Who: Beau and Caleb What: Reconnecting Where: An inn in Everdale When: After this
The horse was obviously supernatural, its body shrouded in mist and smoke that drifted off the barely opaque hide before disappearing into the ether. It moved silently through the cobble street like no horse should and the hooves did not make a single sound when they struck against the stone. Riding abreast the beast was a wizard whose coat and hair flapped in the brisk wind that their stride conjured around him. It briefly exposed the leather harness strapped around his torso that contained the holsters for his spellbooks, giving Caleb the appearance of a kind of arcane cowboy riding across the Wild West.
When they reached the inn in question, the horse instinctively came to a halt. Caleb's dismount was less than graceful but his boots hit the ground without problem. With a snap of his fingers his familiar appeared sitting tall on one shoulder. The wizard regarded the phantom steed, an impressive feat of magic, he reasoned, considering it was a solid illusion that was otherwise only possible in the higher circles of magic. Yes, very impressive.
"Alright," he said to the phantasm, which stood at still attention, "you, uh...can go now."
It did not go anywhere.
Caleb drew a breath and squinted. He held up a hand, forefinger bent in and thumb flexed perpendicular to the other erect fingers in the somatic gesture of dispellation. Only when he waved that hand and uttered the arcane word for ending did the horse vanish, the magic successfully rewoven back into the Weave. With that accomplished, he pushed the door open and made into the inn.
The room was lit by a hearth fire and a few candlelight chandeliers hanging from the vaulted ceiling. Caleb recognized, then, that it was the same inn that Molly had taken him to recuperate. What a coincidence (or perhaps not).
"Uh, yes," he said to the inquiring bar maid, "I am looking for, uh, a friend. About this tall, usually in a blue robe, generally disgruntled temperament..."