WOT Adv 178

--- The Wheel Turns ---

Maer listened to the muttered curse. It was a man's voice. His dark eyes searched the dark heights of the inn's second story. He could see nothing but darkened windows above him. For several long moments the sounds of fighting continued inside the inn.

Suddenly, the door burst open and Maer saw a woman, her back to him, engaged in what appeared to be a dance of some sort. Upon closer inspection, Maer could tell it to be a wetlander dance of blades. He could hear the distinctive sound of a blades meeting blades. Was it? Yes. It was Keb and three others. Taraboner men, by their shape and dress. All of them wielded short blades.

Keb moved backwards on the defensive, but her face was fixed in a fierce grin, a gash down one sleeve of her blouse showed a dark and angry wound.

"Flamin' wench! We'll learn you a lesson you won't soon forget!" one man said, a dark streak across one eye marred his face. "Get around her!"

The shapes moved to get around her. Maer veiled his face and stepped into the pale light that shone from the kitchen windows at the back of the inn. "Death stalks you now, wetlanders. Prepare yourselves to join again with the wheel." Maer said in a deathly cold voice, his hand on the haft of his spear.

The three men stopped watching as this strange man appeared as an apparition. "Who's that?" one of them asked tentatively, his eyes squinting into the darkness over his Taraboner veil.

"Maer?" Keb asked. "Ashes, but it's good to see you! Glad you have my back!"

"He's a friend of the wench!" one shouted in dismay.

"Well, she's ours and anyone who gets in our way will wish they hadn't! You two, kill him, I'll take the woman!"

They surged forward, the one in front moving to engage Keb, the other two moving cautiously towards Maer.