Where Lies Adventure!

OF GODS AND MEN Chapter 4: Sword and Service         Tarsus stood at the ready.  A large, haphazardly armored man with a rusty, notched sword stood poised opposite him.  The look in the warrior’s eyes was clear: he meant to harm Tarsus, if he could. Tarsus drew his own sword, a larger hand-and-a-half bastard blade that was polished and much sturdier than his enemy’s weapon.  He focused on his opponent across the way, and spared a thought for what Drake had told him so many years ago. “Forget everything but the most immediate threat,” Drake had said.  “That threat is a problem with only two solutions: either you overpower it, or you surrender to it.  Until that solution is decided, there is nothing more important.” Tarsus had become expertly good at focusing on a single, immediate threat; and his opponent was now receiving the full force of that gift. The menacing warrior broke into a dead run, raising his sword high over his head.

OF GODS AND MEN Chapter 3: The Gift at the Good Shepherd               The Good Shepherd was a humble tavern.  Bare wooden tables, with benches and stools, lined one half-side of the place while the other half-side was consumed with a bar.  It ran from the back-end of the building almost entirely to the front, but stopped just short of the entrance to the tavern.  Opposite the entrance, at the very back of the tavern, was a modest fireplace.     It was always striking to Tarsus, this fireplace.  The woodwork adorning it was simple, but done with a measure of skill.  Atop the hearth, at either end, were columns carved in the shape of sheep.  They stood on hind legs, supporting a bench shaped like a wide shepherd’s staff that curved at one end.  Above the bench was carved the shoulders and head of a shepherd.  He was looking down on the sheep with a smile.   It was only natural the fireplace looked that way.  Briarden was a way station for shepherds traveling a