“What, pray tell, doth thee see?” Beldrak whispered.
Gary shook his head. “Nothing, for which I’m grateful.” He went on to briefly explain about the canopy lurker.
The paladin who looked vaguely like Darryl said the most un-Darryl-like thing Gary had ever heard. “Knowledge is a burden I envy not. Take faith that thine companions protect thee.”
When dawn came, Gary couldn’t recall falling asleep. He had taken comfort in Beldrak’s assurances. The spinning clockwork of his tuned-up brain had threatened to dredge up and analyze every threat within a dozen miles and cook up countermeasures for each. Reminding himself that this was still just an extended fantasy and that his friends had his back—even if they didn’t remember him from the real world—had reassured him.
With his newly buffed intellect, Gary took custody of the map from Braeleigh and plotted them a course back to Durrotek that avoided one planned encounter and the highest probability of random ones. Judging the differences between his graph-paper, scale-accurate map of the region against the shabby parchment sketch was the toughest part of the planning; conveying that route to Braeleigh with that cartoon rendition of the countryside as a point of reference came in a close second.
When Gary finished laying out their route, Zeeto just shook his head in bemusement. “What the hell kind of bard school teaches all that schlock but not music?”
“They taught music,” Gary snapped. There was an element of Marty that transcended the physical form. Whether six-foot-four and built like a water heater or three-foot-six with the chubby cheeks of a toddler, the guy knew how to get under Gary’s skin.
“Perchance thou couldst explain thy reason,” Beldrak said diplomatically, clearly unconvinced.
Gary sighed. “Animals need water. So do we, but we’ve got our own. Monsters all have their own needs. Valeskins lair in burrows under hills. Scipsies prefer to eat gold, but they live in tall grasses that they can subsist on between meals of the good stuff. Overwolves are nocturnal pack hunters, but their territory in the old growth forest here should be safe due to the full moon tonight.” Gary jabbed his finger at the point along their route that he expected to cross into overwolf territory.
“And in Palo Alto, thy school taught thee all this?” Beldrak asked.
“No. I invented overwolves while attending an athletic contest and jotted them into existence on a scrap of parchment,” Gary replied snidely.
d20: 4 + (Persuade +8) + (Technically, It was a Twitch Stream of League of Legends, but Who’s Counting +2) = 14
Beldrak furrowed his brow but said nothing further on the matter. Gary couldn’t tell if the paladin grudgingly believed him or just couldn’t bring himself to dig past the obvious lie to the deeper lie couched beneath it. Nuanced social deception wasn’t exactly a paladin’s steak and eggs.
Gary’s route took them two days to reach Durrotek at a leisurely pace when they’d made the trip out in just over one. The gamer in him wondered if some random encounter XP would make future battles easier, but the dungeon master in him knew better. A good game runner always kept the challenges proportional to the party. If he’d still been running things directly, any extra leveling done by the players would have resulted in behind-the-scenes tweaks to future monsters and villains.
But there was a simpler reason for Gary helping the party avoid monsters in the wilderness…
That shit was scary.
Adrenaline flooded his veins every time some fanged monster or lizard with a spear took a crack at ending his life. Even if he fully expected to wake up in a hospital bed or on the floor of his own kitchen, Gary couldn’t get over the horror of that state in between the Live-Action Role Play zone of Pellar and a return to the real world.
Death.
Wounds hurt in this world. Hangovers felt just like the real thing. There was every reason to think that, even if getting killed booted Gary back to the real world, it would be the worst thing that had ever happened to him.
Fortunately for Gary’s fear of death, the circuitous route back to town worked just as his freshly upgraded mind had predicted. The city hadn’t fallen to invaders or burned to the ground in their absence. The gate guards recognized them, and the five of them headed straight back to 14 Zephyr Street.
It was time for everyone to find out just who they had in their basement.
38
Five adventurers gathered around the kitchen table of 14 Zephyr Street, upon which the statue-like form of Miriasa Starlight rested. They looked to Gary like a bunch of new hires to the restaurant being hauled out back and told to prep dinner without any further instruction. Beldrak looked to Sira. Sira looked to Braeleigh. Zeeto looked into the pantry.
