Casia observes casually as Dareia heads over to the safe-house's watching eyes. She catches just a bit of the conversation and then flinches when she hears the woman offer to answer questions.
'No, no, no, a professional just wants to get the job over with. Don't invite chat!'
Casia observes casually as Dareia heads over to the safe-house's watching eyes. She catches just a bit of the conversation and then flinches when she hears the woman offer to answer questions.
'No, no, no, a professional just wants to get the job over with. Don't invite chat!'
The man looks Dary up and down, his hands resting on his paunch (one hand inside his weskit, doubless holding a weapon). He shakes his head from side to side, swaying his mop of once-red now graying hair. "Is that so, girlie? And what would you be lookin to transport, now?"
Behind Dary, the other lookout puts aside any presentse of painting. Things are defintily tense right now.
Dary sighs and shakes her head. ”I ain’t particularly fond of this kind of last minute change-up either. I just want to move the product and get a nice pint before the next job.” She holds up her hands, affecting annoyance, but not towards the guards themselves. ”Somebody above our heads thought it’d be a bright idea to try a fake coffin con. Bluecoats are used to seeing lots a’ those going by, eh? Which then means they needed to bring in us locals to make it look good. Figures they wouldn’t have told you yet. The people up top don’t give two thoughts to the logistics we footsoldiers gotta deal with. Probably worried about some conflict with the Lampblacks or a Bluecoat raid or something, if you ask me.” She pulls out the papers she showed the Bluecoats. ”All I’ve got in writing are these bits to throw off the Bluecoats. If you want us to turn around, I understand. Don’t wanna cause anything. Might be a bit awkward for everyone involved when the news goes back up the ladder, but I ain’t dying for a simple transport job, and you two look ready to go, eh?” She keeps herself visibly relaxed but alert, counting on her attempt at commiseration. People like it when you talk to them on the level, especially professionals who are filling a post. Everyone wants to feel respected. She just hopes she presented herself right.
Lolo leans on the cart, her cloakhood pulled low, one hand resting on the loaded pistol strapped next to her hip, hidden from view. "Fookin' bosses. Always, 'do this, do that' no thinking of how. Look, we're gonna raise suspicion just hanging out, out here yeah? Let's bring the coffin in and sort this out."
Jonah nods along with Dareia and then Lolo's. "Aye, things are moving quick. Not surprising we're running ahead of orders." He puts on his best grumbling voice and shakes his head with the others. "Word on the street is someone hit the Lampblacks. Knocked 'em cockeyed." He releases a genuine shiver remembering the sight of the Dimmer Sisters and the example they made. "Rumors along the shadowvine are that the Sisters were involved. Left quite a mess."
"My guess is the boss figured now's a good time to make the run. Afore them coal faced toads get back on their feet."
Paunch looks you all up adn down, nodding slightly. "Well, you've the password. But I've heard nothing about a chanve of plans. Got a signed order from Herself, have you?"
It seems you aren't quite past the threshold just yet. But then who said this was going to be easy?
Finraeth stifles a curse - they should probably have had a go at forging something, despite the risk. Oh well. Too late now. He tries a bit of coercion to go with the bluff. "Look, we were just told by Herself to come here and collect the stuff. When she says jump, you ask 'how high?' - not 'have you got a signed order for that?' Give us a break." He frowns. "Of course, we can always go back and tell Herself that you've decided to keep the stash for yourself. I wonder how that would be received."
Paunch may be tubby, but those greying red hairs have seen a few things in their time - you don't get older in the Dusk by being eaily taken in. "That's a good point you're making, boyo. But I'll wager she'd be even less glad to hear we just gave it away for the asking of it, you know?."
Behind you, the woman abaandons all pretence of painting. The glint of steel shows as she puts her hand to her belt.
Things were going sideways, and something needed to be done to push Paunch in the direction they needed him - inside. Thankfully, Lolo had a contingency set up from her time in Chatterhall earlier in the day.
