Apostasian Revelations

Chapter Twenty Seven

"I'll pay the taxes," A man replied, his hands were full of blisters and red, his cheeks stained blood red as his brown moisty eyes peered towards the two knights. "I swear as this church's pastor!"

"This rundown crap would be the last thing I'd call a church!" The man in blue said with a sneer.

Miguel was caught up in this and had to de-escalate the situation, though after some careful thinking and improvisation, perhaps a little bit of bribing along the way, he was able to get the Templar knights out of the building.

His black eyes observed each and every crevice of the dimly lit chamber.

"Before you ask," The man started, holding his cheek with a wince, "They definitely didn't trash the place, just not this time, thank you."

He nodded, looking to Yuf for any advice on the matters at hand.

  "I think he might need medical attention, shall I? Sir?" Yuf prompted.

Motioning his hand Miguel sighed; he needed information that was only privy to Joan right now.

"What the Hell's going on?" Miguel muttered out, sitting down on a nearby chair, only for it to suddenly obliterate itself. "This isn't how it was last time, what did you do?"

The cleft chinned man gave a shaky, shivering response full of stammering and stutters, "In my defence, I was left near a swindler's den, with a boatload of Liams and without supervision!"

Miguel gritted his teeth, "What did you do?" He asked, such a simple question, yet Joan gulped.

"I might've gambled away all my money.. that you lent me.."

All Hell broke loose that hot minute, and after restraining Miguel to another, relatively healthier, chair Yuf began his own line of questioning.

"Those were Templar knights, pray tell me what's going on? If this is a church, it should be exempted from taxes, right?" Yuf asked with an exasperated look on his face.

Filled with worry he raised a brow, "This isn't a church on papers, is it?"

  "You hit the mark, Yoruland'uf, you hit the mark." He mentioned, spitting out some blood into the bowl nearby.

"Grand, just grand! Those damned Templars just keep on hogging all that cash to themselves! Taxes my foot! They don't even get used for anything! Where's the king during all of this? Or even the Pope?"

Miguel groaned out loud after catching his breath.

"One hand washes the other, sir." Yuf responded, finally done with patching the cleft chinned man up. "And I doubt the Pope can do anything right now."

The rogue leaned back for a moment before sighing in annoyance, "Right, that stupid war's still going on, troubles is what it brings us all, not bountiful rewards or prosperity."

"Right, but my lord, I think I have a deck of cards, you up for a game?"

Miguel jolted back up, and though Yuf gave the man's cheery grinning face a death glare he didn't stop the two.

As they played along, they talked on and on for hours.

Finally it seemed to be midday or atleast reaching there, the sun shone up high and Yuf was asleep on the ground, Joan crying once more as he flipped one last coin.

"Heads, damn it, you're too lucky." He said, gritting his teeth hard enough to chew steel to rubble and dust.

  "I'm not lucky, you're just trash at the game."

"This is literally a half skill based, half luck based game! And the only skill required is bluffing!" Joan remarked quite loudly.

Slapping him with a couple cards on the face, Miguel sat back down and finally showed his cards. "All crabs." He said, all were indeed red.

Joan's eyes narrowed down, "I take my words back, it's half luck, a little bit of skill, and the rest is about cheating, isn't it?"

Taking his wrist by storm he shook it to reveal a whole deck of cards that flung into the air like dust in a sandstorm, crowding up the view of the grey floor.

"As if you weren't either." Miguel snickered, showing him the cheat pack he had replaced before starting the game.

  "Damn it my lord! For a deity-" Joan remarked before sealing his lips shut, checking up on the foreign secretary Miguel had smuggled along.

"That was close, wasn't it?" He remarked with a nervous chuckle.

Miguel with gave a grumpy look to him, "Don't bust my cover, or else I'll sock you, really hard."

Joan sighed, putting his head down he remarked about his situation, "All my life I revered God, only to find you such a despicable deity."

"Honor isn't my greatest strong point, infact the lack of it is, you bastard." He said, tossing the cards back into the half broken box.

"Well atleast I'll be able to brag about it at my death bed." He said, ignoring Miguel entirely.

  "Yeah, about that, they'll call you crazy, I had a friend pass away like that, no one believed him."

Joan raised a brow, "Anyways, as a follower, I request but a simple thing, may I ask of it?"

  "I thought you said I was a despicable guy?"

"Touché, can you go out around and hand these fruits around? I've been growing them but I don't think I can turn a profit from them."

His lips thinly formed a straight line, "I don't do charity."

  "You'll get recognition, maybe, either that or drugs by the end of the day."

"I don't do it for recognition, wait did you say drugs?" Miguel asked, though his request was shot down, both knew who really controlled the drug market nowadays and thought tempting, Miguel wished to remain a devilishly handsome, and somewhat morally alight noble rogue.

"There's starving orphans in the mix up there, if that's what you want to hear." He said with a small grin.

"Alright, tell me the district and lane-ways." Miguel suddenly snapped back.

Before leaving however Joan let out a snicker, "Honor isn't your strong point? Yeah right."