<div dir="ltr"><div>So sorry that it took so long to continue! Recent days have been busy, and this part got very long. Hope you enjoy it!</div><div> </div><div>----</div><div> </div>The hair was getting thicker along Jerrod's fingers, which were still human-shaped but tipped in black claws. The quills hadn't reached there yet, but there were already inch-long quills at the top of his shoulders. His doublet had already been reduced to ribbons, leaving his sweaty back and quills well-ventilated. A bell suddenly started ringing from one of the towers. "Alright, Jerrod," Bruin called out from the side, where he'd been mixing a fresh batch of mortar to cover the next section of flooring. "That's the sixth hour bell. Let's stop for lunch." Jerrod thought his ears wiggled. He reached up to feel them. They felt mostly human, if a bit rounder. It was hard to tell; his fingers felt stiffer and chubbier, and the claws kept throwing him off. "Fine," he called back, and carefully stood up. His pants were caked with dirt and specks of mortar, and the stiffening hair underneath did it no favors. Bruin walked over, and saw how stiffly Jerrod was moving. He looked over at the freshly tiled floor. "Well, you did a fine job with the tiling. All nice and straight. How are you feeling?" "Stiff," Jerrod said, and nearly keeled over. "And sick." "I figured as much," Bruin said. He began walking down the cobbled pathway before stopping, and walking more slowly so Jerrod could follow. "Most Keepers get sick when they begin their morph. Actually, I'm impressed you're still on your feet. I made sure to give you an easy job, in case you should pass out." Jerrod spat on the ground. "My father didn't raise me to be a quitter." Bruin's face tightened. "All the same, I must ask you not to spit on holy ground again." "Sorry," Jerrod winced. "It's my mouth. It's all swollen." "Ah, that would be the rodent teeth growing in. You're becoming a gnawer now, which means you'll soon want a chewstick handy. I'd suggest talking to a mouse or rat morph when you get the chance -- I hear they have a support group in Metamor." "That's fine, I know a rat morph already, in fact." He snarled. "And I do not need a support group." Bruin gave him a look, and led him into a courtyard. There was a young boy looking at them from the tower. Bruin gestured, and the boy dashed inside. Bruin led Jerrod to a tree, where a large plinth-like wooden stump sat opposite a stone bench. Jerrod thought the heavy priest intended to sit on the finely-carved bench, but Bruin instead sat on the stump and motioned for Jerrod to sit. "What else did your father teach you?" "Nothing! There's nothing to tell." Jerrod squirmed as he sat down, trying not to get poked by his own quills. His quills. He would be a spiny animal for the rest of his life. "I'm sure that's not true," Bruin said. "He must have been an interesting man." "What do you care about my father, anyway? He's gone or dead and I'll never see him again as long as I live. I don't know if I ever want him to see me again, like this." "Gone OR dead? Is your father in trouble?" Jerrod quickly looked away. "I don't want to talk about this." Bruin leaned forward to meet Jerrod's eyes. "You don't need to carry your burdens alone." "I know what you want," Jerrod's temper flared as he stood up. "You and your Followers, you come on acting like you're all sympathetic to the people's problems, but when it comes to hard realities, you look away. You're fond of your Canticles, and your teachings of Yahshua. And you love talking about the treasures of heaven, or of giving everything up to worship Eli. I've seen the soulless ruin you've led people under, and ensorcelled with your words of love and forgiveness. You give out bread and healing at the cost of conversion, and the price of conversion is belief and martyrdom. I've seen Followers put to the death for their faith. And I've met men who claimed to follow Eli's word, who would shelter desperate souls through one door, and lead the executioners in soon after. I've known Followers who would lie and cheat and defame the name of Eli, without a shred of guilt. And why not? All it takes is a quick confession and a show of sorrow, and it is as if Eli forgives them! They never need to look at themselves or understand that their actions are antithetical to their own faith!" Bruin sat and bore him with a patient stare. A child morph was standing with a small tray of bread and a jar of plum jam. He had been standing there for some time before Bruin finally noticed him standing there awkwardly. "Thank you, Father Malvin," Bruin accepted the tray and laid it on the bench. The priest smiled and gave a short bow before leaving. "Are you a religious man, Jerrod?" "What? Well, no. Not really. My father said it was better not to hold convictions for one faith or the other. Makes it easier to talk to people, that way." "You do have convictions, regardless." "I find it hypocritical of Followers to not practice what they believe." "That is quite common behavior, not just for Followers, to follow the people they can see rather than the words they can't. It is not enough to be pious, as you've seen; one must also have faith." He took the bread and the knife, and cut a slice for Jerrod first, spreading a bit of the plum marmalade on the slice for him. Jerrod's nose, still human if a bit darker, flared at the sweet scent. He'd never had a sweet tooth, always finding pastries and fruits too rich and artificial