Previously: The party arrives back in Bodra to find that Gillibrand has made a recovery but the fake body of Murth has disappeared. Tyruc has a strange encounter with a woman in the tavern.
“Stubborn fool,” Dallor grumbled as he entered the tavern. “Oh, Sir Tyruc, you’re in here.”
Tyruc shook himself from a reverie. He had been staring into a mug of water he did not recall pouring.
“Yessir. Is everything all right?”
Dallor grunted. “It’s been an eventful day between the business with Murth, your return to town, and just now having a run-in with Belfin.”
“An unpleasant exchange, I take it?” Tyruc asked, recalling the ugly scene in the tavern the previous day.
“Aye. The skunk is drunk as a lord and started up with me. I tried to talk to him but only managed to talk at him. He’s the most infuriating man I’ve ever met, I tell ya. I told him to go sleep it off, and he told me to… well, to do something else.
“But you don’t need to hear my bellyaching. I was supposed to tell you if I saw you that Sareit’ll meet you in the war room in a bit. Between tending to Oli and that oaf, I nearly forgot to mention it.”
“How is Miss Oliette?”
“I’ve never seen her in a state like this. Sareit gave me a rough idea of what happened out at Zifa’s, so any comfort Oli will feel hearing Murth’s okay won’t last long.” Dallor aggressively polished the counter in front of him, as though the rough strokes of the washrag could wipe away the stress he surely felt.
“Times are strange, Mister Tyruc. Danger has never visited Bodra like this. Having jackals running around is terrible enough, but a second and maybe even a third monster? Unheard of.” A look of sudden dawning came over him. “And yet, you’re here. You woke up, right in the nick of time.”
“Don’t say that too loud,” said Murth as he sauntered into the bar, toweling his damp hair. He was clothed in a white linen shirt, leather trousers, and tall boots. His rectangular holster hung from his left hip. “People might wonder if the coincidence is just a little strange.”
Dallor scoffed. “They’d be daft. Sir Tyruc’s a right hero.”
“No doubt,” Murth replied with an easy grin, but his eyes narrowed at Tyruc. He carefully extricated the towel from around his horn, folded it, and placed it on the bar. “All right, Wolf Rider. I think we finally have time to sit down for a talk.”
Inside the war room, Tyruc fidgeted under Murth’s stare, diverting his own eyes to the map on the back wall of the war room and pretending to study it. Dallor had promised to deliver them a hearty supper, and Tyruc was anxious for his return.
“‘Sir Tyruc,’ eh?” Murth finally spoke.
Tyruc nodded cautiously. “Just Tyruc. I don’t really know where this ‘Sir’ business came from.”
“You aren’t aware? Why, it was only two years ago, on the first anniversary of the Final Battle, that you were officially knighted by both Orynheim and Merros as the Knight of Jorza.”
Tyruc’s eyes bulged as he asked, “I’m a knight?!”
Murth let out a bursting, “Ha!” but was interrupted by Dallor’s entrance.
“Glad to see you two getting along.” Dallor either missed or ignored Tyruc’s expression as he placed bowls of stew and honeyed bread before them both. “I’ll leave the two of you to it, then, and go back to tending to the wife.” They both mumbled their thanks as he exited.
Murth took a chunk of bread and dipped it into his bowl. The rending bite he took granted him a look of bliss. “Fymtonstahd would empty its coffers for a baker of Dallor’s talents. Lucky for you, me, and Bodra, a good man cannot be bought with money or fame.”
Tyruc folded his arms across his chest, denying himself the pleasures of the food before him. There was a pointedness in the way Murth had said “a good man” that prickled at him, an itching jab meant to unsettle. He was uninterested in prolonging this game any further. “All right, out with it. How do you know me?”
Murth feigned shock. “You don’t recall? I’m hurt.” Prompted by Tyruc’s continued glare, he elaborated, “I met you. Once. We didn’t take the time to exchange pleasantries.” Murth took another mouthful and chewed it slowly, savoring the flavor and the tension.
“And?”
Murth finished his bite and wiped his mouth with a white handkerchief he produced from seemingly nowhere. “And it was not a flattering first impression.”
Tyruc struggled to keep his expression neutral while his heart sank into his stomach. “Oh? And how exactly did I strike you?”
“In a word, cowardly. In another word, sniveling.”
Is that really how I was? Tyruc wondered, unintentionally triggering input from Nirivilo.
Not a charitable way of putting it, but also not entirely inaccurate. I would have gone with “chronically self-involved.”
Gee, thanks.
You asked.
“I saved your life during the Final Battle,” Murth continued as he threw an arm over the back of his chair and tilted backwards, “and you returned the favor by running away, leaving me to deal with three jackals on my own.”
Memories surfaced of labyrinthine trenches, stalking creatures, and a stranger in the darkness who rescued him. With those memories came a bloom of shame, reddening Tyruc’s cheeks and drooping his chin several degrees. “I remember you. I’m so sorry.”
“I can’t say I hold it against you. I handled myself just fine, and as for you, there are worse things than a coward.”
Murth leveled an even gaze at Tyruc, no longer smirking nor furtive. “For example, a charlatan.”
“You think I’m a fraud?”
Murth tilted his head. “Let’s just say I question whether someone like you is deserving of the glowing reputation you have supposedly earned.”
