"Oh thank god!" rumbled back from Dalmar as I tried to relax my death grip on Maria. My chin was sort of resting on her right shoulder I was holding on so tight, so I heard her snort of amusement at Dalmar's words before she said "The experience is nice and all that, but that was a bit of overkill don't you think? We would have gotten away soon enough"

"Hell no!" Dalmar said loudly, still bent forward, hands clutched tight to Vysta's mane "You need to be thanking Jake because I was damn close to throwing up all over your damn horse"

I could almost feel Maria roll her eyes as she replied "Oh come on, it wasn't that bad"

"Having a problem with the heights here" Dalmar growled back, and I realized he hadn't relaxed a bit, and actually had his eyes closed. Well shit, and I thought I was scared.

"Oh" Maria said in surprise, then half turned her head to give me a questioning look. I shrugged, not all that comfortable myself, but it was mostly the feeling of lifting away from Vysta's back as she dove and turned that had freaked me out. Though, the image of the ground coming at you at a hundred miles an hour was pretty stressful too. I forced myself to loosen my grip a little and lean back as I said "I guess we bring some of our phobias with us. Shadow, the rogue on that dungeon crawl I did for pay had a spider phobia, and she was pretty freaked out when we did that maze"

"No shit Sherlock" Dalmar said grumpily, the tone and words taking Maria and I by surprise "just let me know when we're on the ground"

Maria gave a disgruntled shrug, and I realized it was kind of mean to be taking our fear out on her and the horse, so I said "Well, I can't say I'd want to do it again, but you and Vysta got us through that, so thanks"

She turned to flash me a brilliant smile before turning back to say softly "You did baby. You were awesome"

We banked to the right a little, then leveled out again, causing me to clutch Maria a little harder. I decided it might be a good time to concentrate on other things, and looked at the level up message.

You have reached Level 14

You have one attribute point to distribute

You have gained one new spell

Telina's Minor Shield of Transmutation

Elemental Conversion:

Priest's aura blocks damaging elemental attacks and channels it into the priest's next weapon's strike

Spell Conversion:

Priest's aura blocks an enemy's non-elemental spell and channels it into restoring mana for any party members

*An enemy spell or elemental attack is completely blocked, but a maximum of 20 + 10 points/level of enemy spell mana or elemental energy is converted, after which the spell must be cast again.

180 Mana/use

(Cool down: 1 Hour)

Well now, this was an interesting one. My very first thought was to wonder if it would have blocked Zac's dragon fire, but on further reflection, decided that would be something I didn't want to put to the test. Regardless, this sounded a lot like Ariel's one shot spell blocker, except mine converted it to something useful. It would be great to be able to absorb some morons ice bolt and let Bruce return it with a little interest. It was a little ambiguous about if it only worked once, or if it lasted until you went beyond the maximum points. But on the plus side, it also grew as I leveled up, so it should stay relevant as time went on. Yeah, this was actually a pretty nice spell.

I pulled up my stats and considered my options for the attribute point. I really, really wanted to put it into my strength, since it would be nice to get some of those bonus damage points Dalmar talked about...but, the spells were getting up there in mana, and without my rings I couldn't afford some of them. Grimacing in aggravation, I went ahead and put the point into wisdom. Like it or not, my big stick here were my spells and they needed to have a big mana tank to support them. Being able to do a restore during a fight was a fairly rare thing and running out in battle was dangerous.

With that done, I tried relaxing a little and looked around to see where Maria was taking us. The canyon Lor Frell sat in seemed to have been deep in the mountains where the west/east chain intersected the north/south chain, and I could see mountains in every direction except the north-west. Lor Frell hadn't sat at the top, and in fact, I would guess it had only been at five or six thousand feet, with many of the mountains reaching two or three times that height. We were in clear skies, but a cloud layer covered much of the south-east, with snow capped peaks poking through here and there.

