Bitter bargain

JP with Winteroak and Bandorchu

‘There is nothing free in this mountains. Everything comes with a price.’
Yeah. Alexis remembered.

Why did she even consider this? This could very well be just the ramblings of a madman. His search was taking a toil on him, it was plain to see.

And yet… she did believe him, somehow.

“Name it.”

"I need your help to retrieve an item." He said picking up a nearby stick and adding it to the fire. "I will lead you to one of your friends and in exchange you help me getting it back." He offered.

She frowned.

“One of them? What about the other?”

If this was really true - had they been separated? What had happened to them?

"The other I give to you once our bargain is complete..." He looked at her once again...

She returned his gaze, looking into his eyes. Searching.

“… and this item of yours. Where is that supposed to be?”

"The Gate City. Ostiarium." Came the quick reply.

Alexis was highly tempted to tell Tar where he could stuff his bargain then and there, and it showed on her face.

She snarled and got up abruptly to take a few steps, trying to calm herself down.

Ostiarium! That was what, more than a week’s travel away? Plus whatever time it would take to get the man his accursed item. Did he honestly expect her to agree to leave behind one of her friends for at least two to three weeks? That was a fucking long time she could spend on good old fashioned searching rather than relying on a man of questionable sanity claiming he had been ‚shown‘ her friends‘ whereabouts.

She was pacing now, forcefully trying to tone down her aggravation so she wouldn’t say or do anything she might regret later.

"I know what happens next. I saw you in my dream." His voice was barely a whisper but seemed echo on the growing dusk. "You will do this again. He sees you, He sees all. The Red star. Red stars rise. Twins. There is a shadow upon us..."

She whirled around to him, starting to get seriously furious now with his cryptic words.

“What the fuck are you even going on about? What will I do again? Who’s ‘he’? What freaking stars?”

She threw her hands up in frustration. This whole chac just flew right above her head. How did she even end up like this, in the middle of nowhere, listening to some crazed wannabe doomsayer, when she should be looking for her friends?

"Fosia..." He replied. "God of Fire and Ash. Gatekeeper of the ancient blood-life of these mountains. Father of Fang." He held his hand over the flames feeling its searing heat for as long as he could. "He calls on me." He looked up. "And now you..."

He pulled his had away before it could burn. "That is the deal Alexis Greyriver... Your sacrifice. One soul before the next..."

Alexis sighed and massaged her temples, suddenly feeling very tired. She barely acknowledged Tar knew her full name when she never gave it to him. This whole mess just made no freaking sense at all.

She most certainly didn’t hear anyone or anything ‘calling’ her. Why would an indigenous Arcadian fire deity take any interest in some insignificant hired blade from across the sea that had just stumbled her way into his realm in the first place? What was she even supposed to sacrifice for?

It didn’t seem like Tar would give her any answers to that, if there were indeed answers to be had. This weren’t even answers she had been looking for before she came back here.

She… just wanted to find her friends. That was all.

Alexis looked back at Tar.

“Who am I looking for?”

"An assassin and a hunter. A man and a young woman. Both are in bounds of servitude. One is in chains. Half dead. The other is stalked by a relentless foe." He told her in that far way voice that she would come to recognize that he used when he was trying to remember things he could not have seen with his own eye.

Alexis stared at him for what had to be a full minute, her mind struggling to wrap itself around what she had heard.

‘Half dead.’ ‘… stalked by a relentless foe.’
She wanted to believe that this was … was all just madness talking. Only did this madness know things it should not.
And if what Tar said… had been ‘shown’… was true, then both her friends were in grave danger.
Taking his deal meant she only had a chance to help one of them.
Not taking it…
… possibly neither.

Another minute went by in silence.

“Deal.”