“What?! You’d dare send me back to the guild with that harlot?!” Jason practically shrieked when he was informed about the decision. Paige was there too, and while she looked upset she was at least keeping quiet about it. Unlike a certain noble. “What are you going to do with a brainless girl and the knife eared dick anyway? Not like they helped tunnels, unlike me.”

  I raised an eyebrow while looking at where Zaion was sitting and mouthed ‘knife eared dick’ at him with a confused expression. Which caused the elven man to snort to try not to laugh.

  We were in one of the sitting rooms at the David mansion. Lord David was letting us stay the night out of hospitality, and we’d begun discussing the next leg of our journey when Jason was informed of his new job. He was not happy, to say the least.

  Elayne wasn’t in the room, having gone to collect a few supplies for the trip we were taking. Everyone else had found their own various seats on couches and chairs, with me being the weird person leaning against a table as I sipped at a tea Lord David had provided that was supposed to support a restful night’s sleep. Jason was pacing back and forth in front of me, glaring daggers at Deacon.

  Deacon, with the expression of someone dealing with a small child, responded, “Lady Danielle did her job, as did Zaion. We need someone to get the report to the guild, and you two are the best choice for that.”

  “Don’t act like you’re the leader just because Elayne isn’t here. All you did was whistle and act better than everyone. I could do that.” He said, sneering at the bard.

  “You’re an idiot.” I said into my tea.

  “What did you say?” He whirled on me, red faced. “Do you know whose house you stand in, bitch?”

  I caught Deacon wince out of the corner of my eye, but I was going to try and control my temper. “He’s a bard. How do you think he uses his magic?” I actually had no idea how Deacon’s spell casting worked, just that it did and well at that.

  “Oh, so he’s not even a real adventurer!” Jason said, turning back to face Deacon, “Your just a trumped up musician with a few tricks."

  Deacon rolled his eyes, “Whatever you think, the decision is final. Elayne already agreed to it. Complaining won’t change anyone’s mind.”

  “We’ll see about that.” He said, before turning and storming out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

  I sipped at my tea, watching him leave. When the door closed, I turned to look at Paige then Deacon, “So… we’re giving Paige the important documents, right? I get the impression they’d ‘disappear’ if he took them.”

  “They’ll both get a copy.” Deacon said, massaging the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger. “I can’t believe he’s related to Charles. How does someone get like that?”

  “Few people saying no and bad friends.” Zaion said, turning the page on a book he’d picked up waiting for Jason’s tirade to stop. “I would recommend having them leave at separate times as well.”

  “You think he’ll try something?” Paige asked, looking at Zaion, “I know he doesn’t like me, but… would he really risk angering the guild like… that…” She trailed off as she noticed everyone looking at her. Then she paused and thought about it. “...is it too late to leave tonight?”

  Deacon considered the question, “I don’t think that’s a good idea. I will talk with Lord David about lending you a strider. He can have one of Jason’s retainers retrieve it and you’ll get there ahead of him. If he doesn’t agree, you can wait in town until we get back if you’d feel more comfortable.”

  “Can I think about it?” Paige asked, shrinking in on herself a little. “Are you all sure I can’t come with you?”

  With a smile meant to calm, and a subtle use of his aura, Deacon directed his attention to Paige. “I’m sure you’d do well with us, but we really do need to send a report back. Did Elayne already tell you her recommendation?”

  She nodded, sullenly.

  “And I’m in agreement. It’s only your first attempt at moving up, and you’re still new to your class. Get some confidence and retake it, you’ll do fine.” His smile seemed to brighten the room, and I made sure my own aura protections were up. I didn’t know what he was doing, but I didn’t want to get caught in it.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  Paige relaxed and nodded slowly. “I… you’re right. I think.” She sighed, “I’m not sure I’m cut out for adventures outside of town, though.”

  “Even if you aren’t, I’m sure there’s a bunch of jobs in town you can do.” I said, setting my now empty tea cup on the table between everyone. “You just have to figure out what you’re good at.” Paige nodded, agreeing with me but didn’t say anything.

  “Besides, there are a few classes I’d recommend.” Deacon said, pulling out a folded up sheet of paper and tossing it in Paige’s direction. “I’ve given permission for them to put those on my account too. I was going to make the same offer to Jason but…”

  “He made an ass of himself?” I quipped.

