I am being pursued down a narrow forest path by a great boar. It is no mere animal of flesh and blood but a creature of Faerie whose coat ripples silver in the moonlight. It has just dispatched another who meant me harm and is now demanding that I return the crystal which I stole. While it is true that I have recently manifested magicks that I have been using to barely stay one step ahead of both the boar and the other pursuer before it, I have no memory of such a crystal.
The voice of my unseen friend and guide advises me to offer a bargain to the great boar, if only to buy myself some time to rest during the negotiation, for no fae creature can resist hearing out the offer of a bargain with a mortal. I heed the advice, shouting back at the great boar as I run, fttering it with all manner of titles befitting so great a being as I beseech it for the chance at a bargain by which to make things right.
Our chase comes to a halt and I swear to the great boar by my Name and all that is precious to me that I have no memory of the crystal of which it speaks. In the face of such an oath, the great boar has no choice but to believe me, and yet it can still smell the stolen crystal on me – no, inside me. It says that I have swallowed the crystal, or else dissolved it in my very blood, and if my stomach must be torn asunder or my blood drained and taken to get the crystal back, then so be it. I counter that if I have indeed swallowed the crystal, then we need only wait for my body to do what mortal bodies do in order to remove it without the need for violence, as lowly and disgusting as such processes may be. I then propose that we may both be the victims of a third party who actually stole the crystal, set against one another so that they might get away. It is just as likely that the aura of the crystal pervading my body may be an illusion or that I was tricked or forced into swallowing it against my will, for I surely know better than to antagonize one such as the great boar.
No matter the case, the great boar insists that it has been wronged and demands recompense, and I am the only one around to pay it. Taking the only viable option I can see, I offer to swear myself into the great boar’s service until such a time as either its crystal is returned or that the truth of what happened becomes known to us.
