With a final, heavy grunt and a deep thrust like the killing plunge, Talvan and his quarry both came to a cease. The she-beast had been toppled and tamed, lay--
Her hand cracked across his face. His post-orgasmic bliss met a sharp end and he looked at the wench under him with eyes wider than her legs. She jerked away with a wet squish and Talvan's tool smacked painfully into the footboard below. The wench stormed to her clothes where they lay discarded at the far side of the room, leaving a trail dripping onto the hardwood floor. Talvan, grinning with astonishment, threw his hands to the side. "What?"
"You know fucken what!" She hollered, her voice plagued by the crater's unattractive rural accent and softening him for good. "I told you, not enside! Fuck!"
"Sorry!" He shrugged unsorrily. "I forgot, alright? Here, I'll give you extra..."
"Oh, fuck your money! Better hope your seed don't take; that'll be the fefth one I flushed thes year olone, and this time, it'll be haunten ''you!''"
"Right." Talvan groaned, wiping his hands on the bedsheets and making for his own fabrics, eager to be gone from this town as soon as he could. But first, a drink. "Well, tell it where to find me. I'll be here some days still if you two wonna stop by for a veset."
...
"So, I neared the fell beast, sword held, ah..."
"Aloft?"
"There ya go. Sword held aloft, edging closer by the moment, meeting its eyes. I'd expected to find a measure of respect in them, some kind of understanding that it'd been bested, but there was naught but hate dwelling within them. Those burning, hateful eyes. So by then, there was but one thing left to do, one final plunge afore I finished my task..."
"Ya kissed it?" The one-eyed man threw himself back against his seat and opened his maw to the tavern's ceiling, roaring in laughter. The others gathered around him brusquely followed, their hearty howls drawing the eyes and ire of the tables around them. "Wouldn't surprise me, ya old man-bitch!"
"No, I slew it." Talvan hissed, leaning in over his drink. "You're a real funny bastard, Ogaf, you know that?"
"You mean that truly?" He slowed his laughter enough to chortle out four barely coherent words, picking a tear from the corner of his eye.
"No, you fuckin' wood-guzzler. I don't mean scat! I try to treat you folk to a good story and you act like this."
"A horseshet story, more like!" The fat man directly to Ogaf's pointed across the table accusatorially. "A wyres? Den't fucken happen! Those thengs dun even exest en th' Sharo."
"Yeah? And how would you know, smith?" Talvan narrowed his eyes at the man and tilted his head.
"Because I fucken' grew up there!"
Ah, shit. The commonfolk who'd paid to hear the sagas of a famous and storied adventurer had called his bluff, and they'd surely demand their coin back now. Tarvan needed to be gone. He smashed his palms onto the wood hard enough to make the cup holding his ale rumble. "I don't have to sit here and allow simple rabble to levy accusation after accusation of deceit at me! What a fool I was, to think that mere commoners would be able to appreciate the tales of Talvan the Tenacious!"
"More like Talvan the Fallacious!"
His forehead buzzed angrily. How did a hick fuck know that word anyways? The faux-adventurer rose from his seat and turned to storm out of the alehouse, only to find that same horizontally-endowed smith sliding between him and the door. He's fast, Talvan reckoned, for a fat man! "Out of my way!"
"Not so fast." The smith took a step to block the man after the latter taken his own step aside in an effort to slip past. Talvan scowled and turned around towards where he'd seen the trio of armored guards in the corner, hopeful for their protection, but came eye-to-eye instead with Ogaf.
"We paid good coin for the genuine stories of a genuine hero. If those stories ain't genuine...I want my coin back." The heavyset lumber worker rumbled.
"No refund--oof!" A fist planted itself squarely in Talvan's gut. He doubled over and staggered backwards, right into the hold of the fat man.
"That sword on your hip mean anything? Or is it fake, like the rest of you?"
"Why don't you...find out..?" He struggled to escape, but wouldn't need to struggle much longer: the smith pushed him away, and the folk formed a circle around him. Some cracked their knuckles, some downed the last of their drinks, some only folded their arms sternly. Between two of them, he saw the guards: they watched the scene with curious and drunken gazes.
