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Chapter 13 - The Peacekeeper

17th Day of Aegis

118 I.E.

The Lightweavers Citadel stood tall above even the largest of fortifications inside Olaraa. It was a testament to dwarven engineering. A large dome encrusted with amethyst capped off the main building, while smaller towers sat at each corner. At the very top of each tower was a bell that was rung on the hour every hour until dark, the sound of which could be heard across the city. To some it was merely a church, but to many others it was a home and a place for the Lightweaver paladins to live and rest. It also housed the seat of the Highlord, one of the highest ranks in the Olaraan military.

Awakened early by his escort, Bart was all but dragged through the streets from military headquarters to the citadel. They had intended to shackle him, but without a mage on hand and neither guard a capable enough sorcerer, they were easily intimidated by the surly ursar. He was dropped outside of the highlords office and informed that they would be outside, waiting to escort him back to the barracks.

"Private Bartholomew reporting in. The Highlord wanted to see me?"

A lone dwarf stood before the door. He looked up at the ursar and said, "It's about time you showed up. He's been waiting for you for a while now."

"Yeah, yeah. Just let me in so I can get this over with."

The guard gave a heave of a sigh and pushed the door open as he stepped aside. Bart sauntered into the extravagant room. There were several sets of armor setup on mannequins, one of them looking far more regal than the others and accentuated with floral patterns and a white-gold color scheme. The other was a golden colored plate set that looked far more practical, and it even had a few dings and scratches to display its use in combat. The carpet in the middle was purple with a silver trim, matching the exterior of the Lightweaver's Chapel. Behind a large oak desk was a balcony where the drapes fluttered from a light breeze. In front of the desk stood someone that Bart didn't recognize. Neither this stranger nor the Highlord had noticed he was walking in the room.

"I don't like this idea, Gantors. You know I'm against it. Is it wise?" the stranger asked the dwarf. He spoke the common tongue with an amazing degree of fluency, save for the slight accent that stood out here and there.

"Trust me," Gantors replied. "Ye need ta see fer yerself why I said it'll be a no."

As Bart shut the door behind him, both individuals looked over their shoulders at him.

The stranger was another ursar, Bart realized. He was lean, yet muscular, and tall with broad shoulders from which a silken purple robe hung. He had an odd mix of white and black fur, with black circles around each eye. His chest was exposed from the open robe, showing off pristine white fur. Grey leggings were cinched tight around his waist with a red sash. The ursar had a head full of black hair that fell around his shoulders and was tied into a ponytail. He looked good, for an ursar, and Bart wondered where that thought had suddenly sprung from.

Bart had never seen another ursar in person before. The new-comer was very different from him, despite being from the same race. He had a look of confusion on his face, and that told Bart that perhaps he himself was very different from the kind of ursar this stranger knew.

"C'mon in, Private," Gantors said, breaking the silence.

"What'd ye want?" Bart asked as he slowly sounded out the common tongue. He wasn't used to speaking it. Gantors shot him a stern look and he added, "Sir?"

"That's better. I called ye here cause I want ta introduce ye ta someone." He gestured towards the other ursar with a sweep of his thick hand.

The ursar nodded at his queue to speak. "Watashi no namae wa Arion desu. Hajimemashite." The ursar gave a curt bow. "Dozo yoroshiku."

Bart blinked at him, unsure of how he should respond. What had he said? He didn't recognize that language.

"I told ye he doesn't speak yer tongue, but ye wouldn't listen ta me." Gantors sighed. "I'll introduce you then. Bartholomew, this is Arion, a monk from Xenaria."

"Uh huh," Bart nodded, and looked Arion up and down. "an-" He was cut off as the other ursar spoke.

"-and what does that have to do with you? Why should you care?" Arion asked, taking the very words out of Bart's mouth before he even spoke them. There was something in Arion's right eye that could only be described shimmer or a sparkle, that appeared briefly before it faded as quickly as it had appeared.

"Ya, that's-"

"-what you were about to say? And yes," Arion said with a sigh as he regarded Gantors, "I'm well aware that this is annoying."

Bart wasn't amused with whatever game the other ursar was playing at. Arion didn't smile or show any other signs that he enjoyed doing what he was doing, though, and that only further angered him. His motivations no longer mattered, and Bart figured that he was just trying to get under his skin to try and push him around.

"Whatever trick yer pullin' ursar, I want ye out o' me head!" Bart rolled up the sleeves of his tunic and cracked his knuckles.

Whatever he's up to, I'll put a stop to it. No one treats me like this and gets away with it. I tolerate enough of that crap from my superiors but I won't stand for a complete stranger mocking me!

"I don't think that would be wise..." Arion said. His shoulders drooped a little. Disappointment?

Gantors crossed his arms and chuckled, "This should be good."

"I'll teach ye ta play mind games with me!" Bart shouted as he ran at Arion. He feinted with a left hook, but the ursar didn't take the bait and was able to dodge his right fist with a side-step. Bart attempted to bring his left paw back around, but his claws only cut through air as Arion moved with an unnatural speed. He was backed against a wall and Bart grinned.