The morning sun was just clearing the mountains to our right, and it was bright enough to make you squint if you looked that way. We were winging our way along the west side of the north/south mountain chain, at what I guessed was eight to ten thousand feet, which gave me quite the view. The mountains towered above us, giving the impression of a barrier on our right, but the lands to the west and north were a patchwork of forests and plains as far as I could see. Smaller hills and a couple of larger rivers were visible, and in one of the larger plains areas, a herd of some kind of creatures were moving slowly, reminding me of old videos of American buffalo.

"Look over there" Maria said softly, raising her right arm to point to our right and slightly forward. Vysta's wings somewhat blocked my view, but I searched in the direction she was pointing and didn't see anything until a flicker of blue drew my eye to something moving a couple of miles away. A dragon was gliding slowly over one of the lower peaks, looking like a large bird of prey as it lazily floated on the air rising along the mountains. Like Zac, this one glimmered as if it was iridescent, but where Zac was a beautiful red/gold color, this one gleamed in a blue-white that reminded me of the milky blue of glacier runoff.

Maria and I kind of held our breathes for a moment when the dragon suddenly turned to face us, then stopped in place, flapping its huge wings slowly as it very obviously stared our way. We both let out sighs of relief when it must have decided we weren't worth the chase and pushed into a gliding turn and resumed its slow circles over its peak.

"I wonder if you can ride dragons?" Maria said wistfully, then added "No baby, I wouldn't give you up for anything" She turned her head slightly to grin at me and said "But I know a priest who would look cool on one"

"I don't know" I said, chuckling at the thought "you don't think it would make people think I was going through a mid-life crisis? You know, like those guys who buy a sports car when they're fifty?"

"Maybe" she said with a laugh "but who's going to say anything insulting to the guy on a dragon?"

Good point.

Vysta didn't come with a speedometer, so I couldn't really tell how fast we were flying, and she had some kind of magic that must have acted like a windshield, since there was only a gentle breeze blowing over our faces. The ground was passing pretty quickly, so I figured we were doing better than sixty miles an hour. I wasn't absolutely sure where we were, but on Dalmar's map the two mountain chains intersected about seven to ten days walk south of Maria's castle, which meant we were probably a few hours flight away.

Even with Dalmar so obviously freaked out, the next couple hours were still some of the most memorable of my life. There was a raw beauty to this world that reminded me of New Zealand or Alaska, and even though pretty much everything here wanted to eat us, the creatures themselves added to the affect. I had watched a dragon float majestically through the sky as I was sitting on the back of a Pegasus as it winged its way over vast forests. Only someone without a soul could experience this without coming away awed by it all, and Maria and I bonded a little over the shared experience as we pointed out interesting things to each other as we flew by.

Dalmar...barely twitched the whole time.

The mountains began to thin out some, getting lower and not as spread out as we went north, until the last one ended in the sheer cliff that held Maria's castle on the side of it. Vysta brought us in a few hundred feet above the castle, gliding in a right turn that ended up in a slow, descending spiral.

The top of the castle was flat, with a low, crenellated wall along the open sides. I had to grin when I realized Maria's people had turned the whole top of the castle into a kind of open air bar. There were tables and chairs scattered around, and I shit you not, lounge chairs that had a couple of women lying in them. They were wearing regular clothes, which was good since I would have doubted my sanity if they had been in bikinis.

"Got your own little resort going on" I said, getting a laugh from Maria as she raised a hand to wave at the five or six women getting to their feet and pointing up at us. I was hoping none of them had an itchy trigger finger, as it would be embarrassing to be shot down by our own people.

Vysta slowed, then spread her wings wide, blocking my view as she flared into a landing that had her trotting forward a few steps before coming to a complete stop.

"Oh thank god!" Dalmar mumbled as he reached down and snapped the ropes holding him on the horse. Vysta pulled her wings up and out of the way as Dalmar basically fell sideways off the horse to stagger a few feet away and crouch with his hands on his knees as he drew in deep breathes.

"Maria!" one of the women standing around us shouted, the surprise in her tone clear. Obviously Maria hadn't sent a note to let anyone know we were coming.

