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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sayburr" data-source="post: 26341" data-attributes="member: 92">If You Want Blood, You’ve Got ItI pay the mage to ID the second wand. He tells me it is the first wand’s opposite. He asks if I am interested in selling it as well. I tell him I am willing to part with the wand but would rather trade for some items, if he can get them, instead of the wand for just money. He says to tell him the items I want and he will see what he can do. I ask him what there is to be had. He rattles off a list of things and then I tell him my wants. A wand filled with the spell of mage armor, 2 scrolls with a spell of entanglement and entrapment capabilities, web –he called it, and 2 scrolls with a spell called- protection from elements: fire, are my choices. Sounded like a good idea since we are supposed to face a devil. I liked the web spells because I had been thinking of how we were going to get this devil to hold still long enough for our fat spy to draw blood. All of those things and some coin to boot sounds like a good trade to me. He says it will take several days to be able to put all of the items into my hands. I tell him that will be acceptable. I understand that anything magical is hard to come by.      I head out of his shop to see if I can find a temple of Risk or Watcher. I have a few questions to ask before sticking my head into the mouth of a devil. I talk to a few of Watcher’s clerics at the small temple for him here. Very few of them have dealt with devils, to my surprise. I thought most of them to have experiences with the like and undead as well but they talk of other planes of existence and gates and the difficulties of actually getting such creatures to “our plane”. My head begins to spin as they try to explain these planes. I finally just hold up my hands and ask them what would do me the most good if I were to encounter such a creature. They tell me: enchanted weapons, magic to some degree, and holy water. I ask them about each of the three. They tell me that most devils are so steeped in the evilness and magical environment of their “home plane” that most normal weapons forged here cannot hurt them. Magic, they say, can be very effective or almost ineffective. My bewildered look must show them that they should explain that. A spellcaster with enough power could actually send them back to the creature’s own plane or if the caster is strong enough their offensive spells can harm the creature. Sometimes the aura that gives the devil near immunity to normal weapons can allow them to shed magical energies like a duck does water. Lastly they tell me about holy water. Water blessed by a cleric of one’s faith has the ability to harm some creatures such as devils and undead which do not follow the philosophies of that cleric’s deity when wielded by a follower of that faith.      I try to take in all that they have told me. I think Flamesinger should be able to affect most anything. Magic; I know I am no where near the abilities to be able to match powers with a devil. I ask them about getting them to make me some holy water. They look a little shocked. “You carry his symbol and told us you were one of his faithful,” one of them says. He looks at me sort of strangely and I think he is casting a spell. Flamesinger nearly jumps into my hand before I remember where I am and whom I am with. “His mark is clearly upon you and your aura is laced strongly with enough magical energy to at least cast spells of that magnitude. Why can’t you make your own holy water?” he asks. I tell him that I don’t know. “My trainers were also confused about my inability to cast even the simplest spells but all agreed that my faith and devotion were genuine and the most important in my service for him. He speaks to me in dreams and he has taught me one or two spells thru them, but even though I say my prayers daily he never sends me any spells in answer to my prayers. They are already there when I wake up. I can feel them there before I even say my prayers.” I tell him. He looks at me even more strangely than he has been since I asked him to make the holy water. “Indeed, your faith shines strongly and unwaveringly. And your trainers were right, faith and devotion are more important than spellcasting abilities when it comes to serving him. Come along and I shall bless you some water myself.”  he says. He makes 4 vials for me. I pay him for them and then ask him if I can pay my tithe here as well. He says of course. I give him his second reason to look at me strangely as I pull 4 pounds of what this strange city uses for platinum coins. “I hope this will help Watcher’s servants and temple here,” I say as I gather up my vials and head for the door.      I head back to the inn where we are staying and make sure the coward gets well fed and we talk about what we are going to do now that we are here. I ask them if they want to just jump on this thing at first light or if we want to try to re-equip ourselves a little better since we have some new found wealth. We vote for re-equipping. Pandora says she will replenish her spellbook that she lost to the dragon. Amber says she wants to brew some potions of healing and any others that we want, that she is able to. Ars says that he has a few things to look for and I say that I do, too. I also ask Amber if she will make me a potion to protect me from evil. She says she will have to get ingredients for all of them and gives us an idea of the cost. I tell her I will gladly pay for all the ingredients since I would have had to pay more than that for the one potion I wanted. We are ready for our beds. I tie the spy in my room.      I still dream of the look on his sister’s face when she found her father. I am sure I must do something about her.     The next morning Ars and I are going out to do our shopping when we remember our chicken. We decide upon tying him up and leaving him here with Pan and Amber. Ars goes to look for his things and I go to check with the merchant mage. We follow this pattern for four days. On the fifth afternoon, when I am going to check at the mage’s shop, a man confronts me.      