The Companions of Tartiël (18 page)

Kaiyr indicated the silk. “I am sorry, but I am in the middle of forging a connection between myself and the fibers contained in this silk. It is not a process which can be—”

“Stow it, Blademaster,” Astra growled, but there was no malice in her voice. “You can work on your dress later. Come to dinner.”

Kaiyr sputtered a protest as she grabbed him by the wrist and tugged him out of the room and through the massive airship’s many hallways. His mind cleared enough to find amusing the sight of a six-foot-tall elf being towed by a woman barely three-quarters his size.

Once in the dining hall and with food—excellent food—before him, Kaiyr realized just how hungry he really was. He settled in next to Astra, with Wild and Caineye opposite them at the table. All of them made idle chatter about their activities on board the airship—Wild kept his voice low, and only Caineye truly listened with interest as Kaiyr described his work.

When the tavern room finally stopped serving food, Astra got up and returned shortly with a pair of glasses of wine, setting one down in front of Kaiyr. “This one’s in celebration for getting rid of my Nemesis while I was gone,” Astra said, plopping down and carefully clinking her glass against Kaiyr’s. The blademaster frowned and looked at Astra, her face already tinged with red.

“You are inebriated,” he accused her lightly, trying to find some reason for her to suddenly breach the subject, which none of them had mentioned since the night Luna had flown away.

“Not yet. Just a little unbalanced, is all,” Astra protested. “But, it’s good that she’s away from me. I don’t know why, but I don’t feel safe when she’s around.”

“Maybe because she tried to kill you?” Wild piped up cheerfully and not so helpfully, drawing a look from Kaiyr.

“Maybe,” Astra agreed, tossing back the glass before setting it on the table.

“Why ask about this now, all of a sudden?” Caineye asked, setting his plate on the ground for Vinto.

She shrugged uncomfortably. “I feel like there’s a dagger pointed at my back, and it feels like it’s one of my own. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s following us. Or me, specifically.”

Kaiyr shook his head. “I do not know if you are right, Lady Astra. The Lady Luna is a troubled young woman, to be certain, but she is by no means violent. She never attacked you after falling into the spring at the temple of Alduros Hol; in fact, she could not even speak or walk.”

“Yet somehow, she seemed to be doing just fine with both those things after we rescued her from that mage,” Wild pointed out. “I don’t know, Master Kaiyr. Astra might have a reason to worry for her own safety. And aren’t you blademasters really anal about safety?”

The elf turned a momentary frown to the halfling but replied in even tones, “This is true. However, we have not seen her for almost two weeks. I wish to reserve judgment until we see her again and completely uncover her true motives.”

“Well,” Astra snorted, “don’t wait until she kills me to decide her motives are sufficiently ‘uncovered.’” She eyed the untouched glass of wine before the blademaster, then gave Caineye and Wild mischievous looks. “You’d better drink that, Blademaster. I mean, I went to all the trouble of bringing you another glass….”

Kaiyr shook his head. “Thank you, but no. I have had enough alcohol tonight.”

“You barely had one glass,” Caineye muttered under his breath, but nobody heard him over the bustle of the dining hall.

“Oh, really?” Astra looked at the elf with half-lidded eyes. “I don’t think you have, Kaiyr. Come, at least have this one glass of wine.” She scooted nearer to him and leaned against his arm. “For me? After all, you
do
owe me your life. You said so yourself. So, you have to do what I say,” she told him primly.

Kaiyr glanced at her out of the corner of his eye and saw her pretty pout, and he breathed a sigh. “Very well, Lady Astra.” He picked up the wine glass.

*

“This is ridiculous,” I grumbled.

Dingo shrugged, and when I looked at Matt and Xavier, I could see they found my predicament too amusing to offer help. “You swore your life to her. It’s your own grave.” He, too, was clearly amused at forcing the ever-stoic Kaiyr to avail himself of too much potent drink and knock him off his pedestal.

“This is
so
out of character,” I sighed, but I forged ahead, anyway.

*

Much later, Caineye grumbled as he led both Kaiyr and Astra to their beds. With one of them barely hanging on to each shoulder, his progress down the hall was slow, for he was not a strong man. It made him wonder why he had volunteered for this job.

“So I sez t’ th’ bartender,” Kaiyr slurred, looking in Astra’s general direction but his head bobbing with each of Caineye’s steps, “I sez t’im, ‘Ey! ‘At’s not my ‘orse!’”

