The journey was spent in silence with both of us having a lot to think about. I pondered about the misfortune of my plan, the extent of my new associates powers, our current situation and what to do next. In these thoughts I mostly came to the conclusion, that I still knew to little. I had no lack in theories about how and why he was still alive, but no real answers.
'I thought I knew about this sword and its abilities... alas, something went wrong, it doesn't even have to be the sword that caused this... can't really test it too... there is simply no way to certain knowledge here...'
He seemed to linger in thoughts as well, undoubtedly as irritated by this situation as myself. A couple of ours of walking through the nightly forest and thinking about fruitless questions, the sound of ringing churchbells dragged me out of my train of thought while we were still a fair bit into the forest, only barely able to make out the edge of it
"Do you hear that too?", he asked me.
"Yeah, what's going on there?"
He looked up, trying to get a look at the sun through the thick layers of leaves, as if it suddenly were daytime.
"Can't really tell, but I don't think it's the time for that..."
"How would you know?"
"I've been to church a few times, but I've lost faith into the gods for a while now. They didn't seem to care a lot about me."
"So it seems and it's probably better that way. Anyway, good for us if they're all in there, so let's go."
---
The village, more or less, formed a circle around a main square on which the church stood, it's belltower towering high above the houses surrounding it. The community was also big enough to fill four rough rows of houses, as well as some being spread out around the area, ending up with about sixty of them.
As I walked out of the forest, I made out a crowd on the main square in the distance.
"It seems like there's some commotion going on", I said.
"Maybe a celebration?"
"In the middle of the night?"
"I don't know the local believes, maybe for some god of the night..."
"There's no such god that I know of... but the bells are still ringing, so maybe."
Walking through the rows and towards the crowd, we soon were able to make out people yelling over eachother as well as the bells and sounding rather angry. There were a few tables lined up with four men and a woman sitting at them, facing a large and obviously angry crowd.
There seemed to be a 'discussion' going on, as everyone at the table was yelling at different people in the crowd, each of them trying their best to outmatch their opponent in anger.
---
"Yeah Greg, I'd love to let you take this godsdamn thing down, for fucks sake, I'd do it myself -"
"But you won't!", Herman yelled over, the shoulderpiece of his holy cowl flailing wildly, as he briefly turned around, only to resume his previous yelling to the crowd as soon as I turned around towards him.
"But I won't, at least until Hermans head explodes from all this noice!"
Raising my voice even more throughout the sentence, I looked over to see if he heard me. He was still facing away from me, but his head had turned even redder than before and I saw a vein on the side of his forehead.
'Yeah, he heard me alright. Hope I don't beat him to it, though"
Thinking straight was already a mighty fine chore, my head felt like it could explode just as well. My face was probably just as red as his. Reluctantly I turned my attention back to Greg, who had just continued talking.
"- all I'm saying is, if we wouldn't 'ave taken that guy in for the night, this wouldn't be so -"
"That was three months ago Greg!"
"Yeah, but still -"
I sighed tiredly, massaging the sides of my head, trying to get the headaches to go away. It did not work. I let my gaze wander beyond the crowd of my people, towards my beautiful house, easily the most beautiful in the village, longing for the embrace of my bed.
'Ahh well, I wouldn't be able to sleep anyway, not with all this noise.'
With another sigh, I wanted to look back towards Greg, but on the way met eyes with someone standing a bit behind the crowd. A tall, brown haired man in ragged, dirty clothes and a similar looking hairstyle stood there, locking eyes with me.
From the corner of my eye, I saw that this time, Greg noticed my ignorance towards him.
"Hey, I'm talking to y-"
He fell silent and, following my gaze, he slowly turned around to find out what I was looking at.
The people standing next to him noticed and turned around as well. I took a moment, but one by one, everyone turned around. It looked like the waves after throwing a stone into a pond.
It would have been dead silent, if not for that damned bell ringing.
Most of the people were confused, looking at eachother and whispering, especially the younger folks. However, the older ones, as well as everyone at the table knew. Few kinds of people would show up in the middle of the night. With his clothes having tears and cuts, as well as our convenient problem, there was only one conclusion to be drawn.
'That magical son of a bitch finally showed up. Took him long enough.'