Nordens Juvel

Eliat ascended the corpse of the mighty dragon, that he alone had slayed with his mighty glaive, while his companions had been shaking in the corner of the dragon lair, overcome by dragon fear. Eliat could not feel fear. He did not even remember the sensation. Standing atop the great corpse, Eliat lead out a thunderous roar while lifting his bloody glaive into the air “ACENSIOOOOOOON!”.

Eliat woke with a shock. Sitting up he discovered that he had been sleeping upon the tavern floor. Dolgrim was sitting straight across by the bar, looking red faced, his beard dirty and singed. Dolgrim was clad in his full plate, and gulping down a mug of morning ale, and when he believed no one was looking he let out some surpressed gas, discretly waving the fart in another direction. Eliat looked around the tavern, the soft rays of dawn slowly covered the wooden floorboards. Aurane, the groups wizard, was sitting in a corner reading his heavy leatherbound spellbook, while feeding his raven familiar with a few crumbs of corn bread. Eliat distrusted wizards. He found them conniving, calculating, and without proper faith. Eliat heard once again a fart and a burp from the dwarf. Eliat smiled by himself, he found that he liked the dwarf, the only member of the group that could drink Eliat under the table. The dwarf was like himself in some ways, rash, passionate, religious and could be both crude and caring.

Eliat looked back again upon the wizard in the corner. Of all his companions Aurane annoyed Eliat the most. The wizard was highly self rightous and the two of them rarely agreed on anything. When Aurane had first entered the group Eliat hadn’t trusted him. Eliat rarely trusted anyone who was sober all the time. But even Eliat had to admit that Aurane was a formidable spellcaster and a trusted ally. Eliat wondered if he had actually befriended a wizard?. Eliat pushed the notion away with a shake of his head.

Eliat began to rise, holding a hand upon his beating forehead, as the tavern door swung open, and Chase entered the tavern. He was in high spirits as usual, wearing his oversized hat with the everburning feather on top. He gave Eliat a wide mouted smile and a wink as he strode past him, with his arms full of freshly baked cinnamon buns. Eliat would bet his soul that Chase had not bought any of the bread, but rather charmed it from a young bakers daughter.

Chase dumped the buns upon a table, and smiled to the groups newest member, an usual fellow by the name of Ashalon. Ashalon was a half-elf, not too unusual, Chase had had his share of half-elf maids in his time. What truly puzzled Chase, was that Ashalon mastered both arcane and divine spellcasting, with equal skill. Never in his life had Chase met someone like him. Both very rational, wise and dedicated, Ashalon was diametrically oppsed to Chase, who was not entirely sure if he trusted or liked this half-breed spellguard. Nevertheless Chase threw some cinnamon buns over at their newest member, who smiled politley as he looked up from his spellbook, and caught one of them with a slender hand. At this time the dwarf had hustled his way over to the table located in the center of the tavern. Dolgrim looked tired and grim as he seated himself upon a chair that was a little too tall for his limited height. “So Dolgrim, you once again managed almost to kill yourself by drinking” Chase said with a smile, tossing a cinnamon bun to the hung-over dwarf. “Aye, by me mothers dirty underwear, I could almost feel Kelemvors skeletal hand upon me beard” Dolgrim answered with a shudder. “What is this womans food Chase? I need meself’ some meat, griffon if they have it at this establishment”. Chase smiled by himself “Have you ever even tasted griffon Dolgrim?” he asked the dwarf who looked quite terrified by the prospect of eating buns for breakfast. “I would have ye know, that it is my preferred nutrition aside from kraven” the dwarf answered looking stern. “Don’t you mean Kraken?” Chase added, highly amused by the lying dwarf. ”Bah! the real name is Kraven, it comes from the dwarven word Kraavenkar, which means ocean monster” Dolgrim crossed his arms, as if to say that the discussion was over. Chase nodded ignorantly “Oh, I did not know that”, even though Chase knew that the dwarven word for ocean was gorak. Dolgrim looked satisfied and began slowly eating one of the buns.

They all sat by the table now, except Eliat who had left the in to take a piss. The others could see him by the window when he returned, two young girls giggled as they passed him, and Eliat sent them a charming smile, which made the girls giggle even more. Eliat entered the tavern his chest swelling with pride over his great skills as a womanizer. Chase almost burst out in laughter as Eliat seated himself by the table, grabbing one of the buns. Dolgrim had to bite down hard not to laugh as well, and he did not dare look at Chase. Ashalon also looked on the very verge on laughter, and even Aurane, with his usual stern demeanor was smiling. Eliat was totally oblivious to the fake beard drawn on his face by Chase, and no one saw any reason to tell him of the jest. The day had just started, and it could take hours before the vain paladin would discover why people looked at him so weird. The companions ate this breakfast with unusual merry, and despite the fact that Dolgrim said the cinnamon buns tasted like dry troll worts, and that his people were the only one who knew how to bake a solid bread, he ate 9 of the buns and would have taken more if there had been any left.