Completed Getaway (Inoadar)

[Amolina]

Parnell had kicked the pole away before he was overpowered and knocked out by the boatman. He had sort of saved Amolina, but not for long. Now when the boatman had finished Parnell – or so he seemed to believe – he turned around and fixed his gaze on Amolina again. She looked back. The boatman started to smile slowly. The smile grew to a broad grin and the grin became a laugh. The laugh ended as abruptly as it had begun and he held his hand out and told her to give him the cane. If she would give him the weapon he would spare her and let her go, he promised. Amolina didn’t believe him. She held on to the cane and saw the boatman’s eyes narrow. He made ready to advance…But during the short battle the boat had been running ahead of the channel, without someone to direct it. The high speed they had been moving at had slowed only slightly. Suddenly Amolina saw the leveler of next warehose. The boat ran right into it with a hard thud that made the boat rock violently. Having seen the leveler in time she was prepared and managed to stay on her feet. But the boatman, who had been standing with his back to the lever, lost his balance and stumbled forward helplessly. He fell on the cane. Amolina screamed in horror. Before the man knew it the dagger went into his stomach and with a sickening, gurgling sound he, put his hand on the wound and stepped back, off of the dagger. Blood spurted out and the man moaned and staggered, utter and helpless surprise and agony on his face now ... and then he stumbled again and fell out of the boat, into the dark water beneath. If he wasn’t dead yet, he would soon drown. The boat had stopped, the whole world seemed to have stopped, time itself seemed to have stopped and the silence of the moment felt eternal. Still holding the cane in her hands Amolina stood there panting and stared at the boatmans body in the water. Then she slowly turned and looked down at Parnell. He just lay there, immovable and silent…She didn’t know what to do now…But she knew she couldn’t just stay there in the boat and wait to be found, with a corpse floating in the water beside them and perhaps one more corpse in the boat. This was perhaps her opportunity to disappear…but what if Parnell was alive and would be caught and interrogated? She knew she couldn’t afford to leave him behind. Feeling numb and cold she tried to think, but her thoughts seemed to be weirdly slow. It took her a few chimes to come to the conclusion that she needed to check if Parnell was dead or alive. Shaking, she sat down on her knees beside him. His cloak…the spikes there…the blood on his face…dizzily she managed to put the fingers of her left hand on his throat and find the pulse. He was still alive, or so she believed. He was still alive, but she could easily kill him now and get rid of him forever. As soon as she had thought it, she knew she wasn’t able to do it. He had cooperated and played along all the way from the razzia. He had given her the weapon. He had even sort of saved her life, when he went between her and the boatman at the end, despite how she had only been in the way and it could have been a good opportunity for Parnell to save himself instead. No – she wouldn’t kill him or just leave him there. She would find some other way to get rid of him. Later. Thus her reasoning conveniently ran like water around a major trouble she wasn’t able to cope with. If you don’t want to face it - deny it and avoid it. Perhaps she just didn’t have the guts to kill him, or perhaps it was something else. She got to her feet. Slowly and carefully she made the dagger disappear back into the cane and put it down beside Parnell. Then she took the pole that was now floating in the water right beside the boat, and started to push the ravonsala on. It was darker now, the canal a dim blackness in front of her, no way back. Oddly exhausted, trembling and terribly cold she continued forward. Her thoughts narrowed down to only one single thing: she would take the ravonsala to a part of The Docks where the fishermen had small boathouses and cottages. Somehow she would get Parnell into a cottage, set the boat adrift on the lake or sink it…an impossible plan, only daft and confused imaginations? Time would tell. If Parnell would wake up in the boat she would see what that would entail and where they would decide to go. If he would stay unconscious she would (somehow) get him into a nowadays empty boathouse she had the key to. In that case he might wake up on a mattress on the floor in a room with a fireplace. If he would die there in the boat…she wasn’t even able to think of that option OOCAs your PC went unconscious and next post is yours we'll go on from where he wakes up. You choose.