“How’s this work?” Braeleigh asked no one in particular, holding up the canteen of magic water. “Do we wash her with it, try to get her to drink it, or rub it in like moisturizer?”
“I’ll volunteer for the rubbing,” Zeeto replied over his shoulder as he searched for a snack.
“Well, she sure as sunrise isn’t drinking any,” Sira said. “We’d never get it past her lips.”
“I’ll volunteer for—”
“Can it,” Gary snapped, cutting off whatever rude suggestion the halfling was about to make. “Try sprinkling a few drops on her. Worst case, it won’t waste it all.”
“Hast thy legend no plainer guidance upon the use of this elixir?” Beldrak asked, wringing his hands.
Braeleigh pursed her lips and twisted them side to side in thought. Then, unstoppering the canteen, she dipped a finger inside like a quill. With that one wet digit, she traced a line down Miriasa’s forehead. Where the liquid touched stasis-bound flesh, there was a spreading glow.
“More,” Gary said quickly. “Use more.”
In a panic, Braeleigh doused the curse-bound elf. The amber glow spread like a flash flood across the lithe body, which writhed upon release from the Gem of Eternity’s grasp.
“She’s alive!” Zeeto shouted grandiosely, arms raised to the ceiling.
Braeleigh scooped Miriasa up and lifted her to a seated position as the freshly freed elf coughed and gagged. “Shh. It’s all right. You’re safe. We’re friends.”
Miriasa murmured something. Gary heard the words, but they were a pleasantly melodious gibberish, soft and nasal and flowing without clear separation between syllables. It reminded him of a bistro or sidewalk cafe.
“Sorry,” Braeleigh said. “They don’t speak elven. How’s your human?”
“Water,” Miriasa muttered.
“At once, my lady,” Beldrak said and offered up his canteen of day-old stream water.
After letting Braeleigh administer the drink, Miriasa collapsed back down onto the kitchen table. Only the rise and fall of her chest showed she was still alive, just fast asleep.
Zeeto inspected her critically. “I somehow expected more.”
“She couldn’t see,” Braeleigh explained. “She asked who you all were.”
“Hibernation sickness,” Gary said with a sagacious nod. “Understandable. She’s been mostly dead for eighty years.”
Sira shook her head. “Eighty years. Can you even imagine?”
“Uh, yeah,” Braeleigh said. “I’m a 106.”
“No,” Sira replied. “Not that. I mean waking up and eighty years have vanished in the blink of an eye. She probably remembers Durrotek as a thriving trade city between elven, dwarven, and humans lands.”
“More likely she remembers it from when this was all wilderness,” Gary said. “Keep in mind, Braeleigh’s barely old enough to live on her own. Miriasa was an elf of respect and esteem already before getting frozen. She’s probably more like six or seven hundred years old.”
Sira tilted her head to align with the sleeping elf’s. “I’d kill to still have skin like that when I’m thirty.”
Beldrak snorted. “Thy visage is comely and in no peril of fading. When the world doth etch its mark upon thy flesh, it does so with a master’s brush to tell thy life’s tale
.”
Zeeto cleared his throat. “Um. Anyone going to acknowledge the fact that we’ve got a six- to seven-hundred-year-old elf sleeping off an epic hangover on our dining table? Or the fact that we’ve only got five beds in this place?” The halfling already had a finger to the side of his nose.
The rest of the party caught on quickly enough. Fingers went to noses in the classic “not it” gesture.
Gary sighed, having deigned not to rush in his effort to avoid losing his bed.
That was when Zeeto narrowed his eyes. “Hey… wait a minute…”
Sira scowled. “Gary, you didn’t just—?”
Braeleigh’s eyes widened. “No. I don’t think he—”
“Guys,” Gary said, putting up his hands. “It’s fine. My room is closest anyway, and we should probably carry her as little as we need to. I’ll use my bedroll and sleep on the floor right outside in case she wakes up in the night.”
“On thy honor?” Beldrak asked.