=====
Flashback
=====
Chatterhall was the nicest part of Duskvol, but that didn't mean it didn't have its seemy sides. Case in point #1: the drug house they were going to rob. Case in point #2: the local teens, bored out of their skulls, loitering near a pub down the street. Ok, they weren't exactly seemy. Stopping, Lolo frowns. Young and ensconced in their privilege, they were the type that had the connections to mildly misbehave, and nothing to come of it - which now that Lolo thinks on it, the perfect kids to cause a bit of trouble, if it was needed.
Approaching the teen that seems to command the most attention from the others, Lolo stares her down, a spindly girl dressed in the dark blues and blacks en vogue amongst the fashionable types that didn't want to look it. A small smile plays across Lolo's face as the kid stares right back, not backing down. Perfect. "Oi. You look like just the type that likes to have a bit of fun then. What do you say to causing a bit of trouble? I'll be back, in front of that house down there, the one with the grey-painted brick fronting, in just a few hours. I pull my cloakhood back and run my hand through my hair like this... that means you cause a ruckus, yeah? I don't care what you do, but it has to be loud enough to draw attention from anyone nearby. Keep it up until I get inside the house, and then a couple of minutes more. And in return, I'll be back here tomorrow at this time with enough real fruitwine to keep you in the gutter for days. Chinney?"
=====
Now
=====
Dropping her cloakhood, Lolo gives the signal and the kids down the street erupt into an argument, pushing a screaming, obscenities carrying down the street.
"Fooking great," Lolo says, rolling her eyes. "Oi, Paunch! Look, we've already got the Bluecoats asking questions when we came into the district. No need for us to be seen when those kids draw the Bluecoats. We both know that they'll rub their station in the faces of any Coat that shows, and the Coats'll take it out on anyone they can. Let's get this fookin' coffin inside and work this out? Unless you're a noble and can protect us? Herself ain't gonna like the heat brought on her drug house, chinney?"
Paunch looks at you all as you make your arguments - he looks like he might be about to give in and lead you to the front door, if only to get orders from someone else and meake it their problem when two things happen.
First, Lolo's destraction goes into plan as a bundch of the local kids start causing a lot of noise at the front of the building. Paunch frowns. "What the fark-"
The second thing that happens is the knife that appears in his trhoat, cutting off his sentence. He looks amazed as he falls to the floor, bubbles of blood forming in the red that flows down his front. He makes a wheezind sound as he tries to form words, but all that happens is more blood and froth as he falls down dead. Another knife appears otu of the darkness, aimed at his companion but she ducks *just* in time. She drwaws two blades of her own from inside her shirt. From the edge of the park, three figures, masked and up to no good, run foward towards you all in silence. They obviously have a plan of their own, and it doesn't seem to rely on deception.
What will you do now?
Finraeth blinks in surprise at the new development, but he is moving even as the fat guard falls to the floor; he turns to face the other one, and as she reaches for her weapon he grabs her (as politely as possible) and hits her with a stunning blow to the side of her head with his elbow. "I'm terribly sorry about this, we really were planning to be more subtle in our approach this time..."
Cas rolls her eyes at her brother's straightforward handling of the other guard as she slips a pair of knives down into her hands. Rather than advance, though, she pulls her cloak tighter around herself and falls back putting Finraeth between her and the newcomers.
The attack isn't *quite* enough to put the other guard down - she's maede of stern stuff and shakes her head to clear it, before foucsing on the cutter. She still has her knieves and she steps in close, intent on gutting him with them.
Dary takes advantage of the guard’s focus on Fin and quietly steps up behind her, looping her leg around the guard’s so that she falls face first the second she moves to strike.
Lolo's mouth drops open, her head on swivel, looking from the street - and the kids fighting down the way - to Paunch, now gurgling through his throat on the ground, to the scuffle happening right next to her, as Dary follows up a mean wallop from Finn on the remaining berker with a well-placed leg.
Three. Expert cutters. Long odds.
"Oi! Into the house!"
One last look into the park before the inside-duck. What are the wotchers up to?