I did what Dalmar had, grabbing the rope in both hands and pulling it apart so I could slide off, with Maria only a second behind me. I went over to where Dalmar was slowly straightening out as Maria got mobbed by her people.

A lot of laughter and cooing came from the group as they hugged Maria or petted the horse, but I focused on Dalmar and asked "Doing ok?"

He nodded, taking another deep breath before relaxing a little and saying "That was bad. I was kind of hoping that wouldn't follow me into this world"

"Quick trip though" I said, looking around and deciding this roof top bar was kind of nice. They even had an actual bar, with a couple of ale kegs behind it. I patted Dalmar on the shoulder and nodded that way before walking over. They had mugs behind and under the bar, so I grabbed two, filled them from an ale tap, then handed one to Dalmar. He chuckled as I held mine out, then tapped his against mine before we both drained them.

Wow, that tasted good. I refilled them, but we just sipped on them as he looked around, then said "It is nice up here"

The top of the castle was basically a huge, open, flat, stone courtyard. Probably two hundred by two hundred feet, that had a doorway on the south end that went straight into the cliff. I hadn't seen a way up here before, so wasn't sure where the stairs down ended up. The tables, chairs, and bar were all grouped at the southeast corner by the doorway, leaving a lot of open room.

"You should put your forge up here" I said, glancing over when a burst of laughter came from the group by the Pegasus. Maria was gesturing animatedly as she told some story, which from the gestures, was probably about our first flight.

"Maybe" Dalmar grunted as he studied the area "depends on if they get attacked a lot. Be a bitch if a dragon came around" I had to nod agreement as he continued "but you're right, it would be pretty nice. The portals would make getting around pretty easy, so getting raw materials wouldn't be an issue"

"And you wouldn't have to worry about other eternals hassling you" I added.

Maria broke away from the group still clustered around Vysta and walked our way, a warrior and a mage following her. She gave Dalmar a questioning look that he answered with a shrug and muttered "Fine". The two other women's tags said "Alaina" and "Jessica", which had me considering if only the guys came up with weird names. Even Dalmar, since I doubted he was named Dalmar in real reality. Alaina, the warrior, pulled up three more mugs and began filling them, as Jessica, a mage with an intricately carved and bejeweled staff that just shouted strong magic, said "You two need to start an adventuring group. Every time you go somewhere you find good stuff"

"I'm just following these two" I said at the same time Dalmar said "Jake makes it work". The overlapping words got a laugh from the group as I shrugged and said "You load up on potions and you wouldn't really need me"

"It's not the same" Maria said, taking a mug from Alaina "It might be the goddess, or it might be that you're just lucky, but trips are better when you're along" she looked a little embarrassed as she added "and a lot more fun"

"Yeah" Dalmar rumbled, his eyes surveying the far corner of the roof, but obviously listening to us "Jake's a good teammate. You need people who have fun, but are serious when weapons come out"

The compliments were making me uncomfortable, and my expression got a grin from Maria, but she took pity on me and said "I know you'll be wanting to head home pretty quick, but I thought you could do the spawn point change for Jessica before you leave"

I nodded agreement to that a little before Alaina asked "What do you guys have planned next?"

A sort of group shrug ensued, with Dalmar, Maria, and me exchanging looks before Dalmar said "I'm going to focus on setting up a forge and ask around about Forgemaster Grevlor"

"Spend some time at home" I said, and after a moment of consideration, added "But after that, I might do a bit of a walkabout. See a different section of Tarinath"

"Supposed to be pretty wild once you reach the northern plains" Alaina said "a lot of people have been exploring, and from what I've heard, they've got the barbarian tribes thing going on up there"

"Empire and the elves have a half ass war going on" Maria said, grimacing in disgust "The empire says the elves are raiding the coast and attacking their ships. Some pretty big fights from what I hear"

"Speaking of which" Jessica said "there were a couple eternals that stopped in Mudtown asking about a priest. Samuel said they didn't cause any trouble, but he did say they came from the west coast" at my questioning look she shrugged and added "Didn't get any names or what they wanted. Fighter and a mage supposedly. But a lot of people are dropping their names in Riverbend and the capitol to get you to join their adventuring group, though no one else has made the connection to Mudtown as far as I've heard"

"Two of them wouldn't be a problem" I said, figuring Andulin would have killed them if they were looking for trouble.

