A few folks ran down the street to one of the little shops, eventually emerging with an old man who hobbled towards the scene of the crime with no particular urgency.

"He's not the police for this town is he?" I asked Nadine as we watched the spectacle from a distance. "Surely they have some younger officers to take care of this."

"What's police?" asked my guide with a perk of curiosity. "Is that what you call your undertakers? Old Morris has boys for taking the bodies and coffins, but his hands still calm, he can do the work no young man can do." She gave a nod of confidence and then looked back to where the old man had finally arrived at the stall. He knelt down, slow and shaky, placing his wrinkled hands onto the fallen man's neck.

"Gone. I think I have a box for him, might have to make a few adjustments, but we'll be able to bury him in the morn Luci." The woman hollered and wailed in her grief, grabbing at the dead man's clothes soaked with blood from the wound in his side. She fell onto his chest while Old Morris took out some measuring tape to make sure that box would work. I admired his ability to get the numbers he needed even as the broken hearted Luci blocked his way. That admiration though didn't change the boiling anger that bubbled in my stomach and bit at my eyes.

"Why isn't anyone chasing after those people?" I asked through gritted teeth. "Where are your police? Aren't there any soldiers here?"

"Ah, police mean soldier," said Nadine with a clap of her hands. Her excitement dissipated immediately though. "No soldiers. Only farmers. Only merchants."

"How do you have no law enforcement here? Didn't you guys just have soldiers at the temple last night?"

"They travel long. Early war after Tearing made the gate not safe to be. Royalty moved far and there capital stay. Breydar army once protect these lands, but our numbers now small and the king's army too far away."

"So no one watches over these people," I asked, looking around at the street which has resumed their day, finishing off sales and packing up their stalls for the night, while Luci is pulled from her beloved's corpse and Morris's men haul the body off to the undertaker's.

"They watch themselves and their goods. Food is rare. It is valuable."

"So why doesn't the king protect such a necessity," I asked, getting more and more frustrated with the man that kidnapped Gwen.

"Because they have other towns to protect closer. This just here for travelers." Nadine shrugged and then turned her eyes to some place down the road. "That why such a big inn. We need to find room. Maybe they have none." She sighed at the prospect of no vacancies before trudging down the street with a now loaded pack of food. However, I couldn't just leave the woman crying on the ground.

She wasn't alone. After taking care of their wares, some of the locals came over to console her, but she was rapidly progressing from grief to anger and soon she was throwing her friends from her and rising to her feet.

"Where is Zane? Where is that terrible wretch?" She now stormed out into the street, hollering from the top of her lungs. "Zane! You get out here you drunken leech! You come out right now or I'll drag you out!"

No one told her to quiet and instead they glanced around, as if curious he'd follow her orders without hesitation. Which seemed strange if she were calling out the villain she must suspect to be the mastermind behind this armed robbery.

"Zane!" Tears poured from her eyes and coated her ruddy cheeks. Again a few friends came to call her back, to coax her to their house where they could make her tea, but again she threw them off, demanding this man to appear.

"Yelling does nothing," sighed Nadine, who returned to my side, apparently given up on having me leave the matter alone. "He don't listen to no one."

"Who is he?" I asked.

"He's at tavern next to the inn. You meet him after I get a room if so interested." She grabbed my hand and dragged me away, just as others did the same to the sobbing Luci.

Nadine managed to secure us a room, but instead of dropping our things off and going to the tavern, she kept the pack on her back, claiming that those three from earlier weren't the only ones driven to steal.

"Then let me carry it," I offered as we made our way to the tavern. "You shouldn't be burdened with it all the time. I am your apprentice after all, shouldn't I be the one carrying the weight." I make my petition with a smile, but she simply pushes the tavern door open and gives me another one of her cryptic answers.

"You aren't ready for the weight."

With a groan I followed her in.

"Luci's been hollering for you," said a large bearded man with fists as big as bowling balls down by his sides. "And you just sit here drinking like you not a care in the world."

"You, sir, are as astute as a rock."

The one to respond was a gaunt man with long brown hair tied back with little effort so that stray strands stuck out at odd angles and the rest rippled along his scalp. He wore clothing too big for his small frame and boots that needed a good shine to clear away months worth of grime.

"What you say?" growled the man, but the barkeep threw out an arm and stopped the hulking man from crushing the wispy figure hunched over the bar.

"Enough Vern," she said with a cold glare. "What good would he do anyway? Those rogues would have him butchered in a minute."

Vern flared his nostrils and forced a fit of air through them that looked strong enough to knock the man, I presumed to be Zane, over. However, the lanky figure held his ground upon his stool and took another sip of his beer.

"King cares nothing of us if all he could send was this pathetic excuse for a soldier." Vern slammed his hand down on the bar, knocking a few empty glasses over and tumbling to the floor.

"Get going Vern," growled the barkeep.

"Fine, fine, I'm leaving. Luci needs good men for finding those bandits. I ain't going to do her good here." With that Vern and a few other folks headed out of the bar, while the barkeep scooped up the mugs and went back to work.

"I thought you said there weren't any soldiers here," I said, turning to Nadine.

"Does he look a soldier." It wasn't really a question because I certainly couldn't deny his haggard appearance.

"Now you see Zane. We return to the inn now?" She posed the question and it was reasonable for her to urge me to drop this and get some sleep. Yet, somehow I knew I shouldn't walk away. Instead, I gave her no answer at all. I walked forward, weaving my way around tables, making my way to the bar.

"Hello, I'm Tessa," I said, offering my hand, uncertain what I expected out of the meeting.

"Do I look like I..." He turned with a surly scowl on his face, but once his green eyes met mine, words caught in his throat. He struggled. He tried to get a few words out, but nothing left his lips. A shaky hand massaged his stubbled chin, but still nothing coaxed an answer.

I kept my hand out, offering it all the same. I couldn't look away from him, I couldn't walk away. I felt Nadine watching me, but she didn't intervene. I knew she wouldn't. A part of me just felt that this was what was supposed to happen and that she knew her role in this play. It appeared that only Zane struggled to accept it. That is until he took a deep, shuddering breath and grabbed my hand.

A spark, a flame, a burst of energy passed between our palms and a little thread tied us together in that moment. We were bound together and with that Zane finally found words.

"I knew you'd come for me. I always knew that a part of me was missing."

I found my first aspect.