Sarah watched the taller women pass her by, and she took a step aside to make more room. They had both smiled warmly at her, yet Sarah did not return the gesture. She hadn’t smiled in days. The young healer only hoped that the red tear streaks under her eyes had faded. After all, she had been too exhausted to weep for a while now.
Lady Buxton had held a finger up to Sarah, politely asking her to wait a minute. Sarah took a look at Buxton, and then at Sir Chester, wondering which of the two was the appointed leader of this mission. She wanted to speak to as few people as possible and thus hasten the moment she could fall into a decent bed for the first time in days. The realization that there would be no warm husband there to comfort her felt like a knife to the chest. But she was still too tired to cry.
The young priest had plucked himself off the ground after receiving a verbal lashing from Sir Chester. When Gawain turned toward her, Sarah recognized she had been wrong in her assumption that the man enjoyed the attention his little sword stunt had afforded him. Rather, he seemed hopelessly lost, and it was obvious he was trying too hard. Sarah felt a twinge of pity, knowing all too well the humiliation of striving and failing to get things “just right”. As she was thinking this, she became acutely aware of the young priest’s gaze. Sarah stiffened a bit, and quickly looked away, hoping he had not been offended by her own stare.
“I am a man of God and Gods, sir. If I ever betray you, I'd not only expect you to drive a knife into my heart, I expect my God and Gods to do the same.”
“God and Gods?” Sarah cringed to herself, she felt irritation well up inside of her. “Good, another indecisive teacher spreading his doctrine of ‘whatever’ wherever he goes”. It was men like this that confused uneducated souls who had not the ability to read the scriptures for themselves. Sarah was convinced that the hypocrisy of claiming a singular god and also a pantheon of deities was one of many reasons why people disdained men and women of faith as fair-weathered do-gooders. “How can one expect to convict another without conviction of self?” Sarah wondered.
Gawain smiled as he approached, and took up a position next to Sarah. Sarah tried to return the courtesy but failed. Instead she gave a slight nod and turned her focus to the short young man who had been discovered at the door. He was obviously taken by surprise but seemed more amused by the attention that he was receiving than he did uncomfortable. His audience was short lived however as he was unceremoniously shoved to the side.
In strode a man whom Sarah would have believed to be the owner of this tavern, had he not been clad in extravagant finery. He took long a deliberate strides about the room and sized up each occupant as though they were for sale. His heavy boots thudded on the plank floor as Orwen approached the dark woman standing nearby and placed his jewelry ribbed fingers on her face. Sarah winced at the sight of such shameless nerve. She was half prepared for a fight to break loose as a dangerous glare filled the exotic woman’s eyes.
“Sir Chester, lady Buxton, if I may be so free.. what a shithole.” Orwen grinned heavily and looked towards Karen and then towards the soldiers. “And I thought I paid you all for amassing a company, a true soldiers esquadron. This is more like.. like a militia. No, it's not even that. A militia has uniforms.. hmm.. This is more like a band of robbers, waiting in the bushes for a lady like her-” Orwen pointed at Sarah, with no shame. “-to pass by and then beat her senseless, take her valuables, take her if she's unlucky and then possibly take her captive and enslave her.”
Sarah stiffened when the man pointed at her, and smoothly she stood up straight with as much dignity as she could muster. She locked eyes with this Orwen and gave no expression save for the slightest tilt of her chin toward the ceiling. “Women like me don’t travel alone” she thought defiantly to herself. But she would say nothing to this obscene man, whom she guessed would enjoy nothing more than a clumsy objection to his provocative scenario.
“Speaking of enslavement, do you two know how much slaves I had to sell to rent this place for the time you required it?” Orwen said a grin, as if it was funny, as if slavery was some joke. “Two, my lady, good sir. Two slaves. I sold my best two slaves, strong men who can work the land. I hope this is worth it. I have more funds at the ready, but at the moment you'll have to make due with this.”
Sarah was not terribly surprised to learn that the man was in fact a slave trader. Still, the young healer had never met a slave trader and she could hardly believe that such a brigand was standing before her now. Surely Sir Chester and Lady Buxton would arrest him for his confession? Alas, it appeared that this “Orwen”, was not only receiving a pass for his injustice, but was also expected as a sponsor of the Consano! Sarah wondered what sort of mission this really was, and began to consider if she had made a mistake in coming here.
“Phew. If you lot thought I stank, I can hardly imagine what this guy reeks of. Ah! Wait, I think I can guess. Mommy issues and dirty money, right?”
The young healer’s eyes widened a bit at the plucky adventurer who stood before the slave trader, his legs wide apart and a finger shoved into the space before Orwen’s face. “He wasted no time jumping back into the spotlight” Sarah wondered if this foolhardy fellow was able to back up his grand words. Somehow, it seemed doubtful.
The young woman glanced around at Lady Buxton and Gawain to see if anyone else was as unimpressed by this situation as she.
