The Decameron 2.0

Day 9.9 Coincidence - IN LIGHTS SHADOW ShawnJackson

He glanced out the nearest window and, for a moment, watched the runoff sluice down the gutter and past the window in a torrent. They'd been cutoff in this Outback bar by the flooding for hours already, and, judging by the amount of water cascading over the tin roof, they still had hours before the rain let up. Might as well make the best of it, right?

"Yeah, that was a pretty good story," he said, turning to look at the others grouped loosely around the table, their faces half hidden in shadow with the rest illuminated by the dancing light of a half dozen candles.

"But if you want to talk coincidences, let me tell you a story about a paladin knight that found himself sharing a fire in a storm with his greatest enemy. It goes a bit like this:"

In Lights Shadow by @bloodsword

Paxon Grey, knighted paladin champion of the Light demigoddess, the Veiled Lady, and Lord Captain of Her Order Militant, the Knights of the Veiled Path, felt a brow lift when the first fat drop of rain plonked onto his helmet. It was swiftly followed by another and another, until he was being liberally pelted. Frowning, he looked up at the swirling storm clouds, churning as they crested the mountains that reached into the sky on his right.

The storm had paced him for three days, always threatening but never following through. Only when he was back down in the flats did it finally decide to unleash its fury on him. Was it coincidence that the storm was breaking now that he was leagues from cover? 'Coincidence?' he sourly thought as he pulled the hood of his cloak over his helmet. 'Hardly!'

There was a dark presence guiding that storm. He could feel it every time he glanced at the steel grey and charcoal painted clouds. Something fel and menacing was watching him as he traveled.

The veteran paladin wasn't surprised. It wasn't the first time he had garnered the attention of darker powers, nor would it be the last. Not if his patron, the Veiled Lady, had anything to say about it. A fervent opponent of the Shadow and its followers, she took every opportunity available to thwart their designs before they could come to fruition. And that kind of effort had earned the Shadow's watchful eye landing on her paladin knights as they moved about the known world, doing her bidding.

Paxon's current quest was yet another attempt to do that bidding. He was to strike deep into the northern mountains to take possession of an ancient artifact stolen from the Vault of Light. The Vault was a repository for items of great power left over from the legendary Shift War, fought between demigods of Light and Shadow.

In typical demigoddess fashion, Her Holiness wouldn't say what the item was. Only that he needed to recover it. And he was to do so without a phalanx of knights of the Order riding behind him.

A trickle of icy water down past his sodden collar was enough to return Paxon's attention to his current dilemma.

"We need to find somewhere to ride out this storm, Troika," he said, leaning over to pat his horse on the neck. "Got any ideas?"

The big charger immediately pulled to a halt, forcing Paxon to pull his cloak tight with a gauntleted hand to keep the deluge from sluicing forward over his shoulders and down his front. Then she was moving to the right and off the road towards a jumble of stone twenty paces away.

As it usually was, the charger's instincts were spot on: in the jumble's lee there was a jagged overhang that offered some shelter from the storm's fury. As they approached, he took quick measure of it. Good, it was big enough for both he and Troika to take cover in. It was also an opportunity to be thankful that his patron had sent him alone; the space was enough for them, but not an entire company.