I’m now a nun killer. While I contemplated my mistake, chaos erupted. Envy transformed out of shock into the jolly fat man, Wrath froze and Lust moved towards the corpse. I stuck a hand out and yelled. “Sisters come quick something is wrong”

Envy transformed rapidly and assumed a pose of horror. The rest followed her example. As the first sister poked her head through the door we all were pictures of innocent horror. I had the rag back on. I spoke loudly and panicked. “The sister came in to help us and she fell over. Her heart seemed to have failed her.”

Envy cut in. “She must be buried at once. Her spirit must meet the lord of light to aid us on our quest. May she brighten the stars.”

Envy was a master strategist. Buried bodies don’t usually have investigations into them. After the Solens had recognized her she had enough clout to tell them to burn and eat the corpse and they’d do it. The nuns hurried and wrapped the body in a shroud. Then Envy led an eulogy for the victim. Remorse was certainly what I should have felt. Instead I felt resignation. She was not the first nor the last.

I was now certain to be sent to the void when I died. Murder was a definite sin but a dead nun felt like it was probably one of the worst thing I could do. The body was removed quickly but the silence afterwards lasted for an inexorable time. I wondered if saying sorry would help. Probably not. Even better was that my rag had returned over my eyes.

Envy launched into her plan.

“Ok so the Solens will get us into the capital. We ditch him the first chance we get. Then we find Greed. She is a sorcerer that in exchange for something could probably remove the tracking runes. Then we can part ways if needed.”

Lust signed a few words to Wrath who translated for us.

“He says how do you know we have tracking runes?”

“Well they found us the last time didn’t they?”

I felt my way towards the stone wall. Seemed like they would be arguing again.

Luck had a fun surprise to that mistake. The wall exploded like a flock of pigeons with the bricks flying everywhere. I think I flew into the back wall but it was hard to tell. I tried to remove the rag but a hand caught me. I struggled with it but even without the fever it seemed like whoever was in control of my wrist was a monster. I felt metal constrict around my forearms and snap them close together with a large amount of jarring force. I was then pushed somewhere. I hear noises around me of similar things happening. More metallic slithering and struggling. I tried to swing my arms at whoever was behind me. I received another shove that lead me to trip on a brick and taste the soil. I must say the earthy aftertones really enhanced my palate. The kick that followed was not so enjoyable. Steel toed boots were always a bad sign. Military men wore them. I was set upon my feet and pushed towards somewhere. I recognized the sound of horses.Funnily enough this was not my first abduction. This was basically how I was caught the first time. I was slung over a horse's saddle. I could have tried to run but honestly the fever was telling me that it was a bad idea. Luck was having lots of fun. I felt whoever had thrown me on the horse jump in the saddle and dig the spurs in. The horse heaved forward and built into a full gallop. My head was comfortably bashing against the horse's flank. It was a pleasant rhythm to the pain I was currently feeling everywhere. My stomach tried to empty itself only to find that it had consumed nothing in the past hours. I eventually passed out, maybe from the fever or maybe from the lack of blood in my head.

A welcoming wake up was being slung on the ground like a sack of flour. Unlike the lucky sack of flour I felt the impact quite minutely. An added bonus was the little rocks that dug into my side. I also had an overwhelming desire to use the bathroom. I had drunk only a little of that birch stuff but my body decided it was better off dry. I raised my hand and coughed politely. That was ignored. I then shouted as loud as I could “I will piss on you if you don’t let me use the washroom. A hand pulled me up by the hair (which was fun) and shoved me over somewhere. “Go ahead” a voice snarled. My captors were more polite last time. I took little time relieving myself. So much better. I staggered a few steps away and then sat down. Enjoy the little things I guess. It didn’t look like they were going to kill me so that was a bonus. My experience with abductions meant that usually if I asked questions I would get taught not to. Silence seemed like the best option. The problem with silence meant that I would start thinking again. Darkness led my thoughts to places that I didn’t want to visit. I decided instead to head it off at the pass by trying to discern noises that I could hear. The horses were somewhere behind me. Snorting and chewing grass. There was a fire crackling to my left. I could hear quiet conversation between two people. Sounded like one man and a woman. Clattering mean that at least one was in armor. I heard footsteps come near me. Light footsteps and no metal noises. A robe rustled. That would probably be a green robe. I was listening so intently that I didn’t notice that the footsteps had stopped. A female voice called to me, breaking my concentration.

