A Profit Far From Home

[Zerith]

Hell broke out yet again. This time though it was only between two groups of men. The first were the slavers, the bastards that had to make their living by selling people to pathetic buyers that were too lazy to do work. The other group of people wasn’t even that. They were just three individuals that just seemed to leap into the fray for whatever reasons they had to. The truth was that Zerith would have joined them as well in this slaughter but something had him occupied at the moment. That something was currently asking what he thought of her recent discovery.

“It doesn’t really look like it will keep you very warm.” Zerith replied. It was just a simple tunic really, although it was definitely too large for Ren’s figure it just didn’t look like it would do a good job or providing warmth. Honestly it looked ridiculous, with a large star embroidered on the front and the color of the material made her stand out amongst the crowd. Looking at it made Zerith wonder just what was Ren thinking when she picked a shirt like that. “I think you would be better off with a cloak rather than that,” Zerith suggested. “But if it’s comfortable you can wear that, it does provide a little more covering”.

It was after he said that the chaos began. The loud gunshot, the bloodshed, the three fighters taking on a group of slavers all seemed to occur as a result of Zerith’s answer to Ren’s question. The young fighter gripped his halberd tightly as if he was expecting a small group of slavers to come and attack either Ren or himself. Although he didn’t know this girl he would do his best to protect her. That was just him really, the type of fool that would do something foolish to help a stranger. Right now the best way he could do that was to try and get Ren away from here. The three men that were leaving behind a pile of slain slavers could take care of themselves and defend themselves if they needed to. This girl though was different, she just didn’t seem like the type of person what would fight so the only logical way to get her out of trouble was to get her away from it and to somewhere safe.

“Let’s hurry and go someplace safe Ren,” Zerith spoke loud enough for her to hear his voice from the chaos nearby. “I don’t want to risk your safety here so before we find ourselves confronted by some slavers or something we should get going somewhere safe. I don’t care where as long as it’s not here all right? Wherever you want to go I’ll follow. If we need to figure out where we should go we can do when we don’t have to worry about being killed. Let’s just get out of here okay?”

[Poetra]

“It doesn’t really look like it will keep you very warm.”

"I've never had to worry about it. My cloak was being used as a blanket when I was taken, though, so I'm kinda stuck..."

Sounds of battle erupted from the direction the large man had gone. Whipping her head around, she could see a rather primal person, and one of the others who had helped her escape, running into the fray. What do I do? I can't just stand here! They helped me, I need to help them! Hearing Zerith's pleas for her to run for cover, she could only glance at him with a shocked expression. She struggled inwardly, ready to slap him or yell at him, but also realising the protectiveness behind his words.

"I'm sorry, but I can't run away. I may not be able to do much, but I've got to try."

Turning, she ran toward the building, no longer interested in being protected, at least for the moment. As she neared the door, a bit of intelligent thought kept her from jumping headlong into battle unarmed. Slowing, she crept toward the opening and peered in. Bodies were strewn all over the floor, blood seeping from wounds and splattered on floor, ceiling, walls, comrades and foes. The gore was horrific, but Ren had a mission, and ignored the whirling of her stomach. On further study, she discerned the feral man and the other were still alive and kicking... literally.

The hulking guard was not seen at first, until his miraculous and horrifying awakening. The violence redefined the word as he tore people apart with cold, bloody precision. His life oozed from his body, however, and soon he slumped back to the floor. So few were the remaining slavers, Ren felt secure that the others would keep them busy. Taking this opportunity, she darted in, keeping her body bent over in a poor attempt at stealth. After what seemed an eternity, she knelt next to her true savior and assessed the situation. He needed medicine, and badly. Oh no! My bag, its not here! Panic threatened to seize her mind, but she took a few deep breaths and considered her options.

Gripping the hem of her new tunic, she tore it into strips. As she reached over his body to wrap the wound on his shoulder, a strange and familiar scent came to her. Herbs... The aroma came from below her, and she was surprised to realize they were in the clothing of the man she fought to save. Her new mission was clear, and she turned her full attention to it. Her hands searched through his clothing franticly, hoping beyond hope to find that which would aide the suffering man.

[Storm Veritas]

The others having mostly fled, and the bodies slain about him, Storm was left with only one other swordsman to share in the endgame. The man in black had collapsed to a nearby bench, the puddle of crimson beneath him a ghastly happenstance. The others had stumbled away to safety, the girl and another of the smaller men, the warriors who had so bravely risked themselves. Here, on his knees, there was only flesh and gore and death about him, a terrible circle of carnage.

