There were some cupboards with more candles in them, Edwyrd supposed he should light some, but he wasn’t sure how. He didn’t have a lighter or any matches, and didn’t know how to use flint and steel even if he found them. He knew from experience that Tom could probably light them by force of will alone. He was afraid, though, that in his current form, if he concentrated hard enough on creating fire, he’d lose control over his body. That was his real problem. No matter what he did he felt like he had to hold part of himself back to maintain control.
Idly he looked through some drawers, hoping to find some way to light the candles. The priest went “Mmmmphh, mmmmmph.” Tom looked over to the priest. The priest was wiggling trying to attract his attention. Actually, Tom thought, here was a chance to maybe get some nonbiased information about Astlan. Of course the guy only wanted to escape, but maybe he’d talk, thinking that by talking he could get free sooner.
Tom walked over to the priest and sat down rather stiffly on the floor. It felt really weird to sit down like that. He hadn’t done it in so long. He kept expecting to bend his tail painfully at any moment. He pulled the gag away from the priest’s mouth.
“Son, son, you’ve made a terrible mistake, you’ve been fooled by a group of evildoers.” The priest quickly tried to warn Tom. “You’ve got to help me get free. There is great danger to the entire city. Nay to the entire world!”
Tom would have to try to turn the guy’s attention for a bit if he was going to get any information. “Why should I believe you? After all, didn’t you summon a demon to attack my cousin and his friends?” Actually Tom was pretty amazed at how easily lying came to him. He supposed that being a demon made him a natural.
“NO! Not at all. All to the contrary. They are demonic cohorts. At first I’d thought they were slaves of a Greater Demon, but now I see that they’re actually wizards! Wizards of such vast power as to be able to command the very lords of the Abyss. They came and brought with them two demons of horrific might.”
“I don’t see any demons around here now.” Edwyrd commented, looking around as if for demons.
“I know, I know, I don’t know where the foul beings went. I don’t know why I am still alive! I suspect that it is so they can sacrifice me later! You must beware lest they sacrifice you to.”
Egads, this guy had some imagination. It was no wonder he fainted. Tom also had to admit, that if he really were Edwyrd, and had just walked into as strange a situation as had existed this morning, he’d be half tempted to believe the priest. He looked up at where the braziers were. “Then do you deny summoning a demon?”
Verigas followed Edwyrd’s eyes to the braziers. His eyes began to fill with tears. “No, no, I admit to a small Conjury. I was just trying to summon a first order demon that occasionally runs some small errands for me. Unfortunately, it all went wrong this time. I don’t know how or why but my spell was usurped by a greater demon for its evil machinations.”
“Hmmm, well it seems to me that if you’re going to go around conjuring demons, you get what you deserve.” Edwyrd stated looking the priest in the eyes. After all, he did admit to being a slave owner.
The priest sniffed sadly, “I know, I know, Tiernon has shown me the errors of my ways. If I get out of this alive, I’ll never summon another demon again.”
“Well, that seems pretty reasonable.” At least some of the crazies could be scared into good behavior, thought Edwyrd. “I know if I’d been through a similar experience I wouldn’t want to.
“So what do you do in this city anyway? When you’re not conjuring demons.”
The priest did a slight double take at the change of topic. “Uhhm, I’m the head priest of the God Tiernon here in Gizzor Del. I know the Duke. I can assure you, that if you free me, I’ll be able to provide you with the full protection of the church and the Duke’s men. Your cousin’s friends won’t be able to retaliate.”
“Hmm, but you said,” Edwyrd paused for dramatic effect, “that they had a greater demon. If that’s true, what sort of protection are the church and the Duke’s soldiers? After all, you are the high priest and they captured you.”
The priest started getting teary eyed again. “I know, I know, but we must try, we can’t all be vanquished by the evil machinations of wizards and their demons. We must try and fight for our lives and our city.”
The guy, Edwyrd thought, was at least not the total coward he’d seemed earlier. He at least seemed sincere in trying to stand up against what he perceived as a threat. He’d been cowering earlier, but given the circumstances, that could probably be understood. It was sad, of course, that he had to be scared into believing all this. Edwyrd felt rather depressed that he had to scare the guy so bad, but he didn’t know what he could have done differently.
Knock, knock...knock...knock, knock. Came the prearranged signal at the door that the others were back. Edwyrd quickly replaced the gag on the cleric. He gave the man a slightly apologetic smile as he did so. He then stood up and walked carefully over to the door to unbar it. He opened the door and stepped aside as Jenn hurried in, followed by Gastropé and Rupert.
None of the three seemed to be carrying much in the way of supplies. “Any luck?” Edwyrd asked.
“Well, I found a sage who had a semi-reliable map.” Jenn answered. “It looks like we need to head northeast from here.”
“Over a sea,” Rupert chimed in.
“A sea?” Edwyrd asked uncertainly.
“Yes,” said Jenn, “it appears that we need to cross a small sea to a port called Hoggensforth. From there it’s only a bit over a week’s ride to Freehold.”
“How are we going to cross the sea?” Edwyrd asked, getting nervous about the answer.
“By boat of course,” Jenn answered somewhat condescendingly.
“Yes, but can we afford that? I don’t have any money.” Edwyrd was actually more concerned about being trapped on in close quarters with a bunch of people when he might lose control at any moment.
“That’s where I came in,” spoke up Gastropé. “We went to the harbormaster and found a ship going to Hoggensforth. After a lot of persuasion on my part,” Gastropé’ said with a proud smile, “I was able to get us a discount rate.”
“A discount rate,” Edwyrd asked suspiciously.
“Well,” Jenn said sourly, “it seems there’s a slight problem with pirates on this sea. By convincing the ship’s master that he’d have three combat trained wizards on board, he was able to make a deal that we could afford.” She looked pointedly at Gastropé with a frown on her face.
“Oh.” Edwyrd said, then his brows furrowed. “Three wizards?”
“Well,” Gastropé said depreciatingly, “I did have to exaggerate a little.”
“A little?” Jenn asked, obviously annoyed. “I am not combat trained, and I doubt you exactly are either.” Gastropé sniffed at this. “And Rupert doesn’t even count as a wizard, he’s just a very junior student at best. Besides who would even take a little kid seriously as a wizard anyway?”
“We don’t have to tell them which three of us are wizards.” Gastropé returned. “We can just let them assume that Edwyrd is the third wizard.”
“Oh, yeah, and what if we run into pirates?” Jenn asked angrily.
“We improvise.” Gastropé threw his hands above his head. “Trust me, it’ll work if you don’t lose your calm.”