[Iskover]

Here's another part:



“But he must return to Kurast!” The messenger barely ducked out of the way as Larzuk lifted the cherry-red iron out of the fire, bringing it around to the anvil.

“No, he doesn’t. Rupert runs the new cathedral out here, and the Kurast council can come here if they want.” Lifting the massive hammer, he pounded the end into a proper leaf shape for a spearhead. “It’s barely half-built, and they want to drag him halfway across the world?”

The messenger ducked as the chisel separated the iron head from the rest of the iron bar, dropping it into the bucket of water to hiss. “They’re making him a bishop. His duties won’t allow him to remain here.”

“Won’t allow who to remain here?” Rupert stepped in the door, slapping sawdust from his clothing. He looked up to see the messenger, and frowned. “No. I don’t care what the Council says. I’m building this cathedral here, restoring Tristram, and if they don’t like it, they can come here and throw me out of the Order of Paladins.”

Helpless, the man shrugged. “Sir Rupert, I have to return with you! The Council orders you to become a bishop.”

Rupert made an offensive gesture, and Larzuk boomed in laughter as the messenger reddened. “Absolutely not, and that’s final. I managed to help defeat the Prime Evils, so no bunch of priests sitting in a gold-decked temple halfway around the world can order me to do anything I don’t wish to.” Ignoring the protests from the messenger, Rupert stepped over to a table, picking up a wineskin and taking a squirt of the sweet white.

At last, the messenger fell silent, apparently thinking. “Sir Rupert, the Council did expect that you might not wish to obey their orders. If you do not return, they have ordered that all shards of the Worldstone here in Tristram be confiscated and returned to Kurast to be placed into their care.”

“What?” Larzuk roared, narrowly missing the man with another red-hot iron bar. “They have no authority here, and no justification to do that either!”

Rupert held up a calming hand, and the barbarian slowly subsided. When he finally spoke, his voice was slow, calm, and chilling. “Go back to Kurast and tell the Council, that if they attempt such an order here, or anywhere my friends and I are, then they have sided with Hell, not Heaven.”

Turning, he stalked out of the blacksmith. The messenger fled after him, and Larzuk walked to the door, still holding the cooling piece of metal with his forge tongs. Sure enough, Rupert was climbing the side of their home, where the cages for his carrier pigeons were. As the Council messenger tried to climb the ladder, the paladin irritably kicked it over.

In a few minutes, the first bird winged away into the sky, flying northwest. “Telling Garou and Jezebel first,” Larzuk chuckled, before turning back to his forge and reheating the iron. Soon enough, two more birds vanished into the morning sky, to warn the heroes.

When the third bird had flown off, Rupert allowed the messenger to put the ladder back up, and he climbed down. The man was almost deathly pale. “You turned against the Council,” he whispered, aghast.

By this time, a fair crowd had gathered to watch their leader square off. “Turned against the Council? Are you daft, man? Do you know anything true about my past with the Council?” Rupert shook his head angrily, and started walking back towards the half-constructed cathedral.

“First they demand I submit to their judgement for breaking paladin custom. This is after I rescue them from the effects of Mephisto’s spell. After I prove them wrong, in their own halls of judgement, they grudgingly grant my request to rebuild the cathedral here at Tristram. Now that I’ve finally got work going, they try to call me back?

“No, no, a thousand times no!” Rupert whirled on the messenger. “Take yourself back out of Tristram, back to Kurast, and tell the Council that they should spend a little more time praying to Hadriel and Gabriel for guidance, and a little less time doing their back-room deals to make the church richer at the expense of the common people!”

With that proclamation, the entire village started ignoring the messenger. He stayed at the building for an hour, with the workers moving around him to raise the massive wooden cross-beams for the cathedral roof. Finally, with an air of defeat, the man left Tristram, climbing back onto his horse and taking the road south-west to Kingsport.

The axe spun through the air, shearing through the deer’s neck and embedding itself in the tree trunk. Ron Bars trotted over, pulling free his weapon and carefully lifting the corpse of the animal. “Well?”

Ellonwye sniffed. “I still say that using an axe to hunt game is like using an arrow to shoot flies.”

He groaned, tossing the deer over his shoulders. “There is no pleasing you in anything, is there?”

The old woman cackled. “Isn’t it a law of the earth, that no mother ever finds a man good enough for her daughter?”

He chuckled, perhaps a little unwillingly. “Perhaps you should meet my parents. I think you would like each other just fine.” He leaped over a fallen tree, waiting for the amazon to clamber over it.

Ellonwye chuckled as well. “Well, in your favor, there are many worse men that Erris could have chosen for a mate.”

They slowed when they reached the amazon village. The majority of the town was gathered around the open square, and a messenger dressed in the uniform of the Kurast Council, arguing with one of the village elders. “The Council of the Holy Church of Kurast has made this proclamation, and you must abide by it!”

The elder laughed, mockingly. “Your church and council have no influence and no power in our islands. They have no right to demand our pieces of the Worldstone to abuse for their own wealth.”

As they argued, Erris moved over to join her husband and her mother. “He showed up a few minutes ago,” she said angrily. “Who do they think they are?”

Ron Bars shook his head. “This isn’t a good sign,” he said. “If they’re demanding pieces of the Worldstone here, what demands will they be making on Mount Arreat?”

Erris carefully patted his arm, avoiding the blood dripping from the dead deer. “I don’t know. Do you think it’s worth it to try travelling?”

Ellonwye sniffed. “This time, daughter, if you demand to go travelling, then I am going with you.”

She laughed. “And what does my father think about that?”

The old woman smiled, a twinkle in her eye. “He and I sometimes enjoy some time apart. It is not like you do not plan to return.”

Ron Bars shrugged. “I think, before we travel that way, we should send messenger birds to Rupert and Jezebel. They are closer, and probably have a better idea of what is happening.”

Ellonwye laughed, watching the messenger being run out of the village by a group of warrior women. “Perhaps your friends have already sent messages here, as well.”