The Ghost's Crusade

XI: Drystan

They were hours into the trackless tunnels of the Shalewarrens before anyone deigned to speak. Naturally it was Akkali, who had abruptly decided she was going to sit down against the side of the tunnel, break open her traveling roll and proceed to eat whatever she had stashed away in the folds of her blanket.

"Well I'm taking five. Maybe ten. We'll see what pops out of the stone to harass us."

“What are you doing?” demanded Tiernan, standing several feet away from her at the furthest reaches of the light from Drystan's lantern. Obviously the Inquisitor wasn't in the mood to be stopping for a snack, much less sitting down in a rock tunnel a hundred feet below ground when they were supposed to be chasing down homunculi.

Willfully oblivious to the man's irritation the Enkiri tore a piece of dried deer meat from one of several strips she had rolled in her kit and replied, “I don't particularly fancy fighting a soul-stealing espiri witch on an empty stomach. We've been tracking and backtracking for five hours. Let's just sit down for a bit and see if anyone we can follow comes by to say hello.”

When Drystan sat down against the wall of the tunnel opposite to her the Inquisitor swallowed the retort he had prepared about the sins of sloth and joined them on the ground. “How do you know we've been down here that long?”

Offering a strip of jerky to the Inferi who refused it, Akkali flashed Tiernan a deliberately malicious grin. “I sacrificed twelve wee babes to twelve dark gods during twelve new moons in the twelfth year of my life and they gave me an unholy clock that keeps perfect astronomical time.”

“Charming,” said the Inquisitor with an unimpressed droll. “Truth, please.”

She shrugged. “I can count better than either of you two evidently. Not that difficult.”

“Brilliant.”

Akkali gnawed on her strip of jerky and frowned across the tunnel at him. “You certainly can pick them, Drys. Are all your non-Inferi friends bereft of senses of humor, or is it just a result of the Inquisitor brainwashing?”

The Inferi sighed at his Enkiri friend tiredly, knowing that she was going to give up her civil attitude because she was fed up with keeping up the ruse that she was comfortable in the company of the Inquisitor. The longer things went on the more irritable she was going to become, unfortunately, and there was nothing either of them could do about it. “I'm going to take a nap while you two bicker.” He held up one finger and pointed directly at her. “No stabbing. That's an order.”

Though Akkali would have normally engaged in a verbal sparring bout with him over being ordered to do anything she knew he wasn't really going to 'take a nap' as he claimed. Instead she shrugged at him and made a childish 'shoo' motion with her hand, then turned towards Tiernan. “I've had a wonder since we met, Inquisitor: how exactly do you plan on dispatching me?”

The man stared at her for a moment, obviously trying to figure out whether or not she was honestly desiring an answer to her question. “What?”

“I'm an unsanctioned witch,” replied the woman with a shrug as she slouched back against the tunnel wall. “It goes without saying you're going to attempt to kill me. Surprised you've not yet tried already.”

Tiernan squared around to face her, a frustrated and slightly irate look on his face. Drystan kept his eyes open, wondering if he was going to have to soon intervene in the renewed fight the two had engaged in at the tavern the other day.

“Do you raise the dead?” the Inquisitor demanded. “Do you create homunculi like those things back there? Do you steal people's souls? Do you drink their blood for power? Do you channel spirits from the grave? My guess is no on all counts since you're traveling with Drystan and even though it's been nearly a decade I doubt he's changed so much as to associate himself with one who profanes the dead. So what in the name of Junan could compel me to do you any harm?”