39th of Summer, 514 AV
The Pig's Foot Tavern
The Pig's Foot Tavern
There was a note that had been caught in the wind and latched onto a branch of a nearby tree. At first Lenz had scrounged around her campsite desperately trying to locate any sign of a letter.
Finally she had come to the conclusion of trying to look upwards only to meet the piece of paper with familiar calligraphic scrawl marring the page.
At first it was challenge to read, the scarlet haired woman’s eyes darting across the page and attempting to pick up any recognizable words. It took her man tries before she reached the possible wording of each individual sentence.
She read it aloud to herself before doing anything else. It read,
“There was a man who came to be in the late hours of the night the other day. He claimed allegations that were bewildering even to an individual like myself. I am not stating that I believe in these accusations, merely that because he cornered me and proved his worth with more than just vast amounts of currency he has deemed fitting to achieve what he had paid for.
He came to me with the request of the assassination of a young woman. She lingers near the Pig's Foot Tavern many nights out of every week simply barding her way into money. She is a seductress and an avid body reader, so be careful for she can lure you into her trap whether you find interest in the feminine beauty or not.
This is a task for you to finish, nothing more. There is no need for overly thought out interrogation schemes or torture inclined plots. You uncomplicatedly need to waltz into the tavern, seek out the designated target and successfully complete the mission.
Her name is Caela Dorin.
After letting her eyes drift carefully and cautiously over the page of paper, she crumpled it up into a ball and began to shred it to pieces so that it littered the forest floor and blew away in the slight breeze that wafted nearby.
She lowered her head and pivoted on her foot, ignoring the ever raising questions that bored holes in the back of her head.
It was invigorating just thinking about being assigned yet another mission. She had conquered two in the last three days and to her and plausibly everyone else that seemed like very often.
Usually people in her line of work only received assignments once every seven to eight days or so she assumed from her time spent observing and interrogating other assassins and interrogators. An idea popped into her mind- a rather naughty one.
What if her employer, this shadowed man named ‘A’ found Lenz valuable and even possibly more than just an interest for the caught eye? What if he liked her not only for her studious displays in her profession but also because she was someone one could look at and not turn around scathed.
She held back a blush like a child. What a daft thing to even ponder! She was simply doing her duty, something she had been given on a whim of shared intrigue from a man cloaked in the black.
She traipsed back into her tent only to retrieve her double bladed dagger. She would not use her axe, at least not for this mission, besides it was incredibly heavy and a challenge to conceal in such a skeptical and conspicuous town as Sunberth.
She would use it for times when it was needed but for now a tactic slipped into her mind and expanded out both ears. She would slit the woman’s throat- an easy demise for an easy target. She would follow through and make her superior proud, maybe even earning more trust and honour from him.
She might even toss in a flourish or two and start creating a signature, a name for herself other than the tedious, dry and even dreary name of Lenz. Something more ominous and mysterious would better suit her, but for now she needed to be off.
The sun was slowly dipping into the horizon; painstakingly slow was it drawing out past the lowest of clouds.
She zipped her tent’s flap back up before turning to follow the thinning of tree branches out of the wilderness. Once she had arrived in the depths of Tent City, she took a hard turn to her right and followed an elusive pathway towards the city’s middle.
Emerging from the wreckage of even the poorest of souls, she finally came across a building that was all too familiar. She had shared dark and morbid times outside these doors.
One occasion had been the impending disaster of rape. She had murdered the man out of survival instinct with both her bare hands and the dagger she now held sheathed under her shirt. The other time she had been met with the situation of killing a man, but she ended up refusing to upon considering the youth of the child and the future he might have held.
Later did she know he felled dead due to a cough that wouldn’t concede.
The images would never cease no matter how hard she shook her head.
She took one final step before her boots clunked hard on a wooden floor. She was inside the cavernous disparity of the establishment that sold drinks and sex if a fee was well exchanged.
She immediately began to scan her surroundings, taking in every face her eyes glanced over including the various objects that furnished the walls and tainted the floor.
She nearly stepped into a puddle of vomit before catching herself and hopping daintily over the vile substance. This was when her eyes locked onto someone familiar, yet completely foreign to her.
A young woman was held in the centre of the tavern, a large mass of manly bodies surrounding her. She was dancing for them, wearing semi-revealing clothing. For some reason Lenz instantaneously knew that this woman was the exact woman she had been sent out to execute.
She tentatively slid closer to the female, unfortunately having to brush past several fairly intoxicated men and women. Finally she had slithered past the bustling and hustling bodies of various drunks only to be located near the front of the crowd. Her eyes danced in sync with the female’s bouncing body.
That was until she stopped dancing.
