One more old friend

Less than an hour later, Tiras entered a near-derelict two-story building in the seediest part of the Artisans’ Quarters, on the far side of the city from the Kettle.

Making his way up the creaky and extremely unsteady flight of stairs to the second floor, he could feel his heart sink as he followed the directions that Ratim had provided him with. Walking past the first two doors on the right, he then stopped in front of the third, having first stepped over the loudly snoring and almost impressively filthy old man who was slumped on the floor, sleeping. The old man squirmed about when Tiras knocked hard on the door, but only needed a few seconds to resume his snoring. As for the door, it remained closed, and there was no sound of anyone moving on the other side of it.

Sighing, Tiras grabbed the door handle and pulled it down, finding that the door was unlocked. Hoping as he pushed the door open that he hadn't gotten the directions wrong, Tiras then stepped into the apartment that laid beyond the threshold. The apartment was small, consisting of just one room, and dimly lit, with only a few pieces of coal glowing weakly in the open fireplace in the right innermost corner of the room. Along the left side of the room, less than three yards from the fireplace, a bed was placed, and in it a woman was lying on her back, covered by a thin blanket.
Scrutinizing the **** woman closer as he moved softly towards her, Tiras found that he recognized her, even though her face was thinner and markedly older than he’d remembered it.

“Kess…” Tiras said, softly, partly as an attempt to rouse her and partly in reaction to seeing how the shape of her right leg underneath the blanket ended much higher than the left one, matching the brief description of her crippling injury that Ratim had provided him with.

“Kess,” Tiras tried again, a little louder this time. The two of them had fought together in the Jadhi war until it ended with the Malawans being pushed far from their old empire’s heartlands, at which point she and Tiras had gone their separate ways. In Tiras’ estimate, that had been about three years ago. Kess looked like she’d aged at least ten. Her golden blonde hair had lost its lustre and she looked thinner and frailer than he could ever have possibly imagined, a fair cry from the statuesque figure that she’d cut as they fought alongside each other and shared each other’s lives.

Kess began to stir, groaning as Tiras again said her name as he stopped a few feet away from the bed.

“Aw fuck,” Kess groaned as she opened her eyes and rubbed her head with her right hand, before freezing when she spotted Tiras. He could see her eyes narrow and her right hand rifling for something tucked into the narrow gap between the bed and the wall, before breaking out into a tired smile when she recognized him.

“Tiras?” Kess said, her voice sounding tired and thin.

“Hello, Kess,” Tiras greeted his old friend with a friendly smile.

“What in all the hells are you doing here?” Kess asked as she sat herself up in the bed, with the blanket falling down to reveal the worn, but relatively clean, tan-coloured tunic that she had on.

“Is that any way to greet an old friend, Kess?” Tiras replied.

“Well, as you can see,” Kess said as she turned her body towards Tiras and tossed aside the blanket, revealing to him how her right leg ended at the knee, “I’ve got a good reason to be in a bad mood.”

“What happened?” Tiras asked.

“Took a crossbow bolt right in the shin a couple of months after you left. Wound got infected, I lost half a leg. And that’s about all that I’ve got to say about that,” Kess explained, taking her eyes off Tiras and looking over her small apartment.

Hearing that, Tiras suddenly felt extremely guilty. He’d been feeling much the same way ever since Ratim had given his brief description of the tragedy that had befallen their comrade, but hearing it from Kess only made him feel that much worse. If he’d stuck around for a few months longer, Kess would never have lost her leg. He could have healed a wound like that with relatively little trouble.

“I’m sorry.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Kess replied, “you were a good healer, but not that good...” She’d never learned about his magic ability, he’d always been careful not to be too open about it, keeping it a secret between him and those of his comrades that he had healed.

“I still could have done something…” Tiras maintained, stopping himself before he’d said anything more.

“We were three days out of camp and running low on just about every kind of supplies,” Kess’ voice got harder and edgier now, “Tiras, there would have been nothing you could do about it.”

“How’d you end up here?” Tiras wisely decided to change the subject.

“Took a boat. I didn’t want to hop round back home, so I ended up here,” Kess explained. She was from Heimarike, the same area in which Tiras had discovered the spellforge. A wild and sparsely populated land, it was not ideal for people with just one good leg.

“And the booze back home is terrible too,” Kess added, with a tired chuckle.

“Yes, Ratim mentioned that,” Tiras let slip, his comment causing Kess’ face to contract into an angry frown.

“Don’t start with me, Tiras,” she ordered him.

“Right, sorry.”

“I’m a drunk, I’m fully aware of that,” Kess said, “Now, is there any reason why you’ve interrupted me from wallowing in self-pity and slowly drinking myself to ****?”

“I’ve got a proposition for you,” Tiras began, choosing his words carefully. He’d already decided on which course of action to take, even though he knew that it would mean risking his own life. It was the right thing to do. That much he was certain of.

“You’re going to try to get me back in action or something?”

“Something like that, yes. Or well, exactly like that.”

“Got a wooden peg to give me? Because I can tell you that trying to swing an axe while hopping around on one leg isn’t exactly easy.”

“No. Something better than that.”

“Tiras, honey, two peg legs really isn’t better than one,” Kess grinned at him impishly, reminding him of what she’d used to be like.

“This really isn’t a good time to be smartass, Kess.” Tiras returned her grin.
“Did that ever stop me?”

“No, I guess not,” Tiras allowed himself to chuckle before adopting a more serious expression, “Look, Kess, there’s something about me that’s special…”

“Don’t tell me this is about your dick,” Kess interrupted him, “I swear, Tiras, if all this is because you want to sleep with a one-legged woman before you die, I’m going to be severely pissed.”

“That’s just it,” Tiras remained serious in the face of Kess’ latest snarky joke, resisting the temptation to come up with sort of comeback to it, “I can make it so you’re not anymore.”

“Say what?”

“I can give you your leg back, Kess,” Tiras said. He knew that using his most powerful spell was dangerous and could result in every sorcerer and sorceress in Tharros ending up hunting him.

“Okay, don’t tell me, you’re some hallucination caused by a lack of ****. Do me a favour before you disappear in a puff of smoke and find me another bottle, would you?”

“No more ****, Kess,” Tiras ordered her.

“I forgot how much fun it is when you get all determined and manly.”

“Look, do you trust me?”

“Well, yeah… of course I do,” Kess replied.

“Then close your eyes.”

“Tiras…”

“Kess, please,” Tiras’ pleading brought about its intended results as Kess closed her eyes.

“Keep them closed, no matter what,” Tiras instructed her, before beginning to conjure up the words that would activate the spell.