Chapter 2

Magic, BAH!

I've been playing Dungeons and Dragons Online a lot recently, and not only is it an excellent game, but it has heavily influencedmy ideas for thenextfew chapters. Thank it. NOW!

Dwarves don't believe in magic. It's just the way it is, and has always been. But when a cleric finds you unconscious and turns you from an oversized piece of toast to a healthy breathing dwarf, suddenly magic seems that it may have its uses.

When the rogue awoke inside a cabin covered with holy idols and scriptures, it was just those thoughts on magicthat ran through his mind. He lay for a minute, remembering what had happened before. He remembered the break in, the escape from the governor's room, and the tumble he took down in to the furnace. He remembered passing out in front of a man cloaked in shadow. Moving his hands toward the pocket where he had stashed his stolen money and property, he was shocked to find that no pain came with the movement. Reaching into the deep pocket, he found nothing. Sitting up he began to check all his other pockets, though he knew full well that he wouldn't find the things he stole. Rogues never misplace things. The man who had saved him had most likely taken the liberty of removing the money from his pockets.

The rogue, though he knew he should feel grateful for his saviors help, he couldn't deny the greed and still felt a little angry that a stranger was taking things from him. Reasoning with himself, he decided that there was no guarantee that he would ever get his stuff back, which would make all his work and pain pointless. He continued to feel slightly resentful, but suddenly remembered his dirk.

His hand shot inside his still burned and tattered clothes faster than the eye could see. Reaching to his concealed sheathe, he found nothing and quickly scrambling searched all through his clothes, but once again knowing that it wouldn't be there.

Before when he found he didn't have his stolen treasure, he still toyed with the thought about letting it go, but not the dirk. The dirk was a whole different story. All the gold, platinum, and incriminating documents in the world weren't worth losing the dirk.

One might now be inclined to ask, what is so special about the dirk. The rogue had his reasons of course, but whatever they were, he was not telling. What was important, is that he had always had the dirk, and it had gotten to the point where he felt as though the dirk was a long time friend. The very idea of a weapon being a personal friend is entirely bizarre, but then again, the rogue didn't socialize much, and when your alone 90 of the time, you don't think like most people.

The rogue decided that he had absolutely no choice but to merely remain in the cabin which was apparently empty until the some returned or he simply starved to death. He began to think about the documents he had stolen. They were, as he remembered, a bill for a new tax on foreign farm equipment. The very idea of the tax was most obviously just a government scam to make the rich richer, so naturally it couldn't be revealed to anyone in fear of a mass revolt, at least, it couldn't be revealed now. Eventually after enough pay offs and random political favors the rest of the land governing coin lords would warm up to the idea of the new tax and would, as they always did, eventually find a way to present it to the public in a way that wouldn't spark the massive rejection that it so definitely deserved.

Sometimes the dwarf thought about just killing the whole lot of the greedy bastards, one by one in sporadic assassinations. Of course the idea was ludicrous, but it was just moments like these, of too much pondering and reflection that drove him to seriously consider such thoughts. Fortunately, before his twisted mind could produce any more thoughts of devilishness a audible creak and the heavy clomp of footsteps entered the house the front door.

The dwarf thought about hiding, but the man had already had numerous chances to kill him, so he doubted he would have to worry about it now. When he finally came into view, it was indeed a human male. He carried a large mace that was sheathed on his back, and he wore a broad smile which quickly turned to a puzzled look when he realized his guest was awake and functioning. Hiding his sudden surprise, he turned himself back into his original smiling self.

"I see you've finally managed to rouse master dwarf" he said in a jolly voice. "No doubt you've found your possessions are missing, but fear not, they are all safe with me and I will return them to you in due time."

Master dwarf? It had been a LONG time since anyone had ever called him that. He was caught off guard, and was nearly ashamed of his only reply.

"I would prefer if I could receive them now" said the dwarf in a "no duh" type manner.

"And I understand but you must believe me, I cannot return the weapons back to the thief which I found smoldering on the street, not 50 feet from the Governor's Mansion reported to have been robbed that very night."

The dwarf said nothing, but remained rigid and looking discontent.

"Like I said we will get to that in due time, but first, introductions. I am Jhosper, child and prophet of the great god Pelor. And you are?"

The dwarf hesitated, he hadn't used or heard his real name spoken in many years. Though not much remained of his dwarf clan who rejected him years ago, (83 years to be exact) it was best not to risk getting them involved in his shady affairs by using his real name. He instead made something up on the spot.

"Crunk" he said in almost a whisper. Crunk! he thought to himself, hells bells, what was I thinking.

"Crunk," the cleric repeated with well practied fake acceptance, "well good to meet you. As you are well aware by now I am sure, I have healed your wounds and brought you to this cabin, and normally, I would have no problem doing this and letting you on your way. But the day after I found you, which was 3 days ago if you'd like to know…"

"I had wondered" Crunk interrupted somewhat rudely, as someone who did not socialize might have.

Without missing a beat the Jhosper continued, "The day after I found you I learned the governor's mansion had been robbed, and I of course knew it had to be you. So I thought, this guy has to be good at what he does, thieving and all, so maybe I could use him to my advantage."

Crunk didn't like where this was going. Lifesaver or not, this guy wasn't going down the path of Crunk's respect. Whenever someone starts talking about using you to their advantage, they don't mean they're going to let you off easy.

"Basically, a couple of friends and I, we gotta job to do, and I know I'm being vague, but we can't do it without a thief, and an extrodinarily talented one such as yourself. What I'm trying to say is, if you want yourgoods back, you need to do me as big a favor as I did you."

The dwarf's reply was unsure and hestitant, "that sounds...," he searched for the word, "reasonable. Not like I have much a choice really. However I do need to know what it is you want, and I do nothing until I at least get back my blade."

"But of course," replied Jhosper, "my story is long, but we do have quite a bit of time on our hands, so why don't we start with your story?"

Yeah, that was intended to be somewhat exciting when I first started writing it, but there wasn't much I felt like I could do with this chapter besides more plot prep. Next will most likely be back to our mysterious duo introduced in the last chapter, but that's all for me to decide whenever I start writing again. Cherio.