Yamara

I forced away the false emotion that had threatened to overwhelm me and nodded. Clearing my throat quickly, I added, "She snatched up his keys then and unlocked us before the other man could come into the room and discover what had happened. I stole the dead bandits sword and killed the other one, and now it rests on my hip. We grabbed up the other weapons then, and rushed out blindly into the storm, running without thought or direction until we found this place."

The barkeep leaned back then, one hand stroking his chin thoughtfully. "Well it's a good tale, you've earned a meal if naught else, though I've ne'er heard of Belleville and I served with the Royal Elendarian Pathfinders for 12 years along the southern reaches near The Great Forest."

"'Tis true, good sir," Brina said, coming forward quickly like a good little lost waif desperate for a handout. It was partially true, I figured, since she had left all of her gold in her wagon on Acathia.

"We can pay for a meal and a place to stay," I said, letting a little coldness slip into my manner to show I did not approve of charity. "We need to know where we are, are we in Elendar?" The last was an example of me grasping for straws, hoping that the veteran barkeep would not wish to leave the land he once defended.

"Aye, lass, that you are," He said, grinning. "Brought straight away to Standopolis, home of King Avercrombie.

"If you're just away from thieves, then how're ya goin to buy a meal?" He asked, thinking he was calling my bluff.

Sure I was a woman, but where I grew up, that meant I had to be an even better card player. I grabbed my pouch of coins and dug a few gold coins out of it and slapped them on the bar. He eyed them suspiciously and reached for them. Before his hand got there, I snatched them back in my own hand and glared at him.

"If ya don't let me see them then I don't know that they be real, girl," he said, his voice dropping to betray a touch of a growl. I was back in his territory now, and I had to relent.

He picked up a single coin from where I left the four on the bar and looked at it closely. Finally he bit into it, putting a dent in it that apparently satisfied him. He grunted and swept up the other coins in his meaty palm.

"I don't know where these be from, but gold is gold, I says. Have to charge ya more cuz these aren't Elendarian coins, but you've bought you and your sister a meal, drinks, and a room for the night."

I nodded, knowing that I had plenty more to spare and quite certain I could get more if I needed it. I led Brina to a nearby table halfway between the bar and the entrance. We sat and waited patiently while the barmaid, not much younger then Brina, brought us each a mug of ale and a bowl made of bread and filled with steaming stew. Neither of us wasted any time in digging into what was a feast to us.

It had been months since I had tasted such fare, and I am not ashamed to admit I probably made a bit of a spectacle. Any scene I could have caused was far outshone by Brina, however. Being raised on a parched world, food such as stew was an unthinkable waste of water. Seeing me tear a small piece of bread off the bowl and dip it into the beefy mix was all the encouragement she needed. With her first taste, she was hooked, stopping only to drink when the entire bread bowl had been consumed.

"What was that?" She asked me, speaking in a hushed voice to not betray her wonder to the people nearby.

"Bread bowl stew," I explained, trying to hide my amusement. "A cheap and simple meal, but filling."

Brina nodded, looking around the tavern's common room in wonder. For the first time she noticed the metal about the room. The hinges on the door, the bands around our wooden mugs, the well cared for horsemen's axe that hung over the fireplace, the metal sconces in the walls holding torches, and various other common items. "Is this your world?" She finally asked, her eyes filled with wonder.

I frowned and glanced around the room myself. "No, it's not," I confessed finally. "Similar though I think, if the weather is any indication."

By mentioning the weather I opened another floodgate for Brina. Her arms were already hugging her arms as we dried off. To me the tavern room was fairly warm and pleasant, allowing us to dry off nicely. I was a bit chilly from the drying water and how I'd begun to grow accustom to the harsh climate of Acathia. Brina, on the other hand, had spent all of her life on Acathia and the temperature where we now found ourselves was much cooler then she was used to.

"Does it get warmer during the day?" She asked first. I glanced at her and noticed that she had started shivering now that she was thinking about it. Not only that, but through the flimsy material her halter top was made of it looked as though her nipples could have cut glass.

