I came down the stairs into the tavern. Dave looked over at me and shook his head. Kasidy didn’t even seem to notice that I was there. As I sat down at the bar, Dave walked over and slid me a bottle of dark liqueur and a glass. Then he rushed back to Kasidy.

Blink skipped down the bar toward me. She had a cookie in her hand and a mug of something in her others. When she got next to where I was, she slipped and fell until the stool she was aimed at caught her. Then she laughed.

I smirked. “So what’s Kasidy doing?”

Blink took a bite of her cookie. “Learnings to cooks. Turns out she didn’t haves the skill at alls.”

“So how long has she been working on this?”

“Abouts six hours.”

I nodded and poured a drink. “Why?”

Blink smiled. “Useful.”

I downed my drink and poured another. “Okay, I have stuff I need to do outside. So that I can figure out what all we need to do with Kasidy. If she gets tired of burning the kitchen down see if she can shoot a bow. Might be easier.”

I drained my second double and headed toward the safe room exit. I needed to talk with the old men, and that worked best outside a safe room. I likely also needed to talk with Sam, and that only worked outside.

When I got out of the safe room, I started to set up the Ritual of Remembrance. I knew I needed better advice than Dave or Blink would give me. I didn’t want to leave Kasidy behind because I wasn’t sure how she would do. It wasn’t me trying to be special or a hero, just that she was a city girl, and leaving her seemed almost like killing her. I didn’t want to kill her because, well, I hadn’t killed a person before. Sure the goblins and orcs, but that wasn’t the same. Even if I knew that I could because of the memories that Sam forced into me of the necromancer.

I didn’t want to create a bond with her. I was already worried about the one with Lannah. I didn’t need a second one. It would be odd enough having Kasidy with me when I found Lannah. That was a conversation I wasn’t sure what to do about.

Before long, I had the ritual going, and the smoke started to wisp around. As my chanting went on, the fire in front of me turned from mine to that of the old shamans. I saw in front of me what appeared to be the full gathering of the old men. I hadn’t seen this many since when I first started.

I walked up to the circle and took my seat. The leader of the group smiled and waved at me. He had a small pipe in his hands this time that he took a drag off of before passing it. There appeared to be several such pipes moving around the group.

The old one waited till I took a puff before he spoke. “Arn what wisdom can this group of Shamans bring to you today?”

I took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “I have a problem that I am not sure how to address.”

The old one smiled and waved his hand for me to keep going.

“I am traveling with a woman that I don’t fully trust. She was sent to help me by the god that brought me here. But I don’t know what she can do to help.”

I took a breath, and one of the others spoke up. “Does she look pretty?”

I smiled. “A little but the real problem is she knows I can travel between dungeons and can seed them.”

Another one called out. “If she is pretty what’s the problem.”

From the other side of the fire, one laughed. “She can cook, right?”

I sighed. I couldn’t tell if the guys were messing with me or high. “No, she can’t cook, but I don’t trust her, and now she knows that I can work with dungeons. I don’t know what to do.”

The one that asked about her being pretty answered. “Bond. Make her a shamanka. Then she won’t be a problem.”

I shook my head. “I am already bonded to one woman I don’t want more than one. Besides she follows a different god. I think she is a bard but I haven’t asked.”

The old man asked. “Why don’t you trust her? What has she done, and why do you travel with her if you don’t trust her?

I thought for a moment. “I don’t trust her because Lannah my bonded told me not to trust anyone.”

There was a round of the men stamping their feet. Then the eldest raised his hand, and the men quieted down.

He asked me. “Does Lannah trust her?”

I laughed. “They haven’t met.”

He nodded. “So just a general distrust of everyone?”

I sighed. “Yeah, I tend to trust everyone until they betray me. Even then I tend to try to give them a few chances. But with how weak I am at level 0 Lannah was worried I would get taken advantage of.”

“Any other reason not to trust her?”

“Yeah, her god wants her to write my story. He is the god of the bards so I am sure that anything she learns will get turned into a song or story. Then everyone will know that I am a dungeon master. Not something that I want people to know right now.”

The one who asked about her being pretty spoke up again. “So if you don’t trust her why travel with her? Is she that fetching?”

Most of the men laughed, and I just shook my head. After a few minutes of them picking on me and each other, the eldest called them back to order. Then he pointed at me.

I nodded. “I didn’t think she would live if I left her by herself. So I brought her with me so that she would be safer. I had been thinking about dumping her at the first town. But now I am worried about her betraying me. She seems forgetful and so even if she doesn’t plan to tell people I worry that she will.”

The men all started talking with each other. It seemed like they were trying to find an answer of what I should do. After about twenty minutes, they clammed down. Then three of them stood.

The eldest shaman pointed to the first.

This one was a tall, broad man. He looked like he could have been a great hunter, but he was missing his left arm. He stepped forward and signed something to the eldest.

Then the one-armed man turned to me. “I suggest that you bond her. Many times in the past, we have had more than one bonded. Have her leave her god and become a Shamanka. Chaos will accept her if you bond her.”

The next stood forward. He was short and ugly. His beard was gray and was missing his spots. He smiled, showing a mouth missing teeth.

Short and ugly said. “The problem is trust either you do or you don’t if you don’t then you need to treat her like an enemy. So either kill her take her as a captive.”

The last that stepped forward was the Battle Priest. “Take land, claim a title as a noble. Make her swear fidelity to your title as a member of your retinue. If she is a bard make her your bard and forbid her to speak of these things. The magic of the title will bind her. If she breaks it you will know.”

With that, he vanished. I looked around at the rest as they faded away. The wisdom of the question had been given. Now it was time for me to make my choice. I knew which one I wanted to look into.

As I got up and stretched, my voice was sore from the chanting. I knew from talking to Blink that the whole time I was doing the Ritual, I was chanting. I didn’t go anywhere or stop. It just looked like smoke and me.

I headed out of the dungeon to look at the sky. It looked like I had about half an hour before the sunset, which meant I had just enough time to ask Sam my question. I took a few minutes clearing out a spot, and then I laughed.

I laid down face first and triggered my spell. I had hoped that it wouldn’t be able to get me standing, but I was wrong. My body contracted like I was doing a burpee from a superman pose. As I jumped up, my hands went up above me.

I yelled out. “Oh great and mighty greeter Sam, I the lowly Arn beseech you to answer my question. What is the step by step process to bring Kasidy into my retinue?”

With that last line, the world went black, and I felt my right knee give out first.

* * *