"There's that funny man again," the crook laughed at Riveh's jesting refusal. Which was somewhat concerning, given that the smile seemed entirely detached from the thoroughly irate face. "Surprised you haven't beaten that out of the kid by now," he simpered to Stig. "Maybe someone should." Lors had a surprising ability to detach his voice, expression and even words from what he really meant. Perhaps it came with living one's illicit double-life in an organization dedicated to secrecy.
"Lissen up, kid, you might learn somethin'" he went on, rising from the dirty desk and stepping just a foot within the ifrit's personal space. "I don't send my boys to do a dirty job because they're my boys. You followin'? They work here, at my business, at my ever so legitimate business, they're known. Why the F*CK," (the outburst was as sudden as it was sharp) "would I send my own boys to whack someone when I find myself with two dumb stooges lookin' for a favor? Huh?"
Was the man prouder than he looked? Did he not tolerate backtalk from one such as Riveh? Or were these merely his true colors peeking through his affable air, that of a violent thug? "The guard may be dumb, but I'm not aiming to be dumber, kid. You two have no connection to me, that's why. That's why I send you. Nothin' to lead the guard here. It's not spellcraft, boyo. But then if you were smart you wouldn't be workin' with this one." The long nose bobbed to the knight. He in turn merely glared daggers.
"You came to me, kid," the crook concluded, the antagonistic air lessening just a bit. "I'm just givin' you the opportunity to earn that info you're lookin' for. If you're not interested, the door's right there. No skin off my nose. But don't waste my time."
When had Lors started playing with his knife again?
Riveh did his best to remain cool when the gangster swaggered right into his face. He could almost feel the man's hot breathing on him and he could smell his rather foul breath. Riveh had the distinct impression that this man would gut him with as much regret as another man might slide scraps of food off his plate.
Riveh had been very proud of his little jape, but apparently he had pissed the criminal off. Touchy...
Riveh (slowly) held up both palms and took a step back, "Steady on."
"Fine, we'll do it. Stig and I will go to the Narrows and take care of Barely for you. It would be our honor to help clean up the city." Riveh added grandly before asking, "I assume you don't have an address, or whatever passes for one in the Narrows?"
"Do you need proof or will you take our word for it?" he added suddenly, thinking of a possible flaw in his plan. If Lors wanted the man's bloody head in a bag, things might get tricky....
Rodent eyes, mean and intelligent, roved Riveh's face for a moment. A long moment. Then a nod and a smile, the former firm and the latter (presumably) false. "Glad we could work this out, kid." Then, turning to Stig, "You got a winner here, old boy! Don't let this one get away."
The knight looked about as sour as a dozen rotten oranges. "Not without puttin' an arrow into his back..." he grumbled.
"I knew you could put that brain box to work if you just tried." Lors was back to his affable, if sleazy, self. Or rather, the persona he preferred. "As for where and when, I'll leave that to you. Barley's easy enough to find. He and his boozy crew are occupying a hovel in the Narrows. You'll smell it before you see it. Just follow the trail of passed-out drunks. That said, I've got some intel for you. Barley's been hittin' some of his competitors, scarin' them away from his little flock. There a drinking hole here in Crownsgate, borderin' the slum. Goes by 'the Brassiered Lady', you'll see why. A reliable bird told me he's hittin' it at some point today. Somethin' to consider."
"Do you need proof or will you take our word for it?"
"Don't worry about it, kid. We've got enough ears here to know when the job's done. You just do this right, and I'll tell you everything there is to know about the halflings. And, uh..." The crook leaned in to the ifrit in a mock-conspiratorial manner. "Take care of your old man now, eh? Seen wagon wheel less worn than him."
"Piss off, Lors. Boy, we're leavin'." Yes, it was time to get out of this hive of scum and villainy.
"See ya, Skinny."
"Not on your life, Little."
Once back out on the muddy streets of Crownsgate and a comfortable distance from Bursio's, Stig broke his sullen silence. "I'm not thankin' you for not handin' me over, if that's what you're waitin' for."
"I'm young, Stig, not stupid." Riveh says after they leave earshot of the butchershop. The mud of the unkempt street squelches under Riveh's boots, smelly ooze seeping around every print. The short time inside the shop (and the rough cleaning) only makes the smell of the street worse, not to mention the odor of the sewer on his robes.
"I know if I wait around for your gratitude, I'll be waiting till Aroden comes back/" The young ifrit shakes his head, "Well, that could have gone better. Now we have to kill a man."
He looks over at Stig, "I suppose you'd have no problem with it? Granted, this 'Barely' hardly seems like a saint, but killing him ont he words of some Brotherhood lackey seems...unwise. God only knows what we might step in."
His words are, ironically, punctuated as he steps on the greasy carcass of a dead rat. The soft chunk makes the ifrit shudder.
"Anyway, I think we can avoid that. We find this Barley and make him an offer of some gold. Enough to buy a ticket and start a new life someplace else. If he is stupid enough to turn it down, along with our threat that the Brotherhood is getting serious about him....well, we'll deal with that when the time comes."
"I imagine we might have to get rough with some of his goons, if it comes to it." The idea of getting rough makes Riveh pause in the street.
Trant. What was she up to? It has been hours since they split up, before Riveh knew any of this. Gods only know what she thought happened. Did she think Riveh dead or captured by the police? Or, worse in a way, did she think he found Martella and simply ran off? Oddly, the idea of disappointing Trant made is chest tighten a bit.
Abadar, what was happening? Did he like that blowhard bully?
"Do you think we have time to take a shower?" he asked Stig, casually.
"I'm young, Stig, not stupid."
A derisive grunt escaped the older man closely followed by a condescending smirk. Oh, these kids. What did they know? "You're young. You can't not be stupid."
Having inadvertently yet unmistakably painted himself as a crotchety old man of the worst caliber with this comment, the knight's worn features soured inordinately quickly at Riveh's mere mention of gratitude.
"Pah, go sh*t in your own shoes. I'd have skewered the lot of you, startin' with your pretty little face, had you tried anythin'."
The gruff dismissal, unusually caustic in its tone even for the thug, could only make Riveh wonder: did Stig truly believe this? Did he really think he could have taken on not just the infrit, but also the three gangsters all by his lonesome? Riveh looked at the aging sellsword, the dried blood from his wound, the slight toxin-jitters still playing upon his tendons, the gray in his remaining hair. He had fought with the man and knew that he wasn't entirely helpless. What's more, Martella clearly had to believe him capable or she wouldn't have hired him. And yet the ifrit couldn't imagine the situation ending in his favor. This could be worrying; a comrade-in-arms who vastly overestimated his own ability could very well endanger his allies. Or had the encounter with his past merely put Stig in a particularly foul mood?
If so, that mood did not improve upon listening to Riveh's plan going forward. "Oh, heavens to f*ckity..." he swore with an exasperated air, causing a group of ashen children to look up from their over-sized looms in a shack turned weaving workshop they passed by. "So instead of payin' Little and being done with this, you want to pay this Barley joker instead? Of all the ass-backwards... Yeah, fine. Some miserable sods gonna have to die before we find the little lady. What's one more?"
Well, that was that decided. As the ifrit had suspected, his companion didn't seem to have any objections to a spot of murder. No, he expressed more surprise at Riveh's tentative query. "A shower? Where are we headed?"
----------
Aroden's View was a change of scenery to say the least. To go from dirt roads to immaculate mosaic pathways, some depicting famous historical scenes with genuine artistry, was enough to cause whiplash. Who knew Oppara had such disparity? Well, Stig supposedly, given that the man showed no surprise at the wealth on display, his usual frown only deepening. Another stark difference from Crownsgate that stood out to the now more well traveled Riveh were the guards. Sentries both private and public still milled about here whereas that poorer district had been near completely absent of any such. Was this normal? Whatever the case, said guards made actually navigating the exclusive area just a bit difficult, especially with the surly old man in tow. More than once the ifrit had to curb his companion's foul language so as to not offend an inquisitive watchman. Thankfully the sentries at the Trant manor were far more deferential upon reaching that place, knowing him as they did as a personal friend of the young lady of the house and a survivor of the Exaltation massacre. Even so, they still felt obliged to ask him just a few questions to confirm his identity. These were dangerous times.
"So how is it you know this chit again, and how is she supposed to help us?" the thug asked over his shoulder in raiding the liquor cabinet, the same one Riveh had sampled from some hours ago. They were back in the well appointed yet stark drawing room where the same grumpy valet had dumped them again, where he had waited for the Dame once already. The wait was very brief this time, however. Before he could answer the pseudo-knight, the ifrit heard footsteps approaching. Which was remarkably in itself given the heavy and dour construction of the mansion. If a thundercloud had feet, this might have been what its steps sounded like. Suddenly the door flew open.
Had she grown since he'd seen her last, and if so where was a giant slayer when you needed one? Malphene Trant burst into the room much like the aforementioned thundercloud, huge and black-clad and thunderous as she was. The blonde tresses come loose from her bun even made fair approximations of lightning on the mourning dress.
"I was at the town hall for hours, and I couldn't even get anyone to talk to me! The place was a madhouse! I could barely get through the hundred people outside it, and once I got in there were another hundred inside!" Trant's pale cheeks were red with fury as she raved on. "Half the city was there wanting to know who paid their salaries now, what losing half the senate meant for their dumb projects, and - and... whatever! No one working there knew what was up and down, the fools! I couldn't learn a thing! It was a complete waste of time, and it was a stupid suggestion!"
Judging by the accusing blue glare, she was very annoyed with Riveh. Hold on, hadn't checking the municipal records been her suggestion? That thought would have to wait as the Dame was apparently not done. "Then I come back here to wait for you, and you're just traipsing about without leaving me any message, and I have no idea if anything's happened to you, and..."
The onslaught of frustration came to a sudden halt as Trant's eyes suddenly fell on Stig standing in the corner, seemingly only now noticing him. An awkward air came over her, as if abruptly ashamed at her outburst. But that awkwardness only grew as Stig, apparently just a bit struck for once, spoke. "Aroden wept, that's a big girl."
All color drained from Malphene. She looked like the man had slapped her. "Excuse me?"
"Are we here to recruit her pa, boy?" the thug asked, taking a swig from a crystal flask no doubt intended to be measured in single ounces. "'Cause I'll admit, whatever f*ckin' legend bedded a giant to birth this one has me impressed."
There was the color again. Trant looked ready to introduce Stig's head to his colon at what had to be the crudest insult anyone had dared speak to her face for some time.
"Geminus, who is this barbarian?!"
Riveh sighed when Stig, of course, said his plan was stupid.
"Did you want to offer Lors a bunch of gold and hope he didn't ask for more?" Riveh said, annoyed at the man's negativity. "I doubt Barley will be as dangerous, even if he is as greedy. Your friend seems to be a man who doesn't have the decency to stay bought."
Riveh sighed wearily, "I came as soon as I could-" but is cut off when Trant turns on Stig.
Taking a step toward the still filthy older man, Riveh bowed to Trant, "May I present Sir Stig of Stillhall. he is a temporary ally, but not a friend. I won't stop you, if you want to teach him some manners, but that would waste time."
He looks at Trant, "He is, apparently, another agent of Martella's, the woman I am looking for. My Senate contact. We have a...possible lead on her whereabouts, but also information she is in danger. Do you remember Filibert? He has friends."
Shaking his head, "Stig, could you go...stick your head in a rain barrel or something? You still smell like the sewer. And get something to eat, you look like death warmed over."
"Filibert? The halfling?
Like a run-away tram cart derailed, the Dame's outrage veered of into shock and surprise at Riveh's mention of the murderous assailant. Their brief ally turned assassin had nearly been the death of them both. Trant in particular had been seconds away from the great hereafter, only saved by the ifrit's intervention. She now stood mum, anger seemingly forgotten, waiting for Riveh to explain.
"Stig, could you go...stick your head in a rain barrel or something? You still smell like the sewer. And get something to eat, you look like death warmed over."
The thug puffed in mock affront, as if such an insult should have warranted blows if not for his great generosity. "Yeah, alright. Did let the bleedin' Sarenites run off with the food, after all."
"I'm sorry, the what now?" a confused Trant had no option but to ask.
"Though you should know," Stig went on, ignoring the young noblewoman and angling for the door still clutching a flask of something no doubt very expensive, "I've seen death warmed over. Not pretty. Men will eat anythin' once hungry enough. Anythin' at all. Hey, Miss, where's the kitchen?"
"...The valet will be happy to escort you." No ice golem's utterance could have been more frigid. Coarse as he was, however, the pseudo-knight chose to take no note of this and went out the door in search of an overdue lunch. Riveh and Trant were once again alone.
"Where in the world did you find that brute?" she asked with some measure of astonishment. The Dame was evidently not used to low-lives such as Stig. "No, the less said of him the better. What of this patron of yours, the Lotheed? What danger is she in? How does the halfling come into this? How may I help?"
