Solo I. Enough

[Razkar]

59th Day of Winter
The Drunken Fish
22nd Bell

"Because I'm tired of waiting for people to make good on their promises."

"In Sunberth? Gods, you must be new."

"Less than a season."

"Well, that explains it. Doesn't explain why you're here, though."

"Well, if you want to know anything in this city, seems like the best place to go is the tavern."

"Why this one?"

"Think of it as... starting from the bottom?"

The Father wasn't sure he liked the sound of that. Rheumy eyes narrowed above two cheeks like bright-red apples, as if seeing the hooded savage for the first time. Razkar, that was his name. Seemed a polite sort, for a Myrian, but who petching knew in Sunberth, right? Even the most doe-eyed street urchin probably had a blade sewn into his blanky.

"You wanna explain?"

The Myrian nodded and downed his third, gesturing for another. Few better ways to keep a tavern-keeper happy that making use of his tavern's best seller, after all. And, if he was honest, the ale wasn't that bad: he could barely taste the water in it.

"Of course. Fellow I'm looking for, seems like he left Zeltiva in something of a hurry. Probably came by boat, and I'm guessing everyone that gets off on the docks comes through here at some point-"

"If only to use the privy, right?"

"Your words, not mine."

"How long ago was this?"

"Maybe... two, three seasons."

"Awwww, c'mon, lad!" Father Manowar reared back and nearly eclipsed the lanterns lighting the tavern with his bulk. Razkar had rarely seen a man so... spherical. He hadn't even seen his feet yet, he just assumed they were there, struggling away under enough meat to cover a Tskanna. Now his ruddy, fleshy face contorted in a perfect mimicry of helplessness, gesturing to the sprawl of smelly humanity infesting his business. "Look around, will ya? This is just one night, and tomorrow, every face will be different. Now multiply that over three petching seasons, and think about how likely it is for me to remember, hmm?"

"There might have been something to set him apart."

"What, a name? You even know it was his real one?"

"He had a mark."

"A scar?"

"From a god, my friend," Razkar said, leaning a touch closer to keep their words private, black eyes glittering with intent under the shadows of his hood, "From Sagallius. The... Cordas, I think it's called."

Manowar frowned a little at the reference, dredging through his soggy memory banks for some glimmer of recognition. Razkar had little hope the man would find anything but that, unfortunately, was the game he was forced to play.

The Hound? Not a peep. His oh-so-coy mouthpiece from the Pig's Foot? Even less helpful. For the better part of a season the Myrian had relied on others, and as a result he'd stagnated, lost his focus, his edge.

He could have blamed them, but he blamed himself (well, he blamed them less, anyway). They were barbarians, the scum of a street built from their kind... and he had trusted their word. So who was worse in that case? Who was more more foolish?

So now you have to find this man yourself. Trawl through shyke-holes like this for the glimmer, the suggestion of a memory, with little to go on but a mark and a name.

Time and patience, he reminded himself as he waited patiently for the hulking, heaving, "heroically" built bartender to rub his numerous chin and come to a decision, that's what it takes. And finding the right connection...

"I... No... No, I don't think I remember," Razkar's small ember of hope died but that was ressurected as a pudgy finger stabbed the air, "Wait! There was... yeah... there was... someone, I think. Bearded fellow. Wild eyes. Talking about, ah... 'glory of... Sagallius', something... lads didn't like him and when one of 'em tried to toss 'im out, he just touched him and... nah, I could have been, ah... little more worse for the creature that night..."

Something Ignotus had said whispered through the Myrian's mind, and suddenly he was the one whizzing through the conversation from a season and a long boat ride away. Something about 'putting bodies between the two of you'.

"... he... made people do things?"

Father Manowar looked the Myrian up and down and patted his own head. Razkar just stared for a moment before covering his face with one hand and sighing.

