The music picked up for some high energy dancing which Casavir and Avera opted out of. The hobbit was tired from the long day and the dancing she had already been involved in. They went back to their table to find that Shandra had gone to her room. Avera wasn't surprised. Khelgar was having a drinking contest with a man by the bar while Neeshka and Elanee were quarrelling about whether Elanee should introduce herself to this nice looking elf a couple of tables back. Grobnar continued playing music that people were requesting.

Avera glanced at her mug. There was nothing in it so she got up to get some more. Her hand touched Casavir's as she left the table, and she turned her head to smile at him as she hopped down from the higher flooring to the lower. She almost skipped over to the bar and requested a drink from Sal when a hand grabbed her by the elbow, “There is something I need to tell you.” Darmon pulled her behind the wall which held the fireplace, “It is about that man you travel with … Casavir.”

Avera cocked her head slightly, raised her right eyebrow and squinted at him with her left eye, “And?”

“That is the reason I wanted you to ride with me back to Neverwinter when you saved my horse and myself from those bugbears.”

Casavir noticed Avera being pulled to the side so he walked in that direction. He stopped as he realized that Sir Darmon was speaking to her on the other side of the wall. He turned to the nearest table, and sat down with his back to Sal.

He had noticed both the ranger and Darmon glaring at him after Avera’s dance. He ignored them so that he could enjoy mutual dances with the little woman, but now he wasn’t sure if he should have ignored this man. He had to know what Darmon would say even though his brain told him it was wrong to eavesdrop.

Behind the other side of the wall, Avera’s arms crossed her chest as she watched the officer of the nine, “What do you mean?”

“He left his order. It was a disgrace.”

“I know that he left his order. What is it to you?”

“The thing is what it should be to you. You do not know why he left his order and you need to know. You have to stay away from him.”

“Is that so?” Her tone was deadpan. Casavir’s hopes rose as he realized that she was not accepting the officer trying to turn her against him.

“Look, he left his order because …”

Avera put up a hand, “Did Casavir tell you why he left?”

Darmon blinked and tried to figure her out, “No. He just ran off without warning.”

“Then where did you get your information from?”

“I got it from a man named Pierval. He knows what happened. Believe me; you have to stay away from him. He …”

“If Casavir wishes to tell me the reason for him leaving his order then he will do so himself. You have no right telling me to stay away from him. Next thing you will be telling me is that I have to stop being around Neeshka.”

He didn’t catch the hint, “You do need to.”

“Excuse me?” Casavir cringed at the tone she used. He almost felt sorry for the other man. Well, not really.

“They will cause problems for you and tarnish your name. You have to make them leave.”

“Are you so used to commanding troops that you need to tell everyone in your life what to do? Do you not warn a person that you believe there is a problem; talk to them about possible issues; or discuss things you believe is important ... but instead tell them that they have to do something?” Her voice started to rise, “Who in the nine hells are you to tell me whom I should associate with? If I wanted a lecture I would go back to West Harbor and whiz on my father’s good shoes!”

Casavir almost choked. He chuckled quietly then noticed the ranger in the seat directly across from him, listening in as well. They glared at each other momentarily then decided to leave everything as a truce for the moment. If they did anything else then Darmon and Avera would hear them.

Darmon backed up from the little fury, “I’m only concerned with your welfare.”

“Maybe so, but I’ll have you know … these people are my friends and I care for them. They are family. They stand with me because they want to! Not because they are under my command as they are not soldiers or anything like that!” She snapped.

“I did not wish to insult …” He suddenly realized that he had made a huge blunder thinking that the people she traveled with were guard members.

“You should be happy about me being friends with Neeshka. She had been telling me since the night we met that I should take you for a swing in the hay. I am certainly glad that I did not listen to her. I don’t need a person in my life who would be telling me how to run it! My life is mine. No one … no one tells me to get rid of any of my friends. Not even my father!” She snarled.

“I did not realize they were not of the guard. Except for Casavir.”

“As for Casavir ... for your information, I have been traveling with him for months, and he has proven himself many a time to be an honorable man.”

She stalked into the other side of the Sunken Flagon’s bar, and stopped cold. Someone was talking about her. She glanced across the room to see her uncle relaying a story to a customer.

“She took the whittling knife and stabbed him in the eye. That is why I call it the ‘hobbit maimer.’” Her uncle was telling some man about her worst memory. Why was her uncle telling some stranger about her having to stab a man out of self defense before she had even been five?

