Knights of the Platinum Dragon: A D&D Story

Chapter 28: Corellon's Children

Steam wafted around Ren's head as he waited, the hot and humid sensation clinging to his skin and his ears while the smells soon found their way into his nostrils. He caught the scents of tar, pine and boiling water all mixed together – no doubt the escaping vapour from all the different pools were mixing together out here after being pumped from the rooms.

He was waiting outside a public bathhouse, of all places – a low, broad building of white brick trimmed with navy blue tiles and mosaics, with wide, curved arches over the doorways and between the pillars on the exterior. People came and went all around him, passing him by like he wasn't there as he leaned against one of said pillars, the marble pressing into his left shoulder while his right arm clutched the opposing elbow.

This was his usual waiting posture; slumped with his head held low and his eyes directed to the floor. Sometimes he would put his hands in his pocket... and as the thought occurred to him that there might be cutpurses prowling this part of the city, he did just that.

All around him, people from the lower classes swarmed on all sides like bees, with just as much buzz from their eager, excited discussions. Ruddy-faced farmers and callus-handed artisans approached stalls that were attended by portly, pleasant merchants in richly-dyed clothes, spending what money they had on luxuries to mark the occasion of the tournament. Several of said merchants, along with those who were clearly of higher-ranked trades like barbers and tailors, also passed him close by as they entered the public bathhouse, each one giving him a glance of either disdain or ignorance as he averted his eyes and pretended not to notice.

'Why did you do this, Ren?' he asked himself ruefully, even though he knew the answer, the idiot that he was.

He did it because the alternative was more terrifying to him. So as ever, he chose the least disagreeable path he had.

That philosophy had guided Ren's every action for years – in truth, it was the main reason he was even here in the city of Thalmont. He undoubtedly enjoyed the company of Logan, Romain and Finnan, though not so much with the others, but he chiefly stayed with the party to come here because the alternative was to start wandering Faerun alone again as he had been for so long – on the road, place-to-place, hand-to-mouth, ever lonely. With no-one to protect him...

And so he wound up here. After leaving the rest of the party alongside Arabella, the two of them had wandered into the western districts of Thalmont, which was thick with shops and stalls that appeared to be mainly selling fabrics and clothes fresh from the loom. And while up here, when they had spied the bathhouse, Arabella had asked Ren if they could stop there so she could change in one of the rooms there.

Waiting, the crowds pressing close around him only exacerbated the trembling feeling building up inside Ren. He knew that Arabella would be her usual cheerful self when she came out, but while most might feel drawn to that, the wizard instead found himself dreading it.

Part of him did wonder if him asking Arabella not to dote on him had hurt her, even though he'd tried to put it as delicately as possible.

And would she be angry about that? Or worse?

So on the one hand, he was scared of that. But on the other hand, he had frozen upon leaving the others because, while he didn't want to risk running into Milton, Anseis and Fulber again, he also didn't want to be alone as he wandered the streets of the unfamiliar city, especially when he would have to be so wary in case that... thing caught wind of him again.

In that case, he supposed that some company was better than none. And that he'd gotten what he asked for; Arabella would be out any moment, and two heads were better than one.

'Your wish came true...' he thought, his internal monologue taking on a grim, knowing tone. 'Just not how you wanted...'

Ren should have expected it to be this way – nothing he ever wished for went the way he wanted it to, and his whole life was now a nightmare because of it.