Antaran's Journal

I woke up to a stretching noise of a bow, opened my eyes and saw directly into an arrowhead. The man holding bow and arrow was maybe thirty or forty years old.
"Good morning. May I know the reason why you disturb the peace of my forest?" he said with a dark voice.
I slowly got up on my feet, while every part of my body hurt like I was on fire. From the corner of my eyes I saw Carana awakening and silently preparing for a fight. Tartek and Sereliaen were still asleep.
I tried to put up a smile and bowed. The man was still aiming at my head with his weapon.
"I'm really sorry to infiltrate your lands with our rude manners. If you allow, we will leave this instant and never return." I tasted bitterness in my mouth while talking.
The man took a quick glance at our horses, our cloths, our wounds, the campfire, Tartek, his wife, Carana and finally looked at me again. I saw him thinking a thousand thoughts in a very short moment.
"Who attacked you?" he finally asked.
"Thieves. We were on our way back from Astatik when we suddenly got ambushed. Some of them got killed by us, but in the end we had to flee. And that's why we ended up here. We didn't really notice where we were going." I knew that telling him the truth was too much of a risk, but this explanation was at least a bit true, even though the attack on our way back home from Astatik had happened quite a few days ago.
"And what did really happen?" he asked.
At first I wanted to say that it was indeed the truth, but somehow I realized that no lie could ever deceive him.
So I told him everything. From the jail incidents to the death of Officer Weiler and our escape. All the time his arrow was pointing at me, reminding me of how quickly I could be dead in any moment. When I had finished my story he lowered his bow, put the arrow back into the quiver on his back and offered me his right hand.
"Name's Ontarm. Please feel welcome," he said. I shook his hand and thanked him. Carana relaxed a bit. Tartek and his wife were awake already and looked seriously relieved. The man looked at Tartek's wounded left arm. "I can take care of that in my house. Please follow me."
We helped Tartek get on his horse, then we mounted ours and slowly followed Ontarm through the forest. The wounds on my horse looked worse than yesterday. I asked Ontarm if it was possible to aid our mounts and he just nodded silently.
We arrived at his small wooden house. I remember Sereliaen whispering something to Tartek which nobody else understood, when we got off our horses and Ontarm led us inside the cottage. Tartek smiled. I've never seen him smile like that. It's interesting to watch people's reactions to the ones they love.
The rest of the day Ontarm took care of Tartek's arm and our horses. He prepared herbs soup for us, and gave our horses something to eat and drink. We didn't talk much.
When the sun had almost disappeared entirely, Tartek asked Ontarm where we could go next. The forester suggested the next town Emtik, a few miles north of Astatik. He said that we shouldn't visit Astatik since so many people from Insomida visited Astatik everyday. We should go to the inn and ask for a man called Imarp, a close friend of Ontarm.
Tartek seemed a bit lost today. I still saw a lot of anger in him, but mostly he really looked ... empty.
I don't know how I should feel. I think it will take a few days until I will realize what happened yesterday. I just can't believe that I will never be able to walk into my own house again. Maybe it will be sold to someone else, or just removed so someone can put a totally new house on top of the ashes of mine. I wonder what will happen to what's inside, especially to my books and Carana's paintings.
It seems so much what we've lost. But I think in the end it will be better to start a new life somewhere else and hope that it will improve.
We are allowed to spend the night here. Not inside the cottage because there is no place for another four people, but outside on the ground. Ontarm had helped us making fire and brought us a few large animal hides to keep us warm. We thanked him for his generosity and he just nodded and went back inside his cottage.
Everyone else is already asleep and I have problems staying awake anyway, so I should just give up and end this entry.

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