"No, I cannot read minds. No, I cannot see into your head. Yes, I am aware of what he can do. It's his mark, it allows him to-"

"He just touched 'em," Manowar said, face twisted in the fear and hatred of magic that all his fellow Sunberthians shared, "Touched two men, twice, and they just fell. Old boy like him and he just shook his hands and poof! They were like... puppets, with the strings gone."

Cut, Razkar corrected mentally, but let it go. Yes, yes, this is more like it...

"That sounds familiar. Did you hear about what happened to him?"

"A few times, but... just a few. Someone with that power, he hides it in this city. The people here... they don't like the djed users. Flash that around too much, you'll get strung up. I did here that someone like him was... now... where... was it...?"

He extended his hand, as a gentleman would for a lady, but Razkar knew it was not his fine feature the now-smiling Manowar was looking to become acquainted with. The Myrian smiled crookedly and started rifling through his purse.

"I wondered when that would come up."

"Well, now you know."

Five gold coins were produced. Silence answered them. Ten. Yet more empty air. Twenty and Razkar's face twitched just a little... but Manowar just cleared his throat and took a sip, glittering mound of gold in his ham-like hand.

"Good information is not cheap, my lad."

"How about healers? Are they cheap?"

Ah, that got a furious little gleam from the tavern-keeper, but he didn't act on it. Manowar had heard the stories, of course, from Razkar's first day and first massacre to the one barely a few nights before.

Don't go against him, they said. Not with a weapon in his hand... and wouldn't you know it, while one hand counted coins, the other was massaging the hilt of his gladius...

"No. They're not." Manowar said tightly, and pushed his hand out further. "But then I'll be battered and bruised and you still won't know, will you?"

Fifty gold mizas, just to ram the point home, and Manowar nodded his approval, talking even as he examined each and every coin.

"You heard of the Gated Community?"

"No."

"On the north end of town. Gang called the Sun's Birth runs it. Basically a whole neighborhood, patrolled and guarded at all hours. If you have the coin and plenty of it, you can get a house there, protected by the Dragoons."

Razkar frowned and filed that word away for reference later. It had been a while since he'd re-read "The Arms of Mizahar".

"That is where he is?"

"Last I heard." Manowar tipped the glittering golden pile into his purse and was it just Razkar's imagination, or had he sobered up remarkably quickly in the last chime? "Last season, just before the Calypso arrived? He'd struck some sort of deal. Same fellow, wild beard, wild eyes, going on about anarchy-"

Anarchist, that's what Ignotus said. This must be the man.

"-and the servants, well, they talk, don't they? Say he can control you with a touch, stuff like that. Sounds very much like your man, hmm?"

"His name," Razkar rasped, eyes gone from glinting to flaming, raging and hungry as a starving wolf's. "What was his name?"

"... not sure I remember." Manowar had the stones (somewhere) to smile, but then snapped his fingers and forestalled any retaliation. "But he was from Zeltiva, I heard. He had coin to buy a house there for a year, and his name... was Farro. Arnold Barrow, I thing."

Arnold. Anar. Barrow. Du Farro. Gods, he couldn't even bare to part with his whole name.

Razkar nodded to himself and processed all this. Well, it was an improvement, if not the best news in the world. Now he knew where to find his prey... but it was like finding out that money was kept in a bank vault. All well and good, but how to get to it? He scratched under his chin piercing and turned it over for a while, sipping at his brew.

These... Dragoons, watch it. They guard it. They'll be looking for intruders... but not for each other, perhaps.

"Wait-" his arms snapped out just as Manowar started to slide off the stool, gripping or trying to grip the flabby tree trunk the man had for an arm "-these Dragoons, where can I find them?"

"On duty, of course," Manowar said, reversing the grip on his bottle behind his back, just in case... no, no, the lad was smart. He let go once he started talking again. "But there's a pub not far from the Community, ah... the Strange Fruit, I think. Lot of 'em go there."

Razkar smiled and nodded his thanks to the vast walrus of a man, getting off his stool.

"My thanks."

"Oh, no." Jingle-jingle. "Thank you."

