The Systems Challenge-Chapter 454: The Guest Part 1

Elmo felt like he had an iidea of who the guest was, but he didn't asy anything. He felt like it'd be adding fuel to the fire if he turned out to be wrong. While there were few people he could think of that Kim and Elin would know, and had become friends with, in the capital, he wasn't going to rule out the possibility that there was someone other than Samantha that was likely still in the city.

Naturally, the king was a possibility, but from what Elmo could tell, Kim wasn't' able to make it into the palace and the king wasn't likely to be just wandering around the city to be encountered randomly like that. It would be too much of a coincidence for Elmo to believe.

Though, true to Elin's guess, Kim was back quickly. A half hour at the most by Elmo's estimate.

Although, what he didn't expect was that the guest would bring five horses. One for herself and four for each of her guards. Elmo felt like he shouldn't have been surprised at that development, but he knew he was.

Somehow he'd gotten in his mind that Samantha would have come alone. Despite how young she was.

"Samantha!" Elin cried in pleasure as she leapt to her feet and ran over to where she was dismounting, with Kim's help. "I didn't think we'd get to see you today."

"If Kim hadn't been at the gate to the king's palace when she was, I probably wouldn't have known any of you were in the capital either," Samantha replied, throwing her arms around Elin when she was securely on the ground.

Elin returned the embrace. She had so many things she wanted to tell her friend, not to mention the number of things she wanted to ask the girl about what had happened after they'd left the capital.

Elin wasn't sure how long ago that was, but it felt like years somehow. Even when she knew that it hadn't even been near a single year since then.

"Will you introduce us?" Heather asked, pulling Elin's attention back to the present.

"She knows most of us," Elwin remarked, sounding as if this was something to endure more than to enjoy. "So we really only have to introduce both of you. It'll save all of us a lot of time."

"He has a point," Kim remarked, sounding a little annoyed. "Anyway. The girl on the wolf is Heather and the wolf is Sonya. Sonya can change her shape and she's currently in a wolf's shape."

"Why doesn't she turn back?" Samantha asked as she curtsied towards Heather and Sonya. "I mean, if she can take human shape that is."

"It has more to do with the fact that my clothing doesn't change with me," Sonya replied directly.

Though, Elmo still felt a little weirded out by the fact that he could understand her when it wasn't a mouth close to a human's that she was talking with. When she was a dragon, that was different, since dragons are magical creatures and not something that Elmo was used to dealing with in the first place.

"You can talk even!" Samantha exclaimed, her excitement starting to infect Elmo as well, despite the distance between them.

"Uh, yeah... I can talk," Sonya replied, sounding rather uncomfortable with that remark. "My original shape is human, after all."

"Maybe you could show me all your shapes before I have to go back!" Samantha said, her excitement seeming to only grow the more that was said.

"Uh, maybe," Sonya hedged, looking like she was contemplating leaving the campsite for the evening. Or at least until Samantha was gone.

"Don't mind her," Heather said, hugging Sonya from where she lay on her, rubbing her face against her fur. "She's just embarrassed to shift her shape. She doesn't even like shifting in front of me and we've shared some really rough experiences together."

Elmo suspected that she was referring to the time when they were captives of the goblins near when they first started out. If there was something else that had occurred that fit the bill, he wasn't aware of it. Not that he really expected them to say anything about it, either.

"Well, it was nice to meet you," Samantha said, clearly done talking about Sonya's shapes, which Elmo suspected she was relieved about. "My name is Samantha Goldenweave. I don't know if you met my brother Lance, but he's pretty much the only family I have left. Even if mother says he was kidnapped."

Elmo glanced at Kim, Jonas, and Elin. While it wasn't really clearly them being mentioned as being responsible for it, it was close enough for them to know that they really should keep themselves scarce inside the capital. Elmo could see that the others knew that clearly as well.

"Did your mother say who kidnapped your brother?" Elin asked, sounding genuinely interested.

"Oh, let's not talk about that," Samantha pleaded. "It's such unpleasant do talk about mother."

"Uh, not about her," Elin said. "It's just that Lance left with us as part of Kim's army, so we were worried that it was us who were supposed to hae kidnapped him."

Samantha blinked. "That makes a lot more sense than anything I'd been able to come up with."

"Well, did you hear her say anything about that?" Elin pressed.

"What's the deal with finding out about that?" Patricia asked, sounding like she was bored already with this topic. "If you are, then we'll be gone soon enough anyway. So it won't matter one way or the other."

"And what if we get stuck here? What if we can't go to our homes?" Kim retorted, sounding to Elmo like she was choosing her words carefully.

"Then we can find out then," Patricia replied dismissively. "It's not our problem, so why should we have to hear about it?"

"Have you even heard of 'accessory after the fact?'" Owen asked, more thoughtful than accusatory. "Even if we didn't take part in the crime, if we assist them afterwards, such as to aid them in escaping the consequences for their actions, then that would make us guilty of that crime as well, essentially."

"Are you sure that's what it takes for that?" Jonas asked. "I Think you might be a little off of that."

Owen merely shrugged. "Couldn't care less. All I know is that I'd like to know if I should avoid you guys afterwards if we can't get back to our..." Owen trailed off for a moment, as he glanced at Samantha. "To our homes," he quickly finished, clearly not wanting to give more information to Samantha than he had to, since it was clear that Kim, at least, was avoiding mentioning the fact that they weren't from this world.

"Well, in the end it doesn't matter," Patricia remarked. "Because we haven't a clue if that sort of thing is actually defined the same way or illegal here. So, until it is, I'd be just as happy to not deal with that subject myself."

As the interrupters quieted down, Elmo heard Samantha start talking again. "Actually, I think mother does blame you for Lance leaving, even though I'm sure he'd have found an excuse at some point with how mother was trying to keep him from doing anything."

"Yeah, I got that sense from him as well, just by talking with him," Kim commented, as if she knew Lance for a lot longer than she did. "Last we saw him, se was getting ready to start training the army they named after me. So, hopefully when you see him next, they'\ll be more of an army rather than a bunch of kids playing soldier."

Samantha smiled, clearly happy with that report. "I bet mother would probably have a fit when he returns, if that's true."

"By the way, would the king want us to hang around if he knew we were here?" Elmo asked, a sudden feeling appearing in the back of his mind that didn't feel very pleasant. He hoped that the king wouldn't be too concerned with them, given how they'd save him and his son from being killed. "I mean, I'm sure your mother already complained to him about us."

Samantha's smile disappeared so quickly that it was as if it hadn't been there to begin with. "Actually, the king was made to promise that if he found any of you in the city, that he'd hold you until their children could be returned safely."

Elmo couldn't help but roll his eyes in exasperation. If they were being 'detained' in the city, then it wouldn't be likely that they'd be able to communicate with those who had left with Kim's army for them to return, even if it was in a kind of rotation so they'd be able to continue building that fort or city a portion of their army settled down to do.

"We did encounter some soldiers who were on their way to look into some rumors or something," Jonas commented. "Would that suffice with that condition?"

Samantha shrugged. "I did hear about them building something in the mountains, but I only heard others talking about it, so I don't know what was in the original message."

"Well, maybe we should finish up our business before we see what would the answer to my question be," Jonas suggested with a laugh.