"I haven't the time, I'm afraid," said Merrin with a rueful smile, leaning her elbows on the broad counter. It was as clean, she was sure, as the day it'd been built. The rest of the inn was likewise, trim and neat as the grizzled captain-turned-innkeeper had likely kept his ship. And blessedly warm - the drizzle had had them all shivering and wet through, and Merrin edged an inch or two along the broad bench that ran the length of the counter so as to get closer to the roaring fire.

"We were hoping you could tell us who's docking tomorrow - or soon," she continued. "We need to sail down the coast to Baste."

"Oh aye," he replied amiably enough, and eyed her with a concerned air. "Ye three want a pint o' somethin' warm? I 'aven't seen a wetter threesome since I 'ad the misfortune to sail into that storm seven years back or so...me wife was in a tizzy after that one, I'll tell ye."

Merrin exchanged a briefly inquiring glance with Kendath and nodded. "I'd like that very much, thank you - but could you tell us which ships - "

Of course, he'd already plunked three mugs onto the counter - very large ones - and was talking cheerfully while pouring ale. "On the morrow there's Cap'n Greydon, 'e goes down to Baste on business a fair bit. Mayhap ye could ask 'im fer a couple o' cabins."

_________________

Kendath accepted his mug of ale with a thankful nod. More by habit than necessity, he wiped his cheek. The mud was gone, washed clean in the rain. He rummaged in his pouch and slid the last of his coins across the table. Not counting, of course, the music box worth a fortune, carefully stowed away in his pack. "The ale and rooms for tonight," he said, skipping any mention of meals for favor of their remaining rations.

The innkeeper pocketed the coins, held up a finger bidding them wait, and went to attend a spilled tray. A few complaints and a mop-up later, he returned, fingering the coins Kendath had just handed him. He held one up to the light. "Strange li'l thing. Where d'ye hail, if ye don't mind m'askin'?"

Kendath coughed. "Vryngard."

It was as if someone just informed the innkeeper of his birthday. He dropped the mug he'd started wiping and, eyes protuberant, leaned forward. "Vryngard, ye say? If m'ears don't be deceivin'... What's it like?"

_________________

"It's beautiful," said Merrin quietly, fingering her mug and looking down into the steaming ale. It was big enough that both her hands wrapped around it didn't quite meet. She took a breath and looked up, swallowing a pang of loss. "I've lived there. It's white, and I watched sunsets and sunrises, so many of them...and dragons..." she trailed off and attempted a grin to counterbalance her somber mien. "If you've ever the chance to visit, you should."

"Aye, that I would, missy." He patted her hand and raised an eager eyebrow at Kendath. "An' you, sir? Like the city as much as yer pretty companion here?"

Merrin grinned, but it was rather halfhearted.

_________________

Kendath pondered this for a long while. At length he nodded. "Sunsets and sunrises and dragons. Yeah, that's Vryngard."

The innkeeper made a sound somewhere between a snort and an incredulous chuckle. "M'papa, he used to travel a lot. Came an' went as the winds blow, they say. Been all o'er the world. Came a'back from Vryngard once an' said 'tis the prettiest thing he'd ever seen. Towers all white and shinin' with gold." He leaned forward, as though confiding a secret. "It's in m'blood too, ye know. Why, the places I've seen..." The places he'd seen. Exploits in the Wildlands, battling wild dragons in the frozen north, sailing on the tempest of a maelstrom...

Kendath expected only half of them to be veritable and the other half exaggerated, but the innkeeper was an adroit storyteller nonetheless - not vaunting, but speaking with an earnest tongue and a gleam in his eye. Before long he had an audience - young children, barmaids, even a few grizzled veterans who'd no doubt seen their share of the world. By the third account, even Kendath found himself swayed over. Surely a sea dragon couldn't spit venom that far? Did sirens really raise a city in the middle of the ocean?

"But never have I," the innkeeper lamented, drawing to a closure, "never in all m'voyages have I ever seen the white towers of Vryngard. Will ye take me there someday, missy?" He sniffed away a tear and beamed down at Merrin.

