scott casper

Ehlissa's whole party stopped short, arrested by the serious stare of
their fellow guildsman as it moved between Tenser, Ehlissa, and the
bevy of young women around him. Then his serious look turned into a
smile. "Nice," he said to Tenser, gave him a respectful nod, and then
he just walked away.


The next few days after that were extremely pleasant ones. Ehlissa's
friends seemed to be near-constant companions to her, endlessly asking
her to repeat the sad details of her unrequited affection for Tenser,
the threats and bullying from Gleed, and mostly the sordid details of
her encounters with Bastro Felgosh until she was sick of the
re-telling. Her circle of friends had expanded now too. Johydee,
while younger than the others, was embraced for her role in summoning
the others to Ehlissa's aid (and hence indirectly responsible for all
the juicy gossip about it they were now privy to). Even Hertha was
now embraced by the group, once it was learned that her reputation was
forced on her rather than by choice.

The day Ehlissa was dreading all the while was when the day came to
begin studying with Bastro to learn his charm spell. Although the
offer had been extended to all of Ehlissa's friends, Ehlissa found
most of them were now dreading it even more than she was and finding
excuses to bow out. Ehlissa had to coerce most of them into coming.
Only two people she did not pressure into coming with her – Johydee,
who Ehlissa felt more inclined to protect from a man like Bastro, and
Hertha, who had already suffered so much from him. She was surprised
to see Hertha come on her own without prompting, a look of defiance in
her face every time she looked at Bastro.

Bastro Felgosh, for his part, had been transformed from lion to lamb
and was nothing but courteous and helpful in his tutoring of the young
ladies in his care. Days later, Ehlissa heard from Tenser that
Bastro's guild membership was on probation after the incident in his
office and he was under constant scrying surveillance for 28 days.
That was when Tenser told her his news too.

"You?" she asked. "But why was your membership terminated and not
Bastro's
?"

"Unauthorized activation of a stone guardian," Tenser explained with a
casual shrug. "I'm fine with it. I think I learned just about
everything I needed from the guild anyway. I still have my own mentor
outside of class, like you do now. Care to meet him one of these
days?"

The suggestion struck Ehlissa like thunder. In the time she had known
Tenser so far, he had never suggested sharing any part of his personal
life with her. Instead of answering, all she could do was nod in
agreement. This pleased Tenser, who then said he would arrange it
someday and left it at that. The expectation kept Ehlissa buoyed for
several days until, one happy day, Tenser surprised her by meeting her
outside her house when she was about to leave to run errands.