The discussion didn't last much longer since Jessica wanted to do the spawn point spell before I left, and I wanted to head home. The stairs down turned out to be new, and part of the modifications Maria was doing to the building. Jessica's spawn point was in one of the lower level hallways and didn't take long to get done. I got a hug from Maria and Dalmar gave me my share of the gold we'd found, though I didn't bother to count it. I would be giving almost all of it to Andulin to spend on my town, and only needed a hundred or so gold pieces to travel for months. The four gems were the most useful things, since they were becoming my shock grenades. I could use regular rocks, but this just seemed cooler, and it wasn't like the gems were destroyed. I just had to remember to pick them up.

Mudtown didn't look like it had changed much when I stepped out of the portal at the edge of the square, and Seth just gave me a wave as if people walking out of a wall was normal. I grinned at the thought and headed to the Inn. My greeting there was as exuberant as one could hope, and it didn't take me long to relax back into the comfort of home.

The next week felt like a vacation as I added a couple of drawings to the Burning Mage's walls, then spent the evenings telling stories about what each one was. I lacked Bob's flair for tale telling, but it was fun to sit in a big group after dinner and have drinks and talk. The guy we rescued from the gnoll caverns, Tomas, had found a new wife and he would throw out a story or two. Seth even pulled a couple up, though they were more the "T'er I was, a horde of man eatin orcs a chargin me, and only me trusty axe betwixt me and death", but they were always entertaining.

A day after I returned I got a message from Bob.

Hey Jake. The Lich is toast, and we didn't lose anyone, though it was pretty close during the last fight. Got some great loot and found that stone. Maria sent a note about the northern tunnel, so we're going to head that way.

Short and to the point, just the way I liked them. For some reason I found the messaging thing to be irritating, as it reminded me too much of the other reality and getting emails. I sent him a quick "Thanks" to be polite. I was interested in knowing if he got a quest complete for it, but could wait until he came back to find out.

The Dishonored you ask? Well, they had been leaving messages with any of Maria's people they ran into, saying that they wanted to meet with me, and had been leaving them since two weeks after I cursed them. All three of them had hung around Riverbend until the governor kicked them out of the city for causing damage and disruption. It appeared that every time Jeff walked past a guard, he would trip and fall into them, or have someone bump him and cause him to collide with one. Poor Shadow dropped just about everything she picked up, which made her persona non grata at all the inns. Siril? He would hiccup at inopportune times, like in the middle of a spell. Supposedly it made for some interesting spell casting.

I laughed so hard I had to wipe tears away when Mia, one of Maria's rangers was telling me about it, and she was giggling just as madly.  Mia was a human, and for some reason she had trimmed her brown hair to her shoulders, which struck me as really odd when I first saw it. It's one of those things you just get used to seeing, long hair on everyone, even most of the male elves, so it really stood out when she walked into the inn. She seemed nice though, and had a happy sort of attitude that reminded me of Maria a little.

"Maria said you might want someone to go along when you visit those three?" Mia said, though it came out as a question, with the inference being that she would go with me if I wanted. I shrugged and grinned as I said "No, but thanks for the offer. Other than Shadow, the group was kind of pitiful before the curse, so I doubt they would be much of a risk now"

She nodded and gave a small shrug before saying "Yeah, what I figured. I haven't met them, but I've heard about your trip with them. Their warrior is a moron if he really did put everything into strength"

I couldn't disagree with that.