"If it's similar to Halador, it will get warmer, but not as warm as Acathia," I responded. I was fairly certain of what would come next because she reached up and ran her hands through her hair and brought them away dripping water.

"Will there be this much water all the time?" She asked, her voice trailing off and proving my hunch right.

I could hold my smile back no longer. Chuckling softly I said, "I hope not, the world would be flooded with storms like this all the time. The barkeep spoke of The Great Forest to the south, so that means it is probably a temperate climate with frequent rainfall. Most of the buildings and our mugs are made of wood, more proof of enough water to support a thriving lumber business."

Brina fell silent, easily in awe as she tried to imagine what the world must be like. "I want to see it all," she finally said, her excitement overcoming her fear.

"You'll have to wait until tomorrow," I said, noticing a group of six people at one table playing dice wrapping things up and getting ready to leave. "It grows late here and we should get some sleep."

The serving girl returned then and gathered up our empty mugs. She asked us if we would like another, but I turned her down. "You look to be close to the same size as my sister and I, would you have any clothes that we might buy from you?"

The girl looked surprised at the request, but then glanced at us more carefully and saw how foolishly we were dressed. "I might have some things, you can come with me if you like."

The offer made, I stood up and motioned for Brina to do the same. We followed her back through a doorway next to the bar and down a short hallway beyond a stairway that led to a cellar. Opposing doorways at the end of the hall were open to show two bedrooms, and a third door at the end of the hall was closed. The waitress led us into the one on the left. It was of a modest size and was clearly her bedroom.

She opened up a chest filled with a few items of clothing and pulled them out and showed them to us. Unfortunately, all she had was dresses and robes, nothing that would allows Brina or I the freedom of movement we desired. I thanked her for the effort and paid her a silver for her troubles before returning to the common room to see about getting a key to our room from the owner.

The barkeep was busy talking to a man that I noticed had been sitting at a corner table talking to a few other men earlier. Now the other men were gone and only he remained. He had an average build, a few inches under six feet in height, and had a reddish brown hair that was stylishly cut at a modest length. He had a scar along his left jawbone, but it only strove to make him look more distinguished. I noticed the sword at his side and the dagger at his other hip next, and they looked to be of some value, but also quite practical. I judged the man shrewd, and wondered at what business he might have with the owner.

A few moments longer and the man turned and left the bar. He flashed both of us a smile as he passed and headed towards the exit. I judged the smile harmless enough, but there was something about the man that put me ill at ease. Brina had already blown him off and was waiting for me to do something.

"Our key?" I asked the bartender, stepping up to the barkeep. He put the mug he was cleaning with the same dirty rag down and reached beneath the bar. A moment later he laid the key to a room on the bar for us.

"Third door on the right up the stairs," he said motioning with his head towards the stairs.

"Who was that?" I said as the barkeep turned away. He turned back slowly and looked at me.

"An old friend from the Pathfinders, if it's any of your worries," He said, an edge to his voice that indicated he wanted no more discussion on it. I nodded and turned towards the stairs to our room. Brina hesitated a moment, then followed me.

Upstairs in our room Brina immediately when to the shuttered window and opened it up. Instantly the wind grabbed the shutters, pulling them from her hands. Rain swept into the room, but she reveled in it. She looked at me, a childish grin of pure joy on her face. I scowled as I saw the water gathering in a puddle already on the floor. Her grin disappeared and she reached out and wrestled the shutters away from the storms grip to close them again. Mostly dried from our earlier appearance, she was now drenched anew and shivering.

"What do we do now, Yamara?" She asked me, rubbing her hands up and down her arms in an attempt to hasten the drying and return of warmth.

"Take your clothes off," I said to her, concerned about the shock to her system of the drastic climate change. I was concerned about my own health as well, but I was at least accustomed to the weather far better then she.

Thinking I had something special in mind, she grinned again and momentarily forgot that she was shivering and her teeth were chattering. She stripped off her soaked cloak, loin cloth, and halter top after removing her weapons. All of that was done with a quickness that surprised me. As soon as she stood before me nude, goose bumps on her skin and nipples the size of small daggers, I took off my cloak and handed it to her. There was a hint of a smile on my face, of course. Whether it was from the joke at her expense or simply out of appreciation of her beautiful young body I was not sure. Accepting the cloak without comment, I could nevertheless see the disappointment in her eyes.

