Overheard in the Blue Boar Inn…

“Well, all I can say is that no sooner had I seen the goblin than an arrow right sprouted out of its head,” said one adventurer, leaning back into his seat. “Now, what do you think of that?”

“And you never saw anyone else?” asked another.

“Not a soul, says I,” said he.

            “Not a chance,” said a third, shaking her head. “Arrows don’t come from nowhere.”

            “Right through his eye socket it struck,” insisted the first. “A perfect shot. On my honor.”

            “Which means right nothing,” chuckled the third.

            “Well, is anything too strange to happen in Ravenwood?” asked the second. “Why, just last week you said that you came upon five shillings in your hovel out of the blue.”

            “Out of the blue it was,” agreed the third. “Just enough to send for medicine for me old man- but that was just a bit o’ luck, weren’t it?”

            “Too convenient for good luck,” said the second. “And that clutch of kobolds that were set to hatch in my yard? Gone.”

            “Just some good fortune finally coming our way, what with the Minotaur Kings and the Falcons and the evil East Anglian queens and all the other trouble this year,” said the second.

            The first clucked his tongue. “I don’t trust to luck- nay, something is up and about,” said he. “We here in these woods don’t get luck.”

            “What, just an altruistic-like do-gooder hereabouts, you think?” asked the third, skeptical.

            “Mayhaps,” said the first.

            “Seems unlikely ‘round here,” said the third. “What with folks stealing and betraying more oft than naught. We try to be right selfless and help old Dee, and what’s he do? Up and leave at the first opportunity.”

            The other two frowned, but came to sigh in reluctant assent.

            “We stop them goblins from raising that minotaur lad from the nether-fields, and what do we get? A regular old pond that don’t heal any more’n this ale does.” She lifted her tankard for emphasis.

            The others grimaced slightly in recollection.

            “And we shelter a wandering fugitive what tells us he’s the king, and what happens then? One of our own spills the beans to the soldiers that come and nearly kill us all!”

            “Right, right, you’ve made your point,” said the second.

            “What good gets done around here what isn’t repaid with pain and misery?” said the third.

            “No good deed goes unpunished, that’s what I say,” said the first.

            “Mayhaps it’s just one person,” said the second. “Someone like the Raven, or Malcolm. Someone just thinking of others.”

            “Are good folks like lizard tails?” asked the first, philosophically.

            The other two looked at him in a bewildered silence.

            “What grows back when it gets lost?” he continued. “Yeah? One gone and one takes its place?”

            They hummed in understanding, relaxing again into their chairs with their drinks in hand.

            “What I can say is this,” remarked the third. “I hope whoever be doing these charitable deeds knows what’s coming his way in the end. These do-gooders don’t rightly have a long shelf-life.”