The passing of time

Eldrian returned to ANW two hours later than normal. Shocking several dwarves as he appeared in the middle of the street. 

"Sorry, sorry..." apologizing, he quickly headed to the gate, greeting Ingvar and telling Elizabeth to meet up at the next fort. Stating that he would meet them there.

It was, more or less, a shorter route for him from here than returning to Kynigo and the going to the fort. Plus, it saved him a handful of gold coins. After all, he couldn't exactly be trusted to fuel the teleportation array. The mages responsible for the arrays would lose their heads if they allowed that. 

—

"Why were you late?" Elizabeth asked upon meeting up with Eldrian. 

"I had an intruder." Eldrian replied shortly. Since Theas was in the group, he couldn't talk openly about things. 

"""Are you okay?""" Elizabeth and the others asked.

"Yeah, she didn't seem to want to hurt me, but... she was part of Miracle."