Any sign of offence, whether at the thug or Riveh, was now entirely gone from the lady's well-defined features. In fact, the blond brow was angled in the anxious need to know more, and even in reluctant shame. "And listen, I... I apologize for yelling at you. I was... worried."
Trant's apology unsettled Riveh more then any amount of shouting or anger could have. The idea that Madame Trant cared enough to feel bad...was worrying. What was happening between them? Good gods, 'between them'? Aroden preserve him.
Riveh found a chair to sit, enjoying resting for a moment. As he sat, he told Trant everything that had passed since they parted. Of the police raid on the tobacconist, of his stealthy entry inside and finding the Sarenites. He described the sewers and convincing Sir Stig to come along. Of the chat with Father Fareef and the meaning of the unholy symbol. Of his meeting with Lors, Barley and his supposed plan to bribe the drunken gangster out of the Narrows.
After all that he sighed heavily and said, "It has been a long day. Longer since Stig is as charming as you suspect. Still, any port in a storm."
Somewhat to his own surprise Trant proved to be a committed audience to the ifrit's little tale, hanging on his words with rapt attention. Perhaps this shouldn't be so surprising. After all, she was in this to save her father's life. His progress was of vital importance to her. Of course she was interested. And yet. Said desire did not require her to lend Riveh a sympathetic ear or decent company, but that was exactly what she did throughout his recounting, much to his growing incredulity. "A sign hidden in public?" she said at hearing how he had come to suspect the tobacconist, her voice carrying just enough appreciative wonder to make the ifrit feel clever for the discovery. "The cad!" she said in seemingly genuine outrage on his part as he described Stig's conduct upon first meeting the man. "No, of course such a snake can't be trusted!" she said at hearing the details of the parley with 'Little' Lors, vigorously assuring him that he was right in trying to circumvent the crook.
All these remarks and more, while characteristically brusque, added up and before he knew it they were having something approximating - gods help him - nice conversation. How far they had come. Alright, so the concern was willfully muted and the sympathy awkwardly polite - and when he described entering the sewers she withdrew somewhat from leaning forward in her seat to wrinkle her nose - but it was apparently genuine. Dame Malphene Trant, as near as he could tell, cared. How very worrying.
The young noblewoman grew still only on one subject, the very one Riveh was most curious to see her take on: the Sarenites. At the mention of a secret cult dedicated to the Dawnflower within Taldor's capital she was obviously taken aback, as most anyone would be, yet refrained from making any remark until the ifrit had finished explaining. Only then did she say, with atypical hesitation and care:
"Am I to understand that... this patron of yours is harboring sun worshipers?" The navy blue eyes showed clear uncertainty; the Dame was awful as ever at hiding her thoughts. "Geminus, they must be allied with the south, you know this. Why would she be working with Qadiran collaborators? I mean, at a time like this... Surely at a time like this we cannot just... Do you trust this woman?"
Trant's alarm was of course to be expected. Most Taldans had a very poor view indeed of the Sarenite faith, that deity not only being the primary worship of their hated ancestral enemy, but also outlawed in the nation for sedition and treason against the crown. No one remembered a time when the so called Everlight had not been synonymous with everything Qadiran. "Are you so accepting of this because of your... No, never mind." Now what? The interrupted query had been asked with much reluctance, faltering and then dropping in the air like a bent arrow.
Riveh had to admit, much to his surprise, Trant made a good listener. She was attentive, reactive and (gods be praised) enjoyable. Riveh found himself warming to the occasion, adding a few narrative flourishes to the tale. Waving his arms to make a point, doing his best to imitate Lors backstreet drawl or the scuttling noise of the sewer spiders. He even lit a small Spark to accentuate his fiery spell that dispatches the insects.
Regaling the tale calmed Riveh after a long and stressful day, that only promised to get worse. So odd that Trant, of all people, provided a bit of an oasis. It was hard to see the genuine woman in front of him and still remember the arm-breaking bully he met in the Senate.
People were complicated.
Then the spell faded away as they reached the subject of the Sarenites and Martella. Riveh could tell Trant was uneasy about the topic, clearly as unwilling to destroy the convivial atmosphere as much as he.
His response was to laugh though, long and hard.The ifrit slapped his knee and shook his head as the waves of hilarity flowed through him, and only slowly petered out.
"Trust her?" Riveh repeated, "Trust her? No. Her lies of omission, already, are enough to put me on guard."
Then he sobered and sighed, "But I don't think she is a traitor to Taldor, no more then you or I. Frankly if Father Fareef is a dangerous collaborator, then he missed his calling on the stage. He and his flock just seemed like innocent followers of a maligned faith."
Riveh held up his hand, "Don't get me wrong. Qadira is an enemy state, of that I have no doubt. I wouldn't be surprised to hear they have had some hand in the horror of the Senate. But I think the rot lies mostly much closer to home, and it goes deep. Martella might be slippery, but I don't think she believes in treason."
"Does that count as trust?"
It was a much perplexed Malphene Trant, almost startled even, that looked to the ifrit as he leaned back in his seat to laugh at the ceiling. What was this now? She had been quite serious. "What?" she asked, frowning in her confusion, seemingly half-worried, half-annoyed. "What? Unless your Lotheed just so happens to also be a trusty old stout Taldan war horse, veteran of a dozen Qadiran skirmishes, I don't see what's so funny..." Oh heavens, even her sulking had a certain obstinate charm to it when you knew she wasn't truly mad at you. And thusly not likely to smack you into the next calendar year.
Only when Riveh had explained his reasoning for believing the pseudonymic Lady Coufas as trustworthy as the fox in the proverbial hen house did the Dame settle again. "I suppose it will have to do," she replied to his query on trusting Martella. "Alright then." Noble brow knitted in apparent thought, Trant went on. "So we can gather the location of your patron from the... halfling death cult" (she spat out the words as if she could hardly believe she was saying them) "that has supposedly taken her. The same cult, mind you, that may have been part of the massacre. But your charming companion's underworld friend won't tell you where these madmen may be found unless you... kill some criminal lowlife cutting into his profits? Am I understanding this right?"
It all sounded so unsavory when put like that. Sadly, Riveh had to acknowledge, it wasn't inaccurate. The Dame sighed. "So what is our next step? What would you have me do? I can hardly just send the house guards out to clean up a slum, if that is what you're thinking. Nor do I think we can find any mercenaries of our own with the city still reeling. And even if we somehow were to, the clock is working against us. If your Lotheed isn't dead already, she surely will be soon."
How to ask her? The ifrit hardly had time to contemplate how to ask her to join him again, to once again trust each of their lives to the other if necessary, when he looked into her steely gaze. There he found that the question was moot. She already knew what had to be done.
"You're going to see this 'Barley', aren't you? You and that old cur." There was a moment of hesitation, a flutter as of an autumn leaf blown free from its branch. "I'm coming with you. My father needs me, and I will do whatever it takes to help him."
The noblewoman rose from her seat, to all appearances tripling in height. For a moment she simply stood, looking into empty air, and Riveh knew that despite her apparent determination the Dame was bracing herself. The ifrit had fought alongside her. Capable though she might be, he was well aware that Trant was no more accustomed to life and death combat than any other young noblelady her age. The archives had been her first real test.
Then again, he realized, the same was true for himself. Only Stig could be called battle-hardened among the three of them, and he was fairly sure he never wanted to be as cynical as he. "Go see if you can find the old man," a seemingly more resolute Malphene asked him in opening the door. "I'm going to find a sword."
----------
"Drink this," a newly armed and armored Trant said flatly to the thug as the three of them were driving off within a heraldic-marked closed carriage back to Crownsgate. An innocuous little flask was held in her presenting hand.
"Didn't yer daddy teach you not to take drinks from strangers?" came the vitriolic reply.
"Oh, shut up, you vile old beast! It's a potion. I took it from the guards' emergency rations. You're not going to be any use to anyone hobbling along like you are now."
Stig gave a short grunt of a laugh and swiped the bottle. "Heh. Alright. My old man taught me never to say no to a free drink, anyway."
Things moved so fast Riveh barely had time to take a breath between Trant setting off for a sword and when the three of them were rattling down the street in a carriage. The ifrit had a list of reasons for why Trant coming along was a bad idea, but they were carried away by her relentless determination. It was clear the towering noblewoman would not be left behind, so Riveh rolled with it.
Doing is best to assert some control over the trio he spoke loudly over the clattering wheels.
" Now remember, we want to keep the number of corpses to a minimum." He ignored Stig's eye roll and Trant's impatient snort. "And not only for moral reasons. Do either of you really want to get locked into a turd war in the Narrows? Every man we kill might have a lover, a friend, a sibling who will find us some night and stick a sharp blade in our back."
"We will go to this tavern and wait for Barley or more likely, his men. If they show, we will...convince them to take us to their boss. I imagine we might have to break a few arms to get that far." Riveh shrugged. 'Or worse, but we can hope not. Later, we will try to convince Barley that leaving with a pouch of gold is better then trying to stand against the Brotherhood. Hopefully he agrees. If not..."
Another shrug, 'I doubt Taldor will mourn his loss, but I'd rather not get into the habit of killing people on the order of Lors."
Predictably, Riveh's very reasonable call for their little rendezvous to not turn into a killing floor was met with noisy protests in the small carriage. Trant looked to him with outrage ("What sort of savage do you take me for, Geminus?!") while it was the aging ruffian who moaned loudest, a long frustrated drawl.
"Hell's bells, boy, you're worse than a dozen sun whore preachers. And you can shove yer morals where her light doesn't shine, for that matter." He coughed up some phlegm and spat it to the floor of the coach, a sight that stunned the Dame. "You heard Little, they're all deadbeat drunkards. Wouldn't be where they are if they had any bleedin' loved ones. You speak like only a greenhorn can. Once you have to choose between your own skin or that of some great big bastard running at you with an edge, then we'll see how far yer morals get you. And I for one won't be riskin' my hide for your sensibilities."
A dark eye, webbed with crow's feet and self-interest, shot up to meet the young noblewoman's. "And if the big girl's smart, neither will she." Trant did not respond, merely huffing dismissively and turning to the window. But her gaze was worryingly pensive. Cynical as Stig's protest was, the ifrit's plan drew no such objections. Meeting Barley away from his home turf seemed only sensible, and the suggestion was met with nods, one resolute, the other seemingly indifferent.
Upon their arrival Crownsgate looked no worse for wear in the brief hours since Riveh had last been there, but then the place looked awfully worn as was. Disembarking from the carriage proved a bit of a challenge in itself. Not only did the thug nearly fall on the step down, the spider venom still leaving him much weaker than he pretended otherwise, but the coachman, evidently the loyal sort to have been in the family for years, outright objected to leaving the daughter of the house here, only agreeing after much cajoling from Trant herself. "Can we go now?" an annoyed Stig asked when the carriage finally left. That they could, and with that the duo turned trio could see to their sordid business. It would be an understatement to call them a motley crew as they wandered the district, stopping on occasion to ask busy pedestrians, all exceedingly humble folk with places to be and mouths to feed, for directions to the so called Brassiered Lady: Stig with his uncouth gait, leering and grumbling under his breath every time he recognized something from his youth; Riveh himself with his obviously mixed ethnicity which drew more than a few stares at times; and the towering Dame who... well, even without the breastplate over her conservative dress she made for an unusual sight just about anywhere.
And on the topic of sight, Trant was quite wide-eyed herself in walking the dirt streets. Riveh suspected that this was the noblewoman's first time here, mayhap even that she had never known how people lived here. "What is this building?" she asked in wonder upon them passing a tannery, odious waves of that distasteful industry's stink washing out over them. "F*ckin' blue-blooded brats..." was all the reply she recieved from Stig. Perseverance carrying them true, however, the eventually found their goal: the bar referred to as the Brassiered Lady.
It certainly wasn't much to look at. The one-story hovel was built out of wood and not-so-cleverly incorporated the base of an old statue in its construction, now mostly leaning onto it. The effigy, clearly a remnant of better times for the area, was of a nude woman, her features tastefully obscured. An angel perhaps? Whoever she was meant to be, not much respect was clearly paid to her now: there were dark splotches on her marble chest in the form of hand prints. This was supposedly the establishment Barley intended to put out of business today. Not that there was much business here by the look of things; there was light within, but no sound of customers.
Riveh watches Trant with interest, as they pass through the grimy, disgusting streets. This place had been a revelation of sorts to Riveh, and he hadn't had nearly as insulated and palatial and upbringing at she had. What would she make of the dirty streets, the crumbling buildings and beaten down poor? Would she judge them as refuse or as victums?
Both? Even Riveh wasn't sure what he thought.
"Shut up, Stig." He did says, when the knavish knight offered his usual colorful commentary. "I don't care what color your blood is, the Narrows are disgusting."
