Early the next morning, Dalthan and Sylvia emerged from the Crystal Goblet. The angry red sun hung low in the eastern sky, leading Dal to pause for a moment to adjust the brim of his hat while the grumbling nymph complained about being dragged out of bed before lunch. He tried, unsuccessfully, to ignore her while he read the hastily scrawled sign that Sebastian had propped up next to the doors.

‘Private Party. No admittance.’

“Are you listening to me?” The [Druid] growled in a dangerous tone that warned him that there was only one correct answer to her question.

“Of course, I’m listening to you,” the thief lied as easily as he breathed. Dal tried not to flinch at the way Sylvia’s lips pursed into a thin, pale line. Afraid of digging himself into an even deeper hole, he made the only reasonable decision he could.

He ran away.

Unfortunately, his daring escape only managed to take him across the porch. There, reclining in the same rocker he’d been in yesterday, lay a certain demon with the worst fashion sense of any evildoer Dalthan had ever met. The black outfit with gold trim should have gotten him run out of town before his crimes of mind fuckery were taken into account.

“Hey Drowsy,” Dal said as he gave the rocking chair a little nudge with the toe of his boot. He didn’t kick the chair hard. It was more of a tap. A firm, insistent tap that nearly tipped the poorly dressed demon over backward. “That stupid-looking sign isn’t going to work, is it?”

The porch creaked in protest while the demon’s chair swayed wildly beneath him. To Dal’s disappointment, Drowsy seemed totally relaxed despite the sudden lurch of his seat. One of his dark eyes cracked open, offering the thief a longsuffering stare.

“It’s worked so far,” Drowsy mumbled with a voice laden with lethargy. Not wasting another breath, the evil bastard rolled over and nestled deeper into the chair.

Dal was drawing his foot back to judiciously apply another swift kick to the rocking chair when he felt Sylvia tug at his arm.

“Let’s just go,” the beautiful nymph murmured. She leaned close, pressing her chest firmly against his back while her lips hovered close enough to his ear that he could feel the warm splash of her breath while she spoke. “If we hurry, we may get back early enough to enjoy a nap of our own.”

“You’re such a fucking tease,” Dalthan grumbled, though he did lower his boot back to the porch. “The sooner we get this shopping done, the better. You got directions to the store from Melody, right?”

Though he couldn’t see it, Dalthan could hear the pout in her voice. “I’m not a tease. I just haven’t decided when we’re going to have sex.”

The thief immediately perked up and turned to face the gorgeous nymph. The [Druid] had chosen to leave her armor in the tavern, claiming that it was entirely too stuffy to wear on a shopping trip. In its place, she wore a pair of leather breeches slung low on her hips and a loose-fitting strappy top that fell well short of her navel. In light of her far more vulnerable attire, she’d opted to bring her intricately carved wooden staff with her. It was one of two failsafes they’d brought with them in case of an emergency.

“So it’s not a matter of if, but when?” Dalthan’s emerald eyes flashed with barely restrained eagerness. He might have taken her by the hand and tugged her right back into the tavern if their second failsafe hadn’t trundled through the saloon doors that swung open with a squeal of rusty hinges.

Shale carefully navigated its way out onto the porch. Weathered wood groaned in protest beneath the [Stone Golem]’s feet, the noise so loud that Drowsy opened an eye to warily watch the golem’s advance. Despite the flooring sounding as if it were a split second from snapping beneath Shale’s weight, the porch held together long enough for the golem to step down onto the dusty street.

“You know, there’s no need for all three of us to go shopping.” Dalthan offered in his most considerate tone. “Sylvia and I would probably just slow you down anyway. Maybe it would be best for you to go on without us.”

“I was sent here to teach Dalthan,” Sylvia added helpfully, leaning into the [Rogue]’s side. “I’ve given it some thought and I think I know the best lesson to start with.”

Dal bit back a sudden yelp when she discreetly slipped a hand behind him to sink her slender fingers into his ass for a greedy squeeze.

The playful nymph wasn’t discreet enough to fool the golem. It ponderously turned back to face its two team members. A long moment passed as it regarded them in complete silence.

Dalthan had weathered his share of judgmental looks, but the sensation of being stared down by a rock was both novel and unnerving.

Sylvia shattered the oppressive atmosphere with a light-hearted giggle that sounded like the musical babble of a shallow stream winding through the wilderness. “Sorry Shale,” she said, stepping away from Dalthan to hop down onto the sun-scorched street. “Dalthan just looks so desperate sometimes that I can’t help but pity him.”

“What are you talking about?” Dalthan stomped off after her, trying not to watch the way her hips swayed in those breeches. “I don’t need a pity fuck.”

“Of course, you don’t,” Sylvia said consolingly as she lightly patted his arm.