Astra burst out laughing, and Caineye had to stop to hitch her up again before she fell. “You’ve had too much to drink, Mr. Elf,” she slurred back.

“I’m jus’ gettin’ started,” he protested. His stomach heaved, and he made sounds as though he were about to vomit.

“Hey!” Caineye barked, shaking the drunk elf. “
Not
on the new armor, hear? Not on the armor!” Kaiyr managed to keep it in, and the druid ignored the pair’s drunken conversation until he reached Astra’s room. “You know,” he thought to himself out loud, “I saw her putting those traps up. I think she can weather a night in Kaiyr’s room. I’ll just give Wild my extra bed.” Turning away, he opened the door to Kaiyr’s room, plodded in, and laid the now-snoring Astra down on one bed.

“All right,” he said to the elf, setting him down on his feet next to the opposite bed. “It’s bedtime for you.”

“Yup, sure is,” Kaiyr agreed, swaying and stepping toward the bed he was facing—the one on which Astra lay.

Caineye grabbed him by the shoulders. “No, no. Your bed is over here.” He steered the elf around to the other bed.

“Nuh-uh,” Kaiyr protested, “I distinkly recall it bein’ ov’r
here
. Ooh, pretty lady in my bed. Dj’ou bring ‘er here fer me?”

“No,” the druid said sternly, turning his companion one last time and giving him a good shove to topple him onto his own bed. “Good night, Kaiyr.”

“Yep, Imma go t’ sleep,” the elf agreed.

As Caineye turned to leave, he muttered, “What happened to ‘elves don’t sleep?’”

Kaiyr, apparently having heard him, giggled and replied drunkenly, “Hmmm, trade secret.”

He was snoring in moments.

Caineye breathed a sigh of relief and exited, closing the door before making his way to his own room, intent on getting some much-deserved rest.

*

As the hours passed and his body metabolized the alcohol he had imbibed, Kaiyr transitioned from his drunken slumber to meditation, slowly becoming aware of his surroundings even though he yet dreamed. He had little recollection of what had happened perhaps five hours previous, but somehow it had apparently culminated in Astra needing to sleep in his bed and he in Wild’s bed. The halfling was nowhere to be seen, so he supposed the short fellow must be in Caineye’s room.

It was his body’s and mind’s ability to switch from sleep to meditation that let him be alert to the sudden crash abovedeck and to the ensuing shouts that rang out in the very early morning. His eyes snapped open, and he jumped out of bed. He momentarily considered awakening Astra, but she turned over and let out a loud snore. Kaiyr wobbled momentarily before he adjusted to the fact that his balance had not yet returned in its entirety, and then he dashed out the door, up several flights of stairs, and onto the deck.

It was dark and raining, but the airship’s enormous balloon overhead kept the rain from dousing the torches carried by a ring of sailors who surrounded another, winged figure. As he came closer, Kaiyr recognized the creature.

“Lady Luna?” he asked quietly, but he was too quiet to be heard. One of the armed soldiers on board rushed over and put up a hand before the blademaster.

“Stand away, sir. This creature just crash-landed on deck. We don’t know how dangerous she might be,” warned the man, glancing over his shoulder at Luna, who was panting for breath on her hands and knees. In the torchlight, many wounds were visible on her skin: long, vicious scratches and bite marks, none of which could have been caused by anyone currently on deck.

Kaiyr shook his head. “I know this person, and she does not pose any danger to anyone on this ship. She is wounded. May I see to her?”

The soldier pursed his lips in thought. “You know her? Well, all right. I’ll tell the captain we don’t need to wake the rest of my men. What room are you taking her to?”

Kaiyr told the man, and the soldier hurried off. Before he could take a step toward Luna, Caineye and Wild joined him. “We heard some kind of crash,” the druid said. “What’s going on?”

“Whatever it is, it had better be good. I was having such a nice dream,” Wild muttered. Then he saw the woman. “Luna?” He looked up at the blademaster.

Kaiyr nodded. “Come. Caineye, might you be able to heal her? She is wounded.” He led the way to Luna’s shivering form. Rainwater dripped from her skin and turned her silvery hair nearly black, and her gray wings were frayed and missing feathers, either from battle or the storm or both—Kaiyr could not tell. Kneeling by her form, he put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Lady Luna.”

