Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Chapter 10

The half-empty glass

Xan came to consciousness feeling like he had climbed a mountain with his bare hands only to be pushed off the summit to land on rocks. And that was before the pungent smell of medicinal herbs hit him.

Dear Corellon, he felt horrendous.

Blinking at the brightness, it took him a moment to realise that he was looking at a human girl hovering over him, her auburn hair turning reddish in the light. He was too bewildered to do more than gawk at her visage as his senses slowly returned.

"'Afternoon, Mister Elf," she grinned at him, flashing two rows of perfect white teeth. "We're having a quick bite before heading off, Jaheira thought you should have some." When he didn't respond, she leaned closer with concern. "Er, are you okay?"

"I…" Xan gathered himself, "Yes, I will join you. Give me a moment."

"Alrighty."

With that, the girl flitted off to join the rest of the group. The stammering half-elf and the tall elf were already eating what looked to be dried meat while Jaheira was passing the same to the elven girl. As he struggled to his feet, he thought hard to try to recall their names, but he could only remember Khalid, Kivan and Jaheira. He would have to ask his kinsman to remind him what the other two were called. The escape from the mines felt like a terrible blur in his mind now. The only thing clear to him right then was that he was positively ravenous.

"How are you feeling?" asked Jaheira as he shuffled over.

"I'll live," he replied dryly, accepting rations from her. Opening the cloth wrapping, he noticed that the dried meat had been portioned out into smaller chunks.

She nodded at him. "You must eat a little bit at a time. After your imprisonment, your stomach may not be able to handle normal portions immediately."

"Oh. Of course."

He sat next to Kivan, a frown on his face as he slowly chewed his food. It annoyed him that he needed to be reminded of such simple things. Helplessness had been his constant companion the past few weeks and he had loathed every moment of it. He'd hoped that he could leave that behind in the mines but evidently, he would be reliant on this group to get through the coming days. Despite Jaheira's assurance, he knew the road to recovery would be a long and painful one.

Speaking of which, he did not even know what day it was today.

"Kivan, may I know what date it is?" he asked quietly in Elvish.

"Mirtul. Likely tenth," came the terse reply.

Xan swallowed his ration and somehow managed not to choke on it. He'd lost nearly three weeks in that godforsaken hole. Glancing at his kinsman, he noticed that Kivan seemed more tense than when they were in the mines. He was staring at the ground hard enough to almost burn holes in it. Casting his gaze about, Xan caught Khalid giving Kivan a concerned look before looking away while Jaheira was resolutely not looking in Kivan's direction.

Curious.

Xan filed the observation away for future reference. He then turned to the two girls in their midst. The human was clapping her hands together to clear off food crumbs, already done with her meal. Despite her almost childlike countenance, he knew that she was both stronger and tougher than she looked. She had helped him get through the last leg of the tunnel with her enthusiastic encouragements. For the last few yards, she was the one who pulled him out the other side when his strength finally failed him, keeping good cheer the entire way. The sheer contrast of her with the harrowing torment of the mines was thoroughly disorientating, like getting hit in the face with a Colour Spray.

The elf girl caught him glancing at her and smiled at him. Now, this one was a bit more of a mystery. Barring the brief exchange they had when she cut his bonds, he'd had minimal interaction with her. From what he'd seen, she was young, quick in both thought and act. What he could not understand, however, was that she spoke with Kivan in Common even when it was just the two of them in discussion. And yet, she was evidently a full-blooded elf, not cha'tel'quessir like Khalid and Jaheira.

Those two were obviously a couple, though. There were some gestures between bonded men and women which transcended race and culture. Jaheira's explanation made it seem like this motley crew were mercenaries. He could believe that in the manner of the older members, but he couldn't connect the same dots for the two young ones. Could they have been foundlings rescued from some gruesome fate?

He almost scoffed at that line of thought. As if there was a more gruesome fate than the Life.

Seeing Jaheira come towards him, he wrapped the rest of his food for safekeeping. "Is it time to go?"

"Soon. I need to check your hands," came Jaheira's reply.

