Post by Sire Halfblack on Aug 4, 2014 19:37:21 GMT
Martius IM 1003
Beyond Cheapside the city had become quiet. The citizens scuttled about their business with little said between them and even the crime ridden alleyways and rooftops seemed to take upon themselves a sense of caution. The city was waiting. It had started in the Braided Fox, a place where most of the cities news emerged when not directly from source, and already the people were hearing the sort of news that some welcomed, some dreaded and some, the majority, just feared in case of an unwanted backwash from the guilty. For the Don had returned.
Already, the outside of the previously deteriorating Poison Club looked as it had been attended to. The stone was not looking as chipped as it had been, the painted gang slogans had gone and tiles thought to be missing had apparently grown back into place. It was still not what it had been a year ago but it was enough for the rumours to be given some solidity. Some had thought that Argoth had died or ascended, descended rather, to some terrifying hell to take his place at the right hand of a murderous god. It was therefore worrying that people began to think he had returned.
Nothing changed in Cheapside though. Seemingly in answer to the cities miasma the western quarter boasted several new, rather grubby it was true, new watering holes for adventures and mercenaries in general. Stalls began to appear and for the last three weeks the newly established, by unspoken consent, Wither Lane Market had grown on the second and fourth day of each week. Goods both easily taken and the kind of thing found by mercenaries appeared on hastily made stalls. Used weapons, willing friends-for-an-hour, warm clothing and simple food jostled for space amongst the curio sellers, guaranteed-genuine map purveyors and magical delight vendors. Cheapside actually seemed to thrive from the nervousness of the rest of the city and if the odd mercenary grew too drunk or just too adventuresome then he was dealt with rather sharply by the solemnly unified locals with their cudgels, rusty knives and darkened nets.
But the market was becoming a fashionable place to go and the stalls were spilling out of Wither Lane, into Courtly Alley and even to the edges of the always changing main road of Grot. Money seemed to be in the air. Several businesses were given a lick of paint, good new stock and willing shopkeepers. Old businesses such as Shiv’s, Muckley’s Dough and the Long Gusset had obviously enjoyed recent investment. Even new places opened up, the Wheelwrights Guild were outraged when an old stabling yard was opened as Carter’s Carts. The latter even going so far, it seemed, as to sell all the required parts for such goods individually!
All this meant an upsurge in taxation for the city and out-of-town guilded craftsmen were making a fortune working on the premises, cellars and roofs of each of these enterprises. The city saw all this with concern for despite their reputation as being a ‘shifty city’, the Deci citizens were inherently fairly conservative. Crime was crime and drow were drow, gangs were gangs and life was cheap. But it had all settled into limits and show for the most part since, despite the cities reputation, burglary and street robbery of the normal peons was quite low since, after all, most had dabbled in the business themselves in their youth. In Deci the people were walking softly, but carrying a big knife.
“Quite!” Hissed The Loathing. The youth had been so bold scant hours before but now that he had been lured atop the Governor’s Citadel what he had thought to be a ‘bit of excitement’ had turned terribly wrong. The Nobility had, after a recent killing, become extremely hard to get near since they had brought out the guards and the spies that had previously served them so well. The Loathing had been thankful to the darkness that the young man had been delivered to him in such a way therefore and this he took to mean that his desire was blessed indeed.
Vilayn Grelmarkin was the youngest son of Lord Grelmarkin. The House was hardly an influential one being as it was vassaled to House Duff but the young man was, nonetheless, of the Blood. He had defied his father’s concerns and come out for a night on the town and had even openly boasted that he would like to see the ruffian who could best him. The youth had been watched by a retainer of his House but that man had peeled away from shadowing Vilayn when it seemed that he had picked up a sleeper for the evening. That woman was already dead and now The Loathing was eager to complete the work that had already taken him the best part of a month.
The Rite of the Shadowed City was not a complex one and it had been revealed to him after three days fast and prayer. For weeks after that Loathing had staked out and killed a variety of people about the city but this last one, a Noble of the Blood had been harder to acquire.
“Please let me go!”
“Hush now, darkness comes…” Loathing whispered back. The youth was tied to the stump of a statue whose identity had been lost when all above the knees had been broken free in some distant year.
“I can get money!”
“So can I.”
“Favour, I can acquire influence for you!”
The Loathing shook his head. “No. That simply won’t do.” The man might have screamed when Loathing began but his tongue was the first to go to the creature in the stiff, butcher’s apron and the twisted, haunted face…
*
Troy chewed his lower lip as he picked his way along the line of stakes. He had made a complete circuit of the village now and had found nothing that resembled a break in the carefully aligned fence and so, more than a little nervous as to what might happen, he crept through the pair that at least gave him most cover from where the excavations were taking place. He felt a slight tingling sensation as he crossed the line, but otherwise suffered no other harm and Troy scuttled forward with more speed now that he was clear of the line. Making the cover of the nearest hut he wetted his knives from the small bottle of venom that he held in the other hand and listened.
At first Troy could hear nothing and he strained further only to catch low whispers and the odd sound of shuffling feet. What he did not hear were the sounds he should have been expecting, those of continued digging.
