Ward Of The Realm (Part 147)
I gave him some coins, thrusting them into his dirty hands and walked away. The door was unlocked and he could find his own way back to whatever hole he wanted to crawl into. Some small fragment of me wished he would stay sober and make himself useful, but I knew it wouldn't happen. He'd been this way for so many years that any other life was too foreign a concept. Some people just didn't want help no matter how earnestly it was meant.
I didn't take the most direct route back to my room. I was sure I was being watched either by mundane surveillance or by more esoteric means. Besides, I needed to think and moving around helped me mull things over in my mind while my body was otherwise occupied.
A mage, or more than one perhaps, had searched me out and set me running back to the one place where I thought I might find help. But I'd done exactly what they wanted me to do so far. I'd come to Shada where they seemed to want me to be. Now the thing to do was find out why. It would help if they just told me what they wanted, but mages had never been too forthcoming in my experience. They loved their secrets.
It seemed to me that I had three options. One, I could do nothing. I could go about a life here, perhaps even taking up where I had left off years ago with the Temple of Salketh. Two, I could leave Shada and loose myself in the wide world again and hope that they lost interest in me eventually. But that would mean always looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life. The third option would be to take more direct action in Shada and find out for myself who was behind all of this and why. I just didn't know which path I would choose.
... TO BE CONTINUED
I didn't take the most direct route back to my room. I was sure I was being watched either by mundane surveillance or by more esoteric means. Besides, I needed to think and moving around helped me mull things over in my mind while my body was otherwise occupied.
A mage, or more than one perhaps, had searched me out and set me running back to the one place where I thought I might find help. But I'd done exactly what they wanted me to do so far. I'd come to Shada where they seemed to want me to be. Now the thing to do was find out why. It would help if they just told me what they wanted, but mages had never been too forthcoming in my experience. They loved their secrets.
It seemed to me that I had three options. One, I could do nothing. I could go about a life here, perhaps even taking up where I had left off years ago with the Temple of Salketh. Two, I could leave Shada and loose myself in the wide world again and hope that they lost interest in me eventually. But that would mean always looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life. The third option would be to take more direct action in Shada and find out for myself who was behind all of this and why. I just didn't know which path I would choose.
... TO BE CONTINUED