An Unfamiliar Road - Sorrel Darkfire - 27/05/21
May 28, 2021 22:05:35 GMT
Queen Merla, the Sun-Blessed, Jaezred Vandree, and 5 more like this
Post by stephena on May 28, 2021 22:05:35 GMT
Chapter one - An Unfamiliar Road
With the salt and sand still in her hair, Sorrel headed for the first inn she could see - the Cavernous Seashank. She paused outside for a second, pretending to check the straps on her backpack and eyed the place up and down. A few customers stumbled past, some on the way in, some on the way out. It didn’t seem to matter which way they were headed, they all looked the worse for wear. The longer she stood there, the more at home she felt. Inns and docks had been her schooling, her business and her pleasure. She knew this place like she’d been born here. So she loosened her rapier, pulled the hilts of her shortswords into view and hauled her hood a little forward just enough for the shadow to reach the tip of her nose. Then she stepped inside.
For 9am the place was busy even by her standards. The rumble of voices, the stink of stale booze, the clouds of smoke and strange tang of unfamiliar cooking - a new spice perhaps, or just some very old fish. The breakfast of champions. She caught the barman’s eye, nodded casually and hurled a few coppers down. He poured something into a tankard. It didn’t try to clamber out once he’d finished pouring, which was promising. She took a swallow and nodded.
“You want a room or a job?” the barman rumbled. She glanced at him as quickly and carefully as possible. The carotid artery undefended, but the nose already broken. Two hits would do it, if she was fast. Wrapping her fist around the tankard handle she mulled it over as casually as possible then shrugged. “Both.”
“Rooms are one silver, I think,” the barman turned to a willowy man leaning up against the bar. “One silver?”
The man belched. “Two copper Jed. C’mon.”
Jed glared. “Two for the room and that…” he tried to find the right word as he pointed across the room to an unusually busy table in a room dedicated largely to solo drinkers. “...merchant… is hiring. If you know how to handle yourself.”
She met his gaze coolly. There was a moment’s struggle then he looked away. She slapped four copper down. “I’ll hold a room for two night. Sorrel Darkfire.” He nodded, pocketed the cash and started scraping what appeared to be tiny barnacles from the lip of a mug.
Sorrel walked slowly across the crowded bar, her eyes playing across the sea of faces, noting with quiet satisfaction how many checked her once then found something else to focus on. She reached the merchant’s table and found as curious a collection of oddballs as she’d seen lined up in any of the village fete costume parades she’d sat through when she was hunting Akash - a wizard of some sort, drunk on a little arcane power but still fooling around with the trinkets of his art; a bard with instruments clanking from his belt like a tinker’s son on his way to an audition and a lithe figure in a cowl just begging for a tonsure all gathered around a flamboyantly clad and unnecessarily moustached wannabe wide boy.
She sat down, keeping both this gang of freaks and the door in view and almost reflexively went through the target points. Wizard, close in, slash the wrist tendons then a blade up through the throat. Bard, go low, they always worry about their balls. Monk… she considered him, intrigued. She’d never fought one before. She wondered idly for a few seconds then realised they were staring at her.
“I hear you’re hiring,” she nodded at the wannabe. None of the others looked like they had the money to buy a new set of clothes let alone put a team together.
“My name is Anatoli, Anatoli Ricolash…” he waited for some sign of recognition then, with nothing forthcoming, ploughed on a little mournfully. “I have a wagon. No, two wagons. I have a caravan…” he’d hit on the right word and beamed. “I am importing cargo to Daring Sights.”
“Heights,” the wizard corrected him.
“Heights, yes, Daring Heights,” Ricolash nodded eagerly. “I have these men…” he indicated the motley bunch with some pride. “I think maybe two more?”
Sorrel nodded. As his words hung in the air, the door crashed open and an enormous blue skinned creature stomped in, twigs and branches hanging from the misshapen plates of second hand armour welded uncomfortably together like lumps of steel having a fight.
The room went quiet. When something that large walks in, even a dockside pub clientele knows to study the bottom of its tankards with great care. The creature grabbed a drink and crashed onto a bench next to the group, gazing off into space as if he’d failed to notice them.
Playing hard to get, thought Sorrel. Worth a try. After a long pause, she realised, no, he actually hadn’t noticed them.
“My friend, are you looking for work?” Anatoli leaned over and shouted up into the creature’s mud packed ear. As the blue head turned curiously, Sorrel suddenly realised - a firbolg. This must be a firbolg. She marvelled at his size and surprising grace as he leaned down towards the merchant.
