and released the spell working. Tinker sighed as he looked down at the slightly now glowing green garnet. He then placed it before Hendle saying.
“Here, I wish to give that to your lovely family Hendle as a thank you for inviting me to share a meal with you all.” Hendle, still eyeing the now glowing gemstone said. “Ahh, Tinker, I hope we hadn’t irked you,” Tinker chuckled, saying. “Nothing of the sort my friend Hendle. This is a gift and will not harm anyone. Why don’t you turn the gemstone over so it sits on its top? Can’t be any safer than that now can it?” Hendle sucks in a deep breath then reaches out and turns the glowing gemstone over and freezes as the room becomes a forested elven scene with a running waterfall with sunlight sparkling off the water and vines with fruit and flowers, fruit trees and soft grass covering the ground beneath it all. There were even butterflies moving about. Everywhere Hendle turned he found he was standing in the center of an enchantment that surrounded the table he was seated at.
He then turned the gemstone back over and the vision vanished as if it had never appeared. He looked back at Tinker thanking him for this wonderful gift. Tinker told Hendle and his family were welcome and then poured himself a tankard of mead and they chatted until Hendle finished his tankard then stood up and after bowing, headed home with the gemstone in his hand. Tinker waited, knowing his great grandfather was going to ask just how he made that seaming work, but when he looked over his grandfather just had a smirk on his face as he enjoyed his tankard of mead. Tinker continued to wait until he couldn’t and said. “What do you find in what I did to be so smirky, for?” Mage Bufford chuckled and replied. “I’m proud of you Tinker, you have made a very well crafted enchantment. And no one told you how to do it. You, my great grandson, have reached master class in the shortest time to my knowledge. And you're my kin to boot. So of course I have a reason to be ‘smirky’. Now. Back to what we had started to talk about much earlier today. I haven’t thought of anything that could be done further than what you have already done. Outside of going and getting yourself killed by trying to face off against these death ritualists alone.”
Tinker sighed as that was something he had been thinking of doing. Well once he had drained that swamp out first of course. No sense in allowing them to have such a backup supply of magic. Of course it would be prudent to know if they are even in that swamp…hmm might be away. Tinker stood up and emptied the fruit bowl and then filled it with water, his grandfather watched him with a raised eyebrow. Tinker then focused as if he was going to fully heal someone and called upon the High Elf Lady Henotta to aid him in his effort and released the magic he had gathered into the water filled bowl and it glowed for a moment then returned to normal.
Chapter 11
Tinker then called up the map that had the swamp upon it and focused his mental, water and earth magic to be able to see that swamp as it currently exists to be viewed from within the blessed bowl before him. And the bowl started to glow from within and then to show a zoomed out vision of the swamp itself. First Tinker tested how to move his sight within the magical viewing and once he had gotten it to move to showing him the outer reaches of the swamp Tinker zoomed out until the swamp was in the center of the bowls viewing.
He studied it and once he had found the most likely place within it for the ritualists to be, he didn’t focus on anything, just made the viewing zoom in until he was just above the tree level and he was able to see the ritualists and the staked out victims. His grandfather had moved so he could see just what his great grandson had done and gasped at what he saw. Tinker pulled back away till he was seeing the whole swamp again. He took a deep breath and moved the view to the place he had decided would be the best location to start the swamps draining and return the river to its original pathway.
Here he figured he would test if he could work through the looking font he had crafted and reached out as if he was standing right there at the river's edge and used his earth magic to lower the edge of the river bank that use to be the old river beds pathway and raised a hundred yard in length earth dam to block the current water pathway to the swamp until it was level with the river banks.
Then he zoomed back out until he could see the swamps exit the waterway. Here he deepened the swamp side of that waterway gradually so it would become forty foot deep for about a mile to cause the swamp water to drain out quicker. Then he pulled back out and concentrated on causing the swamp to evaporate its moisture by enhancing the ultraviolet and infrared light from the sun just over the swamp. Tinker waited until almost all the standing swamp water was drained away then he released his sun enhancement magical working. Then moved his view back over to the area he had found the death ritualists and examined the ritual work that held their current victims and found it was like the one that was used upon another of the ritual sites he had cleansed. The victim was used as a filter that drained the life from the area it was in.
Tinker found that each person tied here was a filter directed out into different parts of the swamp. He quickly broke the victims from the ritual that would feed the death ritualist magical power he then healed them all and removed their rope restraints and caused foot long daggers to form right by each one of their hands then pulled back to see if he would need to magically attack.
But the captured victims found they had a means to kill their attackers with the daggers they found right by their hands and didn’t waste any time doing so.
