"I was born with the careful touch of the Western God." I always hated telling people about my blessing. They always saw me differently afterward. Like some tool they could use. But I knew I needed to tell them about it, if I wanted this to be all over.

"I apologize, but could you please go over your pantheon for me?" The gurgling voice marked that as a question from the merrow. She had brought out a bound tome while I wasn't looking and was focused more on it then me, which was a tad refreshing to see. I wasn't the one to answer her though.

"We have 3. The Northern God is one of blacksmiths, miners, and laborers. Supposedly protects them, and is the one who most commonly will bless new babies, gives them strength and fast reflexes, or a steady hand made to craft. The Eastern God is of commerce and traveling, and the one my family reveres. Helps guide travelers and merchants to their destination safely, and is the rarest to bless people. When someone is it's typically with a silver tongue or they always know which way is north. Not typically seen as very extraordinary compared to the Northern God." Q stopped there and looked towards me, to pick up where he left off.

"Leaving the last one, the Western One, presiding over nature and people themselves. They're the one you pray to if you want to recover from a sickness, or to have a good hunt. And their blessings typically reflect that, with control over plants and animals...or the ability to heal." I stopped there, mumbling out the last part. Hoping they didn't hear or would ignore it. Not connect the pieces.

"Ah, so that's your blessing is it? Odd, I didn't detect any Celestial magic in your potions when I was examining them."

"Well yeah, I try not to use it, especially when I make my potions."

"Is there a specific reason you hate your blessing that much? Did something happen?" I had been avoiding looking at Angie while I was talking about my blessing, worried I'd see the same change of expression that I saw so many times before. But looking at her, I saw nothing but pity. A sad look in her eyes, but I didn't know why.

"I hated having this ability to heal. To do so easily what my own parents had to work so hard to accomplish."

"Right, your parents were apothecaries. A job made pointless when someone can be healed with just a touch." The orc seemed to say that to catch the others up. "Did they shame you for it?"

"No, never.” Need to get him off this topic. “That isn't all either. After being born with this power, disciples of the Western God would occasionally find my family and try to take me away. They got more aggressive with it as I got older. They stopped a few years ago, but until then my family had to keep moving to stay ahead of them."

"I'm a bit surprised you managed to avoid capture for that long. They are notoriously difficult to shake off and tend to not stop for anything."

"Your family actually helped a lot. We were able to hitch rides with them and take the carriages to remote locations. All we needed to provide was quality potions for you guys to sell."

"That's where those extra potions came from? Every time I had to take stock of one of our arriving traders' carriages, they had way too many potions. I figured we shortchanged the suppliers and sent the extras back. Those greedy bastards must have been pocketing them." There was a look of frustration on his face. We had provided a lot of potions to the drivers over the years, and that must have caught up with him right at this moment.

"It's not all bad. They helped us when they didn't need to. They deserved some repayment for that at least."

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"I guess that's fair. I just hope that was the only thing they took." He still looked deep in thought, but managed to focus back on the conversation at hand.

"Why did they stop pursuing you?" The merrow was still writing away in her book, rarely ever glancing up, and never for more than a second. I was sure I hadn't said enough to even fill a page, but she occasionally turned over a new one and kept writing.

"I don't know. Honestly I wish I did so I could be sure they actually stopped. I'm still worried whenever my family stays in one place too long. Just got so used to running it's hard to be able to sit down. We had stayed at that town for the last few summers, longer than most places. I almost started calling it home." I took a few deep breaths. The pleasant memories from home felt good to think about, but in the end it didn't matter. Everything was gone. No place to go back to. Can never have those good memories again.

"Hey, it'll be alright. You're safe now." Angie approached me while I was thinking. She had her hands over mine again, and I welcomed the warmth it brought me. "What do you plan to do now?"

It was a question I hadn't actually considered. I had tried to leave, but I just wanted away from them at the time. I could tell now that they weren't with the church. The merrow had been too invested in what we had said, and would have been wasting too much paper. The orc looked at me much the same that Angie had, far more pity than I was used to from others. Maybe more so than even Angie now that I looked him over. Before he was always on guard, ready to pounce at any moment. It made sense being a diplomat's bodyguard and all. But now it's clear that was because of me, that he saw me as a possible threat to the others. That was gone now, replaced by a look of sadness. The Matrin had the oddest look about him, of deep understanding, or maybe kinship. Whoever these people were, they weren’t here to hurt me or force me to go worship some god I didn’t care about. But I also didn’t have anywhere to go. No goal in mind that was attainable, no place I want or need to go visit. I know I definitely don’t want to go back to the village, even if it would be right to bury the dead.

“Who’s the she you were mumbling about while asleep?” Angie snuck in close to whisper that to me. Why she didn’t want the others to hear was beyond me, but the question itself was what really caught my attention.

“My mother. I saw her get taken away that day. Carried off likely with the other village woman. I was only spared their fate because I was caught inside my burning home.”

She jumped up when I was done. “Then we need to rescue her! We can’t leave your mother to those ruffians. Along with all the other women they have captured.”

The Matrin was the one to try and dissuade her. “That probably won’t happen. They keep their kidnap victims deep in bandit territory, alongside people legally sold to them by their own families, so we have no way to know who’s there as a captive and whose their property.” The Matrin have no hand in the slave trade in Bogra, and he looked all too disgusted even mentioning it.

“It would likely be seen as a declaration of war on ‘good lawful citizens’ if some diplomats stormed the bandit dens and tried breaking all those people out.” The orc laid out his thoughts with the same look he was giving me, feeling the disappointment brought with them.

“And besides, they have a large group of trained fighters waiting just to prevent that sort of thing from happening. There’s no way it would ever happen, which is why I was resigned to just giving up. Letting all of them live on in memory seems better than dying trying to save them.”

“That’s where you’re wrong. We won’t be storming their base. Our only goal is to get those captives out, and avoid fighting as much as necessary. Why fight an entire militia of bandits when we can just go around them?”

“Well, I’m glad you all have your plans for the next month, but I’m going to try to find work around town. I’m sure this place could use a good apothecary.” As I got up to leave once again, this time to avoid the clear insanity about to transpire, I was stopped by a hand gripping my arm.

“Don’t you want to see your mother again Ginger?”

“Of course I do! But I would hold you all back from whatever crazy plan you have, so I’ll take no part in it!”

“What if you’re necessary for my plan?” The look in Angie’s eyes told me she was dead serious.