She turned her head weakly to look up at him, a relieved smile on her fair features. “Kaiyr,” she said and toppled onto her side, unconscious.

Kaiyr gently lifted Luna in his arms and looked to his companions. “Master Caineye, may we put her in your room? I believe it would be unwise to put Lady Luna and Lady Astra together.”

Caineye nodded, stifling a tired yawn from having been woken up in the middle of the night. “Sure.”

XIII.

“Damn it,” Xavier swore not so seriously, bouncing his
Player’s Handbook
and character sheet on his leg, “why does Jeff’s character get all the girls?”

His complaint was rather quiet, but we all heard it despite the heating system’s constant hissing and clanking noises that always permeated the air in our room. I grinned. “It must be my awesome Charisma score of ten,” I joked; a 10 in any score represents a completely average ability.

“Seriously,” he replied, “I mean, come on. Even
I
have a higher Charisma than that.”

Dingo raised an eyebrow, but I responded before he could. “I don’t think ‘getting the girls’ has anything to do with this, Xavier. She fainted, and I picked her up because I took the initiative to do so. Kaiyr isn’t ‘getting’ anything here, except maybe some more blood on his robes.” As an aside, I muttered, “At least they’re made of dark fabrics, so the stains shouldn’t show too much….”

“I don’t think Kaiyr’s getting much action from Astra, either,” Matt chimed in. “Rather, it’s more like he’s her bitch now.” He threw me a grin.

“Gee, thanks,” I replied. “So, about that D&D game we were playing.”

Xavier sighed. “Whatever. Yeah, about that D&D game….”

“Okay,” the DM said, leaning forward in his chair. “Luna seems to be sleeping now, and her wounds have pretty much healed over, leaving small patches of knitting skin. After a few hours, as the sun’s just coming up, there’s a knock at the door.”

Matt and Xavier were too slow, so I replied, “I get up and answer it.
Who goes there?
I ask.”

“
Room service
,” Dingo answered in a high-pitched voice.

Matt frowned and looked at me. “
We didn’t order room service
,” he said quietly.

I nodded and looked back at Dingo. “I keep the door closed and say,
I believe you have the wrong room, good sir. We ordered no room service.
”

“
It’s compliments of the captain and chef
, says the boy,
He sends his thanks for taking care of the business on deck earlier
.” Dingo waited for our response.

Shrugging, I looked to Matt and Xavier, who both nodded. “All right. I open the door and let him in. I’m… going to roll a Sense Motive check to see if anything’s fishy.” I rolled low and shook my head. “No beans.”

Dingo took his d20 and rolled several times. This alerted us to the fact that there likely was indeed something up. But the sign of a good gamer is the ability to avoid acting on metagame knowledge, so we just waited. We figured the kid was probably just stealing a few coins from us, anyway, so it really didn’t matter. “All right. Well, the kid leaves a cart covered in plates full of eggs, bacon, and bread, and cups of tea for all of you, including Luna.”

Matt smiled. “I’m diggin’ in, then.
Kaiyr, having some?
”

I nodded. “Yeah, I’ll eat, too, since it’d be a waste to let the food get cold while Luna sleeps. She’ll just have to have a cold breakfast, unless Caineye would be kind enough to reheat it with
produce flame
or something.” I winked at him. “You never know; it might just earn you her gratitude.”

Xavier snorted but didn’t reply audibly, so Dingo sighed and said, “I want all three of you to make Fortitude saves.”

“Aw, shit, it was poisoned?” all three of us exclaimed in some manner or another. Dingo just nodded and waited while we rolled.

“All right!” Matt said, making a gesture of victory. “My first natural twenty
^[25]
of the game!”

“I got a nineteen, after modifiers,” Xavier said.

“Jeff?” Dingo looked at me.

I glanced down at my transparent aqua d20, frowning at its betrayal. “Well, I rolled a five. So, plus four makes that a nine.”

“Ooh, not good. Luckily, it’s a rather weak poison. You’re just nauseated for the next…” He looked down at his wrist, though he didn’t wear a watch. “Minute, until you make the secondary save
^[26]
.”

I rolled again, getting an eleven. “Unless an eleven succeeds, I’m going to run to the rail and barf over the edge.” Dingo nodded at me meaningfully. “Well, I throw open the door, run to the nearest rail, and hurl over the ledge until I stop. Then I stagger back.”