“My name is Doro,” the firbolg said softly. Sorrel could see a holy symbol of some kind hanging from his neck. “I don’t fight, but I can heal.”
“Great! I need an escort to Charing Heights and I can pay 15 gold,” Anatoli was still yelling.
“Daring,” the wizard sighed.
“Yes, Simon, I’m so sorry, Daring Heights,” Anatoli blushed.
“Only 15 gold?” the bard spoke up.
“That’s all I can afford Breeze,” the merchant seemed nervous.
The bard… Breeze, she assumed… started talking. She zoned out. Bards and their silver tongues. She recognised the smooth rhythms. Some words drifted into her mind “great danger” “so talented” and then the monk jumped in, evidently taking issue with Breeze’s opinion of his skills. The holy warrior, who’s name sounded something like Viereari, seemed ready to challenge Breeze there and then.
“Is this typical of adventurers?” Anatoli turned towards her.
“Typical of boys,” she shrugged. “Shut their mouths with money if I were you.”
Anatoli seemed to wither, die and remerge like a half-assed phoenix with self esteem issues.
“I can pay 15 gold and if we get attacked I will pay a bonus five gold?”
This seemed fair and she couldn’t stand listening to Breeze list his skills all over again so she spat on her hand and reached across. “Deal.”
The merchant looked in horror at her rough skin, streaked with salt and rope burns and now shining with a light sheen of spittle. She met his eyes. He blushed again, spat on his own hand and they shook. The others simply muttered their assent and Anatoli excused himself, heading for the bathroom. Sorrel looked down at her scruffy travel clothes and filthy skin then sighed and headed off herself for a swift swill in the sink.
The bathroom had a cracked mirror and she stared at her reflection for the first time in months. She barely recognised herself. The wind and the salt air had scoured her cheeks raw and her mop of hair was too matted to attempt a dousing. This was excavating rather than washing. She did her best then rejoined the group as they headed back towards the docks, Sorrel’s hood up to avoid bumping into her former shipmates.
When they arrived at the grimy portside loading bay, the two wagons were waiting - along with an old gnome and a fat, contented feline. The five adventurers stared at the animal - which stared right back as if ready to square up.
“Is for good luck,” Anatoli said, apologetically. “My baba won’t travel without him.”
The gnome, presumably baba, took offence at Simon the wizard’s sly comments about the fluffy monstrosity and whacked his shins with a thick staff. As the sage and old gnome bickered, the wagons creaked forward and the party took up positions, Sorrel riding on the rear wagon atop a pile of crates. People stared up at her and she met every gaze until they turned away. If there was one thing the Master of the House had taught her it was to claim a reputation early. There was no such phrase as “too dangerous’ if you were new in town.
As her mind drifted back to the House and to Sana, and the old feelings started to rise, she heard a shout. She jumped, and turned towards the sound, just in time to see the fat cats basket hit the cobblestones and the furry blob squawk like a throttled parrot before rocketing off into the crowd as Anatoli screamed “stop him, stop him, we cannot travel without him!”
Sorrel sprang into action - as did the rest of the adventurers, almost cannoning off each other in their eagerness to prove their worth. For a few moments there was a cacophony of eldritch crackling zinging through the souls of passersby as spells fizzed back and forth, painting bright glowing fish in the motes of air, conjuring up severed hands that grasped at the beast and, for Sorrel, plucking a mental targeting sight out of the ether and zooming in on the cats tail. For a moment she briefly considered downing in with a well placed arrow but regretfully assumed this would cut her take from this particular circus’s earnings potential.
Finally, the five of them managed to corner and catch the reluctant pet, dragging it back to its master as its claws dug channels in the grime of the street. Between them, they fought the beast back into its basket and slammed the lid back on. They stood there, panting, eyeing each other up cautiously.
“Worth a tip, surely?” said Breeze hopefully to Anatoli.
The silence was deafening.
And so they clattered on, out of the town gates and down a well kept dirt road that wound its way through dense woodland, past the odd carefully prepared halt with fires left by passing rangers for travellers to rest and cook food. She noted how dry the branches were - less smoke, which suggested skilled woodcraft.
Eventually they hauled in at one of the resting points and the men all gathered round the fire, heating up a bland stew and arguing over their martial prowess. Sorrel grabbed a bowl and clambered back up onto the pile of crates, watching as the wizard practiced turning the flames of the fire blue and let blue embers soar up into the noon sky before fluttering back down onto the leaves as they walked towards her.
