I think this may be done. I went through and did a stroke around most text to make it a bit more legible against the texture and mountains, and finished naming all those stinking towns. Here's the last bit of the story:
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Gavram always remembered that night as the last bit of calm before the madness entered his life.
The newborn haura calf didn't bring quite as much as he'd hoped from Big Theo, the Inn's master, but along with two of the lesser quality bolts of cloth from the jungle kingdoms of the south, they had enough to put up everyone for the night in private rooms, including the warlock. Gavram had balked at this, but after Doris had browbeaten him into it, the unconscious man got his own room next to Arvid's. Arvid himself was fascinated by the Tallman. He'd never met one before and was insatiably curious, his quietness after the vrak ambush having quite deserted him. Along with Doris, he'd tended the man all that long afternoon, cleaning up his wounds as best he good, binding his cracked ribs and applying a poultice to the nasty gashes on his head. The man, drifting in and out of consciousness, thanked him and managed to give his name - Esho Santirez - but his origins and goals, not to mention what he'd been doing by himself in the wastes, remained a mystery.
The evening meal, a feast including roast haura, steamed carrots and beets, fresh bread, and candied cheese, was just over when Esho Santirez appeared in the common room. That was how Gavram viewed it, anyhow. One moment the bench next to him was empty, and the next the Tallman was simply there. Gavram shuddered involuntarily and just barely stopped himself from making the forked sign. He couldn't stand magic, and this man reeked of it.
Esho's voice was low and smooth. "I thank you, sir, for the rescue. It was the Seafather's own mercy that put you in my path this day."
Gavram frowned. "I seem to recall you were in our path."
Esho smiled and nodded. "And this also is true. Perhaps we were destined to meet."
"I think not. I do wonder though, what exactly you thought you were doing all the way out there. Even one of your... skills... wouldn't last long on his own."
"I see you are a learned man," Esho said with a curious gleam in his eyes. "Not many of the desert folk know a warlock of Vizeray by sight. Have you met many of my order before?"
Gavram pondered his answer for a long moment as he realized that all the other conversations at the table had ceased and everyone was watching the two of them. The people of the Merchant Republics were traders by nature and so hardly unused to strange foreigners, but the Tallmen from across the Vasty Blue were still a novelty - the first of their great deepwater ships had only made landfall some thirty years ago, and their handful of port towns were still minor affairs of a few hundred people each. But they had power, numbers, and strange magic. A bad combination.
Finally, he said, "I've not had the honor, but I do hear things. Even a humble trader such as myself has contacts."
Arvid jumped in. "He's one of the most influential Guild Merchants in all the Republics! Why he--"
"That's quite enough, Arvid," Gavram said. "We must allow this man his rest. Perhaps I can advance you a small loan to see you to Salttown on the coast?"
The warlock looked at him somberly. "You are most kind, but... I had something else in mind. Tell me, how much do you know of the deep desert to the west, especially the ruins known as the Circle of Pillars?"
Gavram sighed. I knew this would turn out poorly, he thought.
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