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I rub my head and groan inwardly as we hear yet another case of a person attempting to pee in public after the 'funeral'. Attempt because it was a female half elf, and according to the guard report the woman in question was protesting loudly as to why she couldn't do it like the guys did. The woman in front of us was sufficiently embarrassed by the whole event. Seven cases of people trying to pee publicly and it was just the start of the cases for those with bad behavior after drinking that strong beverage. After the number of incidents, the council swiftly decided any time someone suggested trying a drink gifted from a God the city would decline.

Most of the punishments given to the people who did something egregious enough to come to court, did not entail fixing what they did. As it was almost a week after the event. However thanks to the 'pissers', we were going to have an extremely clean city. It was decided that any of the bad behavior that was only embarrassing but caused a mess would spend a week scrubbing the streets.

Once the embarrassed woman walks away thanking the court for being lenient Jake steps forward attempting to keep a straight face. "Pasture half elven is here on drunken disorderly. Specifically he climbed the center piece of the fountain in the market square and in attempting to jump off became hung up on a piece of decoration and hung there till one of the on duty guards was able to rescue him."

I heard a few snickers from our council that were quickly stifled, and we all paused as we look the young man over. He was red faced and trying to look meek as he stood in front of us. He did look familiar to me, and Alberich told me why. {This is the man who collects the unicorn excrement and sells it to the farms. Granted Harriet gets half of it before he's allowed to sell any off}. I think for a moment Alberich allowing me to tell the rest of the council who the man was, then I ask. {Does he have a wife and children yet?} Alberich thinks a moment, {no he only is responsible for himself at this time. I believe he was amassing wealth to impress someone he wished to become involved with}.

Hmm wealth, that's not a good trait just to do it to impress people. Not when your society is about ensuring the happiness of everyone. Wealth only makes a small amount of people happy and they tend to be stressed over how to obtain more wealth to keep up "appearances". After some deliberation I grin at the half elf.

"So Pasture, because your actions whether you were sober or not could have had some bad repercussions should a child have seen you we need to give you a stiff punishment. You will spend the next moon in guard training, with your free time devoted to cleaning the school house or receiving extra training from Ecthelon. During this time you cannot benefit from your business, also you cannot 'pay' to put this decision aside. The council has decided a fine is not sufficient enough to cover this, I hope you learn your lesson."

The man collapses to the floor crying as if I killed his best friend, "why are you doing this? I need to earn enough wealth so that I can marry." Ecthelon gives him a pitying look, "and why is that half elf? People here do not have a dowry, and if you didn't notice this city prefers people to not care about wealth."

The upset man responds with, "but the human woman I love says that if I am not wealthy enough she'll never marry me." I groan again inwardly, this poor man found one of those women. I shake my head, "listen Pasture. I would like to speak to this woman, as everyone has to pay for the crimes they commit and you can not always pay a fine based on your behavior." Well at least now we know why he tried jumping off the fountain, somewhere inside he thought it would impress this woman. I nod in agreement and wait as the man responds.

"I can't do that, she doesn't want anyone to know who she is. She says she's in hiding, from some bad people." I sigh again and Hekkogar jumps in a talks to the man, she does get the woman's name out of him and we find out it was one of Samantha's friends. Father Peter shakes his head, I think there will be a sermon this week about the Golden Rule after this.

I nod at Tammy and she quietly gets up and goes out of the room, a couple of guards take the man who was still crying out of the room. I lay my head on the table hoping this day would end. Thankfully Ecthelon had given me a surprise this morning that I have to look forward to using when we were done with court today. It was a composite bow, made from Dragon bone and one of the elves super hard metals. He had said it was made with a Dragon Hunter in mind, and that he could barely pull the string on it. He was not sure I could repetitively pull it as of yet, however he did say he was sure that Zander could and was probably the only other person in the city who could.

Tammy returns with a pair of guards flanking a shackled human woman who was yelling at the guards. "You have no right to tie my hands I haven't done anything wrong!" I nod at Jake who steps back and prepares to take notes. "Ma'am we have a report of you attempting to get men to give you a great deal of money for favors." She sees me and says "I don't acknowledge your authority. From what I have heard you aren't really a human and I only recognize the authority of humans." I smile then as she gave me the prefect opening, "well then. If your refuse to acknowledge the authority of all species then you shall be banished from this city. The point of this city is to have those of the different species living together, if you do not wish to partake in that you do not belong here."

The woman raises her head high, "I don't care aside from finding out who ratted me out. It must have been that shop keeper." I tilt my head knowing that the guards hadn't removed Pasture fully from the building, "shopkeeper huh? So you have done it to multiple men then." The woman snorts in derision, "only two men and a handful of those half elves. Abominations all of them."

We all hear a cry come from the next room and I see one of the guards nod to Cassie who was inside and she walks out to calm the poor man. I turn my head back to the woman before me, "as you can see the one who 'ratted you out' was a half elf. One who was under the impression that you would marry him."

