Everything was quiet in the dim basement. Eliot was sitting on a bucket while Liza was tying his hair in a ponytail. After finishing it, she grabbed a knife and started cutting his hair vigorously. It was the first time she’d to use so much strength to simply cut someone’s hair.

Simon and Lars were playing “5 stones”, Boro was still sleeping and Ben was lying on his blanket, staring emptily at the ceiling. There was some tension in the air, thus no one spoke.

Soon, the sound of things being moved upstairs reached their ears, followed by footsteps. Simon and Lars stopped playing and rushed to the stairs. The people that came in were Popis and Nicola, both carrying a basket and a linen sack each.

“Big sis! What took you guys so long?”

“We ran into some trouble, but it’s alright now. We also had to buy some stuff, I told you I’d get paid today. Here, the cloaks and other things you asked me to buy,” she said, tossing a sack to Liza.

“Trouble? Is everything okay?” Liza eyed her and Nicola in the weak light provided by the Ghost Mushrooms. She couldn’t see anything wrong with them, only that Nicola was less energetic.

“Yeah, don’t worry, I’ve dealt with it.”

“Ok, if you say so.”

Having finished cutting Eliot’s hair, Liza put the knife away and opened the sack, fishing out the cloaks from inside. She carefully put one on Eliot, wore one herself and tossed the last one at Ben who was still lying on the ground with his hands on the back of his head, staring at the ceiling.

Coming out of his reverie by having his face completely covered by a cloth, Ben gave a long and exaggerated sigh.

“What the hell are you doing? You’ve been staring at the ceiling since you woke up and now you’re sighing so melodramatically. What’s the matter with you?” asked Liza.

“I’m just wondering what’s the point… it troubles me every day. Even here, in this different land, the first thing I thought when I woke up was the same. It’s funny, in weird a way.”

“What’s the point? Of what?”

“Of everything… never mind,” said Ben shaking his head.

He seated up and examined the cloak. It was made of a simple and rough black fabric that covered most of his body. A clasp was used to secure it around the neck and there was a hood to cover your head with. It was one of the most common items for travelers, a very useful piece of garment.

Liza shrugged. She too sometimes thought about such things, but to preoccupy yourself daily with such matters seemed silly to her. There were usually much more practical and worrying things that troubled her mind. Like making enough money to eat, finding information about elves and, more recently, caring for the two troublemakers.

She patted Eliot’s shoulder to indicate she was done and he could move again. He got up and touched his head, feeling a strange sense of lightness. Now, instead of long hair that almost reached his buttocks, he’d short hair that looked like it wanted to go to every direction at once. A permanent case of bed hair. Unaccustomed with the sensation he swung his head around and kept ruffling through his hair with his fingers.

“How are things outside?” Liza asked.

“Bad. There are patrols everywhere and since you walked around town with Boro yesterday a lot of people remember you. They quickly found out the inn. Lucky for you, we managed to get there first. The gates are currently closed, they won’t let anyone in or out of the city,” replied Popis.

“Thanks. I wouldn’t mind losing some stuff, but there was a package I was entrusted with that I couldn’t leave behind.”

“No problem.”

“So, they closed the gates… hum, that’s troublesome. I thought we could hide in a merchant’s wagon or get smuggled out with some of their goods. They can’t keep them closed for too long though, right?”

“Probably true, but they can keep them closed long enough. They’ll either start searching house by house, or worse, offer a good reward for your capture. Then the entire city will be after you. I don’t think you can just wait it out.”

“Sorry, it was I that got you guys in this mess. They probably spent a lot to bring me to this world, they won’t let me go so easily…” said Ben, fiddling with his thumbs. Realizing what he said could give them bad ideas, he complemented: “Or you for that matter, since you guys broke into his manor, killed one of his guards and ended up helping me escape.”

“I told you before, saying sorry doesn’t make it right. Instead of apologizing, help us figure out a way out of this place,” said Liza.

Scratching his head, Ben voiced the first thing that came to his mind.

“What about climbing the walls? From what I’ve seen, Eliot can climb better than a monkey and I’m not that bad at it myself.”

“Impossible. Do you think you could climb a well maintained, six meters tall stone wall? Right underneath the nose of the patrolling guards? I don’t think even Eliot could do it.”

“Err, you’re right.”

“But going over the wall is not completely out of the question. If I take a day or two to try and make him understand, Boro could fly over the wall and secure a rope for us. But it has many risks. First, we need to know about the number of soldiers on duty, their rounds and gather other important information. Popis is already working on that for us.”