[Inoadar]

'They're going to sell me out.' his suspicions told him, 'Did they find the letter opener? Was there blood I failed to completely clean off?' It was the very thing he'd killed The Elder with. The wagon had made so many turns, Inoadar had lost track of what direction they were going. But it stood to reason they had turned around to return him to Nyka. He knew his little souvenir had the etched "SE" of the Second Edict faction. The murder would still be a fresh outrage back in Nyka. This family had figured it out and were speaking in hushed voices, thinking him asleep.

It had served The Elder right, he knew, but he could hardly expect any of those fools to share his puritan outlook and agree that his parting gesture had been both necessary and justified. He had given his all to inspire them and they had degraded his effort, calling it "insurmountable", making it an excuse to accept second best from then on. 'That's what they ought to call themselves...'Second Best". he thought to himself bitterly. He knew he would have to kill the family that had picked him up after his escape from Nyka. He knew they suspected he was wanted back there and were planning to take him back to face retribution.

He would not call it 'justice'. Nor would he accept the blame for the necessity of killing these poor folks. The Nykans were all so quick to accept whatever their damned monks told them. They would twist what happened to make him look like some kind of criminal. It was due to THAT that this family felt this unfortunate sense of duty. It was THAT that made it necessary to kill them. He would take the father first, silently. He would drag the body off and finish the others one at a time as they searched for him. Then he would take the wagon the rest of the way to Ravok.

'They must have really greased the axle on this wagon.' he thought with appreciation. It made none of the noise associated with a land crossing. And there was a strange rhythm to the rocking, almost as if the rises and falls of the land were patterned like waves, regular and continuous. That reminded him also of the sloshing sound. He had seen no barrels inside where he lay. 'There are crates, but since when is liquid kept in crates? Why go to the trouble to seal crates against leaks when barrels are so available?'

His curiosity got the better of him and he strove to raise his head for a look. His head spun and he could hardly defeat the weight of the tarp over his head. 'What in Dira's Dungeons is this? Who put this over my head? Where did it come from? There was only a blanket on me. And why am I so weak?' With a supreme effort that left him exhausted, he managed to get his head free of the tarp. His head swam in dizziness and he thought he might be sick. It was dark and walls rose high on both sides of him. he felt like he was in a long hallway, except the ambiance of the outdoors was all around him.

The wagon rocked like a canoe and he nearly rolled the thing over with the effort of looking over its sides. 'Sweet Dira, where am I?' The world would not hold still, bobbing up and down, adding to his nausea. He gripped the rail of the boat to steady his dizziness...'Boat?' he puzzled, 'What in the world?...'

It all came pouring back into his memory now. The raid on the brothel, the Ebonstryfe, the playacting, his old assistant, the Ravosala, the phony boatman, Amolina's beautiful treachery, the fight, the poison, his cane...his defeat. He suddenly hurt everywhere. It dawned on him that he ought to be dead. He was in enough sudden pain to almost make him wish he was.

He heard a noise, and looked around to find Amolina messing with a lock on what looked to be a boathouse. "Hey..." he called to her, getting mild amusement from her gasp of surprise as she spun to face him. "Why didn't you kill me? Does this mean I can have my cane back?"

[Amolina]