"I can think of a way to help me warm up much faster," Brina said, not giving up her hopes.

I shook my head with a grin and replied, "Not tonight, Brina. I don't like the looks of that man in the tavern from earlier. If he's a friend of the barkeep from his time in the Pathfinders, he must have been a babe at the time."

Her mind quickly slipping into the challenge of following mine, she all but forgot about her lust. "How do you know that? Maybe the owner just got out of the army a short time ago?"

I shook my head again. "The axe over the fireplace was surely his chosen weapon, it showed signs of wear and use, though still in good shape. More importantly, it hasn't been used in years. Besides, that barkeep had the look of a grizzled veteran, yes, but his body had gone to slack. He'd still be a tough opponent, but he showed signs of slowed reactions not enough work to keep him in shape."

Brina was silent for a moment, remembering our encounter in the common room. After a few moments she nodded and said, "What do you expect?"

"I have no idea, but I want to be ready for it. I'll take the first watch"

Brina nodded again, glancing at the spartan accommodations of the room. The single bed had room for two if the occupants did not mind a little intimacy, which we surely would not have under other circumstances, but was filled with straw. She slipped under the coarse canvas blanket, wrapped in my cloak, and lay there for a long time thinking. Sleep was slow in coming to her, but she was so caught up in her own thoughts that she never once spoke aloud. Finally she fell asleep, leaving her with only a few hours of sleep before I roused her to take my spot.

Unfortunately for both of us, we never got the chance to swap. An unnatural breeze slipped into the room and blew out the candle in our room, plunging it into darkness. I cursed myself, wishing I would have had the common sense to extinguish it hours earlier so that my eyes would be accustomed to the dark. Regardless, I quickly moved to my feet and had my sword in one hand and dagger in the other.

I backed up to where the wall was so that the window was on my left and directly across from me was the bed with Brina in it. In spite of the latch on it, the shutters suddenly opened from without, letting a bare amount of light in. My eyes adjust quickly normally, and the faint light only helped me. I hefted my dagger and prepared to use it. Whether a faint scraping noise alerted me, a hint of movement from the corner of my eye, or just a sixth sense, I turned and threw my dagger instead at the now open door of our room. It caught the man entering the room just above the elbow, luckily for him he had reacted on the same instinct I had or else the point of the dirk would have found his throat. He stumbled back out of the way but was replaced quickly by another two men entering.

I scrambled for another dagger and turned back as a man slipped in through the window in a graceful fall that took him out of my range before my swing could connect with him. He rolled and stood in the middle of the room, facing me and separating me from Brina. For her part, Brina had come awake at the first sign of a scuffle and was getting out of bed quickly, reaching for her weapons at the side of it. Before she could reach them one of the two men from the door had closed on her and held his sword at her throat.

"You can do this the easy or the hard way," The man facing me said, his voice youthful and full of himself.

"What do you want?" I spat out, ready to launch myself at him.

"I'd like to see more of you two naked," He said with a lecherous grin I could barely make out in the dim light. "But it's not my wants that count. The boss wants to talk to you, and where things go from there are up to you two."

"Who's the boss?" I asked, increasingly unhappy with the situation.

"I am," said the man I had hit with the dagger. He glared at me with undisguised animosity. "Put that away before I have to hurt you."

I bristled at his talk and decided that, given the opportunity, I would have to kill him. A moment to late, I heard the other man muttering something under his breath. I spat out a curse that never finished as his spell overtook me. My muscles tightened at first, forcing me into an unnatural posture of rigidity. I stood there frozen, mouth partially open and body balanced low and ready for a good fight.