Ahead of them stood the Brassiered Lady, a clapboard building of little insight. The sight of the dirty and mistreated statue did move the ifrit a bit, and he wished he had some spell or potion that could clean up the old girl. Still, she seemed to be a survivor.
Still, it gave no inspiration.
"All right, I suppose we should wait inside?" Riveh said, looking at the squalid little square. "Not only is there no place to wait out here, we'll draw attention and perhaps warn off Barley's thugs. Let's go inside."
Oh no. Entering the dingy drinking hole was a bit like looking into an abandoned dog house: even disregarding the leaking walls and the faint smell of urine, it was just damn sad. Dismal as the establishment appeared from the outside, the Brassiered Lady was just as depressingly dreary on the inside. Two windows, both home to nothing but the jagged remains of panes, had been shuttered, leaving the few murky lanterns in the damp ceiling to just barely illuminate the shop, a thankless task if ever there was any as the less one saw of it the better. The floorboards, clearly strangers to brush and soap, creaked like a widow's back as the trio walked on them; they were home to nothing but a few cramped tables. That, and the sickly smell of vomit, no doubt ingrained to the wood. If Riveh never smelled this particular blend of aforementioned bodily fluids mixed with the sharp tang of high-proof spirits, it would be too soon.
"Oah!" the Dame cried in disgust, nearly turning to flee the place. Stig only nodded, however, as if the bar was everything he had expected and lurched inside. It was seemingly deserted. The only thing alive the ifrit spied was some mold creeping down a wall. "Hey, barkeep!" the knight hollered in reaching what passed for a counter and smacking it with an open palm, a gesture that saw some unseen glass or another smash onto the floor by the resulting crash. "Either you come on out, or I start servin' myself, you lazy sod!"
Riveh thought he might have seen graves livelier than this, even sans necromancer, but nevertheless a clatter in the back, somewhere in the darkness, heralded the coming of someone or another. A door opened upon with a bleary-eyed man, pear shaped and dressed in what appeared to be someone else's funeral attire, staggered out. He appeared confused, alarmed and apologetic in equal measure.
"Oh, eh... S-starting early are we, gentlemen?" he tried, simpering smile only betraying his bewilderment at being woken up by customers at what had to be an unusual hour for the establishment. And some rather rotten teeth, of course. The unfocused eyes opened just a bit wider in recognizing that the tall 'gentleman' at the back was in fact a woman.
"Spare me," Stig shushed him. "Just give us something sharp enough to shave with."
"Still, uh, ridin' the revelry?" the barman asked. Was making small-talk a nervous tic for him? "It was a late night for meself, you see. Or are we pouring one out for the Grand Prince? Terrible, terrible news that..."
"We'll take the bottle," the knight interrupted again, swiping a jug of something brown just as the man retrieved some questionable glasses. A silver piece clattered over the counter as he then grabbed those too. "C'mon then, you pampered little sh*ts." Angling across the tiny space and throwing himself into a chair that threatened to snap at the impact, Stig began pouring into the three cups. "Might as well make ourselves comfortable if we're goin' to wait."
Trant looked to Riveh at this less than appetizing invitation, as if she'd rather be anywhere else in the world, before sinking onto a chair of her own with a heavy sigh. "Don't just stand there, boy. You need a drink. Steadies the hand for the crap we're in for."
The Dame actually gagged at taking a tentative sniff at her glass. "This smells like the in-between of a toe!"
"'Course it does!" The thug's laughter was rough as butter over stale bread. "It's sh*t. It's supposed to be sh*t. Good drink is for celebratin' good times. Sh*t drink is for makin' your own life seem less so."
Crassly worded as the sentiment was, Riveh thought he recognized some truth in it. Places such as these were not meant for the work-weary, a small reward after a full day's labor. Neither was it intended for those seeking companionship and good company. This was a drinking hole in the fullest sense of the term, a place where the sad and despondent went to drown their sorrows, sinking into sweet oblivion. This place fed on unhappiness. And all it shat out was unhappy people, now penniless and drunkards.
"I don't understand," a genuinely puzzled young noblewoman said. "This place is awful. Why would anyone come here?"
Riveh looks at Trant's confused face and then to Stig's battered visage.
"I think the answer to your question is quite simple, Madame Trant." the young ifrit said, doing his best to resist the rather....fragrant odor of the tavern. "The people who come here are so used to being kicked around, they can't imagine anything else. What do you think of that argument, Stig?"
Riveh poured some of the pungent liquor into his dirty tin cup, and swirled it around. The brown liquid seemed to have curdled somewhat, and it clung to the rim of the cup. Disgusting.
He glances back a the surly Sir, "I am curious Stig. How did you become a knight, anyway? People used to places like this rarely get to hold titles. I bet it is an interesting story that rightly burnishes our empire's reputation as a land that rewards bravery, skill and intelligence."
Riveh tips back the glass and drinks the foul brown stuff inside.
On the Geminus estate, the overseer had been named Kert, a surly old man who cursed as much as Stig. Bent and aged, he was never seen without a lip full of tobacco, one of his many vices. The disgusting habit had revolted Riveh's mother however, and she insisted that Kert only spit into a container when he was indoors, even if only in a barn. Riveh had never really seen the improvement, but Kert had always followed the order.
Years later, long after Kert had passed away and Riveh was a young man, the ifrit found himself in the barn after a long hot ride. A farmhand had given Riveh a cup of water, but the nobleman had set it down while currying the horse. When he reached for it, his hand didn't find the cup f clear well-water but instead a long forgotten bottle of Kert's spittle. The foul tobbaco juice had sat through hot summers and cold winters for over a decade, becoming a drowning place for generations of flies and their spawn. It was this fouls pew that Riveh tipped and drank long and deep, hoping to quench a dry and thirsty throat.
The drink from the Brassiered Lady tasted worse then that.
Riveh choked, sputtered and retched, spitting up a wad of phlegm (and maybe worse) onto the floor.
After he slowly mastered his throat, Riveh croaked, "Times are bad Stig, but not bad enough to deserve this. Aroden's eyes, that was awful."
Wiping his mouth (and gods curse him if the acidic drink didn't burn his hand) Riveh went on, "Let me do the talking if Barely's men show up. I want to give them a chance to walk away. I honestly doubt they will, riled up drunks aren't the type to walk quietly, but maybe we'll get lucky."
Still wincing he added, "Do we want to follow them right back to Barely or not? We could just make one of the thugs lead us to him. Maybe that will go better then politely asking."
"The people who come here are so used to being kicked around, they can't imagine anything else. What do you think of that argument, Stig?"
The knight initially gave a shrug of the head and looked into his cup by way of reply, as if reluctant to agree with anything at all Riveh might have to say, however innocuous. "'S'fair enough," he relented. "Poor sods here don't know anythin' else. I didn't before I left Oppara."
"Oh, was there an Oppara back then?" the Dame sniped, some of her sardonic wit apparently having recovered from her initial shock at the establishment. Or were her nerves just latching onto what was familiar? "I had assumed your youth to coincide with mastodons roaming the plains."
Stig looked grim as only an old man insulted by someone half his age can at this remark. Whatever had he done to deserve being saddled with these brats, honestly? "Milady, the only great hairy behemoth here is sitting opposite me in a skirt."
Recognizing that he was standing in a brief window of time before an incensed Trant hurled the table away to get at the thug, the ifrit very wisely elected to change the topic of conversation, asking the latter about his curios ascension to nobility. It was a peculiar occurrence, after all, even disregarding the man's vulgarity. Some would look to someone like Stig earning a title as a sure sign that the world had reached the End Times, that whatever variant of the apocalypse they believed in was fast approaching. Riveh even detected some faint curiosity from the young noblewoman, flaring nostrils notwithstanding. But they were both to be disappointed.
"We've been over this, boy," he growled, the rumblings of his low burr not quite a threat but certainly hinting at one, like standing at a foul-smelling cave mouth and hearing the snarls of some nameless beast. "Drop it." The danger was not quite extinguished as he downed another glassful of misery.
The Dame crossed her arms at this non-answer, obviously unsatisfied, but did not inquire further. In all likelihood she did not want to give the thug the satisfaction of denying her anything more, given how thoroughly irate she was with him at the moment. Still, the statuesque features softened after a moment. Riveh felt she looked deep in thought, perhaps on his own words about the clientele that frequented such a shop as this. Her eyes rowed from the sooty lanterns to the dark corners of the place to the unmarked jugs and bottles behind the counter to a mysterious stain on her wobbly chair that caused her to shoot up and swap it for another. There was revolt in her gaze. But the ifrit also detected dumb disbelief, as if she struggling with and failing to understand his assertion of a life with so few prospects that drunken oblivion became enticing. His earlier guess had likely been correct; she really had led a sheltered life.
Perhaps he should see what the fuzz was about himself. "Geminus, you're not really going to..." she said in shock as the ifrit let the foul liquid sink to his gut. Where it promptly morphed into a dozen scurrying rats. At seeing his retching and coughing, Trant slammed her own glass onto the table and looked at it as it could explode at any second. Stig only chuckled. That bit of good humor only lasted until Riveh recovered and could explain his plan forward, however.
"Still tryin' to earn a bleedin' sainthood, boy? These aren't just drunks, they're drunken thugs - they know the game they've got themselves into. I say we kill however many of the dumb c*nts it takes for the big man to show up himse..." Aged though he was, the ruffian wasn't deaf. And neither was Riveh. He heard what caused the man to suddenly stop mid-sentence. There were footfalls outside, several of them, all clumsy. Loud voices accompanied them. A group was approaching the pub.
"Thissit?" a shabby man asked far too loudly in peering in through the door, as if unable to control his volume. "Yeah, yeah, this is it!" some companion of his answered, slurring his own words. "I've been here afore, this is the place."
In came a group of... five? Six? Seven? It was difficult to tell exactly with how disorderly they were, not to mention their swaying; the hovel was so small they're couldn't all fit in immediately, and the ifrit spied a few more outside. Regardless, they were all inordinately scruffy men, dressed in stained and tattered clothing. Every one of them looked like they had slept in a gutter, and Riveh recognized that this was likely true. And yet they seemed lively enough, even in good humor, though the explanation for this was obvious enough. They were clearly already inebriated.
"Where's the drink? Where is it! Aha ha harh!" one bellowed, the barkeep soon running to his station. His nervous query on how much he could serve them was met with laughter, however. "Enuff to burn! Enuff to burn!" several spoke in unison, the call having the odd quality of a recital. "Master Barley said we could take however much we wanted... as long as we left enuff to burn the sh*thole down! Ha ha harh! C'mon, boys!"
The drunken mob flipped some chairs and began climbing the counter, very inexpertly, heading straight for the tantalizing booze behind it.
"Stig, for once will you listen-" Riveh's retort breaks off as the Brassiered Lady suddenly gains some new guests. It only takes a few seconds for Riveh to realize this is the group they have been waiting for, Barley's liquored up thugs. They seem to be....exactly what he expected. Dirty drunk idiots happy to smash up a tavern for kicks.
Not the best clay to work with, but he would make do.
Riveh stood up and strode to the center of the room.
"Gentlemen!" he roared, waving his hands and casting a Light spell on his fingers. In a second they flashed into glittering golden light, bright in the gloomy interior of the dingy tavern.
"My name is Riveh and I am hear to speak to your boss, Barley. He is in danger and I'm here to make him an offer. Which one of you is in charge?"
Not the best clay to work with indeed. As the drunken tramps tossed everything between them and the dingy drinking hole's stash of sweet, numbing booze, Riveh knew that swaying them with words would be near impossible. These weren't just thugs, after all. If he'd understood Barley's business right, these were addicts, their master consolidating his power via turning himself into their only access to their craving. It was as despicable a scheme as he'd ever heard. Doubtlessly effective, however. The common idea of herding cats certainly wouldn't be made any easier by giving said cats a tipple.
And yet. The ifrit undeniably made an impressive figure in striding forward in a flash of golden light, the drab surroundings only emphasizing his comparative dignity like a pearl in porridge. Such was the effect of his sudden appearance that he actually managed to catch the attention of a few of the vagrants.
"Hanh?" a red-faced man squawked, his face bloated and puffy from years of drink. He looked suspicious and surprised in equal measure at Riveh. "What are yer on about? What's ah, you want with the boss?"
"Don't try to stop us now!" another warned, looking hatefully - and fearfully - at the two figures behind the ifrit, both Trant and Stig now brandishing their weapons. Neither moved just yet, though. They were willing to let Riveh try his way first.
"Geminus..." the stern voice of the Dame still felt it necessary to call out. She pointed to the back of the bar where the riotous hooligans had found the place's stash beneath a hatch in the floor. The barkeep was getting increasingly desperate, and they were surely seconds away from coming to blows.
"Tell your men to stand down!" Riveh shouts and raises Dignity's Barb. The crossbow feels heavy and solid in his hands, and he points it at the thugs harassing the barkeep. "Or I'll clean out your friend's ear with this."
