Biss made a sudden movement as if he had smelled something. That woke Geo up. After a small moment of confusion, he smelled the smell of burning flesh. Geo assumed that a cremation was going on for the dead. He felt sort of guilty for sleeping while everyone else was awake. So, he followed to smell to its source. Like he assumed there was a cremation going on. The pile that was burning was the one of the attackers. It seemed like they wouldn’t burn as planned so Conrad walked around the mountain of corpses lighting them on fire with his hand. The flames he used were smaller than the ones Geo saw the man do yesterday. Diane and Jaeger were sitting about 10 meters away from the fire. Biss trotted by Geo and went to his master, who started to snuggle him as soon as possible. Geo saw that Jaeger still had the weird wooden construction on his belt, that he used as a weapon the night bevor.

  “Hey Geo are you feeling better?”

  Asked the girl as she waved her hand to signal Geo to come to her.

  “Yes, thanks for asking. Jaeger was right. Biss makes a great pillow.”

  The bodyguard smiled hearing that compliment as he rubbed his dogs gray head.

  “So, are you burning all the dead? I can only see one pile on fire. But there were more corpses. What did you do with them?”

  “We buried them and have sent them to Reso’s kingdom. It’s a long process. Some of the more religious survivors joined us, like Sieg, and said some nice things about the deceased. It was sad. But we must be happy that not too many of us died. It could have been so much worse.”

  Conrad said coming over from the fire.

  “And why didn’t you bury them?”

  Geo pointed to the fire.

  “We don’t know them. And it’s forbidden to give a burial to your enemy. Don’t ask me why. That is just how it is. But if you could make a firebreak it would be nice.”

  Geo was happy since he could finally help. So, he went over to the fire, made a sturdy stance and went to work. He did a series of low kicks around the fire so that a 30-centimeter-high wall stopped it from spreading. As he was erecting the wall Sieg came over.

  “I see you guys are finished with the burial and Geo woke up again. That is good. Listen in 20 minutes we will leave so take your position in the caravan now! I don’t want to stay here longer than necessary. Got that?”

  Everybody nodded and joined Sieg back into the line. But there was a small change. The driver of the cart that would be behind the priest trio died in the attack. Since the merchant who owned the goods inside didn’t want to leave then behind Geo was ordered to now act as driver for the remaining days. The cart wasn’t to impressive. It was old but made of sturdy sun-bleached wood with one hairy brown cow pulling it and a waterproof blanket covering the goods. The bench for the driver wasn’t padded but it offered enough space for two people to sit on it. So, he offered his friends to sit on it when they got tired. They reluctantly accepted his offer. The first one to sit next to Geo was Conrad. He spent the morning digging graves and pulling bodies around. So, he needed some rest.

  “Say Conrad, what was that fire blast today morning? It was a real inferno. I have never seen something like this.”

  “You know that I am a blackhand right. Well the formulas on my body were a gift from the archbishop for when I completed my training. It is tradition to give a priest some tattoos as proof of their training. The formulas themselves are closely guarded secrets of the church and most monasteries have their own specialties. But the archbishop made sure that I got a large amount of them. Mostly for convenient everyday use. Like a magic light or to light a fire. But some of them can be weaponized like the fire one. That is what you have seen yesterday.”

  “Oh, ok. But if you can do such strong fire, why do you carry that thing around?”

  Geo pointed at the shovel spear that priest always carried with him and that was now placed behind them on the blanket that covered the goods. Conrad snickered and saw nostalgically into the distance.

  “I asked my teacher something similar back in the day. We were doing body and mind exercises and he answered something like this: “We can’t just burn down everything that we don’t like. And fire no matter how much you think you are in control, is always unpredictably. So, it is safer to stab them in most cases. Also, you can’t dig graves with fire. So, keep your moonspear near you. For it will safe your like”

  Conrad ended his short lecture. But Geo just started to become interested in the priest’s life.

  “This thing is called a moonspear?”

  Conrad started to become annoyed.

  “Listen Geo! I am tired. I want rest for a while. If you want, we can talk later but now I just want a break.”

  Geo didn’t expect to be shut down by the usually nice priest. So, they just sat next to each other in silence until Conrad fell asleep next to Geo. After one and a half hours Conrad was exchanged with Jaeger. Who was in way better shape than his colleague and didn’t need to sleep. It was clear that Jaeger was used to stay awake for long durations of time. For the duration of the ride Biss wedged himself between the goods on the cart. Geo wasn’t sure if that was ok. But then he remembered both how nice of a pillow he was for him and more importantly how easily that dog killed two men. So, he decided that he wouldn’t chase him away. Mostly out of fear for his fingers. Getting bored Geo tired to start some small talk with the man and hoped not to get shut down as fast as with Conrad.

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  “You seem in pretty good shape. Are you sure that Diane shouldn’t be the one sitting here now?”

  “She had more sleep then me and Conrad. And she didn’t fight during the raid. She should be fine. Also, I can’t do my job with my feet hurting as they do right now.”

  “Didn’t she help Conrad dig the graves?”

  “No, she slept during most of that. Also, I don’t think that Conrad would give her his moonspear for a second. He is very attached to it.”

  “But he offered me to help digging. Wouldn’t he have to give me the shovel for that?”

  “He offered that out of formality. He would have found an excuse to keep that thing somehow.”

  Biss made noises in the back. Jaeger moved his arm backwards to pat and crawl his head which shut the dog up. He continued:

  “That reminds me. I never thanked you for protecting us with your magic. It was a big help.”

  “Ohm that is no problem. I should be thanking you for taking control of the situation so fast. I don’t think we would have made it for to long without your orders.”

  The man smiled.

  “By the way.”

  Geo continued.

  “How did you know that that man was dead before we found his body?”

