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Stunned and blank-faced, then smiling while Jod rushes forward, Sol grimaces with pain in Jod's embrace. "Easy, Jod! Everything hurts." After the kellid puts him down, Sol makes introductions. "This is all that's left of the garrison. Kamilo here is senior officer. " He turns quickly to the garrison. "These are my friends. Jod and Kira. The others are Mulluq, Hannik and Ghroth. Don't worry about their looks. Ghroth is summoned by Hannik; Mulluq looks like a demon but he's a true paladin of Iomedae no matter how many times he says he's not worthy. They are all Knights of Mendev." Returning his attention to the party, Sol continues, "We're marching to take the bunker on the end from the inside. I'm glad you're with us." During the brief period before the march renews, Sol quietly asks Jod and Kira, "Either of you have a healing potion? I'm barely on my feet, and everything stills hurts"
ReSOLving:
"I am not much of a fighter, and these, " Sol lifts a longsword, "certainly aren't my kind of weapons. If it was just me, I'd make a run for it." He straightens up and adjusts his cloak so that the brooch shows plainly at his shoulder. "But the army and my friends are out there, fighting to free us. And there's enough of us that we might make a difference. Let's secure this building, then see how it looks outside before deciding further."
Quantum of Solace: "I can try. If the walls are rough, I can probably manage, but lifting the trap door could be tough."
Shuffling his feet in the dark, Sol follows Kamilo to the wall under the trap door. He stretches a little, then feels for, and digs his fingers into, crevices in the rock face and begins to pull himself up.
SOLitude: Sol smiles in the darkness. "Jod must have gotten back to them. " "Captain, I have a few tricks. I could take the appearance of one of them. I might be able to tell a convincing lie or two. I might be able to scare one or convulse one with laughter. That's all. Unless we can lure them down here one by one, I won't be of any more use than the next man." "So what can we do to help ourselves?"
Sol, center of the solar system: "I don't have much, a few minor magics. I just learned how to cast invisibility. That's my best spell. "My friends are an odd grab-bag. Three're good warriors. One's a mage of some power. I stayed alive in Kenabres by sticking with them. I don't think they'll leave me here if they know I've been captured."
Yes, Sol: Sol coughs while he considers his answer. "Not willingly. At least not me. My friends and I kind of fell into adventuring during the demon attack on the city. Since then every able-bodied person has been pressed into service in the crusade, or has fled. We were sent north to scout for the demon forces while the army regroups."
Sol, a campaign unto himself: "Mother? I had a terrible nightmare..." a confused Sol rides that comforting warmth to consciousness. It and the darkness draw a curtain of charity between his piight and his awareness. Lifting an arm slowly toward the shadowed shadow cradling his head tears that veil. Thanks to the healing, his pain is not acute, nor in any way incapacitating, but it is a pointed reminder his recent martial exploits. His arm falls back down, and it is with some little fear in his voice that he asks, " Where am I?"
Sol looks over Kira's shoulder and recoils, hand to mouth. "Why're demons always so, so grisly?" But within seconds, he's putting up a braver front. "Don't let the kiddies see this." By the time she's examined the body, he's recovered himself. "I don't know, Kira. But we'd find someone missing at role call, or when they didn't report in. I'll guess this poor bastard never saw it coming."
"Thanks, guys. That means a lot." Sol says quietly and lapses into silence. A few moments later, the young man comes out of his reverie. " Do you know where I was today? I was riding with the scouts! I asked Captain Orwem, and she said I could on account of our service in
At the march's end, Sol had returned to pitch his tent with his comrades. Turning from tightening a ground line, he joins the somber conversation. "My family farmed a patch a half day's travel from the Wardstone line. I don't remember a lot. Sun in the garden, a cool patch of woods. But my parents loved it, even with all the work. They often talked about it at night. They never did get completely used to life in Kenabres. "One of my dad's greatest regrets was the night the demons attacked and we had to flee. I remember getting lost in the dark. I couldn't find my parents. I was tired and hungry and scared, but a woman found me. She gave me a little food, and caught a lightning bug to give me a little light. But that bug wasn't ordinary. It was bright and had big colored wings. I think she was a angel from Desna. She disappeared just before the crusaders found me. "It was two days before the crusaders got me back to my parents. I don't think they were ever so glad to see me again." Sol shakes his head, corners of his mouth turned down, eyes unfocused and turned down with them.
Sol also wants to ride with the scouts. Younger, and less thoughtful than Jod, the young Kenabresian urges his horse forward to speak with Captain Orwem. Should he even make it to an audience with Orwem: "Captain Orwem, ma'am. I know I don't look like the usual scout recruit, but I've dreamed about riding as a scout in the Crusades for most of my life. If you'll have me, I'd be honored to ride with you until we reach Drezen."