He puts his hand out in front of him between us. “You have something I want and I mean to have it,” he says as he unsheathes a sword and pulls out a mace as well. I will Flamesinger into my hand. “Do you want to surrender it now or do you want me to take it from your dead hand?” he asks. “Take it if you are able,” I dare him. I say the words to use Risk’s power to  shield me and slash hard at him. At first, I think he might be one of the order which continually hunts for the swords of power but as I get close to him; close enough only to smell the stink of Daresh on him, not close enough to draw blood, I know otherwise. He, however, does not miss. I take a nasty cut from the blade and the mace bounces off my head hard enough to make me see stars. I call upon Watcher’s strength to return the injuries with a quick but accurate slash. He is good. I do have to give him that. He ignores the wound I just gave him and comes in strong again. I think I know his style now though. I make him miss with the blade and roll with most of the mace’s impact hardly feeling the bruising force wasted on the muscles of my shoulder. I use the momentum from the twisting motion I used to dodge his blow to spin around and deal him a bad wound that would have splattered the crowd watching this dance of death had they not had the forethought to give us plenty of room. I thought I had his attacks figured out. I didn’t take into account that he might change them slightly after I made him miss last time, so he scores a terrible strike that has me leaking blood from both the front and the back from the same thrust. Luckily, he didn’t change his defensive posture as well so I am able to glide in past his guard as I did last time. With a vicious slash that starts his guts spilling into the street and makes the wound he gave me feel like a hot iron has been run thru it, I make him think again about who it is that will be taking what from who’s dead hand. He makes some motions with his hands and I hope I can weather whatever spell it is so I can finish him as I go to close with him to end  this. I am stopped as if I have run into a wall even though there is nothing between us. He is holding his guts in with one hand as he steps closer to me. “Daresh said you would be a strong opponent. She didn’t say you would be this strong,” he says with blood running from his mouth.  My blade batters the invisible barrier between us in response. “We will meet again, though, my dark skinned tigress,” he says as he turns to stagger away. “That we will minion!” I scream after him, putting as much disgust as I can into the words. “You have only quickened your trip to the underworld by allying yourself with that bitch!” I rant as I batter the clear cage, venting my fury on it since I can’t reach him. After some time the barrier disappears. I go back to the inn to let Amber tend to my worst stab wound.     We drop back into our former routine. Tie the spy, shop the shops, and meet back at the inn for the evening meal. I pick up a pack saddle, some more thieves’ tools, a silver dagger, some more antitoxins, some more trail rations, a new light cross bow with some bolts, and some clothes to replace the things I lost at the blue dragon’s lair. This passes the next few days. When we meet on the eighth day for our evening meal, Ars looks as bad, if not worse than I did a few days ago. He says that he met up with his step-father again and narrowly escaped. I tell them I pick up the last of my items tomorrow and ask them if they will be ready to make our assault on the mage, Li-mead. They all nod in agreement. We agree to hit the place tomorrow night.     I go to the merchant mage’s shop and pick up my list of my items. I go back to the inn and lie down for a short nap until dark. We assemble in my room and decide the spy should be disguised as a monk with his hands tied under the folds of long loose sleeves and a gag just to be safe. He doesn’t like it but no one cares. We slip out into the twilight toward Li-mead’s home at an easy pace. We walk right past the gates of the place that are set into the 10 foot wall surrounding the grounds. They don’t have a chain nor does there appear to be a locking mechanism. They must be magically guarded. We keep walking right on past in order not to bring too much attention to ourselves. We round the corner and I say that I will sneak a look onto the grounds if Ars will boost me up. He boosts and I survey the yard. I tell them I see a large glowing cat on the prowl and that I see another glow coming from the other side of the grounds after I drop back to the ground lightly. I ask Amber if she wants to look the place over and perhaps detect for evil. She goes to the front gate to look in and do this. She comes back shortly to tell us that as she was looking in a man stepped out from behind the wall and told her to move along since this was private property before she could cast. Ars asks her if she wants a boost to just do it from here. She steps into his locked hands. She casts and concentrates for a few moments. We are waiting for her to tell us what she has learned when she goes limp and falls from her perch. We gently rouse her and ask her if she is alright and what happened.       She tells us she was concentrating to learn as much as she could from Mother’s spell when everything went black right after an almost sickening sense of evil washed over her. We decide to set things into motion. Pan is to hurt the beast using her magic missiles in order to lure it over the wall. Ars boosts her up. I get my new wand and use 2 charges on me. I get out a scroll to use when the beast clears the wall. Pan sends her missiles into the cat.  “You there! Stop! What are you doing? Hold!” is shouted from inside the wall. Pan comes down quickly. I am looking for the cat. She stammers something about being seen and wanting to move down before trying another spell. She could mess up trail rations, I think to myself. Ars starts moving down to reposition when the cat clears the wall with apparent ease with an old man on its back. Startled, we all scramble into defensive and offensive postures. The old man says, “We have been expecting you. Please, come to the front gate and then inside to see my master.” We look to one another to get a decision. I nod quickly, to get the voting started. We are all in agreement. The old man seems somewhat pleased at our decision but the cat doesn’t. It seems almost spoiling for a fight despite the odds.     