When Amolina had arrived at the boathouse she had searched for the key in vain. It had no longer been where she had hidden it when she had closed and locked the empty boathouse after the great storm last year. Or perhaps she had just forgotten where she had hidden it? She had been too upset to know for sure, spent after the effort of pushing the boat all the way there, dizzy, and feeling colder than could be explained by only the weather. There was no light to guide her. She had fumbled blindly, searching with her hands for hiding places she could only vaguely remember. The feeling of disappointment and hopelessness had been nightmarish, but finally she had found the key after all, in a small crack in the wall on the left side of the door. Not that her troubles had been over that easily…now she was trying to fit the key into the lock to open it, hardly seeing what she was doing. "Hey…Why didn't you kill me? Does this mean I can have my cane back?" The sudden sound of Parnell’s voice behind her made Amolina wince, gasp and spin around. She nearly dropped the key in the water. She felt it slip out of her hand in that seemingly slow yet unstoppable way it can feel when you know you are dropping something but you are reacting to slowly to stop it and all you can do is watch the inevitable happen…but in the last moment she managed to turn her numb hand just a wee bit and the key fell in the boat instead, with a small clanking sound of metal against wood. It was dark. She knew the key was there on the bottom of the boat, but she couldn’t see it. It was the same with Parnell. She knew he was there on the bottom of the boat and she knew he had woken up, but she couldn’t see much of him either. Why had she not killed him? And did this mean he could have his cane back? The question and the way he asked it seemed to imply some kind of logical connection between not killing him and giving his cane back. Well. Come to think of it she HAD actually put the cane beside him, like she had been giving it back after not killing him… “I felt I … owe you” she said wearily. “You gave me the weapon and you and went between me and the boatman when he was about to attack me. It gave me a chance to survive. The boatman…is dead. I took the boat here.” Yes, apparently she had taken the boat there, no need to say that : she felt like her brain had stopped working and she was down to stating obvious things. All she wanted to do was to get rid of the ravonsala and get inside the boathouse and…rest and recover in a safe place, was what she had been thinking while Parnell was unconscious.To be honest it didn’t feel like such a safe place anymore, not now when the poison maker was awake again. But the boathouse it would be. “The key! I dropped the damned key” she whispered hoarsely, dropping to her knees to search for it. She was hoping to find the cane too in the process. She must have been out of her mind when she had put it down beside Parnell like it was nothing else than a mere walking staff. It would be much better to keep it than let him have it back.

[Inoadar]

Inoadar managed to find his cane. It was right beside him, after all. He began to lean into an effort to rise to his feet, but nearly fell on his face in an aching swoon. He overcompensated dizzily and rolled onto his back, partially on the bench seat, partially on the crumpled tarp that had been over the upper part of his body. He decided to just stay there a moment, checking the length of his cane to be sure it was all there.

He unlocked the blade and slid it out, realizing immediately that the blade had not been wiped off. He slid his hand to get whatever was on the blade on his hand and brought it to his nose to sniff. 'Blood.' he confirmed with a sense of pride in Amolina.

"You are just full of surprises tonight, sweetheart." he praised, falling back teasingly on the playacting pet name he had used. "I didn't think you had it in you, to do...that...well...or that...really, ANY of it. I'm quite impressed, to be honest. Don't get me wrong, I don't WANT to die, but I can't figure out what you wanted, now. Maybe this confusion is what you're after? You still have more surprises for me? Trying to keep me off balance?"

He found it an effort just to talk. He ached everywhere, and felt the residual sharp pains of closed wounds, ready to start bleeding again at the least provocation. "I mean, why go to all that trouble, setting up all these scenes, killing your other loose end, and then letting ME LIVE. You owe ME, you say? I don't know why you'd think that. Yeah, you stole my ledger, but I've got no real beef over that anymore. And I knew, really, that you'd never get anything from that Clyde guy. If there's one guy with more of a bug up his ass than me, it's him."

He chuckled groggily, "By the way, you need to wipe blood off of a blade as soon as reasonable after you use it...The oil...salt" he sat up with a grunt, "Did you really kill him? The boatman? Come on, level with me, you really shanked your partner just to tie up a loose end?"

He studied her. She was staring at him as if he'd been having a seizure and babbling like a madman. "Look, you can cut the act now, sweetie. You don't owe me anything. I blamed you for a lot of stuff, but I don't really know why. Maybe you were the only one accessible for me to punish. Did you spare me because you think I need to feel like I owe you something, so I won't kill you? I'm not going to kill you, don't worry."

He sagged slightly as he continued, as if in regret. "I almost got your antidote done. And then you and Clyde show up and bring my progress to a grinding halt. I never DID finish it. I've got a real good start though, I just need some hard-to-find materials to get going again. I bought a dose of that antidote if you still need it, but it's back at the shop. It just seemed like once you got involved in anything I had going, it all went to shyke. I guess I've just been taking it too personally. Not very professional of me."