With Dary's assistance, the other guard goes down, alive but not kicking - although in the struggle her knife manages to wound Finraeth. As you do so, the three newcomers approach in a fast run, obviously not wasting time. The leader quickly retreives her knife from Paunche's throat, wiping the blade clean while the other two catch up with her.
All three of them are masked and colwed, not giving away much of their identiy, although the leader is a woman around Lolo's age while the other two women are younger, perhaps around the same age as Casia/Finraeth. The leader sizes you up quickly, giving a nod to Lolo. Her voice betrays a clear Skovlandic accent. "I've nothing against you, babchka. My quarrel is with those in that house. Take your friends home now."
What will you do, talk or fight?
Things were happening fast. One guard down. The second tumbling under the combined assault from his own comrades. Jonah grabs the reins of the wagon, ready to take off when the women run up and start speaking in an accent not so dissimilar from his own. His eyes quickly flick back and forth between the fallen guards, bleeding Fin, and the deadly newcomers.
"Alayne's tears fly in the night." He says in his native tongue quietly gazing at the knife protruding from the dead guards throat. It was a phrase many of his former comrades at arms used following the assassination of the Skovlander Queen and the bitter end to the Unity War. A phrase to say the war may have been lost with the Queen, but Skovland's people would never forget...or forgive. The fight would go on. Blades would slip through the shadows and take their revenge.
It was a path Jonah had contemplated, but his sister's disappearance and death had pushed him...elsewhere. He didn't know the woman, but maybe a deal could be made.
"We've business to conduct as well. Business that isn't necessarily to benefit those inside." He says nodding toward the second guard taken out by Fin and Dareia. "Might be we can help each other out?"
Lolo nods, silently thankful that Jonah is there to diffuse the situation - for a few seconds at least.
"Babchka, my friend is right, and we have no love for the ones in the house. We can help, and we all need to be quick about it, yeah?"
Lolo gestures down the street, her gloved hand sweeping towards where the kids were fighting, since having vanished now that a real fight had broken out. "Those kids they were with us, a way to convince Paunch here to let us in. And the Bluecoats, they're surely coming and quick." Clicking her tongue against the roof of her mouth, Lolo glances down at the wotchers. "That's not changing now."
Squatting, Lolo grabs Paunch's corpse by the arms and starts dragging him towards the door, hoping the urgency of getting off the street makes it clear for everyone to follow her inside.
Finraeth winces as the knife finds its mark, putting one hand to his injured side as he gives Dary a grateful nod. "My thanks, kind lady. Her head was harder than it looked." Gritting his teeth, he winces as he pulls himself up off the ground. There's a certain amount of blood ruining his shirt, but he'll live.
He watches warily as his two Skovlandic friends try to negotiate with the new arrivals.
The leader of the three women shrugs slightly. "We were quiet. If we're fast, we'll be gone before the Bluecoasts get suspicuous." She looks at you all, her eyes probing behind eht mask she wears to stay concealed. "Our quarrel is with this gang, corsairs from teh Dagger Isles who sold so many of our people into slavery after teh War, my son included. What is your reason for being here?"
She's lying, or at least not giving the full truth. The gang might well be slavers, but that's not the reason she and her friends are here.
Of course, challenging her on this in the middle of the street might not be the best idea either.
Dary notes that they are not telling the whole truth, but she does not necessarily think that is a problem. Everyone has multiple reasons for doing what they do, and why broadcast the self-serving ones if you do not need to? Still, it does let her know to keep an eye on them until she figures out what exactly the reason is. Once there’s a quiet moment to themselves, she will discretely tell the others to also keep their eyes open.
”We are professionals. Our interests align with yours, it seems. Afraid I cannot give much more detail than that. Bad form to talk so openly about one’s employers, you understand.”
"But," Lolo interjects, "We're not going to stand in your way. Let us in to do our thing, and we'll leave you be. We just need to find something and we'll be gone, like ghosts." Wally's visage passes briefly through Lolo's mind and the Skov shudders. Well, not like the angry, rampaging ones.