Her inspection was methodical and precise, as he'd begun to expect from the druid. He almost sighed when her healing spell washed over his stiff fingers. With luck, he would be able to cast proper spells now. He'd barely managed to refresh a few spells from his spellbook before resting, but since his pouch of spell components were missing, his repertoire was quite limited for the time being. Still, it meant that he wasn't completely useless in a fight now. As a Greycloak, he'd been trained to only need his moonblade, a spellbook and his wits to fully function. Anything else was a bonus.

The group gathered their things and headed off, following the sun as it began to move westward. Based on the maps, they were somewhere within no man's land in the Cloudpeak Mountains, a few days' journey from Nashkel. The barren area used to be some sort of burial ground, Jaheira told them, so they should be wary of undead.

"South of these peaks is the heart of Amn, with the great Lake Esmel in the centre. The lake shines like a giant sapphire in the landscape," she shared with the girls, her expression almost wistful. "Then further south you will cross another mountain range called the Small Teeth, and just beyond it lay the Forest of Tethir. The locals call it the Wealdath."

"I've read that the Wealdath is the one of the vastest forests in Faerun," mused the elf girl.

"It would take a week to traverse from one end of the forest to the next, yes."

"Amazing. I would like to see it one day."

The human chuckled at that. "Taken a liking to the great outdoors, Lene? Never thought I'd see the day!"

She shrugged. "The world is our oyster, Im. Seems silly to want to stay in one place forever now."

"Here's to that!"

Ahead of them, Xan saw Kivan flinch at the girl's exclamation. His kinsman turned to look at the girl but caught his eye instead. He raised an eyebrow at Kivan questioningly, but the other man just shook his head and kept moving. Definitely not one for small talk, Xan concluded.

Jaheira was quite right about this region being no man's land. Barring minor skirmishes with gibberlings and wild dogs, their trek was mostly humdrum with sporadic breaks taken to accommodate to Xan. His only finding of the day was finally figuring out the names of the two girls. They pushed forward until late at night, when Kivan signalled that he had found a water source. Xan almost sagged with relief at this discovery. Although prestidigitation cantrips did a good job of cleaning, he felt that only water could truly cleanse him of Mulahey's filth. If he closed his eyes, he could still feel the creature pawing at him in the dark.

The party congregated nearby a narrow river. After refilling their waterskins, they took turns to clean themselves as much as they could. Xan waited for Kivan to return, his hair still dripping wet, before being the last one to clean. Given a choice, he would have liked to just drown himself in the cool waters but the moonblade would probably end him before he'd even submerged his head underwater. His mission was still incomplete, he reminded himself. He needed to survive for that if nothing else, no matter how wretched he felt.

Feeling infinitely better after a wash, he scooped out handfuls of river sand and deposited them on a flat rock by the riverbank. He sat there for a long while, watching the wet sand thoughtfully as water droplets dripped from his hair and into his collar.

Another thing to deal with when they reached civilisation: a haircut.

"Xan? Are you alright?"

He turned to see the elf girl emerge from the treeline. Her eyes flickered like quicksilver through his Darkvision, uncertainty clear in the hunch of her shoulders and her uneasy hands. Likely Jaheira has asked her to fetch the defenceless mage before he was eaten by a random wild animal.

"I'm fine," he replied, turning back to his little project. "Just watching sand dry."

"I'm…sorry?"

He wondered if he wanted to make her squirm a bit more, but he took pity on her. "You are a fellow practitioner, yes? Sand is a spell component."

"I see." He heard her step closer until she was right next to him. She smelled strongly of soap. "Which spell?"

"Sleep."

"Why didn't you take any from the barren lands?"

He shook his head. "Quartz gravel won't work. I need fine sand, such as this."

She did not reply, yet he could almost hear the gears turning in her head. Instead of another question, she surprised him with a suggestion instead. "Jaheira has a trick she uses to extract water out of things. Maybe she can help with the drying part."

He glanced at her. "I will take that under advisement."

"Did you need any other components? I have scraps of leather for Armour if you'd like. And some fleece and lodestones."

"I would appreciate that."

She peered at him as though looking for another reaction. When none was forthcoming, she angled away to make her move back to camp. "Anyway, I'm on first watch tonight. Jaheira said we should stick close." She gestured at the pile of sand. "You can come back and collect this in the morning, perhaps?"

He sighed as he got to his feet. "With my luck, it will get blown back into the river by morning."

