Adventures of Jessa: the Adventures Continue

24

Jessa is irritated that she can't find Ricardo. She never does well when she doesn't get at least six hours of sleep, but last night kept her up so she was lucky to get a short nap of two hours.

Once she makes sure that he wasn't in the inn she slips out to the stable. She knows that she's not supposed to leave the inn itself without a guard, but they are all sleeping and she doesn't want to wake them just to go to the stables.

Entering she finds two dead bodies and after checking to see if they are Ricardo leaves them. She heads inside the building and that's where she finds Ricardo.

"Princess, I didn't let them hurt the mules." Ricardo manages to say, in between his pants, Jessa leans in closely to hear his words since they are so faint.

Jessa had started to carry around her own healing potions and so gives him one of them after calling on Jethro for healing. When that still isn't enough to heal him completely she does another prayer to Jethro. That's enough to get him back on his feet.

Jessa helps him inside and calling out to the innkeeper that she wants some hot water and  some clean rags. She takes Ricardo to the back room and washes off the blood once the water and rags arrive.

"You still aren't completely healed." Jessa says sitting back on her heels as she looks at his wound. "You'll stay in bed after eating for the rest of the day. I'll check on you in a bit and give you another potion if you still need it."

She gets up and goes out calling for the innkeeper for food for them both. Once she has done that she cleans up the mess. When the food comes in she exchanges it for the dirtied water and rags.

Once the innkeeper leaves she sets a spell for privacy and turns her full attention once more to Ricardo. "When you can, I want you to tell me exactly what happened."

"Of course, Princess." Ricardo misses the glare Jessa throws at him at his words. He starts eating his food. But after only a few bites he sets down his spoon. 

"After you and your group left I went to check on the mules. There I encountered two people taking out knives and talking about making sure that none of the mules are able to leave any time soon if at all." Ricardo pauses as he takes some deep breaths. 

"I moved up silently behind them, like you taught us, then I attacked. They responded quicker than I had expected though and managed to get through my defenses. They thought I was done for and so one turned his back on me. That's all it took for me to throw one of my knives and I hoped it was a killing shot, but I was then set upon by the other one and so wasn't sure until later.

"I'm still not sure how I managed to stop the attack by the other one in time. By then I was bleeding out pretty bad and could feel myself weakening. I managed to slip below his defenses and gut him before falling down.

"Once I regained enough strength to move I went to check on the other man. He was dead and so I took myself into the stable. There I did my best to stop the bleeding until help came. I had hoped it would be someone from our group, but thought it more likely to be the ostlers that work for the inn."

His words make Jessa look at him hard.

"They hadn't come in yet to feed or check on the animals?"

"Not yet. You were the first since I went out there last night. I take it that your exercise went well?" Ricardo says painfully.

Jessa frowns at him. She had given him enough healing that he shouldn't still be this bad unless the wounds were much worse than she thought and she thought they were pretty bad.

Jessa calls on Jethro to come this time so that he can take a look and tell her what she missed.

Jethro does come and after examining Ricardo, "You are damn lucky to have survived until Jessa could find you. There must have been poison on one of the weapons they used on you. I'm going to take a look at the two you left for dead. You should be fine after some sleep."

Jessa just looks at Ricardo as he stands up weakly.

"Get some sleep, I'll check on you later. Please have Dhiren join me."

"Of course, Princess." Ricardo slowly makes his way to the door. Once more missing the scowl Jessa gives him for using her title.

Soon she is lost in thought and  goes over everything Ricardo told her. There is something bothering her about it. He told the truth, otherwise she would have heard the lie, but he didn't tell her everything. That much she's sure about.

Some time later Dhiren joins her and startles her when he gives her a kiss good morning.

Dhiren smiles but holds back his laugh at how high she jumps when he kisses her. He's less happy about the knife poking him in the gut.

It doesn't take Jessa long to remove it though. 

"Sorry to startle you, I thought you heard me come in." Dhiren says holding back the questions he wants to ask.

"Not your fault. I was lost in my thoughts, sorry for the knife." Jessa tells him.

Dhiren waves away her words. "Not a problem. What had you so deep in thought that you didn't hear me come in?" Jessa is always aware of her surroundings. Always.

"Just going over what Ricardo told me about the fight he was in after we left last night. It appears that two possible assassins were here to damage if not outright kill our mules. He managed to kill them but not before they injured him. Jethro thinks that there was something on at least one of the weapons used to injure him."

Jessa's words are enough to make sure that Dhiren isn't smiling or wanting to smile. "You don't believe the fight happened the way he said it did." Dhiren isn't asking he stating.

"No, he was telling the truth as far as it went, but he left out something. I just don't know what the part is or how important it might be. That is what had me so lost in my thoughts."

Just then Jethro returns and he's  not smiling. "Jessa, your guard was damn lucky to have survived. All their weapons had been coated with poison. Even the ones they hadn't taken out to use yet.

"I would be very interested in finding out how the hell he did survive."

"Perhaps he called on Lady Zira to help him? If he had done that he might not have mentioned it." Dhiren suggests.

"Why don't we find out?" Jessa smiles a hard smile.

Dhiren swallows hard and does just that.

Zira isn't all that happy about being called at this time of day, but does come. "Is there a problem, Dhiren?" They can all hear how unhappy she is.

"There is, but we are hoping that you will be able to help us solve it. Last night did Ricardo by any chance call on you for healing?"

This brings Zira's attention to him before looking around the room. That's when she notices Jethro for the first time.

"What's going on Jethro?"

"One of yours was attacked last night. All the weapons had poison coating them. He shouldn't have survived until Jessa found him this morning. The only way would have been if he'd had healing, but it wasn't sufficient to stop the bleeding, just to keep the poison from killing him."

"No, if I am to give healing I would have done my best to fully heal him. Unless it's a disease that can't be cured he would have been."

"Thank you, Zira." Jessa says before becoming lost in her own thoughts once more.

"Could he have taken a potion of curing light wounds? Would that have worked on the poison enough?" Dhiren asks in the heavy silence once Zira leaves them.

"I don't think so. You are going to have to ask him what he did in order to find out how the hell he survived." Jethro tells them more than a little irritated. "I would like it if you would inform me once you know how." Jethro says and once Jessa nods he leaves as well.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So just how did he survive the attack? Any ideas?

Is Ricardo a good guy or a bad guy just biding his time? What  do you think?