Sandor the Wise

"I thought that you were all supposed to be pacifists." The guardscaptain said, hefting up the mace. It was nothing like her refined and polished weaponry, being more like an ugly lump of metal attached to a stick than anything she'd consider worthy of wearing. "This doesn't look very pacifist."

"Technically pacifist." The man - the guardscaptain had to scoff at calling anyone who'd worked with who he'd work with truly human - smiled placidly, his hands on flat on the table. He bore the interrogation a little too easily for the captain's liking, as calm as a prince having tea with a princess. She gave the mace a few swings, nearly wrenching her arm out of her socket.

"Doesn't seem much pacifist about this." She grumbled.

"My order is forbidden from drawing blood." Sandor said, accepting her criticism with a polite bow of the head. "That weapon does not draw blood. Crushes skulls and bones, aye, but does not draw blood."

The captain gave the mace a few more looks, noting the stains on it. "How... wise." She said. The cleric did not rise to the bait.

"Has my information been processed?" They said. "The goblins are-"

"We don't listen to reports from deviants." The captain said. "We don't trust them, either. Why are you here?"

"I believe my stated reasons are the same as the past three days." Sandor said mildly. "It would be annoying to see the fort fall when it protects so many. I have given accurate information on-"

The captain slammed the mace down between Sandor's hands, hoping to make him jump. They barely flinched. "-the new tactics and leadership of the horde."

"I thought your order wasn't supposed to associate with goblins." the captain growled. "How'd you get this information, then?"

"Technically, we are not supposed to sully the holy tongue by sharing it with creatures of chaos." Sandor explained pleasantly. "But since I did not use the holy tounge to speak to them, I defied no holy writ."

"But you defied us by speaking to those things!" The captain remonstrated with the mace and immediately regretted it, feeling the weight pull at her shoulder once again. She set the mace down on the table, out of Sandor's hands. "They are all the same! They are all arrayed against us! There is nothing to learn from these creatures of chaos!"

"Technically, as creatures of chaos they cannot all be the same. The former precludes the latter. One or two are quite reasonable about these things-"

That was too much. The captain drew back her fist, but Sandor just looked at it. "If you were going to hit me, you would have done it by now." He said. "Someone has told you not to: possibly the same someone who has marked you as having come here for an easy job by taking note of your suspiciously clean and expensive uniform and weapons, I suspect."

The captain paused and then, with a snarl, drew her fist back further - and dropped it at the sound of the gongs, announcing the arrival of the goblins.

"My mace, please." Sandor said, and didn't even bother to wait for the captain to come out of their horrified trance before standing up and taking it.

"You can't-"

Sandor held the mace in a manner that said he was ready to use it and that, despite apperances, were running quickly out of easily availible self control. "Which way to the armoury?" He said.

The captain made several survival-based calculations, and pointed.

"Thank you. The keys?" There was a clatter, and then Sandor took them from the table. "You may flee now." He allowed. The clattering of the door told him that the captain hadn't even waited for his permission.

Well. That had been cutting it a bit fine, timing wise, but providence and the provision of mortals had once again surmounted the present obstacles. Now there was just the minor matter of a goblin invasion to defeat, the wounded to be tended, the farmlands to be regained an all of the details therein...

Of course, first he'd have to find his armour. Safety considerations aside, it was very difficult to be himself without the form-hiding metal. And then after that, there came everything else...

Oh well. The gods help those who help themselves.

Humming the happy tune of a man who has been given a divine mission, Sandor went off to his work.