Two horsemen ride up to a tavern...

The still shimmering form of Callahan listens intently to the fierce exchange from a short distance, his demeanor unchanging, "The wizard simply forgets that Intelligence without wisdom to guide it is worthless. It is not his fault though; the fish misses not the lands he cannot walk, for he never had legs to start with."

Thrandimir ignores Callahan entirely, but chuckles at Kou's fiery response. "You can call me whatever you like, Keeper," he tells the monk good-naturedly.  "I have no doubt that you will keep your word to those boys and the credit for that is your own. Do not hand it so lightly to Tempus who has done nothing to earn it. You want to hear about future cost? Give an enemy spellcaster but a sliver of a chance and they will make you regret it. I may have just saved your life. That's what it's all about, Kou, the greater good. You only have to do more good on balance ."

"The deeds are done, its is time to ride, we have a long road ahead." Kaed mounts up, his effortless seat showing a lifetime spent in the saddle . "Thrandimir made his choice and I have little expectation of him changing his ways. His is not an evil we must fight, it is merely pragmatism in his eyes. If that spellcaster had wished to die in his bed an old man he should have walked a different path." Without looking back Kaed begins to move his horse off in the direction they had been heading in.

Katrin doesn't say anything during the heated discussion. She collects her horse, and sheathes her sword again. Her patience is beginning to wear thin with Thrandimir and Callahan's moral difference. As she rides past Cal, she merely says "You can't change minds that don't believe they need to be changed."

Ascian had been silent throughout the exchange, lifting the fine cloak he'd pulled from the pile of treasures and seemingly focusing his attention instead on the way the sunlight reflected off of it, melting it back into the landscape. It's a long moment before he looks up again to see Kaed riding onward and leads his own horse over to where Thrandimir has made a throne of the wagon and lingering beside it. He looks up at the wizard for a long moment, considering, and waits for the others to surge into motion to ostensibly follow Kaed and Katrin. At last, he asks,  "Do you really believe that? That it comes down to the balance?"

Thrandimir nods down to Ascian like a wise old king. "That is what I was taught when I was a child and it stands to reason, based on what I have read over the years. Some might dispute it, but holy texts and priests tend to agree on one thing; that one is 'weighed'. That implies a kind of balance. How else can a soul be judged? Nobody is perfect. Nobody is perfectly good. Everybody has committed one kind of indiscretion or another. What is important is that, overall, you do more good than ill. If by killing this man I have saved a dozen families from starvation, then his execution was an act of good."

Ascian's quiet, and it clearly seems to strike something in him, as evidenced by the look of consternation on his normally impassive face. After a pause the look clears and he nods, vaulting himself into his saddle. "I hope you're right," he says simply, gathering the reins into one hand and turning the stamping horse back in their destination's direction. He blinks down at the dead mage.  "Not about him. Just. In general." His attention flicks back up to study Thrandimir a moment longer before he nudges his horse into motion after Kaed.

Back on the road, the rest of the day passes quickly. Kou is able to quickly point out a small clearing a few feet back from the road that will make for a suitable campsite. Camp is set up in relative silence, with the battle and heated comments after weighing on everyone's mind. Food and water are consumed, and the group sets up their watch rotation for the night.  Ascian and Thrandimir are up first for the watch. The fire casts dancing shadows across the parked cart. Wind whistles slowly through the trees surrounding the clearing. The summer night is comfortably cool while near the warmth of the fire.  Ascian feels a brush of warm air on the back of his neck, as if a stranger had snuck up behind the rogue and was crouching there, breathing. He whirls around, but there is nothing behind him but the grass, shrubs, and trees of the wood.

The nearly-white hairs on Ascian's arms are on end as he rises from where he'd been sitting to quickly pace to the other side of the fire, gaze flicking upwards to the woods every few seconds as if a phantom might appear there, a faint frown creasing his brow. Experimentally, he stretches his hands towards the fire as if to warm them, somewhat alarmed rather than comforted by the glint of silver from one. It had felt so real . Slowly, he rubs his eyes with his ringless hand and then runs it roughly across the back of his neck, as if expecting to feel that same gasp of warmth again; instead it's met with the nighttime coolness that had filled every moment prior to this since the sun had gone down. He swallows, and glances uncertainly to Thrandimir, shifting his weight as he reluctantly extends both palms back toward the fire. "You didn't feel anything. Just now?"

"Hm?" Thrandimir queries, looking up from his books. "Feel what?"