Sol spends the evening quietly. He looks up Aravashniel to see how the blind mage is doing. He also looks in on Anevia solely to tease her. "See, you should have gotten me in with Lady Tirablade's scouts sooner. I'd be a duke by now." And, more soberly, "Are you coming with us? Who knows where the fight will take us after Drezen?" He'll also touch base with Elinda and her kids. Other than that, he was packed and resolved to leave town the day of the attack. He's ready to wander.
Queen gone, a jubilant Sol is feeling saucy again. "Get a room, you two. It's embarrassing the way you flirt," Sol comments as he brushes by on his way to say farewell to Kaygan. He congratulates the mage, wishes him luck, and tells him that he'll visit for magical pointers again some day. For Wendaug and Booam, it's a quick farewell. They were good comrades in the fight, but hardly more than acquaitances. Sol's good bye to Rhok is brief, stiff, and stilted. Afterward he observes to Jod, "I never knew what to make of your kinsman. I was just glad that he was on our side. A little scary in an intensely quiet way."
Sol keeps quiet after his apology and edges back in the crowd a little. When the call comes for knighting, he chooses his time and place carefully so that he maneuvers into the middle of the group when he kneels. He knows he doesn't deserve the additional attention that would go with being first or last. Yes, a nice safe unremarkable middle spot would be best for him. Having no sword himself, and sensitive that one of his daggers might be a trifle ridiculous, perhaps even considered mocking, Sol folds both hands over his raised knee when he kneels upon the other.
After half a breath looking down on the kneeling teifling, Sol realizes that he might have gone too far. He looks unseeingly to the left and right, then drops to one knee himself. "No, no! Mulluq, I'm sorry." "Your majesty it's my fault not his. I only thought to have a little fun and get him the accolades he deserves. I am sorry for embarrassing my friend, and wasting your time."
Sol's jaw hangs open while they walk in and the queen addresses them. He nudges Jod and whispers, "That's the queen." When Kira speaks (we get to talk!?) Sol takes at least one cue from her. He bows before excitedly speaking himself. "Your majesty, I humbly submit that valorous Kira is being far too humble. Although we personally have had both good fortune and help since the demon attack, and the finest of leadership since we were able to reach the Defender's Heart, our actions were not small. After the very heart of Kenabres was destroyed in the demon's initial attack. Crusaders , visitors from neighboring lands, , average citizens , and the most abused, and downtrodden people of our city, , a people forced to live in the shadowed crypts, catacombs, and tunnels beneath Kenabres, banded together and stopped the invasion in its tracks. Coming so quickly after such a terrible defeat, perhaps our victory can not be called great. But it was in no way small." Sol turns his head to review the party and flips Mulluq an evil grin. "And at the forefront of our little band, was a humble man who will be put out that I even mention his part, but who stood at every turn between us and the greatest danger, a man who would rather cut off his own hand than have any of his companions suffer a scratch, a man without whom none of us would have survived the caves let alone aided Irabeth's forces, a man who is not as hideous as he believes, because his golden heart beats true, and who with every choice proves that a man's actions can belie his very birth, a man who denies that he could ever be worthy to be a champion of Iomedae the Inheritor, but whose every action proves him her most faithful servant, Mulluq."
While the party hangs out during several hours of cosseting, Sol fills the others in on what little he knows about the Queen. For the benefit of the out of towners he starts with pedantically obvious information. "You guys must know her royal highness Galfrey rules all of Mendev from her palace in Nerosyan. She's also been running this crusade and fighting the demons longer than my great grandad would have been alive. That only makes sense since Mendev has more to lose than most countries if the demons slip the noose we've drawn around the Worldwound. People say that Iomedae herself keeps the queen young so that she can continue the fight. She's doing that good a job. Some say it's a blessing; others say a curse. The fight has had its price in dead and maimed and the Queen must bear responsibility for over a century of it." "I've got to say she looking pretty well preserved. Not at all like a fossil. If my dad and her had met and hit it off instead of him loosing an arm in the crusade, I could have been a royal bastard."
Party! This could very possibly be the best moment in Sol's life. People are happy, beer flowing, and although his friends did all the heavy lifting, the teenager is more than willing to cash in on their celebrity status. Through the night he repeats incresingly lubricated versions of their exploits. The earliest versions illustrated with illusions of their foes. He never quite makes it to the bedroom. The next morning it's not the excited knight that wakes him. It's the sunlight, and the gentle shoe of a barmaid who wants to swab the floor. He stumbles back to the bedroom in time to catch the party in their preparations. Rubbing his neck he says, "I had the greatest dream about us all last night." The dream made such an impression, he forgets to boor them with tales of ridiculous drinking.
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