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Message: <blockquote data-quote="xenoflare" data-source="post: 1595373" data-attributes="member: 12431">Prison of the Firebringer - A Brief, Uneasy lull amidst the FirestormEvening, Crossroads outside the Ruins of Selskar Vale, Forgotten Valley of the Cold Lands  The campfire was silent, heavy with a deep, unwieldy absence of noise that seemed to imbue even the simplest and most innocuous action with the most awkward of connotations. Peter sat mutely, staring at the orange glow of the embers, seemingly looking for something that was not physically present, and his fingers twitched, halfway through an unaccustomed fidgeting gesture.   A sinuous, serpentine brown head suddenly poked itself mischievously into the fire, disturbing the serenely dying blaze and sending a shower of flickering, fading flames into the air. The young warrior flinched instinctively, as his meandering thoughts were similarly scattered, and the gaze of the martial artist met that of the dragon.“Peter. What are you thinking about? Or rather… Mekhet should ask – who are you thinking of?” piped the young wyrm, eyes dancing in bronze pools of liquid glee.“Er... Nothing really, in particular. I was just thinking about how dangerous this quest to stop the Firebringer has been, and about our inability to work together with each other. There’s been so many deaths already…. We don’t work well as a team! Solvius was killed and he was our strongest warrior. Coreyl’s been so unstable and cold, and Master Yang sometimes seems like he doesn’t care about anything anymore. And what’s more… so many people have already… left our cause.”The acrid sting of betrayal in Peter’s voice could be discerned in its raw entirety in the wintry night’s chill silence.Mekhet flapped his tiny, vestigial wings and watched the little glow-worms of ash fall from his shoulders, and propelled himself over to Peter’s side. “They left because they had to, Peter. They have things to do, important things to do...”Tension unlocked itself from the young knight’s shoulders in visible, audible –pops- as he blurted out “But this is important too! What could be more important than striking down evil and preventing it from harming innocent people? We all have things we want to do, but there’s got to be priorities, right? It’s not fair that…”Peter stopped in the middle of his outburst, not quite sure how to continue.The dragon snorted a tiny cone of superheated dirt into the snow, and lazily flicked its tail at a passing snowflake. “Not fair about what…? Not fair that some people are going to a home, to do things for people they care about, to meet these people…? While… we are not able to do that?”The young man could only look on in mute indecision.“Peter… you like the young lady we met yesterday, right? You like Serilla Destare, don’t you? You’re angry that the happy god-monkey-man Ravi is going home in the middle of this problem, to tend to his temple and his people in Mahani while you can’t go anywhere to protect anyone you love? Are you jealous? It’s not that bad, you know… if you like Serilla, I approve. I won’t get in the way of your schoolboy romance, you know, I’m not like other dragons, I can accept that my pets need company sometimes. And anyway, if you like her, then you have already protected her yesterday, from that nasty minotaur demon Moskoog...”Peter flushed, and turned his face uncomfortably, and offered a brief prayer to Celestian, God of Stars, wishing that the moonlight didn’t shine so brightly and show his shame-reddened face so prominently.Apparently, the God of Stars was busy that night, for no such miracle occurred. The paladin shuffled off self-consciously and jumped up a nearby tree, to escape the uncomfortable turn the conversation had suddenly taken.**Mekhet smiled and rolled a frozen bit of slush into snowballs with his little talons, and proceeded to play a game of billiards, using his tail as a cue and the fire as a goal-board. He was halfway through his second stack of snowballs when his nostrils rustled. He laughed happily as he recognised the familiar scent of a good friend.“Fharlangan-man! Canter! Yo! How are you doing? Is everything okay now? Did you send everybody back safely?”The smiling priest of Fharlangan sat down with a sack of food by his side, and laughed in reply to the eager wyrmling. “Of course everything went all right – what could go wrong? Fharlangan smiles on our quest, and the teleportations went off without a hitch. Serilla Destare is safely back home in Argive; tell the lad not to worry, eh? I even had time to buy some provisions for our journeys – no use going on a war eating tasteless food, that’s what I say. I found some pearls on the cheap for you, and got some rye bread, nice spiced venison and boar for the rest of us.”Canter stretched and propped his staff on the floor for support, and hollered out to the camp. “Hey everyone! Dinner! Time to eat! Mmmm-mmm, chow time! I’ve got roasts and breads of all sorts! You’ve been complaining about my iron rations, so here’s something fresh for a change of taste!”A spectral form suddenly materialised next to the priest and said sullenly, “I heard you the first time. Do you have to shout out so loudly and announce our location to all our foes watching us?”The priest grinned on, unflappable in his good cheer. “Hello, Coreyl. My, you seem hungry today – what’ll it be? Argivian spiced venison, Durkwood roast boar, or this bit of mutton soup I got at Mahani?”The assassin muttered something softly, and Canter nodded vigorously. “Got you. The mutton soup. Always figured you were more a venison guy. You know, all that skulking and running and jumping, I would think deer makes more sense than goat, but hey I’m an open-minded guy. I would even offer you rabbit if I could, that’s very appropriate, don’t you think? But I didn’t find any. Rabbit, that is. No worries, ok, relax, Jack, keep your head on, no need to get too frisky, 1 mutton soup coming right up.”The shadow-dancer settled back mutely, and picked up a loaf of bread, cutting away the hard crust deftly with surgical precision. It was somewhat disturbing to observe the hardened killer at work with a blade, even when his attentions were focused on something as un-sanguinary as cutting bread.“Wow, you’re really good at that! You’re really an ace at this knife-fighting business, eh? I’ll be hard-pressed to find anyone in my Duchy with half the skill as you have with a blade...” The time-tossed elementalist, Seth, had popped out of his tent upon hearing Canter’s call to dinner, and was observing Coreyl’s fancy knife-work with great interest.“…then don’t look too hard. I’ll hate to cost you any sleep.” Coreyl Belarus took the bread and soup, faded again into the shadows as he strode past the bemused magus, and appeared next to the brooding Peter. “Here. Don’t think too much about things. You still need to keep your strength up.”Peter accepted the food and offered his listless thanks. Between the knight-son and his killer-father, there was very little need for words, because very little remained to be said at times like this.They both stared into the horizon, heavy thoughts squatting toadlike upon their brows, the boy fretting about life’s new twists and turns, the man worrying about death and its icy grip. Peter thought of light, love, and beautiful silver-haired aasimar mages as he quietly chewed at his bread. His surrogate parent thought of darkness, death, and dangerous black-hearted diabolist killers; even now, the assasins from House Belarus tracking his son and were awaiting his command and directions to strike. Coreyl was not sure what he was planning anymore, he was not sure if he was really an undercover agent going to kill his adopted son, or if he was going to betray his organisation for the second time, or even if he was going to finish his dinner.Indecision is the thing, Coreyl ruminated, that will kill me, in my line of work.Problem is, it’s not just going to kill me this time.Below their tree, the mage Seth, Canter, and Mekhet sat, tucking in with great gusto, telling bad jokes and exchanging laughter with wild abandon. Halfway through the celebrations, the wyrmling surveyed the juxtaposition of mirth and misery, and shrugged in a decidedly most un-draconic manner, and fluttered off somewhere into the night sky.</blockquote>

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