  Everyone let out some form of a laugh and any remaining tension seemed to evaporate. I felt Deacon retract his aura from around Paige before he drained the rest of his own tea cup. “I think we should all start heading for our rooms. Dani, if you could stay back for a moment so we can talk?”

  I was starting to get drowsy but waited for everyone else to clear the room. He put up the sound barrier and stood to stretch his arms out. “Thanks for not hitting Jason.”

  Blinking in surprise, I looked from him to the door leaving the room, “Why would I hit him? He’s an ass, but he hasn’t really done anything to deserve it. Yet.”

  “Fair.” Deacon said and walked over putting a hand on my shoulder, “Are you going to be okay if we do this?”

  I batted his arm off my shoulder and sighed, “Yea, I’ll be fine. My feelings are… complicated on the matter, but he needs help. And while it probably doesn’t need to be resolved right away, he could be a big help.”

  “Convincing yourself that it’s for a good reason is the first step towards villainy.” Deacon said in a teasing tone.

  I rolled my eyes, “I’m being paid to do it, so don’t act like it’s purely for good intentions.”

  Deacon chuckled, and smiled at me. “Fair enough. Let’s get some sleep.”

  We left the room together and headed to our rooms.

  We all got ready to go early the next morning. Jason, being an apparently late sleeper, did not come to see us off, but we did manage to see Paige off on her own trip back to Cotton Rock. She was going to take a strider while Jason was taking a wagon with a small group that was heading to Cotton Rock to sell some goods.

  Our trip was going to take longer, though, since we weren’t taking the large birds with us this time. Our destination was well off the path and with sinkholes being a threat we didn’t want to risk one of them breaking their legs.

  So instead, my storage closet was loaded up with camping gear, enough supplies for a couple meals on the road, and several days worth of water. Most of this we had to buy at a store in the town, and I even picked up a book on common plants in the area on a whim. I copied it to my Personal Library immediately and put the physical one in my closet in case someone else needed it. It created a number of encyclopedia entries too, which I thought was neat.

  We left with little ceremony and walked for the rest of the day away, or exterior as I was learning the direction was called, and counter rotational, or the direction opposite how the sun sets.

  The entire walk, Deacon wasn’t doing the thing he’d done with his aura in the wagon or while we were riding to the quarry. I tried to keep an eye out, but I was under the impression that his perception was higher than mine, so I didn’t expect to find much.

  We had, one encounter late in the day. It was with a massive creature that had a lupine head with massive claws, but a body large enough to qualify as a small shed. I scanned it can came up with:

  Species: Howlbear

  Level: 51

  Elayne grabbed it’s attention when it attacked. She did this by grabbing the creature’s jaws in both hands, one for the top and one for the bottom. Deacon stopped it from using its claws to put her insides on the outside, but didn’t move to engage it. Instead, that was a job for me and Zaion.

  Zaion shot several bolts of water at it, but they didn’t seem to do much against it’s thick hide. Its head was moving around too much for him to get a clear shot there either. I didn’t know what the difference was between this and the bugs, but assumed it had something to do with levels and magic power.

  Between his barrages, I had started to attack it as well. I decided the tonfas were a bad match here, so was using my sword instead. I mostly performed thrusting attacks, aiming for it’s neck and trying not to catch one of its massive paws.

  It collapsed from the constant barrage after several minutes, and Elayne actually did the killing blows. As it had staggered from our assault, she’d taken out a smaller dagger and started tearing into it’s face from point blank range.

  After the exercise, we set up tents for the night, planning to skin and then eat the bear we’d been forced to fight. Well, Elayne was planning to skin it. I was just watching and taking notes.

  Zaion then joined her in preparing the meal while I set the tents up with only a minor amount of help from the one armed bard. The evening passed without incident, and we continued on the next morning bright and early.

  We had only been traveling a couple hours after that when Zaion stopped us from going forward. He pointed out a number of signs of disturbed dirt in the area, and a number of plants that were withered and dry. Apparently that, and the lack of any water underground in that area, was a good enough signifier of a sink hole to know we were in the right area.

  We continued with caution.