Gary rolled his eyes. “On my honor. Geez. It’s not like we enchanted her to fall in love with the first one she sets her eyes on.”
“She really is pretty,” Sira stated, shifting from foot to foot.
Gary pinched the bridge of his nose. “Beldrak, would you like to swap with me? I’ll take your bed, and you can sleep here on the floor in case she needs tending.”
The frustration and anxiety showed, unbefitting a holy warrior. It was, however, entirely in keeping with Darryl’s hopelessness around attractive women. He’d gamed with Katie for a good six months before being able to strike up a conversation when they were the only two in the room together. “Thy breadth of knowledge might serve the lady better. Proximity ought be thy ally.”
“How about you?” Gary asked, staring down Sira from a pace away. “Sevius probably has divine mandates about tending to the sick.”
Sira glanced away. “She’s not ill or wounded, in my professional opinion. Like you said, it’s more of a hangover.”
Or you can’t trust yourself to keep your hands off her, Gary added silently. Gary hadn’t written of Miriasa’s appearance in fine detail, but the world had sprung into existence with the frozen elf as the pinnacle of elven beauty. Sira wasn’t made of stone.
“You don’t have to ask,” Braeleigh said, clapping a hand on Gary’s shoulder. “I’m not afraid of her. You can have my bed tonight.”
Gary shook his head. “It’s fine. Really. I just wanted to make it clear that I wasn’t trying to avoid being the one on hand in case Miriasa wakes up confused. She spoke human. I should be fine.”
“One word,” Zeeto pointed out.
Gary glared down. “You think a prominent elven wizard from this region knows exactly one word of human speech? Come on.”
“Water, food, ale, bed, latrine,” Zeeto said, ticking the words off on his fingers. “Basics you should know for any land you travel. Every idiot knows that.”
“Ears,” Miriasa murmured from the table. “Not decorative.”
Zeeto stiffened. “No offense, ma’am. Don’t toad me!”
“No one’s doing anything,” Braeleigh said, taking charge, “except getting this lady to a bed for some proper rest.”
Beldrak and Braeleigh carried her. She was so frail and thin-boned that Zeeto probably could have managed on his own. But the two bearing her limp form took the greatest of care in settling the elf woman into Gary’s bed.
Then, after making sure she was comfortable, everyone headed off to their own rooms to recover from the long journey back.
Except for Gary.
When the footsteps faded, he sat at the foot of the bed, past where the petite wizard’s feet reached. “Do you remember who you are?”
The slumbering chest rose and fell three times before she answered. “Miriasa Starlight of Evenhall, emissary to Gelzhearth. Not… in Gelzhearth, am I?”
“No. You’re not,” Gary said. “This is Durrotek. It’s the Year of the Gods 954.”
Despite not opening her eyes, Miriasa’s brow knit. “That can’t be right. That would mean…”
Gary waited, but the math wasn’t coming together for the elf’s foggy thoughts. “Eighty years. Yeah. Gem of Eternity robbed you of eighty years. Well, not robbed, I suppose. But it deferred them.”
“I can’t… no. I had… But we…”
Gary put a hand over Miriasa’s. “Rest. You’re safe here. There will be plenty of time to fill you in on what’s happened.”
As he rose, a feeble hand reached out for him. “Don’t leave me.”
“I’ll be just outside in the hall,” Gary promised her. “Sleeping on a bedroll.”
He spared a look back as he closed the door behind him.
She wasn’t even real, and his heart broke for her.
39
Sleeping on the floor wasn’t as bad as it sounded. The bedroll passed the hardness of the stone floor straight through to Gary’s back and neck, but that was the worst of it. The house at 14 Zephyr Street was warm, and there was little risk of monster attacks in the night. If Miriasa had awakened in the night, she hadn’t summoned Gary from the hall.
That reminded him.
Kicking the bedroll aside, Gary tugged the wrinkles from his clothes and opened the door. Miriasa stirred at the sound.
“It’s just me,” Gary said. “I’m about to make breakfast. Is there… anything I should know about your diet?”