As we are following them to the gate, the glow coming from the cat seems to be flames actually licking off from its body. I wonder if we would have had to have gone any further for our devil’s blood. I came here looking for a large humanoid with a pointy tail, large fangs, clawed hands, black soulless eyes, and a pitchfork. Now I wonder if this might be the devil guardian we were told about.     The old man and the cat lead us thru the front gate and across the yard to the base of tower. The man whistles and the other glow, a twin to the cat already here, races around the corner of the house. He tells us to wait here and tells the cats to watch us before turning and going into the house. A short while later Li-mead comes out. He asks if we are the mighty warriors that Daresh told him about. We say we are they. He says she offered him a tidy bounty for our heads but that he doesn’t really like her and likes the fact that she thinks she might consider him a hireling even less. He wants to know what we want here and why he shouldn’t kill us for trespassing and just take the bounty as a bonus.     I tell him that, having a common enemy, perhaps we could be temporary allies. I say that we came here to do him no harm since we have no quarrel with him. We only have need of a small amount of devil’s blood for a rite we must perform and had heard that a devil guarded his home, that is why we are here. I ask him how could we help him in order to gain what we need and for him to gain as well and at the same time confound Daresh. I give him my most winning smile to top off my win-win-Daresh loses proposal. He thinks for a moment and decides in our favor. Finally, something goes our way in this mad, mad-woman hunt!     He says he will allow us to harvest the blood, but not kill, we need from one of his hellcats. (I was right!) He will allow it, that is, after we do something for him. (Of course.) He says that he sent one of his men, Phol, to retrieve a book from some ruins in a swamp to the south. He hasn’t seen him since. If we go get the book Phol was supposed to get, we can have our blood. He describes Phol and the book and warns us not to try to read the book or even to open it. We tell him we understand. We were prepared to be up this night so we decide to go ahead and ride toward the swamp that he says is between the Fautee forest and the Ka-asa mountains that run north and south to the west of the city.      We ride about 6 hours and make a hasty camp. We ride about 6 more hours and come to the edge of the swamp. The air is fetid and filled with the smell of wet rot. We are looking for signs of the ruins when we come across a half-sunken road in great disrepair. We decide to follow it. After a few hours on the road, Ars says that there are some figures up ahead. We look at them and then around us. There are about a dozen in a circle around us at roughly the same distance of 100 feet. They are not showing threat or weapons so I lay my cross bow across my lap but do not place a bolt in it and continue to ride at the pace we were on. I wave to them. They return it. As we get closer, we can see that only one is human. The others seem to be as much lizards as they are men. The human steps forward and tells us well met. I return his greeting. He fits the description Li-mead gave us for Phol as much as I can make out except Li-mead never mentioned all of these terrible burn scars.     He tells us that his name is Phol and that the large humanoid beside him is Saki or Snakey or something and these are “the People”. I notice the big lizardman beside him is wearing a talisman of an acorn and take him to be a nature priest at least, or perhaps one of the secretive druids even. I ask him if we are trespassing on his lands and tell him that we did not know and meant no offense if we were. He waves that away and says no offense taken. He and the people just don’t get many visitors and they were just wondering what brought us to their lands. I tell him we are just making our way thru the countryside taking our adventures as we came to them. He asks if we will come back to the village and eat with them and there he will tell us of an adventure. We agree and follow them for a short while back to their village. Ars asks if I noticed that Phol had a black book in a belt pouch. I said I saw it but didn’t think much about it. Pan carries one very similar to it. I figured him for a wizard, I say. He does work for Li-mead and doesn’t look like hired muscle to me, I say.     At the village, over a meal Phol tells his tale. He says that he came here with a party of 5 others to loot the treasure of a dragon living in a ruined keep here in the swamp. (So much for the unguarded story Li-mead gave us.) He says that the rest of his party was killed before they even made it into the creature’s lair and that he was badly injured as we can see from his scars but managed to stagger away and into this village before dying. He says that Snakey healed him and that he has stayed here since. He says that the dragon exacts a tribute from the village of one sacrifice per day for a week once per month to keep from destroying the village. He asks if that doesn’t sound like a task for adventurers such as us and that he will help us. I start to tell him with a smile that we are not that kind of adventurers but I stop just before doing so and tell him that it sounds like a noble quest to me but that I cannot speak for all of my party members. I ask him if we might have some time and privacy to discuss this. He says of course.     