[center][h1][b]Hope for a Dying World[/b][/h1][/center]

[center][h2][b]Day One[/b][/h2][/center]

[b]The King's Road, near Lastbridge[/b]

The dawn had come bright and clear a few short hours ago, and the day was already warm for early autumn. Osric ambled south down the road to Lastbridge under a cloudless sky, one hand grasping the lead of his pack horse – a big strong gray – and the other clutching a walking stick. He passed a field full of farmers working to bring in the harvest and failed to return their friendly waves. Such coldness was not his wont; normally he would have greeted them with great cheer, singing as he went. But he was in no mood for levity this morning.

He knew that lack of sleep was at least partly to blame for his ill humor. After the evening rites were finished the night before he had gone off quickly to his cell, but peace had proved elusive. He ended up leaving just a few hours later. Father Superior Robert and Mother Superior Matilda were roused from their owns beds to see him off, though Osric would have sooner not bothered them. He'd had precious little to say to them, anyway; his mind had been too distracted for proper farewells.

Soon Osric approached the outskirts of Lastbridge. It was the most watchful of the Seven, bounded by walls of stone and guarded ceaselessly. He did not enter the village proper, but stopped outside the shabby tavern that lay just before the northern gate. The Forlorn Hope was its name; whether or not she had known it at the time, the proprietress of that place might well have glimpsed the future when she had named her establishment.  For it was here, where the young monk secured his horse to a crooked post and sat down in the shade of nearby old oak tree, that Humanity's last desperate gamble would first begin to play out. This was the appointed meeting spot.

No one approached him directly, but Osric knew he was being watched. Two comely girls had paused in mucking out the stable across the road to look at him, whispering to each other and making no attempt to disguise their interest. That sort of attention would have bothered him on any day – a monk was sworn to celibacy, of course, and this monk took his vows very seriously – but doubly so on an occasion such as this. Did they not know that the fate of the world hung in the balance? Still, they were young; younger even than he was. So he did his best to forgive their indiscretion and ignore them, closing his eyes and meditating prayerfully.

The prayers were automatic, arriving as naturally as the breath they were mumbled under. They had been drilled into his very soul, and he hardly needed the beads at his belt to count them off. “O Queen of Heaven most holy, blessed be thy unuttered name,” and so on and so on. The tranquility that was supposed to accompany them was less forthcoming. His worries should have been carried up to the gods, but Osric still felt their weight upon his shoulders.

There was the note in the pocket of his robe, for one thing. Only with effort did he manage to stop himself from pausing in his prayer to pull it out again. He had read it dozens of times already; looking again would yield no new information. Still, it mystified him. The plain writing had promised the aid of someone skilled at arms – the value of which he could hardly deny – but a line at the bottom of the note was plainly enchanted so that only he could see it:

[i]'Magic, glad you're well.'[/i]

No one outside the Order should have been able to write such a missive, but no one inside it would have had any reason to resort to such subterfuge. Hendrick, the man who had passed him the note at the Assembly, had refused outright to say who had sent him with it. So Osric was left to ponder over the bare handful of mages that had entered the Monastery and then run away. One name came to mind, over and over, yet he couldn't bring himself to hope that it was her. And that wasn't all.

The visit to his family still weighed heavily upon him, too. Osric knew now that it had been a mistake to go and see them for dinner.  Oh, they had been encouraging enough; he could not fault even one of them for that. The fault was his own. He had gone forth expecting kinship and found nothing of the sort. His siblings were practically strangers to him now, and his parents little more. Perhaps if he had tried harder over the years to remain close with them then things might have been different. But –

 – no. There was no sense in dwelling on regrets. The path ahead was laid: There was nothing to do now but to follow it gladly, wherever the gods willed. He loved his family, his friends, and his brothers and sisters of the Order no less than he loved all humans. It was for all of these that he had embarked upon this Quest, after all. Yes, for these. All of these. It was for all of these that –

– he fell asleep in the pleasant warmth of mid-morning, succumbing at last to bodily exhaustion. His head slumped back against the trunk of the oak tree under which he had sheltered. He saw no more, for the time being, but slept peacefully.

[hr]

As Osric slept, the horse chomped thoughtfully on the grass at his feet. Both man and beast were loaded with baggage. Dried food and clean water, fodder and rope, fresh clothes and soap, phials of holy water, religious symbols and talismans, tools of every description; almost nothing that might aid the Quest had been left behind. There were even maps and books of lore to guide them. A keen eye observing them might also have noticed the angular shapes bulging from one particular bag on the horse's back, shapes that looked suspiciously like long knives.

The most important piece of baggage was not to be found in any of the bags strapped to the pack saddle, nor in Osric's backpack. The Cup of Woe – holiest of relics – was enclosed in a plain leather case slung over the monk's shoulder and hidden under his dark cloak. It was snugged firmly between his arm and his torso, as if even in sleep he intended to protect it with his life. Perhaps he did.

The village of Lastbridge went about its work as the monk slept. The staff of the Forlorn Hope prepared for the coming day of profligate drinking, sweeping away the vomit and sundry filth of the night before. The stable-girls went – well, who knew where? No doubt they were busy with something. There was always something needing done, and staring at a silly-looking monk and his horse was hardly a worthwhile use of their time.