He shook his head a bit, then looked up, his eyes clear and direct. "So tell me, was this all a sham, the Stryfers? My old assistant? The boat arriving right then? I mean you played me beautifully. My overconfidence. I petching disarmed myself and let you pin me down. Was this all just to get me vulnerable, so you and that boatman could take me down? I mean I really learned some lessons here, I've got to thank you for that."

She continued to stare. He assumed she was simply hesitant to answer. It probably meant there was some additional stage to whatever she had planned. "Suit yourself, doll. I just don't know why you didn't kill me when you had the chance."

[Amolina]

… Parnell had delivered an amazing mix of odd reasoning, confused assumptions, reasons for not wanting to kill her anymore, general flattery and an onslaught of cute pet names. Amolina started to feel like she was at the receiving end of lots of skilled sweet-talking. She found this sudden change in attitude suspect. She didn’t trust him. What was he aiming at, was the question. Nolan Parnell had used to tell her he was the smartest man in the world and he was going to kill her in horrible ways. Now he said he had been outsmarted and he had discovered lots of reasons for not killing her…he said. Well. It actually seemed like he believed she was teamed up with the whole world against him, and carrying out an advanced and complicated plan in order to …it was unclear what he believed the purpose of this to be, but it was obvious that he had no problems imagining an immense amount of interest and resources from all sorts of enemies being focused on one single person: Nolan Parnell. This spoke volumes about how much Parnell overestimated his own importance, was her first reaction to it. But then he said it : MY old assistant. And she remembered how that slave had called out and the Ebonstryfers had walked over to her and Parnell…and how it had ended with the slave saying he had been mistaken, and the Ebonstryfe officer saying the man the soldiers had been hoping to seize was dead. She didn’t remember the name now. But it had not been Parnell. She looked at the man in the boat – only a shadow among the shadows. She couldn’t see him clearly, couldn’t see and judge the expression on his face. Amolina had no idea why he believed it had all been a trap, but he clearly did. But was he angry with her ? Oh no, certainly not ! She was his lovely sweetheart, sweetie, doll even ! He was impressed! He was grateful! And also, LOOK, he had something she might still want, the antidote to cure her namely – but not here, it was somewhere in his petching poisoned shop. But she could hear the effort and pain in his voice – it was strained and groggy, despite the teasing tone he was speaking in and the easy way words seemed to come to him. She saw his dark form move in the darkness and how he failed to get to his feel. The groggy chuckle was suspiciously similar to the sound of crying and she heard a low grunt of pain. So…it seemed like Parnell was injured, groggy and desperately trying to make a deal to buy himself out of the complicated trouble he imagined he was in. A promise to skip revenge and give her the antidote, in return for her helping him and letting him go, seemed to be the offer. Oh, how terribly cold she was and how oddly tired, and how she wanted to get indoors, shut the door and shut her eyes, for a few chimes shut it all out, the whole situation, and the memory of the boatmans gurgling scream when the dagger cut him up, his body twitching in the water before it went still…make a fire to warm her, add one more thin peaceful trail of smoke to the trails of smoke from the boathouses nearby…but there was Parnell and there was the boat, she would need to get rid of both…and there was perhaps still the Ebonstryfe too, how could she know. How had it come to this? Shyke, how she was freezing… Amolina wasn’t sure how to do now. Her thoughts felt slow. She answered cautiously, Ravok style. “Perhaps Rhysol wanted it. May His will be done.” Her voice was low, not much more than a whisper. “But an…antidote, you say? You have it after all ? Well. In case I can see reason to spare you from a fate worse than death…we can speak more, indoors…if you are able to walk?” She had found the key and finally unlocked the door to the boathouse. It opened with a low creaking sound. The platform the boathouse was built on was low and it was possible to step from the boat right into the house. Inside was only one room. There were nets and other fishing equipment neatly hanging on hooks on the walls, a simple chest, a small fireplace to keep the boathouse warm in winter. It was meant for work, no to live in, but there were a few bedrolls and blankets piled on top of the chest. There were several other boathouses nearby, with very narrow walkways between them. It was possible to turn left or right, take one of the walkways and reach the higher platforms behind. She didn’t know if Parnell would agree to enter the boathouse. Perhaps his weakness was faked and he would sneak away, or even take the boat and leave with it…then again, she wasn’t sure if he was able to move at all.