We retire to a hut that some of lizard men show us to. We talk about it. Of course we are going to do it. We just want to try to sort things out first. He has not mentioned Li-mead yet or the black book. Li-mead did not mention a party or a dragon. I mention that it seems odd that if he in fact works for Li that he would take up this do gooder attitude of- help these people that are not even human lift the yoke of the oppressive dragon. I say that we should be careful of the “help” that Phol might give us. He could be lying or charmed or anything, including getting us to be a big part of this month’s tribute. We go back to Phol and tell him that we will do it and ask him how far to the dragon. He says not far at all, maybe an hour or so. We say we are ready. He suggests getting a good night’s rest first and getting an early start. Very early. He says he has been watching the dragon since he was healed enough to. It seems to forage mainly at night and then return to its lair a little before dawn to sleep thru the day, he says. If we were to get up before dawn we could get there after it comes back from hunting. Then we could sneak in on it after it has gone to sleep. It sounds reasonable to us, so we agree.      We get up in the dark and follow Phol to the wyrm’s lair. It is still dark when we get there. Morning’s twilight is just beginning to cut into the night. I don’t know why I didn’t think to get Amber to see if the man was evil before now but it just hits me that we should know before we walk into this possible death trap. I give her the high sign and distract Phol so that she can cast and concentrate. To my dismay, she feints shortly after casting. We rouse her once again, just like at Li’s. She says there is a great evil inside the castle, she looks at Phol and shakes her head when he turns to look toward the ruins. I tell them I will go scout a little ahead to see if the drawbridge seems safe enough to cross. It does not. I notice when I am up there that the moat is dry. How odd! Here we are in a swamp and the one place that would be and should be wet even outside of a swamp is dry in here. This new contradiction only serves to increase my sense of foreboding about this mission. I go back to the others and suggest we make our way thru one of the torn down sections of the wall rather than chancing the bridge. We tie our fat spy with the horses and make our way to one side of the ruins. Phol makes his way to the back of our formation. Ars and I go side by side in the front but I hand signal to Amber and Pan to flank Phol and not let him all the way behind them and to watch him closely.We go thru one of the gaping holes in the wall and cross the courtyard to the doorway that leads into the main building. The wyrm lies sleeping on his hoard about 50 feet from the doorway in the dark shadows inside the building in the pre-dawn grayness. Everyone puts on their best magics to help them against what is sure to be an unimaginable retaliation to our attack.       I know the plan was to try to sneak up on the big lizard and put as much damage to it before it was awake and I even start to quietly approach it but Risk’s guidance screams to me that it would be so wrong. What if one of us isn’t quiet enough? What if Phol isn’t going to try to be quiet? No! Be bold! Conservative is for farmers, not followers of Risk! I charge! I ask Watcher’s hand to guide my stroke as I sprint across the floor toward the sleeping drake. I bring the flaming blade down with all the force and momentum I can muster where Watcher whispers to me to strike. Just behind the skull a few scales of its armor have a space just big enough for my blade. My stroke doesn’t stop until Flamesinger bites into the stone of the floor. The floor is already awash in the great creature’s blood. I severed its head so cleanly that it never even opened its eye or woke up before it died. I turn to show Phol the point of my blade just in case he was thinking of anything stupid. My turn slings a pattern of blood from the flaming blade to the floor but the point never rests on my intended target. Phol is gone! Pan shouts, “He flew up and thru a window.” I look up but don’t see him so I tumble to one side to avoid the attack I am sure is coming. It doesn’t. I dive over the beast’s neck for the cover the body will give me and search the rafters for Phol. I still don’t see him. Amber shouts, “There are floors above this room.” I dive over the body and tumble and come up in a sprint that gets me outside. They are pointing up but not doing anything else. I pull my rope and hook from their ties on my backpack and start twirling for my throw. I hear chanting from the upper floor and in the back of my mind I know that can’t be good. I throw and my hook catches. I test it with a pull and start up the wall.      I can’t seem to climb nearly fast enough and the ascent to the window seems to take forever even though I am sure it could not have taken half of a minute. I tumble in thru the window in case someone is waiting for me to climb thru. No one is. Phol is too busy groveling at the feet of what looks to be a handsome Svimohzhish prince to ambush me. The dark skinned prince seems to have been crossed with a demon because in spite of his comely features he has two large sharp fangs that show as he smiles at me and his fingers end in weapons that are more like talons or claws than nails. Behind the dark skinned prince is a glowing portal that seems to float in the air. Of course! Now all the cleric’s talk about gates comes into focus. This must be one of the gates they told me about. I hear a yell and a scream and a couple of thuds and another scream from outside. “Hey guys! I found Phol and his friend. Come on up and help me.” I yell. On a podium between the men, a black book rests. So close! I think I will have to throw Magnus’ advice about taking out the wizard first out the window. I am not sure that rule applies when there is a devil in the room. I rush them.     