"You know, if even a lick of what ya say is true, you'd be able to cut us all down before we even touch you. Except...it isn't, is it? You won't even try, because you know you're a liar."
Talvan glared at Ogaf, as though trying to mimic the wyre in his story, but stayed his hand from the blade at his hip. None moved. He lowered his head with a sigh and tore the pouch of coin from the belt and dropped it. "Take it, you oafs."
...
Nighttime found him alone along that dusty old trail out of town. Already, the window-lights were low and distant, and all around him the fields, rustled by the occasional languid breeze, stretched neatly into the dark which obscured the faint hills he knew lay beyond. The earth dipped into square-patterned irrigation canals, devoid of water at this hour. All manner of crop was harbored in these fields, from barley to beets and all between. Far off, coyotes spoke to one another across the hills in their wailing tongue, no doubt frightening the region's livestock and leaving farmers on edge. They wouldn't find much sleep tonight, he suspected.
But between the rising and falling howls, something else reached the man's ears. Fabric shuffling, mixed with low murmurs. Talvan adjusted his gaze, eyes wandering from the road ahead to just off its side, where sure enough, three silhouettes stood just barely highlighted by the half-moon. Two stood side-by-side, hassling the third, and though he couldn't make out the finer details, the shape of a knife in one of the former's hands was immediately recognizable. Talvan's eyes widened and his posture straightened, a stricter gait carrying him closer down the road. He tried to only watch out of the corner of his eyes though found himself staring, and his gaze was returned.
"Sir!" A relieved cry went up from the hassled. His voice was shrill and nervous. What little he could make of the figure was tall but lanky, gangling limbs waving in futility to catch his attention. A young adult, most likely. "Help! Help m--augh!"
Tarvan flinched as the robber's knuckles caught the victim's head, a heavy backhand knocking him to the ground. The robbers kept their eyes firmly on Talvan now, or more accurately, he suspected, on his sword. That was the upside of carrying it around everywhere he went; nobody trifled with a man who had a sword. It didn't matter how many pressed him, because when the blades came out, somebody was losing a limb, and why risk being that somebody when there was an unarmed sucker just a couple paces away? So long as he made no move against them, and they made no move against him, there'd be nothing to fear. "Sorry, kid!" Talvan called, never slowing or skipping a step as he passed. "Just swallow your pride and give them what they want. Easier for everyone."
An insidious cackle rose from one of their lips. "'E's right, lad. Ye can afford to lose yer coin, but can ye ma afford t' lose ye?" Talvan heard a kick in the darkness, followed swiftly by a yelp of pain from the young man. The mention of a mother, while not directed at him, brought a frown to the charlatan's lips. What would she do, he wondered then? It was a strange thought, because it wasn't one he'd ever suffered. Talvan was the furthest thing from a sentimental man. He believed himself a learned man, and the gods held no sway in his life. But if they were real, he would've sold his soul for a stack of gold, a good horse, and some shiny new armor long ago. He had a brother out there somewhere that, in his many, many years of travel, he'd never once considered meeting. Talvan hadn't granted his mother so much as a consideration in a very long time, so why now?
But just as soon as the thought had forced its way to the surface, it disappeared again into the deep where it belonged, dragged down by reason and left to drown. It doesn't matter what she'd do, Talvan reasoned, because she was dead now, and a dead person's wisdom was useless. So he continued on his way, content to leave the sounds of the youth not too far into his adult years get beaten to the dirt as his well-earned money was stripped from his pockets. In spite of that, this wasn't what had happened.
Talvan made it no more than half a dozen steps away before the other robber spoke, loudly: "Hold on now. See the pommel of his sword, there, Gittan? That's an Umbian trinket, yes it is. That man there's an Umbian!" He stopped in his tracks. Those words, in that tone, was never good. Talvan turned, slowly, his hand crawling to the blade at his hip. Don't make me use it, don't make me use it...
"That an issue," he began, keeping his voice steady and measured despite his growing anxiety, "sir?"
