The rest of the day passed quietly for the group. Tauster and Jyothki spent a lot of time talking to one another in elven. Blacky eventually came back without the escaped prisoner. The remaining prisoner were moved to Tauster's cellar for safekeeping for the time being.
Gala spent most of the day caring for the wounded. Echo and Jana returned from the other house with a large collection of things, including what they suspected to be Kaileer and Lasiar's equipment. Azrun came back after a while with a new quarterstaff. Lytern did not reappear from Tauster's study. Arachne spent several hours sitting in a corner staring off into space with occasional breaks to kneel over one of the wounded and concentrate for a few minutes, first using her efforts on Blacky, then Jana, and finally Aloysius.
When all of the things from the Zhents and the mercs had been gathered, Tauster left his conversation with Jyothki and quietly cast a spell. "This blade," he indicated the two-handed sword, "and the suit of split mail have a dweomer on them. The magic on the blade is slightly stronger than the magic on the armor." He also mentioned that a spear, a shield, and a locket among Kaileer and Lasiar's belongings were magical as well. He spent some time examining the potion vial and finally declared it to be an elixir that allowed the drinker to read someone's thoughts.
"Are you sure you don't want to wear the splint mail, Jana? It might save you some punishment, you can always pack that suit of chain away for your children someday if you're that attached to it." Blacky said with a smile.
"No," Jana said, shaking her head. "I'm fine with this armor. You wear it."
Blacky picked up the splint armor and tried to loosen it enough to fit his frame He also took what he deemed would be his split of the coins and the two-handed sword. "Maybe Jana would want this, if not I guess it's time I learned a warriors' weapon." Blacky said almost to himself. "If you want me to help with the prisoners, just let me know." Blacky said to Azrun and Aloysius.
Thurmaster-Early Morning, 18 Eleasias 1374 DR
Everyone retired early that evening, exhausted from the events of the morning. It proved fortunate that they did so, since the three unconscious men awoke before dawn and managed to wake everyone else. Tauster did not appear from his room, and Lytern had yet to make an appearance.
Gala woke when her patients did, she had bedded down near Kuiper, Johnt, and Aloysius and woke quickly despite her diurnal nature when they roused. "Quiet," she whispered. "Everything is, more or less, ok."
She quickly related what had happened, trying unsuccessfully to keep the others from being awakened.
Once she realized everyone was awake, she said, "It is almost time for me to make my reverence to Lathander and pray for the power to heal more. I think we should leave now before Lytern sees us all. Is there somewhere else we can go? We need to talk." With that she looked at Azrun especially closely.
Azrun stared back at Gala, "If we're going to talk, it shouldn't be within the walls of this village."
Jana walked over to Gala. "Excuse me, Gala? I, uhm, found a mace yesterday. If you'd rather, it's okay if you just keep mine, and I'll use the one off the bod--" Jana winced, then continued nervously, "Maybe you should use Laisar's shield, until we find him and Kaileer. Mine's just plain metal."
Gala handed Jana's mace and shield back to her. "I'll just go weaponless for a while." she smiled at Jana nervously. "I wouldn't feel right using someone else's possessions without asking. Hopefully, Parlfray will still have my own weapons, armor, and money--assuming he'll give them to me after what we did to his son." She sighed. "oh well."
Jana made no move to take her mace or shield. "Use mine, then. I offered them to you, remember?"
Gala backed up a step from Jana, looking even more nervous now. "I surely won't need them just yet. I don't mean to offend you, Jana."
"Offend?" Jana asked, clearly confused. "Look, I know you don't like me, but would you rather go around weaponless in a place like this, just so you won't have to be contaminated by something I touched?" Jana turned away, still without her mace and shield, but not in time to prevent Gala from seeing the hurt expression on her face. She walked over to her things and began to wordlessly pack them up, keeping her back to the others.
Gala just looked mildly frightened and confused.
Jana blinked sleepily. She looked like she felt better, but still not all that wonderful. "Uhm, is it really wise to leave Lytern? I mean, what happens the next time someone tries to kidnap him and no one's there to help him? Shouldn't we at least offer to take him back home?" Jana frowned. "Maybe not all of us. I mean, we haven't even really looked for Laisar and Kaileer, and we know something happened to them." She stared defiantly at the others. "I'm not going to abandon them." She got up and pulled on her somewhat-cleaned armor. "Or Lytern."