"Good excuse for another wash then," she smiled as they walked back to camp together.

"Elene, you are…of the People, are you not?" he asked her curiously.

She huffed a small laugh. "Did the ears give it away?"

"And yet you did not greet me in our way, as Kivan did," he replied calmly in Elvish, gauging her reaction.

His words seemed to break through her easy-going veneer for a moment. She responded in stilted elvish, "I…do not know how."

"Truly?" Xan was so incredulous that he nearly stopped in his tracks. "Where are you from?"

"I mean," she amended quickly. "I know the words. I just don't think I'd sound convincing saying it."

"You were not raised by our People?" he guessed.

She shook her head. "I was adopted after my mother died. It was no great crime to elvenkind - as far as anyone knew, she had no living relation."

"What about your father?"

She shrugged. "To me, the only father I know was a human."

He paused. "Was?"

Her gaze dropped to her feet. "He died recently. We were ambushed on the road."

And suddenly many things began to make sense to him.

"I am sorry for your loss," he offered, awkward but sincere.

"Thank you. Well, we're here. Good night, Xan. Hope you'll feel better tomorrow."

She split off from him the moment the camp came into sight, evidently wishing to avoid further conversation on the topic. Belatedly, he realised that she'd also avoided mentioning any specifics in her answers. Either the matter was still too prickly for her, or she did not want him finding out more, or perhaps both. Despite her youth, she may not be as naïve as he'd initially thought.

He decided to let the matter go for now. Rest and recovery took precedence.

The next morning dawned uneventfully. Once again, he seemed to be the last person to awaken, judging from the sounds and voices by the doused campfire. He spotted a linen pouch next to his bedroll as he sat up. Curious, he tugged it open and found it filled almost to the brim with sand. River sand, to be precise. Tied to the sand pouch was a smaller cloth pouch with what felt like small stones and a strip of hard material in it. Lodestones and leather if he were to take a guess.

He cast his gaze about the camp and saw Elene deep in conversation with Khalid. Dark circles hung under her eyes. She looked like she had been up for hours. He glanced at the pouches in his hand. He would have to remember to thank her later.

That day, the group walked in better spirits knowing that Nashkel would be within reach by nightfall. Xan could hear Imoen wondering about the type of celebration the mayor could throw to mark the happy occasion. Jaheira was much more cautious on the matter, as if uncomfortable with the attention they would garner by marching up and announcing their success to the whole town. He was inclined to agree with her. Mulahey obviously had connections to some insidious people. There was no telling who could be watching them from a crowd of celebrating farmers and miners.

An hour outside of town, however, Elene signalled for a halt. Kivan had found something.

"They're waiting," Kivan said simply as the group drew together. "At the edge of the farmland."

"How many?" Jaheira's voice was tense.

"Four that I can see."

"Who are they? How do you know they're waiting?" Xan wanted to know. Looking around him, the rest seemed to be on high alert, but he could not understand why.

"It's obvious," Kivan replied with a blank look but his gaze skittered to Elene for the barest of moments.

She shifted from one foot to the other. "Can we go around?"

"They will see us." He shook his head. "It is better to face them than to have them at our backs."

Khalid studied the landscape thoughtfully. "Even if it is an ambush, we have room to scatter."

"And we have the element of surprise now," Imoen added.

Jaheira leaned on her staff as she weighed all the arguments, her brows furrowed as she thought. At last, she looked to Elene. "Kivan has a point. I would not want them at my back if they are a threat."

Elene swallowed, a haunted look settling on her features. "I suppose you're right."

Xan studied the girl. She has been standoffish since morning but in the current circumstance, he noticed she was behaving downright strangely. Did this potential threat they were facing have anything to do with her?

"Xan, are you able to aid us if they are hostile?" Jaheira shifted her gaze to the elf in question.

He touched the spell components at his belt. There was slim chance of him swinging his moonblade without further healing. "I will do what I can."

"Good." The druid straightened up. "Let us move quickly."

Jaheira, Khalid and Elene took point for the approach to the farmlands, with Imoen and Xan further behind and Kivan stealthily bringing up the rear. Sure enough, as soon as they neared a grain silo leading up to the path to Nashkel, four human women emerged from behind the structure. They were heavily armed and ready for a fight.