Darmon tried to follow her but halted as he noticed the hobbit shaking. He had heard Duncan’s words and they sunk in, making him wonder. There was more to the bartender’s story than he was telling.

Avera growled as she moved around the table Casavir and Bishop sat at then over to the fireplace. She removed her whittling knife from the wall and threw it across the room. It stuck into the far wall inches from her uncle’s nose, “That is not a tavern tale! Do you know the whole story to that?”

People stopped what they were doing. Her friends gaped as she clenched her little fists in fury.

Duncan stared at the knife then looked over to his niece, “Yes.”

“Do you tell the whole story?”

“No. Just that you were attacked and you stabbed the hobbit.”

She took a deep breath, “Good. Don’t! Don’t ever!” She screamed then stomped out of the room and ran down the hall to her bedroom.

Casavir got up from his seat in order to go after her when githyanki burst in through the front door.

Nnn

The sound of the door slamming was pleasurable to her ears. She stripped off her new dress and put it up before allowing herself the comfort of flopping down onto her mattress.

A clinking made her turn in surprise. The bouncing had shaken a scroll from it’s spot and beside it was a bottle. She lifted the glass container while looking into it with curiosity. It had an airy scent of strawberries. Her eyes shone with expectation, taking away some of the hurt she had been feeling.

Carefully, she opened the vessel and poked her little finger in then reset the stopper. The liquid was an oil which felt smooth on the skin. She rubbed the oil onto the back of her hand. It felt so good that she had to bite her bottom lip.

This must have been there since she got the dress from Dora. She had changed in the girls’ room upstairs and the children brought her armor down to her room as she went to show the dress off.

Her heart jumped with emotion because of this little treasure. She held the bottle to her chest. It had to be from Casavir. No one else would think of that or even suggest giving her a backrub. What to do now? Certainly he would follow her but here she was in her underclothing. That would look good. Hey baby, I noticed this massage oil. Come get.

A giggle escaped her lips as she grabbed her clean leather armor. It wasn’t as if they could do much even if he was interested in more than giving her a backrub. Her womanly cycle had begun just after she had danced with Casavir. That was luck for her. It didn’t dampen her spirits much because the present was more than enough to keep her in a thrilled state for quite a while.

As she wiggled into her slacks, she noticed the sounds of fighting. Her eyes grew wide as her Uncle cried out an alarm about intruders. Damn. She furiously put on her slacks.

Then her door opened. A githyanki strode into her room instead of her paladin. Her heart sank. She had yet to put on her armored jerkin and here was the enemy, sneering at her, happy to see the Kalach-cha in such a delicate state.

Without a thought she threw the bottle. As it hit the intruder she cringed, but she had no time to mourn the loss of an object. She pulled on the rest of her armor and grabbed her mace.

The githyanki tried to remove shards of glass as her mace pummeled down onto it's head. It fell near her window and tried to get up. But it set off the acid trap Neeshka had set to keep certain individuals from trying to get in. It slid down the lower part of the wall, dead.

She didn’t have time to pay attention to the corpse. Another gith came through. From there she could only hope that there were not many in the hallway. The fighting in the common room sounded nasty. It made her realize there were quite a few of the creatures. But she concentrated on the here and now. There was nothing she could do for anyone else until she got out herself.

It wasn’t an easy to kill gith but she finally managed. She ran into the hall and back into danger. Her uncle was fighting with two githyanki on his own with no weapon at hand. Her temper flared. Her mace took out the ankle of one gith then kept going into the side of the second one. It gave her uncle a chance to start pummeling the one that had fallen to the ground from her foot attack as she took on the one that was still up.

She had never seen her uncle fight. Even out of shape he fought with a passion that indicated a near berserk personality. They were back to back keeping their opponents from getting together to hit on only one of them. It seemed like ages until they were able to kill them. It was only moments, but the fear for her friends made it seem much longer.

Her little legs moved of their own accord to bring her into the common room. She was happy to see that the children had not been in there or they did not stick around.

Khelgar and Neeshka were fighting three gith together in a far corner. They fell one and turned onto another. They were doing well so she turned her attention to more of the room.

She watched as Qara was backed to the fireplace by two other gith. With a scream of hatred, the sorceress made them both burst into flames. Avera ran up to her and stood in front of her protectively, “Dang good job!”

“That was nothing.” Qara reported in her high and mighty manner.