As I close, I can feel some one gripping my mind with amazing power. I try to make it as slippery as possible and feel them lose their grip. I use Watcher’s words of power to guide my blade again. The dark prince seems amazed that I hit him at all even if the wound doesn’t seem too bad. The very air in the room seems thick and rife with the magical energies these two are bringing to bear on me. I dare not let the dark prince touch me even as something in the back of my mind tells me how much I yearn for it and would enjoy it. I use my best defensive move. One I have used and never been touched and come away with claw marks thru my clothes. No blood was drawn but I am not sure I can move any better than that. I can only hope that was his best attack as well but the fear that has started to creep into my mind is whispering that it probably was not. Phol fans his hands out like I have seen Pan do. That can only mean bad things. I tuck my shoulder and roll underneath the sheet of flame that shoots forth from his splayed fingers. I roll up onto my feet in time to see the demon man shoot a look of displeasure at Phol as if the fire in his presence was not a good idea. Strange for a hell spawn to show a distaste for flame. Who knows, maybe he gets plenty of flame on his home plane? I use my last spell to guide Flamesinger to his ebony skin again. I know I have not hurt him badly but I have cut him twice but rather than being displeased with me there is almost a look of pride in his eyes. For me. I know this can’t go on like this for long. Where are they? The room has a nearly audible crackle, like fat in the fire, from the arcane energies being spent. Finally, I feel my muscles begin to stiffen quickly, paralyzing me. Watcher whispers in my mind, “These next few seconds are yours. Do with them what you will, in spite of his spell.” Both of them seem surprised that I am still able to move. I try to end it with a killing blow aimed at the handsome devil but fail miserably and then feel my muscles knotting up again.      I see the dark devil step toward me and know I am about to taste death again but I am helpless to do anything about it. I can only hope that the protection from evil potion that Amber brewed that I drank before going in to the dragon is still working. I feel his caress on my cheek and am revolted by his touch and revolted even more because I find myself yearning for it. I feel his nails go thru my clothes again. This time blood is drawn. Only a small amount, as if to say this could be down to the bone if I chose for it to be but I didn’t for now. He looks over my shoulder as the grayness of the twilight is giving way to the dawn. He speaks to me in an old tongue of Svimohzhish with some of the words I haven’t heard outside of the gypsy camp. “My black beauty, I would love to stay here with you but I have unfinished business at Sleeping Bear Rock. Do not worry though, we will meet again, and I will make you mine, then,”he says. Then he turns, grabs the book and turns into a cloud of smoke or mist and drifts out the window.     Amber comes in thru the window as Pohl is shaking his head as if he just took a good thump from a constable’s club. He asks what happened. I stand there like a statue. Phol flies out the window over Ars’ head and disappears. After a short while the spell breaks and I can move again. I tell the others what happened and what I saw and begin going down the wall. I rush back to the horses and I start to change my clothes as soon as I get there to Ars’ and the fat spy’s  delight judging from the size of their… eyes when they realize what I am doing. I can still feel the touch where his fingers trailed over me. And the scratches that he left let other people know that he touched me makes me feel more naked than I ever have before. Even standing here in front of the 4 of them.  We know Li will not want to hear any excuses but perhaps if we offer to go to Bear Rock we can still get the blood we need without too much trouble at Li’s place. We take the valuable treasure from the dragon’s hoard and decide to stop at the village to see if Phol went there. No luck. We get the idea across to the lizard men that the dragon is dead by drawing in the mud since none of us can speak to them. We trek back to Xaarum and Li-mead’s.     Li is not pleased and does not want to hear about us going to Sleeping Bear Rock to get the book there. After my description of the dark devil and describing him as such, Li  laughs at me. He tells us that the creature was probably not a devil prince at all. Li says that what I describe sounds much more like the powerful undead creatures we probably have heard called vampires. He says we are lucky he does not kill us for failing as it is. I look to Ars and he knows that is just the kind of talk I do not need to hear. I am pleading with him with my eyes  to let me cut off this arrogant bastard’s head like I did the dragon’s. He gives me the- this is not the time and place with the 2 hell cats and his servant and him all here- look. I bite a hole in my lip to keep from bringing the flaming bastard sword to the flaming bastard’s neck and follow my partners lead out.     We go back to the inn to figure out what we will do. We know we need to get out of this town as quickly as possible. We know we need devil’s blood and that we were sent here to get it. We wonder if we could get an evil cleric to summon a devil for us to bleed like Am summons her lynx. We figure it is worth a try rather than trying Li’s again. We cannot get a cleric to do it once they find out what we want to do. Sometimes you just can’t shed the shackles of fate. We will hit Li’s tonight.     We go back to the wall where Pan hit the cat the first time. I take out my web scroll to try to trap it so we can get the fat man to cut it. I read the scroll. A huge web shoots toward the cat but it dodges it before the web can trap it. Then it leaps to try to take my head off. It nearly succeeds. I dodge its foreclaws letting them go over my shoulders but being on top of Ars limits my movement so that it sinks its fangs into my head as it knocks me backwards off of Ars and to the ground where it slashes me with its rear claws. The pressure of the huge creature’s jaws on my head starts to black out my peripheral vision, making it seem as if I am looking down a gopher’s tunnel or something. I will my blade into my hand but cannot wield it properly enough to even scratch the hell cat. I can hear the commotion going on around me but it sounds like it is getting farther away. I hear the crunching of bone and hope that one of them hit the big beast hard enough to make it let me go. They must have because the pain is nearly gone now, maybe it won’t be as bad as it felt at first. Then the blackness swallows me…     I awaken on the road. By all the gods! My head! Even though Am tells me they cleared most of the blood off my face, my eyes are still nearly matted together with the coagulated mess. My head pounds with every beat of my heart and any tilt makes it feel like it will explode. I throw up three times within the first hundred strides of my mount from the pain the animal’s movement brings. Thankfully there is nothing left to bring up after that. We ride like the very prince of the underworld is on our heels and after what we have seen and done in the past few months, he might very well be. We push our mounts and ourselves to the limit as we ride straight thru to Zoa.      