The MIDDLE!

[Anonymous]

John sighed as he put Jean down. Turning towards the bard, he suppressed a flare of red hot anger.

At least the bard was smart, so that tempered his anger.

Crossing his arms across his chest, John remained silent during the proceedings. This was Jean's show, and he wasn't about to butt into it.

[Bean Bandit]

Jean's expression turned frosty.

"Thirty, and I'll forgive you for the groping, I won't ruin your instrument, and John here won't kill you for trying to blackmail us."

She folded her arms under her breasts, waiting. She trusted John to stay quiet, so she just watched Lucky with a hooded gaze, her dagger still raised and aimed at the bagpipes.

[RangerShade]

"Thirty five, and I won't curse your boy toy with lifelong impotence or bring up your existance to the local authorities later. Do we have a deal?"

The Bard had measured the distance off perfectly, he'd get off a spell well before either of them could close if they tried. He did hope they would be reasonable though, he hated violence, especially when it was directed towards him.

[Bean Bandit]

Jean debated for a moment, toying with a counter offer. No, best to leave off like that, to let him think he had won. She sighed dramatically, hiding her smile, and pulled out a money purse that didn't belong to her.

Neither Lucky nor John recognized it, but a certain young mage was likely to notice it's absence soon.

She tossed it to Lucky, nodding. "Deal. Now get lost."

[RangerShade]

A quick count of the bag's contents verified their number and quality.

"Always nice to do business with a reasonable party."

He gave the pair a humble little bow and faded into the woodwork.

Of course the first thing he did once out of sight was to discard the bag
and add the gold into his *own*little stash.

Then he settled down to wait for a bit.

After all he'd only said he wouldn't tell the others, he'd said *nothing* about
not following them out of the forest. Better that they take any lumps then he did!

[Kwokinator]

Heezan stopped abruptly in mid-run as he noticed a familiar-looking money purse.

"Huh...?"

Feeling around on his waist, he didn't feel the money purse that would normally be there.  Grabbing the purse up from the ground, he took a closer look.

"Hey, that's mine!" he exclaimed.  Opening the money purse to check on its contents, he was enraged to find that nothing remained in it.

"Dammit!" he cried. "I had thirty five gold pieces in there!  Who took it?!"

[Carthrat]

The situation was as thus.

Excepting Jean and John, the party was pretty much travelling single file through the somewhat dense brush, searching for the aforementions.

The path is relatively easy to find- simply double back.

To the north, there are a great many trees which block out futher view.

The south is the way in which the party came. If they go back that way, they'll find themselves in Escaville again.

To the West is a valley with a slope that simply can't be climbed down with the parties current equpiment. Spells *could* be used, but would *you* trust Heezan?

To the East are some farmsteads, occupied by the middle class farmers who have several labourers underneath them.

The direction in which the party must go to further the adventure along it's linear route is north.

However, the occasional traveller the party past across has heard of strange doings to the farmsteads, who have only been exporting half their usual grain.

OOC: There are technically two parties now, but at the moment, you're roughly in the same place, just... well, you know what I mean.

[TannimFodder]

OOC:  Hey, what about me?  I know I haven't been around, but there hasn't been much fighting to be done.  >_<

IC:  

Hammerfist Axebeard trudged along.  He had been trudging for a while now, since he was much slower than the average human.  The rest of the party had decided to travel ahead without him, and he didn't want to slow everyone else down.  Besides, the puny humans would tire long before he did, so in the end everything would work out.

It was therefore suprising to him to find the trail he had been following split into two directions, and he wondered what happened to the rest of the group.

"Hullo, out there!" he yelled, in hopes someone was still close enough to hear him.  "What's happenin?"

[calendar]

Lallie stopped, uncertain.  "I hear someone back that way, Heezan."

He was busy mumbling about his money purse.  Gosh, that was a lot of money to lose, wasn't it?

"I think it's Hammerfist.  But Jean, John and Lucky went on up ahead this way."

She didn't like the woods.  Her family had lived on open fields.  Edging closer to her companion, she took a look around at the close-knit trees and brush.  This was really, really not fun.

[Kwokinator]

Heezan blinked out of his thoughts on how many spells he would use on whoever took his gold.

"What?" he said without thinking.  "Oh, that way... alright, let's go..."

"Huh?" he uttered as he suddenly noticed Lallie's apparent nervousness. "What's wrong?"

[calendar]

Lallie shrugged, grinning.  "Nothing!  You're being silly, Heezan!  C'mon, hurry up!"

[Kwokinator]

Heezan shrugged.

"Well, if you say so..." he said, looking at the direction Lallie pointed them at. "Let's go then!"

Breaking out into a run, he sprinted towards their target.

[Anonymous]

John looked around at their current surroundings, and began to assess the situation.

South was no-no...he most certainly did NOT want to join up with those nutjobs anytime soon.

North was iffy, too many trees, they'd likely get lost if they went through there.

That left West or East...

Pulling out a coin, he flipped it.

Coming to heads, he nodded.

East it was.

Turning towards Jean and what's his name, the bard, he started.

"Whatever, let's go now before trouble finds us, alright?"

Not even giving the two a chance to talk, he started heading East.

[Bean Bandit]

Wordlessly, Jean fell into step behind John, glaring at the area where Lucky had vanished.

He had better hope he didn't run into her again. If she ever saw the pervert again, she fully intended to rob him blind.

[RangerShade]

Lucky trailed after the pair, staying just out of sight.

Nothing beat a pair of Polish monster detectors out front to keep trouble away. ^_^