A body hitting the paving stones with a sickening wet smack was not the last thing Roran expected when he and his brother crept into the abandoned castle but it was pretty far down the list.  He let out a small, involuntary squeal and jerked his whole body backwards, pushing at his brother Chon until the taller man planted his feet.

They stood with a formerly grand entranceway behind them.  Collapsed stonework let in the searching rays of a setting sun which cast the expansive area in a golden glow.  The forest had worked its way into the castle with brush and small trees growing almost right up to their feet.  Ahead of them was a shadowed entrance into the interior.  The whole sprawling castle was laid out around a towering atrium that had once been a ballroom with a series of colonnades stepping upwards for a hundred paces and capped with a vaulted ceiling.  The ballroom floor was now covered in layers of swampy muck and old dead things that had been rotting for decades.  For a few moments they both stared at the body laying just inside the gloomy passageway.

"All right," whispered Chon in a flat voice.  "Remember when you asked what was the worst thing that could happen?"  He pointed at the body.  "This was pretty high on the list."

Roran didn't answer.  He looked down at his leather vest and realized he had blood spatter on it.  "Uh,"  He brushed absently at his thighs and chest.  "Uhm, look, uh."  

"We're leaving," said Chon, grabbing his arm.  "Or rather, you're leaving.  This was a stupid plan."

"No, wait."  Roran shook his head and pulled free.  "Look, now this just proves that the Arcanum crystal is here.  There are others after it.  We let them draw out the holong and deal with it.  While that happens we take the crystal.  It's a perfect plan."

"It isn't even a plan.  You just came up with that while you were talking."  Chon held up a hand to cut his brother off before he started again.  "We're not playing down by the brook with wooden swords.  This is real.  Whoever's here probably found out about the crystal the same way you did.  That means this isn't an old abandoned castle anymore, people will come to it.  And that could provoke the holong to clear the whole region starting with the villages just a half day from here."

Roran's face set in grim, little brother stubbornness.  "If there's even a holong here."

Chon stepped forward, using older brother intimidation.  "If there's even a crystal here."

The face off they had played out a thousand times as children stopped when they both heard voices from far above, echoing off the stone.  Roran smiled.  "See, there's more of them.  Let them fight or whatever.  We get to the top of the tower and grab the crystal."

Chon nodded down towards the body.  "The holong is the only thing here I know I can beat.  That's a Rennon warrior.  There are probably more of them.  I can only fight so many things at once.  And the Lantern is setting."

Roran stepped over to a side passage and glanced around the corner.  "That's why we need to get moving."  He looked back at his brother.  Chon stood tall, his golden Lasskyr skin capturing the warm light around him.  He wore the magic enhanced bracers and breastplate of a Palan Ranger, longsword at his side, and he didn't seem to be convinced.  "Chon, a crystal this size doesn't come along very often at all, you know that.  The old svarosmiths would easily have one the size of a walnut and you need me to find it.  I could craft it into maybe five or six pieces.  Upper tier.  For very wealthy clients.  We'd be set for life.  Like the old Kings of Kyro."

Chon snorted and shook his head slightly at that.  Then the two of them shared a look that had bonded them for years.  "Let's find some stairs."  He gripped the hilt of his sword and started walking past his brother.

Roran drew his dagger and followed him with a satisfied look of little brother smugness.  

Chon whispered over his shoulder, "You know the Kings of Kyro all died violent deaths."

"Well, yes, but they were still rich."