It was the answer Ascian had been expecting, and simultaneously the one he'd been hoping not to hear. Slowly, jerkily, he retracts his hands and shakes his head. "I thought I felt...nothing, nevermind. I probably just need sleep." At his own words he pauses and frowns, thinking back to the last time he'd actually felt the need to do that. It was...days ago, now; not since the night they'd gotten back from the orcs, and even then it had been barely a handful of hours. And when he'd woken up... He glances down at his own chest, unmoved by breath, and slightly twitches his head again. Better not to think of that, or the brutal smoke that had risen out of him earlier, or the phantom breath on his neck, or the disappearing tower. But the list of things to bury is steadily growing longer with every set of the sun, and alongside it a creeping sense of panic. He looks uncertainly at Thrandimir and hesitates, but the need for a rational answer is too great. "Not doing it - sleeping...what does that do to you. Can it make you see things?" He looks at the sleeping party members before adding reluctantly,  "Things that aren't there."

Thrandimir closes his book and looks Ascian in the eyes, to assure his friend that he has the wizard's full attention. "It can," he admits with a slow nod. "Are you not sleeping?"

"Not since we went back to Fireblade. Three nights ago."  He shifts his weight uncomfortably.  "I don't know what it means."

For a moment -- a mere half-second, Ascian's vision flickers, and Thrandimir, the cart, the fire, and the rest of the party are gone, replaced by empty grass, reminiscent of the tower earlier that day. Moss grows on the trees, which appear less hardy -- as all living things tend to look in this other  place.  Then the wizard is back, along with the cart, the fire, and the rest of the party. 

Ascian sinks slowly to the ground as the scenery warps back into focus, his mouth dry and somehow numb, as if the words he’d intended to say had stayed behind in the world of moss and shadow. For a long moment he stares unblinkingly at Thrandimir from his new seat, waiting for him to finally admit he’d seen the shifting too. When the wizard doesn’t, Ascian adds on to his statement with a long shaky exhale of,  “I don’t think it’s good.”

Thrandimir's brow wrinkles and he eyes Ascian with concern. "You don't seem tired..."  the wizard observes. "One moment," he adds, opening his spellbook again and beginning to weave a ritual of detect magic around his friend.

"Well, you're not magical, " Thrandimir tells Ascian with an almost embarrassed chuckle. "Maybe we should ask a cleric?" He adds, nodding to the sleeping forms of Katrin and Kou.

If Ascian had breath to hold while Thrandimir was casting he would have done so, waiting for some sort of dismissive handwave from the wizard to tell him it was something magic could easily fix. When the opposite comes, he visibly tenses, following Thrandimir's glance to where Katrin and Kou lay. Neither had been quite so vehement against his methods as Callahan, but... Slowly, stiffly, he nods.   "If you think they might know something. They may think I'm mad." He pauses. "I might be."

Thrandimir hesitates when he notices Ascian's reaction. "Well... I'm sure that it can wait until morning," the wizard adds, kindly. "It's just you and me for now. Why don't you tell me more about all this? Why would anybody think that you're mad for insomnia? Is there more to it?"

“I’ve always had it. Sort of. Seeing things. It’s just never been this bad. Earlier, with the bandits, I lost the tower for a second. Fell straight to the ground.” He rubs his eyes with his thumb and middle finger hard enough to see stars - though mercifully not more moss than there had been when he’d first closed them.  “I’m not hungry either.”  His hand drops heavily back to his lap as he looks baldly at Thrandimir and dully admits,  “Or breathing.” 

For a moment, Thrandimir gives Ascian a look like he's just explained that he has a second head, before stepping in close to the pale boy and placing the palm of one hand flat on his chest.

Ascian's skin is cool beneath his clothes -- much more than Thrandimir's own on the cool summer evening. Even more troubling is the apparent lack of a heart beating in the younger man's chest.

" Hm ," Thrandimir marvels, only slightly perturbed. He rubs the back of his neck, warming the hand against his own skin, and looks Ascian up and down before meeting his eyes again. "I mean... if I didn't know any better, I'd say that you were undead . You don't eat, sleep or breathe. You have no heartbeat. I don't suppose you recall dying, do you?"

"What. No. Of course not. "  He stares in incomprehension at Thrandimir, having jumped slightly at how warm the wizard's hand had been. "Undead? That can't be right. How would that happen." A horrified pause, as the facts Thrandimir had laid out in front of him continue to stare at him, harder and harder to argue with. He glances again at Kou and Katrin, with their holy passion, and back. "Undead are monsters. Hunted."

"I said  'if I didn't know any better'," Thrandimir assures Ascian. "It doesn't add up. You don't match any of the descriptions of undeath that I've read about. This is something different, but the similarities are noteworthy.  It's clearly magical, but it defies detection.  Is there anything else that you can tell me about what has been happening to you? How did you lose the tower?"