[Inoadar]

'Talk indoors, eh?' he thought guardedly. Her answer was perfect. It gave absolutely no illumination to what her agenda may be. This was not the first time Inoadar had felt that he'd erred on the side of hostility. Again, someone that had surprised him with unexpected capability was never going to trust him enough to even call a truce. He began to inhale deeply for a good sigh, but his ribs rebelled painfully against the gesture.

He had thought Amolina's delay in getting the boathouse opened was some sort of tactic. When she got it open, he tensed, thinking some other thugs were going to come grab him, but only empty darkness beckoned. 'Not completely empty', he corrected himself. A crate or chest covered with blankets or tarps or something and what looked like fishing gear against the wall by a fireplace. He half expected an icebox full of food.

He looked back down the canal to see if some crew was approaching to ambush him, but it seemed safe. He moved to rise and step from the boat, but pain nearly gagged him. He didn't want to reveal how vulnerable he was, but expected that Amolina could see it easily enough. She was in control and he was largely at her mercy. It annoyed him, but still the fact that she hadn't killed him while he was out intrigued him. Too much so to let mere caution hold him back.

This wouldn't be the first time that he placed himself in a possibly precarious position out of sheer curiosity. He hoped it wouldn't be the last. He steeled himself against the pain, reminding himself that he had been the most extremist member of Nyka's Second Edict not too long ago. What was a little pain? He pulled himself up, relegating the shooting lances of pain to a back shelf in his mind and stepped onto the landing. He wobbled a bit as he made his way to one of the bundles of blankets.

He wanted to flop down onto it, but he knew that might actually aggravate whatever injuries were torturing him right now. He leaned himself back against the wall and slid himself down slowly onto the soft stack, letting out a long slow sigh.

"Okay, maybe I didn't actually say the words...Thank you for not killing me. If you have some other horror in store for me, then I'll be taking it back. But I have to admit, you've got me completely stuck here..." He looked around, seeing nothing that suggested an ambush. "So...what now?"

[Amolina]

