Bonded by Brendan Lamerton

Author:Brendan Lamerton [Lamerton, Brendan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: anonymous
Published: 2024-03-08T00:00:00+00:00

fifteen

“What are you doing in my temple?” the monk asked in a heavy accent Jin had never heard before, emphasizing the wrong parts of each word, and stretching out the vowels.

He’d arrived like a late summer storm, a clap of thunder announcing his entrance as he burst through the door. He was a tall, lean man, not overly muscular but without a shred of fat on him, with short, rust coloured hair and a heavy plaited beard. He carried a massive stone war hammer in one hand, and he had blue script tattooed all over his body, written in harsh angular runes that Jin had never seen before. Despite all this, his most striking feature were his eyes, which were a solid slate grey from sclera to pupil, the same colour as the storm clouds outside, and every time lightning flashed outside his eyes blazed white as well.

He’d looked around the temple, his storm cloud eyes passing over Jin, Suni, and Briam all sitting on the floor in various states of exhaustion or injury, paused briefly at the dead jiangshi, paused longer at the enormous hole in the wall, before finally settling on Rhava.

Jin had winced internally when the monk had paused at the hole. He hoped he hadn’t damaged the carvings of the Azure Herd too badly, since he suspected a monk that ran a temple dedicated to following the Storm Bringer around might be a tad touchy about something like that.

“Why are you here? I won’t ask again.” The monk’s voice took on a dangerous tone. Jin could feel the pressure of his aura bearing down upon him, far heavier than any he had felt before, including Lord Sha’s.

“To fight ‘em,” Briam mumbled, slurring his words. Jin hadn’t even realised he was still conscious.

“Ah, I’m sorry, my lord,” Rhava said, back to his snivelling self. “But as my young pupil here so eloquently said, Lord Sha sent us to deal with the jiangshi. He received your raven.”

“I’m no lord, I am Ran’un, and I did not send a raven.”

Jin waved a hand in greeting. “Hey Ran’un, I’m Jin.”

“Be quiet, fool,” Rhava hissed, then turned back to the monk. “I am sorry, perhaps it wasn’t a raven. I meant to say we received your letter requesting help.” He was wringing his hands together as he spoke.

“I did not request help,” Ran’un said, “It was only a few jiangshi. I was already on my way back to deal with them, having escorted my villagers to safety, when I hear that there are strangers in Stormhaven currently fighting them.”

So that was where that villager had disappeared to. Jin had been wondering about that, he was glad they hadn’t fallen off the cliffs or been grabbed by one of the jiangshi. But if the monk hadn’t been the one to send the letter, who had?

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to imply you needed our help, but… ah, we did receive a letter. I can show you if you’d like,” Rhava said nervously.

Jin didn’t blame him, honestly.

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