Dragonstone 53

**Chapter 53**

Dawn finds Samurai Chick looking for a place to practice with her katana. She finds one, but Burel is already there, flinging his sword around. Samurai Chick notes that *“He seemed adept at handling the blade, but not in the ways of war.”* She greets him and performs her own kata, which amazes Burel.

Burel says he has no one to teach him how to use the sword, and asks if Samurai Chick will. She agrees, and says she’ll teach him other weapons as well. Over a page, she convinces him to take a swing and her, only to dart inside his reach when he does and tap his neck with her dagger. The scene ends dramatically as *“the sun burst over the lip of the scarlet basin, shedding its golden light down and in.”*

Elsewhere, Arin and Egil are screwing like drunk bunnies. Necessary information, I’m sure.

Ferai is sitting with her back to the wall, *“her head in her hands, wondering at this inchoate feeling deep inside her, wondering what to do.”*

It appears she’s fighting the mind control. I’m sure she’ll submit soon enough, and resign herself to her fate as Delon’s prize.

Delon, for his part, is fiddling with his sing-like-an-elf amulet and thinking: *“Ah Ferai, my sweet Ferai, I’ve sung about* amour *all my life, yet I’ve never known its touch. Is this what it’s like? Am I truly in love?”*

No, Delon, you’re horny and you’re being shoved along by the Plot. Just go with it. There’s no escape, and at least you’re succumbing more gracefully than Ferai is.

Breakfast comes, Ferai and Delon *“smile [...] shyly”* at each other, Alos is unrested and grumpy, and Burel and Samurai Chick are busy with shop talk. Ferai says that if Burel is who they’re looking for, *“then it’s time to go after the treasure,”* adding that *“It should be worth a fortune.”* Ferai has a one-track mind, doesn’t she? Arin reminds herself that they’re not planning to sell the Jellybean. Instead, she says they *“must give [it] over to the Mages - in Black Mountain, or in the college at Rwn.”*

Oh yes, because the Black Mountain mages did such a bang-up job of keeping it safe last time. One of their own (appears to have) stolen the Jellybean, thus invalidating the oath they swore to protect the world from dragons and potentially triggering a war of unprecedented bloodshed, and *they didn’t even notice!* Clearly, they are the most reliable of guardians. \~/\~/

Delon recites the “rede,” and we get a discussion of souls and reincarnation, whih segues into a discussion of honor, and justice, and society, and immortality. It’s not terrible, but it doesn’t really accomplish anything except giving Ferai a chance to squawk about being innocent, and let Delon giggle about being such a bad boy.

There’s two pages of useless chatter about the Ilsitters’ sanctuary, and the we finally learn about Burel and why Mayam thinks he’s the person these foreign weirdos are looking for. Burel starts his tale, which is almost immediately sidetracked by Egil, Delon, Arin and Ferai squabbling over eye color. Yes, really. That was stupid and I’m taking a drink for it. \~/ Anyway, Burel’s father, Ulry, was a knight who was sent to Kistan by the High King to investigate the increase in Rover activity. He became a crewman on board a Rover ship that was hired by a mage, and manage to read some of the mage’s scrolls when the mage was visiting the high priest of the Fists of Rakka - evil people always work together, you see. It seems the Rovers were raiding more frequently *“to finance a campaign of terror that was to come.”*

So the Rovers increased their raids, thus increasing terror in their enemies . . . to finance a campaign of terror.

Did they play to use the spoils from that campaign to fund another, even greater campaign of terror? \~/ And so on, and so on?

Another scroll refers to hiding a powerful talisman, a green stone, in a silver chest. Ulry decided he had enough information and fled, but was somehow found out, and the mage sent some pirates after him. Ulry met Burel’s mother - somehow - and she, as an Ilsitter, knew the path to the hidden temple and guided him there. The pirates were thus foiled, but the mage sent a demon instead, which showed up demanding Ulry’s blood. Although it could not enter the temple area, that being holy ground, Ulry could not leave. When his now-wife became pregnant with Burel, Ulry finally came out to fight the demon, only to die gruesomely since the demon seemed immune to his sword. Burel has never left the temple area because he believes that the demon will appear and kill him as well.

Arin accepts Burel as the Cursed Keeper of Faith in the Maze, and asks if anyone know the name of the mage who sent the demon. Mayam replies that it’s Doomy.

Drinks: 4

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