“Spread out!” A sharp voice carried across the village. “We have an intruder here...!” Troy swore as he realised that the stakes were not meant to cause harm to a transgressor but rather were some sort of elaborate sentry line and now the weaver of that miracle knew that someone had entered the habitation!
Ducking his head about the edge of the hut he saw several of the warriors spreading out into a curved line that would have his hut in its centre any minute. Not wanting to engage in a stand up fight, he moved as quickly as his stealth would allow him back the way he had come and there he lay in the hollow of the thickly thorned bush. The warriors came about the edge of the hut, weapons drawn and two appeared on the top of the dwellings roof. He thanked the gods that he had not sought to hide there.
Now though the larger of the warriors joined his men and began to direct them in an outward fan that would lead to the picket line of stakes! Troy swore again under his breath and began to scuttle sideways, intent on not broaching the ward again if he could help it. As he did so he couldn’t help but admire the way the warriors were searching the area as they advanced. They even stamped down on low rises on the ground in case their prey was concealed by some spell or ability upon the ground! It was their caution though that gave him the time he needed, barely, to duck through the cordon and make it to the next hut in line just as the warriors reached the stakes and hacked down the bushes that lay there – one of which had been Troy’s transient cover so recently.
“Not here!” The gruff looking warrior shouted to his leader and the bigger man cupped his hands to pass the findings back into the village. From the direction of the ruined tower the same voic as had started the hunt shouted back.
“He has not left keep searching Woegrem!” The big warrior muttered something in response but Troy was too far away to hear what he said and in any case he was moving away as the conversation took place, hoping the slight pause would let him slip free. Cutting his way through the wattle and daub of the wall of the next hut, he slipped within and helped himself to a set of discarded clothing he found there. The smock, hood and britches were rank with sweat and age but Troy slipped them on nonetheless. Then he ducked once more out of the hut before the search caught up with him. The rent in the wall he had to cover with a few handfuls of mud for he had not the time for a better job.
Knowing his disguise would not hold if observed too closely, for in a village of this size everyone knew everyone else, he used it only to walk to the village’s further side, glancing into the pit as he did so. At the base of the hole stood a thin man dressed in the tribal manner. His head was shaved and Troy knew this meant the man was a shaman of some power, clustered about him were several more of the burly warriors and these faced outwards, weapons drawn and shields held high. The villagers stood about, uncertain what to do and as Troy moved to their very fringes he saw that at the bottom of the pit, only slightly uncovered, was what he thought to be some sort of broken statue. But then he was out of sight of it and detail eluded him.
His knives were hidden beneath the smock but Troy did not fool himself that he could get close enough to the shaman to be sure of a kill. Even if he threw his knives the warriors might catch them on the broad shields they hefted and then… he would be weapon less. Troy had also been well trained to remember that a hit was only successful if the attacker got away. A death for a death was rarely a good exchange. As the outward warriors continued their skilled search, the two villagers nearest to Troy seemed to see him for the first time, their eyes confused as to who he was. One drew breath, though whether to whisper to Troy or call alarm it was impossible to say.
*
The Seething chuckled. It had endured a great deal in the city and knew death intimately from both sides of life’s barrier. He had learnt to move along that wall like a shadow cast against the light and in the settlement of Deci knew a sanctuary from the prying eyes of others that his exertions of previous weeks had shrouded him within.
He had learnt to move amongst the great powers of the city and already he had come to their attention. He was not such a fool to think he could rail against the touch of those who held the city in their fist and so had taken it upon himself to be their hound, to seek where he was sent and to spread his taint where it was given to be so delivered. He had gained reward for this and that he had lapped up like a babe would whelp to its suckling mother. For if the city lived it would be a woman, a great, saggy breasted sleeper to whom her thin-minded brats would always be forgiven and their trespasses ignored. It was also a city that sat well with the Seething. For here his deity was strong, here his god could be seen on every street corner and felt in every cross word and ill thought of the populace.
And this had been the gift to the Seething. In the empty and sodden loft he had taken for himself, he stared out at the frosted rooftops that stretched like so many broken roads all across his mother’s bloated body. The Seething turned what he had found over in his mind and chuckled to himself even as he picked up the stray cat that had taken to following him about of late. It was a mangy, one-eyed thing that stank of dung and decay.
The Seething had learnt a little of rituals. That which shielded him had been of the city and so easily performed. What he planned now was patently more difficult. Rituals were difficult – the preserve for the most part of wizards, priests and the Nobles of the Blood. But the Seething had some power and this enabled him to use what others had researched even if the ability to develop something from base knowledge eluded his twisted mind.
His master had directed him to where the scroll might be found and for more than a day he had struggled with the hidden message. He was not a natural ritualist but he thought that this he could work. The Rite of the Blighted Son was a ritual devised long ago by some evil-minded soul who had sought revenge on another and thus suited the Seething very well.
“You see,” he told kitty, “it works like this. It is a blight that strikes down those of simple vitae. A creeping thing it twists their innards so that they piss fouled milk and weep ashes. It can be performed upon a soul and then left to come into effect anytime up to a month later but it is not easy wretched kitty. Oh no!” He paused then and playfully held the cat by the scruff of its neck and idly tugged out one of its whiskers before whispering in its ragged ear the details of such power…
By Alan Morgan (CI5V4)