An Interlude of Peace

Lakes are wonderful things. On a hot summer's day, immersion in the lukewarm, clear, water brought peace to a troubled mind, and refreshment to a tired body. Leaving her sword and clothes under some rocks, in a place that would not be readily seen, but which she could identify, and leaving Folly on his own, Astra began to swim lazily away from the shore. A measured swim in a warm lake is the closest thing that a human being can get to the free flight of the birds. Astra soon shut out the outside world, and the peril in her life. She thought back to the carefree days of her childhood. She started to wax philosophical. "Goddess, why, as adults, do we leave that behind?" Astra thought. "Why do we spend so little time enjoying the simple, but pleasurable things, like this little swim?"

She was shaken from her thoughts by a booming voice, "Hey, you, get out the lake. This is private property!"

"The Goddess has not lost her sense of humour," Astra thought. "I hope that this is just her way of humbling my pride, and the man will let me go on my way without enquiring too closely as to where I was coming from."

Astra looked up. The man had come from a slightly different direction than she had, and she swam toward him. He rode a large white horse with black markings. Astra thought that he was probably a servant of someone important, for he was riding the offspring of one white mares reserved for the nobility. If the man had been noble himself, he would have had a white horse without any markings. Astra said nothing, but waved to the man in as friendly a manner as she could.

Astra stopped about ten lengths from shore, slightly stooped, but still up to her armpits in water. The man casually motioned for her to come out with a wave of the four fingers of his right hand going toward and away from him. He said nothing. Astra was not about to question the man's order, and lumbered clumsily out of the water and stepped barefoot onto the rocks of the shore.

"Now I have seen it all," deadpanned the man. "Lady, what are you doing out here? And do not lie to me. The satrap of Polabi likes to keep his parks and roads free of robbers and troublemakers. You certainly do not look native to Hespan, and you are definitely not of Polabi - you are too tall, fair-skinned, and nobody here has hair that shade of red. Now do you wish to dress while you explain to me why you are swimming in my master's lake?"

Astra was faced with a dilemma. She could get her clothes and sword. She would then have a lot of explaining to do, as to why she had guardsmen's clothes, and why she had a sword. Women highwaymen were not common, but neither were they unknown. On the other hand, if she could not find her clothes, she would also have a lot of explaining to do, as to what a foreigner was doing swimming naked in the middle of nowhere.

1. Astra gets her sword and clothes.
2. Astra walks away from the direction of the sword, and starts to talk to the man.

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