<span style="font-family: 'Book Antiqua'"><span class="fixed-color" style="color:#ffffff">Marden was exhausted beyond any definition of the word that he had known or experienced. He was parched and his body felt like cracked, broken earth, through and through, with no hope of respite in sight. Still, he trudged on through a wasteland devoid of any geography or landmarks; everything just looked like gray shifting sand against the backdrop of a grey cloudless sky. He didn't know where he was, how he had gotten there, or, worst of all, how to get out; but still he fought to move forward with everything he could muster.<br/>
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"You will bring him the water and I will bring back his strength..." <br/>
<br/>
Marden heard a voice and swiftly swung around to see who had spoken but there was no one there. There was only more gray and no indication that there was anyone there but himself in the vast emptiness. Had he just imagined the words? Was he losing his mind? The voice had not been his own internal voice, but there was no one else there. He felt loneliness hit like a heavy weight of stone in his heart and he sank to his knees offering a desperate look to the sky. He wasn't a spiritual man and he wasn't one to place his trust in things he could not see or touch, but with nothing else to lose, he pleaded silently for deliverance from whatever damnation had befallen him.<br/>
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As he sank further, from knees to prone, he wondered if this wasn't some kind of retribution for the life he had been living. As a Belmiran and a member of one of its most respected slaver families, he'd never questioned the right order of things or his position in them as a hunter of men. He'd grown capable, renowned, and wealthy with his skill and cunning to locate and bring back escaped properties and to locate new assets. It wasn't until he had retired and begun traveling the world for pleasure that he began to see people for what they truly were, and it was then that he began to question if his life and work had been built on a foundation skewed with false importance and cruelty. <br/>
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He heard a rush all around him and the dry earth trembled as he lay helpless on it. What was the meaning of all this? This was no place like any place he had traveled before and it seemed to have no known natural order that made any sense. He couldn't move anymore and could only motionlessly resign himself to whatever it was that rose around him so fast in it's deafening roar. Suddenly he was washed over in a wave of water that at first threatened to drown him and carry him under. He fought back the panic that gnawed at the edges of his mind to let himself be carried by it. His body soaked it up, filling the dry cracks and holes of his aching form and spirit. The landscape turned to a sea of aqua under a blue sky and he shook his head like a dog would shake off water to have a look around. It was all new, but somehow just the same in its vastness, yet the loneliness had been washed away. He wasn't alone; he could feel it.<br/>
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"If I cared for my way of life I should just poison you now."<br/>
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It was a new voice, and as Marden spun around treading water, looking around frantically, he still saw no one. The words had been but a whisper, but they had been so close they struck a cold chord in him like an invisible assassin.<br/>
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_____<br/>
<br/>
Orri leaned forward to rest his chin in his hands as he rode backwards with the kind of supple limberness of a circus performer. "I do know." He smiled affectionately to Rhiak through his smeared skull make up. It was an odd dichotomy of imagery, but none-the-less his warmth shown through the grim visage. "And you are right, we walk the same roads." There was a hint of further knowing in his words but he made no attempt to explain his deeper insights.<br/>
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He stared at the hunter for a long moment, simply taking him in; how he moved with the gait of his mount, how his expression sat calm and still on his face, and how his spirit settled calm in his breast. As he watched the hunter, his own expression gave easily over to the affectionate nature his feelings which he made no effort to hide. A decision was seemingly then made in his head and the resolution played out on his face as he abruptly sat up and spun back around.<br/>
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"Rhiak the Hunter, will it work?" He shrugged with a light laugh. "Who knows!" He let his head roll around and back so he could side glimpse Rhiak. "However the future unfolds, there is only one thing that is certain. Either the world of stone and sky retains two souls, or the realm of spirit becomes their new home."  He squinted his eyes tight with a small chuckle despite the gravity of the statement he had made so casually and turned back to watch the path ahead as they neared their destination. "It is the arithmetic of life!"</span></span>