The bringer of pain and suffering, the harbinger of doom. What a fine man you have become.

The voice of his father, the never approving tyrant, the condescending bastard. It was too real now for Veritas, too damned all-encompassing. He had become a monster, he had become a killer. There could be no going back from this. No return to normalcy, no petty grifting. He had butchered four or five men with merely short-blades, and was doused with a thick, fast-drying layer of burgundy blood. It was caking to his skin in the heat, browning and painting him in tiger-stripes, the thin streams of scarlet and spraying life-nectar leaving him a demonic sight.

He sat still on his knees, taking in the environment about him. The crowd was beginning to grow, the morbid curiosity making the onlookers grow bolder and bolder still. They needed to see the mortal wounds inflicted, the merchant of death and destruction still sitting here, a vile monster for them all to behold.

Barely human. Barely even worth a second thought. Nothing better than the monsters that you once tried to protect people from.

It was the first time that he had killed so many; and there was no air of self-defense that one could fall back on for the justification of so much destruction. He had attacked to save the girl, he could try to convince himself, but even that was a lie. She was property, and while slavery tickled him as wrong, it was far less abrasive than some of the other things that he had witnessed and allowed to transpire.

He had intervened not to save, but to kill. To murder. He felt the bloodlust, the rage, the desire to destroy, and he was a very effective assassin when he did strike. Inside, he knew that there was no good reason for this action, no underlying justification for the death of so many.

There couldn’t be; he liked it. At his core, he lavished in the killing. He enjoyed being the deathbringer. Watching the blood flow slowly over his skin, Storm realized that he was born to do this. Born to kill. Born to destroy.

There was nowhere to go, now. Nothing that he could do, nowhere to run. He was tired of running. Perched in the center of town, he knew the constables couldn’t be far off.

Let them come. He was tired of running. It would end one way or the other.

[Malagen]

When he finally stumbled from his position of an ancient tyrant sitting on his throne to the blood-soaked dirt below, the world started to shut down one piece at the time. The color was first to fade away, the endless azure so uncanny for these lands at this time of the year seemed like a blue blanket drenched with too much bleach. Blue shifted to faded blue, then to no blue at all as ominous grayness devoured every trace of color, making the sunny sky above devoid of all hues to Malagen. The sound was the second to go, the countless murmurs and the dousing ruckus shifting to nothing more then just a heap of slurred voices and sounds that were coming from a deep damp well. Or rather he was sinking deeper into this well. Yes, that would explain the eminent coldness all over his back that made his body shiver gently. “Death shivers.” he thought in his usual matter-of-factly serene tone that his mind usually used for his inner monologues.

He didn’t mind much about it all. Death was just a waystation, something all were bound to strike on their path sooner or later. But he did suddenly became aware of lateness of things, or things left undone and unfinished, pages left unwritten in a story that shouldn’t have ended up in some lousy town at the hand of some two-bit slavers that couldn’t even parry a sword if their life depended on it. And there was a new emotion he was introduced to at that moment, and it left a sour taste of a rotten apple in his mouth. The emotion was regret and it seemed that it had been introduced to the life of an emotionless man a tad too late. He closed his eyes. It was alright. There were worse ways to go anyways.

Tiny, frantic hands, passing over his body. Searching for something desperately. Either his sense of touch was still present or he is being pickpocketed down in the seventh circle of hell. No, the cold at his back was still there, clinging to him like a sick demented monkey, and the unrecognizable echo of some delirious symphony was still the same, if not a touch clearer. If only his eyelids weren’t made out of solid iron he would probably see the monochromatic sky as well. How come death never came swiftly and painlessly for the likes of him? How come the bad men always tend to meet the most horrific painful end? He should’ve been a hero. Heroes always live happily ever after and always wind up in a castle or a house with a picket fence with a nice woman and a happy-happy family.