Receipt-50gm

[Razkar]

60th Day of Winter
The Slag Heap Fire
4th Bell

He woke to hell, or something very close to it. The one he'd always been warned of when he was a boy: the place of choking smoke and brutal heat and grinning, giggling shadows that tore apart souls like another man would seduce a maiden. His whole body groaned when reality slapped him around the face, and the simple act of shaking his head made the throbbing in his skull raise to a scream.

"Ahhhh, what-"

Not another word escaped before a broad, tanned hand slapped across his mouth and his nose and before he could make anything out he couldn't breathe, he was choking-

-couldn't move, bound at his wrists and knees and ankles, a heavy ghost sitting on his chest, watching as he choked, air, air, he couldn't get any-

The hand moved.

-air, gods, how he sucked down lungfuls and shook and trembled and forgot for a tick how much the smoke stung his eyes and the heat from the inferno behind them was so close it singed his hair and made his blood boil.

All of him boil, in fact. Or freeze, at the bottom, because he was naked. He felt every lick of flame and gust of wind because... gods... not a stitch. Bound, wounded, naked, about to burn or freeze, this must be some level of Hell...

Then he looked up, and it got worse.

Cold black eyes looked down on him. More life was in the blade the figure carried: a heavy, curved dagger that he knew was called a "kukri". Flames danced in the reflection it cast, but none of it seemed to touch the shadowed face... nor the eyes that the man could see his own face in.

Young. Beardless. Scarred around the right eye by some cunt of a whore who didn't want to discount for the Dragoons. Well, she got hers, regardless. But it was Edward that ended up mangled... though it did add a certain something to-

The kukri raised high, but slowly, then paused. The figure wanted him to see.

Edward looked up and licked his lips, finding his voice after a few ticks.

"L-Look, I don't k-know who you think you are, b-but I'm a Dragoon, you hear me? From the Sun's Birth? L-Look, you let me go, I'll forget this, but my friends are looking for me-"

The blade twirled in experienced hands. Now it was held in reverse; ready and waiting for The Plunge...

"A-Are you f-fucking mad?! Let me go, you have no fucking-"

A hand made of callused steel gripped his jaw and held him steady, choking off his words like it did the air a chime before, then the kukri fell like an angel from heaven, down, down, and time slowed just to prolong his agony-

-as it missed his head-

He screamed.

-almost.

Razkar looked down with that same stony expression, watching the kid's eyes bug out his head in sheer agonized disbelief. The thick blade of the kukri didn't just impale his ear to the ground; it nearly cut it in two. Only a thin tendril of cartlidge was keeping it-

He twisted the blade, and what was left flopped off into the mud.

-ah, well, scratch that.

Edward screamed anew, tears soaking his voice as his face fell into itself and Razkar's hand was at his lips again... so when the human opened his eyes, he could see as well as feel the Myrian gently stroke his face from forehead to chin... with the bloody tip of his blade.

"Let us start from the beginning..."

The Strange Fruit Tavern
Nearly A Bell Earlier

"Go gently, Molly Darling,
Kiss me 'fore you go!
And know time's grace,
Shall ne'er erase,
The aching I feel so!

O'er wild hills and through mountains,
My heart will guide my feet,
'til by the gods and through the odds,
Our lips will surely m-e-e-t!"

"Gods, I wish they wouldn't fuckin' sing that when they're sloshed."

Bernard winced and grimaced until he couldn't take it anymore and turned his head to one side, stopping up the side facing the knot of bawdy Dragoons with his rag. He didn't even know what was making it so soggy, he was just glad it cut off half his hearing. Every night they came in, hogged the same tables, stiffed him for tabs and sung the same bawdy song, but could Bernard complain?

Could he bollocks. These were Sun's Birth Dragoons, the most feared collective of killers and warriors in the city, and most importantly, the best trained, best organized and best armed. Every other gang was a bunch of peasants with pitchforks in comparison. Bernard had complained before to Old Jardeg before, but the grizzled bastard had just laughed (or grunted, more accurately) his worries away.