Gala closed her eyes for a moment and then re-opened them. "He thinks most of you are bloodthirsty butchers. It will cause him great pain to see most of you again. The woman..." Here she swallowed audibly and was trying not to cry. "The woman you killed was with child. That's why he was trying to protect her--to get her to surrender. Maybe I can take him back to his home or me and anyone not involved in that fight. But I don't know that he will go home now. He's all that's left to represent his people here, now that Marlen is dead."
"If she was with child, what was she doing involved in a raid on this building? We didn't provoke the attack, remember? I also seem to recall her stabbing Jana in the back when she entered the room as well. While I have sympathy for the unborn child, the fault in its death clearly lies with its mother." Blacky flatly stated.
"You're precious mommy-to-be stabbed me in the back," Jana replied to Gala, obviously trying hard to keep her voice calm. "If she were the kind of person who cared about her child, then she wouldn't have been kidnapping and killing people. None of us here hurt anyone who didn't try to kill us first." Jana shook her head. "But, what do I care. Last damned time I try to help anyone who hasn't paid me up freakin' front." She stood, her voice dangerously calm. "Rescue the little twit and he cries because we hurt the sons of bitches who kidnapped him. Barely get out of there with our gods-damned lives, and we're 'bloodthirsty.' I've had enough. Nothing I do is ever going to make you happy, Sunshine. I don't know what the hell I did to you to make you hate me. Well, you freakin' win. And you can take this damned mace," Jana added, pulling out the mace she'd liberated and setting it on the floor, "or fight off the next round of goblins or gnolls or men with your smile. And I'm taking my gods-damned shield and mace with me. You have no gods-damned freaking idea what it cost me to buy them." Jana furiously wiped away tears and grabbed her mace and shield and equipment, clearly heading for the door.
Gala's temper suddenly flared. "Dammit. I didn't say she was in the right. I'm just trying to explain why Lytern is upset. This isn't about right and wrong. It's about...oh, never mind. You only understand killing things. You don't understand people's feelings or that sometimes there isn't a right or a wrong. Who knows? Maybe it was that or sell herself on the streets. Who knows why anyone does anything? But all you can do is kill." Gala stopped unable to go on. "Fine then. Kill all you want. Leave me out of it. By the way, did you know your leader is a felon from Cormyr? Maybe you should talk to Azrun before Lytern takes him to jail. Or are you going to kill Lytern too?" Gala rose and walked out of the building.
Azrun looked as if he'd been run through by a sword. He collected himself before turning back to the group, "What of it? I'll openly admit it. I admit to one of the charges I'm convicted of and if I had a chance to do it again, I probably would. If you're going to judge me over a stupid wanted poster though, I'll leave." Azrun waited and watched for the others replies.
"I never killed anyone that didn't bring it upon themselves first. You can think what you want, but this world is filled with people who don't deserve your kindness or sympathy. Everyone chooses the path they walk and they must live with the consequenses. As for whether Azrun broke a law in Cormyr, I could care less. Most laws in my experience are just excuses for powerful men to do whatever they please, while the rest of us suffer under their rule." Blacky replied bitterly.
Even after all of the prayer and attention he had received, Aloysius still didn't look very good. His hat and robe were burned, and his robe and shirt were soaked with blood. He cradled his left arm delicately in front of him and made great efforts not to bump his shoulder on anything.
He listened attentively as Gala explained what had happened. He sat silently in a corner as the verbal "fireworks" began, but said nothing. It appeared that he lacked the energy to summon a response.
Under the discussion regarding proper behavior by pregnant women, Arachne took 20 of the gold coins and added them to her backpack. She perused the other remaining treasure and also added the ruby cloak-pin to her backpack. She examined the leather armor, but it was all quite large; she left it. When the conversation became furious, Arachne found a corner of the room to huddle in and wait out the storm.
"Wonderful," Echo muttered. "We all need to take a lesson or two in understanding each other, I think." She looked at whoever hadn't stormed out of the room. "I think we'd better continue this discussion elsewhere, sooner than later, before someone gets arrested. All this shouting is certain to have roused even sleeping beauty in there. No matter what else is true, if you're a wanted man," she glanced at Azrun, "the boy is going to be required to arrest you if he knows. Even at his age he'd know not to risk trouble with Cormyr over something like this." She quickly grabbed her belongings, making sure the spellbooks and the potion were not left behind. She looked at the others to see if they were preparing to leave. She continued to mutter to herself as she grabbed her things and pulled her cowl over her face. She stopped deadstill and turned toward Azrun. He was unable to see her face under her cowl, "What's the charge, anyway?"