It took a half a day to track them down since they had moved out of the city, and I cast my new spell before I started, just in case they got rambunctious. I found Siril first, sitting outside a travelers inn a dozen miles north of Riverbend. He was slouched in a chair, feet up on the railing of the covered porch at the front of the inn, staff leaning against the wall behind him, and when I rode up, he just rolled his eyes and toasted me with a mug before saying "About damn time"

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

I swung down from the horse, then walked up the steps and dropped into a chair next to him. He seemed pretty calm about the whole thing, but Siril always had been pretty detached about all of this. I shook my head in a mix of humor and surprise when I saw his tag had "Siril Skywalker (Dishonored)" on it. Parentheses and all. looking around, I didn't see his friends, so asked "Your partners inside?"

He took a drink, then snorted a laugh before saying "Had to split up. We were getting ready to kill each other. Shadow might have killed Jeff by now, though he probably would have sent me a message if she did. Girl is pissed!" He laughed, obviously remembering something, then added "I think Jeff was hoping to wait this thing out, but that hasn't worked out, and he wouldn't give us that bracer we owe you. He's lucky we can't loot each other's corpse or Shadow would have killed him the first week"

That got a grin from me as I pictured Shadow taking out a huge guy like Jeff. He wouldn't have stood a chance.

"I'll send them a note if you're going to wait" Siril said, giving me a questioning look. I shrugged and said "Sure. Either here or the city"

He grimaced and shook his head in disgust as he said "Nah, can't go back to the city until we lose this curse. Jeff couldn't take a step there without knocking down a guard. They were getting pretty mad about the whole thing" he turned the disgusted look on me, but only added "wish now I'd taken your advice and went my own way"

Me too. Jeff would have probably just surrendered my stuff if his partners hadn't stood by him. Whatever, I could hang out here for a day.

The inn was smaller than the Burning Mage, but I was surprised to find three locals in warrior garb, and one was an orc. They were sitting at a round table, drinking and eating, but they paused when Siril and I walked in to give us a good look before turning back to their meal.

"Mercenary group, heard them tell the innkeeper they were heading north to hire out" Siril said, ignoring the three and taking a seat at a back table "something new I guess. Came in last night, but haven't been willing to talk"

Non-eternal mercenaries? That was new, and I could see where it might be something I needed to keep an eye on.

Jeff and Shadow obviously wanted the curse off, since both of them showed up before nightfall, with Shadow making a bit of an entrance when she arrived. I was standing on the porch, drinking an ale, when I felt something poke me in the back. You didn't have to be in this world long to know that something touching you in the back wasn't a good thing, so I reacted by diving over the rail and pulling Bruce up. It was habit now to have him in my left hand, and as I rolled to my feet I realized Sam hadn't made an appearance.

Shadow was standing on the porch, a knife held backwards in her hand, and based on the glare, wishing she had used the pointy end.

"You asshole" she growled as she made the knife disappear "You made your damn point, you couldn't show up a couple of weeks ago?"

I put Bruce away, then shrugged and said "I was busy, and blaming me for your own mistakes is stupid"

"God damn it!" she yelled, real anger showing "You back your friends. Jeff's a damn fool, but I would have sorted it out. Now..." she showed her teeth like she wanted take a bite out of me before saying "now were not. Yeah it's his fault, but...damn it, we were friends" the last part came out as a growl as she turned and went into the inn.

Ok, there was something wrong with me, because I was feeling guilty and I had nothing to feel guilty about.

When I walked into the inn, Siril nodded at an empty corner, meaning Shadow was probably doing the invisible thing Maria did now and then. I shrugged and took a seat by Siril, but kept my back to the wall. Just in case, you know.

Jeff stomped in about an hour later, sort of filling the room with his huge, angry presence. He looked around until he saw me, then stomped over, tossed a set of bracers on the table, threw a handful of coins at me, then stomped out without saying a single word. A glow surrounded him, then faded as he slammed the door behind him. Siril and Shadow had the same happen, with Shadow appearing as it did so.

