Silent Meditations of an Illiterate Sylvan (01/23/10)

by Rue

Many thanks to thee, Great Hunter, Solonor.
Thy strength is my strength.
My eyes are thine eyes.
Thy keen is my keen.
My body is thine conduit.
Today, thy might resounded in the string of my bow, and the blade of my khopesh.
And for that I am grateful.  Many praises unto thee, Solonor Thelandira.

I met  and traveled with many friend’s this day.  Some old, some new.  A relatively new friend of mine, Kailan, bought me a suit of leather armor.  I can not hope to pay him back with the meager amount of silvers and golds that I have on me.  But I swear, Great Hunter, that I will pay him back for his kindnesses.  He has demanded, though, that I carry his frying pan for him.  Something about it being too cumbersome for him to carry.  He has with him a horse, which looks more than capable of carrying the extra weight that the frying pan would render.  As he had already done me a kindness, I obliged him, amused at his insistence.

Our party has chosen to lodge in town, which seems utterly assinine to me, considering that I’ve already spent my life savings on lodging and other easily had provisions for the few nights that we’ve been on our quest.  I just grinned and obliged my traveling companions.  I would be perfectly at home around a campfire under the bare sky, praise the Great Hunter.  There certainly is something to be said for bounty hunting though, which has brought us a tidy sum of gold already, far more profitable than farming.  The gold return so far has been worth leaving my life on the plantation.  It promises many increasing returns.

Kailan and everyone else in the party seems to be able to interpret the writings of the page.  I have never had a need for such things, Great Hunter, but it seems to be everywhere around me now.  I am inundated by it, I am drowning in my ignorance.  I almost purchased a map earlier today, it seemed like a good idea to me, the salesman said it was for the “Mine of Chaos” which we are searching for.  Kailan is far more educated than I, so I asked him about it.  But at the insistence of Kailan, I did not purchase it.  This man would have taken my silvers for a worthless scrap of parchment, and I would have been taken as an ignorant bumpkin.  No more!  Give me strength, Solonor!  I resolve to learn how to read!

As the day wore on, we decided to leave town to go hunt for a bounty head.  I’m not sure which one we were actually searching for, but we certainly found one.  They were foul creatures.  No taller than my middle.  I believe that Nyneva referred to them as “Kobolds”, but I’m not entirely sure.  Terribly ugly things, with the heads of dragonkin and the eyes of wild men.  They smelled of spoiled goat’s milk and the carrion of even lesser beasts.  Their weapons were stained dark with the blood of men.  It was Liam who struck first with a keen arrow.  I was embarrassed at my lack of speed in this matter, as I struck just a moment later.  May your strength flow through me.  My second arrow claimed the life of one of the foul demi-men.  Struck through his middle where his life resides no more.  Rolando ran directly into the fray, screaming with what I thought was terror, initially, but upon observing his wild manner in combat, I have resolved that it was a fit of pure battle lust.   A respectable companion,  Rolando, his fury seemed to blind him.  His attempts landed nary but when I shoved one of the disgusting wretches off of its balance and into the path of his furious threshing.  Much like one would set a ball up, into the air, for a spike point during a match of Gromney ball.  I was impressed with the prowess with which he sliced through the neck and took its greasy, blunt-toothed, head on the awl of his other axe.  Killing is such good sport!

During most of this entire ordeal the rest of the party hung back, from what I could tell, and fired arrows into the melee.  Their volleys mostly hit their intended targets.  But there was some apology from Liam to Rolando, later, about a stray arrow striking Rolando in the buttock.  I saw no such thing… So I paid no mind.  Their arrows were supplemented by the arrows of two entire phantasmal columns of archers on either side of us!  Doake has gotten much more powerful since the last time I’ve seen him perform any magick at all.  A far cry from the parlor trickery he used to perform when we were children.  The columns were so real that their arrows seemed to actually harm and kill the witless creatures.  One, terrified by the volume of enemies, broke rank and ran for its pathetic life.  Usually, I am rather merciful, and this was no exception.  So I chased it down and granted it release from its putrid existance with one thrust through its neck.  As I turned the blade and tore it out through the side of the beast’s throat, it fell, gurgling its curses to the last.  I turned and ran back to the fray, there was regrettably, not much left to kill, besides the Kobold that I pushed into the passionate swingings of Rolando.  And the very last of the wretches, who had been surrounded by Kailan, Nyneva, and a phantasmal facsimile of myself.  It felt very strange, watching myself.  It gave me pause, even though I had been reassured by Doake, in his usual manner.  I was instantly reminded of his relentless prankery as an adolescent.  But instead of scaring the shite out of my siblings, he was actually using my doppelganger productively.

Soon, the last Kobold fell, and I set about collecting their ears which were worth 1 gold coin each to the guild.  Not bad at all.  Such a strange custom, selling the ears of fallen enemies.  Don’t they know that most things have two ears?  As long as we can exploit their ignorance, I feel that this adventure will be most profitable, indeed!  I think that we should find creatures with more ears though.  There were few other valuables among the slain.  Liam managed to salvage an entire suit of armor, albeit ragged, I feel that it suits him well.  I however, could never wear such a suit of armor.  I don’t think that I could deal with the stench of “Kobold” for any longer than it takes to bisect one in battle.

Many thanks to thee, Great Hunter, Solonor.
Thy strength is my strength.
My eyes are thine eyes.
Thy keen is my keen.
My body is thine conduit.
Many praises unto thee, Solonor Thelandira.

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