Ink, Blood and Curses - Sorrel finishes the job herself

I’m no writer. They taught me the basics, but communication has never been my strong point. I feel things too intensely for words half the time, and I’m next to numb the rest. I’m no poet.

But sometimes you have to speak for yourself. Because in a case like this, I’ve found the number of books is rarely the problem. It’s the number of writers that bothers me.

When Zola said; "we'll have a good moon tonight" it was like coming up on snakeroot just as your girlfriend’s brother slugged you in the guts for breaking his kid sisters heart. Painful, warm, hallucinatory and wildly unstable. Zola throwing the extra shapes didn’t help. I flung the shortswords around as best I could, but I needed time. Who was this chick? What was with the crown? How did she know Sarin? Was she Sarin?

Also, and don’t judge me – this is why I don’t do the writing – I have a code of honour that literally holds me together. Without it, I could fall apart. Existential angst has nothing on a kid who’s sinews and tendons are rules, skills, muscle and hope with nothing much else to live for except putting one foot in front of the other. So, I honour my promises in the way most people breathe in and out.

And being saved from the horror of the Hunger Spirit – you have no idea. I mean, nothing comes close. Imagine swallowing broken glass every time you took a breath, except the glass spread through you heart, mind and soul. And imagine each piece of glass was whispering all the time, making you hungry, but each time you ate you wanted to vomit but you needed to eat all the time and the glass kept coming. That resembles having a Hunger Spirit in much the same way as having a splinter in your finger resembles a rusty dagger stripping your forearm muscle from the bone.

So, I was grateful. But I was stacking up the gratitude here. Sarin, Silvia, Jaezred, Seraphina… a girl only has so many hours in the day to die for folk.

Apparently you have to put sub headings in to keep people engaged

We did the fight and sold the book. Kelne and Tayz were on form. They’re hard to call, those two. I’m always glad to see them, but they could save you from death or amble around the battlefield yelling at the bad guys to stop and getting ignored by everyone and it’s hard to know which way they’ll go. Still, they sold the book. Two to go.

We hit the warehouse and Varga flew into action. Varga is one badass motherfucker. I never quite know where I stand with her – getting a sharp right cross as a greeting… is that good or bad? But I’m glad we’re on the same side. I hope we’re on the same side.

(I have to stop all these relationships. It only gets people hurt. Everything is easier when it’s purely transactional. This continent, man. Honestly.)

Anyway. I wouldn’t say I’m a good person. I’m a professional, I keep my word and if I turn up on your doorstep you’ve done something to bring me there, but otherwise I mean well. Most of the time. But I do bad things. Sometimes by accident, sometimes as part of a grand plan but sometimes just because I want to. Sometimes not even that. Sometimes I do bad things just to avoid an awkward pause in the conversation. But I am good at three things. I can appear behind you when you least expect me. I can move so fast you’ll already be dead by the time you realise I’ve attacked. And I’ll give you the best night of your life so that you briefly forget you are mortal. Although, usually not in that order.

Also, you have to stick to the story. I am told. 

So the point being, when Barnard’s thugs appeared to try and sway the deal in his favour, I was behind them before they’d noticed. Stealthy isn’t so hard. It’s moving like an animal. Be aware of the terrain and try to flow with it instead of moving against it. Walk where there's cover. Keep your movements steady the way a cat moves when stalking prey. A slow rhythm to avoid random sounds will be less noticeable. Walk toe to heel, control your breathing, and be prepared to drop or jump without creating impact.

Barnard liked the deal though. He offered a barrel of brandy to keep his master work off the market. He said it was Thorian Brandy from the ruins of Gadenthor like this was a big deal. The clerics – this was not their area of expertise. But I have tasted everything from garlraw hooch with a mixed company of orc and dwarf mercenaries in the Dessarin Valley - you have to sprinkle pepper on top to absorb the fussel oil – to pure elverquisst during six months undercover in the High Observer’s bodyguard in Elturel. Let’s just say I have an educated palate.

This brandy was beyond eleverquisst, cleaner than moktessa and had a longer finish than exeltis ice wine’s oldest vintage. It was rich and dark, no hint of acidic backnotes and it melted through the tongue like chocolate or mother’s milk. I was lost in its complexity for a second, which almost proved fatal. I didn’t notice the raiders. Three orcs and a minotaur. They’d bolted the gates and scared the staff by the time I was out of my reverie and the clerics incantations were proving as much use as asking them to please be nice.