“Are you Death of the Sins?”

w

I contemplated lying but I was pretty sure that I was the only one blindfolded.

“That would be me”.

“Are you aware how much of pain you are to catch? Honestly.”

A morsel of food was pressed to my mouth. Once I bit down on the food, the hand went to my forehead.

“Kinda hot. Hey Mira think he’s got a fever?”

Another pair of footsteps sounded and a cool hand touched my forehead. Mira seriously needed to get gloves. Her hand felt like ice.

“He’ll live. Get him some water”.

Mira sounded less pleasant than the other. The food in my mouth tasted like bread which was a plus. I guess I was officially a valuable object. Can’t starve the human weapon and all that. A waterskin was pressed to my lips. I gulped down as much as I could.

“Sleep and behave. I have no problem if you arrive with less fingers than when we caught you.”

Mira was truly a joy to be around. I laid down in my best “I’ll be good” position. I wonder if they had Pride. Probably not. He wasn’t with us and he had the best evasive abilities. Ability wise I honestly didn’t understand Lust’s power. The nuns didn’t seem to fall head over heels for him. I’m assuming he is here as well. Why aren’t the green robes infatuated with him. Envy too. Why can’t they just transform out of these cuffs. Or Wrath could get angry and break out.Why was I the only helpless one in this situation. That's what I ended up falling asleep to, a warm fuzzy feeling of frustration and maybe a touch of insanity.

I was awoken by a rustle near me. I panicked for a second. I was blind, I couldn’t see anything. I then remembered that I had a blindfold on. I appeared to have the intelligence of a dumb pigeon. Maybe even an inbred pigeon. A whisper startled me.

“Hi Death, glad to see you're not dead. I am here to come to your rescue.”

Pride was the world's most marvelous idiot. I hissed back at him.

“They have guards, birdbrain. Scram before you get caught.”

“He’s asleep. Plus it's dark and there is no fire. Now, who has the key for those shackles. Actually where is the lock?”

“They are bound by runes so you can’t release them. I won’t be able to escape. Just take my blindfold off and get Envy. They’ll be able to help with freeing the rest of us. Do you have the horses? “

“Yeah but I could only bring two. The other one was slow. Which one is Envy, cause it kinda looks like there are two Wrath’s sleeping over there.”

Looks like Envy was trying to confuse them.

“Envy is the one in the nun outfit. Check both for that.” A couple seconds later some hushed conversation happened. The guard snored a little and a collective hush went through everyone. I didn’t doubt that my heart wasn’t the only one that seemed to be panicking. Then a muffled sound of rope being cut echoed in my ears. It was like thunder in my ears.And yet the guard slept on regardless. Whoever was on watch was probably a knight. He wouldn’t be used to guard duty. I relaxed a little. If he was a knight then he could sleep through catapults, canons and the end of the world. I had seen it first hand. My guards would sleep through Wrath’s fury when she didn’t have her sleeping draught night by night. I didn’t sleep much anyways but it was impressive. I wished that Pride had taken off my blindfold but he had enough on his plate. Wouldn’t want to inconvenience anyone. I also couldn’t remind him without waking the green robes. I heard them leave with a rustling of tall grass and a horse snorting. The things I could do if I had my hand free. The metal was starting to go from excruciating to eye gouging pain. It had a knack of rubbing against the bandages on my wrist. It was as enjoyable as sitting on a wasps nest if those wasps also had little spears. This was honestly only made worse by the fact that all my things were gone. I had a halberd that I wanted to try. It looked like fun. It looked like something you’d slay dragons with. Now it is gone. I tried to scratch my leg. I hadn’t noticed but I was wearing clean clothes. They must have washed them while we were at church. I wonder if Envy had done that. Among other things I couldn’t keep focus. I thought I would be worried about Envy’s escape. If they were bound like me then they’d be useless. Those green robes were powerful enough to cause an explosion like that then bound Envy alone couldn’t match them. At the moment I was useless so it was best to enjoy the extra sleeping time.