_________________

Merrin listened as raptly as any of them, gladly letting the old man's more than glib tongue carry her away to far-off places...mythic tales...lands she was sure existed nowhere but in imaginations. It felt good to, however briefly, think of something besides Shadowers and defeating the Lich and saving the dragons. Her worries wove themselves into the tales - a legion defeated by one warrior, an evil wizard vanquished by a farmboy with a magic sword, a dying princess saved by a kiss.

She was leaning forward with the rest, happily lost in a world of nothing but dreams, when the adroit storyteller - the innkeeper? It hardly seemed as though he could be one, not anymore - broke his flood of enchanting words. " - seen the white towers of Vryngard. Will ye take me there someday, missy?"

Vryngard. Merrin had never had what could be called a real friend during her years there. Never had anything until Wyvern. He'd been her life, her solace, the second half of her very soul. And to remember all the evenings she'd watched the sunset from one of those white towers...

Now Wyvern was dead, and Merrin had a brief, bitter vision of white towers turned black, a Meiltha pennant flying triumphant. But the pang she felt was not so devastating as it had been. This was why Merrin was herself. This was what she had to live for, fight for. Aye, she'd lost her dragon and her home, but others did not have to do the same. And while she'd never had a friend in Vryngard...a face burst briefly into her mind.

Aye. Despite their differences, which were many, when Merrin saw Kendath now she saw no Meiltha assassin - she saw a friend.

"Someday," she promised, smiling up at the grizzled old seafarer. This time it reached her eyes, lit her face in a way no smile had for a long time.

A glance down into her mug revealed it untouched and cold, abandoned on a journey into dreams. Merrin grinned in spite of herself, and glanced up once, wryly, at Kendath. "You have a gift for stories, master innkeeper."

_________________

Garthag sat on the side with a bored expression shadowing his face as he listened to the over exaggerated tales and babbling of the inn keeper, for a moment he couldn`t help himself and let out an amused chuckle as he mentioned battling wild dragons in the frozen north.

"Too bad they are almost extinct these days...."

Garthag said with a wide smirk on his face, knowing that it was all very much thanks to him and Kalma who had planned to be the only dragon in the north. Kalma had been a wild dragon, that was until he was enslaved, but then again it was no wonder that he killed Garthag`s brethren. One can`t change what they truly are or can they? Garthag glanced suspiciously at Kendath, but turned away quickly. Despite all this kindness towards Merrin and pretending to be a good man, Kendath was a killer as he had been in the Meiltha service.

Just the fact that he didn`t acknowledge that he would have been better off with the Meiltha, some tried so hard to change, but they couldn`t run far in the end. Garthag leaned his chin against his palm and hmhed as Merrin complimented the innkeeper for his talents in story telling.

"I must agree with your stupidity for once as he has clearly charmed you with his babbling, but too bad they are just tales.... but who knows maybe they will be singing tales about you one day, eh Merrin?"

Garthag asked with a rather bored tone and it showed as his eyes trailed off to stare around the space they were in, trying to find something more interesting than the faces of the three mongrels, two of which he had to up with constantly.

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!

The innkeeper made a commendable effort at modesty, though one could tell by the flush in his whiskered cheeks that he was pleased. "Thank ye kindly, missy." His eyes fell upon his sizable audience as though seeing it for the first time. Grin broadening, he reached for empty mugs. "Like m'stories, do ye? How 'bout another round o'drinks, aye?"

The cry that greeted him could not have been more agog. The patrons shuffled forth, bandying laughter and raising their mugs to be refilled.

Kendath ostensibly chuckled with the rest of them, but he didn't raise his voice for more ale. Setting his empty mug on the counter, he retreated to watch the merriment from afar, his expression curiously pensive. Did the innkeeper not know of Vryngard's defeat? No matter - the news would travel like wildfire and reach here fastest of all. He knew then, with sick certainty, that Port Dragonhelm would no longer be a neutral port. Cities would fall to fear, one after another, without the shedding of a single drop of blood.

What then would the innkeeper dream of, when the white towers of Vryngard were no longer white?

