Girls toys pussy. Flights ~ Shen the Skald Book One
One moonlit shadow on the wall
Disrupted in its own creation
Veiled in the darkness of this fall
Is this the end – manifestation
-Opeth, Patterns in the Ivy 2
15
Having the minstrel pluck at his lute or tap a rhythm on its body seemed to me a good accompaniment for my tales as I told them. I tried my best to ignore the Priest Zihn near the door at his table with his stare. I tried my best as well to ignore Mavia if I saw her moving about the crowd that was listening as I spoke. An hour had become two and as I passed the mark negotiated by Chloe Harver but still kept on I saw her shake her head at me in frustration and then she spoke to the bartender. She gestured around at the crowd there spending their coins freely while she talked to him and I saw him shrug and nod and give his assent. More coins changed hands. Perhaps the next day would see us on new horses after all.
As the second hour drew to an end and my voice grew rough I finished my last story

There was silence for a moment and then soft claps began. They were not raucous like those in Esternesse had been. The men and women of Cantos had seemed to like my more serious tales and verse and as I finished they responded as those who had been affected rather than those entertained. It was a fancy place, fine and rich, and so too then were its customers. I waited a moment for the boisterous cheers that did not come and then nodded and waved and joined my father at the bar. The barkeep thanked me and Chloe admonished me for almost working for free.
Mavia, for her part, seemed to enjoy the spectacle of a room full of people with coin. It was still some more moments before she came to my side and when she did she was breathless and sighed

Her voice was excited and she spoke rather loudly when she leaned to me ear and said, “We did very well tonight, Shen! If there’s one at the stable I wish for my horse to be black like coal!
Maybe it is not good to speak of this here,” I said back to her.
No one knows what I’m talking about,” Mavia scoffed. “It is perfectly fine.
Yes, what are you talking about?” Chloe asked her and Mavia stopped then and stared.
We should go now, to our rooms, and then leave right at dawn,” she said while looking at none of us.
I thought perhaps we may stay here a day or more,” I replied, nodding to the barkeep whole held up a drink.
Me too, Shen Marth,” she said while still staring. “Me too, but instead we should go and then leave at dawn.
Chloe looked confused, my father was drunk, and I looked in the direction of Mavia’s gaze. A man with his friends, rich but not wealthy, was arguing with the girl who’d waited their table. He pointed over and over to a spot on his belt and she told him more than once to pay. The barkeep had noticed and went to assist, and Chloe took Mavia by the shoulder with one hand.
Is this what you’ve done?” she asked her with force. “To get a new horse? Mavia, you’re a silly girl.
We should argue about that upstairs in our rooms,” Mavia said, twirling her dark hair and turning for the stairs.
I followed and asked Chloe that she bring my father along, and once upstairs behind doors Mavia laughed and wrung her hands with glee

“Shen! Look!
From under her cloak she brought out a fine purse, she had taken the thing belt and all. From this pocket or that she brought out more coins and put them all in her new pouch. She produced twenty or thirty, most of them silver but a few there were gold, and shook it once full so it rattled. I shook my head at her as Chloe came in the room, and the two of us stood there; Chloe looking angered and I somewhat bemused.
Do you think this enough for a carriage and horse?” Mavia asked us with wide youthful eyes.
You’re a thief, I should have known when you bought all those clothes,” Chloe Harver said with her hands on her hips and a sneer on her lips and her feet set apart on the floor.
Where is my father?” I asked her, looking out the door to the hall. “I asked you to bring along my father.
He was behind me just now, at the base of the stairs,” she replied, still staring at Mavia intently.
He is not here now, though,” I said as I left the room and the women within.
My father was half way up the stairs and he leaned on the rail, frail and drunken and looking about blankly. I told him kindly to come and that I would help him and took him by the elbow
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ENTER TO GIRLS TOYS PUSSY
He said to me slurred, “The barkeep is looking for you, son. Something about a purse. Did you forget your purse, son? The barkeep, he has it.
Come quicker, Father,” I told him and we went back in the room. “We have to leave now, get your things, all of you.
I was going to have another bath, Shen,” Mavia protested, “And then we can just leave at dawn.
I told you not to get caught,” I said to her as I pulled on my jacket and pushed old clothes in a bag.
I did not!” she lamented, looking at the coin belt she had just set on the bed. “We got away
We are still under the same roof,” I went on as Chloe scowled and left for her room. “And it would seem that does not count as ‘getting away’.
No!” Mavia said, putting the belt around her waist and grabbing her own saddlebags

