I Can't Get the Vampire Rogue to Romance Me

Chapter 37 - Just a Dog Joke

One of the other features of the party's camp was a small pond that sat in one corner of it. At least sometimes. Evangeline understood that the camp was designed to reflect whatever setting they were in. They wouldn't have the pond here forever.

"Okay, so what's going on? What did you learn?" Evangeline asked as they approached the water's edge.

To her surprise, Sigismund plopped down on the shore. Hiking up the lower edge of her robe, and she stuck her bare feet straight into the water.

"Oh, gods, that is glorious," she breathed. "My sandals have been rubbing all day."

Taking the cue, Evangeline dropped down next to her as well. "Are you dodging my question on purpose or what?" she asked, peeling her boots and socks off to do the same.

Sigismund sighed. "Sorry. Valerian really has a way to get under my skin. Something so smarmy and off-putting about him."

"You're not wrong. But he's got issues just like the rest of us," Evangeline said, wrapping her arms around her knees.

"Hmm, be that as it may, I'm not letting my guard down around him for a second. I've been saving one last spell for the end of the day to cast blessing protection on my and Artmond's sleeping bags." Then the cleric realized what she said and gave Evangeline a quick glance. "I have extra spells today, I could do a ritual to make you a talisman to do the same for your sleeping bag." Then her eyebrows pinched together. "In fact, I should just do that in general," she murmured to herself, just realizing it.

"When did you have time to sneak off to talk to the other clerics about what was going on? You were with us the whole time at the camp," Evangeline asked, bringing the cleric back to the matter at hand.

"It was at the place with the caffee machine. While you lot were talking with the woman running it, I got chatting with a couple of clerics waiting there. I didn't get much, but apparently, they were asking me which side I was on."

"Side?"

"Well, it reminded me of something I learned in school. We all learn a little bit about the pantheon of gods and some of their more popular traditions. There is a tradition between Kish's and her brother Ashan's . They steal each other's divine idols in a sort of game ritual at the Sowing Moon and the Harvest Moon. We're approaching the Sowing Moon and Ashan's idol is missing."

Evangeline furrowed her brow, which was something she had been doing quite a lot that night. "That doesn't seem like something to start a war over. Though war is probably too strong a word. Civil kerfuffle?"

"These things can get really serious," Sigismund said flatly. "Especially since the tension between Kish and her brother, ever since the Great Crusade."

"Right. The Great Crusade," Evangeline said, tossing a pebble into the pond.

"Yeah, I know. They're all 'Great' one way or another, but I'm referring to the most recent one, a hundred years ago."

That pulled Evangeline up short. "Oh," she said.

Knowledge: History. Fail.

"I'm sorry, I don't know my history that well. I'm more shocked that Hagor is that old?"

Sigismund glanced over her shoulder at Hagor's sleeping spot. They could barely make out the top of his head over the rise. "I mean, I guess, but I understand that it's pretty young for an elf. I mean, he's a proper adult amongst their kind."

"Okay, but what would that be in human years?" Evangeline asked. The two women looked at each other and then burst out in giggles.

"I don't know, maybe late twenties, early thirties?" Sigismund suggested and kept giggling.

"Happy women make a happy village," Artmond declared, approaching them and bearing two bowls of steaming stew. He offered one to each of them then sat down. "What were you laughing about."

"Oh nothing," Sigismund said, clearing her throat to banish the giggles.

"Just a dog joke," Evangeline said, using the wooden spoon to move the chunks of vegetable and meat in her bowl to encourage the cooling.

"What was the joke?" he asked.

"Well how old we are compared to an elf, you know, in human years." Artmond continued to smile at her, no understanding entering his eyes. "Like in dog years but for humans..." she continued, trying to lead him along the path of logic, where all jokes went to die. "Never mind."

"Uh, okay. So what are you talking about?" Artmond pivoted.

"Apparently, the idol for the clerics of Ashan is missing, and they are blaming the druids, okay?" Sigismund snapped, stabbing at her food with her spoon with clacks so hard Evangeline wondered if the bowl would crack.

"Oh, it's missing?" Artmond asked with genuine interest.

"Yes, apparently," Sigismund groused.

"Well, can't they just resanctify another one? Isn't that what you clerics do? Sanctify things?"

He asked the question so innocently that it took Evangeline and Sigismund a moment to realize that what he had asked made sense.

"I hate to say it, but he makes a really good point," Evangeline said, pointing at Artmond, who, if he had been a dog, would have started wagging his tail.

"Yeah, but who cares," Valerian interjected again. This time appearing on the other side of Sigismund as if he had been sitting there the whole time, which he hadn't been.

Sigismund jumped and yelped, while he smiled even more smugly ... if that were possible. Evangeline just narrowed her eyes at him. "Yes, yes, we all know you're very stealthy. Will you please cut that out?"

"No," he said sweetly, shaking his head before leaning back, his shirt falling open in a very come-hither way that she knew was also a tease.

"My point is, none of this is our problem. We need to find a way out of these collars and back on with our lives."

"And if it's important to Sigismund?"

Valerian snorted. "Is it important to Sigismund?"

They all looked toward the cleric.

Each of them have a faction? If so, it would be "Kish's" and then factions (with the s). But if you meant one faction, you had it set up correctly.

However, based on what comes before and after, it reads like it is two separate ones. 

To be continued...

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