While Parnell stumbled in, Amolina quickly tied the boat beside other boats nearby. She would keep the boat, for now. One boat more or less – people were too caught up in their own business to notice, they wouldn’t count or care. And if against all odds somebody would notice, there was nothing that connected the boat to her. It was only an average ravonsala and its unknown former owner was gone. It wasn’t officially her boat – but she had a boat now, sort of. This done she went into the boathouse and sat on the floor between the fireplace and Parnell. She took a few of the dry pieces of wood (fuel gathered on the lakeshore long ago) and started a fire before she turned to him. He had been able to walk into the boathouse, albeit she was under the impression it had been hard for him to make it. The man lay on a pile of blankets on the floor, looking more composed than she had expected. She recalled the sound of the pole hitting his body, and how the boatman had slammed Parnells head against the boat over and over and over again. But it was hard to tell exactly which shape he was in. “What now” he was asking her, in a tone like he expected some kind of advanced torture never before heard of. What now…yes, really, what now ? Honesty wasn’t Amolina’s foremost tactic. In particular not with Nolan Parnell. She always went for trying to fool him. And she had succeeded, sometimes, albeit temporarily. She had taken that tactic over and over again. And it had, like Parnell had pointed out, always seemed to make everything go to shyke, not only for Parnell, but also for herself. And it seemed to become worse and worse for every time she did it. It had nearly gotten her killed, several times, and Parnell too. What now? She could do like she had been so tempted to do only a few chimes ago and try to take advantage of how weak and deluded he was, make a smart deal, get things her way, built on lies and temporary power. And afterwards…Parnell would likely be an even more dangerous enemy than he had been before and her days would be counted. So, what now? More of the same, like she didn’t have a brain and wasn’t able to ever learn from her mistakes? Act like she was unable to hear and understand what he was saying ? Use his own delusions against him once again, lie another time, try to fool him anew and then…No. She realized it had failed, every time. It was time to try something new. Like…being honest and direct, as Clyde Sullins had put it. An unnatural tactic for Amolina Moletta, who had grown up in a city where there was literally no solid ground under her feet, only water with unfathomable depths beneath. Trust was out of question in Ravok, most of the time. It would be a lie to say she wasn’t affected by the things that had happened this evening. Parnell HAD done his share of getting them out of harms reach. If not for him nearly getting himself killed in the fight against the boatman, she would be dead. There was no denying this disturbing truth. And as she didn’t trust him, what would it be worth to make him promise things in return for being set free? It would gain her nothing but a worthless deal that would start the whole hate and revenge thing up again. It was in a way just a choice between a sure retaliation and an unsure truce – “Mr Parnell, there’s nobody else involved in this.” she said. “I have no idea why you think so. Everything is just like it seems to be.” She told him all the details about what had happened when he had been knocked out. “You saved me, I saved you, and I would say we are even. My only plan right now is to hide, rest and wait a bit before going home. If you have any better ideas …” REGRET! Oh she was stupid, stupid, stupid ! How COULD she have said this? Now he had no reason to cooperate with her anymore. How stupid must she be to tell somebody like Nolan Parnell the truth?! He still had that cane and albeit he was injured he might still be able to attack her. She laughed a brittle little laugh of despair and self-contempt. She was the silliest woman in Ravok.

[Inoadar]

Inoadar lay, his gaze unfocused in the direction of the ceiling, as Amolina gave her account of the death of the boatman. She made it out to be nothing more than simple good luck. 'So the man had fallen on the blade...it was too convenient to be true.' To his mind, it was more likely the man had taken his leave, his intent all along to provide Amolina with the boat and building.

Inoadar waited for his mind to clear and slowly, gingerly got to his feet. Amolina's eyes followed him as he wobbled across the floor toward the boat. He saw the damage that supported her claim of the boat having struck something to cause the man to fall. 'Of course, that could have been done afterwards.' he told himself.

He considered that there HAD been blood on his blade. He ran through the opposing evidence in his mind. 'It could be his own blood, there was certainly enough of that to smear on a blade. Would they have debated whether to wipe it off though? Or would they try to present her as being unaware of the basic practice of wiping a blade clean after use.'

Her story was perfectly in line with the complete lack of conclusive evidence one way or the other. "There was no body" - it fell in the lake, "There was blood on the blade" - it could be HIS blood and there was no way to prove whether she would have thought to clean it off, "There was no one else involved" - there was no proof one way or the other, but everything had been awfully well timed to be random chance. But, by the same token, he'd seen stranger things before. Also he knew she had some connection with The Black Sun. Developments stemming from her theft of his ledger at their command proved that, as well as his suspicion of Marcus' involvement, someone he knew to be Black Sun.

And now the convenient appearance of a handy boathouse to hide in. Was she going to claim this was her building? She couldn't have known where this "random" boatman had his "random" boathouse after all. He recalled the impression that she had been searching for the key as his consciousness had returned to him a short while ago. Had she known where to look or had she simply made an educated guess? And where had she obtained this education in larceny?

He was getting dizzy with all this circular thinking. Did any of it really matter right now? The only really threatening scenario that could still develop was that she was stalling to keep him here until some interrogator could arrive. Otherwise, there seemed to be no reason for her to be telling this elaborate lie. And he was in no condition to mount an interrogation of his own to try to trip her up with some inconsistent repetition of her story. Besides, if this really WAS the incredibly well-prepared plot he'd thought, wouldn't the interrogator already have been here waiting?

