‘Temporary’ because I’m staying up to get it to 48K. Today was a very complicated day involving fixing a persistent problem with this website, but that’s no excuse not to finish. 50K awaits!
“It’s always the quiet ones?” Lucas was shaking his head as we walked back towards the less ostentatiously wealthy part of town. “He looks just like the kind of minion you’d only trust with one arrow at a time, too.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t test him on that,” I offered.
“Why? You didn’t.”
“I could tell he wasn’t lying about that.”
“He was lying?”
“Well, sure. Everybody lies to Shamuses. He was laying it on a little too thick with the aw-shucks routine. I figure it was so I wouldn’t look into whatever he’s got going on. Whatever it is, though, it’s got nothing that has to do with the yapokvil. Probably he’s skimming a little off the top of the monthly budget for new galoshes, or something.” I took a drag off my smoke, smiling as the smoke washed away the last lingering reeks of eau de monster. “Like I’d care about that anyway.”
“Fair enough,” Lucas said. “Anyway, I didn’t try to push at his story because I could tell from the start he’d taken some shots.”
“Really? Shots, plural?”
“Oh yeah, Tom. That just wasn’t the arm. He was moving like somebody had knocked him down a couple of times, got a couple shots in in the side, or the legs. I’ll bet there’s more bandages under his clothes, too. Nothing a healing potion can’t take care of, but even those take a day or two to get at the last stubborn bits.” Lucas shrugged. “Besides, Henry didn’t move wastefully, you know what I mean?”
I did, a little. Most people, when they need to do something in a hurry, they think about what they want to do, they get ready to do it, they give themselves permission to do it, and then they start doing it. Meanwhile, an Adventurer has already just gone and done it and is now doing something else, hopefully not to you while you’re still trying to get going. Which is why I ain’t an Adventurer, myself. Well, that and a whole other bunch of reasons.