The 'boss' walked up to me then, and I fought desperately for the strength to break free of the magical paralysis and strike at him with my sword. For naught. He stepped in front of me and smiled wickedly. I braced myself then, for he brought his fist back and drove it hard into my face, splitting my lip and jarring a few teeth loose. While I couldn't control my muscles, apparently he could because my jaw clamped shut, biting my tongue hard enough to make it bleed. That was a secondary concern to me though, for the force of the blow had knocked me off balance and sent me crashing to the floor face first.

"That's for the dagger," He said from behind me. I changed my vow then. Instead of just killing him, I planned on making him suffer first. Any further plotting was halted as the mage cast another spell on Brina and I, dropping both of us into the blackness of sleep.

Chapter 8

The younger man leaned against the wall waiting for his boss to close the door behind him. The boss did so and nodded to the guards waiting on either side of the door, who in turn locked the door securely behind him. He then turned and headed off down the hall with the younger man following him.

"What do you think, James?" The younger man queried.

"I'm not sure, Paul," he responded, genuinely uncertain. Via Paul, James had responded quickly to the message from his agent at the Grinning Dragon Inn. The two suspected spies he had watched carefully long enough to determine that they were truly an enigma to him. Enigma enough that he had decided to blow his cover and pull them in after he had spoken with Berk at the Grinning Dragon.

"If they're spies, they must be from the south by their tans. No Gneissian would be so dark," James said, thinking aloud. Paul nodded, following his train of thought.

"Did Dagrazt send them?" He said quietly, wondering it aloud.

"Shh!" James hissed, stopping and turning on him. "You know better then to say that name aloud, it draws his attention!"

Paul mumbled an apology and had the good grace to look humbled. James turned and continued walking, heading up some stairs and back into more populated areas of the palace. They fell into silence, each lost in their own thoughts, scarcely noticing the pages and servants that worked at the late hour. Finally they reached James' office and headed inside, shutting the door behind them. James spent a few moments going over his office, checking to make sure nothing had been disturbed, then sat down and relaxed as much as the opportunity could.

"Has anybody ever seen him?" Paul asked after he had fallen into a chair facing James' desk.

"Who?" James asked, his mind already assembling a list of possible answers to the question.

"The evil one," Paul said, knowing better then to utter the name again.

"I never have," James admitted. "Nor do I know anyone who has."

"Then how do we know he exists?" Paul said, leaning forward anxiously. The subject was something that had troubled him quite a bit, and finally he had a chance to express his thoughts.

No stranger to doubt himself, James grinned at his protégé's line of thought. "I've little use for Gods myself, and I've never seen one," he said. "Does that mean that perhaps the God Ban-Dayid does not exist?"

Paul cocked his head to the side for a moment thoughtfully at James' challenge of the existence of the God of Healing. Finally he cracked a smirk himself. "Point. I can only assume he must exist because his priests have used their powers granted by him to heal me and others I know in the past."

"So if Ban-Dayid exists because his priests have healed you, then perhaps the Dark One exists because his priests have tried to harm you?"

Paul shrugged. "Tried and failed, mostly. But I yield. He has a mighty nation and is served by armies of fey beings, as well as a gathering of worshippers that wield powers clearly granted of a divine origin."

"Not to mention he was said to be old before the great wars plunged the world into chaos," James added, gazing thoughtfully towards the ceiling.

"Bah, that's clearly a rumor," Paul said, sneering. "To think that the tales told of the mighty feats even men without magic could do have any truth to them is a fairy tale at best."

"It was over a thousand years ago, Paul," James said, snapping out of his reverie and returning his mind to the present. "There's no telling what could have happened. From what I've learned, many survivors of the Great Wars cast down their sciences, magic, and knowledge in light of the damage and destruction they had caused, choosing instead to live a simpler life. Thus was found the empire of Gneiss to the west.

"Only those that clung to the destructive knowledge flocked to the Dark Ones banner many leagues to the south and west, carving out their fell kingdom there.

"Others sought a balance between the old and the new ways. Science and technology were cast aside, and our forefathers in Elendar turned to the Gods and the powers of magic to make their way in life."

Paul chuckled, "Spoken as well as any tutor to a bored child. But do you believe it? That the world was once filled with machines that served mankind and allowed him to cheat the very laws of nature that we live by?"