Wait, what? She looked again. Yep, the trees were walking. Before she could shout a warning, two walking trees rustled out of the thick woods and strode towards them. The rest of the party ran from the fire towards the beast. “Blights,” screamed Doro. “They are pure evil, burn them, cut them down, have no mercy on these abominations!”
She hauled her bow from her back, notched an arrow and let it fly at the nearest blight and as the bolt buried its shaft deep into the pulsing trunk of the beast she marked it as her chosen enemy with a quiet prayer to Selune.
From the corner of her eye she could see Simon snatching blazing bottles of oil from straps beneath his robes and sending the hurtling towards the second blight as the monk set about the creature with blade and fists.
The blight she’d marked suddenly loosed a flight of sharp needles at her. She coiled and ducked and they sang past her ears so that she felt the rush of air all around her. The beast loomed towards her, towering over her head as it prepared to strike again.
Then Doro gave a harsh shout - ‘flee abomination’ - and she felt deep, ancient power pour from him. The blight shuddered, uncertain, just as its comrade was torn to pieces on the other side of the clearing. She could feel it’s terror just as the bard flung words towards them both - filling her, she felt, with a new resolve just as they tore into the dark mind of the stumbling creature. It turned and fled.
Surrounded by the bardic glow, she dropped her bow, reached for the two shortswords strapped to her back and drew them with a hiss and twang of steel. She somersaulted from the wagon and gave chase, cutting and slashing its retreating form as the monk shot past her at an unearthly speed, aiming to cut the blight off before it could make its getaway. But just as they readied for the killing blow, the blight seemed to melt into the foliage, indiscernible, untraceable, invisible… and gone.
Remembering her task, she returned to the wagons where a sobbing Anatoli was passing out handfuls of gold.
“But for you my wagons would be gone and we would be dead,” he wept. “I owe you my life.”
The five shuffled awkwardly back to their positions and rode the rest of the way in silence, uncomfortable with gratitude and raw emotion, relieved when the walls of the city rose from the earth before them.
As the wagons clattered to a halt, Sorrel slipped from her crate and vanished into the crowd, her money safe and her heart intact. Connections were more dangerous than monsters and love was the closest to death she’d ever been.
She hauled into a gloomy alley and took stock. Less than 24 hours ashore, 20 gold richer and… well… 20 gold richer. A start.
With the salt and sand still in her hair, Sorrel headed for the first inn she could see - the Cavernous Seashank. She paused outside for a second, pretending to check the straps on her backpack and eyed the place up and down. A few customers stumbled past, some on the way in, some on the way out. It didn’t seem to matter which way they were headed, they all looked the worse for wear. The longer she stood there, the more at home she felt. Inns and docks had been her schooling, her business and her pleasure. She knew this place like she’d been born here. So she loosened her rapier, pulled the hilts of her shortswords into view and hauled her hood a little forward just enough for the shadow to reach the tip of her nose. Then she stepped inside.
For 9am the place was busy even by her standards. The rumble of voices, the stink of stale booze, the clouds of smoke and strange tang of unfamiliar cooking - a new spice perhaps, or just some very old fish. The breakfast of champions. She caught the barman’s eye, nodded casually and hurled a few coppers down. He poured something into a tankard. It didn’t try to clamber out once he’d finished pouring, which was promising. She took a swallow and nodded.
“You want a room or a job?” the barman rumbled. She glanced at him as quickly and carefully as possible. The carotid artery undefended, but the nose already broken. Two hits would do it, if she was fast. Wrapping her fist around the tankard handle she mulled it over as casually as possible then shrugged. “Both.”
“Rooms are one silver, I think,” the barman turned to a willowy man leaning up against the bar. “One silver?”
The man belched. “Two copper Jed. C’mon.”
Jed glared. “Two for the room and that…” he tried to find the right word as he pointed across the room to an unusually busy table in a room dedicated largely to solo drinkers. “...merchant… is hiring. If you know how to handle yourself.”
She met his gaze coolly. There was a moment’s struggle then he looked away. She slapped four copper down. “I’ll hold a room for two night. Sorrel Darkfire.” He nodded, pocketed the cash and started scraping what appeared to be tiny barnacles from the lip of a mug.
