Chapter 100: A mercenary guild
"Because I could do it."
Rael’s expression tightened slightly.
"That is not much of an explanation."
"It is the explanation."
Encrid leaned back in his chair.
"I had the authority to redirect the resources. There was enough surplus in several allocations that could be moved without affecting the Wall’s reserves. I moved what was needed and entered the names into the roster. That is all."
Rael heard his explanation, but even then he couldn’t believe it.
"You did not expect anything in return?"
"No."
"Not even from me?"
Encrid shook his head.
Rael was quiet for a while.
Then he said, "Three commanders have tried to recruit me before."
Encrid waited.
"They all used the same method."
Rael looked down at his hands.
"They found out about the children first. Then they offered me a proper position, better pay, better quarters, enough money to keep everyone fed. They never said that was the price for joining them, but they did not need to."
His mouth twisted.
"The message was obvious. Take the post and your people eat. Refuse it, and they do not."
Encrid considered that.
"It is an effective method, I have to agree."
Rael looked up sharply.
"You admit that?"
"Of course. If your people depend on you, threatening their food is an excellent way to make you cooperative."
Rael stared at him.
Encrid continued before he could misunderstand.
"But that is not why I did this."
He folded his hands on the table.
"I did not feed them to make you work for me. I did it because I could."
"That simple?"
"Yes."
Encrid shrugged.
"I am a Quartermastery clerk. I have authority over resources that you do not. If I see sixty-three people going hungry while I have the means to prevent it, then I either help them or I decide not to. I do not need a more complicated reason."
Rael remained silent for a while, and Encrid looked at him.
"If a man has the power to help someone and chooses not to, saying that he was too busy does not make him innocent. He simply decided not to help."
The door opened.
Gus returned carrying three bowls and a large pot, followed by a loaf of bread tucked under his arm.
"I hope nobody expected anything fancy."
"Anything edible will do," Rael said.
They ate.
For a while, the conversation stopped. The three of them sat around the small table while Gus tore the bread into pieces and Rael ate with the appetite of a man who had spent too many years wondering where his next meal would come from.
Encrid waited until they were halfway through before speaking again.
"I have another offer, if you want to hear it."
Rael stopped eating.
"Another?"
"Yes."
"What do you want?"
"Nothing yet."
Rael raised an eyebrow.
Encrid set his spoon down.
"I know how ambitious you are."
Rael gave him a cautious look.
"And?"
"And I do not blame you for it."
Encrid glanced toward the door, then back at him.
"You have talent, and you have people depending on you. Wanting something better for yourself and for them is not a fault."
Rael said nothing.
"So I thought I might help you with that ambition."
"How?"
"Build something."
Rael frowned.
"What?"
"A mercenary guild."
The answer took him several seconds to process.
"Here?"
"Yes, here. At the Wall."
Encrid reached beneath the table and pulled out a folded document.
"I have looked at the numbers. There are enough independent mercenaries operating around the Wall to support a proper organization, but none of them have any structure. They work alone, negotiate their own contracts, buy their own equipment, and disappear when they die."
He unfolded the document.
"I want to change that."
Rael looked over the pages.
"A hall. Proper contracts. Books. Equipment. A physician on retainer. A reserve fund so the guild can survive a bad month without abandoning its people."
Encrid tapped the document.
"I will handle the money, the contracts, the initial funding, and the administrative side. You handle the people and the work."
Rael looked up.
"And why would you do that?"
"Because I need capable men."
Encrid did not pretend otherwise.
"The Wall is going to need them. I would rather build something useful with them than continue watching ninety men work separately until the first disaster kills half of them."
Rael read further.
"What is the split?"
"Six to four."
Rael’s eyes narrowed.
"Six for you."
"Yes, six for me and four for you. I said you were ambitious, but I never said I wasn’t."
"Is the split after expenses?"
He was asking more questions, that means he was interested. Encrid smiled, keeping that fact to himself and answered his question.
"After wages and the direct costs of completing a contract."
Rael looked at him.
"That is generous."
"It is an investment."
"It sounds more like you are buying half a business."
"I am funding most of it, what do you expect?"
Rael continued reading.
"And my people?"
"Anyone you bring in who is capable of doing the work gets a place."
Rael looked up again.
"All of them?"
"All of them."
"Even the ones who are not fighters?"
"A guild needs more than fighters. Cooks, porters, clerks, stable hands, scouts, quartermasters. If they are willing to work, I will find work for them."
Rael leaned back.
For several minutes, he said nothing.
Encrid let him think and continued with his meal.
Finally, Rael placed the paper on the table.
"I like this offer, but I have one condition."
"Say it."
"You do not own the guild."
Encrid waited.
"You can fund it. You can take a larger share because of that. You can provide the hall, the equipment, the money, and whatever else you want to put into it."
Rael pointed at the contract.
"But I run it."
Encrid nodded.
"And if the day comes when what you want conflicts with what my people need, I take my people and leave."
Encrid studied him.
"That is a significant condition."
"It is the only one that matters to me."
Rael’s voice remained calm.
"I have watched too many men become someone’s property because they accepted help when they were desperate. I will not let that happen to my people."
Encrid was silent for a moment.
Then he picked up the pen.
"Agreed."
Rael looked surprised.
"You do not want to negotiate?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Because I would ask for the same thing if I were you."
He added the clause himself.
The two of them spent the next hour going through the agreement line by line. They clarified ownership, profit, wages, contracts, expenses, recruitment, and what would happen if either of them eventually left the Wall.
When they were finished, Encrid signed first.
Rael signed beneath him.
They looked at the two signatures for a moment.
Then Rael extended his hand.
Encrid shook it, and the moment he did - a familiar window appeared in front of him.
[ Connection registered: Rael ]
[ Narrative Relevance: 2.21% → 2.78% ]
[ Quest Progress: THE KING BEFORE HIS CROWN ]
[ Completion rate: 33% ]
[ Primary Objective: Make a connection with the future King of Mercenaries - Complete! ]
[ Reward withheld until the quest completion. ]
Encrid smiled at the increase in relevance, which boosted even more than when he made a connection with the Lord Commander of the Wall, and sulked at the withheld reward.
Nevertheless, neither of them knew what they had just started.
At that moment, they were simply two young men sitting in a small room on the Wall, one twenty-four and the other twenty-two, eating an ordinary meal after a long day.
Neither could have known that the guild they had just created would one day become the largest mercenary organization in the Empire.
History would remember the guild.
It would remember its contracts, its battles, its wealth, and the countless men and women who would wear its crest.
And, eventually, it would remember the two names at the bottom of that first contract.
Encrid Gannon and Rael.
But for now, history would still wait for them.
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