Kendath looked at Merrin, smiling as he hadn't seen her smile in eons. He closed his eyes, burning that image in his mind, that quintessence of hope. They would destroy the Shadowers, restore dragonkind's place in this world, and when they returned, he would fight. Not a soldier, but a spy, perhaps, he who knew the darkest of Meiltha secrets better than any Renegade general. What he'd told Garthag that night in Eastguard Fortress still stood true - not that it made a difference. He might not hold faith in the gods, but he owed them a debt for their mercy.

The sensation of peace that pervaded him now was alien but as lucid and powerful as a cataract. Pushing through the crowd - and halfheartedly returning a few toasts and pats on the back - he found Merrin on the other side of the common room. She was beautiful as ever, more beautiful than she'd been at their first ball, more beautiful than she'd been at Midsummer's Eve. Standing there with both hands on her shoulders, staring into her earnest face, he came very close to leaning in and showing her exactly how he -

For some unfathomable reason, Kendath couldn't bring himself to do it - not so soon, not in front of Garthag. Nonetheless expression still wormed its way into his actions. For once not caring if Garthag was watching, he pulled Merrin close and brushed his lips against her forehead. "We meet downstairs at daybreak, then," he said to the group in general.

_________________

With firelight dancing on faces already lit with contentment, cups clinking, a buzz of lively conversation interspersed with the frequent chuckle or hearty guffaw, Merrin could have leaned back and closed her eyes - and felt entirely at home. It seemed completely in the spirit of the occasion to have Kendath's arms around her however briefly - but beforehand, when for the barest moment they were face to face...

Merrin herself was surprised by how the room and its happy cacophony faded around her, and for an infinitesimal pause in time only the two of them existed. He was close enough that she had to look up, tilt her head back for blue eyes to meet dark ones...and Merrin felt that if only the moment had lasted longer - just a second longer - perhaps she could have flung her arms around his neck and...

Instead she felt his lips touch her forehead, a gesture that almost made her really pull away and ask him mutely, with only a pair of beguiling cobalt eyes, to kiss her there no matter who was watching. But when that pause, that suspension of time, had flown like it was so much dust on a salt-scented wind, Merrin found herself entirely content to let her head fall against his chest and merely enjoy the embrace, the feel of his arms tight around her like a shield.

When he did let go, her smile was undiminished - in fact, it was if possible more completely contented than it had been. Enjoy it, said a fleeting, warning voice. Tomorrow war begins again. But it was easy to ignore such thought now. "Aye, daybreak," she agreed with a nod, and just before turning away reached and found his hand to slip hers into. The touch was gone in a moment but however fleeted the entire evening was, it promised to remain a bright spot in a sea of shadow.

Eventually the inn's many patrons did filter out, having emptied many a mug of ale, and Merrin herself could feel fatigue beckoning her to bed. She delayed leaving, wanting to remain in the bright common room as long as she could, but the umpteenth jaw-cracking yawn eventually made a soft mattress irresistible.

_________________

((Double-post. Ignore.))

_________________

Garthag could not have helped notice Kendath`s actions as he approached Merrin and Garthag only smirked widely at the sight before gazing away. Perfect, you just keep on giving me new weapons to kill you Garthag thought as he stared away, the boredom had faded away and it had been replaced by a fixed, cold stare. Only the shadowers stood in the way of Garthag having free hands to kill Kendath, but there was no doubt they needed each others in order to defeat the shadowers. Yet knowing Kendath, Garthag could not foolishly place all his plans, his life on the line on such an assumption.

To his own amazement Garthag remained at the same table as Merrin as the hours passed and the inn began emptying from it`s customers, perhaps he had nothing else to do or he just felt the need to keep tracking Merrin`s every move. When you thought about it, she was the weakest of the three, Garthag had his spells and wits, Kendath was a skilled combatant and also had some other tricks up his sleeve. Yet Merrin, surely she knew how to fight, but not as well as Kendath it seemed and surely she would be more easy to brake mentally than Kendath. Or then again... taking down Merrin would take down Kendath, their care for each others would ultimately lead them to their deaths. Neither of them would want to see the other one hurt in anyway, one reason why Garthag had eliminated such weakness long ago.

As Merrin prepared to leave from the table to bed, Garthag followed and went up ahead, climbing the stairs quietly and slowly enough so that he wouldn`t trip on his own robe.

