Breaking Step (Dungeon Runner 3)

Breaking Step, Chapter 37

"You didn't take things over while I was in bed?"

"Me and Quigly did," the fighter replied, "and we kept the other Runners doing the patrols, but rogues don't take well to brutes ordering them about, and if someone slips by the guards, it's not going to be fighters and archers who catch them."

"What's the damages?"

"Darran will have the details," Jackal said. "But there's been break-ins and breaking of stuff. Just wanton breaking. The big stuff's stopped. The guards don't let anyone planning on burning buildings through anymore, and no one died for my father's revenge. But small, sneaky stuff's keeps on happening without the rogues to stop them."

Tibs ground his teeth. Or course, the town's trouble wouldn't stop because he was wallowing in misery.

"Tibs?" Mez asked.

"I'm fine," he growled.

"I'd be more convinced if your teeth parted to say that."

He glared at the archer, then forced himself to unclench. "I'm fine," he repeated. "I'm just angry I didn't think about any of that when I went and fell into wallow."

"You were healing," Don said.

"I was wall—"

"You were healing." The tone left no room for argument. "You still are. What you did hurt you as much as you hurt others. You need time until you're whole again. And that starts with accepting you made mistakes, that it's okay if you make more." Don's tone soften. "You're angry. I get that. But you need to find a way to let some of that go. Mostly what you're directing at yourself."

"What makes you such an expert? "Tibs snapped. "One of those books you read?"

"Retired asshole here, Tibs," the sorcerer snapped back, then took a breath. "I have a sense of what it's like to cause damage and—"

"Semi-retired," Jackal interrupted.

"No, I have put that—" Don paused, considered something, then glared at the smirking fighter. "Fine. Semi-retired. Some people are making it hard to put all of my assholeness behind me."

"What's the fun in it being too easy?"

"I—" The sorcerer bit back and limited himself to glaring some more at Jackal. He looked at the others. "Just how do you put up with him?"

"That," Khumdar answered, "is a question that all of time shall never be able to answer."

Despite himself, Tibs smiled.

* * * * *

"Look," Tibs told the assembled Runners. "You can't just walk away from the work you agreed to do."

"You did," Sarsan replied sharply.

"I was healing," Tibs said through clenched teeth, yet again.

"Like there aren't potions to do that with," she replied. "I didn't sign up to work for the merchants. I'm a rogue. I run the dungeon, then I have fun. Running after troublemakers isn't as fun as you first made it sound like."

Ice would be so nice right now. It might lead to her encased in the stuff, but at least he wouldn't have to deal with the headache she was giving him. Somehow, there was only so much purity did when the cause was constant.

"Just to be clear," he said. "You are done helping." She'd been one of the better urchins he'd helped; among the first to reach Upsilon, and eager for the assistance and equipment when a piece was available for her or someone on her team. "You want to go back to only being a Runner and relying on the guild to make sure you have the training and equipment you need to survive the dungeon."