After it made sure the degenerate humans were properly moving, Shale began to lead the way down the vacant street.

It wasn’t just the street that was empty. The entire town of Sweet Water more closely resembled a cluster of abandoned buildings than a functional settlement. Doors were shut and windows were shuttered or, in some cases, outright boarded up. Each of the empty buildings bore signs of negligence and disrepair. Ranging from wind-scoured walls to collapsed roofs, the accumulated damage reminded Dal of Low Town after one of their milder hurricanes.

But when wind and rain had flattened homes in Low Town, there had always been people there to help rebuild what had been lost. Here, the streets and the houses were silent as tombs. No carpenters were repairing failing woodwork nor were there any stonemasons shoring up crumbling walls. The only sign that Sweet Water remained inhabited was the constant patrol of thri-kreen marching up and down the silent roads.

The oppressive atmosphere began to subside the further they moved from the Crystal Goblet. Or, perhaps, it had less to do with their proximity to the Goblet than their nearness to one of the towering hive structures that served as the thri-kreen’s home. As they grew closer to the massive stone monolith, thri-kreen activity increased noticeably. The bug-people’s heavier presence brought with it the first signs of human habitation.

Dalthan recognized the look on the faces of the folk scurrying through the streets like rats in a maze. He’d grown up in a place where desperation and hopelessness blended to form a heady concoction of nihilism. From the look on the haggard peoples’ faces, they’d all drunk deeply from that poisoned cup.

“As people fled to escape the fighting, the ones who chose to remain must have moved toward the hives for protection.” Sylvia’s voice was hesitant as if she were putting together a puzzle that she wasn’t entirely comfortable seeing in its completion. “I wonder why they remained behind.”

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“Why else?” Dalthan said bitterly, his green eyes flashing with the heat of old anger. “They don’t have the money to escape. It can’t be cheap to travel across the desert. You need food, guards, a guide…” The [Rogue] trailed off as he watched a painfully skinny walking briskly down the street with a toddler clutched in her arms.

“They got caught in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Dal murmured, continuing to watch the woman until she disappeared into a small house. When she stepped inside, the young boy in her arms looked back at the trio of evildoers. There was no interest in the child’s expression, nor any anticipation. The brief glimpse Dalthan stole of the kid’s face showed him the kind of tired resignation he’d seen on so many faces back when he’d fallen in with Two-Teeth’s gang.

When Dal wrenched his eyes away from the quiet house he noticed Shale looking back at him. Something about the golem’s attention made the thief flinch away.

Sylvia, feeling the shifting mood of the group, asked in a soft voice that was barely above a whisper. “Does any of this change your plan?”

Dal’s first instinct was to snarl a snarky reply but he forced himself to put a cork in his anger. Instead, he turned to the beautiful woman and asked, “Should it?”

The nymph’s slender shoulders lifted in a delicate shrug. “I’m not here to make decisions.”

Dalthan arched his brow skeptically. “Even when those decisions could get you killed?”

Her lips curled into a coy smile while she batted her exquisite amber eyes. “You’ll keep me safe, won’t you?”

The thief answered her with a wolfish smile. “Of course. But it’ll cost you.”

“Ahh…” The nymph gasped, making a show of covering her mouth with one delicate hand. “I don’t have any coins? How will I ever pay you?”

Eyes twinkling, Dal was preparing to tell her exactly how she’d compensate him for his trouble when he walked face-first into Shale’s back. He stumbled backward, his arms pinwheeling desperately to keep him from flopping gracelessly onto the dusty street. By the time he regained his balance, Sylvia was doubled over in a fit of laughter.

“What the fuck, Shale?” Dalthan groused, rubbing at the shoulder that’d slammed into the rock wall that was the golem’s back. “Did you wake up today and think to yourself, ‘Today is a great day to fuck with Dalthan.’ Because that’s what it feels like. It feels like you’re doing your best Zaplixel impression and that is not a fucking compliment.”

Like a boulder in a thunderstorm, Shale weathered the torrent of Dalthan’s irritation without moving an inch. When the golem did move, it was to point at a nearby building. The large stone structure looked to be among the biggest that they’d seen. It was even larger than the Shaded Palm tavern that Kleko and his crew were staying at.

Across the front of the building in large, blocky lettering, a sign proclaimed ‘Murray’s Magnificent Mercantile.’

“I think Shale is telling us that we need to focus on our job,” Sylvia stage whispered loud enough that Keysha probably heard her back at the Crystal Goblet.

“Don’t fucking encourage him,” Dalthan grumbled as he stomped toward the door. “I didn’t have to put up with this shit back in Wavecrest.”

“No,” Sylvia agreed, offering the angry thief a demure smile. “You just had to put up with being fucked to death.”

