To Rhial

41

Desmond

Bells in my head. Ringing and beating against my skull. Of course I was hungover, just like every other morning. I laid in bed, staring at the ceiling, trying to remember everything that happened in the last twenty four hours.

I had a few drinks at the pleasure parlor, a few more when I went out walking, and a few more while I was out bar hopping. I remember buying a bottle of something strong and walking around the park drinking, but that was it. Yup, it's safe to say I blacked out.

The room was as bright as my recollection of things. I peaked out the window, greeted by the hazy moons high up on their pedestals of stars. It had to be the middle of the night.

I caught the scent- or stench, rather- of vomit and booze from Brenden, who was curled up on his bed, cradling half a loaf of bread and laying on top of now-smashed cheese. I hobbled over, set his food on the table, covered it, and pulled the blanket over him. The cheese was nice and sharp, a little too warm for my taste though.

As I opened the bedroom door, light flickered in from the glowing stones in the hall. Almost instantly, bed sheets were thrown aside and Brenden zoomed like a flash of light down the hall in the same direction I was going.

I found him panting and sweaty, washing his hands in the bathroom. A rather putrid stench wafted from the toilet. We made eye contact, but didn't say anything. I pissed and met him back at the water spout, where he was cleaning vomit off his mouth and chest, and some blood off his swollen ear.

"Jesus, man. What happened to you?"

He croaked. "Rough day." Brenden lowered his head to the spout and washed out his mouth, rubbing cleaning paste around on his teeth and tongue.

"I'm gonna clean off and go to the baths. You coming?"

He sighed and held his hand still for a moment. "Uh, yeah. Gimme a minute."

"Kay. Cool."

For as gaudy as Hallax hall could be, it was clean and nice. Having decently advanced plumbing in a world that was basically medieval Europe was a really nice feature, though. And hot water, holy shit. It had to be sigils or something that kept the water warm unless I didn't know about Hallax's secret underground bath warmer sweatshop. I stood under one of the six faucets and just let the water run over me, calming my head and my hangover while I washed off, drinking more water than I was washing with. It wasn't just showers either. Sure, you could shower if you needed to clean up quickly, but relaxing in the hot baths was such a treat, even if they were communal. It was unlike anything I was used to in America, but fuck, they really needed to make baths more popular back there.

Brenden waded his way through the bath and plopped down about five feet away from me. He sat there all brooding-like, mean mugging me while I was trying to relax.

He was starting to scare me a little. I hadn't seen him this grumpy since Adam allegedly backed into his dog. "Somebody piss in your ale, or did you just do that 'cause you liked it so much last time?"

"You don't remember, do ya?"

"Remember wha- ah fuck, what did I do?"

Brenden didn't look surprised at all, just bitchier every second. He pushed his hair back and sighed. "You tried to wingman for me and now Miriel thinks the only reason I was talking to her is because I wanted to, in your words, lay pipe."

Yep, sounds like me. Ah, little blips are coming back now.

"Okay, listen-"

"Desmond, if you try to justify yourself, I'm gonna pour boiling water down your dick hole."