When we get there, the line to get into the city is longer than the longest merchant caravan I have ever seen.  We ride past the people in line and right up to the gate. I offer to buy passes from the gate guardsman. He informs me that we need to get back in line that passes can only be bought inside the city. We start back toward the end of the line. Ars says that maybe we can buy a place in line. I say maybe that would be ok with the guy you buy off but what about all the people behind him. He says maybe instead of getting in front of them we could buy their place altogether. We start asking. We find a melon farmer who has a wagonload waiting to get them inside. I offer to but his melons so that he doesn’t even need to go into the city. I ask him what they would be worth and he says 100 gold pieces. I tell him it is a deal. As soon as it is out of my mouth I know it is a mistake. I agreed too quickly. “Never let them know you need what they have much less that you need it badly,” my father used to tell me after his negotiations. This farmer then says but what about my time it is worth something too. Very well then, what is it worth, I ask. Another 100 gold he says. I am ready to slash his throat but know it was my mistake that got me where I am in this deal so I pay the man the 200 gold he asked for and he wheels his wagon on out of here and we take his place.     We ride thru the gate and point our lathered mounts in the direction of the forge at Haalan’s house. It seems like we crawl thru the streets at a snail’s pace. This last leg of our trip seems to drag on forever when I think of it from the perspective of reaching our stopping point. At the same time, the pace seems so comfortable when compared to the frenzied, tension-laced race of the rest of the trip from Xaarum. How can one thing be perceived so differently?      When we get to Haalan’s, we are hardly surprised by the latest obstacle in our path. This quest seems so full of such things that I bet our path might resemble that of someone lost in the woods who follows his own tracks. A note is tacked to the door. It reads as follows: THIS HOUSE CONDEMNED. THE OWNER HAS BEEN ARRESTED FOR INSIDIOUS AND TRECHEROUS ACTS. We barely have time to listen to Pan translate it from the Reanaarian it is written in before we hear the crunch of gravel under rough boots behind us. Damn. I must be more tired or injured or both than I thought. They just walked right up on us. We turn to see the latest in the long line of ambushers who seem to know our every move and await us at every other corner. One of them steps forward and tells us to come with them without a fuss or become pincushions. To add insult to injury, we are told we can not even take our horses. I can almost imagine them sighing in relief.      We are herded back outside the city. 200 gold pieces for about twenty minutes in town. It makes my head hurt even worse when I think about that. We travel a short distance luckily. We stop in a small clearing in a copse of woods. A large man with the sign of Scorn comes out of the trees. He says that we have something that he wants and that he will trade for something that we want. “What could we have that you would want?” asks Ars. “The books,” I simply state. “Very good,” he says, “I won’t have to spell it out for you then.” We tell him that we want to see Haalan alive first. He says no way and starts to walk back into the woods. I yell to him to see if he wants to meet back here. He turns back to us smiling the smile that only those who think that they are holding all the trump cards can smile. He tells us, yes, back here in just a few hours. We protest. We tell him that his men didn’t let us buy passes and that we could not even get thru the gate in that short time. Oddly enough he agrees. He yells to one of his partners who comes running out. “You know a captain in the city militia, don’t you?” he asks. His man answers that he does know one like the back of his hand and laughs. “Write these heroes some gate passes, would you my good captain?” the big Scorner asks. They both laugh as the second man produces some parchment and quills and ink from several scroll tubes. I hope the man’s confidence is based on past performances rather than the bravado of most forgers who get caught thinking that all the people who read a note are stupid or faking it. I hate to think what the punishment might be for trying to get thru a gate of a city that is practically one step away from martial law. We take the notes and trudge back to the gate. They work famously. I hope the others appreciate the talent of the man who forged the papers. I wonder if any of them gave a thought to what might happen if the man’s work was slipshod.     