So.
You wanna know how it ended?
You really wanna know?
You want the climax? The poetic tragedy? The bittersweet goodbye? The burning lute floating down a river while I stare after it, single tear rolling down my cheek like some godsdamned epic heroine?
Tough shit.
Here's what happened.
Oleander's wife showed up.
Yeah. Wife.
No, not a lovely forest dryad with long flowing hair and tragic tuberculosis.
I'm talking middle-aged harpy. Fat. Mean. Wore too much rouge. Smelled like onions and old coin purses. You could hear her coming by the way her ankles clicked.
Tracked him down with two bounty hunters—actual bounty hunters—who looked like they ate poets for breakfast. Said he owed her six months' worth of domestic duties and four pigs' worth of bride price.
Apparently, he married her for land. Or money. Or goats. I don't know. I was too busy laughing so hard I nearly dislocated a rib.
He tried to say something as they dragged him away—"Saya, my flame! My eternal—"
I threw a tomato at him.
It hit the older bounty hunter instead. He wasn't amused.
And so there you have it.
The pure-hearted minstrel. The divine fool. The one who saw my soul and composed ballads about the silk of my inner radiance or whatever—
Turns out he just forgot to file the divorce papers.
So, no, I didn't stab anyone. I didn't cry. I didn't whisper "goodbye, my love" into the dusk.
I just went through his saddlebags, took my five silver, and his backup lute.
Don't look at me like that.
I'm not heartbroken.
I'm fine.
Really.
It's just... quiet tonight.
Too quiet.
Anyway.
Where were we?