for his taste. But something about the plums made his stomach gurgle, as if remembering he hadn't eaten in over a day. He took the bread, but restrained himself. Bruin was still watching him, studying him. Jerrod set down the bread in a huff. "What do you people want from me?" "'We' people? Which people do you mean?" "You, the monastery, all of Metamor. I'm just a prisoner. A murderer. A robber who tried to stab someone. I realize I was stupid. But that doesn't change that I did it. So what are you going to do to me? How are you going to teach me my lesson? Through hard work? Indentured servitude? I work until I pay my debt to society, is that it?" Bruin cut a piece of bread for himself, also topping it with jam. "You've been entrusted to my care until further notice. Wherever I go, you go. The full nature of your crimes isn't important to me. I just want to know more about you, and the pains you hold onto." "If you're trying to preach to me, I've heard it all before. 'Let Eli bear your sins', 'confess', and all that. I've done nothing wrong, though. I may have committed sins, but only out of necessity. Whatever it takes to survive in this world, to try to make something of myself, for my family." "What do you mean, when you say you've committed sins, but done nothing wrong? How does that make you any less hypocritical than the priests you despise?" "I never swore to follow Eli's word, is the difference." "Do you believe in Eli's word?" "No," Jerrod said, and suddenly stiffened. "Well... it's like it's no different from the acts of the Aedra, and the sort of favors they ask of you for their service. That's all Eli is. That's how my father explained it." "Is that what you believe, though?" Jerrod shuddered. Without thinking, he took hold of his bread. "Well, the world is cruel. It doesn't follow Eli's word. So why should I try to follow it, if I'm to be a man of the world?" "But is that who you are?" "Stop asking me!" The quills on Jerrod's back rose, and Jerrod tried his best to sit perfectly still. The jam squelched as his fingers sank into the bread. "I'm sick of people asking me questions about who I am or how I feel! It's nobody's business but my own!" "Something in your past still haunts you," Bruin took a bite out of his own slice. "Before you became a robber, what were you?" "I'm not a robber!" Jerrod snarled. "I'm a potter! I make tiles out of slate and clay and lime and ash. My father and I would sculpt them, glaze them, fire them, and polish them. Thousands of tiles! We sold them across the Midlands. No one ever made any so fine but durable as ours!" "Your father first made them?" He nodded, a smile returning to his face. "He was a genius. There is a secret to how you fire them, in the glaze itself. Only he and I know the secret. It was to be our path towards getting a new home! A safer home in the city, away from the farmlands, from the marauders, from the whims of the nobles..." Without thinking, he lifted the bread up and bit it. His eyes widened, before he hungrily bit in again. "This is delicious!" "You're welcome," Bruin smiled. "It's local Barnhardt bread. Not as fine as the kind you can get in Metamor, I hear." "It's just like the bread back home," he sniffed, wiping a tear that was suddenly there. "We had a baker, a man named Olgar. One of my first jobs, when I was seven, was laying the floor tiles in his bakery. He gave me four silvers for it. Me alone! It was like a fortune in my hands!" "Did you have a lot of customers?" "Many people from our village would buy from us. Some of them preferred darker colors or brighter colors. Some had specific shapes or designs they wanted. Sometimes we did bricklaying or roof-tiling. Eventually, Dad and I travelled to other villages, and then the big cities like Marigund, to find richer clients. Isn't it fascinating how nobles will look kindly on the man who sells bricks, and sneer at the man who makes them? I would play the role of the craftsman, in my trousers and apron, while my father wore a jacket and hose and played the part of a merchant. We're both peasants, sure, but at least a merchant garners respect." "So what happened?" Jerrod's face fell. "A bit of bad luck." He pointed at the bread and the knife. Bruin carefully cut him a second slice of bread, with another dollop of jam. Jerrod ate almost half of it in one bite. "Dad got a nasty cough one season. He never quite recovered; he was always out of breath when we'd travel across the country. He'd stay at the inn longer and longer while I went alone to our customers. I gambled with some of the other workers for a little extra money. One of my partners through all this was Rodrick. He was already living on the streets when we met. He taught the basics of bluffing and reading people, how to track cards and how to force a hand. All without getting caught." "Cheating at cards?" "Not with the workers. They needed the money as much as I did. The nobles, however... it's their Eli-given duty to give their wealth to the poor, anyway. Is it wrong to enforce Eli's will upon others?" Bruin tilted his head. "Bearing false witness is one of the great sins. As is coveting your neighbor's wealth." Jerrod shrugged. "Just a joke, as Rodrick would say." "Is this the same Rodrick I heard stabbed someone yesterday?" Jerrod finished his bread slice without responding. Bruin cut another two slices, one for each of them. "Anyway, I borrowed my dad's jacket and hose when I gambled. Nobles only like gambling with