"We're leaving! Freckles, pull us out!" I barely recognized Zena's voice. Targeted by three ancient vampires, she was busy fighting them, sending sparks, blood and f-words flying as the four were swirling around.

My target wasn't going to last long: the others had already forced the vampire's hits into the orange zone. Gritting my teeth with disappointment, I activated Destructive Touch. Bang! The Elder lost six-something hundred hits and collapsed onto the rocks. The evacuator popped open. Freckles pulled us out a few hundred feet away from the scene. Trust my luck to land in a crevice in the cliff twenty feet deep, losing half the hits in the process.

I heard her cast a portal spell—a classic group one this time. With a pop, we found ourselves about three miles from the battlefield, just next to the Manticore's Lair. Good job we'd noted its location—well done, Freckles. Saved us the trouble of retracing all the way back. The girls hissed and cussed under their breath and still some sounds were missing. Too quiet. Almost knowing what I was about to see, I checked the group's status. Minus Zena and Charmsy. Oh.

I checked the group chat. Zena was there spitting orders as she changed into a spare kit meting out instructions to the rest of us. I got my share, too:

Relax, dude, this is business as usual. Charmsy and I have respawned at the Guild's, I just need five sec to discuss something with someone, then Freckles will bring us back. Just wait up a bit.

The five seconds lasted a good quarter of an hour. Add to it the teleports followed by buffs and meditation time—the clock kept ticking. I had barely two hours of paid time left and we had covered barely five miles.

Zena came over and crouched next to me. "Keeping an eye on the time, eh?"

I nodded.

"You understand, don't you, that we're not going to make it?"

I nodded again.

"Actually, time isn't the only problem. We won't be able to make it past the vampires. We've got to either hire more people, at least the same again, or take another road past the nearest city, but that's 150 miles with no guarantee of success."

I shook my head, "Two teams for another twenty-four hours, that's fifteen grand. Too much. I'm not some oligarch picking dosh from money trees."

Zena lay her minute green hand on my chainmail gauntlet. "I understand. We've been getting the measure of you. You're all right. You're not bossing anyone around. You're not tight with money. And you're not an idiot. Summing it all up, we've got a counter proposal for you."

I looked up at her with interest. All sarcasm was gone from her intelligent eyes.

"We'll switch to an hourly rate. Strictly as a private offer: the guild doesn't list this kind of service. This way, you're happy and we can skip the 20% guild tax. Just do keep your mouth shut about it, okay? I've already had my first warning. Four hundred an hour, will that be okay with you?"

That was a good offer. In fact, it was perfect. My freshly-gained authority was starting to bring in its first dividends. I needed to tell my inner greedy pig to take a leaf out of my book. Not everything is measured in money. Good contacts and healthy relationships can often do more than any amount of gold.

"Agreed," I said. "But that's not all. You've just said we can't get through."

"I did. But I haven't finished talking yet. Now, I have a friend. She collects those numbered vials. She has seventy-one of them already. Whenever she hears about a new vampire spot—especially a fresh nest like this where they may drop rare numbers—you can't stop her. I've had a word with her. She can bring her team to join us if they get the loot and you don't claim the nest and promise to keep the information under wraps for a week. What do you say to that?"

"I say, awesome! Thanks, Zena! You're the best!" unexpectedly for myself, I leaned over and pecked her snub little nose. Then I drew back blushing as I realized what I'd just done.

Zena burst out laughing. The girls' faces blossomed with unsure smiles. It wasn't often their leader laughed so wholeheartedly, especially without a good reason. On the contrary, this was some serious brow-wrinkling time.

Zena looked up at me, her eyes moist with cheerful tears. "I bet you thought I'd drop my frog skin and turn into a princess?"

Taking in my embarrassed face, she laughed some more, a happy laughter as she blotted the corners of her eyes with a promptly-materialized hanky.

We spent another hour waiting for the other team. I relaxed, trying to enjoy the fact that my money was flowing away, direction unknown. I had a funny feeling everything was going right. Everything was as it had to be. So I dozed off on the grass under the gentle sun.

I awoke as Zena gently shook my shoulder. "Get up, commander. The reinforcements are here. Time to clip the vampires' fangs."

Astra's team was a cut above my own. Although her ladies belonged to the same Sullen squad, all of them were a good thirty or forty levels above Zena's team. Plus vampire-tailored gear. Much to their disappointment (and to my quiet joy) we crossed the vampires' territory without a glitch. The bloodsuckers just didn't dare attack a group twice as big. Astra kept looking this way and that, indignant, as her two rogues branched out a few hundred feet, trying to encourage the cautious vampires, but they'd apparently thought better of it. The tough chick pursed her thin lips, promising to sieve the area and dig it all up as long as she found the wretched nest. At least she stuck to her part of the deal, taking our team all the way to the Bone Fortress. There, she shook our hands reminding us about her exclusive rights to the farm. Impatience glinted in her eyes as she shifted from one foot to the other, impatient to bolt off and add to her vial collection. True collectors are all like that. I remember reading about some rare stamp or other leaving a bloodied trail of collectors' bodies, too weak to fight their obsession.

The fortress protected the narrow—and, more importantly, the only—passage leading to the boulder-locked Valley of Fear. Its startling architecture had a bad effect on my head. The unknown builders had used giant dragon bones as building material. Twenty-foot high vertebrae formed a massive wall from one end of the passage to the other—the wall highly resistant to both steel and magic. The towers were put together from ribs, the enormous skull serving as the gate tower, about fifty feet high, its fangs as tall as myself. No idea if it delivered on its promise, but the visual effect definitely did.

We were already about five hundred feet away from it when a heavy steel spear sank into the ground not far from us. We got the message and stopped watching the fortress defenders appear on the walls: a good couple hundred skeleton archers and warriors carrying shields and short broadswords. Among them we glimpsed the stooping silhouettes of Liches wrapped in their gray cloaks. Considering that every skeleton was way over a 100-plus, trying to storm the fortress without a small army for backup was madness to say the least.

Zena stared at me with interest. "Here we are. The contract's closed. You owe us eight hundred for the two extra hours. But honestly, I wouldn't mind spending it on a few front-row tickets to see you charge it."

I was riding a wave of reckless courage as sensing the end of my long-winded journey gave me added strength and nerve. I readjusted the Crown of the Overlord on my head. "Agreed," I gave her a wink. "Choose your seat and go get some popcorn. And don't you tell anyone you haven't seen anything."

At least that way I had someone to resuscitate my arrow-perforated body, I added mentally. I also wanted to leave some lasting impression on the girls. I liked them. It would be a good idea to catch their interest with some intrigue and some prospectives. Our clan's combat section was desperate for a few battle-wise warriors.