Where Lies Adventure!

OF GODS AND MEN Chapter 32: What We Might Have Been               Tarsus stood upon a sea of rubble, the remains of the once great palace that Malthus called home.  He pulled Malthir from his belt and he held the broken sword aloft.  A muted grey: lifeless and inert: was all that the sword offered him now.  Tarsus closed his eyes, and drew forth.             Slowly, the half-blade came to life in a dull, pale glow.   Tarsus opened his eyes, focused on the faint light that gave this once mighty weapon a brief renewal.   “Where is she?” he asked of the power inside, funneling it through the blade it knew so well.             Without delay, the power answered.   A ray of light fell from the broken edge of the blade, falling to the ground only a few paces from where Tarsus stood.   The Sunsword walked forward, but the light did not move from the spot it had settled on.             When he reached the spot that the light touched, Tarsus got to his knees and carefully set the sw

OF GODS AND MEN Chapter 31: Communion               “He is right,” Tarsus thought bitterly.   “I have sealed his doom, and in so doing, sealed Cecily’s…Finnian’s…mine.   It is over.”             Tarsus’s glare did not waver from the smirking eyes of the demigod that lay in his lap.   That was all that was left to the Sunsword now: defiance.   He had lost to Cassius, in the end, but he would not give this childish fool the satisfaction of seeing him broken.   He had to be strong now: resolute.   Soon enough, Cassius would pass from this world, and then he could grieve; but not now.             Tarsus opened his mouth to speak.   He did not know what he would say, but he felt he had to say something.   Cassius’s expression came to life with an impish glee, and Tarsus knew that he had given himself away.   However silent it was, there was no masking the demigod’s delight in the Sunsword trying to cover up his own weakness.             But then, something changed.   Cassius’s

OF GODS AND MEN Chapter 30: Dead End               SLASH             Cassius let loose a savage horizontal arc with the half-blade Malthir, swiping at Tarsus’s exposed face.             The Sunsword recoiled quickly, successfully avoiding the strike but losing his footing in the process.   In that moment of ill balance, Cassius tackled him to the ground.               The huddled crowd of newly homeless citizens; all of whom had lost their homes the night before in the wake of the palace’s fall; began quickly rising to their feet.   The night before, Tarsus and Finnian slept among them, using this alley behind the White Light Tavern for some meager shelter.   Now, even that was denied them.   The legacy of Malthus had found its way here, and it yearned for Tarsus’s blood.   The townspeople sped out of the alley as quickly as they could.   They would leave Tarsus to finish this alone.             Cassius got to his knees quickly, pinning a dazed Tarsus Cole to the ground