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!

A last burst of laughter from the one remaining table made Merrin grin and pause, one hand on the banister of the broad stairway leading up to their rooms. Another jaw-cracking yawn made her reluctantly admit how tired she was, and followed by flickering firelight and voices still raised in jest and general merriment, she climbed the stairs and went to find the her room. It was across from the one she assumed Kendath and Garthag were to share.

She dd not envy Kendath his roommate. Despite traveling with him, Merrin had never liked the mage, and though she'd learned to ignore his caustic comments, she wondered if there wasn't more behind them. Trust was something that had never existed there, not even now.

Coincidentally, he too seemed to have meant to retire, but had stopped outside the room, almost as if waiting. Merrin raised an eyebrow as she drew near and stopped with a hand on the doorknob of her own accommodations. "Did you want something?"

_________________

"Hmh? Me? What could I possibly want from you?"

Garthag asked, acting offended and overconfident as always, but kept up the smirk showing his amusement for the situation. Garthag gazed at Merrin quietly before taking a step towards her and placing his shoulder against the wall, next to the door. He crossed his hands loosely, but didn`t turn his typical ice cold, calculative eyes away from her.

"I know that you do not care, if I see you two, but it was clear to be earlier. You and Kendath... hah..." Garthag said and spun his head back, gazing at the roof briefly before bringing it back to look at Merrin. "Will be the death of each others, even mine if things go badly..."

Garthag said with ever growing anger in his voice and with every word he began to sound more like a snake than a human, despite his relaxed stance he seemed furious for a second at the thought that he would die because of them, but suddenly calmed down.

"Your... affection for each other" Garthag said with a dry tone as the word seemed like the most caring word he could conjure up from his vocabulary. "It shows and if you dare to show any of that in battle or any situation when going against the shadowers, we are doomed, you don`t like seeing each others hurt. You both are such idiots that you would die for one another when it is specifically what the other one doesn`t want. I suggest you keep your emotions under control during the battle, whatever may come. I won`t have you have me killed because of your feelings and nor do you afford to fail to complete your cause now that you have come this far...."

Garthag said in a way that told how objective he was able to be about this, discarding emotions as a weakness that they could not afford to pay for and showing that he doubt Merrin failing more than Kendath.

"Oh and you know when this is over we are enemies, I am curious to see who dies, whether the gods will allow you to push your luck that far...."

Garthag said before pushing himself off the wall and procceeding to the other door, he briefly placed his hand on Merrin`s shoulder, but it seemed more like an unfriendly shove as he passed by. Garthag opened the door into the room and walked in, he gazed at Kendath who was in the room.

"Lovely, we apparently did not possess the funds to get us separate rooms..."

Garthag said before walking up to the window at the end of the room, he placed his hand on the window board and leaned against it whilst turning partially towards Kendath.

"I had a chat with our little missy, the target of your affection or whatever the hell you want to call it what has been going on between you two..."

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!

Kendath looked up from splashing his face with cold water. He picked up a towel folded beside the basin and regarded Garthag warily. The mage was a sobering presence, and for a moment he almost regretted his display of emotion. Only a few months ago, he would have thought the same - two idiots mired in sentimentality, both plummeting to their deaths.

Being one of those idiots did offer a different perspective.

He removed his cloak and falchion - placing the latter within arm's reach - and began rummaging in his pack, seconds before realizing that he was too tired to be hungry. Instead he threw himself onto the straw pallet that, in his fatigue, might as well have been a goose down mattress. For a moment the only sound breaking the silence was the gentle pattering of rain against the shuttered windows.

Garthag's eyes hadn't stopped boring into the back of his skull. A scrutiny of the mage in his peripheral vision offered nothing but the usual - an air of cold calculation too often seen on Meiltha archmages, right before they tortured their victims. His own position, lying prostrate on the pallet, inexorably reminded Kendath of just that. Not liking it, he sat up and returned the stare, deadpan. "Emotion is weakness, isn't it." His voice fell flat.

_________________

Garthag`s eyes didn`t change from their coldness, but inside Garthag`s head his thoughts changed and his attitude changed to a more cautious approach. A question Kendath should have known an answer to, so why was he asking someone who would give the answer Kendath had already heard? Perhaps to deny it, it would be so much easier to deny everything the evil mage would say instead of himself.