"As for what we want Barley for, we want to make him a deal. An offer that he would be wise to listen to." Riveh, very loudly, clicks the hammer on the crossbow, the mettalic sound carrying quite well.
"To use a cliché, we can do this the easy way or the hard way. The easy way is you back off and take us to Barley, leaving this tavern in peace. The hard way is we beat the directions to Barley out of you and you leave with a few broken bones and worse. Now hurry up, I have better things to do."
Where words had failed, the sight of a bolt aimed their way succeeded; Riveh finally had the full attention of the drunken mob. Well, as much attention as their ethanol addled minds could muster, anyway. One after the other, five pairs of bleary eyes looked up from their precious bounty to the ifrit as the vagrants understood that their simple little job was not to be so simple after all. The riotous revelry, fueled by what inebriation they were already feeling, with which they had set to looting quieted to an uncomfortable silence. Riveh could practically see what little power remained in the booze-soaked sponges the thugs had for brains work hard to process this development and how to respond. But already he could detect the growing anger radiating from their red faces.
"You're warnin' them when you could be killin' them..." Stig grumbled immediately behind him, despite the fact that he himself was no doubt adding weight to the ifrit's threat. In the gloomy light of the tavern little could be seen of the gruff man but the large bow he held high and primed into the glare of Riveh's magical gleam. It was a stark thing, as cruel in its simplicity as his own legendary crossbow was majestic in its detail. As a statement it worked wonders, however, as did Malphene to his other side. The strongest light source being so close, in the form of the ifrit's glowing hand, made shadows play over her towering form deceptively, making her appear even more titanic in the petty hovel. Of course, the low roof of the place already hardly accommodating the dame only added to the effect. She too had drawn her weapon and stood ready, though Riveh noted that she had done away with the exotic axe from the underground archive. Now she held a handsome blade in a double-handed grip, a longsword in the classic Taldan style. The thing almost looked petite in her hands.
"Gnh... C'mon! Away! Away to the master!" the hooligan he had been addressing, one of the few who had actually followed his every word, cried out fearfully to his nearest companion. "The master'll know what to do!"
"But won't he...?" the other asked nervously. The ifrit's threat seemed to have almost sobered them.
"C'mon, I say!" The pair turned tail and fled, quickly followed by a third man after a moment of indecision, stumbling and crashing into the door frame before escaping. This still left five now thoroughly irate drunkards, however.
"Ye think you can boss us around?!" A sharp crack rang out. One angry lush over by the hatch had broken a bottle over the counter, now brandishing the sticky wet points of the glass in Riveh's direction. "I'm done takin' order from uppity sh*ts l-like you! Done, ye hear!" Even standing several feet away from him, the ifrit could smell the hoppy stink on the man's breath as he hollered. "This here's ours! Yer not takin' it!" The others bellowed in agreement, their alcohol-induced stupid fury boiling over. Pulling knives - not even daggers but makeshift shivs - from deep pockets, the incensed thugs appeared ready to fight for some jugs of the worst swill the ifrit had ever tasted.
A fight was about to break out. Riveh could feel it, that slight change. The angry shouts, the tightness of muscles, the shifting of people's eyes. More then the pulled weapons, it was those little things that signaled this was escalating past mere words to violence. Riveh only had a moment to derail things or soon Stig would have is wish, and they would have to bust some heads. Granted, beating up a few drunks wasn't the end of the world but scrambling around on the disgusting floor of the Brassiered Lady was...demeaning.
Riveh had already clambered through a sewer today.
So the ifrit took two steps, got between the loudest drunk and the bar, and smacked him with the crossbow.
The butt nailed the thug right between the eyes.
"Don't be an idiot. I really don't want to have to kill one of you, but I will if I have to." He leaned forward and placed the crossbow gently against the thug's ever so slightly concussed skull.
What would the nation's historians have to say if they knew what was occurring in Crownsgate at this moment? What degree of surprise, shock and horror would they express if they knew that not only had an artifact of the Seventh Army of Exploration survived to this day intact, the famed General Gerefein's prized crossbow at that, but it was currently being used to batter a nameless drunk over the head in a bar brawl? Riveh Geminus wasn't in the best position to consider questions such as these right now, but he did know now this: the lacquered wood of the weapon made a damn satisfying thud in colliding with the thug's skull.
"Bluh?!" Very literally raving and bawling and hollering for a fight though they were, the vagrants had apparently not been prepared for the ifrit to take them up on the invitation and simply stride up to nail one of them right between the eyes. Arms windmilling about in shock and confusion, the poor man staggered backwards at the blow, teetering... teetering... only to fall back on his bum like the world's most inelegant tree. He stared up at Riveh, now cross-eyed. "Ey, whaddya think yer doin' to Ezmar?!" one of his compatriots cried in protest as they finally, furiously, registered what had happened. Not Ezmar, though. No, that poor sap finally managed to focus his sight on his assailant, and when he had done so Riveh could only see one thing there: fright. He scrambled backward down the hall to get away from him.
"You little sh*t! I'll get you fer that!" Incensed at this affront to one of his brothers (or just by the alcohol coursing his veins), the nearest vagrant leapt at the ifrit, almost literally so; the counter separating them necessitated him hopping belly-down on the surface to reach him. It was a ludicrous assault, the kind that only a drunk could even contemplate. And yet. Cayden Cailean himself must have guided this inebriated soul's hand as the wild flailing of the broken bottle with which he was being attacked actually managed to cut Riveh across the cheek, drawing blood.
"Geminus!" Trant called out sharply behind him, whether in alarm at him getting hurt, or in reproach at him allowing himself to get hit by such an inexpert attack he wasn't sure. Regardless, it was a shallow cut, more damaging to his pride than anything else. At least he knew that the jagged edges of bottle were so soaked in high-proof hooch as to be sterilized. "Wah!" Emboldened by the ruffian's success, however, more followed, one staggering up to the ifrit with his shiv held high.
Blinded as he was by rage and drink both, though, it was no wonder that Riveh easily evaded him. Shaky as his footing was, the fool was almost sent to the floor by his own wild swing as he stabbed empty air. But significantly more determined footsteps followed; the Dame stomped into the foray like... well, like the earlier mentioned mastodon, huge and full of righteous indignation.
"That is enough!" she shouted in grabbing the flask-wielding thug by the hair. "Stop this ridiculous performance right now!" Riveh felt the entire shop shake as she proceeded to first lift up and then slam the man's head into the counter.
He slid off the sticky table with a groan and was out like a light. And he wasn't the only one: a sharp whistle sounded through the tavern followed by a dull thud, after which another drunk cried out in shock. Stig had just launched an arrow precariously near the ifrit and noblewoman to fly into a thug's shoulder.
"How in the hells did you manage to get hit by that one, boy?" the knight chuckled and pointed to his own sallow cheek. The perforated thug fell to the floor clutching his wound. "Oh, watch yourself. Here comes another one," he went on sarcastically. "Don't get killed now 'cause if you do I'm dumpin' your stupid corpse in a ditch."
Another inebriated miss from a bum who could barely see straight. No, Riveh didn't think there was any particular danger of the Geminus line ending in a Crownsgate gutter.
Riveh's annoyance grows (and is alloyed with outright contempt) as he watches the one-sided fight unfold around him. It is obvious the drunks are no match for even him, let alone Stig or Trant. The bumbling fools seems to have as much trouble standing up as finding their targets. The luckily slice of his cheek only frustrates him, although the angry buzz of pain adds an edge to his dark mood.
Which is why the usually cool ifrit lets out a curse when yet another man stumbles at him, one hot enough to even make Stig raise an eyebrow.
"For the love of all the gods, dead and living, give it up man!" he says, dodging the wavering attack with ease. "We are trying very hard not to kill you, but you are trying my patience! Throw down that *amned knife, you idiot."
"Or do you intend to fight all three of us, on your own? To the death?"
Forties? Fifties even? It was difficult enough to guess the age of a red-faced alcoholic as was, given the damage enough drink did to a person. But a red-faced alcoholic tramp? Any such unfortunate soul was given to be aged far beyond his years. Still, the stubbly man last to take a swipe at Riveh had to have seen forty winters, at least, and cold ones at that. Which made the sight of the young nobleson half his age giving the aging drunk a reproach the like of which he probably hadn't received from anyone since his own mother all the more incongruous. He initially stared at the ifrit in blank shock, fading into remorseful realization as the biting words rained his way. He swayed uncertainly.
"But, uh... Ye don't... The boss - Master Barley, he..."
The man clearly didn't know how to explain his actions in burpling his way through a defense. This might have frustrated Riveh even further, if not for the look in the hazy eyes. It wasn't pigheadedness or misplaced pride he saw there. No, it was fear. The thug didn't dare do anything but attack the interlopers out of fear. What did this mean?
"Whaddaya doin'?!" his companion bellowed next to him, loud as only the inebriated can be. "Help meh kill these whore sons!" The ifrit could smell the sweat and booze on him.
"Geminus, why are you talking to these dogs?" Behind him the Dame was looking very displeased indeed. She was wiping something or other from her hand onto her dress with visible disgust, apparently some remnant left over when she had grabbed the one vagrant by his greasy hair. "You can't reason with riffraff such as this. Stand aside. I will end this charade if you won't." Feeling her strong hand on his shoulder, Riveh was pushed (gently but forcefully) aside as Trant passed him in the narrow quarters, clearly determined to subdue the two remaining lackeys. "People like these only understand *GASP*!"
"Yah!"
Many held that Cayden Cailean had passed the test of the Starstone by drunken luck alone. This particular drunk was not the next Cayden, but the wild swing with which he managed to just swipe at the towering noblewoman's pale neck was undoubtedly a lucky one. He only missed an artery by a hair's breadth. The Dame clutched at her neck, momentarily stunned. Only after a second did she withdraw her hand in wide-eyed bewilderment, a piddly smear of blood on her palm. And then - Riveh could feel it before it happened. Just as one adapted one's posture to picture perfection before the Grand Prince, something sloughed off within Trant, some posturing she had adopted and worn since meeting with her again. It was in her bearing before it reached her face. But when it reached there, those statuesque features were barely recognizable twisted into fiendish fury.
The crack from what was undoubtedly a now very broken nose rang out in the tavern. Trant's fist sent the thug crumpling to the floor with all the grace of a sack of potatoes. With the one blow, he was out and done. But the Dame apparently wasn't. "How dare you? How dare you?!" An enraged kick followed to the already unconscious drunk. "Know your betters, scum! You don't ever lay your hand on me, do you hear?! You are filth! You are nothing!" The kicks turned into vicious stomping, the floorboards creaking beneath the body being battered. "Lowlife scum, how dare you?!"
And they had been doing so well. In an instant the image of the newly restrained, civil and even sympathetic Trant was gone, and Riveh recalled her as he had first met her: a domineering bully. No, at the Gala she had enjoyed her ministrations. Now she was simply furious. Which was worse? A clunk distracted him as the one vagrant still standing, the one he had reproached, dropped his makeshift knife to the floor. He was clearly not willing to fight anymore. Neither was his downed companion in any state to do so, though if the Dame didn't stop now he wouldn't be in any state for anything at all ever again. Her next stomp was likely to crack ribs, if not kill the fool outright.
Riveh watched the drunk slash Trant's wrist, giving her little more then an embellished papercut. Far scarier is seeing Trant transform into a towering figure of noble vengeance and anger. It was an ugly sight, to see the refined posture and bearing give way to sheet spite and violence. Even uglier then the battered tavern, which was saying something.
Still, watching her prepare to main the drunk, Riveh does consider allowing her to finish the job. It wasn't as if he was feeling all to kindly to the thugs right now, with blood dripping down his china nd his face on fire. These idiots had tried to destroy this business, hurt people and then to start a fight with them. Trant wasn't far off by calling them scum.
Even so.
Riveh clambered over and did his best to get within Trant's red-tinged field of view.
"Madame! Enough!" he spreads his arms. "I'm not saying you are wrong, but I can't let you stomp a man to death. He isn't worth it and besides, Barely will probably listen better if we show up without having killed some of his friends...collegues....thugs." He trails off, after realizing Barely probably didn't give two shakes if these men died.
Shrugging, and trying to add a bit of levity to cut through her anger. "I think the fight is over. Besides, you'll soil your dress."
He also glanced at Stig to see if the foul-mouthed knight was taking the chance to finish someone off. Riveh didn't put it past the ruffian.
Yes, Riveh decided. Probably best to stop the Dame before she turned this guy into something resembling the leftover pulp from a grape treading. Now if only he could manage doing so without turning himself into the target of her rabid retaliation.