Sorrel walked slowly across the crowded bar, her eyes playing across the sea of faces, noting with quiet satisfaction how many checked her once then found something else to focus on. She reached the merchant’s table and found as curious a collection of oddballs as she’d seen lined up in any of the village fete costume parades she’d sat through when she was hunting Akash - a wizard of some sort, drunk on a little arcane power but still fooling around with the trinkets of his art; a bard with instruments clanking from his belt like a tinker’s son on his way to an audition and a lithe figure in a cowl just begging for a tonsure all gathered around a flamboyantly clad and unnecessarily moustached wannabe wide boy.
She sat down, keeping both this gang of freaks and the door in view and almost reflexively went through the target points. Wizard, close in, slash the wrist tendons then a blade up through the throat. Bard, go low, they always worry about their balls. Monk… she considered him, intrigued. She’d never fought one before. She wondered idly for a few seconds then realised they were staring at her.
“I hear you’re hiring,” she nodded at the wannabe. None of the others looked like they had the money to buy a new set of clothes let alone put a team together.
“My name is Anatoli, Anatoli Ricolash…” he waited for some sign of recognition then, with nothing forthcoming, ploughed on a little mournfully. “I have a wagon. No, two wagons. I have a caravan…” he’d hit on the right word and beamed. “I am importing cargo to Daring Sights.”
“Heights,” the wizard corrected him.
“Heights, yes, Daring Heights,” Ricolash nodded eagerly. “I have these men…” he indicated the motley bunch with some pride. “I think maybe two more?”
Sorrel nodded. As his words hung in the air, the door crashed open and an enormous blue skinned creature stomped in, twigs and branches hanging from the misshapen plates of second hand armour welded uncomfortably together like lumps of steel having a fight.
The room went quiet. When something that large walks in, even a dockside pub clientele knows to study the bottom of its tankards with great care. The creature grabbed a drink and crashed onto a bench next to the group, gazing off into space as if he’d failed to notice them.
Playing hard to get, thought Sorrel. Worth a try. After a long pause, she realised, no, he actually hadn’t noticed them.
“My friend, are you looking for work?” Anatoli leaned over and shouted up into the creature’s mud packed ear. As the blue head turned curiously, Sorrel suddenly realised - a firbolg. This must be a firbolg. She marvelled at his size and surprising grace as he leaned down towards the merchant.
“My name is Doro,” the firbolg said softly. Sorrel could see a holy symbol of some kind hanging from his neck. “I don’t fight, but I can heal.”
“Great! I need an escort to Charing Heights and I can pay 15 gold,” Anatoli was still yelling.
“Daring,” the wizard sighed.
“Yes, Simon, I’m so sorry, Daring Heights,” Anatoli blushed.
“Only 15 gold?” the bard spoke up.
“That’s all I can afford Breeze,” the merchant seemed nervous.
The bard… Breeze, she assumed… started talking. She zoned out. Bards and their silver tongues. She recognised the smooth rhythms. Some words drifted into her mind “great danger” “so talented” and then the monk jumped in, evidently taking issue with Breeze’s opinion of his skills. The holy warrior, who’s name sounded something like Viereari, seemed ready to challenge Breeze there and then.
“Is this typical of adventurers?” Anatoli turned towards her.
“Typical of boys,” she shrugged. “Shut their mouths with money if I were you.”
Anatoli seemed to wither, die and remerge like a half-assed phoenix with self esteem issues.
“I can pay 15 gold and if we get attacked I will pay a bonus five gold?”
This seemed fair and she couldn’t stand listening to Breeze list his skills all over again so she spat on her hand and reached across. “Deal.”
The merchant looked in horror at her rough skin, streaked with salt and rope burns and now shining with a light sheen of spittle. She met his eyes. He blushed again, spat on his own hand and they shook. The others simply muttered their assent and Anatoli excused himself, heading for the bathroom. Sorrel looked down at her scruffy travel clothes and filthy skin then sighed and headed off herself for a swift swill in the sink.
The bathroom had a cracked mirror and she stared at her reflection for the first time in months. She barely recognised herself. The wind and the salt air had scoured her cheeks raw and her mop of hair was too matted to attempt a dousing. This was excavating rather than washing. She did her best then rejoined the group as they headed back towards the docks, Sorrel’s hood up to avoid bumping into her former shipmates.
When they arrived at the grimy portside loading bay, the two wagons were waiting - along with an old gnome and a fat, contented feline. The five adventurers stared at the animal - which stared right back as if ready to square up.
“Is for good luck,” Anatoli said, apologetically. “My baba won’t travel without him.”