Pushing the door open, Lolo reaches down again and continues dragging Paunch. "And I'm sorry to hear of your son. Describe the one you're looking for, and if we see them, I'll draw you to us, if we're separated. Blood grows grief's garden. I wish you a verdant future."
Blood grows grief's garden was an old Skov saying that meant essentially the only way to come to peace with one's grief was to hurt those that hurt you and yours.
Keeping her weapons in hand, Casia moves towards the house as well. Slipping beside her brother, she whispers, "Are you all right?" Her eyes never leave the newcomers, though.
Slavers. The word sent a jolt of icy fury running through Jonah's body. Images of Skovlanders forced from hearth and home to provide forced labor and worse for the Imperial mines, factories, eel farms, and barrack entertainment. People like his sister.
For the moment he uses the simple act of guiding the wagon around back to the servants entrance to try and recenter his mind. He is unsuccessful.
Dareia's whispered warning is barely acknowledged. Sure these newcomers were hiding something. Who isn't in this rat hole of a city? But there was some truth in his kinswoman's words. No matter her real reason for being here, he'd still help here put an end to these traffickers. These weren't the Silver S*$!s that took Naty, but they'd done the same to plenty of others among his people. They all deserved to end up mushroom food.
Drawing his knife he follows the others inside.
Finraeth feels a definite uneasiness at the mention of slavery, although for very different reasons from Jonah. He throws his sister a quick, questioning look as she moves alongside him, trying to work out what (if anything) she knows. He never enquired too closely into the family business, but trade is trade and their parents' ships carried all sorts of cargo. He certainly never had any qualms about spending the money that it provided.
He tries not to look too closely at Jonah or Lolo, in case the uneasiness he's feeling is showing on his face. He gives a silent nod, one hand on the hilt of his knife as they move forwards.
The older of the three nods breifly at your parley. "Agreed, no time for tlaking here. Let's move."
The front door to the house is not locked and it opens quietly. Inside is a hallway which runs to a series of rooms on the ground and a set of stairs. Someone is walking down the hall out of the kitchen, a lean youth with long red hair. Their eyes flash in a smile as they see the door open. "Ah, c'mon Fatso, tis not my watch yet-" Their eyes go wide as they see that you aren't who they were expecting, and their mouth opens to shout an alarm -which dies in a gurgle as a knife finds its mark in their body. The mushroom pastry they were eating falls to the floor with a wet thud as they collapse against the wall and slide down, dead silent.
Your three newfound allies push forward, the leader again collects her knife. She points with it for emphasis, splattering the walls with blood as she gives instructions in a whisper. "We'll take down here. You clear upstairs before they know what hit them."
Speed is clearly of the essence here; Finraeth draws a blade and moves to the front, going up the stairs as rapidly as he can.
One of Death's Dark Angels herself. Jonah thinks as the woman takes down yet another of her unsuspecting. Sinking into his wartime, killing mindset, the Whisper simply nods and follows Fin up the stairs keeping an eye out for both the enemy and the drugs they were here to acquire.
Casia follows close behind her brother, but grabs his arm when they reach the second floor. "Isn't this getting a little bloody?" she questions. "Are we really going to just kill everyone here?"
The Dusk Mites speed and momenturm carries them up the stairs before the other side can react. There's a large landing on the top floor that leads off into sevarl other rooms. At a table in the landing area, three gang members have been playing cards and drinking. The air smells of cheap liquor and stale tobacco. They hastily fumble for their weapons as you burst in, but you have the initative.
Finraeth gives Casia's hand a reassuring squeeze. "I've not killed anyone tonight; and I hope to keep it that way."
When they get to the top of the stairs, he points the blade of his knife at the three gang members, with his other hand on the butt of the pistol in his belt. "Good evening. As you can see, we have the drop on you. Nobody has to get hurt if you're willing to back down. But it's your call." He gives them a steely smile.
Lolo's pistols flash in the dim lantern-light as she draws them in concert with Finn, training each on a different gangster. The slightest frown crosses Lolo's face as she realizes one was loaded with her ectoplasmic ammunition, but the goons didn't need to know that, chinney?