each other. I was able to pass as one well enough to win some small fortunes. "I got an unexpected bit of luck. Without even trying, I won five hundred crowns from a deacon in Kelewair. Sure, he wasn't supposed to be gambling. But none of us were, technically. It would've more than enough to buy a new farmstead, maybe even a townhouse. I could finally give my father what he wanted. Safety. Freedom. "I only got as far as Haethor..." Jerrod paused, his eyes getting distant and angry. "It turns out, that deacon had a brother who was constable there. He chased me into an alley. He said he knew I was a card cheat, a trickster, a villein. That I had stolen the money, and my jacket. He wanted it all back. Said I belonged in my rightful place..." He squeezed his bread, though more carefully this time, so as not to stain his fingers. "Rodrick had given me a knife for protection. When the constable came for me, I..." "You attacked?" "No," Jerrod gave a lop-sided grimace. "I didn't. I got scared. This was a man of the law. But he saw where my hand went. And he punched me. He stripped the coat off me, and dumped out all the spare tiles I was carrying on, and ripped it up. He took my knife. And he took my money pouch, like a thief. Then he kicked me again into the street. And he said I should be grateful that he showed mercy on my kind." Jerrod tore bitterly into his bread. "I'd never felt so humiliated and degraded before. I didn't want to imagine what my Dad would say. Not only had I ruined his coat, without even asking to use it. But I had lost the money he had trusted me with. The constable had taken both my winnings and my honest wages! I knew if I walked away from this, the deacon and his damned constable brother would win. I would be responsible for my family's destitution. That's when I asked Rodrick for help..." "I think that man was been a terrible influence on you." "That's not ptue!" Jerrod said, accidentally fumbling over his teeth. They had been growing subtly for the last few minutes, though nowhere near their full size. He smacked his lips and tried again. "Rodrick taught me how to fight with a knife, how to watch for an opening and how to make a sudden movement. He told me how to pick a lock, how to misdirect attention, how to sneak in the shadows. Thief skills, yes, but those are the skills you need in a world of thieves! The one thing I lacked, he said, was the willpower to use them. To overcome my fear. To do what I set out to do!" Bruin leaned back. "That murder you committed... it wasn't really self-defense, was it?" "No! I never intended to kill him!" Jerrod leaned forward. "Rodrick distracted them, while I went through his drawers. He let me have another knife. Somehow he always had one on him. I was in through the window and at the constable's trunk. He hadn't even locked it! And then there he was, in the doorway, sword in hand. He lunged at me! I started fighting without thinking. Like he was a bandit. Like it was my life or his!" Bruin shook his head. "What he did was wrong. But what you did was worse." "But I needed it, you understand? It was my life he was taking from me, my future, my family! Everything we had!" "Did your father ever find out what you had done?" Jerrod faltered. "N-no. I... I ended up running from that place with a handful of coins. Rodrick stuck with me. Between us, we got enough to get new weapons, some armor, a new outfit, and to disappear as caravan guards. I kept trying to go east, back home! But the constable's men were looking everywhere for me. And if they knew where my family was... I couldn't even write them a letter! It was in Giftum that Rodrick suggested we take a caravan that went north and south to Pyralis, and cut our way through the Flatlands. But we never made it south. Because..." he waved a hand feebly. "We came here, first." "And that's when you lost everything." Bruin cut the bread for the last time. Jerrod held out his hand while Bruin spread the jam. "All I keep thinking is, I'm smart enough. I'm tough enough and brave enough. And I never give up!" Bruin handed him the thick slice, keeping the small end slice for himself. "You gave up a normal life, and you lost your home and your father. Is taking from the rich really more important to you?" Jerrod tried to look defiant, but his eyes were lost in memory. "Rodrick told me..." "Is Rodrick's respect more important than your father's?" "He's..." Jerrod looked at the ground. "He's the only one who never laughed at my dreams." "Is he more important than your family?" Jerrod looked away as he swallowed the last of the bread. "You don't know him. You haven't seen how he fights, or heard about his travels. He... he's everything I failed to do in life." "Would his father have been proud of him?" "I... don't know. He never mentioned his family. But... I assumed they were proud of him, being on his own and such..." "Let's get back to work," Bruin sighed, glancing up at the clear sky. "How are you feeling with your changes? Any light-headedness? Soreness? I don't want you to pass out while working." Jerrod just shrugged. "I'm sore all over. But I've been sore ever since Haethor. It's nothing I can't handle." "At least you've got that." Bruin stood up. "I know you don't think of yourself as a quitter, Jerrod. But there are times you need to ask yourself what rules you're playing by. And who are you playing for." He started off. "Come on. The mortar should have settled by now. Let's pour another layer." </div>