Zola and Varga were already closing in by the time I’d strung my blow, but the minotaur looked like trouble and one orc was a mage – he’d frozen Zola with a word, making her easy meat for the twin horned brute.

Did I say I was good at three things? Oh la, sir, forgive my girlish blush. I quite forgot the fourth. My three arrows were in the brute so fast you could have been forgiven for thinking I’d shot them all at once. Precision is key on a minotaur. The huge, flaring neck muscle – the morillo, they call it in the south – has to be weakened so it drops its shoulders and loses its power. You need to place arrows on either side of the neck, good spacing, but deep penetration. It’s about the rhythm of the minotaur’s movements – you almost dance together so you join its flow, gather its intention and send death to wait just a second into its future. For that brief moment, you love the beast. Then the arrows sliced home, it stumbled, dropped its neck and Varga finished it with a blow.

The mage was easier. Varga seemed to want to keep the orcs alive so the chest just above the heart is best – you aim to glance off into the deltoid, trapezius or bicep and a wizard with only one useful arm is just a bad dancer with a short stick. The downside is, the rate of blood loss leads to unconsciousness in maybe 20 seconds, death in 30. There’s always the risk of hitting the heart and then it’s Goodnight Velarsburg but I’m good. They were administering first aid by the time I was bartering with Bernard for an extra bottle of this excellent Thorian.

Skip to the end Darkfire, you're boring everyone

Things moved quickly after that. Varga unloaded the council minutes on the grateful Bernard and we headed back to Spinecracker, picking up a little young adult fiction on the way. The Perks of Being a Tiki Flower, the Vault in the Stars and some Strixshaven diaries about Phoenixes and Philosopher’s Stones. That sort of thing.

Spinecracker and chum were waiting for us – which was odd. With the curse broken, surely they’d both be… whatever happened after the curse, but not still in the shop. Turned out they’d both hidden books from us. Little cute undead guys didn’t want to leave each other. Seemed to me a library was the solution. I didn’t want to wow them with mind blowing concepts, but after a run through of the basics I figured the idea of renting books was somewhere in their desiccated transoms.

They showered us with this and that, everyone hugged, we all promised to write and then the party plane jumped back to Fort Ettin with the satisfaction of, if not a job well done then at least a case of brandy that tasted like angels crying on the tongue.

Having lived the Occupied by the Hunger Spirit lifestyle for a while, I’d not enjoyed the pleasures of tissues soaked in finely distilled, long matured spirits in some time now. I intended, I told my comrades, to reach a pleasant state of oblivion and invited them to join me there.

They came half way, I’ll give them that. Zola told me a ton of stuff about Sarin that I did my level best to hold in my head as the brandy cuddled me home. When she left I gave her a possibly overflowery letter of thanks to the clothes dodging genius. But hey, when a drow sucks a spirit from the Shadowfell out of your soul, you owe him a little poetry, right?

A few hours in, my mind wandered to Silvia. The things I would’ve done to that girl if she’d been there… Probably for the best she wasn’t. I have eclectic tastes and my palate is as broad in matters of the bedroom as it is in liquor. I’m an acquired taste. And, of course, almost everyone I sleep with ends up dead. Which, I want to be clear, never has anything to do with me directly. But still.

I did gather that Varga was going to try and find Silvia a fox before heading back to Daring Heights. I considered helping out, but the brandy wanted to take me to bed with one last nightcap to keep me company.

Varga saw me head for the dorm and decided to help. I can’t say I’m not grateful. “I love you, you mad bastard,” I told her. It was only partly the brandy talking. “I’m going to carve your name into my favourite dagger so I’ll always remember you if I’m caught up in close quarters work.”

She seemed pleased. Or embarrassed. Hard to say.

As she tucked me up in bed, a thought struck me. Are you sure Silvia wants a fox?” I muttered as I felt sleep steal over me.

“I am certain. Why?” Vagra was brisk.

“Personally, as you can probably tell by now, my favourite animal is a shaggy dog.”


(Wanted: third fifth ghostwriter for ongoing autobiography project. Union rates paid. Punctuality expected. Discretion essential. No need to enquire. We know where you live.)