"Now I've got ye! Ye've no where else ta run!"

Bart's attack stopped in midair as he struck something solid. There was nothing there, but it was as if he was beating on a solid brick wall. He pulled his throbbing hand away and took a cautious step back, fearing that he might break his paw on whatever magic shield Arion was creating.

No mage I've ever sparred against had a shield this strong. What magic is this!?

"It's not magic, Bartholomew," Arion said, answering the question in Bart's mind. He turned his head to look at Gantors as Bart renewed his assault against the invisible barrier with a fury of punches and kicks meant to break through whatever trick the ursar was pulling. He didn't care how broken or bloodied his paws became. The shield would let up eventually, and he was determined to make it happen.

Arion didn't seem to care about what Bart was doing though. "Can I put a stop to this pointless violence now? You knew I was against the idea from the start."

"Aye, go ahead," Gantors said just before an explosion of force send Bart flying across the room. He shouted incoherently, startled, and then stared in amazement as Arion disappeared from right in front of him. Before Bart hit the wall behind him, someone grabbed his arm and spun him around, throwing him back in the direction he came from. Bart crashed in a heap and tumbled into the stone wall.

"Ow, my head," Bart said as he fought the blackness creeping in from the edges of his vision.

"I wish you hadn't requested I do that, friend," Arion said to Gantors. The tone in his voice was sad. He watched as Bart stood up and dusted himself off.

"I told ye how he was. Not me fault ye wouldn't listen ta me." Gantors shrugged his shoulders. "Ye can't expect someone like that ta change."

"Hey!" Bart yelled, trying to get their attention. They continued to ignore him, and whether it was intentional or not, it annoyed him.

"Even still, pushing him like that won't make him cooperative," Arion said, "It probably just pushed him further away."

What the hell are they talking about? Why was I called here anyways?

"Would ye both stop talking as if I'm not standin' right here!?" Bart shouted, which finally got them to turn their heads to face him.

"My apologies, I'll not do that again." Arion bowed as he spoke.

What the hell is the deal with this guy?

Bart let out a low growl and thrust his index and middle finger in the air in a rude gesture. "Ye can take yer apologies and shove 'em up yer ass!" The bewildered look on Arion's face amused Bart. It was clear to him that this monk was not used to being spoken to in such a manner. Bart then spun and pointed a finger at Gantors. "An' what the hell did ye summon me here fer anyways? I don't care how high up the chain o' command ye are, I ain't in the mood fer these kinds o' games!" Bart was breathing heavily by that point, and noticed that his claws were out.

Damn they have me riled up. Bart took a deep breath and retracted his claws.

"Fair enough." Gantors indicated Arion with a sweep of his hand. "He'd heard about ye through the grapevine, an' how ye'd come to be in the military. He said that he wanted ta meet ye an' offer ye a place within his Order, but, I told him ye weren't the kind o' ursar that would want ta be apart o' somethin' like that, and ta prove it, I told him to push ye until ye were good an' bothered." The dwarf eased back with a smug, satisfied look on his face. "A true Xenarian wouldn't get angry, he said. They would just roll with the punches. But I told him otherwise. Was I right?"

"Unfortunately," Arion said sullenly. Bart was too annoyed with the other two to notice Arion's change in mood. "I still fail to see why you asked I do this. I didn't need to aggravate him to get a feel for the kind of individual he is."

"Ya but ye need to see it first hand. I know ye Arion, an' ye'll try an' try an' try 'til yer blue in the face if ye didn't see his temperament first hand. He never woulda joined yer Order."

"Yer damn right I wouldn't join any Order o' his! Who the hell are ye anyways?" Bart spat as he whirled on Arion.

"Just a simple monk. Now, if you'll excuse me, I believe I've caused enough trouble for today. Thank you for seeing me today, Highlord. And Bartholomew, I'm sorry we didn't meet on better terms." Arion bowed, then padded out of the room and shut the door behind him.

Bart snarled quietly as he watched Arion leave the room. Just who did he think he was, picking fights with him? Did he even know who he was tangling with?

Next time, he'll be lucky to leave here in one piece! Bart thought.

"He's a Xenarian refugee, Bart," Gantors said after a short pause, switching back to dwarvish. Bart swiveled around to regard him with only the mildest of interest. "The Empress had Arion and his followers cast out and exiled for leaving Xenaria to aid in the Gnoll War without permission."

"I don't really care about this ursar or any of his kin," Bart said. "Why the hell did you want me to meet him anyways? I was quite comfortable in Evergloom, and you had to call me back here!" He looked back at the door and snarled again. "I don't know why you think I care-"

"Because they are your people, and you deserve the chance to be with them, and to know about the culture you came from. That's especially true since you've never known anything about them."

Bart scoffed at the idea. He'd never once considered himself an ursar, not for as long as he could remember. Not only that, but he wanted nothing to do with them, either. Their culture and their ways were too foreign for him, despite the fact he knew nothing about Xenaria.