"Ok then" I said with chuckle, pulling the bracers over. They were the kind that wrapped around your forearms, and were made out of intricately detailed leather. The tag said

Bracers of Diligent Defense

+8 Armor

+2 Dexterity

+4 Dodge

Usable by: All

Sam had kind of covered the leather bracer I previously had on my right arm, so I wasn't sure what would happen when I changed them out. I didn't have to worry though, because when I pulled the left one off, the right one fell off on its own. When I slid the new one on my right arm, Sam sort of slithered over it, making me the proud owner of a magic item that a goddess had cursed people over. I had actually been worried that Sam wouldn't allow me to wear them, and I was pretty sure Shadow would have killed me if that had happened.

Of course, now I knew Jeff was going to trade this bracer set and some coin for Sam, which took away any guilt I might have felt about the whole thing.

Siril stood up and stretched, then picked up his staff and headed across the room to the stairs, saying over his shoulder "It's been fun Shadow" then walked up without a backward glance.

Shadow sort of sighed and looked my way, the glare gone, replaced by a sort of sad smile. She shrugged at my questioning look and said "We all said things we can't take back"

It was early enough that I was going to head back to Riverbend to take the portal home, but stopped at the door and said to Shadow "I'm going to go exploring in a few weeks, and if you happened to be in Mudtown when I leave, I wouldn't mind if you went along"

"You hitting on me?" she asked in disbelief. I huffed a laugh and shook my head before saying "Nope, I have someone I love already. I'm just offering you the chance to make some new friends and I think you'd be a good addition to a group"

That set her back a moment, then she asked "Mudtown? What the hell is a Mudtown?"

"My home" I said, turning to head out the door, saying over my shoulder "think about it"

After I got back, Mary and I spent our time picnicking, shopping, snuggling, and generally enjoyed our time together. I had a couple of serious conversations about what she wanted in life, but all she would say was that she was happy where she was. The second time, she said "My lord, you seem to fear you are abusing my trust in you, when in fact it is I who am abusing you. You are a handsome but innocent man that I have seduced, and I am taking advantage of your simple nature to have my wicked way with you"

Well, consider me schooled...and very well taken advantage of.

I continued my daily routine of making two potions, and doing a shock grenade or retention rune depending on the day. My stock of magic gems was fairly full, so I decided the next couple of retention gems would go to Bob, since he could probably use the holy fire ones when he went undead hunting.

My two visitors showed back up two weeks later, while I was at the castle doing another spawn point change. Maria hadn't been able to locate the underroads entrance, so was just waiting for Bob's group to pop out of it. From a single message Maria had received from them, they were about half way back.

Andulin was waiting when I stepped out of the portal in Mudtown, and did that nod/bow thing before saying "The eternals have returned and are awaiting you at the Burning Mage. I have posted two guards to watch them, but they appear to offer no threat"

His armor had benefited from the flow of magic items, and he had a breastplate and a couple of rings that I remembered passing along. He was level eighteen now, but when I had asked him about leveling up, he had just said it was from training with his guards. Anyway, he looked pretty formidable, so I felt pretty confident his other guards had benefited as well.

The inn had the usual four or five locals drinking at the bar, two or three travelers eating, as well as two guards by the door, and a pair of eternals sitting at a table by the fireplace. It wasn't cold out, but there's something comforting about a fireplace, and it didn't seem to put off much heat unless the night cooled down. Both eternals looked up, then did the normal grin at my name, which was also followed by the usual sober expression at the dragonsbane part.

The two of them were kind of odd, or at least that was my first impression. A man and a woman, both human, but dressed a bit differently than most. The woman was a warrior type, with a leather jerkin over a puffy sleeved shirt. She also had a hat on. A hat with a feather stuck through a band on one side, with the other side curled upward, and overall strongly reminded me of the three musketeers. Like all eternals, she was beautiful, with dark, wavy red hair, bright green eyes, and tanned skin that somehow worked with the red hair.

