NEVER SPLIT THE PARTY: The Adventures of the Creeping Bam (BOOK 1: The Job)

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR: GAEL

This is taking a long time to get used to. Barely hours ago, these people were trying their best to kill us all on that bridge, now they're plotting their own company's betrayal and the defeat and almost guaranteed death of their current employer along with the rest of us. I'm being as watchful as I can be, keeping a sharp eye on Shayline Swift-Kill and her three companions, but I can't help looking at Kesla every once in a while too, as much trying to work out what she's really thinking as anything else. I trust her with my life, but for the life of me I can't quite get behind this crazy thing she's just done.

They're sat with us now, eating stew and hunks of bread like the rest of us, there's even a jug of ale which is being periodically passed around, although few of us are really drinking much of it yet. It could almost be called companionable, except that they're all very much in our cumulative line of sight, and Driver 8 looms close behind them, silent and implacable and a perfect warning not to try anything. As if they could, we've got our own weapons close to hand while theirs have all been unceremoniously dumped thirty metres away next to a random tree. Granted, they all turned out to be impressively honest when they were searched after I insisted they all be checked after that initial surrender, but it was better to be safe than sorry. Even so, the fact they're here in the first place, sat with us like it's a companionable meal with another party we just happened to cross paths with, still doesn't sit well with me.

Every once in a while I start tracing idle nonsense lines with my fingers, I can't help it, it's turning into a nervous thing with me now, just checking I can still cast if I have to. I've got the dragonhalf's components satchel in front of me now, I've looked through it, and while it's not quite as well-ordered as my own it's exceedingly well-stocked for a hedge wizard. There's something about them, too sharp and professional, the way I've seen them work, the way they act even, that suggests they may have come from the same kind of place I did. That's very interesting under the circumstances.

Despite the situation, my appetite, at least, has remained strong. Perhaps nearly dying in the river has something to do with it, but I certainly am hungry. I'm on my second bowl of stew already, Wenrich having rustled up something really tasty from the supplies their wizard brought back with the remainder of our gear, and it's already having an effect. Not for the first time since I woke up again, I cast a very careful look Art's way, a whole load of complicated feelings boiling up under it, but once again he's concentrating on his meal and the conversation. Every time I catch him looking I try to put as much reproachful ire into my expression as I can to cover my embarrassment over the situation I found myself in, but it never really feels true to me.

He was a perfect gentleman about it, if I'm honest. I was naked, but he treated me with the utmost respect the whole time we were bundled up together, according to Krakka and Yeslee both. Not that I didn't see far more of him than I ever intended when he started scrambling about to get me some fresh clothes from my pack, although I might have been looking a little closer than I should have been. He's in very good shape indeed.

By and large the conversation, such as it's been, has steered clear of business while the meal was prepared, and then when we've been eating. Mainly it's been focused on introductions, getting to know each other, exchanging names, a few details but those very guarded, and more than one assurance of trust. In truth they seem to be as wary of us as we are of them, and I don't think they like us either. There's been too much death for friendship, I think. I can't say I really blame them for that, to be honest. But they are trying, at least, so we must as well.

They're all strange ones, but Shayline is definitely the prize here. There's an almost regal bearing to her, a far greater nobility than I've ever seen in a half-orc before, despite the strict honour-bound culture she's sprung from. The more I look, the more convinced I am there's elf blood in her, she's definitely too graceful, willowy and svelte to be anything else, while her dark eyes are also unusual, orc eyes usually presenting with gold or amber irises. There's a strong beauty to her, tempered and sharp like steel, but polished to a high sheen by her heritage all the same. Every once in a while I catch Kesla looking her over, and while it's surely still a warrior's evaluation of a potential opponent, there seems to be a little bit of something else in her gaze too. Something hungry, I think. Less of a fighter studying an opponent, more a predator observing her prey.