"What's one tavern against keeping my lads happy?" He'd said, hand on his sword and surrounded by armored cronies. "You sayin' you're worth more than them, hmm?"

Bernard had not, and since then, he'd sucked it up, to use the vernacular. Besides, not all bad news. The Strange Fruit was big enough to host a hundred or so revelers, and the Dragoons made up only a fraction of that. The other taverns on the block could handle the rest; he had his portion of trouble, and they were outnumbered ten-to-one by respectful and paying customers.

For Sunberth, anyway.

"Another ale?"

"Please."

Like the one who'd been giving him the shivers all night. Hooded and cloaked in something that smelled like tanned hair (and had the same consistency in some patches), the stranger had sat at the bar for bells, just drinking, watching... but watching what? Bernard didn't answer.

The stranger had slapped five gold coins onto the bar, told him he wanted "ale and privacy to enjoy it". Bernard had translated that as "let me get drunk and don't bug me", and that he could do.

"Alright... timea' drain the snake, lads!" One of them tottered to his feet, taking several attempts, black-and-green tunic stained with grog and pub food over his resplendent chain mail. A grin that reeked of booze and youthful confidence oozed around the table and he tossed a mock salute. "Goin' privy, back soon, oi, tender?! 'nother pitcher, nah, make... make it two!"

The table roared its approval, frothing mugs raised high, drunken killers playing at being soldiers reveling in the fear of strangers. Bernard shook his head after he turned from them, careful to keep an obsequious smile grinning their way at all times.

"No bloody respect for their elders, that's what the problem is," he said aloud, thinking The Stranger would still be in earshot, and didn't seem the type to care much for the Dragoons. "Not like the old days, am I right? Mister? Hey, are you-"

An empty bar stool greeted him. He looked into the tankard... and found the booze still gently sloshing from where The Stranger had put it down.

"-there...?"

Edward, to use another vernacular, well out of it. Drunk on more than just alcohol and the Red Weed Stefan had got hold off, he was intoxicated off his very self. What did he have to care for, after all? Barely even twenty-three and he had a solid position with the Dragoons, his looks, his purse, his comrades... and the fear of all who laid eyes on him.

He'd grown up in filth, and now he gleamed when he walked. By the start of his shift tomorrow, his armor would almost glow, as if he were Syna striding the world. He fought well for Master Joander, and he didn't ask questions as to which neck he cut. Wasn't that worth living well and loud with the lads when night fell?

"Bloody... Bloody right it does..." He muttered to himself in the closet-like outside privy, trying and failing to get his stream in the bowl. Yet another thing he didn't need to worry about. "Good labor... good wage... foundu... funadash... start of good... relat... serivice. Yeah..."

He was so sozzled he barely heard the door open... but he did feel the wind chill his back, and see the light fill the tiny toilet-

-before it was eclipsed again, and his eyes widened as the shadow lunged-

-and an arm like a vice wrapped around his neck, his throat in the hollow of the elbow-

-and Razkar gripped his left shoulder with his right and pulled back, right arm forming a thick, rude garrote immediately pressing into the drunken Edward's throat, choking off his wild yelp of surprise and pain, left hand pressed against the back of the Dragoon's head and pushing forward, stopping him from a retaliatory headbutt-

-both of them toppling back as the Dragoon's questionable equilibrium finally failed him, clanking and clattering onto the straw-covered cobbles. Edward struggled, kicked, tried to swing his elbows back but the booze fogging his mind put flight to all his training. Every gasp and he lost air, but couldn't regain it. The world swam and the implacable, grunting figure behind him... its voice slithered into his mind like poison.

"Should've come out with a partner," it said, snarling and sneer even as the blackness began to envelop the feebly-struggling Dragoon, "Much safer, in city like this..."

Edward's world, or the world he knew and that mattered to him, vanished from his senses. The cobbles, the cold wind, the choking arm, the voice, the grind of his armor against his skin... all of it was swallowed up by an icy void that spread from his mind and froze all of him.