"I don't know. I was jumping, and I reached for it. It wasn't there. Everything was greyer. And then when I hit the ground, it was."  He shakes his head, not realizing he's been violently twisting his ring and the skin beneath it until it's already red and raw. Slowly, he forces his fingers to still and looks back at Thrandimir. "It's not the first time. It's been happening ever since I can remember. I don't...have the easiest time telling when I'm awake and when I'm asleep." He looks back at the silver band on his finger, still ringed with terse skin. "This helps. Normally. I don't have it when I'm dreaming. But it's starting to happen more and more when I'm awake. Or think I'm awake." He thinks of the moss and the too-quiet campfires and the snow he'd seen back at Fireblade, when they're headed towards summer. Begrudgingly, he admits,  "Twice just now."

"Now that sounds like you are somehow phasing through the walls of this plane," Thrandimir notes with a little too much excitement, tossing his hand dramatically in front of him. "I bet that Marianne would know more there. That dark, grey world is a mirror of our own. Some things are the same," the wizard explains, holding out his palm,  "others different," he adds, flipping it over, "but everything is cold and washed out. That would explain the 'almost undead, but not quite' thing. You've always experienced this? Your whole life?"  Thrandimir seems surprised, but fascinated.

"Yes. Some of my first memories are there. Grey. Or maybe they're dreams. I don't know." He frowns faintly despite Thrandimir's enthusiasm, unable to share it in the face of the same cold, dull dread. "It's getting worse. Quickly. If I am  doing that - phasing. It wouldn't be dreams, then." That thought is somehow just as alarming as the thought of undeath had been.  "Is there a way to stop?"

Thrandimir strokes his beard in thought. "There are places where the walls between worlds are thin. It's almost like you are a place like that. Perhaps what you need is an 'anchor'. Something that holds you here. That would be a powerful enchantment, but we could investigate the possibility when we next reach a city?"

"That's what I tried to make this. And these." He holds up his ring, before rolling up one of his sleeves to show large, thick black glyphs tattooed up and down his arm. More can be seen just at the edge of his collar. "If you know of magic that can do it, I'll try. I'm out of ideas." He pulls his sleeve back down, looking exhausted in the firelight, though his body disagrees.  "That's the reason I was in Fireblade. I'm trying to find someone who can help. And money to pay them."

Thrandimir nods in understanding. "We'll get this job done and then we can see what we can do. Do you mind if I talk with Katrin or Kou about this?" He holds Ascian's gaze with a solemn expression as he seeks permission.

He gives Thrandimir a long, measuring stare before he finally stiffly shrugs. “If you think it will help. I don’t want them to think I’m a liability.” 

The wizard shrugs back. "I'll see if I can be discreet. I won't ask if I don't think that it's to your advantage. There's just a divine divination that I'd like them to cast for me."

His expression clears from discomfort to give the wizard a quizzical look instead. “Divination for what?”

"It reveals if the subject of the spell is an aberrant, celestial, elemental, fey, fiendish, or undead creature." Thrandimir explains. "Just as a kind of check, to be sure."

“Oh. Your magic can’t do that?” He eyes Thrandimir’s spellbook doubtfully. “There’s more to you than just illusions. I at least know that.” 

"My magic is arcane," Thrandimir explains, patiently. "This incantation is divine magic, from the Gods. That's why Katrin or Kou should be able to help."

“Alright. Gods are about all I haven’t tried,”  he admits, looking to the book again and standing. “I’ll stop interrupting your studies.”

Thrandimir shakes his head with a smile. "Helping a friend is not an interruption. We watch each other's backs," he assures Ascian, as they settle back down.

The night looks so different to Kaed now, he quietly marvels as he takes his watch. Back to the low fire he views the world in a grayscale that he is slowly becoming used to. He sees Ascian, somehow still keeping awake move a little, the willowy man an enigma. From a people who value brawn Kaed's own lithe build often meant he had to stand up to larger men who wanted to assert dominance over him. Despite the fact that most had failed, the tribesman still equated size with prowess, Ascian, despite looking like a strong breeze would knock him down had proven lethal, claiming many kills with his bow, and he seemed as hardy as any, Kaed knew that he needed more sleep than his friend for one thing. Still, he reflected, a person's business was his own, he wouldn't pry. His thoughts turned back on themselves, to his childhood, to the days after his father had left.  There had been many whispers, many furtive glances at Kaed for months afterwards, he remembered hearing phrases like, dark-hearted, wraith, and a terror of the night, as they muttered, and make warding signs.  He had assumed, and nobody had ever offered him a reason to doubt himself, that it was figurative speech. From what he recalled his father had been a killer in every sense of the word, a legend on the battlefield but a danger away from it too. His mother had always seemed scared of him,  but then many of the women in his tribe had been scared of their abusive husbands, men who believed that might made right. But it occured to Kaed now that maybe there had been something literal in their words, he seemed to becoming a part shadow himself, it was locked behind the power he drew on in combat but there were other things bubbling under the surface, things he had no idea of, but they seemed to well up inside him during times of peril. It was both wonderful and terrifying. Kaed stared out into the night, seeing his new world, relishing it, the smile creeping across his face one showed joy, unadulterated save for the the unnatural red eyes above them that no human should possess. So, it was possible he had his father to thank for this blessing, he might have to thank him should their paths cross in the future. Kaed idly thought a fitting gift might be to kill him quickly, rather than the slow and deliberate manner he had planned over the years since his mother had been taken from him.