Tinker pulled further back and seeing as the swamp was almost completely dry stopped his sun enhancement working. He rechecked upon the rescued victims and they had all run off. Tinker caused a fire to burn down the death ritualists body and ritual site and once it had and looked to be spreading he used his fire magic to cause it to burn out. Then rechecked the rest of the swamp but found no other death ritualists or ritual sites. As Tinker dismissed the vision his grandfather said in a shaken voice. By the gods Tinker do you realize what you have done?” Tinker sighed and replied.
“I’ve removed the chance that the death ritualists leader can survive being attacked. And if he somehow is able to check, he will only find out that the victims managed to get the upper hand and killed his puppet.” Mage Bufford was looking at his grandson in stunned disbelief as he listened to him. Once Tinker had finished talking he said. “Tinker you have worked magic from a great distance, it's one of the most sought after magical works of all time. And I’ve witnessed it and still can’t see how you did it.” Tinker tilted his head in thought then replied. “Well, All I can say is No one had asked the gods for aid as I did. For I’m sure I couldn’t have done it without them aiding me. So that aged sought after magical work is still lost to the ages.”
Tinker excused himself as he was feeling all that drunken ale and mead needing to be released. His grandfather was staring at the bowl and found a beautiful elven lady looking back at him. He started to say something but the vision cleared and what water that was within the bowl vanished leaving not a drop within it. Mage Bufford sighed, then muttered wondering how he was going to explain to his great grandson what happened to all that magical water he had made.
Which just caused the forest shadow wolf to start his weird laughing sound again which Mage Bufford said. “Oh, shut up, isn’t there something you need to go chase or something?” Which only caused the wolf to start rolling on the floor while making that weird sound even louder. Tinker returned to find Dan rolling on the floor making that weird sound again and his grandfather looking irked for some reason and when he heard why he started to chuckle as well, only saying it was only water. That for some reason stopped Mage Bufford in his place and caused him to tilt his head in thought, because it really was water that Tinker had used and wryly smiled while shaking his head.
Tinker's grandfather sighed and waved as he mentioned he needed to take a nap and left for his room. Tinker sighed and looked over at Dan and said. “You are a very mean wolf, you know that right. My poor great grandfather who lives to find answers and you just keep poking him when you laugh like that.” Dan brought himself under control and moved over and licked Tinker's hand and Tinker patted the wolf's head in response. All was right between them. Tinker then decided he should inform the dwarven King of no longer needing to invade the Diamondedge Kingdom to remove that swamp from the death ritualist leader's backup reservoir of magical power and to report the leader wasn’t there after all, just a puppet.
He looked over at Dan who got up and moved over to join him and they both left to go find the King or Garain, come to think of it the two were always together so he probably will find both of them. He asked where he could find King Ouramon when he ran into a palace staff member and was told the king's audience hall. So Tinker headed down the main staircase and toward the audience hall he knew of and found an assortment of dwarves, gnomes, griffons all waiting to be allowed within the audience hall. Tinker spotted Janacey off to one corner and walked over and made sure he wasn’t in Janaceys way of observing the great halls area and the double doors to the king's audience hall, asked.
“What's all this Janacey?” Janacey, not taking his eyes off the things he felt he needed to watch, replied. “These are our neighbors and allies who have come to pledge their help for the upcoming war with the death ritualists.” Tinker tilted his head and asked. “So there's another dwarven kingdom nearby? And a gnome one also? I knew that there was a griffon one not too far from the vineville valley.” Janacey nodded his head as he continued to scan the open area and replied. “The Kingdom of Ironhammer is nine weeks travel to the northeast of us here, though the gnomes are spread out in that Golden Plains of theirs down past the elven forest we do a bit of trade with them and have hired out a few dwarven warriors to be their guards from time to time.
Tinker was impressed. He also sighed as it meant he wouldn’t be getting in to see the king anytime soon. Just then, Garain exited the king's audience hall and seeing him standing here talking to Janacey headed over. When he got close enough to talk and not have to shout to be heard Garain said. “I thought you and your great grandfather were chatting away on magical stuff, at least you were when I left you in the guest dining room.” Tinker chuckled and replied. “We were, hmm I had to go relieve myself and we finished up our talks in my room. We had a mid day meal with Hendle and his lovely family. Then some more talking and..”
Tinker looked around to make sure no one was close enough to over hear then said. “I did a distant magical working and searched that swamp in the Diamondedge Kingdom. And found the death ritualists encampment their and their held victims. And before you ask, I’ve managed to clear that reserve of backup power by draining the swamp and arranging the victims to be able to kill the puppet death ritualists, that was there to feed the ritual leader the power of using those victims to gather the swamps powers and send it to him.” Both of the dwarfs stood there staring at him. Tinker looked between the two then sighed and said.
“I came to pass that bit of information on to you so you could tell your brother, Unless we hear or find anything new, we don’t need to enter that kingdom. Now we just need to find out where that death ritual leader currently is. And I’m willing to bet it's not up our way. Oh, and also by now those death ritualists survivors have reached a kingdom station or patrol and should cause the Diamondedge Kingdom to start searching for them.
