El’s journal #002

I had the occasion if not the spirit to sit down for a celebratory draught at a local counter with some of the other competitors from yesterday, including two of the elemental creatues. The blue one, named Venture, makes me rethink the thoughts I had yesterday about their kind. He (or is it she? I am not entirely certain) was well-spoken and friendly, with a preternatural wiliness that is good to keep in mind. The other of his kind—but not of his kind exactly—is more of a mystery. Where Venture is cool and blue, the other is crimson and flammable. Where blue is friendly, red is silent. The fire-y one did not say anything at all, simply sat ensconced in heavy robes which must be hot as hell in this desert wasteland.

The name that one gave was Pele, and that did not assist me in determining gender.

The third of the party seems straightforward in comparison. He is a somewhat shifty human man called Dyson. He is a fighter of some sort, or at least he wears a sword that brags of some skill. I’m not certain, but believe perhaps his arrangements led us all to be approached by the representative from Mallard.

We had been at the bar a couple of hours, and a friendly card game had broken out. We’d been dealt hands and stories, though it was mostly the fighters who told tales of their recent battles, of their lives as tomb robbers. Tomb robbers must be the Mullhirandi term for paladir
(q.), halelya (s.), adventurers. It’s not a nice way of putting it.

And when the man showed up at our table, he seemed to bear us in commensurate respect. Though he was a servant, he spoke direct, and even disparaged one of our company. Though it was in jest, it bore an edge of revulsion. Mulhirand and home are, I suppose, not so much foreign to one another.

But regardless of the Mallard man’s feelings on our style of life, he still seemed ready to pay a nice price for our services. We agreed to meet with him early the next morning, and sent the young servant to return to his master and say that his offer to make an offer… was accepted. We played a few more rounds of cards, and I think nearly everyone wandered towards sleeping quarters in order to be fresh for the morning’s opportunity.

I don’t know about my newly-minted partners, but I could surely use the money. Tialas made certain I didn’t set out empty-handed, but it had been some time since I’d spent the last of the coins he’d given me. For some years, I kept the last copper, imagining the warmth of his hand was still contained in it, but one winter I had travelled too far into lands where Elves were not exactly… welcome… and had some trouble finding work. Struggling, unsure, I had spent everything I had, every last copper. As soon as it was spent, I found my way quickly to employment, out of the scarier of the lands, and soon was comfortable again. Too bad he didn’t just *tell* me it was enchanted; it would have saved me months of trouble.

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