Beside her, the guy was in mage's robes, but he had a belt on that made them seem less clunky than normal, and he was wearing a cowboy hat. A black, flat topped, cowboy hat. Somehow he made it work though, making me wonder where the two of them had bought the hats. I grinned at the thought of riding into a town wearing a top hat. The woman smiled back, though the guy just nodded as I walked over, the two of them probably used to people grinning at their outfits.

"Loser Dragonsbane, but you can call me Jake" I said, then nodded to the captain and said "This is Captain Andulin. Heard you wanted to talk to me?" Their tags said Skylark and Zane. The Zane seemed appropriate for a guy in a cowboy hat, and the Skylark seemed to fit the woman, though I couldn't have told you why I thought that.

The woman gave us both a nod and waved for us to take seats, studying Andulin as we did so. Her eyes came back to me after I had sat down, and Mary came by to give Andulin and I drinks, and me a quick kiss on the cheek. Skylark raised an eyebrow at the kiss, but ignored it to say "We've been trying to find a priest, and heard the Dragon's Fall story. Heard enough in the capital to head this way, and we've been waiting for you to show up"

She paused, so I nodded and said "I'm a priest of Telina"

The two of them seemed to relax, with Zane muttering "Finally!"

Skylark grinned at her companion, then turned the smile on me to say "Thank god. We were worried no one had chosen to be one. That dickhead that coordinated the initial transfer had the whole thing fucked up, but I didn't realize how bad until I got inside"

Um, what? My confusion must have shown, because she laughed and took a drink before saying "He's supposed to do a full brief and go through each of the classes' strengths and weaknesses. I knew I wanted to be a warrior, so didn't find out how they had rigged things until to late. This place is seriously screwed up, but there's nothing we can do now but deal with it" she pointed at me and said "You appear to be the only damn person who chose to be a priest, and priests are supposedly the only class that could change someone's spawn point"

Again, what? I shook my head to clear the confusion, then asked "Back up. What do you mean rigged? And how do you know about the spawn point thing?"

"I worked as an engineer for a company that made the hardware these places run on" Skylark replied "we had to sit through a bunch of seminars on how these places worked to get us all pumped up about how important our jobs were. Most of it was management stroking their own egos, but some of it turned out to be more relevant than I anticipated after I was arrested" she gave us a rueful shrug, but continued "Thing is, these prison worlds were designed to keep the inmates from running wild. All of them have some version of the human empire, and it's supposed to prevent us from preying on each other at the beginning. This place doesn't have that. The plan is for us eternals to learn our way around, then move out into the world and get a priest to move our spawn points. I think the whole idea was to get us to work together or some B.S., but hey, the empire doesn't care, and no priests"

Ok. I would have to think about all that, though off hand it seemed to align with everything I knew so far. I gave a sort of sideways nod to show I'd heard, then said "Alright. Can't say any of that surprises me, but like you said, all we can do is deal with it"

"Some better than others" Zane said, his eyes on me as if he was making a point. I shrugged and looked back at Skylark to find her studying me, her face thoughtful. "What? If you're making a point, I'm missing it"

"The point" Skylark said seriously "is that you might be the only priest in here. That means the only way for people to gain any freedom, is to buddy up to you"

I leaned back with a shrug, taking a drink before saying "Yeah, I knew that, though I don't think moving your spawn point will necessarily make you that much safer. The empress is moving to restore some order to things"

"Yeah, that's definitely taken some assholes by surprise" Zane said with a chuckle "and we ran into one of your goddess' paladins in the capital. Got a nice thing going there"

The innuendo was beginning to get irritating, which Skylark must have picked up, since she punched Zane in the shoulder and said "Lighten up. You said yourselves that there was no reason we couldn't have done the same thing. You're starting to sound like a whiny asshole"

"That's because I am a whiny asshole" he said with a laugh, returning the punch before saying to me "Sorry. I'm just jealous. Skylark wouldn't be trash talking me if I was a priest"

"Yeah I would" She said back "you're just that irritating. But I probably wouldn't have let that manticore eat you that one time"

"That shit hurt" Zane muttered, drawing a laugh from me, which drew their attention back my way.