  “Huhh, which man?”

  “Just after that flash from Conrad. You turned around and said that he was already dead. How did you know that?”

  Conrad didn’t say anything for a moment.

  “That isn’t something that I don’t want to talk about. Let’s just say that this isn’t my first time in a situation like this. Ok?”

  “Oh, yes. Sorry.”

  Geo felt ashamed that he apparently touched an uncomfortable subject for the man and stayed silent for a while.

  “Can I ask you another question?”

  Geo tires to get the man to talk again.

  “Sure.”

  “What was that wooden thing that you used as a weapon.”

  “This thing?”

  Jaeger pulled out the construction. From his back. As it turns under his jacket he hid a belt which held the item for him from where he could quickly equip it when in need.

  “This is sort of a crossbow. It is a relative new weapon. While it does shoot bolts like a normal crossbow. I can put this clip of bolts here.”

  He fiddles around at the top of the weapon. And the clip gets stuck at a 45 degrees angle.

  “Having this clip saves time when reloading. And even more importantly. While hidden there are magic formulas that I can activate so that it reloads near instantly. If I were to spam it I could shoot one bolt every two seconds without aiming. A fast man could shoot one blot in about 20 seconds.”

  Then with a swift movement he pulled the clip of and strapped it under the weapon. So that is didn’t waste to much space and made it easier to hide. Geo was impressed.

  “Where I am from we rarely use weapons for ranged combat since we prefer to just shoot a rock. There are some areas where they do have bows but this I have never seen one of these things before. There are so many things that exist here that no one knows about back home. It’s amazing.”

  “Well your home does have some other interesting things. After all you can bend the earth to your will with the flick of the hand. If you ask me that is at least as impressive.”

  Geo started snickering.

  “I don’t think that is as amazing as you make it out to be. Where I am from nearly every man does it and most women as well.”

  “Well I guess depending where someone is from they do think certain things are normal even though for everyone else it is special and weird.”

  Geo started to laugh harder and harder.

  “What is so funny?”

  “It’s just you think earth magic is sooo special”

  Geo waved his hands to underline his sarcasm

  “While barley reacting to a guy throwing fire out of his hands. Hahaha”

  “I don’t get it.”

  “I don’t know why I am laughing this isn’t even funny.”

  Jaeger slowly started to grin as well.

  “I still don’t get it, but your laughing is contagious. Hehehe”

  And soon both men were laughing like maniacs for no reason at all.

  “What is so funny?”

  Diane was suddenly walking next to the cart and Geo tried to answer:

  “It’s nothing. Buhahah.”

  Jaeger regained his composer and answered for real:

  “I think we are just tired and laugh at nothing at all. Diane, I think I am fine for now. Do you want to sit for a while?”

  Jaeger made a shot whistle sound and signaled his dog to leave the cart. Still snickering he left the cart and Diane jumped on the moving vehicle. For a while none of the two said anything. Then Diane asked Geo a simple question:

  “Why are you here?”

  “Pardon?”

  “I mean, why are you with the caravan. What do you hope to archive from this journey?”

  For a moment Geo didn’t say anything.

  “How much do you know about how I ended up here?”

  “Not much. Only what Sieg said when you were hired.”

  “Which is?”

  “You are from really far away and you are a blackhand who can do magic without inscriptions. That is essentially it.”

  “Guess we haven’t talked to much about that. Well there isn’t too much to it. I was stranded in the village where Sieg picked me up. Since no one knows the way home I hope to find a lead in Sailport. And going there alone is dangerous since I didn’t know the way. So, I joined the caravan. That’s it.”

  “And what do you do if you don’t find a way back home. If it is that far away chances are you will never get back. Have you thought about what to do then?”

  Geo lost the good mood he was in before, he grabbed the emblem on his neck and asked quietly:

  “Please, don’t ask me that! I have to get back.”

  Realizing that she overstepped some boundaries Diane went silent.

  “Sorry, if I asked something uncomfortable. I just wanted to know.”

  “No, it’s ok. It is a good question, but I don’t think I am ready to face that possibility yet. Do you mind if we changed the subject now?”

  Happy that Geo didn’t take the question to personally Diane responded:

  “No, I have nothing against it… What do you want to talk about?”

  Geo thought for a moment and then asked:

  “Every evening you are studying over some weird looking books. Conrad explained to me that they were part of your training. Could you tell me about them?”

  Diane bit her lip and put a hand behind her head. This is the second time Geo saw her put her hand behind her head like that. He guessed that this was sort of a thinking pose of hers. He waited for a response of hers.

  “Well this isn’t something I am really supposed to talk about. If you really want to know you should talk with Conrad about that stuff. I am sorry that I can’t give you a better answer then that.”

  Geo started to smile a little again.

  “The first things we want to talk about and neither of us can answer, aren’t we great. I tried talking with Conrad before. He was in a bad mood and unusually snappy. Didn’t think that he could be like that.”

  “Really? I haven’t really experienced him like that yet. Must be because you are a stranger to him.”

  “Or it might be a byproduct of being awake the whole night, burning people and then having to dig graves for hours.”

  Now Diane started to snicker.

  “So even he has a breaking point when he gets rude. That is good to know. Maybe we should both just avoid him he next time he stays awake to long.”

  Geo having seemingly forgotten his sadness from before started to laugh again and added:

  “Yes, we should let the baby sleep at night or he will become cranky.”

  Now even Diane laughed out loud at the image of the priest as a baby and the two were laughing hard. Similarly, to when Jaeger left the cart. When suddenly they heard an annoyed voice from in front of them.

  “Hey, I heard that!”

  Somehow this made Diane laugh even harder and even Jaeger who was walking next to the priest started laughing. Making Conrad sulk at the embarrassment.