> "And, I..I.." I looked away from the RavenLord's eyes in shame,
"I'm afraid
> to travel alone."

A cool hand reached out and laid itself lightly on the barkeep's.
Chance had been sitting nearby, her conversation with Samantha long
over. Things had been flickering behind her eyes: Atlanta, Seattle,
Vancouver, Victoria, Tacoma. Chance didn't even need to leave the
house any more- her awareness was split between the worlds she
traveled. And maybe it was time to get out of the House for a bit.

"I will Travel with you, if you Choose to go."

_____________________________________________________

I covered the small hand of the lovely Chance with one of mine.
My admiriation for her was deep...she'd traveled so far and seen
many things and still graced my bar with grace and charm and wit.

Hah. My bar. Sometimes I'd forget that I was merely a caretaker, that
the House belonged to a remote and mighty force. A force that had
vanished and left me to bumble along and make sure the place kept
running.

Patrons like Chance would come along and make it all worthwhile.

"Chance, you honor me. Are you certain you'd want to go on such
a journey? Especially since where we'd go might not exist?"

I turned to the Ravenlord, "How do I know that I might not set foot
off the train and vanish into some sort of limbo? Chance would
probably be protected by her power or skill or curse or whatever
you want to call it."

I felt like a coward. Yet it's one thing to face death, another to face
complete nullification.

"Someone would have to take over the bar...and perhaps a third
companion...and I'd want to talk to Rhioban before I left."

Chance squeezed my arm and I loved her.



W.