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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Cerebral Paladin" data-source="post: 3729629" data-attributes="member: 3448">We traveled north for the rest of the day.  While the trueborn slowed us and made us much more visible, they pressed hard to keep our pace.  I think Sergeant Cilorean was pleased by how far we had managed to travel before the unending shadows and gray clouds of day gave way to night and travel would be too dangerous.  The sergeant and Durak maintained continuous patrols during the night, since they also had no need to sleep, while both Spring and I needed rest to recover our spells.  We agreed that I would sleep first, and then wake for the last watch, while he would sleep.  We also posted a handful of promising young trueborn--children of about 10 or 11 who seemed alert and sensible--as pickets.  The trueborn were obedient and cooperative.  I approached a couple of the most attractive of the women about sharing my camp with me, and they were eager to become the servants and concubines of a subchief, as they seemed to view me.  I will need to consult a priest when I can to be certain that taking on lovers outside orderly matrimony is not a sin, but I do not think it is.  Lord Paranswarm teaches that those who rule are entitled to the benefits of their lesser, and while I am but a common mage relative to the free people of Caldefor, the trueborn are right to view me as a subchief under the command of Sergeant Cilorean, who is now effectively their chieftain or master.  But I must confess that I might have indulged even if it were a sin.Shortly after I fell off to sleep, one of my concubines woke me.  She looked very apprehensive, although I am not certain why--perhaps she was worried about the threat that had been spotted.  One of our pickets, a boy of about 10, stood nearby, and when I asked him why he had awakened me, he said that he had seen two great metal spirits.  He reported the spirits to Spring, who had said that he had power over metal and had flown from the camp to observe the spirits personally.  As the boy, who I later learned was named Bonepicker, described this, he made it clear that he thought Spring’s actions were foolishness.  I asked him to describe the spirits in more detail, and he said that one was a great serpent with thousands of segments, while the other was a huge puma, and that both had a long line of glowing orange crystals along their backs.  I told Bonepicker to accompany me and began leading him to Sergeant Cilorean, because this matter needed to be reported to the Sergeant at once.Bonepicker said that the spirits must have spotted our camp and would surely destroy Spring and then attack us, because the metal spirits hate all the servants of the Shadow.  At that I grabbed Bonepicker and forced him to his knees.  I informed him that he now served Lord Paranswarm and would never be a creature of Shadow again.  I think I frightened him greatly with this, but it was worthwhile, because he accepted his endarkening as I made the sign of the downward arrow over him.  Once that matter was taken care of, I told him to return to his feet so we could continue to Sergeant Cilorean.  The boy followed, a little shaken but still obedient.  He added that the metal spirits were fully charged, because all of their crystals glowed, so they must have a charging station nearby.  At that, I finally realized what they must be.  Metal constructs with orange power crystals that hate the Shadow could only be constructs of the Orange Mage.</blockquote>

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