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By Root 1207 0

many shelves in the room with the medallion still in hand. He picks up one book, flips through the pages briefly before returning it to the shelf and then chooses another. “It seems that I remember seeing this in one of the older tomes, perhaps one dealing with…” he begins to explain before trailing off. Removing a tome with aged, yellow bindings and cracked by the march of time, he nods his head then brings it back to the table. “This may be it. This tome relates the history of various religious orders in the area, both those currently popular and others that have fallen out of favor,” he says to James as he returns to his seat and lays the book between them. Carefully opening it, he says. “There used to be other religions around than there are now, but for one reason or another have disappeared.”

“Disappeared?” James asks. “How can a religion just disappear?”

“Perhaps disappear is an over generalization,” he replies, looking up from the book and glancing across the table at him. “But some religions are no longer sought after by the common man. Over time their temples close, people no longer wish to be priests of that religion, so the religion, sad to say, fades away.” He returns his attention to the book, and continues flipping through the pages. Every once in a while he would pause when he came to a drawing, stopping only long enough to compare the diagram on the medallion to the one that’s in the book. When it proves not to be a match, he continues on.

“Have there been many religion’s to fade away?” asks James.

“I would think so,” he says. “Though how many is hard to say.” He turns to another page and again brings the medallion up close for a comparison. “I think we may have found it.”

“Really?” says James excitedly, leaning across the table in an effort to get a better look at the picture. “What does it say?”

Ellinwyrd hands the medallion back to James and silently reads the section in the book relating to the design depicted on the page. “There is not very much here, just a paragraph,” he says and then moves the book closer to James so he can better see. “This is the symbol of the god Morcyth. The man who wrote this did not know very much about those who believed in Morcyth, simply mentioning that it was an ancient religion whose priests were scholars and teachers.” He turns several more pages but finds nothing further written about Morcyth, so closes the book.

“Have you heard of this Morcyth?” James asks him.

Nodding, Ellinwyrd says, “A little. His influence waned over five hundred years ago I believe, though I am not sure why. I do know his priests were good, always helping everyone they came into contact with.” He looks questioningly across the table at James and asks, “One wonders how you came to be in possession of a medallion bearing the sign of a god whose priests have not been seen for over five hundred years?”

Shifting in his seat under the eyes of Ellinwyrd, he hesitantly replies, “It was given to me.”

“Oh?” Ellinwyrd says, arching one eyebrow questioningly.

Not sure why, but James feels that he can trust him. “It’s a rather long, unbelievable story,” he says. “I was not born in this world,” James admits as he looks to see the reaction his words are having on him.

“Truly?” asks Ellinwyrd, intrigued but somewhat skeptical. “What world were you born upon?”

“We call it Earth,” he explains. “It’s very similar to this one, but with many differences. One of the major differences is that magic doesn’t work in my world.”

“Fascinating,” Ellinwyrd says, then prompts James to continue.

James then relates the tale of how he answered the ad and all the events from the time he entered this world until the time the god, or whatever that little creature is, gave him the amulet. He further explains how he came here to Cardri, how he hoped to discover the meaning of the amulet. How he hoped in some way to shed some light on all this.

“An interesting tale,” Ellinwyrd says when James finishes. “It seems strange that you were brought to our world and not told why.”

“I agree,” James says. “All I was told was to