He turned back to her, opening his mouth to relay all his thoughts. He stood there a moment, his mouth agape. Then he closed it, shook his head, eyes closed, sagged a bit and shrugged, the only feeling showing on his face one of exhaustion. He pulled a pair of blankets free of the stack and slowly carried them over by the fire, not far from Amolina, but not too near either.

"I guess I have no reason not to believe you...Or any reason to still have any grudge against you either. You say we're even?...I agree...we're even. I'm going to take a nap. If I wake up in chains, I'll know I was wrong." He lay on one blanket, and curled up in the other. He could feel the light doses of several poisons still affecting him. Under the blanket, he removed the dart still in the cane and folded it into his socks. It was Dark Reaving and combined with what was already in his system, it would stop his heart. If someone came for him, he would use it as a suicide pill. It was better than being tortured.

[Amolina]

Time had passed by – it was night. Amolina had fed the fire with new fuel to keep it alive, while she sat in front of it wrapped in one of the simple blankets. The trembling, mindnumbing coldness she had felt after the death of the boatman and during her lonely efforts with the boat had slowly receded. Not until now had she felt warm enough able to begin to relax, despite the tiredness. Parnell was asleep on the floor in front of the fireplace. His lean body was curled up in his blankets and his eyes were shut, the green coldness of his gaze concealed. Amolina watched his sleeping face as the dark golden firelight moved over it – it was calm and relaxed in sleep, like the man didn’t have a single trouble in his life. She had spent bells sitting there, watching the fire and her knocked out partner in escape. It’s enigmatic, she thought, how a face can look different when sleep wipes away the tension and expressions that shapes the face of the person when awake. It’s in a way similar to taking off a mask and revealing the face behind. She had seen Parnell’s face a number of times before, but she had not watched it this way, only observed it in passing by. His face had mostly showed arrogance, aggressivity, anger, hate, hostility, threat, sarcasm, contempt. She had also seen it full of drunken, blatant, raw desire, one time long ago. And this evening, before disaster had struck, his facial expressions had matched the pretended feelings of a lover, teasing endearments, tender petnames and smiles. She had actually been surprised that he had been able to act as well as he had. Now his face was peaceful, the way a sleeping face is while the soul is away in sleep and dreams. An empty canvas waiting for the painter to make it come alive with something. Normally it could actually have looked appealing, the way a sleeping face is often appealing just for being so calm and peaceful. But there was blood on Parnells face and it made him look like a cross between an attack dog sleeping off the aftermath of a particularly nasty fight and a helpless but difficult baby. She had not tried to wash the blood away. Amolina knew nothing about how Parnell had happened to poison himself by accident during the fight. The unconsciousness, the extreme tiredness and need for sleep, and the confusion and balance problems in between, made her think he had a concussion to the brain. It had seemed best to wait and let him sleep and rest without disturbing him. She would tell him when he woke up, that he had a concussion… Briefly, she fantasized about Parnell waking up in the boathouse among nets and other fishing gear, wrapped in old boat blankets. In her inner vision she could see his facial traits tense in defiant arrogance and the eyes take on a guarded look, something scornful settling over his mouth and then he would answer something insulting…or cocky…or both. Oh, well. With a shudder she recalled how the sharp spikes had shot out from him when the boatman grabbed his throat. Amolina glanced at her own hands at the memory…what if the boatman had not attacked when he did, what if the show had gone on? In that moment right before disaster had struck it had actually felt…fun. If there had been time for her to go on with her part of it, if she had put her hand on his shoulder as he turned to her and put his arm around her, smiling …would her hand have been pierced by the spikes and turned into a painfull mess of bleeding flesh ? Amolina studied the sleeping man and recalled his words about him waking up in chains. Her thoughts went on a detour…Parnell was lean, and right now he was helpless like a baby. But she had seen him in action and she knew he was also agile, speedy, strong. She realized she wouldn’t be averse to have him chained to the wall, or at least tied up so she could feel safe and dare to get some sleep too. Or else she might be woken up with a dagger pointing her way and a refreshed Parnell at the other end of the weapon. So perhaps she ought to take one of the fishing nets and…but he had said he didn’t hold a grudge to her anymore. If he said they were even, maybe it was true ? Silently she put a few blankets for herself on the free part of the floor in front of the fireplace and laid down on them. Parnell wasn’t particularly far away from her. The space left for her in front of the fire seemed to have shrunk a bit. Or maybe she only felt that way, in her imagination. But she was too sleepy to care. She fell asleep and her own face went as peaceful as Parnell’s.