But as it happened Trant ceased her vicious stomping immediately, almost physically recoiling at his words as if doused with ice water. She stood still, swaying slightly with her head nearly touching the low ceiling, and gasped for air, her exertion seemingly more so emotional than physical; her terrible countenance had shifted to one of mild confusion. She looked to him. And from there the ifrit had a first-row seat to the spectacle that was the noblewoman's sculpted features slowly shifting into tightly drawn horror, face pale, mouth tight and eyes wide. What was this now? Was she ashamed of her excessive response? Of her temper? Was she aghast at having nearly killed someone?
For a moment the Dame did a decent impression of a gasping fish, opening and closing her mouth as if she wanted to say something, while Riveh defused the situation. In the end she said nothing, however - whether due to will or inability was difficult to say - although the ifrit's levity seemed to calm her down just a bit. Instead she suddenly decided to march past him again back to the table they had shared where she tore up the cup she had vehemently refused earlier. This time the acrid swill passed her lips in a single gulp, and she remained standing there looking into a filthy wall. Behind her a very dubious looking Stig shifted his narrow gaze from her to Riveh. He pointed his crude bow in her direction. 'The hell was that?' his dark eyes seemed to say, somewhat accusingly. Wait, what had he done? He wasn't the one who'd just tried to flatten a man.
"Right then!" the knavish knight went, clearly eager to move past whatever this bit of melodrama was. Bloody kids. "Congrats, boy. You got what you wanted; the stupid sods are all alive. You can still become pope. Idiot." He angled over to the bar, casting a discerning eye on the aftermath. "Well, all 'cept the poor bastard the big girl turned into beetroot marmalade."
Still not looking back, the Dame's shoulders nevertheless tensed noticeably.
"No, wait," he went on as a gurgle suddenly escaped the mauled thug. "Huh. Weeds don't forego so easily, I guess. Stupid c*nt's alive."
Trant's shoulders relaxed.
"So are we questionin' these dolts or what? Wasn't that Barley joker supposed to be here?" Riveh looked round the dingy drinking hole. Not withstanding some upended furniture and three pummeled drunks littering its already dirty floor, the establishment had taken no noticeable damage. Two thugs remained conscious, both of which he'd battered into submission, one with harsh words and the other with the butt of his crossbow. Neither looked to have any fight left in them.
Riveh let out a sign of relief when Trant chose not to kick in a helpless man's ribs. Not that the drunk was a sterling addition to Oppara, but killing him in cold blood seemed....well, cruel.
That said, Riveh worried about this growing bond between them. It didn't exactly shock the ifrit that two people, who had lived through the last few days together, should grow closer but it was still scary. Trant's little...outburst there showed that, under whatever other layers she may posses, she did have a very negative and hateful side to her. The bully he saw in the Senate chambers had not been a mirage or an illusion. It was a part of Trant as surely as her height or noble bearing.
And yet, she seemed relived the man had lived. Was that still due to Riveh's judgement or was it honest regret at something done in the heat of the moment? Did anyone know?
Riveh turned to Stig, and back to the business at hand, "Only two questions really. Can they walk and lead us back to Barely? I don't think we can trust them to send back a message. Clearly I overestimated their level of professionalism in my first plan."
He turned toward the still harried looking bartender, "Hey bar keep! We just saved your inn for no charge. Do you have anything to drink that doesn't taste like decade old horse piss?"
The your ifrit turned back toward the beaten drunks, "So, what'll it be, friends? A nice walk back to headquarters or a few more knocks to the head?"
"Huh? Oh yes! Oh yes yes yes, of course!" the shabby barkeep of the shabbier still tavern exclaimed at Riveh's query, clumsily recovering his simpering occupational mask after the fright of nearly losing his business. "Yes, a reward is, uh, certainly in order, sir," he nodded. "And thank you! Thank you kindly, sir! I'll, uh... I keep some good stuff in the back. I'll just..."
"Go on, be a toad and hop to it," Stig grumbled dismissively as the pear-shaped proprietor looked unsure whether he was allowed to leave through one of the doors. Strangely, the man looked to the trio as if they themselves had just claimed the place, as if besting the drunks was akin to warring tribes of savages fighting for land. Gratefully he scurried away.
"F*ckin' idiot..." the knight spat, turning to his young companion. "Little early to celebrate, boy. Savin' this sh*theap wasn't the deal, we're just supposed to kill Barley. Or pay 'im off, whatever..." What lank black hair remained on his scalp bobbed back and forth as he shook his head at Riveh's obviously unreasonable, not to mention childish, plan. Kids, pah! "Let's break some thumbs, learn what we can from these ninnies, and be on our way."
While the breaking of fingers was not on his agenda (not yet, anyway), the ifrit did want to see whether any use could be extracted from the thugs. So with this in mind he approached the two of them still capable of speech, albeit slurred, and tried the proverbial honey before using the vinegar.
"So, what'll it be, friends? A nice walk back to headquarters or a few more knocks to the head?"
The vagrants exchanged a bloodshot look. There it was again, Riveh noted: fear. There was obvious fear in their eyes. He had seen it earlier in the open-mouthed dumb expression of the tramp he had reproached, and now that same man answered him, seeing as his compatriot simply remained on the floor shaking his head.
"We... we cannae... We can't go back," the middle-aged lush began, clearly struggling to string coherent thought into words with his addled mind. "Not now. Not havin'... failed him. The boss... Master Barley, he... He'd..." A genuine shudder went through his sweat-stained and filthy form. Saliva dripped into the stubble as he suddenly stared into nothing, bleary eyes wet in fright.
"Don't!" the other abruptly shouted from the floor, very sharply. He had curled up into a ball. "We can't say that!"
The tramp appeared to regain some focus at this. "The barrels..." he said, almost in a whisper. Then, affixing his wandering gaze back onto the ifrit: "I can't. Please dun' make me go back. The boss'd be angry." By the heavens, but he made for a pitiful sight, this homeless drunk, a fully grown man quivering in his ragged boots like a child caught in some caper and now afraid to go home for the beating his mother would give him. But the fear was genuine.
"The piss is this now?" Stig wondered at this display, obviously annoyed though also taken aback. "Your Barley managed to whip some loyalty into you drunken bastards beyon' the whole addiction angle?" Riveh almost thought he looked impressed. "Heh. Alright, I guess I'm gettin' to see how far back those fingers bend, after all..."
"Geminus." Trant's call was as clear and concise as it was abrupt. Whipping his head back to her, the ifrit found her seemingly having recovered from her little episode, standing tall and proud as ever, though she wasn't looking to him. Instead she was casting a mistrustful glare towards the door. And from there he immediately understood what it was she had seen fit to warn him about: there was a man standing in the doorway. Filling it, actually.
His head nearly reached the very top of the threshold, Riveh saw, as he stepped inside, slowly. Tall, but rakishly thin. And on the topic of steps, no shoes. The man's feet were completely bare, gnarled ugly planks accustomed to filthy floors such as the tavern's. But then the aforementioned towering head was equally bare; no hairs were visible along the smooth dome, nor on what he could see of the face - his heavy brow was naked. The ifrit could only see the top half of the strangely rough visage, however, as the man's tattered brown jacket's high collar was buttoned all the way up and over his nose, obscuring his features. Actually, was he... naked under the garment? The notion entered Riveh's mind, unbidden as it was, at the bare feet and hands, the latter being just as knotted and misshapen as the former. He made an intensely bizarre sight standing there, just looking, and the most bizarre of all was this: he was yellow. Every part of skin Riveh could see beneath the obscuring coat, from head to hands to feet, was an uncomfortable muted tone of yellow, like urine after a night of revelry. Who in the world was this man? No, the ifrit's nose demanded answer to a more pressing question: where had this man been? By every hell, he stank. Only now catching a whiff of him, Riveh nearly recoiled. The drunks had smelled of drink, yes, but this man stank like an entire distillery, heady waves of alcohol and fermentation coming off him in waves. And yet his stance seemed steady without any obvious sign of inebriation.
Behind the ifrit the tramp fell to his knees. "M-master Barley..."
Idiots Riveh thought to himself, as he watched the drunks refuse to help. What was this? Stupid enough to attack despite being hopelessly outnumbered but loyal enough to hold out against torture? Something didn't smell right about this. Still, he shrugged as Stig reached for a still unbroken thumb. They needed answers and a bit of pain wouldn't kill anyone.
This all changed when the new figure walked in. Riveh stood up, eyeing the strange man. While this was surely Barley (that had been plain even before the thug's croak) he hadn't been at all what Riveh had expected. The ifrit had expected to see a fat man with an evil eye and little wisdom. The usual sort of tough that roamed the lower streets of Oppara (or at least who Riveh imagined was usual). Not this...creature.
Was Barley even human. Hiding their face and skin that color...it made Riveh's flesh crawl. Still, time to play out this scene.
He looked the newcomer in the eye and said, plainly, "Barley? My name is Riveh and I have been sent by the Brotherhood to kill you. I would much rather give you a few coins and send you out of the city. What do you say to that?" No diplomacy, no threat, just a bald statement of fact. Riveh wondered how this weird man would take. Would the mention of a death threat from the Brotherhood shake him? Would he simply attack? Would he laugh?
Anything and everything suddenly seemed possible and Riveh felt the initative slip from his fingers.
Filthy floorboards creaked as the man - the creature? - presumed to be the notorious Barley took another few bare footed steps into the Brassiered Lady. A sooty lantern set to swaying lightly as his bare head knocked into it, seemingly strangely careless of its presence. The resulting dance of shadows about the murky hut only added to the unnatural air that had befallen it. Yes, he was tall, Riveh noted. A great reed stalk of a man. Though not quite as lofty as the Dame, and nowhere near as well built. In fact, despite the dirtied coat obscuring so much of him, he appeared almost morbidly thin, unhealthily so. Coupled with the yellow skin, one almost assumed the man sick. And yet nothing in his stance betrayed any such weakness.
As for the young noblewoman, she clearly felt it too. Riveh saw her casting uneasy glances his way in between glaring at the bar's newest guest. Beside him even Stig was wary, his eyes nearly disappearing in a mistrustful web of crows' feet. Both gripped their wapons. The same disquiet thrumming inside him was in them. Barley was not what any of them had expected. Still, the ifrit was not deterred, not entirely. He had accepted the possible failure of his bribery scheme from the outset, after all. While he preferred not having to kill anyone, the gang leader's death being necessary was something he had come to terms with. As unexpected a personage as this Barley had turned out to be, that much hadn't changed. He should still make the offer.
Standing undaunted and speaking clearly, Riveh relayed his proposal. It did not have the desired effect. Namely, it initially had no effect at all. The tall stranger merely stood there, not even turning his direction. Had he even heard him? A tense second passed. Then another. And only then did the man slowly crane his obscured neck his way to have their eyes meet. Yellow. His eyes were yellow too, the pale amber of a high-proof liquor with the tiniest pinprick of a black pupil floating in their middle. It was an intense, thoroughly inhuman stare. But the ifrit did not see madness glowing from it, as he had feared. There was cunning in those eyes. He just wasn't sure said cunning followed any human logic.
And then, happiest of happy occurrences, he spoke: "Brother... hood?"
What accent was that? Even with the voice being singularly bizarre, a slow hissing like the fizzle of a newly poured beer, it was the accent that threw Riveh off. His mind somehow connected it to the far east, something beyond even hated Katapesh, though he wasn't sure why. It sounded foreign, as if the obscured mouth only barely managed the stressed interplay of vowels of the Taldane language. Although when the man spoke again, it was with some degree of assuredness.
"Brotherhood," he repeated. The slightest of nods followed which Riveh thought was more so for himself than any listener. Did Barley not immediately know what he had meant? "I know the Brotherhood. They sent you... to kill me?" This did not seem to phase him. "Goood."
The last utterance fizzled and popped like a foaming ale. Good? Having the largest criminal organization in the nation, not to mention most infamous assassination guild, out for your head was good? "Cheats and... frauds. Rooogues. That is all they are. They are weak. They do not know... control like I do."
Barley lifted a knotted hand, gnarled fingers stretched wide. He indicated the terrified drunks within, and, the ifrit just noticed, a few more thugs behind him, standing just outside the doorway. It was the three tramps he had scared off earlier, before the fight had broken out. So they had run off to tell their boss? He must have been waiting close by to come here so soon. They now appeared pitifully subservient, not even looking at their leader, their heads instead bowed to the ground. "Your people are weak. Your master died tonight, killed by... his own. Weeeak. So easily enslaved. Thralls... to your own thirst. I am... not like you. Show me to them." The yellow eyes took on a firm light. "Show me to them. The slums are... mine. The Brotherhood sent you. Lead me to them. I will kill them."
