The continual nights of bad sleep were beginning to take their toll on Reaver, and he was more than irritable at breakfast the next morning while his well-rested companions made plans and laughed. He kept to himself, knowing better by now than to even try to start an argument, and picked absently at the food in front of him. There would have been a time when he would have cleared the plate and imperiously demanded seconds, but today his heart simply wasn’t in it, and his appetite was sorely lacking.

“Come on, Reaver, buck up,” Hammer said cheerfully. His first reaction would have been to point a gun at her, but instead he lifted his eyes, his gaze near-thunderous, and she blinked twice before looking away. The pirate frowned at his plate, then sat back and pushed it away from him, glancing about the room. He had to wonder what kind of a man had bookcases in his dining room, idly scanning the titles on the other side of the room until one caught his eye. Standing, he made his way around the table to the bookcase and drew the book down, running his thumb over the peeling gilt lettering of the title, ‘The Temple of Light’.

Dropping into a nearby chair he propped his feet up on the top of the table, crossing his ankles and opening the book on his lap. It had been a long time since the temples had fallen, some time before Reaver had even been born though they had still used the old names back then, more out of habit than belief. It was a habit that the pirate had yet to break out of, though he was quite sure that he had invoked the Gods more times in the past fortnight than he remember doing at any other point in his life. He absorbed himself in the book, mentally checking off every mistake that the author had made, and he didn’t notice the others finish their breakfast and move to leave until a hand fell on his shoulder and he all but jumped out of his skin.

(more…)