The Myrian moved fast. He checked that spot on the man's neck... and found it pulsing every few ticks under his finger. Good: he was useless dead, after all. Then he gritted his teeth and lashed his hands and legs with rope he'd scavenged from the garbage of Sunset Quarters.

"I was hoping it'd be you," he said to the unconscious man a little breathlessly as he fixed a gag into his mouth, "You're about my size. Much... better-"

He grunted and heaved the boy onto his shoulder, thanking Blessed Myri once again for giving him both strength beyond humans and endurance beyond most others, too. The armor surely added some weight to him but he could handle it. He wouldn't be going too far.

"-to be this way. Worth waiting for, most definitely."

Razkar poked his head out from the alley behind the Strange Fruit and saw nothing but rustling leaves and faintly-falling snow. Another advantage: the weather would keep the streets somewhat clearer than usual.

The Myrian started walking west.

Receipt-5gm

[Razkar]

Two Bells Later

Do you want to hear the juicy details? People usually do. Oh, they act disgusted and shake their heads and their skin crawls and trembles... but they want to know. They're happy with blood as long as it isn't their own; they love a clever man, even if cleverness is turned towards pain.

So much pain. Pain enough to break confidence and loyalty and courage and honor. Many a brave and noble man would say such things (especially the last two) cannot be broken, or at least theirs couldn't.

They're wrong. Everything can break. All it takes is time and application. Edward certainly did.

Once Razkar had wiped his brow for the tenth time and held up everything he'd cut off the young Dragoon, oh, he'd talked. Razkar couldn't shut him up.

Once it was clear the tanned skin covering his taut torso would never grow back right, not with the strips the Shorn Skull had peeled off. Once the agony in his hands subsided to a dull pain, and he realized he couldn't feel his fingers. Razkar showed him why.

He showed him the round, bloody ball that followed the white agony that tore into his soul and set him screaming into the uncaring night. One of a pair, actually, and the Myrian told him if he didn't talk, he'd eat the other one.

Edward talked. He broke. Razkar was glad: this was never his forte.

"Tell me about the Gated Community. How many guards, day and night? When do the gates close? How often are the patrols? Is there a guardhouse or barracks? Are there other businesses there? Tell me, tell me all, boy, or this goes on an on..."

That was the key, Razkar had told himself. To make them believe it could stop and they still might survive with enough of their parts to still be considered a man. That there was no help, no rescue, no redemption. Death would not relieve him and life... life was to be granted, by the new god in Edward's tortured new world.

It took bells, but it worked.

Now he knew, and in his knowing, his path became clearer... if not easier. The Gated Community was a fortress, to hear Edward tell it. The Dragoons filled it during the day and night, and come the darkness, the gates were all shut and no-one entered or left. There were other businesses there, too - a loan agency, a brothel, a barracks and a jewelers - but at night, all but the barracks were closed. And Tarak... he said something about "The Tarak". An Akalak, once Razkar waded through his babbling. Well over six foot tall, unbeatable in barehanded combat, with eyes that pierced the thickest darkness as a normal man's would the day. He watched, watched everything, eager for a change to blood his hands.

Razkar noted that. He noted all of it. But nothing more than his first question, the question...

"Where is the Sagallite? The one marked with Cordas? Arnold Barrow? Which is his house, and is he alone?"

Well, fine, that was two questions, but they were both pertinent. After gasping for breath a few times and having Razkar prick the edge of his remaining eye with his kukri, Edward vomited the words.

"F-Fifteen... Fifteen! Num... Number Fifteen! He... He does... doesn't leave... guards... body... bodyguards... two... two of 'em... maid... I think."

"Good." Razkar said gently, and he meant it. "One more thing, my friend, and then this is over."

"Wh... Whaa...?"

"When are they taking out the garbage from behind the stores?"