Jyothki stared as the argument raged, she watched as people stormed around and generally made quite a commotion. When Gala left, she went over to Azrun. "Has she gone to look for Kaileer and the Silverstar?"
"Nay," interjected Aloysius, "she hath not, fair one. Galaret's departure hath been long in coming, I fear. Miss her terribly shall I, but understand her I do."
The purple-haired wizard rose again from his corner and began to gather his things. He rolled his hat up and placed it inside his pack. He also folded up his robe in a like manner and placed it in the pack as well. "Mage Tauster, our thanks for the use of thy abode. If thou hast a shirt that mayhap I could purchase from thee, I'd like to replace this one." His current shirt was heavily soaked with blood in the area of the left shoulder.
"I suspect that our captives in the cellar will know where we can find Kaileer and the Silverstar. That should be our primary focus for now."
After getting his pack together, he sat it pack down and went to the table where the treasure was. He picked up 5 gp and put them in his pouch. "This be all I wish of this booty," he announced. "Let us go and see what our captives have to say."
Azrun looked over at Echo, "Arson & kidnapping."
Azrun then turned and walked over to the treasure pile on the floor. He picked up a small handful of coins, two of the daggers, and then flipped through the pages of both of the spellbooks. He picked one of them up and stuffed it into his pack with the rest of his belongings.
Echo pushed back her cowl and looked at Azrun increduously as he nonchalantly began going through the spellbook as alarms went off. She took a sharp breath and pulled the cowl back on. With her belongings in hand, she walked out the door, muttering, "When the rest of you come, don't forget Lasiar and Kaileer's things."
Azrun looked up at Echo, "The way I see it you all have a few choices: You can go on hear say like our priestess did and judge me on that or you can actually wait and let me tell you what happened. The choice is yours. I really don't care anymore." Azrun waited for the others reply.
On her way outside, Echo replied, "I made my judgements about all of you already, and chose to travel with you either because of, or in spite of, what I judged you to be. This has nothing to do with that. My concern is this noise which has certainly woke the young lord, and your pressing arrest, which I just mentioned, he will be required to make. I don't want to be involved, so I'll wait outside."
Jyothki looked at Aloysious with an exasperated expression. "I definitely need to learn the human language," she muttered. She then turned to follow Echo. "Wait," she called. "May I walk with you?"
"The 'human' language......?" the mage began to reply. "But there be more than one......." he called, most likely unsuccessfully, after the elven woman.
Azrun looked at the others, "So what are we going to do with these guys? I talked to a man in town yesterday. There is no law now that the Lord's man is dead, but he figured they would send someone else within a day or so. Personally, I'd like to tie them to a post outside and hang a big sign on them telling what they did. Of course this might not go over well with the rest of you."
Aloysius stood by his pack, arms folded. It seemed that after getting chance to move his left arm around a little, it was doing better than he had thought earlier. "I care not what becomes of these men, so long as they reveal to us the whereabouts of Kaileer and Brightmantle."
"They might not _know_ the location," Arachne muttered. "And we _do_ have to care what becomes of them. That's the responsibility that goes with winning the fight and it's also our only justification for thinking ourselves better than them. That's Gala's point. We can't leave prisoners to starve or dehydrate. Maybe depositing them at that tavern instead of outside of town..."
Aloysius considered Arachne's questions for a moment. "Since Lytern is apparently 'the law" here now, perhaps we should leave the fates of the captives up to him. I'm sure his father has discovered his absence by now and will likely be sending men here to find him."
The mage started towards the cellar door. "Small one, perhaps thou shouldst go first since thou canst see? It should take not more than a moment to discern if these men know of Kaileer and Brightmantle's location and if they are going to divulge such information. let us go find out."
"Come on, Aloysius," Arachne said. She was evidently indifferent to the door alarm, as well as Gala's advice that it would be best to be gone when Lytern awoke. "Let's go talk to the subterranean men. I wonder --" she continued, walking over to the cellar door. "How did Lytern know that the woman was pregnant? Did she tell him? If so, why should we believe her? Mightn't she have known what would attract Lytern's sympathy? We know the potion they had. They could have had more and could have used that already to know how Lytern thought. I wonder how long ago Lytern's mother died..."
The mage then addressed Azrun. "Darkwalker, I knew not that thou hailed from Cormyr. I, too, come from there. We shall have to discuss that sometime."