"To get to the bottom of it, yes, your emotions have lead to a certain thing and you just keep making yourself weak when in fact you should discard things like that. The only thing that matters now is our goals, defeating the shadowers, regaining... well that is actually my goal... powers and of course you can then return happily knowing you have saved the dragonkind..."

Garthag said carelessly and now bringing back his usual mock, his expression was awry before he threw in his reminder that he might as well be able to kill them along with the shadowers.

"Eh... sorry I must not lie, you might return."

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!

The words had barely left Garthag's mouth when, faster than the eye could follow, Kendath's wrist snapped, launching a dagger that grazed the mage's ear by centimeters and embedded, blade quivering in the wall behind him.

Garthag didn't flinch. Angry by the mage's consummate indifference, angry for even letting the words taint the peace he thought he'd found, Kendath turned away. He shouldn't have done that, he knew. He shouldn't have lost self-control, labeled Garthag an enemy when he knew full well he was still formidable despite the affliction invoked by the Lich. So why let the man live? He'd had a dozen chances to kill Garthag in his sleep. Garthag was right - he was becoming soft. Sentimental weakling.

What was Merrin, then? Whatever else he might believe, Merrin was far from weak. She seemed stalwart in spirit, at peace with herself and the world. She was strong enough to know that she could give love and not regret it, give love and still have strength to give some more.

"You're wrong," Kendath said, turning back to meet Garthag's stare. A shadow of himself screamed its derision, but he wrestled it down. Voice firmer now, he continued, spitting it out, "You're a coward, mage. What are you afraid of? Your own humanity? Displaying emotion - because that's tantamount to admitting you have emotions? And having emotions is tantamount to admitting that you can hurt, that every time a whip falls you feel pain...." Averting his gaze, he clenched his jaw, feeling the words torn out of him by his own desire for them to be true. "Because it's easier telling yourself that you don't care."

_________________

Garthag`s eyes remained the same as he turned to stare at the dagger sticked out of the wall and pulled it off with a quick, sharp pull. He took the dagger in his hand and pressed the tip against his other hand`s index finger starting to spin the dagger by the handle. Garthag stared at the dagger as the tip drilled trough the skin and made a drop of blood to stain the daggers steel. Kendath surely was not one to back down from a debate, wanting to prove himself right, perhaps even believing that he could make Garthag realize his point. Yet what Kendath spoke of sounded so hollow and distant to the mage who had spent his years in pursuit of power.

"I killed my family you know"

Garthag suddenly said with a calm and unshakable tone as he observed the dagger tip covered in blood. There was perhaps a hint of grief in his words, but otherwise it seemed like a cold statement presenting the facts. He could sense a moment of absolute silence descending upon the room and expected to see either a shocked or despising expression on Kendath`s face. Garthag silently stared at Kendath before hmhing and gazing outside with a certain emptiness in his eyes.

".... and burned down the village I lived in"

The sea of flames swallowed the group of wooden shacks that stood at the mountain side, the heat was unbearable as the flames rose ever higher and a lonely youngster stared as the buildings began to collapse. Charred corpses lay on the ground and those few who still lived were engulfed in flames, running around desperate trying to get rid of the flames as they consumed their flesh, turning their skins pitch black. The youngster stood quietly staring at the horror and devastation that took place, knowing that he could not do anything to stop the process he had already begun.

Then he saw the modest shack where he had once lived crumble down in flames, collapsing onto his sisters and mother who were still inside. His hands covered in burn wounds and his white robe had been burned in many places, leaving black spots and holes behind. He had not dared to do anything else, but watch as the fire spread at a terrible speed and magnitude, creating a huge bonfire made out of wooden, hay and humans. It could be seen many miles away into almost every direction, especially it was visible to a small group of travelers that decided to head towards it.

Garthag hmhed at the memories as, if they were worth something or actually nothing, but he was not one to dwell on the past. Besides there had been no way of taking responsibility for his actions, everyone had to fend for themselves in the frozen north and he would have died had it not been for the skyseekers.

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!