Miriasa didn’t rise or even open her eyes. “Would wine be too much to ask for an invalid? I feel I’ve been chewed, swallowed, and disgorged. No hangover could compete.”
“You’re sounding better this morning,” Gary said, stepping into the room to check on her.
“By degree alone,” she replied without lifting her head from the pillow. “Much as a tumble down a flight of stairs feels better than being burned alive.”
“Well, maybe a full belly will help you gain back your strength.”
A dainty sniff preceded Miriasa’s reply. “A very human solution. Especially since, strictly speaking, you aren’t.”
Gary blinked. “What did you say?”
A shout from above forestalled any further discussion of the subject.
“Intruder alert!” Zeeto’s shrill voice shouted from the front of the house. “Intruder alert!”
Gary hesitated at the door, but at a shooing gesture from Miriasa, he dashed out and headed for the foyer.
This wasn’t written. He had no idea who or what might have come after them here in their little sanctum. 14 Zephyr Street was supposed to have been a place to rest between adventures, to take up crafting hobbies and store trophies. He’d expected it to eventually be decorated like a schizophrenic Caesar’s Palace of knickknacks and artwork from the tombs and towers they’d plunder.
It wasn’t supposed to be the sort of place that got intruders.
When Gary got to the top of the foyer, he skidded to a halt behind Beldrak, who barred the way with his sword drawn. The paladin was squared off against a familiar, sneering face.
Kurgath.
“What do you want here?” Gary demanded, leaning to be seen past the paladin’s bulk.
Kurgath stepped inside. His garments were no cleaner than on his last visit. If nothing else, they’d grown dustier and sootier. But the thief-hunter’s dishevelment failed to make him any less intimidating. For every step he took forward, Beldrak retreated in equal measure. Gary liked to think that the paladin was keeping the encounter distance a constant for some sort of sword-fighting disadvantage, but he feared that Darryl was shining through yet again.
“Ah, there you are,” Kurgath said, squinting into the shadows of the foyer, where even Gary hadn’t noticed Zeeto crouching, dagger drawn. “Little friend, you almost led me astray. The fine fellows of the Talis Guild denied until their dying breaths that they knew of Nethel. But at the last, one broke. That dying breath was enough. Lucky you.”
A faint creak of leather from Braeleigh’s glove made Gary glance over at her. The elven ranger stoo
d with the north door of the foyer as cover and an arrow nocked and trained on the interloper. “You just go away. We don’t want you here.”
Kurgath sniffed the air. “Interesting. I tell you what. I’m going to pass along the last known whereabouts of my thief, the vermin Nethel. You’re going to find him and bring him back.”
“Make up your mind,” Braeleigh said, the tip of her arrow not budging from its aim at Kurgath’s throat. “Are you so tough you’re not worried about all of us stomping the poop out of you right here and now, or are you too much of a punk to chase down this so-called thief yourself?”
Kurgath smiled. “I don’t fancy a trip to Sillimar this time of year. The weather disagrees with me.”
“Sillimar?” Beldrak echoed, sword tip lowering a handsbreadth. “Thy thief hast fled to mine homeland?”
“We’re part of the same kingdom, ya dummy,” Zeeto snapped. “Kovia doesn’t end at the Temblin.”
Kurgath swept a hand aside, and Beldrak stumbled out of the way. Gary didn’t have to be told, he practically dove headlong to clear a path. There was no Initiative roll. This wasn’t combat. Gods help them all if it turned into one.
“You can’t go down there!” Braeleigh shouted. When Kurgath didn’t stop, she loosed her arrow. At such close range, she couldn’t have missed.
Yet she did.
No… no… no…
d20: 20 + (DEX -1) = 19
Of all the times to waste a critical roll.
Gary felt the world release him like a hunting dog off its leash. He stepped in front of the stairwell, throwing his arms out to the side. “Don’t! He’ll kill us all!”
Beldrak tried to oust Gary from his spot. “Harry not mine path! The villain mustn’t be allowed below!”
Gary sensed the grapple and had to decide whether to dodge Beldrak’s grip or try to stand his ground. If the paladin got past him, there was no telling how quickly the blossom of this battle might fall.
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