We go to Haalan’s first to get our mounts to make the trip faster. When we get there, half the horses are gone. That is just one more thing gone wrong in this odyssey. Amber is furious as her frustrations erupt thru her normally placid demeanor. We are all so tired that it is a wonder that more of us haven’t displayed our tempers so evidently. We get on the horses that remain and ride to Geolain’s. We use our secret ring code so we can get the cowardly Joa to answer the door. We tell him that we need to see Geolain. We ask him if he knows that Haalan has been taken. He says no and leads us to the waiting room. We wait and wait. No Geolain. Finally, we begin to yell for him in our impatience as well as our dire need. Joa comes back to see what the fuss is about. We tell him we need to see Geolain now! We have only a short time to ransom him or he will be killed! He scurries off. Geolain arrives within a minute or two. “What is Joa talking about concerning Haalan being kidnapped and about to be killed?” he asks as soon as he enters the room. We tell him that we need the books that we saved from the Scorners. We explain that the Scorners have him and will trade him to us for the books but we have to hurry. He says he thinks that he still has them all and calls for Joa. The two of them rush to another section of the house and bid us to follow them. “You will get them back again, won’t you?” asks Geolain. I say sure we will and hope he has no spell for discerning lies. We put the books in four sacks and load them onto the horses.       We ride back out to the clearing. When we get close, we decide to have Ars and me ride in with half the books while Am and Pan stay hidden with the other half of the books just in case these thieves are less than honorable. We ride in and call out to them holding out the sacks. The big man comes out and asks us if we have the books. We tell him we have half of them but that we want to see Haalan before we have the other half brought in. He nods as if he might have done the same thing and waves to a section of the trees. Haalan is marched out, flanked by 2 men with their crossbows almost touching him. We wave Am and Pan in with the other books. The big man looks in the bags and nods to the bow men. They give Haalan a push towards us. We pull him up to ride double and head back to the city.     At Haalan’s, he pulls the note down and wads it up and throws it to the dirt in disgust. “Idiots,” he grumbles. He tells us to hurry. He says that it was hard enough to keep the coin ready to accept the final magics with heat from the forge while he was here. He hopes that it has not cooled enough while he was in the grasp of the Scorners to ruin the rite. We rush in and he calls for Ars to start pumping the bellows right away. Ars does so in a rush. He asks if we have the blood. I hold out the vial of the precious liquid to him. He goes thru a lot of ceremony and chanting that I don’t understand and then has me throw some powder into the fire. It makes the flames blaze higher. He continues chanting. The door bursts in under the pressure of the eight armed men behind it. They attack us yelling some fanatical idiocy about stopping evil and magic and some other rot. Haalan continues to chant as we rush to stop the wave of men. He shows great resolve as he continues the rite despite taking a couple of sword thrusts. He then pours the devil’s blood onto the coin and every flame and light source in the place goes out. Even Flamesinger! The fighting continues in the pitch black. Abruptly the whole place is lit back up as all of the light sources and flames re-ignite along with most of the house. Haalan yells over the din that he needs a soul to seal the magic. “Let me. It is my destiny!” I yell in response. I begin making my way toward the coin. My dreams all make sense now. I must get to the coin.      Haalan pulls a wickedly curved dagger from somewhere. I am so close. Amber screams for me to stop. She says that if someone must die to let it be her. Her nobility touches me deeply. I suspect that her character might be stronger than any steel. She thinks I am trying to sacrifice my own life! How could I possible fulfill my destiny if I am dead? I am trying to get to one of the last attackers to let him play the role of sacrificial goat. Haalan beats me to the punch when he grabs one and opens the man’s throat with one slash of that dagger. The man’s blood gushes over the coin in a gory splash. The man’s essence is pulled into the coin and his body withers into a dry husk in front of our very eyes in seconds. As Ars puts the last attacker down, I pick up the newest coin of power. It burns my hand as I hold it but I refuse to let the pain make me put it down. I know, after my dreams have become clear this day, that fate and destiny are but flip sides of the same coin. That coin is the coin of our life. Just as we have helped forge this tool of magical power, I will in turn use it to forge my destiny. Now we should be able to face Daresh on level footing. I must take care not to repeat her mistakes. I have to remember that the coin is a tool only. How much destiny does a garden hoe have? I must remember that true greatness is defined by one’s character. I must take care to remember that the true hero can overcome trials without her tools as well. She must not fall into the trap of just being the steed which delivers the item that does the great deeds. She must not fall into the habit of relying on her magic to achieve greatness. True power must come from within just like Amber has. I must take care to remember that…. this place is on fire! I come out of my fugue to rush out of the burning house just in time. A crowd begins to gather as they always seem to do at such spectacles. We decide to slip away while we can before everyone determines that the terrible stink is burning flesh. We ride in different directions away from the fire to avoid as much attention as we can after agreeing to meet up at Geolain’s as soon as we can.       This gives me the opportunity to see the fat spy’s sister. I hasten to her house. I rehearse what I will say in my mind on the way there. I try to come up with a lie that I will be able to tell her that will make him sound brave and heroic but as I tell them to myself as I ride they all stick in my throat. I try several but none work. She probably would know that they were lies anyway. She should know her brother better than we did. I am shaking when I get there. It takes all I have left to will my feet up the short set of steps which lead to her front door. I knock almost too quietly to be heard but I hear feet rushing to the door. This is it. Show time. She opens the door and looks like she will scream until I realize what I must look like. Dark skin and clothes covered in blood and reeking of smoke, some of my gashes on my face and head from the cat still open despite some of Am’s best spells. I come to this realization as she is opening her mouth widely to let her whole neighborhood know she is in danger. I fumble for the idiot’s name. I can’t blurt out Fat Spy sent me! “Gonnathan sent me,” I finally manage to get out. Relief floods her face as tears begin to flood her cheeks. She starts a thousand questions which I can’t even separate much less answer here on her porch. “Can I come in?” I ask her.     