Riveh considered that he may have to reevaluate this Barley. Perhaps he really was mad. Take on the Brotherhood? Ludicrous. And what if he refused? "Then..." the rakish man responded, taking a single step closer. The stench permeating him immediately assailed the ifrit once more. It wasn't the reek of alcohol, he realized, not really. No, it was the heady smell of proto-beverages, the earthy fermentation of hops and... well, barley. It was all the vapor of a hundred-year old distillery tank infused into one person, and it was eye-watering. It was only in having to look away from him for a moment that Riveh noticed it: a corked glass bottle of something no doubt vile rested on the counter immediately beside him. It was bubbling. The liquid within was bubbling and boiling, the sizzling growing stronger with every step from Barley. What in the world? Suddenly the tension was brought up and over the edge with a great clatter; the trio jumped at the noise and looked behind them. The portly barkeep stood there, shocked as anyone. In his grasp were the remains of a bottle, supposedly of 'the good stuff' he had been directed to fetch. It had exploded in his hand.
"Then I kill you."
Riveh felt the atmosphere change when Barley spoke. The man's voice had a strange unsettling buzz to it, that made Riveh shiver. Instantly he could see his hope of convincing a two-bit would-be gangster with a few coins to leave the city was stupid, ludicrous. Whatever this man was, it wasn't that.
Riveh's scheme became more patently ridiculous as Barley went on with his monologue. The ifrit felt, a bit, as if he was in one of the classic stories, where the villain laid out his evil plan before the hero. And yet it wasn't as silly or humorous as Riveh had thought such a scene would go. Instead he felt dread weighing down his limbs as this weird, alien man laid out his plans to kill the most powerful criminal organization in the city.
It became clear by the end of the man's words that negotiation was not possible. This was not simply a matter of underground turf wars over money and profit. This...Barley was not just another criminal. Not only were his plans repellent, his control over the stumbling drunks worried Riveh. This was not simple intimidation or bribery, whatever Lors thought. Besides, mere thugs couldn't make alcohol bubble from across the room.
Nope, this called for a more....Stig-ian response.
"Stig." Riveh said, turning his head away from the creepy figure ahead of them with an effort. "I think you were right. Let's kill him."
"Boy..." Stig huffed, visibly steeling himself with a uneasy smirk in the face of whatever manner of unholy fiend this was they were about to fight, "that's the most sensible thing you've said all f*ckin' day." Huh. That faint glint of approval in the jagged smile was oddly gratifying. The knight reached for his quiver and it was on; Riveh's words had been the starting whistle, and they were already past that magical point, that precarious mark where fear and animosity turned from the emotional to the physical, where tension broke out into violence. This was now life and death combat, and everyone present knew it.
Given this knowledge, Barley's immediate action seemed as strange as most everything else about him. He reached a gnarled hand up to his high collar and began unbuttoning it. "Fool... You are weak. Weak." The voice, that strange hissing voice like gasses escaping a cork, grew clearer though no more pleasant as the layer of dirtied coat began falling away in tugs, the buttons slipping their holds. "Weeeak. You cannot kill me." And then, final stud tearing to drop onto the floor, the top half of the jacket fell open.
Trant gasped. "What the hell is this freak?" Stig cursed. And as for Riveh? His mind was momentarily transported back to the rural childhood home that had passed for the Geminus estate. There he had observed a snake raiding a duck's nest one summer. It had been one of the most peculiar sights to befall the young boy in his still short life. The serpent couldn't possibly eat the comparatively massive egg, after all. It was a fool's errand! And yet it had stretched its mouth around one end, and then begun to gape, and gape, and gape... And what had seemed impossible one moment inched ever closer to reality as its jaws just continued to distend and reach further, beyond any measure of reason. As a spectacle it was terrible in its morbidity, knowing that this bizarre act of gluttony could only end in either an unborn life consumed or the serpent torn apart in its own voracity. And yet the snake had ultimately been victorious, its greed rewarded. The common idiom of having 'eyes bigger than one's stomach' had lost all meaning to the boy that day.
The ifrit couldn't help but think back to this errant childhood memory now. Because the moment the coat fell, he saw that snake in Barley. His mouth. It just... kept going. Whatever Barley was, he had no lips. Instead his mouth was a blunt slit seemingly without end. Where others could draw the corners of their smile high, here they trailed along the yellow skin further and further, down the cheek, down the jaw, down the neck even. The mouth extended all the way to his bare shoulders. And then he opened it. "You cannot kill me!" he hissed. By every god, the teeth. They encompassed the entire length of the maw, and that was what it was, Riveh recognized. This was no mouth. It was a maw, an entire toothed throat capable of distending beyond the limits of the grotesque, and he knew that given the time, the monster that Barley was could swallow him whole. Just as the serpent had done in his nightmares as a child.
The Dame, obviously disturbed, nearly shrieked as Barley suddenly bolted for her with a fluidity and speed belying his stature. She only just managed to instinctively bring up her arms as he slammed a misshapen hand of his own towards her. She wasn't ready. Riveh could see that he had caught her wide-open. She was easy prey. Which made it all the more confusing when he didn't strike at her, instead grabbing her by the wrist.
"Wha..." the confused noblewoman sputtered in regaining her bearing. She struggled against the knotted fingers latched about her arms. "What do you think you're doing, monster?! Unhand me! Un... graah." An alarmed expression came over Trant's eyes as she suddenly groaned and feebly clutched at her own stomach with her sword-arm. "What did...? What did you...? Eerp!" She gagged, violently. The ifrit could only look on as the Dame began retching pitifully, her face red, saliva running down her chin, and the usually so proud stance crumpled together. What? What had Barley just done to her?
Whatever it was, he obviously felt confident in having negated whatever threat she might have posed. Letting go of her hand, he simply turned on her, ignoring the young woman completely in setting his yellow glare on Riveh.
Riveh's dread turns to horror and revulsion as the...thing called Barley reveals itself. The alien mouth makes his gorge rise and the ifrit can taste the noxious liquor he just drank tickle the back of his throat. What was this yellow monstrosity? Had Lors known what this thing was, had it been a set-up?
No, surely even a street hard gangster would have given something away, if he had sent a man to fight this monster. That disgust and horror would have reflected in the street thug's eyes. No, Barley was something unknown, and it clearly had to be stopped.
Then he watched Trant go down like a woman struck by the vapors. The imposing noblewoman slumped over onto the grimy floor, barely keeping her head off the rough wood floorboards. The sound of retching made Riveh's stomach do a slow lurch. What was this thing that could make an angry Trant double over in an instant? Could they fight it?
They had to.
Riveh pulled himself together, and forced himself to look directly at the unsettling, massive set of jaws. What was it, really, compared to the bizarre well that he drew on for his power? Riveh had once plumbed the depths of the Space Between Spaces for aid and magic. What was some monster of demon rum?
"You'll be surprised what can die." Is all he said, and then he summoned the freezing cold of the outer void.
It was an unusual day for the Brassiered Lady, to be sure. Not only did the hovel play host to both gang warfare and guests significantly nobler than its usual clientele - literally so - but a small section of it was momentarily and quite suddenly transformed into the empty vacuum of space. Yes, an unusual day. The latter phenomenon was of course due to a Riveh Geminus who by sheer force of will summoned the interstellar void onto earth in the form of a midnight-black orb right where the monstrous Barley had stood just a moment earlier. Some small part of him took a certain ironic pleasure in seeing the man consumed so, he who looked like he could swallow a halfling whole.
But alas; when the sphere disappeared as quickly as it had materialized, the tall figure of Barley still stood, appearing almost none the worse for the experience. There was surprise in the evil amber eyes, confusion even. The supernatural attack had clearly taken him by surprise. Beyond a few angry welts, however - the yellow skin turning an unpleasant ochre at the intense cold - he seemed largely unharmed, his expression even turning to one of dismissal. "Weak," the impossible maw hissed. He took another step towards the ifrit. And, by necessity, the man standing immediately beside the ifrit.
"Oh, shut up and open wide, ya freak," said man grumbled, very paradoxically, in raising his ugly bow and sending an arrow sailing through the dingy tavern.
It missed. No, worse than that; Barley had actually evaded it. In an impressively fluid motion, the toothy monstrosity had bent out of the projectile's path, his rakishly thin form looking nothing so much like a reed in the wind. That, or suspiciously like... the strange gyrations of the extremely inebriated. Whichever the case, the arrow burrowed itself into a moldy wall. Stig cursed. Barley took another step.
Immediately below the arrow, a quivering figure rose, however. A very tall figure. Red-faced and still clutching at her stomach, Trant was not at her most dignified looking like she did as if she had just thrown up behind a seedy bar, but she did in turn appear absolutely livid, so much so that her fury might supersede any fear she harbored for the unnatural man. Dirty-blonde tresses falling into her fuming face, she grabbed at her longsword with both hands and pulled it back as one might a cudgel, an audible growl escaping her clenched mouth as she swung at the opponent who had dismissed her and shown her his back. Which was when it happened.
Riveh saw the Dame freeze mid-swing, her eyes the size of beer mugs. She was staring into the bald scalp of Barley. "You too," his fizzling voice spoke, leisurely, disdainfully, not even turning to look at her. "Weak. All weak. All of your kind. Weeeak." Then, more insistently, in a sibilant hiss. "On the floor... like the lush you are."
Another miserable groan, this time accompanied by an utterly mortified expression, was all that preceded before the noblewoman did exactly as told and fell to the filth encrusted floor in a crumpled ball of fine cloth and agony. "I can't..." she moaned in holding her middle. "It hurts... It hurts to look at him!" It what? While the ifrit wasn't sure what the choked words meant, he knew that this fight was not off to a good start. The prone form of the writhing Trant behind him, Barley took another step forward.
"RAAAAH!" But it was to be a step too soon. The sheer pigheaded determination of an incensed Trant was apparently not to be underestimated, as, having managed to get one foot beneath her, the Dame leapt up in a shrieking tidal wave of affront and anger, sword first. "Foool," Barley spat, not to be caught off guard and whirled round, that impossible maw unhinging itself wide in the process.
Clunk. If only he had a better view. While surely a rarely impressive sight, Riveh's vantage point did not afford him the particulars as these two titans, both threatening to scrape along the shabby tavern's ceiling, collided into one another. Even so, he was fairly sure what the dull metallic thud had represented: the monstrosity's mighty jaw snapping shut around Trant's breastplate only for his teeth to fail penetrating the steel. "Die, you monster!" Caught as close as he was, the Dame's blade would have no such problem.
The bellow of pain that followed the sword to his bare chest confirmed it, if his bestial uncovered appearance hadn't already told them as much: Barley was no human. No human had ever uttered a shout such as this. Riveh was treated to the repulsive vision of Barley's gullet, every slick, red, toothy, multitudinous inch of it as the creature threw open its inconceivable jaw, everything above the shoulder splitting open, in shouting. "You... you...!" While far from defeated yet, the group had by all appearances at least taught the so scornful beast the error of underestimating them. Drawing blood tended to have that effect.
The blood. The ifrit's eyes were suddenly drawn to Barley's blood. This too was no human's blood. It ran down his thin torso in rapid rivulets, a pale yellow stream apparently not nearly as thick as his own ichor. But the clear liquid only became that much more peculiar in striking the floorboards and seeing thick clouds of fizzling foam rising from it. It couldn't be. Was it...? Heavenly host, it was. Barley's blood was frothing like a newly poured ale.
"You cannot kill me!" The howl was followed by another, more pained, from Trant. Obviously keen to retaliate, the monstrosity latched its mighty maw around the Dame's arm.
Riveh's concern sharpened to outright fear as he watched Barley shrug off his magical spell, Stig's arrow and Trant's counter-attack. Whatever this strange beast was, it was no push-over. Worse, it seemed quite vindictive, focusing on the battered and sick Trant. Riveh's stomach lurched as it unhinged the unholy mouth to gorge on the noblewoman.
This fight truly was life and death.
"Stig, if you have any tricks up your sleeve, I'll take them right now." he shouts, fear mixing in his voice.
Then, Riveh once again dips into his well of power, drawing on the divine and arcane energies swirling below his conscious mind.
"I'm not seein' you doin' much either, boy!" a thoroughly irate Stig barked the young nobleson's way in fishing another arrow from his quiver, the spittle-soaked chastisement a thin disguise over what was really upsetting the man. Riveh could see it clear as day; the knight was every bit as unnerved at their target's true nature as he was. Given the ruffian's supposedly long career in fighting 'n killing, this was not a good sign.
But the ifrit was "doin'" something. Drawing on the unnatural forces that were his blessing and curse, he sent them slithering into Barley's mind, there to cause as much havoc as only the anarchic energies of the night void could. Their effect was immediate. Bolting upright, the man-creature released his hold on Trant's arm. A visible struggle raged within him. The evil amber eyes were confused, the gnarled fingers clenched, the lanky back bent rearward and tall as if his brain was threatening to crawl out the top of his hairless dome. For a moment he staggered.