“I wanted to have another bath!
I wanted…to have another ale,” my father said sloppily and then wobbled and belched.
Sorry father, you’ll both have to wait,” I said, taking him to his room and getting his things.
They were neatly in order, bags buckled and packed. Ever the soldier my father was ready to leave at a moment’s notice now that the familiar patterns of the road had wormed their way back into his foggy mind. Chloe was already in the hall and the four of us went down the stairs and out the back door. Perhaps somewhat foolishly we went to the stables for our mounts but found there instead the barkeep, the innkeep, and three men.
That’s the girl!” one man shouted, the one missing his purse, and the proprietors turned then and glared.
He stepped fast for Mavia, grabbed her arm and pulled, and before I could think I was there. I wrenched her arm free, pushed the man back, and stepped between them and held up one fist between our faces in the air

Mavia held her wrist like this man had hurt her and I menaced him with a scowl. The others stayed back and behind, my father cocking his head to the side. With five men before me I knew not what to do, but then Mavia grabbed me and shouted, “Come on, Shen! We should be running!
Running away with a drunken half blind man is not something I would wish on myself but she was right and there was no other path I could see. We went between buildings with them chasing behind and by the time we lost them we were lost too. One street seemed the same as another in this forest of brick and timber so we wandered instead and discussed our next move.
We’re criminals,” Chloe Harver said dismally with a frown on her brow. “Criminals on the run because of one silly girl.
I’m doing more to help us than you have so far,” Mavia told her, her tone more pride than malice.
Is that so?” Chloe asked her, her voice climbing the scale

“Then by the stars pray do tell me what harming us would look like?
Shush,” my father mumbled. “Both of you be still.
What do you hear father?” I asked him, lowering my voice and slowing us down before we went round a bend in the street.
There’s someone over there,” he pointed to a narrow space between two buildings nearby. “They hold their breath now, thinking to stay hid.
I stepped to the space and reached into the darkness, feeling cloth and pulling whoever it was free.
Hello Shen of Zihn,” the priest said in my grasp. “I only wish to help you, the Regia are looking for you.
Priest of Zihn,” I spat. “Your stars and scrolls can’t help us with this. Who are these Regia you speak of? A militia?
They are the guards of the city,” he went on, “far more than a militia. I can help. You can hide in the temple as long as need be.
Fine,” I grumbled, letting him go

“But if this is some priest’s trick we will have words, you and I.
He nodded agreement and led us away, down this street then that and deeper into the city.
16
Their temple was in disrepair, as most of Zihn now were. Zahn had gained ascension and that meant something important to the priests and those who kept strictly to the Days and the Scrolls. For most it meant the priests at births and deaths and marriages now wore red robes and not blue. The happy circumstance of it all for us was that it also meant that the Temple of Zihn was all but abandoned. One old woman, also robed in blue like the one who had led us through the streets, was the only other there but for us.
You will be safe now,” he said to me. “The laws still prevent the Regia from entering temple grounds.
Our thanks,” I told him. “Now tell me why you have helped us, and speak the truth

Why are the Priests of Zihn so interested in me?
You are Shen of Zihn. You were born under the sign of Chiron. Ascendancy could be at hand again,” the old woman explained as she took my father by the hand and led him to a bench where he could rest his tired legs.
Ascendancy?” I asked them. “You speak of the stars and the Scrolls, and I do not keep to the Days as others do.
You do not have to,” the man said. “The Days keep themselves. You have only to be for one half, to know for the other. To be and to know at once for the third.
Only a priest could live in a world where three halves make a whole,” I said, pushing my hair over my ear and shaking my head
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