The cold feeling in Tyruc’s stomach warmed, turning into a growing indignance. “I’m not the same person I used to be.”
“None of us is. But are you really the revered Wolf Rider, knight of the realm, slayer of monsters, and harbinger of peace? I have a hard time seeing it.”
“I have a hard time with it, too. I don’t claim any of those titles. I woke up less than a week ago from a three year nap with everyone clamoring over me and mythical beings talking in my head,” Tyruc rambled, a grit of frustration catching in his tone, lodging there, and growing until he was nearly shouting. “I’m trying to do the right thing, trying to help people, but I don’t actually know what I’m doing or even why I’m doing it. I understand less than half of what’s going on around me, I’m given no more direction than what I can see directly in front of my face, and while we’re at it, as confusing as it is to have this good reputation I don’t feel that I’ve earned, it’s downright infuriating to have a bad reputation hovering over my head that I can’t erase!”
Nirivilo hummed in his mind. You have been saving that up. Do you feel better now?
Tyruc closed his eyes to avoid rolling them. You’re not helping.
It is acceptable to feel frustration, Tyruc, but beware that it does not turn into self-pity.
A crisp, rippling sound startled Tyruc’s eyes open.
Murth stared at him, his expression unfazed, while ruffling through an ornately patterned deck of cards. He shuffled them deftly, cutting and flipping and bridging without a glance. He then slapped the deck onto the tabletop.
“You give an impassioned speech, but I am not one to be convinced by words.” He gestured at the cards. “Draw one.”
“What? Why?”
“Let’s keep it simple. High card wins.”
“Wins what?”
Murth tucked a lock of hair out of his face behind his horn. “Sareit asked me to cooperate with you. Lend you my expertise as a hunter. But it’s no fun to just give away my services, so we’ll play for it. If you win, then I am at your disposal. If I win…” Murth paused for effect, a smile spreading across his face, “... you leave Bodra. Immediately and permanently.”
An incredulous laugh burst from Tyruc’s lips. “That’s not how this works.”
“Oh, but it is. In case you are unaware, you have become a fixture in the Honeywillow household. I will not see those good people’s faith in you taken advantage of until you decide to run away again. If you enter into this game, you will abide by the terms. I’ll make sure of it.”
And if I don’t play his game, then I’m admitting to being the coward he thinks I am, right?
That does indeed seem to be his ploy. What will you do, Tyruc?
“Just how is a card game going to prove anything to you?”
“I believe anything can be settled with a friendly game of cards. Call it a quirk,” Murth said with a shrug. “Tick-tock, my friend.”
Tyruc slapped a hand on the deck and drew the top card toward himself facedown. It was surprisingly sturdy, not the papery substance he was accustomed to but instead a thin metal. He thumbed the edge, and though it was pliable, it was also sharp. The back of the card was embossed with six symbols in a circle and two more side-by-side in the center.
The Wheel, Nirivilo said. Fire at the top, then clockwise it moves through water, lightning, earth, wind, and ice. Dark and light balance each other in the center. A rather elegant diagram, is it not?
Murth slid the next top card to himself and asked, “Ready for the flip?”
He is testing you. Do you know what is wrong here?
Tyruc did. This style of deck and its many games were intensely familiar to him from his days playing in port alleys and on ship decks. It was an ingrained habit that went beyond mere memory into the realm of breathing and blinking.
“You haven’t set the hierarchy.”
Murth’s eyebrows perked. “My mistake. Let’s say light is low.”
How rude. A friendly dealer should never declare his opponent’s element as the low card.
This isn’t a friendly game. It’s a moot point, anyway. “You can’t set light low. Dark is always lower than light in High Card Draw, and they’re both above the Wheel. Perhaps you meant lightning?”
Murth passed a hand over his mouth and swung one leg over the other. “I just don’t know where my head is today. Yes, of course, lightning is low, water is high, and—”
“And the Throne is full.”
Ah, yes, the Throne. The highest card of each suit if the Throne is deemed ‘full.’ If the Throne is ‘empty,’ then they are the most worthless cards in the deck. This could go well for you, or very poorly.
“Full Throne it is,” Murth echoed, his hand still hovering over his mouth. “Flip on three?”
Tyruc nodded curtly. “One.”
“Two.”
“Three.”
Murth revealed his card in a twisting, dexterous flourish. The edges of the golden card held small crowns. The center depicted luminous stars. “That would be the Crown of Light.” He dropped his hand to reveal a smile of victory, but it faltered as he looked across the table at the card Tyruc had flipped over without ceremony.
“Full Throne of Graces,” Tyruc stated. The card shimmered in glossy silver hues, and the stylized Palms of Graces took up the entire face of the card. “I win.”
Murth stared for a long moment and then broke into another smile. “Then it seems you will be blessed by my wealth of knowledge after all. Unless you care for another round?”
A thump on the door to the tavern preceded Sareit’s entrance. She held a bundle of books under one arm and had another tome open and balanced in her palm. She stopped short in the doorway to look at the two men with narrowing eyes.
Tyruc stood and slipped the winning card back to Murth. “Perhaps another time.”
“A shame,” Murth lamented with a sardonic wobble of his head. “Sareit, my girl, you’re just in time. I was about to share with Tyruc my theories on what exactly we’re dealing with in our imposter hunt.”
Next Time: The trio discuss the nature of monsters and what exactly may be threatening Bodra.