And then, relaxed. Failure. Riveh felt his spell slipping off the alien mind. Barley let out a few worn breaths, his impossible maw rendering them as reverberant and raspy as those of a great ox. Recovering from the would-be mental intrusion quickly enough, however, he turned his yellow stare at his assailant. "You," he hissed. "Your magic cannot... Hrn?!"
Where was that light coming from? Barley's hideous half-face scrunched up at a sudden glare of what appeared to be innocuous sunlight somehow shining right into his eyes. Sunlight? The ifrit would be surprised if the miserable tavern had seen any natural light in decades, all shuttered and stuffy and reeking of mildew as it was. How...? A bottle. A random glass bottle left on a stained table had reflected a ray from a half-inch crack in a moldy shutter which in turn had been at just the right angle to let in the waning light of the setting sun. And with the toothy monstrosity's concentration dropping for that barest of moments, Riveh felt the remaining corona of spell power still swirling about that sickly yellow head sink into it.
Barley's morbidly thin form went rigid, and the last Geminus knew that his magic had taken hold. Torag's tectonic teabags, what inconceivable luck! He was sure that the monster was going to throw off the spell. If it hadn't been for that most minute and incidental of distractions, then... The faintest whisper, quiet as a sun ray over felt, floated past Riveh's ear. It was the murmur of prayer, fervent and faithful even in its softness. Resonant too. Resonant exactly as echoes off cave walls were. He imagined he heard his name in it. Barley clutched at his hairless scalp. Perhaps it hadn't been luck on his side.
"I am goin' to hammer your yellow, f*ckin' scrotum flat! F*CK!"
The dulcet tones of the knavish knight's vexation interrupted Riveh's ruminations on the fine line between happenstance and divine intervention; Stig had launched another arrow which, after a brief flight, had joined its brother on the dingy wall. Barley's strange undulating evasiveness really was remarkable. Even befuddled with his mental invasion, the man was fearsomely quick on his knobbly feet. Showing some remarkable resilience of her own, however, the teetering Trant hefted her sword again, preparing to lay into the beast once more. Hells below, her arm. Newly released from the grotesque jaw, the Dame's arm was a tangled mass of bloodied strips - some that had been her sleeve, some that had been healthy flesh. Nevertheless she raised the blade with a manic look in the... wait. Wait, why was she closing her eyes? For reasons the ifrit couldn't guess at, Trant struck out with her eyes screwed shut, totally blind. What was she doing?
Then again, why argue with results? Who would have thought howls of pain could ever sound so sweet? Shearing across Barley's back, the Dame managed to spill more of the man-creature's bizarre frothing blood. Yellow hide gashed and welted, coat tattered and stained with his strange ale ichor, evil eyes confounded with mystifying magic, Barley no longer appeared quite so insurmountable. Maybe, just maybe, none of them were set to die here after all. Riveh hoped so; the Brassiered Lady's swill being one's last drink was a terrible fate for anyone. The Dame evidently agreed, awkwardly shouting "Ta-Take that, you... lemon-headed creep!"
Lemon-headed creep? What? Even at her most miffed (especially at her most miffed), the noblewoman had displayed some snide wit in her tongue-lashings. The ifrit should know; he had been at the brunt of quite a few by now. Was the blood loss dulling her insults? This was almost worrying, but as Riveh looked to Trant it wasn't her grievously mangled arm he saw. No, it was the sway in her step, the redness of her cheeks, the dull gloss in her usually so forceful look. It was almost as if she was... Wait, was Trant drunk? When had that happened?!
"Raaaah!"
A question that would have to wait. For now the ifrit felt his magic's play upon Barley's mind work itself to a white-hot crescendo, imbuing him with an unnatural rage. A troubling prospect to be sure, given how dangerous the man had proven himself to be. Or so it would be, if Riveh's spell hadn't also specified a target for that fury: the drunken lackeys.
The Dame took another, failed, swiped at Barley, but he was too swift, charging at the thugs meekly observing the battle from the tavern's doorway. "Master Barley...? Boss! No! Nooo!"
The tramp's death was swift as the creature that had enslaved him engulfed his entire head.
A respite. That was what his spell had given them, a few seconds where the...thing's rage was directed elsewhere. Trant had used to profitably, getting in a blow of her own (and also getting her away from the foul thing). Stig, sadly, had wasted yet another shot. Still, the spell would not last long. Even now he could feel the tendrils that linked their minds fading. He must use this time well.
Riveh flung out his arms, and watched as they were wrapped in the space between spaces. Shards of not-black surrounded him, the ethereal cloak dancing just on the edge of sight. Let Barley confront something he was unsure of. Wrapped in his cloak from the Great Beyond, Riveh took his mace and charged forward.
Riveh runs right up to the doorway, raises his mace high and tries to smash in Barley's head.
Time had a funny way of slowing down, imagined or otherwise, in the direst of circumstances. As an example, the event now known as the Exaltation Massacre had certainly seemed an extensive horror for Riveh in the moment, despite now knowing as he did that the whole tragedy likely only took place over minutes. Heavens above, had that really just been last night? How time could fly, conversely.
As it appeared to in this moment. Charging forward and using his momentum to propel the mace, Riveh sent the weapon careening into the yellow dome that was Barley's head. The monster never saw it coming, turned away in the doorway as it was. A satisfying thud with accompanying wound saw the ifrit regain some confidence in the struggle that had at one time appeared nearly hopeless, and yet: Riveh felt the impact ringing in his hands. Striking at the man-creature had been like chopping into a century old oak. Barley was bruised, battered and bleeding. But he was still standing tall. Whatever he was, Barley had proven himself inordinately hardy.
Another thump, this one softer. Hm? What was...? Immediately before the towering form of their opponent, just outside the hovel, Riveh saw one of the three terrified tramps fall to the weed-strewn street. It was the man Barley attacked in his compulsion. He had no head. Barley gurgled. A third thump, smaller still. Oh. There it was. Now freed of the enchantment, the monstrosity wheeled round towards the ifrit as the two remaining drunks fled in wild panic behind him. The fresh blood now smeared all over the mighty maw, bright red clashing with dull yellow, only added to the creature's fearsome aspect, but the truly disturbing thing was this: that its eyes were more dreadful still. The twin pools of amber liquor had carried dismissive scorn earlier, even disinterest. Now they burned with a maddening fury.
"You," the seemingly mile-long jaw hissed. "You! What did you do to me?"
Riveh didn't get the chance to answer. "Geminus, out of the way!" A stomping Trant - swaying dangerously partly due to her intoxicated state, partly because she was still bizarrely holding one arm up and over her eyes - approached sword-first. Even as she swung at their opponent a sharp twang preceded another arrow from Stig. Both missed. Barley, once again demonstrating an inhuman agility, did not move from the spot as his reed-thin form undulated and swayed from the attacks. In fact, his incensed stare never left the ifrit. The knight cursed, loudly.
"Your magic..." he went on as if nothing had happened. "You do not control me! Your kind... Your kind is weak. I am the poooison in your veins! Rotting your stomach! I am the haze in your head! I am your aaaddiction! I am your master! You serve me! I control you!"
Having said this a gnarled hand shot out at Riveh, and although the young man was swift, the monster was swifter.
Riveh feels more then a little satisfaction as the creature grapples with the fact that it had been hurt, and even more insulting controlled. The fight certainly wasn't even half over, but he had at least shaken Barley and lit a spark of hope. Would it catch?
Apparently not.
Both Trant's and Stig's attack miss, the beast seeming to dodge without apparent effort. Was he truly even on this plane? Did they strike a phantom? Not entirely, Riveh's mace was spattered with foaming ichor.
Then he had little time for further consideration as a bolt of Barley's magic surged into him and turned his guts to boiling acid. It was like drinking that foul liquor for a month straight, without a chaser.
But Riveh was made of tough stuff. He gritted his teeth and forced down the rising bile inside of him. He would not fall here, in a rundown tavern on the edge of the Narrows. This was not how the last Geminus would die.
"Losing your touch, Barley?"
Oh, this was undeniably satisfying. Young and (moderately) privileged as he was, Riveh was hardly accustomed to life and death scenarios, never mind combat. Though this was quickly changing. Being caught in a position of potentially having one's life snuffed out at any second was still a harrowing experience to the ifrit. But this moment right here? Defying the monster Barley? Overcoming his unnatural power? Seeing his evil eyes go wide in furious disbelief? Making the haughty bastard doubt himself for the first time since meeting him? This was thrilling, and Riveh thought he finally understood those bloodthirsty soldiers and storied barbarians who thirsted for battle, who lived for death. Smacking his cudgel into Barley's distorted face was only a bonus.
"Argh!"
The slum boss recoiled with a choked bark as the metal caught him square in the mouth, a natural enough target for any strike given that everything above the man's shoulders was mostly mouth. The blow was devastating, potentially deadly to any normal person, and Riveh observed with some pleasure the teeth he'd knocked loose fly across the drinking hole to join the other refuse on the filthy floor. And yet he still stood. Barley was still standing, though only just. An uncertainty had entered his stance, a sway to his knobbly feet that had nothing to do with drink or his rapid evasion. Gods, the creature was tough as shoe-leather, but they were wearing him down. The ifrit saw it; he didn't have much left in him. This should have been encouraging. Every Taldan knew, however, reared as they were on the axiom, that it was the wounded lion that was the most dangerous.
"You..." the impossible maw sputtered. "YOU... hrk!"
A blur flew before Riveh's vision before lodging itself in the monster's bloodied gullet. A black-feathered arrow had suddenly sprouted there. Barley looked confused. He coughed once, twice, frothing ichor boiling from his throat and around the projectile's shaft. Then his towering form came crashing down, face first, to spatter onto the floor. The liquid bleeding from him looked for all the world as if he's crushed a jug of ale beneath him.
"Howssat, you f*ckin' gangly piss-cicle?!" Stig bellowed in victory, his frustration finally finding release in this one true shot. "Dodge that, you sh*t!"
Was it the fourth time that was the charm? Regardless, the trio had made it. Barley, their target, was down, out and not coming back up. The battle was over. Tension released as the knight, obviously more fretful than he wished to admit, grabbed a bottle at random. The Dame meanwhile had apparently only been carried by said tension as she now clumsily fell against a wall, drunk as a skunk, and clutching her mangled arm. "Don't feel so good... *urp*"
Riveh watched the unholy creature sway, tip and then crumple to the ground. Bubbling, foaming ichor flowed onto the floor mixing with the stains and grime of decades of hard partying. Fitting, considering Barley seemed to be made of liquor. Dust to dust, in a sense.
The ifrit looked back at Stig and said, "Piss-cicle? That is your roar of triumph? Thálatta! Thálatta! it isn't." The famous warcry of Ancient Antiquity sounds very odd in the battered and now bloody tavern.
He shudders as he watches the worn knight grab a bottle, "How on Golarion can you be thirsty after seeing that...thing. I don't know if I'll ever drink again." Riveh waves a hand at the bubbling, gurgling Barley. A scent like rotten beer hovers above the prone figure.
Then he forgets both Stig and Barley, as Trant nearly falls over. The sight of the heavily wounded and sick noblewoman makes Riveh's heart sink. Whatever else her flaws, she was certainly brave enough. This was what, the third fight that she had risked all?
Riveh hurried over to her, pulling something out of a bag. 'We need to get you some armor if you keep charging, Madame." He says with mock seriousness. "Here, sit down." Riveh grabs a rough wooden stool (sadly coated in years of graffiti) and props her up.
"Just sit while I heal you."
A dismissive wave of the hand was all the response Riveh received from the knight, though this was natural enough given that the mouth was busy downing a bottle of brown something. While many might exclaim the need for a drink after a harrowing experience, the ifrit couldn't help but wonder if the fight hadn't taken more out of Stig than the man would ever admit. Regardless, he seemed content to drain some liquor for now. No, it was Trant who needed his immediate attention.
Stepping over the prone form of Barley (gods, he still stank like an entire distillery), he hurried over to support the teetering noblewoman. Though she too smelled like a hard night on the town in getting up close to her. That, and blood. The fact that she answered his humor in turn was therefore encouraging. "Hey, Geminus," she smiled wryly, notably keeping her swimming gaze away from her mangled arm, "do you think you ever get used to this stuff?" Was the alcohol numbing the pain to some degree? "Ho-hope I'll never find out."
Heavy as the tall Dame was, Riveh had just a bit of trouble maneuvering her intoxicated self into a chair. Still, she didn't protest as he fished an ancient scroll out of his pack and begin invoking the magic inscribed therein. She sighed in relief as the torn shreds of flesh began restitching themselves into pale, healthy skin beneath his touch, the arm beginning to look like its well-built self again.
"Oh, what the hell, boy?" a protesting Stig complained over by the counter as the paper crumbled into dust, the magic apparently having been the only thing keeping it whole. "You had something like that all this time? Never thought to use it when I was bleeding into my own damn shirt? I'll remember this."