[Inoadar]

'How simple it had been to kill the boy. Just don the missing father's clothes and lie face down in the path the kid was approaching. So predictable, the young fool, rushing to his father's side, falling to his knees, begging for the truth to somehow be false. The knife already in his hand. The boy rolling him over to confirm the unbearable truth.

He still wondered if the boy's last emotion, before the blade claimed him, was gladness that it wasn't his father that had just driven a dagger into his chest. He still went by the name Trandino Adarius then, but it was probably these deaths as much as the death of the Second Edict Elder that made that name hated and marked by the Nykans. The bounty never to be collected.

Maybe if he got world-weary enough, he would return and embark on a campaign of no return, a bloodbath of retribution against a town that had rejected him, a wake of remorseless carnage to make those miserable Celestials themselves quail. He would stack monks like cordwood. Eventually, he would be cornered and slain, but he would die singing. SINGING of his contempt for them all. daring each one to be the one to join him in death.

He could only hope such an end served Rhysol in some way. At the least, the priests of Dira would sing his name. TRANDINO ADARIUS! INOADAR!...NOLAN!...PARNELL! PARNELL PLEASE!...'

"Please?'...Who knew the name 'Parnell' in Nyka?...No...he was not in Nyka...or in the wilds...the light patter of water slapped wood. His dream of his escape from Nyka had returned to find itself in a boathouse in Ravok. Someone was shaking him and calling the name. Dira's Teets! He felt like he was going to vomit...But the thought of his abdominal muscles clenching like that struck with anticipatory pain. He groaned and opened his eyes to see...'Amolina?...Oh yeah, she was here too...'

He tried to breath deeply to stabilize his nausea, but his chest revolted in agony to the effort. At least the pain took his focus off of the floor of the boathouse, spinning dizzily beneath him. He had no idea what time of what day it was. 'How many wounds? How many afflictions?...'

There was his ankle, still sore but mostly healed, despite whatever Wrenmae's presence had done to it a season ago. Then a confrontation with some of Barton's thugs, an ongoing conflict he was working to "resolve". Then a second go-round with a tough bar owner, also working for Barton. Then another mauling by wolves, 'unhappy' with the aid he'd rendered to the Kelvic girl, Ariella, against them. Then a beating by slavers, this time with Ariella, in tiger form, coming to HIS aid. Now a thrashing by the boatman.

Inoadar told himself that he'd only lost the more recent fights because of his increasingly battered state. But now he was suffering from his own poison, the darts having been smashed in their holders and splattering on his arm where the glass had inflicted numerous handy cuts. 'Shyke Nuggets! had he ever felt so completely whipped?'

He thought the 'confusion' effect of the Bloodroot must be causing Amolina to look genuinely concerned. 'Surely she doesn't really care...Why should she? Oh wait, of course...She just doesn't want me to die here. Bladder draining, Bowels releasing...Ugh...Why doesn't she just roll me into the canal? Just put me out of my misery...HER misery.'

He started to chuckle, a sick, wheezing giggle with an element of mental disturbance to it. The slurred words - "My misery...your misery...is OUR misery." slipping through the choking laughter. It turned into coughing. Bloody lipped coughing that clearly caused him pain. He wretched once, but his stomach was fortunately empty. The agony was not though, and he was reduced to a cringing whimper as his eyes grew unfocused and he seemed to forget where he was again as his delirious words returned to rambling defensive babble about "HAVING to kill the mother and daughter too."

Eventually, his red, tear-streaked eyes closed and he fell back into a near-comatose sleep.