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Rush Of Blood To The Head, part 2.8.


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#1 Guest_Theodur_*

Posted 24 June 2003 - 04:31 PM

Rush Of Blood To The Head, part 2.8.

It’s a late afternoon in Trademeet and I sit at the table in the local tavern and slowly sip my Evermead, watching how the local bard is preparing for tonight’s performance. We have a couple of hours left, before heading to pick up Cernd and travelling to the Druid Grove. My companions have gone about their own businesses - Jaheira retreated upstairs to refresh her spells that were wasted on Aerie’s problems… Aerie herself probably is sulking in some dark corner. Jan and Yoshimo had disappeared right after the dinner, I don’t think that I really want to know what they are up to… but knowing those two, surely no good. I’m not sure where Nalia is, but probably upstairs studying her spell book.

I startle from a tap on my shoulder… “Mind if I join you?” I hear Nalia’s cheerful voice. So she’s not studying her spellbook…

“Sure, sit down, I’m starting to get bored here… Neither do I have to study a spellbook, pray to my deity to grant me power to fuel spells, sit in a corner and whine or hang around the city pickpocketing people. I’m the resident boring archer with a lot of free time on his hands…” I grin at her.

“Nope. I don’t think you’re boring at all. You couldn’t be even if you tried…” unlike Aerie who would have blushed red saying such words, Nalia remains composed, only her eyes glimmer merrily.

“Thanks,” I feel myself blushing just a little… “You seem to be in a good mood lately… I’ve been meaning to ask you how are you… coping with… you know what… ”

“I’m feeling fine. Sometimes… I even reprimand myself for feeling good, when I should be grieving, but… you all have been such a great help and I have begun to like the life of adventurer…”

“Forgive me if I have made some false conclusions, but…” I stammer a bit, “I have noticed that you have been spending a lot of time in Yoshimo’s company… you’re both getting along very well…”

“Yes, he has been very supportive… he has such nice way with words as well…” she is speaking very openly and without any hesitation, “but I can’t allow it to be more than that…” she sighs.

“Perhaps, time will change your perspective… especially that about class distinction,” I wink playfully.

“Perhaps…” she takes a sip from my mug without even asking…

“Enough sorrow for today,” she speaks and squeezes a somewhat artificial smile, “I’m so happy that tonight I won’t have to share the room with our blond wide-eyed doe… she really drove us nuts last night…” as we both laugh, I cannot hold myself from asking “Is there a chance that you may tell me what exactly she did?”

“Well, she’s got a huge crush on you, as I’m sure you’re aware…” she watches me giving her a confirming nod, “well, she yammered all evening about what she likes in you the most, your dark-brown eyes, cute little nose, silky black hair… and so on…” she laughs at my embarrassment, “for a moment there I thought Jaheira will strangle her, but somehow she managed to confine herself only to threats of causing grievous bodily harm,” Nalia chuckles quietly… did the air inside the tavern just got a little stuffier?

“I mean, Aerie is the only one that doesn’t know, right?” she smiles innocently…

I open my throat to speak, but no sounds come out as I keep opening and shutting my mouth like a fish ashore.

“Oh, come now, Theodur, you really don’t think you could keep that a secret? I mean… we, others, have ears… and the sounds that I’ve been hearing… unless Jaheira has been suffering from a very severe headache, can be explained only as… you know what I mean,” finally she is blushing…

“But… but… our rooms in Mithrest are not even adjacent…” I have to admit that it is a pretty embarrassing counterargument…

“Exactly my point,” she giggles, “but don’t worry… someday you will tell me more, but until then I won’t pester you with questions… I won’t chastise you for what you both feel, I have no right, neither do I want to do that…” she rises from the chair to leave, “it’s just that… you look so cute, when you are embarrassed…” she quickly bends down and kisses me on cheek and runs up the stairs, leaving me sitting in the chair, all confused…

 

Shortly after our arrival at the grove we make two important discoveries. First one is revealed by a non-hostile druid – it seems that the Grove is now being under control of the Shadow Druids, quite a determined sect of fanatical druids. I remember that I had some conflicts with them in the past and their way of fulfilling the questionable goal of “maintaining the balance” was to take as extreme measures as possible.