I woke up to a furious noise. It looked like Mira had found out that the knight hadn’t done his job. In a string of profanities that combined in ways I thought was mythical. I hoped Wrath didn’t take any notes. Her insults were bad enough without inspiration. After finding out that the knight in question made rotting bags of pus on rat dick look good, the punishment was meted out. They yanked off my blindfold and I was staring into the eyes of a moustached man. They were pretty eyes brown with little dots. The wrinkles on his face spoke of the time he had spent here. I had cut that short, another leaf plucked from the tree. The blindfold was shoved over my face once again. Orders were barked and Mira then found out that Envy was gone. I was glad to be sitting around minding my own business. From the sound it appeared that the corpse was being kicked. I thought it was impolite to speak ill of the dead. Not a qualm held by Mira apparently. It sounded quite like a drunk yelling with a church bell going off behind. The plate rattled every time her foot met it. In sight of the furious mage, the camp broke quickly. I was hauled onto a horse upright this time. Beats being slung like a package over the side. Someone swung their leg up and jumped in the saddle with me. A robe hit me in the face as they got their other leg over. Please not Mira anyone but Mira. Luck laughed and Mira snarled.

“Which one escaped. Do not try my patience.”

I made my best innocent face and replied “I was blindfolded, I didn’t even know that the guard was asleep.”

“We found a feather near your sleeping spot. Now talk little boy before I make you squeal.”

“Sir there are plenty of birds in the forest, maybe go ask them what they saw”.

I was fairly certain I could hear Mira’s teeth grinding together.

“Be careful, you wouldn’t want to bite off your tongue and deprive all of us the sweet melody of your voice.”

Someone snickered to that. Checkmate Mira.

I then received an elbow to the stomach. Probably deserved.

Riding continued at a regular pace as far as I could tell. I’m fairly certain that she would go near branches so that they would hit my unsuspecting face. I tried remaining crouched over but my back quickly reminded me of our bipedal nature.

After hours of trying to guess when branches were coming, I heard distinct sounds of water. Not the flowing of stones but the roar of furious water plunging off some cliff face. I had never seen waterfalls and it looks like I wouldn’t see this one either. Soon the horses hooves clattered against stone and the water crashed louder, the sound rattling the ground with its strength. We stopped suddenly and I was thrown off the horse. I was quite tired of getting thrown places. This was the fourth or fifth time I had tasted dirt in my mouth in the last four days. Roughly lifted upright, a sack was shoved over my head and a rope was looped around the cuffs. Only when I started getting dragged did I realize that I had lost horseback privileges. I stumbled around before getting the hand of jogging behind the horse. I felt hard stones beneath my feet then on my face. One misplaced rock and I tripped with Luck howling in laughter in the background. Between sickness and bruises I was probably going to die. The cell was looking increasingly like the peak time in my life. I started to hear sounds of a city. A set of wheels rattled to the left and a loud disagreement on prices was happening somewhere. Two wings were far too much apparently. A voice was yelling orders somewhere ahead. I couldn’t catch what they said because I stumbled again and had to jog to keep up. The water was still crashing and roiling somewhere nearby. My first time in a large town and honestly first impressions weren’t great. The road appeared to be designed to trip blind people and it was not very well lit. It was almost like a constant night. However the sack quality was excellent, nice and rough to provide maximum scratching. We stopped right by the yelling voices. Turns out tolls were what was being demanded. Four horns was the going price. Coins clinked and off we went. Immediately my leg found a pile of what I hoped was horse dung. A slothlike pace developed as more and more sound approached my ears in a parade. In the same way the forest radiated peace, the city bled, laughed and cried all out on the streets. It was a beautiful chaos to listen to. I heard at least four merchants that were “bluddy criminels” and one man whose wife was displeased to put it lightly. I was so entranced by the sounds of the city that I failed to notice a low hanging sign which promptly floored me for the fifth time. Mira was snorting and Luck was joining her. The next moments were devoted to the discovery of how to stop nosebleeds. Without use of hands it appeared to be a fruitless endeavor. Several irritating moments of trying to not swallow blood I realized we had stopped.

I didn’t remember much after that. Someone shoved some sweet smelling rag under the sack and I really couldn’t focus on anything besides the vivid feeling of unconsciousness. Surprisingly no nightmares came of the involuntary nap.

I woke in a room much like my cell. Stone walls and ….. Huh. The blindfold was off.