Where Lies Adventure!

OF GODS AND MEN Chapter 34: Renewal               “Finnian Pell…” Drake said hollowly, a numbness spreading in the pit of his stomach.              “Drake Mathix…” Finnian mimicked with exaggerated condescension.               “I never expected to see you again,” Drake said with disarming candor.             Finnian looked back at the former captain of the KingsGuard, momentarily stunned by such quiet sincerity.   Then, as though realizing to whom he was speaking, Finnian’s surprise became impish as he replied to Drake’s stoic concern with a raspberry and a wide smile.   The younger Pell drained what was left in his cup, slammed it onto the bar, and clapped for more.             “Clearly you have had enough to drink,” Drake said, indicating that he, himself, had not.   To remedy this, Drake raised his own tankard to his lips and drank deep.             “Drake Mathix drinking,” Finnian said in jovial awe.   “I never thought I’d see that again in this lifetime.”   Madeli

OF GODS AND MEN Chapter 33: Returns           The dark of the midnight hours placed its all-consuming hand outside of the Good Shepherd Tavern.  Nothing of the outside world could be seen from the small windows at the front of the place, though there was no one looking through them to begin with.  The room was dim, in both appearance and spirit; no fire lit the hearth, and the little lamplight that shone on the wooden shepherd’s face reflected a somber melancholy.   The few shepherds drinking, who filled only a quarter of the once bustling bar, were mirror images of their wooden namesake.   Like him, they existed in utter stillness.             That gloom was everywhere, infecting the living company who drank with downcast eyes.   They all sat ruminating over the same questions; reeling to and from the same terrors: for Malthanon, the greatest city in all of Arden, had fallen.   What could that mean for its border villages, such as Briarden?   And what happened to Malthus, G