Will the Trio become a Duo?

Morning came early in Varna. It may have been the biggest town in the Eldeen Reaches, but it was still a frontier place, and when the cock crowed at dawn people began to move. First up were the farmers, followed by the tradesmen and laborers. Before the body of the sun broached the horizon ninety percent of the city was up and working. By the time the entire sun cleared the horizon only a few noble scions of the dragonmarked houses were still sleeping.

Well, them and a pair of tired adventurers.

Pillar regarded his new comrades quizzically as they groused about the noise outside of their window and tried to hide under their pillows. Kaspar's vocabulary was particulary colorful. Pillar did not sleep, and as such he did not understand the attraction to a bed, but he did not see why someone would enjoy being non-functional. A short time later a smeal from downstairs came wafting through Pillar's olfactory receptors. While warforged did not have the same range of smell as a born creature, they could detect smells and their basic nature. Pillar took a moment to realize that bread was baking and meat was roasting. The second smell was more familiar to him as he had been among a group of human soldiers that had died from a fireball attack during the war.

Kaspar and Castille obviously liked the smells as it finally got them up. They greeted Pillar and got dressed, and shortly all three were packed and downstairs. Pillar watched them drink a bitter thing called "coffee" and eat "sausage and grits." They swore it tasted excellent and gave the server some extra coin. The girl bringing the food shuddered every time she looked at Pillar, but was pleasant enough otherwise. Pillar noticed that he was drawing several looks, as warforged were not common in this part of the world, but he was used to them and so he ignored it.

"Why don't you eat?" came an accusing question. Pillar turned to look at the man walking in, and he noticed that Kaspar and Castille both put a hand on their weapons. "Why don't you EAT?" asked the man again, his voice rising.

Pillar regarded the questioner. The human was dirty, and wore hides that had not been polished in some time. A long snake draped itself over the man's shoulders, and it peered about the room, tongue flicking as it regarded everyone. It seemed to Pillar that the snake was watching the man's back. Druid, Pillar realized. The warforged knew little about the nature priests, but the room had gone quiet and pople were watching the situation warily.

"I do not need to," Pillar answered him truthfully. "I draw sustenance out of the air and the ground, the very sun and the moons."

"It is the natural way to eat," the dirty man insisted, jabbing an accusing finger. "It is unnatural - EVIL - to depart from nature's way!"

"Ashbound sect," Castille muttered to Kaspar. The half-orc nodded.

"This - THIS cannot be tolerated!" the man said, whirling and addressing the room. "You have sinned! You have allowed the arcane to come in and corrupt the natural! The Ashbound WILL protect nature, and nature is watching, noting who sits here and ALLOWS -"

Kaspar was up so fast that the snake barely had time to hiss. The half-orc's huge blade was out and the point was mere inches from the mad druid's neck. The human had shut up, and the snake had bared its fangs but made no move towards the half-orc.

"Leave," was all Kaspar said.

The human swallowed, then ran. "The Ashbound are watching!" he yelled as he cleared the doorway. Kaspar made some ribald comment and the crowd laughed nervously. The half-orc sat down and sheathed his blade as the covnersation in the common room returned to normal.

"Thank you," Pillar said to the half-orc.

"No problem!" the half-orc said, giving Pillar's shoulder a good-natured punch. Then Kaspar winced and blew on his knuckles. "The Ashbound don't like sorcerers much either," Kaspar then added, nodding towards Castille.

"And I don't care much for them," Castille replied around a mouthful of food.

Some ten minutes later they had left, much to the relief of the inn owner. They did not see the Ashbound druid again, but a pair of shfiter watchmen gave the trio a cautious escort to the north gates of the town.

As they went throught the gates to the staging ground for caravans, Pillar was overwhelmed by the sights and sounds of so many peoples. Horses, wagons, ponies, and brightly colored tents of merchants competed for his attention. Castille and Kaspar ignored all of it, heading toward a tall banner with the insignia of House Orien, the dragonmarked Transportation and Roads Guild.
House Orien had a small pavillion where some magewrights conferred about roads, some merchants hired guides and horses, and several House Orien retainers were loading parcels and mail onto some large, slow flatbed vehicles that had no wheels, just flat panels of glowing and shifting earth under their axles. Pillar realized that these were Earth Sleds, inventions from Zilargo that had embedded Khyber dragonshards holding bound earth elementals. House Orien Earth Sleds were slow, far slower than horses, but could carry a great deal of weight and they did not need to travel on smooth roads. Pillar noticed most of the Earth Sleds carried heavy construction materials. He had heard that House Orien had been given permission to build more roads in the deeper wilderness. In addition to the supplies and parcels, there were men with crossbows and elves with wands.

"Why all of the security?" Pillar asked a halfling who was walking buy, leading some kind of large lizard on a leash.

"Ain't ya heard?" the halfling said, looking up at the warforged and jangling his bone jewelry. "Ashbound attacks! Thems don't want no more civilizationing in the Reaches, especially not of an arcane nature!" The halfling laughed. "You're a big one, who owns you?"

"I own MYSELF," Pillar growled.

"Hey, hey, hey peace!" the halfling said, stepping back. "Just haven't seen your like in Talenta!" Then the little humanoid scurried off, leading his lizard away.

"Don't fall behind!" Castille shouted to Pillar.

The warforged hurried after the half-elf. Made of heavy admantine, he did not move as fast as his new companions. Pillar followed Castille around the corner and saw the vehicle that Kaspar was approaching.

It was tall, long and thin, a platform atop long, sloped legs of bronzewood, each leg ending in a Khyber dragonshard-studded knob. A gnome in a House Sivis uniform stood by it with bags of mail. Three dwarves in scale armor holding heavy crossbows stood atop it, scanning the crowd. A human in silk robes, half his head shorn to show off his glowing Orien dragonmark, conferred with Kaspar over some papers.

"An Earth Skiff," Castille told Pillar. "Made to be fast, very fast, faster than horses. First of its kind, a prototype. It's made for speed and tight turns, not war or transport. It's our ride. We've got hundreds of miles to go to get to the mining town."

The Orien human looked up suddenly at Pillar. "Oh no!" he yelled. "No, no, no!!! No warforged!"

"You are Ashbound?" Pillar asked the human.

"I'm a pilot for a dragonshard-powered vehicle you dumb hunk of rock!" snarled the human. "You think I follow the wacko nature priests? No, I just don't like YOUR KIND. Warforged are murderers, made to kill and maim, and I'm NOT going to have one on my Skiff!"

"We have tickets -" Kaspar began.

"Wrong!" the Orien pilot said. "You and Castille have tickets. The machine here doesn't have one. And even if he did I wouldn't take him on!"

Pillar hurt, but did not show it. The Orien man was not the first who had such views on Pillar's race. Pillar watched the half-orc and the half-elf exchange a look, and realized that his two newfound companions HAD to be on that Skiff to get to the mining town in time. Was their team about to be broken up...?