She otherwise keeps her hands steady, her voice low, almost a snarl. "Listen to the dandy, eh? No need to get yer names in the deadbook tonight when you can go home to your families."
The leader of the three, a lean man with a greyhound sort of appearance, looks at you all with narrowed eyes. His firearm is on the table, but it might as well be in Iruvia right now and he knows it. He glares at Finraeth. "Sure and you're so cocky you've got the drop on us, boy. But yeh've absolutely no idea who you're dealing with here. You think this is our stash we're guarding?" He gives a laugh and a shake of his head.
He stands, slowly, and indicates to the otehr two that they should do the same. "Me an' mine will be taking our leave now. But dno't think for one moment this is the end of it." He gives you a tip of his hat, showing the ragged mop of red hair underneath, before turning on his heel and leading the other two to the stairway at the back of the house.
You barely have time to breathe a sigh of relief though, when there's a crash of glass from the floor below, and a distinctive *shoomf* sound of rushing flame. The front door slams shut and from a window on the landing where you are, you can see your supposed "allies" running off! They're carrying a bag between them that must hold the drugs - or at least that's a fair assumption, because they didn't have it with them when they came in. The fire below must be chemickal in nautre, because it is quickly ablaze. The crackle of flame and the sting of smoke rises up the stairwell towards you.
You have a choice: you can follow the gang you just defeated out the back stairway and back down to teh ground, but you'll lose precious time. Or you can try and run downstairs and out the front to pursue the other three, with the obvious risk of fire and a burning building.
What will you do?
She otherwise keeps her hands steady, her voice low, almost a snarl. "Listen to the dandy, eh? No need to get yer names in the deadbook tonight when you can go home to your families."
Finraeth gives Lolo a pleased smile: he can't afford to dress nearly as well as he would like to, these days, but it's good to know that the efforts he is putting in are drawing the right kind of attention.
His thoughts are distracted by the commotion downstairs, and he wrinkles his nose at the smell of burning chemical accelerants. "Well that complicates matters somewhat."
Casia gives Finraeth a shove towards a nearby window. "We need to get out of here first," she says. "Then we can decide what to do about the a~!@%#**s making off with our score!"
Jonah curses as the slavers start to simply walk away. Fury still flowing through his body he turns to give the others an earful. The words die a quick death as the crash erupts from downstairs and he catches sight of the other raiders fleeing on the street below.
Realizing his mistake of simply taking a fellow Skovlander at her word a flurry of profanity fitting a war veteran spills from his lips. Not really thinking, Jonah grabs the pistol sitting on the table. A heartbeat passes and he is knocking out the window sending a storm of glass raining down into the street below. Before the shards finish clattering on the cobbles he raises his arm, aims, and fires at the fleeing scoundrel.
Not bothering to see if he hit his target or not he stuffs the pistol into his belt and starts rummaging through his pack for the section of rope he'd stuffed in there prior to last nights job.
"Straight down seems the quickest way out to me." He says handing the rope off to someone else to tie down.
Finraeth is keen to get out of here, he needs no urging from his sister's push. He takes the rope from Jonah and heads down to the ground as fast as he can. He's more intent on dealing out some pain for the double-cross (and retrieving the drugs) than he is on looking where he's going.
Gravity can be such a harsh mistress.
Jonha's shot is true and it catches the woman carrying the drugs,hitting her in the leg. She stumbles, and cries out in pain and the other slow down to pick her up and carry her.
Unfortunately for Finraeth, whoever broke the glass in the windoew didn't do it completely and the rope catches on a piece of broken glass. It doesn't cut trhough until Fin is near the ground, at which point he falls heavily. The wind is knowcked out of him for a few moments.
For the rest of you upstairs of course the situation is now much worse as the flames start to creep twoards the stairs and your rope is gone.
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"FIN!" Casia shouts out as her brother lands with a crunch on the cobblestones below. Reaching up under her cloak, she pulls out another rope and moves to roughly secure it before descending clumsily to the ground.
"Please tell me you're ok," she pleads as she kneels next to him and lifts his head.