But the hands just kept rummaging, gently and yet at a great pace, as if somebody’s life was depending on it, trying to find the hidden compartments in the interior of his thick cumbersome coat. He dragged his lids upwards, revealing his azure eyes that seemed just as faded as the sky above. He wanted to tell whoever was here that she (She? Yes, now that he thought about it, it was definitely a she with her feminine smooth fingers and gentle audible sighs) just be done with it and, oh, by the way, give him a swift death if possible. But what his eyes were bestowed upon was not black and white like the world, and not blurred and slogged as everything else, not wrong like all that took place on this fateful day. “I...I know you...” he whispered, and even his whisper seemed static and chilly, robbed of any emotion. Yes, he knew her. Only she should’ve been halfway to the outskirts of this wretched town with that young runt, that halberd-wielding brown-haired fellow that he instructed back in The Cage.

And yet she was here, risking her freedom for a malicious murderer that a day ago wouldn’t spare as much as a spit from his mouth even if she was dying from thirst. “Go away... You should... go away!” he tried his best to shoo her away, but neither his voice nor the feeble movement of his arm served as a good persuasion. She just kept looking down at him with those big damned doe eyes filled with warmth and compassion, everything he didn’t deserve contained in that single glance. And it burned, it burned on that place where his heart could’ve been if he wasn’t a heartless killer, hurt to see such an act of mercy and being unworthy of it. It hurt when it shouldn’t. Because he was a machine, a god of war and the very embodiment of death in case the grim reaper wasn’t around to fill the role. Or so he kept saying to himself. But that damned thing burned all the same under the sympathetic look of the unnamed raven-haired girl. And it all came down to a simple choice; be a murderer and die in a pool of your own blood in some god forsaken middle of nowhere where marriage with your cousin was perfectly legal, or take the gift she had to offer. For the first time in months the frozen facial features of Malagen shifted into a minute smirk. How come there was always a woman at the fork in the path of a man’s fate?

His hand, crimson and shivering, caught her own by the wrist, tainting the perfection of her own perfect pale tan. But instead of pushing it away, it led it deeper beneath his coat, led it to the series of compartments that stood within the bulk of the thick cloth. There were three rolls of bandages in this one that he bought the other day at the local bazaar, buying them off from a healer that had only one chance to agree to the price Malagen was offering. Luckily, the elderly rounded monk saw that he meant business and sold them for a bargain, just so he doesn’t end up on the sharp end of... well, anything sharp that the dark man had in his inventory. They were soaked with the healing ointment and disinfectant, packed in small burlap wrappings and sprinkled with small dried pieces of various herbs that let out a scent of menthol and myrrh.

“Work fast. You should not tarry here.” he instructed her in the flat raspy voice once he released her hand. He had made his choice, to whatever end it may take him.

[Poetra]

Ignoring the demands for her to leave, Ren continued to rummage through his clothes. So intent was she, that she was unprepared for the strong fingers that clasped tightly on her wrist. As he led her hands deeper into his clothing, she felt icy fear creep into her conciousness, fearing something she didn't understand. But when her finger brushed against a pouch, she realized the truth. He's helping me save him...

“Work fast. You should not tarry here.”

The warmth of his hand left hers, and she felt the bloody residue he'd left behind already drying. Jarred into action, the priestess lifted several bundles into the open and splayed them out on the floor next to her. Chaos still loomed around them, but the calm of necessity was more than enough to keep her mind on the project at hand. Quickly she sorted through the materials, and located just about all of what she needed. Except the fever-herbs. We must find some soon, once we can leave...

There was no time to mash the leaves, though her saliva would hold them together. Something to keep them on the wound... What can I use...? Her eyes scanned the area, but nothing was clean enough. On a whim, she looked down at herself and noticed abstractly that her own tunic that she had so recently "acquired" was still clean, for the most part. Without hesitation, she tore the hem into a strip, and continued to tear off strips until there wasn't enough fabric to tear.

With trembling fingers, Ren used one emerald rag to wipe the wounds clean, a hint of gold thread reflecting light softly. Once she felt that she could do no more, she smeared the make-shift poultice onto them, and tied it down with the remaining cloths. Finished, she rocked back onto her heals to rest, and wiped her forehead with the back of her wrist. She wasn't satisfied with the results, but at least he had a chance to live now.

"You need rest, and I need more herbs. Otherwise, you will catch a fever, and maybe still die." Her voice was gentle, with a no-nonsense tone. Her eyes betrayed weariness and doubt, but were highlighted with hope. "How do you feel, warrior?"