Edward hadn't been expecting that: well, would you have been? But Razkar had been turning over an idea since Edward had told him about the businesses dotting the Community. Getting in wasn't a problem; staying in was. The Dragoons cleared the civilians from the streets at night and no more came in. Well, the uniform he'd stolen would help, true, but getting in with dozens of other Dragoons when the shifts changed from day to night?

What would I say? That I'm a new recruit? No, it won't work. Officers would question me for answers I could not produce. I need to be inside already when I don my false clothes and make my move.

"Edward? I'm losing patience. Do you want to keep that ey-"

"F-Four m-m-more d-d-d-kff!" He broke up into a coughing fit beneath the sighing Myrian, who was frankly tired of sitting astride a bloody man's stomach. "Four... d... days!"

"My thanks." Razkar said, then raised his kukri, holding the mutilated Dragoon by the hair, jerking it back and exposing his throat. "Go to your gods, and be free from pain."

"Wh-"

Whatever Edward had to say, Lhex had decided it was to remain a mystery. His plea or curse or final defiance devolved into a long, gurgling, choking, drowned gasp when Razkar slashed downward with a blade designed for such a blow-

-digging so deep that blood spurted, veins and airways were severed at a stroke and he even felt the solid nick as it struck one of his vertebrae.

Blood gushed up, a fountain that bathed him for a moment like a fresh torrent of flame, soaking his chest until his ink and scars were just suggestion beneath and dripping riot of red. Razkar opened his eyes... and saw Edward's were likewise, but they would never see again.

He looked up at the sky, bathed in his dirty victory. He knew. He had a plan. It would not be easy, but... it was there. It would happen. From Zeltiva, across the ocean, to the chaos of Sunberth... Anar DuFarro had run far. But it didn't matter. Dira had found him.

Razkar smiled up at the smoke that belched upward all around him. At the largest fire, ever-burning, he heard laughter and carousing faintly over the crackle and roar. No-one bothered him, though. A half-naked Myrian carving up a naked man? Would you interfere?

Another slice and he had a fresh scalp. Dirty his victory may have been, it was still just that, and accomplished with skill and cunning and determination. Myri would be pleased with it, of that he had no doubt.

And it brings me closer to my true target.

He wiped off his blade and then spent a good few chimes wiping the rest from his chest and hands. Snow, leaves, clumps of muddy water... he didn't care. He didn't want to return to Edreina stinking of smoke and misery. Once he was clean (or clean enough), he turned back to the stiffening corpse and laboriously leaned down, gripping him under his back and his knees.

Holding him like a man about to carry his bride over the threshold... but threw him into the middle of the flames, instead. The smaller slag heap "whumped!" as the body crashed into it, flames distorting for a moment... then munching into the fresh feed as eagerly as it would anything else. Razkar watched the mangled example of a man blacken, his skin start to fry... the stink... familiar and disgusting all at once...

The stench of memories to a Child of Myri. Enemies slain, roasted, devoured.

One of them picked up the bag containing his new uniform, since Edward would no longer need it, and began his long walk back to the Sunset Quarters.

To Be Continued...

[Vanari]

Razkar

Intelligence	+3 XP
Interrogation	+2 XP
Butchery	+2 XP
Drinking	+2 XP
Torture	+2 XP
Unarmed Combat	+1 XP
Investigation	+2 XP
Intimidation	+1 XP
Planning	+1 XP
Weapon: Kukri	+1 XP

Lores :

• Father Manowar: Spherical Informant
• Losing One's Edge in Depending on Others
• Gated Community: Run by Sun's Birth
• Target: Wild Eyed Anarchist
• Lead: Working with Sun's Birth Dragoons
• Target: Going by the Name Arnold Barrow
• Lead: Strange Fruit
• Carving the Truth from Edward
• The Gated Community: A Fortress
• Arnold: 15, 2 guards, 4 more days
• Roasting Edward for Myri

Loot :

-55 GM
+1 lovely Edward scalp

Notes :

Always a bloody delight

Please don't hesitate to PM me with questions, comments, or concerns! Also, remember to edit your grade request as "graded."

Cheers