The gnome, presumably baba, took offence at Simon the wizard’s sly comments about the fluffy monstrosity and whacked his shins with a thick staff. As the sage and old gnome bickered, the wagons creaked forward and the party took up positions, Sorrel riding on the rear wagon atop a pile of crates. People stared up at her and she met every gaze until they turned away. If there was one thing the Master of the House had taught her it was to claim a reputation early. There was no such phrase as “too dangerous’ if you were new in town.
As her mind drifted back to the House and to Sana, and the old feelings started to rise, she heard a shout. She jumped, and turned towards the sound, just in time to see the fat cats basket hit the cobblestones and the furry blob squawk like a throttled parrot before rocketing off into the crowd as Anatoli screamed “stop him, stop him, we cannot travel without him!”
Sorrel sprang into action - as did the rest of the adventurers, almost cannoning off each other in their eagerness to prove their worth. For a few moments there was a cacophony of eldritch crackling zinging through the souls of passersby as spells fizzed back and forth, painting bright glowing fish in the motes of air, conjuring up severed hands that grasped at the beast and, for Sorrel, plucking a mental targeting sight out of the ether and zooming in on the cats tail. For a moment she briefly considered downing in with a well placed arrow but regretfully assumed this would cut her take from this particular circus’s earnings potential.
Finally, the five of them managed to corner and catch the reluctant pet, dragging it back to its master as its claws dug channels in the grime of the street. Between them, they fought the beast back into its basket and slammed the lid back on. They stood there, panting, eyeing each other up cautiously.
“Worth a tip, surely?” said Breeze hopefully to Anatoli.
The silence was deafening.
And so they clattered on, out of the town gates and down a well kept dirt road that wound its way through dense woodland, past the odd carefully prepared halt with fires left by passing rangers for travellers to rest and cook food. She noted how dry the branches were - less smoke, which suggested skilled woodcraft.
Eventually they hauled in at one of the resting points and the men all gathered round the fire, heating up a bland stew and arguing over their martial prowess. Sorrel grabbed a bowl and clambered back up onto the pile of crates, watching as the wizard practiced turning the flames of the fire blue and let blue embers soar up into the noon sky before fluttering back down onto the leaves as they walked towards her.
Wait, what? She looked again. Yep, the trees were walking. Before she could shout a warning, two walking trees rustled out of the thick woods and strode towards them. The rest of the party ran from the fire towards the beast. “Blights,” screamed Doro. “They are pure evil, burn them, cut them down, have no mercy on these abominations!”
She hauled her bow from her back, notched an arrow and let it fly at the nearest blight and as the bolt buried its shaft deep into the pulsing trunk of the beast she marked it as her chosen enemy with a quiet prayer to Selune.
From the corner of her eye she could see Simon snatching blazing bottles of oil from straps beneath his robes and sending the hurtling towards the second blight as the monk set about the creature with blade and fists.
The blight she’d marked suddenly loosed a flight of sharp needles at her. She coiled and ducked and they sang past her ears so that she felt the rush of air all around her. The beast loomed towards her, towering over her head as it prepared to strike again.
Then Doro gave a harsh shout - ‘flee abomination’ - and she felt deep, ancient power pour from him. The blight shuddered, uncertain, just as its comrade was torn to pieces on the other side of the clearing. She could feel it’s terror just as the bard flung words towards them both - filling her, she felt, with a new resolve just as they tore into the dark mind of the stumbling creature. It turned and fled.
Surrounded by the bardic glow, she dropped her bow, reached for the two shortswords strapped to her back and drew them with a hiss and twang of steel. She somersaulted from the wagon and gave chase, cutting and slashing its retreating form as the monk shot past her at an unearthly speed, aiming to cut the blight off before it could make its getaway. But just as they readied for the killing blow, the blight seemed to melt into the foliage, indiscernible, untraceable, invisible… and gone.
Remembering her task, she returned to the wagons where a sobbing Anatoli was passing out handfuls of gold.
“But for you my wagons would be gone and we would be dead,” he wept. “I owe you my life.”
The five shuffled awkwardly back to their positions and rode the rest of the way in silence, uncomfortable with gratitude and raw emotion, relieved when the walls of the city rose from the earth before them.
As the wagons clattered to a halt, Sorrel slipped from her crate and vanished into the crowd, her money safe and her heart intact. Connections were more dangerous than monsters and love was the closest to death she’d ever been.
She hauled into a gloomy alley and took stock. Less than 24 hours ashore, 20 gold richer and… well… 20 gold richer. A start.