The woman actually smiles, "good he has a broken heart. Whomever would create such an evil creature should be burned at the stake like during the witch trials." I sigh shaking my head, "I don't care if you do not recognize my authority. You will know this, due to your behavior if you are ever found within these city walls you will be given a public flogging for your first offense. It won't be a simple ten lashes either, your behavior is reprehensible." I wave to the guards to have her removed as I didn't want to waste any more time on her.

I had a feeling we would be seeing more like her before we removed all of them from our city. Jake walks a group of young people in the room and I see a number of people in our watch area frown. Those must be their parents, at least they are going to help with this punishment. Jake reads off the charges, "Carmen et all for destruction of valuable property and causing a mess in a food storage facility." The second part of the charge was something we had talked about after we found out they had messed up the store room. We hadn't made allowances for someone messing with food stores previously, what we had not known at first was that they had somehow managed to damage the charm on the bottle of blood. So our various mages had to scramble to make a new one, as we had a formal request from a new city in Egypt who wished to send an envoy if we were able to feed a good vampire. This was another mixed species city, the envoy was coming to petition the addition of a Hunter to it's city for protection.

While I welcome the envoy, there won't be a Hunter available for a number of years as yet. We will see what becomes of it. I look down at the group of youngsters, the first part of the charge surprised them. So I decided to enlighten them, "I found out from the mages; that if you do not wear the special gloves given with the bottle. You will destroy the charm upon it, as the charm is extremely complex any possible interference from mage potential will remove it." The group collectively blinks at me, I chuckle. "That means youngsters that one among you is a mage and you don't know it yet," Merlin pops into the chamber.

He looks to me, "apologies Hunter; as the situation right now just came to my attention." He turns and looks at the group of young people and waves at a young man. "Come along then, you are about to be properly trained." He turns to me, "oh he will be punished Hunter. I am surprised the mages within your city were able to make that charm to begin with it is quite complex. It'll take the better part of half a century to train this young man, so that should be punishment enough. As we all know I am not a nice man, when he has acquired journeyman status I shall have him work within this city as the remainder of his punishment." He gives the young people a withering look, "he will be the only one in this group that will truly understand why what they did was so horrible."

He then takes the man's hand a poofs out of the chambers, and a couple of the watchers make to stand and think better of it. {Cassie when you have a moment there is a pair of parents that will need your help. Merlin claimed one of the bottle breakers as an apprentice}. I get an affirmative from her as I look back at the rest of the group.

"You will all be punished with a smaller sentence than fifty years with a mad mage," {I heard that}. I had already had their punishment prepared as our coming envoy was going to be a great thing. "So for the next moon you will be in the guard, learning everything about how to be a silent guard. As when our vampire," the young people blanch. "Envoy from Egypt will be here then and you will be assigned to guard his quarters during the daylight hours." The youngsters blanch again and their parents look unhappy, "lets hope that the bottle we made as a replacement lasts. Or you will be asked to become donors, as that appears to be the policy in that city."

I announce to the room, "you heard right a vampire envoy. I was reassured this envoy has excellent skills in diplomacy, and while they do have a vampire population. They have a rigorous process to allow for 'donors' for these people. From what I understand the vampires accept it even though they feel it is not as much fun as hunting their food. They would like to see if our blood bottle works well, if it does one of those might be a second item they wish to request from us."

I nod at Jake as he takes the youngsters out of the room. Fredrick then walks into the room and I mentally groan again. He stops in the middle of the room, "I am petitioning the court to discover who wrote those words on the side of my building!" I could hear a collective sigh come up from the council, funny thing about the phrase "Fredrick is a stinker!" It couldn't be removed and required to be covered with a magical paint that will cover anything. Atsuko took some samples but is baffled at how simple paint is irremovable and uncoverable. If Gilorndir had been near her when she gave her report I was sure he'd say 'it's magic that's why'.

I shake my head, "you know the answer to that Fredrick. Unless you are willing to pay taxes yourself that is not happening, you are quite welcome to pay someone to find out for you. Then we'd have to validate they are being truthful before punishment is administered." Fredrick looks furious then, "if you don't look into this I'll pack up my inn and go someplace else." I smile again, "you are certainly welcome to do that as well. As I am sure the people using your inn would welcome having lower rates within the city." Fredrick stomps out of the council chamber then ranting about how unfair we were. I sigh again, definitely no more God given drinks.

Unknown Perspective:

We make it to the Brittany 'camp', though I personally wouldn't call it a camp. It was better stocked than a camp with a sign stating how it was asked everyone replaces what they use. {This is a nice touch and very thoughtful}. I snort at the thought, my wolf going quiet. I turn and look towards the City that the Hunter founded, {not long now. Lets hope I don't need to put someone down}.