46th Ash, 4619
As Thomas urged his wagon along the winding, poorly kept road he wondered for the umpteenth time about what exactly he thought he was doing. Normally, he didn't follow treasure maps, he sold them to other people. For that matter, he normally sold them to people after forging a treasure map for them to follow. Hopefully, the real treasure would be the memories of the journey itself, and any friends they made along the way. Being familiar with the hallmarks of fake maps, though, led him to believe that this one was actually the real deal, and he'd already been in Daravin with the traveling carnival. It seemed perfect. Fated, almost.
He'd bought some of the supplies using his wages from being Altair the Clairvoyant, and the crew of the carnival had actually given him the rest of the supplies. Turns out, it paid to be personable. If the carnival wasn't seasonal, and if traveling as part of a drunk circus of random people didn't make him feel so exposed, he might have considered staying on indefinitely, but there was to be no indefinite engagement, which was just as well, because a customer had come in to ask him what he thought of this map toward the end of the tour, and then threw up all over his tent. While he'd helped the man put himself back together, he'd pocketed the map, replacing it with a folded scrap of paper. The man was far too drunk to notice, and by the time he woke up and sweated out all the booze, Thomas would be long gone. Besides, cleaning vomit out of velour was hard, so he was owed something for all his labor. The man had only had twenty farthings on him, which wasn't nearly enough.
In any case, this map seemed to be the real deal. For one thing, it was a carved off piece of an actual high-end map, likely something from an Entente estate. It wasn't just old paper made to look fancy; it was something fancy that someone had repurposed for their own ends, adding careful markings that were not necessarily meant to be understood by other people. That was another hint: the map wasn't in code, but it wasn't particularly clear, either; this was a note to self, a reminder to whoever had made it to return later. People didn't make those for things that weren't worth money, and people didn't need them if they didn't have multiple caches of valuables, so this person clearly did, and something about this one merited special consideration. Finally, it seemed liked he could stay on the roads, where it was relatively safer, for much of the journey.
Once he got about two thirds of the way there, of course, he'd have to rough it a bit, but his brave team of Stubborn the mule and Chestnut the Horse would do just fine. Or at least, he hoped they would. He'd heard many things about the Badlands, few good. His best hope, if all else failed, was the gun on his hip. He hadn't shot one since he was sixteen, but hopefully, it was like reciting a soliloquy or riding a man -- not hard to do once one knew how, even if some time had passed between now and then. Hope and apprehension warring in his heart, Thomas urged Stubborn and Chestnut on as the sun beat down mercilessly on the three of them.