“I know.” Avera winked at the young lady as she turned to see what else was going on. Qara followed her example and looked about as well.

Grobnar and Elanee just finished taking down another enemy. Bishop was shooting his arrows with a blinding speed which made her jealous. She turned from them after making sure that Neeshka and Khelgar were ok.

She ran around the wall that partitioned the Flagon and stopped in wonder. Casavir was fighting back to back with Darmon against five gith. She threw herself into the fray and soon worked her way to her paladin’s side, between him and the officer of the nine. The battle was difficult as more gith came to the fallens' aid but with working together they were able to whittle them down.

They were down to one adversary when she noticed Casavir’s eyes widen. She swirled in order to hit what was behind her but the gith dropped. Multiple arrows stood out from it’s head and neck.

She looked over at the ranger. Bishop sneered then shrugged as if it all did not matter to him.

There were no more githyanki to fight so Avera pulled herself into a chair at the edge of the wall barrier to catch her breath. This was a definite surprise.

Darmon walked over to her, “I will have to inform Lord Nasher about these creatures.” He pulled his hand back as he was about to touch her arm, “I am sorry that I upset you.”

“I know that you only wanted to protect me. You just chose the wrong way to go about it.”

“That is true and I regret it. I hope that you will greet me with pleasure instead of disfavor the next time I come for a drink.” He took her hand, kissed it and left.

Casavir watched as the man removed himself from the Sunken Flagon. He noticed that without thinking of it his hand had navigated itself to the hobbit’s shoulder, “Are you ok?”

“Yes.” She looked up at him, “I had to use your gift.”

“What?” What in the world could she mean by that?

“A gith came into my room before I could get my jerkin on. I threw it to hurt and distract it.”

He put his palm over her cheek, “It was used for your protection. My lady’s life is more important then mere oil.”

As they turned to check out their friends, Duncan came into the common room in a rage, “That lass, Shandra, has been taken! How in the hells did those githyanki get into the city?” Her uncle snapped making everyone realize what the githyankis’ goal had been.

Bishop knelt over one of the dead. A cocky grin adorned his lips as he stood up and looked at Duncan, “Does that matter? You'd best hurry if you want to get her back.” His eyes trailed over the gith to it’s boot, “Look, this one has a sprig of Duskwood trapped in his boot. That means they came from deep within Luskan territory... and that's where they'd be returning to.”

Duncan advanced on the ranger, “Luskan... that's your territory, Bishop.”

“Yes, but it's not my problem.” His no nonsense tone hinted for Duncan to back off, “I'm not going into Luskan territory for some farm girl, and certainly not with any kin of yours, Duncan.”

Avera raised an eyebrow, “You actually think I want you with us? I’d rather recruit a dire porcupine. At least they are less prickly!”

The ranger raised an eyebrow and snorted. She had quite a mouth to her. She was a bard so what did he expect? But she certainly was no gentle bard.

Duncan became forceful, “You'll help them, Bishop, whether you like it or not.”

“And what makes you th...” His voice turned into a cold, sinister snarl, “Calling it due, are you, Duncan? Are you sure?”

“A woman's life is at stake, Bishop. If that's what it takes to move you to do the right thing, then so be it.”

“Fine, it will be worth it to be rid of you - and for such a small price, too. You're a fool, Duncan.” Bishop sneered.

“So be it.”

“What?” Avera growled, “Whoa, hold on there! Since when did you become the leader of this merry little band, Uncle?”

“He knows Luskan so he has to go.” She had never heard her uncle being so uncompromising but this was hers and her companions’ lives at stake. She was not willing to throw in with someone who hated herself and her uncle that much.

"How far away is Duskwood?" Her nose wrinkled in distaste.

"Two, three ... maybe four days depending on how fast those little legs of yours can go."

Her eyes narrowed, "You don't want to see what these 'little legs' can do, Bishop."

"Don't be too sure. I've already seen one wrapped over a paladin, and those dance moves show much more of what they can be used for."

Avera sputtered as Casavir took a step forward, "You shall not treat her with disrespect, ranger."

"I will treat her with whatever respect I feel she deserves."

"You will take that ..."

She put a hand on Casavir's arm and stood, "We don't have time to squabble."

Casavir nodded, "You are correct. We need to get going if we are to save Shandra."

"At least she is not the kalach-cha. They will likely keep her alive for whatever they need to use her for to get into the haven."

“Then that gives us an advantage. We will need all we can get." Bishop grumbled.