"They aren't my people, and they never were. I stopped being one of them when my good for nothing parents went and got themselves killed." His paws clenched at his sides, and he felt his face heat up. "Fuck them!"

Something stung his eyes. Tears?

"Don't speak ill of the dead!" Gantors slammed his hands on the desk and stood up. "Your parents were good people, despite what you think."

"Oh yeah?" Bart said with a challenging tone in his voice. He barely knew the Highlord and never met him in person before. How would he know anything about him or his parents? "And I suppose you know all about them, don't you?"

"I know more than you're willing to admit," Ganthors shot back. "Your parents were working with the Lightweavers as healers, to try and establish a temple here. They were good people, trying to help us out during the Plague Years. They were priests of Xenar, and they didn't have a selfish bone in their bodies."

"Bullshit! Ive never heard of any such thing."

"We never had the chance to go public with it," Gantors admitted. "We were waiting for clearance from the Grand Council before we told people about the temple they planned to build."

Bartholomew had never considered what he would do when or if he learned about who his parents really were. The idea had seemed so impossible to realize that he paid it no heed. It certainly hadn't helped that many people had told him throughout his life that his parents were no good, and that they were the scum of society. Bart's mind had filled in the blanks then, and he concluded long ago that his parents were thieves or murderers or something of the sort. Bart didn't know anything about Xenarian culture, but he knew that his parents were no good, because he wasn't a good person by dwarven standards either.

"I'm not buying into your lies, sir," Bart said with venom dripping from his voice. "You want to trick me into believing that those bears are my people? You're wasting your time. I wasn't raised by them; I grew up here, in Olaraa. I don't want anything to do with them."

"It's your choice," Gantors sighed and shrugged. "Just remember, though, you may be Olaraan, but you aren't a dwarf. Nothing can change who we are."

"I cut up the last idiot to tell me that," Bart said. His claws found their way out of their sheaths of their own accord, and he had to tuck them away before he stabbed himself in the palms.

"I know. I read the report." Gantors shrugged again.

"May I go now, or do you have more games to play with my head?" Bart asked.

"I don't have any more 'games' to play, if you want to put it in such a negative light, but there is one more thing I want you to see." Gantors reached into his desk and pulled out a folder that he tossed onto the desk. Some of the papers slid out and showed their contents to Bart.

"What's that?"

"Your mother and father's papers and the agreement they had drafted with the Lightweavers. The Nakamura's were not in Olaraa for long, barely a year if that, but I'd consider them good people and I'd certainly consider them my friends. You were born here while they were in the country."

Hesitating, Bart shifted forward to pick up the papers from the desk. He could read the scrawl that was dwarven throughout the document, and below that, a small article that was written in the syllabic script of Ursese. He couldn't read any of what that part said though. Instead, he glanced over the document, noting the names of the two ursar in question.

Satoru Nakamura and Mizuno Nakamura were the names of his parents. As a cub, he'd longed to know who they were for so long, yet after being broken by Remi and his ilk, he no longer had a single desire to find out who the Nakamura's were.

Bart threw the papers down on the desk. Not even seeing the truth right in front of him was enough to sway his decision. When he thought of his real parents, all he could see were the scarred and surly cutthroats that he had sketched so many years ago. Nothing would be able to get rid of that image in his mind. The Nakamura's had been dead for so long that he doubted anything would change by finding out who they truly were.

"Do you expect me to take on their name?" Bart said in a low growl. His mind was running with dozens of thoughts, but he didn't want to hear any of them. He had a sudden, aching desire to drown everything out at a tavern.

"That's your choice," Gantors said. "If you want the Nakamura name, you can have it. If you want to continue being called Private Bartholomew by the military, that's happened, that's fine, too."

Bart's lips curled up to show a thin line of his teeth. He hated the name Stoutmantle, but he didn't want to take on his parent's name, either. It wasn't part of who he was. "Why do you care?"

"Why I care is my business and mine alone," Gantors said simply as he gathered up the loose papers and stuffed them back in his drawer. "If you want a reason, then let's just say I feel I owe it to a pair of dear friends to look after their only son."

"Are we done?" he said with a snarl.

"One final thing, since you've yet to hear my 'all or nothing' deal. Join the Peacekeepers and your military sentence will be revoked. You'll get your freedom and your record will be cleared. You may not think highly of me, but as the new Highlord I'm willing to give you a chance, one that no one else has been willing to give you. Its up to you if you want to take it though. I won't force you, but I will say that he can help you. There's a lot of things you don't know about your people, and it would make your life much easier if you take the offer. He only wants to help you."

"I don't need his damn help!" Bart roared, his voice rattling the armor on their stands. "May I go now, please?" The ursar glared at the dwarf.

"You're dismissed," Gantors let out a sigh and waved Bart away with his hand.

As Bart stepped outside, he ignored the guard standing there with a confused and curious look on his face. He had the sudden urge to want to punch the dwarf for listening in on the conversation, but he didn't bother acting out on it. Bart just turned and wiped his face clean, his arm coming away wet.