Skylark waved a hand dismissively and said "Anyway, priest, spawn point. We would like to work something out"

"There are many thousands of eternals" Andulin said, getting blinks of surprise from Skylark and Zane "Lord Loser would be required to spend all of his time on this endeavor if he were to perform this service for all"

"Um, are you...I mean, aren't you a...local?" Zane asked, his confusion reflected on Skylark's face.

Andulin and I exchanged glances, and I told him "Eternals call everyone else locals. They're weird that way"

The explanation got a grave nod from Andulin, and he turned back to tell Zane "I am not an eternal, if that is what you are asking. While I will not be reborn as one of the eternals are, that does not make my question any less valid"

"Yeah...ok" Zane said slowly, then gave a dismissive shake and said "You're right, but that's not our problem"

"But it is mine" Andulin said "Loser has feared that eternals might one day find their way here, and that your presence would threaten our town. Should he agree to your request, others would soon follow"

Skylark and Zane exchanged confused looks, then Skylark said to me "Likely, but that's a good thing isn't it? I mean, you have a monopoly on this"

"You speak of holding power over other eternals" Andulin said, making me wonder when he had become my defender, though I wasn't complaining "but it is an illusion. It would take dozens of years to accomplish this task, and that only if Loser applied his full efforts to it. Eternals, for the most part, lack patience and appear to believe they should be first in all things. If bribery failed to make them first for Loser's skills, then violence would soon follow. Eternals know no other way"

No one said anything for a time, with both Zane and Skylark studying Andulin like he was some kind of alien creature. Skylark eventually started saying in a thoughtful tone "Well, you're not wrong. I'm sitting here thinking about how I would get Jake to help us, and bribing him with something is about the only way I can think of. We wouldn't resort to violence, since that would be sort of self-defeating, but I can see where others might try it"

"What are you thinking Captain?" I asked, wondering what had brought this on. I totally agreed with him, and dreaded the idea of everyone knowing I could move their spawn point.

"Let each, by their own efforts, learn that it is possible to move their point of rebirth" Andulin said "This would aid us in preventing a sudden rush of eternals to our city" I gave a humorless smile to the other two, and said "I doubt that our guests have shared their knowledge with other eternals"

"You don't think much of us do you?" Skylark asked, her tone interested rather than accusatory

"You live without honor" Andulin said "offering it only to those of the eternals you call friends. You are worthy of respect only if you are willing to show respect. Lord Loser has spoken of doing onto others as you would have them do onto you. These are words of wisdom for any who wonder why others think ill of them"

I could tell the other two were pretty overwhelmed by the surprise philosophical discussion, but again, I agreed with Andulin, though I was interested in how he would keep word from spreading. Before Skylark or Zane could get more side tracked, I asked Andulin "How do you think we could prevent people from spreading the word about this?"

"An oath to the goddess" he said, looking at me like it should have been obvious. Ok, yeah it should have, but hey, I have a simple nature according to what I've been told. 

---- Author Note----

Hey all,

I know, light on the action in this chapter, but Jake is prepping for another adventure and Sam and Bruce should get a good workout in the next one.

A lot of you are noting that I have inconsistencies in how and when my magic works, and you're right. Things have drifted a bit over the length of the story, but that's kind of inherent in the whole posting one chapter at a time. I really am making it up chapter by chapter, and I while I know where I am at the start of each, and where I want to be at the end, the middle kind of gets made up sentence by sentence. I will be almost as surprised as you to find out what kind of troubles Jake gets into when he reaches the west coast (not that I'm guaranteeing he will).

I would be interested in feedback on the characters though. Not so much what might be missing, but what your gut reaction to them is based on what I've written. Do you like one, hate one, want to see more of one, etc. But really important is why. I've been surprised at some of the responses I've gotten regarding a few characters, and would like to understand what evoked those responses.

Regardless of anything else, thanks to everyone who left a kind note or positive feedback. Those are the currency that authors on RRL get paid in.

S. Zaplosky