Any defense of this choice of resource management would have to wait, however. Feeling a hand at his neck, Trant suddenly grabbed at the ifrit and pulled his head close. Her hazy eyes had much trouble focusing on him, but the insistent whisper she suddenly adopted was loud and clear, probably more so than intended. "Gemi-Geminus, Geminus, listen to me... Listen to me, this is important..."
What was this now? Riveh, now uncomfortably near the young woman, could count her blonde lashes, never mind see that she had something evidently important to say in her drunken stupor. Something very important; her heart could be heard thundering on her boozy breath. His mind couldn't help but spring at possibilities. Was she about to divulge some unwelcome secret? Or...? Gods, this wasn't where they...? "This is important, listen... I don't mind that you're ginger. Alright? I don't mind. It's, it's just fine." Oh, for Heaven's sake. "No no, it is, it looks good. On you. It suits you. It's fine. Ish fine."
"Stavian's beard, she is drunk as a boiled owl." The knight, clearly just bemused at the sight, raised a bottle in mock acknowledgement. "Might wanna convince her to jam some fingers down her throat, boy. Not gonna be much use to us like that. Heh."
"Otyugh liver."
All heads - even Riveh's, newly released - turned to the rotund barkeep who had piped up after his stint of shocked silence. "What did you just say to me?" Stig asked.
"Otyugh liver," he scrambled to explain himself. "It absorbs the drink, you see. Clears the head. Cures your stupor, sir, honest. I-I just wanted to help."
"No, it doesn't, you idjit."
"Honest, it does!"
"Have you ever seen an otyugh? I have! Damn thing looks like an elephant turned inside out and then took a dip in sewage. No, hold on, it actually does swim in sewage! There's no way eatin' any part of that wouldn't make you more sick!"
The inane discussion on how to clear inebriation went on, Stig strangely taken with it, if dismissive of any counter-arguments. Meanwhile the Dame, looking much healthier if no less drunk, was peering at the two with suspicion. "What did they say, Geminus? Are they talking about me?" She rose, angry. "I'm not stupid, you know. I know what people say about me. I'm, I'm not stupid."
If the green in her cheeks was any indicator, Trant was ready to vomit on him at any moment.
Riveh turns back to look at Stig, "Maybe if you had asked nicely, I'd have patched you up. Didn't you mother ever tell you that you catch more flies with honey then with vinegar? Consider it a free lesson."
When Trant becomes rambling about his hair color he can't help but smile and roll his eyes. Granted, it was nice to know the towring noblewoman didn't find him hideous but this really wasn't the time...
"Trant." Riveh says, lowering his voice in a vain attempt to hide his embarrassment, "Trant, you are as drunk as a skunk. Maybe you should just relax."
Riveh listens to Stig and the barkeep bicker for a few moments before interjecting, "Do either of you have one of these amazing livers?" A beat of silence as the answer becomes painfully obvious.
"Then it doesn't really matter, does it?" Riveh says, turning back to Trant. "We are just talking about how sick you are." And for once this is the truth. "Just focus on...keeping it down."
Riveh stands and looks at the barkeep, "Do you know of anyone who has one of these livers? Or anything else that might work? A less then curious healer or alchemist? I need this woman sobered up and I need it yesterday. You heard what I said to...Barley. The Brotherhood is cracking a whip on this. Anything you do to help me might make them forget about this tavern for awhile."
"What?" the crone cawed incredulously. "No, my tonic doesn't have any otyugh in it! What do you take me for, a quack? That'd be mad!"
"Told you," Stig huffed.
Sometimes it really was amazing where life lead you. For example, just this morning Riveh hadn't expected the day's rigors to involve haggling for a supposed cure to drunkenness with an old beldam he couldn't quite decide was what passed for a wise woman in the deprived slums or just a plain old drug dealer. Given that it had been the proprietor of the Brassiered Lady, a man all too familiar with turning substance abuse to measly profit, who had directed him to her, the latter theory seemed the likelier one. Was it 'amazing' he'd used to describe the circumstances? No, he'd meant 'unfortunate.' 'Tragically, woefully unfortunate.'
"*HURK*" A wet sound as if of anchovy soup bursting out of a waterskin assaulted the ifrit's ears as somewhere further down the alley Trant threw up. 'Tragically, woefully, malodorously unfortunate.' No, this was not a good day.
The trio had left the tavern (a swaying Dame needing some assistance) in search of some mountebank the barkeep had pointed them to, eagerly and deferentially after Riveh had brought up the Brotherhood's name. Finding the old woman down a narrow dirt street, supposedly selling crooked ribbons from a basket, she had agreed to lead them to her true business and "stash" after some coaxing. Given her apparent helplessness, he rather suspected that she too paid a portion of her earnings to the Brotherhood for protection. "Lissen," she squawked irritably, "didje want the tonic or not? 'Cause if yer not buyin', I ask ye to be so kind to piss off. Yer lady friend's vomit is not good fer bus'ness."
She held out a small vial of something disconcertingly pink in a liver-spotted hand. "How much?" the knight asked.
"30 crowns."
"Thirty?!" he protested. "Oh, I'm sorry, old girl, that's not otyugh in there at all, is it? I didn't realize you were slayin' f*ckin' dragons daily and boilin' their blood into your wondrous concoction."
"Thass the price! Now are ye buyin' or not?"
From the halls of the Senate to the begrimed gutters of the Narrows. Riveh was seeing everything Oppara had to offer, although he doubted this toothless old woman featured in any of the guidebooks next to the Memorial Arch of Prince Jalrune and the Serpent Column. Maybe the next edition.
"Thirty crowns is highway robbery!" Riveh blurts out at the price. "And we don't even know if it'll work."
Then he thinks of something. "How about a trade?" he fishes around in his pack for a few moments until he pulls out a small green vial, plundering from Filibert's corpse.
"A nasty poisin. I'm sure you'll find a buyer for it down here. It's worth thrity crowns and more." The ifrit looks over the woman's battered wares and points to a sealed jar of white paste. The smell was certainly that of vermin repellent.
"The poison for the stink and the cure. Fair enough."
"And also not having our friend vomit onto your ribbons." Riveh added cheerfully.
It wasn't often that young Riveh and the loutish knight stood united in a cause, but then price gauging was known to bring together the disparate masses. Even so, the ifrit was a wee bit concerned when, in plying that silver tongue he had developed, the crone took the vial of proffered poison, uncorked it and promptly dipped it onto her discolored tongue. The old bat looked like a stiff breeze could knock her dead. And yet she merely smacked her lips and nodded in acknowledgement as a wine taster might in recognizing a good vintage.
"Alright, young sir," she cawed. "Ye 'ave yourself a deal."
Huh. An immunity built up over the years, perhaps? Whatever the case she handed over both the pink tonic and pungent paste, apparently satisfied at the trade. Angling back over to the Dame (carefully avoiding the pool of vomit), she had found some purchase for her wobbly legs in leaning up against a derelict depot. "No, no, don't want to drink any more... stomach hurts..." Convincing her to down the potion seemed for a moment almost alike to feeding a obstinate toddler, however.
But surprisingly she relented quickly. "Okay, Geminus. Just because... just because it's you. Because I trust you, y-you know?" Trant slurred. "You-You are... because I trust you. You know?" With this said, she took a mouthful of the pink something. Immediately the stately features scrunched up in distaste. Only for the blue eyes to open in surprise, and even to Riveh the new clarity in them was obvious. She drank the rest of the flask in a hurry.
"Ach! Tastes like... liquid chalk!" The ifrit wasn't too bothered if it tasted like the underside of a goblin; the noblewoman, while still a bit red in the cheeks, was already looking and sounding much improved. "Oh, Aroden's ghost," she whined in raising a hand to her evidently aching head. "I've haven't been this sick since I was fourteen and stole that wine bottle... But I'm feeling much better. Thank you." Riveh was suddenly fixed with a urgent stare from her. "Wait, what happened to that yellow gespenst, that Barley? He's dead, right? It's all a blur to me... Did I say something stupid?"
He couldn't answer as promptly as he would have liked. As it happened, Riveh was just a bit distracted by the Dame's mouth, or more specifically her tongue. The elixir had turned it black. That would probably be fine, right?
----------
Long shadows dominated the dirt street on the way back to Bursio's, the butchery acting as the Brotherhood of Silence's chapter house in Crownsgate. Evening, if not darkness, was setting in. And with it came an unrest in the last Geminus as he led the trio back for his just reward. Martella Coufas - Lotheed, whoever - had been gone for almost a full day now. Though the note found on the traitorous halfling Filibert had spoken of interrogating her, the cult of Thamir Gixx had undeniably been hired to kill her, among others. Was she still alive? He'd run all over Oppara, above and below its street, in trying to find his enigmatic employer. The thought of uncovering nothing more than her cold corpse was not a welcome one.
No, he was set on this path now. He would follow it to its end. And right now it led him to that butcher's shop and the scoundrel inside who ran it as his den. It was time for Lors to pay up. Hm. Those were some awfully inexpertly repaired doors.
Riveh smiles a bit, and merely says, 'Only that you thought red was nice color for hair. I thank you, it is probably the only compliment I'll get all day. As for Barley, he's dead. Stig here actually got the final attack in."
He turns to the old knight, "A nice shot actually, I forget to say. Thanks for that."
Soon the trio have arrived back at the butchershop, now with doors. Riveh strides up and hammers on the doors with a closed fist, "Lors, you black-hearted excuse for a gangster, get out here! We have business with you and I do no desire to spend more then one second on your disgusting threshold then I have to." The ifirit hammers some more, and ponders taking out his mace and smashing them a bit. It was the least he could do to the man who nearly got them all killed. Still, he didn't want to waste the effort or time. But he isn't overly gentle and he can hear the hinges creaking ominously under his flurry of blows.
"Or maybe you didn't expect to see us again, after sending us into a thrice-dammed ambush? Aroden man, open up or we'll tear these doors off!" he adds, churlishly.
If the ifrit had meant to embarrass his lofty confidante by revealing her behavior unshackled by reason and social mores, it had worked. "Yes, well," she sputtered. "That only goes to show how thoroughly stupefied I was! As if anyone ever... Not that I mean to call your hair unattractive exactly, but..." A hasty change of subject was apparently in order. "Never mind that! More importantly, what was that monstrosity? I thought you said he was just supposed to be some petty slum crook? The man was a fiend! If this is your information gathering at work, I shudder to think where you'll lead us next. The eighth circle of Hell perhaps?"
And there it was. Trant was back at haranguing him; the cosmic scales had been righted. Still, he was getting better at reading the woman over time, blunt as she was. He could see that the scolding was meant as a shroud, a protective cover over something vulnerable. Whether that something was itself concealing a black core of pettiness, spite and anger - that was the real question.
One almost grew to appreciate Stig. At least you knew he was scum. "Yeah," the knight said dismissively at the compliment paid the excellence of his shot. "I know it was." The reply was almost enough to make Riveh reconsider expending the remaining Senate scroll on him.
----------
In fact, thoroughly abused by the day's rigors as the young man felt, it seemed only fair to direct some of that frustration Lors's way. Hammering the door of the meat market was a poor substitute for what he really wanted to beat in, namely the crook's snide face, but it was plenty effective in getting results. Soon enough a pair of apron-clad bruisers - their biceps bigger than their brains if their limited vocabulary was anything to go by - stormed out to begin posturing, angrily asking what Riveh though he was doing and sharing some colorful anecdotes about his parentage. Of note was that he only recognized one of them. Trant immediately drew her sword.
And the knavish knight wasn't far behind. "Oi!" he called through the disorder sharply. "Hands off the boy before I find the biggest salami in yer death trap of a store and shove it up your sh*tpipe." Huh. Maybe Stig did know gratitude after all, in his own way. Regardless, knowing that both had his back was not an unpleasant feeling
"Alright, alright, that's quite enough of that," said a nasally, and very familiar, voice. The weaselly form of Lors leisurely bounded outside with another thug in tow. "Well," he smiled, "if it isn't Riveh, Skinny and..." His beady eyes took in the Dame, an arduous process given the size of her. "...whoever Tall & Gorgeous over here is. Evening, Miss. Now, Riveh, kid, forgive me if I heard you wrong, but one could be mistaken for thinking you had some sort of problem with me."
He'd just figured it out. The ifrit finally knew what it was that rubbed him the wrong way with the crook, even beyond the chicanery. The duplicity, the false geniality, the fake smile that never reached the eyes - it was like looking at a man wearing the skin of someone else's face. Lors was a grotesque creature. "Ambush? That's a mighty hurtful accusation, kid." There he was doing it again, distorting the lined flesh into mocking distress, an invisible puppeteer with fishhooks standing on his shoulders. "We had a real simple agreement, you and me. Which you upheld! Congrats, kid! I already heard Barley won't be botherin' us anymore. That's good work. So what do you say we step off the street, get something to drink, and we discuss that reward I promised you?"