I have always frowned a bit on Jaheira’s ideas of “preserving the great balance”, though of course I never told her that. The idea in general was something that I could agree with, but the fact that a person such as herself – her inner world always in turmoil, unbalanced – would sincerely believe in it, seemed a bit peculiar to me… It seemed as if it was somehow forced upon her…

The second discovery was related to Cernd. He turned out to be no ordinary druid indeed, but a shape-shifter. Though, he should have told that to us earlier, I think while trying to convince Aerie to climb down from the tree… it takes a while to calm her down and after that has been done we can resume our walk through the grove. A pleasant trip it turns out to be, the sun is shining brightly upon us, and only growling of charging trolls interrupts the cheerful tweeting of birds… Indeed, the local faunae consist from overgrown spiders, various sorts of trolls, aggressive mushrooms and some fanatical shadow druids on top of that.

Well, all the “normal” animals are attacking Trademeet – it figures, I ponder. I was not quite sure how Jaheira would react to this bloodshed that these determined druids want to bring on themselves, but seeing her beheading another poor fanatic that is helplessly entangled in magical wines, without any great deal of compassion on her face, reassures me that everything is all right…

Cernd proved to be a formidable fighter in his werewolf form, but we had to ask him to shift back to his human form. Aerie got so nervous with the werewolf around that she could not concentrate on spell casting and when she did succeed in that, the spell was completely unsuitable for the occasion… That forced me to take up fighting in frontlines as Cernd retreated back to supporting spell casting and healing. Fighting shoulder to shoulder with Jaheira was something that I thoroughly enjoyed, all this time I had been forced to watch her graceful movements from a safe spot behind her back, meanwhile burying our enemies in a barrage of arrows… However, impaling the enemies with my Chaos sword was something that I started to enjoy, and was slowly becoming good at as well, even Jaheira admitted that, albeit somewhat reluctantly, and did not frown when I joined her in melee… The scent of sweat and blood that made me succumb to something like a bloodlust… I was not able to experience this before.

We take a little pause as I ask an old lady for directions; we seem to be unable to find our way to the place where the new leader of the grove resides. What a charming old lady, I think as I see Yoshimo returning from his scouting mission to a large tower beside the old grannies house. He is carrying a shiny blade with him.

“This one seems to be magically enchanted,” he ponders and hands it to Nalia, “try to identify it, may be useful.”

“Whoa! Clean it first, smart one!” Nalia exclaims, “I ain’t touching it with all this cow dung on it!”

“Ah, I forgot that you have that noble blood in your veins,” Yoshimo chuckles and wipes the blade clean with a tuft of grass, “is that better?” he asks.

It turns out to be a very powerful weapon indeed and Jaheira quickly claims it as hers and by her expression I can see that she is very pleased.

We press on through the grove encountering some small groups of shadow druids, but they do not present any significant challenge. The sun is setting and it’s getting darker and darker as we finally reach an entrance to a cave, it is likely that the Shadow Druid leader is residing inside. Sadly, at the entrance we are ambushed by a somewhat tougher group of druids.

The battle would have been easier, if not for one of the druids summoning an insect swarm upon us. Of course Aerie is too inexperienced to realise that she should cast a dispelling spell, thus Jaheira has to retreat from melee and waste precious time to free Aerie and Nalia from the plague of insects… after a little scuffle the druids lay dead, filled with my arrows and cut open by Jaheira’s and Yoshimo’s blades and Jan is looting their bodies, our both mages lie on the ground bleeding heavily.

“While you take care of them, Cernd and I will scout ahead,” I tell Jaheira and turn to Cernd, “come, let’s see what it’s all about,” and we enter the cave…




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