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Finraeth looks up with a glazed look at the figure kneeling beside him. Tries to focus, tries to draw in a breath and speak...
"...mother?"
...then the gaze refocuses and he gives her a grin, and a wink.
"I'll - be - be ok. Just... give me a minute to - start breathing - again."
Adreniline burns within Lolo, her cheeks hot, her ears taking on the sound of the sea within a shell, a low, crashing buzzing through her head. Striding to the window as Casia ducks out of it, the Skovlander raises her pistol and squints into the darkness, waiting, waiting, willing herself still and quieting the buzzing in her hand... and one of their enemies passes through a pool of lamplight.
Her pistol cracks, acrid smoke billowing through the room, and Lolo raises the second pistol in quick succession, another CRACK resounds. The second shot was with her ghost ammo - hopefully it has some effect on the living as well...
Coughing and choking, Jonah scrambles down the rope after Lolo finishes firing. His eyes and lungs burn from the heat and smoke as he reaches the cobbles below. Seeing Fin up and breathing, he lets the young man's sister see to him and instead lumbers toward where he last spotted the fleeing Skovlander's.
"This is why we lost the bloody war. Too often fighting each other rather than the bloody emperor." He snarls to himself as he stumble runs along, still coughing from the blasted smoke. Oddly, the treachery by his fellow countywomen made him long for simpler evils like Wally. At least with that old ghost you knew he was out to kill you from the very start.
Dary is quick to take steps to minimize the effects of the smoke: keeping low and bringing her scarf up to cover her mouth, which she also holds tightly shut until getting down to the ground. ”Damn good shot. My gun doesn’t work from nearly that range, sad to say. We get caught up and maybe I can do somethin’ I suppose.”
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...then the gaze refocuses and he gives her a grin, and a wink.
"You s$**head!" the girl snaps back, but pulls his head to her chest for a moment before helping him to his feet.
She then turns her narrow-eyed attention on those that betrayed them. Pulling off her gloves - now torn to shreds from her clumsy descent - she pulls her daggers again and waits to follow the lead of her companions.
Even with the smoke in her eyes and the distraction of the flames around her, Lolo doesn't miss. Two shots, and the two women carrying their injured companion collaps into the street. Electroplasmic ammo works fine on people if it goes through the brain stem.
The last survivor scrambles up, hobbling on her injured leg, and abandons the drugs and her compananions as she stumbles away, clutchign at her leg. The trail of blood makes her easy to follow, if you want to.
Jonah reaches the dead and the drugs still wheezing as the smoke simply refuses to depart his body on pleasant terms. For several long seconds he contemplates the blood trail and going after the woman, but then shakes his head and grabs the sack of drugs instead. He wasn't much better off then his fellow country woman.
Slinging the goods over his shoulder he turns and makes for the wagon and what he hopes is a quick escape.
Probably better for everyone if the stuff burned up in the fire. But coin is coin...
Scurrying down the rope, Lolo flips her cloakhood up and sprints towards the others, all the adrenaline she'd forced into her still space now flooding through her, her teeth chattering as she approaches the dead Skovlanders. Oh, there's going to be so much heat coming down soon.
"I can follow her," Lolo whispers, peering into the darkness, "While you all get the drugs back. Best we know who our enemies are, yeah?"
The two of you separate from the others, folliwing the trail - it's not difficult, expecially for a tracker of Lolo's skill. You find your target about halfway into the park, her back against one of the glowing, poisonous trees. She is trying to bandage her injured leg with oen hand while the other points a pistol at you both. The muzzle wavers as her arm shakes. "That's close enough. Back off!"
You load up the cart, disposing of the coffin now that it is no onger needed, much to Casia's relief probably. the cart has *defnintely* seen better days, but your temporary repairs to it are holding - just.
Who will try to take it and you home?
With a last glance toward Fin and Lolo, Jonah wishes them luck and then clicks his tongue and flicks the reins to set the goats and cart in motion. He does his best to avoid trouble and attention by guiding the rickety cart along the side streets and less traveled roads of the district as much as possible.