The night continues on uneventfully. The morning sun peaks over the trees and the warm summer sun begins to evaporate the dew. The group prepares to set out for the day. It's only another two days to the Hydellian Retreat.

Katrin's eyes flutter open as the first rays of sun touch the wet grass around their camp. She pushes herself into a seated position, drawing her hair back over her shoulders and tying it up to keep it out of her face. Something glints in her eye, and she remembers the sword she'd laid next to her the night before. She grabs the hilt and stands up. Moving to the dying fire, she kneels near the flames, placing the blade lengthwise through the coals. She mutters a short proverb, and the sword flashes bright. She lifts it from the fire, and it maintains a dull glow. Wonder how this day is going to go.  She looks around at her still-sleeping companions, her gaze resting between Thrandimir and Callahan. Their conflict had started so suddenly and to her eyes, had no end in sight. Her patience with the two was starting to wear thin.    

It took significant effort for Kou to rouse himself for the early morning watch, sleep had eluded him through out the night. The arguments from yesterday continued to reverberate throughout his head. The scene replaying over and over each time he tried to close his eyes, seeing the man surrender, witnessing him being bound and restrained and finally seeing his throat cut open by one Kou would name an ally. But what truly kept sleep at bay, was that when the scene replayed it happened just as it did. Thrandimir slitting the mans throat while Kou stood there watching. The thought continued to nag at him during his watch, even his meditations couldn't clear his mind.  His master once told him that when the storms of doubt fill your head sit and observe the world. He could almost hear the old man's words "Slow your breathing, empty your mind, and open your senses to what lies around you. Let the world wash over you and see what truth it brings."   Focusing himself he listens to the rhythmic breathing of his allies as they sleep, his eyes tracking the flight and dive of a hawk as it ensnares it's prey, the smell of a blooming flowers carried by the breeze. But no matter where his focus wandered, his mind continued to drift back to the incident. The only thing that provided some distraction was finding Ash awake. The boy must be part elf, Kou had never seen him rest.  His meditations continued as the rest of the party began to stir and begin their day, a burst of activity where before there had been nothing but stillness. It is in that moment that the truth strikes him, it wasn't Thrandimir's brutality that has unbalanced him. It was his own inaction, Kou stood by and did nothing while a man who had surrendered was slaughtered. Kou had trained himself to be fast there may have been a chance he could have stopped the blade, Kou is a skilled healer through methods both mundane and divine if he tried he could have prevented death from claiming the man. But he chose the path most foreign to him, that of inaction. The realization strikes him like lightning reinvigorating his spirit. Finally understanding his error the rest no longer mattered,  he ended his mediations with a quiet oath to himself "By Tempus never again."

Thrandimir stretches as he wakes and decants a little water from his skein to wash his face with. Ascian is still up, of course, and one by one the others seem to be rising. Seeing that Katrin has risen early, the wizard grabs a bite of hardtack to chew on from his pack and heads over in search of the Dwarf's counsel. "Katrin, might I have a word?"

Katrin blinks, and brings herself back to the present. "Something I can help you with, Thrandimir?"

"Yes..." the wizard ponders distantly, "have you prayed yet this morning? I'm in need of a particular spell. A divine incantation that priests use to identify supernatural creatures. It's quite elementary, I'm sure you know it. Can you help me?"

Katrin studies the wizard's face as she speaks. Can I help? Of course I can. But she knew that wasn't the question he was asking. Will you help. But who do you want me to help? You? Or someone else? "I haven't yet. And I know the spell. What do you need it for?"

"Ascian is experiencing some... unusual magical phenomena," Thrandimir explains, choosing his words carefully. "I've not been able to detect any enchantments so far, but we'd appreciate if you could check his aura. Just to be on the safe side."

Katrin nods, considering the predicament. "I'll help. I'd like to talk to him first. Unless he would rather keep whatever this is a secret between the two of you, but it would help to know what I'm supposed to be looking for." She walks over to a clear space near the edge of camp and sinks to her knees. "Give me one moment." She closes her eyes and begins her prayers, tapping into the divine presence held within her soul. A few minutes of this, and she opens her eyes. She nods to Thrandimir indicating her readiness.

"That's up to Ascian," Thrandimir admits, leading Katrin over towards Ash while they continue to quietly talk. "I just want to help the boy. He needs guidance and the warmth of a friend. I don't think that there's anything acutely dangerous at play. This is mostly just to rule some things out. If all goes to plan, then you won't sense anything and he'll appear entirely normal and human."