Tales of Solhaven (storyline)/A Dark and Stormy Night (vignette)
A Dark and Stormy Night (vignette
Cold and heavy, rain sheeted across the rooftops bringing a dismal grey to the sky and flooding the dark boardwalks of Marshtown. Pale lights spilled from dirty windows, their warm glow testament that anyone who could be indoors was, likely enjoying a warm meal around a communal fire. Lanterns flickered from strings and masts out in the bay, the bobbing lights silent sentinels at the edges of the shore. Water cascaded in rivulets down her brow and across your nose, dripping from the tip before falling into her sodden clothing. She suppressed a shiver with a clench of her jaw and left her eyes upon the extra guards that were fortifying the jailhouse. From the direction of Market Bridge, a bobbling lantern caught her attention long before those of the guards. Narrowing her eyes, she crept from her place in the shadows to listen as the newcomer began to speak.
“… so then this fellar named Samfelt says that the ledger has marks what look like indigo skeletons and symbols on it. They are still trying to figure out what the symbols mean, but it seems that two names were known.” The guards leaned forward.
“One was Lugadvin down in Tamzyrr. Dunno who that one is, but…” The newcomer paused, enjoying that he had the attention of his peers and reveling in keeping his prized newfound information.
“Spit it out man,” one of the guards roared as he wiped rain from his face.
“The Skinny Man of Solhaven.”
Lightning split the air, silencing their continued conversation for the moment, but the watcher felt as if a stone had just dropped into her stomach. Her mind raced and turned with thoughts, ideas, and certain pieces of a puzzle she didn’t know she had to solve suddenly clicking into place. Why they had really gone to Mist Harbor was sharp and clear to her now. Why they had returned and all the little roads they had taken to do so. It all made a horrible, dreadful sense to her in the deadly silence of her mind and her limbs started to feel cold from something completely unrelated to the rain.
“… I’m tellin’ yuh, that’s what they said. The Skinny Man and his Talon are in bed with Bodohal. We should have known. Nothing good comes out of South Haven…”
She let their pandering voices trail off as she slipped through the shadows on her way to Market Bridge.
---
Creaking slightly, the floorboards of the Wehnimer’s Landing militia barracks protested as someone moved across them. A dirty, unshaven face appeared at the cell bars, looking around but finding no one there.
“If you have word, spit it out.”
A young sopping wet street urchin steps into the light.
“Who are you?”
“His Talon.”
“Then Wilhard is dead?”
A rustling of keys at the door interrupts the exchange, causing the urchin to disappear into the shadows as a pair of guards with a plate of stale bread and water enter the room.
---
Lightning crackled through the air as the door opened to the small hovel. Snuffling, the grotesquely fat man lifted his sleepy eyes to the soaking-wet figure in the door.
“Close it before the floorboards get soaked, Lass.”
Turning her back, she closed the door but left her hand on the knob, the knuckles growing white.
“How could you?”
Her voice had that deadly edge that alerted the older man that something was up with his ward, some storm greater than the one cascading across the rooves outside. Affecting a casual air, he chuckled.
“Well, she was rather nice and her pegged leg intrigued me. I mean, with her own talent as a healer and the many around, why keep it? But I did brief re—”
“Knock it off, old man. I know your tricks.” She turned on him, her eyes narrowed and her lithe form so still after the movement that a fool would think she was stunned. Plaitime was not a fool.
“How could you betray the Empire? After all the work, after all that they have done, after all the struggles. How?”
The question hung in the air between them and for the first time ever in her life, she thought she saw a flash of fear in his eyes.
“We don’t owe the Empire anything, Lass. Now, come, tell your uncle what is really wrong.”
“I think we both have known for a very long time that you aren’t really my uncle, now then are you Plaitime?”
He froze at her tone, the iciness of it feeling strange to him since he wasn’t used to being the target.
She took a step forward.
“And the Empire owes us everything. Who was it that drove the Shadows out of South Haven?”
She took another step forward.
“Who was it that rebuilt the homes of the poor and weak after the flooding?”
She took another step forward.
“Who was it that stopped the world from collapsing? That took orphans in and fed them, clothed them?”
She placed her hands on each of the arms of his chair, the water stored in her chair dripping off her chin and nose as she leaned into him.
“And who was it that paid for the burial of my mother, sister, and father?”
She practically hissed the last out between her lips. Her cheeks were uncharacteristically flushed, but he knew the coldness of her voice, knew the stance she took, and had a flash of pride at what he’d taught her. Pushing off the arms of the chair, she turned her back to him.
“Do you know what your mistake is, old man?”
“That I didn’t involve you in my plans, lass,” He asked with a laugh that he certainly didn’t feel.
“Thinking that I need you as much as you need me.”
Thunder roared across the heavens.