She stumbles as badly as I did and finally reaches out to pull me in by the wrist instead of answering me. Where is he? Why isn’t he here himself? Is he hurt? Is he alive? All of these and more rush out of her mouth as she finds her tongue again. I tell her that I know that she must be beside herself right now but as she can see I am hurt and in need of some cleaning up before I can go back out in the streets. I tell her that when I last saw him that he was very much alive and in fact unhurt. I ask her if the rest of her questions can wait until I can dress my wounds and wash up in general and change clothes. I say that then I will tell her all I know then and give her what Gonnathan sent to her. What he undertook this quest for in the first place. She looks ready to burst but finally agrees. He was alive and unhurt? You are sure? I reassure her and ask if she will show me where I can wash and patch up. She takes me up the stairs over a rug that was not there a few weeks ago that must cover the stained floor where her father bled out. I know I am doing the right thing. So much blood. Not just here but all along the path Daresh has blazed for us to follow. She leads me to her room. She can’t know that I have already been in here but I remember. She excuses herself and leaves me to myself.     I finish in a hurry because I know she must be climbing the walls waiting on me and because the others will already be getting to Geolain’s. I stuff my bloody smokey rags back into my pack and go down the stairs. I tell her that I really don’t know much except that he went on a quest of great importance and that he saw it thru to the end. I do not know which direction or where he went after he left me but I know that he thinks you deserve this. I hand her a pouch with enough money in it to get her father raised and tell her what it is and what it is to be used for. This is part of why he went on this quest I tell her. For the love of his family. I hope he will return home to you soon. I know he faced great personal injury and danger to make sure that you were safe. She is crying openly now and says that she doesn’t know what to say. She tells me that she knew he had that in him even though no one else believed her. She says that she cannot thank me enough for bringing this great amount of money to her to help her get her father back. She says that he must have trusted me very much to have given it to me to get it here. She starts to praise me, saying that most people would have taken it for themselves rather than bringing it to her. That is more than I can take. I tell her to just think of it as something I had to do and tell her that I must leave. She rises as I do and follows me to the door still crying like a summer storm. I tell her I must go now and open the door. She bids me wait just a moment longer. “I don’t even know your name. At least tell me that before you go,” she begs. I tell her I am known as Jzashaedra. I turn and run to my horse and head him down the street for Geolain’s.      At Geolain’s they all wonder what took me so long and I tell them I ducked into an alley along the way after some of the looks I was getting riding down the street soot covered and bloody. Geolain offers to let us stay there to rest and begins to tell of some of the dangers of the coin. He says that there are rumors of a new woman of power to the north of Haanex and that just might be Daresh. He suggests we go back to see Veodon. The books again, Veodon again, did I mention someone following their own tracks before? That thought is interrupted by a pounding on Geolain’s door. I doubt this is the dwarves again. “We know they’re in there,” shouted from outside removes all doubt. Geolain tells us to take the back way out while he buys us some time. We move quickly despite our fatigue. Personal danger has a way of revitalizing you.     We head north. Sleep comes in the saddle. I no longer dream of a young girl waking up to her father’s bloody corpse. I dream of Risk and Watcher and their triple layered game of Go. They are speaking in the tongue of my previous dreams. I can understand more now but still not all of it. They are definitely saying my name and the word similar to it is the variation I told Gonnathan’s sister. Watcher has the head of a black dragon over his fist like I would wear a puppet. He moves its mouth in time to his and Risk’s words. “Now you have it right. Jzashaedra not Jzashedra. Angel Redeemed not Angel Forsaken. Only one letter difference but a very important difference, wouldn’t you say? Many of the old languages are like that,” he says.  He turns the head inside out like taking off a glove that is too tight. It becomes the coin of power. Risk takes it from Watcher’s upturned palm and places it into his wine goblet he uses for his go pieces. Funny. I just now realize that the go pieces are so similar to the coin as to be nearly impossible to tell them apart. It makes me wonder just how many coins there actually are. He shakes it and “rolls” it my way. I catch the coin easily. It says, “She was once ours, now she has been taken by greed,” on 1 side and “she must be stopped,” on the other. I awaken still in my saddle. Head still throbbing, still tired but not as bad, still on the road on the run, remembering when I could think of nothing more than being on the road to get  away and realizing now that one of the best parts of traveling is the trip back home and how different being on the road constantly running without some where to go back to is from that. But even with all of that, a smile spreads across my face: Angel Redeemed sounded so much better to me than Angel Forsaken…</blockquote>

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