For the nobility may have forgotten but the citizens hadn’t, so you might want to alert those you have watching about the ant hill that's about to be kicked over. Which should help us in the long run to find out if any death ritualists happen to be hiding within that Kingdom.” Garain nodded his head then turned and headed back within the king's audience hall. Tinker, now comfortable that King Ouramon had the most current news, chatted with Janacey then returned to his room. As he and Dan entered he felt a chill pass over him that made him bring up his magical protections over himself and Dan. Tinker, not seeing anything, used his magic to enhance his eyesight and found his room was covered by a film of some kind of magic.
He examined it and found it was something to prevent magic from working correctly. He was even able to trace the magic back to the one who cast it. Tinker sighed and slowly shook his head. He exited his room and moved down the hall to his grandfather's room and found the same spell in place here as well. Tinker knocked upon his grandfather’s door and once he answered it, Tinker told him what had been done and who had done it so he would understand if he used magic and it didn’t work correctly, why and who had done it.
It could have been protection against any of the influx of current visitors and informed his great grandfather of the current goings on down stairs and that he had informed the king here of the swamp issue having been handled. Tinker, now that he had informed his grandfather, returned to his room and broke the spell placed upon his room and put one of his own up. One much stronger and decided he would follow his grandfather and take a nap himself. Though he should have figured he wouldn’t be getting much rest as he soon heard a pounding on his door. He sighed and got up and placed his protections to cover himself and Dan who had moved over to the door and sniffed at its edges. As he reached the door told Dan to sit to the side of the door and once the forest shadow wolf had he opened the door with his head tilted and a bored expression upon his face. For it was no other than the Kings Mage himself in a tiff standing before him. Tinker didn’t move to invite him in, just there waiting for the dwarf to state why he felt he just had to come and pound on his door.
When the dwarf mage saw Tinker wasn’t going to invite him in he said. “I told you to never magic on the palace again” Tinker held up his hand saying. “And I haven’t magiced a pebble of the King's Palace. So to what do I owe such a rude awakening. I had just fallen asleep for my afternoon nap and I’m awoken by you pounding upon my very door. Now what is so important?” The dwarven mage replied. Someone broke the ward I had placed upon the King's Palace, that's what happened.” Tinker cocked an eyebrow at the foul tempered dwarf and after waiting a few moments to see if there was something else replied. “You mean you covered my and my grandfather's room in that magic suppression magic of yours? For it wasn’t something that was covering anything but our rooms.
I double checked and followed it back to you to ensure no one was pulling a surprise attack. Now listen and listen well, Me and my grandfather are allies. And I hope you haven’t insulted any of the others with your crankiness. Now state your reason for bothering me and go do your duty!” The mage dwarf was getting red in his face and looking ready to call Tinker out for a mage duel when Garain came running and grabbed the dwarf in question, saying. “Ahh here you are, the King has been calling for you, we can’t keep him waiting now can we? Oh, I’ll come back after guiding this one to the King. I have a request we need to talk about.”
Garain said all that as he half pulled, half dragged the King's Mage down the hallway sputtering he could find his own way to the King and didn’t need some young’en to guide him there. Tinker looked down at Dan who was starting to make that weird sound again. Tinker sighed as he stepped back into his room. He went into his bathing room and washed face and dried it then walked over and started to set down at the rooms dining table but stopped and piled all the fruit back into the bowl he had used to handle the Diamondedge Kingdoms swamp issue, well almost all the fruit, he kept the pear he found and and after pouring myself a tankard of mead and a bowl of water for Dan he sat down to enjoy a snack.
Not long after he heard a knock at his door and called out for them to enter if they wished and Garain entered. Tinker had just taken another bite from his pear and was chewing it as Garain walked over and sat down. Tinker pushed the pitcher of mead toward Garain who grabbed a tankard and poured himself a drink then took a long drink from it. Tinker himself was drinking his as Garain said. “Sorry about that Tinker, the old fool got his beard in a twist learning everything you had done this morning while he slept in. And had to learn of what you had done for us all from the palace staff as they were all talking about it as they worked. Tweaked his butt it did.”
Garain chuckled at saying that, Tinker just sighed. Garain took another drink of his mead then said. “Tinker, do you think you could make double the number of fighter shields? Because Ironhammers have gotten wind of them and are requesting them as fair trade for offering their support in the upcoming battle with the death ritualists.” Tinker scratches his head then asks. “Hmm, maybe? But wait a moment. Does that mean that if I hadn’t made that fighter's shield they wouldn’t be joining in against the death ritualists? And if so, why did they bother to show up?” Tinker was getting irked, they were preparing to battle against a series of foe and here they come in requiring magical items to join in.