"You there!" barked one of them, a burly woman in plate mail armour and a mace on her belt. "Do you travel with one named Elene of Candlekeep? Your answer better be the truth, for your life depends on it."

Khalid surreptitiously positioned himself between the women and Elene even as Jaheira stepped forward. Xan's sharp hearing caught the tell-tale sound of Kivan's bow being drawn behind them. Hidden as he was, he had all the time in the world to pick his target and line up his shot. The Greycloak steeled himself as he tightened his fingers around the sand in his right hand, already targeting the other woman in heavy armour. It seems they were going to fight this one out, after all. He'd almost forgotten how much he hated direct confrontations.

"Watch yourself, girl. We are not going to tell you any of our names," Jaheira retorted.

"Yeah, so why don't you and your little amazons wander back to wherever you came from?" Imoen called out.

"You insolent pigs!" the woman spat as she stabbed a finger at Imoen. "You know not who you speak to. Your arrogance will cost you your lives."

Xan threw the sand in the direction of his target and barked out a brief incantation. The woman wobbled on her feet before collapsing in a heap of metal, fast asleep. At the same time, an arrow flew from Kivan, piercing the opposite side's bow-woman through the throat before she could even nock her own weapon.

Two down.

The fight ended up being tough despite their early advantage. The spokeswoman was apparently a cleric who managed to keep Khalid at bay with a disorientating spell. After which, Elene had a difficult time getting through the woman's defences. The final enemy was devastating with her darts, which Jaheira warned was poisoned. Xan recited an incantation to blind the dart-user, making her an easier target for Kivan and Imoen to deal with.

By the time they'd despatched those two, the sleeping woman had returned to consciousness and began casting her own spells. Xan tried to grasp a hold of her mind, but she managed to resist him. In the end, an arrow from Imoen was what it took to end the fight.

Elene winced as she stood over Imoen's kill. "Remind me to get a helmet."

She and Imoen rifled through the belongings of the defeated women while Xan opted to sit by the wayside. Although he did not do much in the fight, he now felt too drained to do more than observe and contemplate his surroundings. Jaheira was having difficulty healing herself as the poisoned darts made her wounds bleed much more heavily than usual, so Khalid had to staunch the blood flow for her to focus on spells. Kivan, as usual, had set off to scout the vicinity.

Xan stared at the corpses on the ground. These people meant business – if he and Kivan hadn't tipped the scales of the fight early on, the situation could have easily gone pear-shaped for their group. His eyes then trailed the bodies to Elene, who was focused stripping heavy armour off one of the bodies. He was still trying to wrap his head around the fact that these women were specifically looking for this girl. Who was she to have armed thugs pursuing her in the middle of nowhere? As far as he knew, Candlekeep was a human library fortress to the northwest, home to reclusive sages and scholars, not orphaned elven foundlings.

Curious as he was, he restrained the innate investigator's urge to ask. He doubted he would be able to get a straight answer anytime soon. From what he'd observed thus far, he would need to earn this group's trust first.

He could wait.

In the end, they walked away with a good haul from the fight. The leather armour of the bow-woman was enchanted and a perfect fit for Imoen while the dart thrower's enchanted leathers could be repurposed to replace Elene's gambeson. Jaheira took possession of the cleric's plate armour, but the fit would need to be adjusted for her to move well in it. The poisoned darts were given to Xan to supplement his magic while a bundle of potions was kept by Jaheira.

As they departed, Xan noticed Imoen pull Elene aside to whisper, "Did you find one of them papers?"

"Only a Cyricist's prayer sheet."

"I didn't find anything either."

Elene nudged her friend. "He can hear you, you know."

"Ugh." Imoen threw her hands up. "You elves and your darned hearing."

Xan quirked a small smile at that. The sharp hearing definitely was instrumental during his captivity, when Mulahey would mutter to himself at times or read correspondences aloud. He'd picked up a fair bit of information just laying still and listening. It is too bad this group was much more aware of that trait than his previous captor was.

"The path is straight from here on out. We will see the town soon," Kivan informed them.

For the first time in a long time, Xan felt hopeful. A bath, a bed and a meal that did not consist of salted meat. He supposed that life wasn't completely pointless when you had such things to look forward to.