Following my sage advice, Gerald made sure to keep it very clean and unobstructed until then. When his throat reopened, he was able to wait until the stoma closed on its own. It did leave a small scar that identified him from his other triplet brothers. That was a small price to pay when compared to his whole life. We then had another conversation that lasted a couple of hours. Marion also was happy to talk to someone that did not look at him like he was a living embodiment of sin. When Marion was finished, he left. Evan was in the kitchen the whole time. I was happy that I did the right thing. When Anthony and Fabien returned they looked somber. I asked what happened to them. They heard the news from the grapevine. Lady Killroy survived the assassination attempt. However, she had become totally handicapped. She lost a fair bit. The ability to walk was gone, and she could barely speak. It had to be really tough on Sir Killroy. She seemed to be a woman full of life before. "You told him this could happen. How did you know?" Fabien asked. I explained it. "She could try to relearn it."
Having hope was important for anyone's recovery. When word got back to Sir Killroy he decided to withdraw from future tournaments while we took care of his mother. I wished the best for them. Keeping him out of the picture just made the new tournament brackets easier. A nice courier arrived at the door in the afternoon. Now that I had time to think on it, it had been a bit over 2 months since we had arrived in the city. It was Lord Swiftheart from the seal on the letter. I read the letter first. He was pleased to hear we arrived safely and already purchased a home in the city. He and his wife were going to prepare to come visit in a month. It would raise Anthony and Fabien's morale to see their father again. That meant that he should be just starting his journey about now. We would therefore probably see him in about a month. We still had a spare bedroom for him to live in while he stayed with us. I put the letter back down on the kitchen table. There were more things to worry about. We had some more cash to play with. I did not need to go to work. Neither did the others. I had a plan for our time.
We were slowly losing our name as Blood Knights. I waited until everyone returned in the evening. I let Anthony and Fabien read the letter from their father. They were all pleased, but were not expressing any outward joy. They just put on a front for the rest of us here. I then proposed that we go to the garrison and see if their were bandits that needed to be hunted down. If we were all known for a plethora of things, the more our name would spread. It would help when it was time to petition the king. Clout was supremely important. No one wanted to listen to a nobody. Even worse if they wanted something difficult from you. Petras and Jeran were my personal companions so they were in. All of the others were in as well. We went to the garrison. There were indeed tons of bounties for bandits plaguing the surrounding villages. We spent the next couple of weeks venturing out and finding them. Most of us were unfamiliar. Because they did not know, they were not scared in the least of having open tolls on the roads. We slaughtered them all. The bounties were dead or alive. We collected a lot on it.
The villages were happy to have us roaming around and making the roads safer. We were an elimination task force. It was not our job to recover stolen goods. All of their stuff was probably locked up in a hideout somewhere. It was up to them to organize a large search. After that, we returned home to take care of our wounds. On the way back, they tried to ambush us. It was a giant fight. One of Fabien's attendants were critically injured. We killed all of them and then brutally displayed those corpses. The rest of the bandits took the hint after that. Activity for them dropped drastically in the following weeks. When Lord Swiftheart arrived, he gazed upon our home. He did not seem to think much of it. To be fair, if we had a better reputation upon entering the city, we might have gotten a better place to stay. He brought his wife with him. Anthony and Fabien looked genuinely happy to see their mother again. Their father was able to tell us the results of the research that they had done at their home. They had found a forest project that the king's father started had been stalled. It was to their north.