“That was an accident!” Dalthan hissed. “I’m ninety percent sure. Madame Leatherlace was looking a bit nervous that night, but it was because I’m a high-class client!”

“Of course you are,” Sylvia said breezily. The nymph tossed him a saucy wink as she stepped past him to enter the store.

Dalthan, silently fuming, moved to follow only to be brushed aside by Shale shouldering its way through the door.

“The first fucking thing I’m going to buy is a chisel,” the [Rogue] muttered darkly while he followed the [Stone Golem] into the general store.

The general store was not at all what Dalthan was expecting. The stores he was accustomed to were large, open rooms stacked with sacks of grain or rice and entire pallets of fruit. They had dried meat hanging from the walls and pickled vegetables on shelves scattered across the floor.

Murray’s Magnificent Mercantile had none of that. At least, not in the quantities Dal expected. What had looked like a large warehouse from the outside had been walled off to create a single room smaller than the Goblet’s common room. Narrow aisles separated rows of shelves that held small glass containers. Each jar held a different item, ranging from finely ground flour to what looked like tallow for candle making.

Dal was still trying to make sense of what he was looking at when he heard a raspy voice wheeze, “Drain my well and call me parched! That is a fine specimen you have there!”

Out of the corner of his eye, the thief caught Sylvia’s bemused expression a heartbeat before a wizened old man shuffled around the corner of a nearby shelf. Dressed in a pale blue robe, the old man had long, stringy white hair and a horrific scar on the left side of his face. Whatever discolored his skin had also taken his ear and left his eye a uniform shade of milk white.

The old man’s other eye was the same pale blue as the robe he wore. It remained sharp and focused, though it wasn’t Sylvia that’d drawn his attention.

It was Shale.

“This is a fantastic design.” The old man had hobbled close enough to Shale that the golem had taken a wary step back. “I haven’t seen a golem of this caliber since well before the fortress fell. Would you be interested in selling it?”

The golem seemed unconcerned by the old man reducing it to a mere commodity. Dalthan, on the other hand, reeled back as if he’d been struck. “No. We would not be interested in selling Shale,” the thief replied curtly.

For the first time, the old man turned away from the golem to direct a stern frown Dalthan’s way. “You must be the adventurers Kleko told me about. I’m surprised no one told you not to name your golems. That can lead to odd behavior. They are tools, young man. You wouldn’t name your shovel or your wagon. Whoever sold you this unit did you a grave disservice.”

“But horses have names,” Sylvia said, her amber eyes flickering between Dalthan and the old man.

“Of course,” the scarred figure said with a solemn nod. “Because they are alive. They are living, breathing creatures. More similar to pets than tools.”

Dal frowned, his fingers idly drifting toward the hilt of his dagger. “Shale isn’t a pet,” the thief said around a smile that was growing more strained by the second.

“Exactly,” the old man agreed, nodding furiously. Oblivious to the [Rogue]’s rising tension, and the [Druid]’s mounting concern, the old man barreled onward. “My name is Murray, just Murray. Like on the sign. I’m an alchemist and an enchanter by trade. You can find anything you might need for your journey here in the store. Feel free to peruse my wares though you’ll find only samples of my products in the storefront. The rest is locked away in the back room.”

The enchanter's voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. “It keeps the sticky-fingered riff raff from taking something that isn’t theirs. It isn’t my job to feed the refugees when they’ve got an entire desert to forage in. Besides, the population is so low now that hardly anyone starves anymore.”

Dalthan tried to get in a word edgewise, but before the thief could either speak, or plunge his dagger into the store owner’s cold heart, the old man clapped his hands.

“Customers,” Murray announced with a smile that never graced the ruined side of his face. “Let me introduce my assistant.”

A marble statue clumsily emerged from a nearby aisle. As it awkwardly shuffled closer, Dalthan began to note the similarities between it and Murray. They were of such similar height and build, but where one was horrifically scarred, the other had an unblemished face that’d been carved by an expert hand.

“Hello customers!” The golem’s voice was loud and cheerful, like the tone of an over-eager child. “How can I help you today?”

“It can talk?” Dalthan asked incredulously.

“Of course,” Murray beamed. “It is my crowning achievement.”

Dalthan blinked in shock. Not at the enchanter, or his golem, but at the message that sprang to life right before his eyes.

Quest

Make your way across the Quartz Valley to the Fortress of Scorched Stone. Once there, find a way to release Rimewyrd. You have fourteen days to accomplish this goal.

WARNING: The Fortress of Scorched Stone contains an interdiction field that prevents planar travel. Returning to the Hub will only be possible once you have escaped its boundary.

Time Remaining: 12:15:42:30

Bonus: Destroy Murray's golem and retrieve its Anima Stone. Use it to grant Shale the ability to speak. Reward: +2 Milestones