“Yep. My friends will be back once they figure out the number of guards, how long they take to change shifts and things like that.”

“Oh, I see…” said Ben. “The walls are troublesome, the gates are a no go, then how about the sewers?”

“Sewers, what’s that?” asked Liza and Popis in unison.

“Urgh… forget it.” Ben gruntled.

They discussed their options, but every plan proposed seemed to contain major flaws that made escaping the city almost impossible. The air was heavy with worry and everyone was scratching their heads, trying to think of a way out. That’s when Ben had an idea.

“Hey, what if…” he began explaining while everyone listened attentively.

-

“And that’s what happened last night, manager,” said Rodney.

“I see. Our little friends are quite bold, it seems. But who could this mysterious third man be? He must be someone important, otherwise the earl wouldn’t react this way,” Barnabas asked rhetorically.

Hearing the question, Rodney smirked. Barnabas was a wise man, a mage that spent many a time reading and deciphering complicated books and acquiring knowledge. Therefore, it was not always that Rodney had the opportunity to be the one leading the conversation and doing the explaining. He thoroughly enjoyed teasing the old man in these rare situations, revealing only morsels of information at a time.

“To tell you the truth, sir, one of my informants figured it out who the man is.”

“Oh, really? Who is he, then?”

“The informant refused to disclose how she found out this information…”

“Right, right, but who is he?”

“But I believe her, she was always trustworthy…”

“OUT WITH IT MAN, WHO IS HE?” shouted an exasperated Barnabas, his spittle flying everywhere.

Realizing he might had gone too far this time, Rodney explained quickly with few words. “A world traveler, sir.”

Barnabas froze for a moment. “That’s impossible,” he finally said.

“I thought so too, but like I said, this informant was always reliable. She probably doesn’t understand the significance, only knowing that it was important information, so she just reported what she’d found out. It would explain why the earl got the entire city in lockdown.”

The old man drummed his fingers on the table, remaining silent.

“What should we do manager? Should we inform the guild master?”

“Tell me, Rodney, how long have we known each other?”

“Around fifteen years, I’d say. Why?”

“Fifteen years… that’s a long time. We’ve been through a lot in this period, so I trust you and your judgment. What do you honestly think about the guild master? Do you like him or the things he stands for?”

“I do not. In my opinion he’s a sleazy merchant that only wants to grow and consolidate his power. The only reason I opted in this whole guild thing was because you asked me to.”

“Oh, yes, the guild. Such innovative and yet simple idea that got me wondering why nobody thought of it before. I was captivated by the concept and all we could do under a single banner… only to be left completely disappointed. The guild master is the one to blame for that.”

“Then?” asked Rodney.

“Yes, we won’t tell him. Nor anyone, for that matter. I dislike him as much as you do and who knows what he’d do with such information? Sell it to the highest bidder? Gather new favours? Try to find and get the otherworlder to do his own bidding?”

“Right, I could see him doing all of that. At the same time, even.”

“Ha! I wouldn’t put it past him. But what should we do?”

“Sir?”

“On one hand I’d like to find this mythical person, talk to him and study the truth of the legends while keeping him somewhere hidden and safe. On the other hand, I wouldn’t like to cross our friends who rescued him in the first place.”

“I didn’t know you held them in such high regard manager, I thought you only found them interesting.”

“Oh, they are interesting indeed! A half-elf, a unique monster and that young man… I don’t believe I’ve told you, but he has the highest mana concentration I’ve ever seen on a human body!”

“What? That dumb looking kid? Is he a paragon?”

“Hahaha, I’ve been wondering that myself the entire time! He could be. I’ve one theory, especially now that they ended up ‘accidently’ rescuing a world traveler.”

“You think it was premeditated? But my informant was there and saw everything, she’d swear up and down it was a coincidence.”

“That might be the case, but who knows? Anyway, it’s all conjecture for now. What’s important this instant is deciding what we should do.”

“A paragon and a world traveler… I wouldn’t like to be on bad terms with either of them,” said Rodney.

“Right, so this is what we’ll do. Spread the word around that we want to help them escape the city. Only use your more reliable sources, after all, we don’t want the Hampshires to find out. With this we’ll establish a communication line in case they come asking for assistance.”

“Okay, so we’ll just help them out without asking for anything in return?”

“Correct. Let’s establish a relationship of goodwill. If they’re half decent they’ll help us out in the future. If they’re not, I doubt we would have managed to make a mutual beneficial transaction anyway.”