Geoff stifled a laugh. Did a 'lady' just say "dragon's piss"? Maybe this was his kind of lady indeed. If he could get past that monstrosity she kept at her side.
"Look, m'lady," he said with a wry grin to himself, "if it's all the same to you, I think the best course of action here is cooperation. I'm not a smart man, but I'm at least smart enough to know I'm not. You, on the other hand, seem extremely intelligent. I'm not good at a whole helluva lot, but I am good at fighting. I'm not sayin' I'm better than you, an' I'm not sayin' you're bad at fightin', I'm just saying the lot of us would have better odds against an entire campsite if we weren't sicking our dogs on each other"
God, what was with that dog anyway? It liked the lady and that one wizard dude just fine, but it hated Geoff. He was normally good with animals too, real good. But this dog hated the fact that Geoff was NEAR it's owner.
"I suppose I should introduce myself" Geoff said at last. In retrospect, that last remark may have been offensive, "I grew up in the sands. I dunno what you people call it, back where I grew up there wasn't enough land to name. Just dunes and dunes of sand. An' everyone was poor. The land couldn't give you jack squat, so everything you wanted you had to take for yourself. We weren't evil people, no, but we were desperate people. An' I wanted out.
"In the sands, you choose your weapon wisely. A shield will get stuck, get lost if you drop it, get buried, and when the wind blows it'll get blown over an' take you with it. You can't take a bow, can't see far enough to shoot and the wind'll blow your stuff off course. I heard some mages lived there once, but I never met one. No, if you lived in the sands, you fought with a sword. A big one.
"I dun' like big swords, I always stuck with the small fellas. But since I had a free hand, I figure, why not carry another sword? And so where everyone else was just whacking each other with the biggest log they could find, I learned to be quick. Do the job, do it efficiently, move on. And that? That I was good at.
"I made my money in the killin' business. It's not a threat, it's a fact. It's the only thing I'm good at, and it's what I plan to keep on doing 'till I'm rich. I bless the gods each mornin' cause I'm at least good at something. I wasn't cruel about it, I worked as a bodyguard whenever I could, but I didn't discriminate against my clients. I didn't let my morales get in the way of making money. You can't in the sands.
"But I got outta there. Made enough money and left that hellhole. I ain't never goin' back.
"Now if you don't mind," Geoff said at last, "call your dog off, an' maybe we can help each other," Geoff leapt back as the beast nipped at him with it's beak, angered. "Please?"