[Storm Veritas]

The bloodlust was unsettled, as the constables would never close. He stood in the clearing, as those circled around, drifting back slowly and away from this comical monstrosity. His appearance had become ludicrous; he was clad in mud and blood and gore and sweat, but beneath it, the barely human beast which teetered on the edge of sanity was far too real. There would be no apologies for the lives taken; nor would thanks be necessary. He had certainly done what he felt responsible for out of passion and fire, rather than organized care and goodwill.

The wait was tortuous, and his heart slowed. The cool breeze that soothed the skins on this unseasonably warm day tingled his skin, the beads of sweat the first to feel the effects. The mud cover was streaked now, long thin streams of perspiration clearing a path down his muscular frame. The blood remained in scattered patches, crimson stains upon the skin. He was quite probably injured, and scratches and bumps and burns were beginning to whisper at him, no doubt the quiet phase of healing before the pain would come. The adrenaline was coming down now, the endorphine seizing up. Even his breath slowed, the gasps for air coming more evenly, more regular, his lungs moving with some rhythm now.

Beneath the happy mask of insanity, he was spiraling, his realization of his own misdeeds starting to hit him again. They would come for him again, and would come in full force, when he was alone. The running man would have to continue traveling, have to keep moving. He was not getting better, not moving towards some real existence. He was not becoming the man he wished to be, and not the one his father had once been. He was a monster, nothing more.

But today… today you can make a difference.

As if driven by some imbued sense of duty, he pushed on, moving in the direction of the other fighter, the felled warrior who was being treated by the girl from the cage. Protectively, Storm turned his back to the two, his still keen-eyes darting about for some sign of further assault, some follow up attack to end this once and for all. There was nothing yet; they had bought themselves some time. There was a gentle grace about the girl, and a heroic nature upon the downed fighter. The two were diametrically opposed to the diplomat turned demon that was Storm Veritas. He was once a man of dreams and aspirations and will. Today, he was a blood and mud-smeared Neanderthal, his primal urges to kill and bludgeon matched only by the guilt that followed. The voice in his head tormented him.

You’ve gone and f*cked it all up, now. A good man is down, because you hesitated, you were too slow. The girl will never leave alive. You’ll be hunted like a f*cking dog.

For now, there would be no time for second guessing. He turned his head and knelt gently, his daggers sheathed and hands exposed. Beneath the façade of gore and sinewy musculature, he spoke in a voice that was serene, almost scared. The girl had worked hard, and the man looked better, but the short breaths, his color, his distant eyes… they were still the eyes of death. This man would certainly not leave this spot of his own accord.

“Let me help him. He has lost a lot of blood. His heart is slowing. Let me help.”

Moving closer, the hands of Veritas began to buzz with a tingle of energy, the air smelling of ozone and the sizzling sounds returning. The fingertips burned white with electric energy now. He would be either heralded or assaulted, and he prayed that the judgment of the girl was worse than it appeared.

For any smart woman would not trust such a maniac.

[Malagen]

Blood loss was in many ways like being on a really bad trip, like taking a drug too strong or too venomous that messed up your senses and took you to the dreamland via a shortcut plagued with apparitions and monsters. Every face was distorted, sound deviated to wails or shrieks or some unearthly combination of the two. And it was always cold, colder then a grave in the middle of Berevar mountains, and the chill embraced you like a treacherous lover with a kiss and a knife. Malagen felt this way before. Back in Ferioh they actually had training for such situations, cutting the veins and leaving the trainee in the middle of the forest. If neither the cold nor the wolves got you, you passed. Otherwise you didn’t live to tell the tale. Malagen went on this training trip three time, twice on his own accord.

But back then the wounds were never this severe and he never had to cut through a handful of slavers, then get beat up and shot only to cut through another handful. That’s why today he had his angel, his own personal messiah that struggled with the wound as if she was saving a good man. If she only knew... If she knew how many were killed by those blades that aided in her escape, the wailing women with ripped guts, the shattered skulls of the children, the men that came and fell by the dozen, like scythed hay on a sunny summer day. If she only knew that she was saving a monster. This drew out a real smile on his face as her hands frenetically applied the herbs and procured the makeshift bandages made out of already too short tunic for Salvar weather. If she could see what he had done she would have been halfway to Corone just to get away from him.

He could feel the herbs’ cool numbing sensation spreading over his shoulder like a tide, overriding the pain and interchanging it for uncanny serenity and senselessness. It would take weeks for the wound to heal and it would take a wonder for his bone structure to heal the right way after the pulverizing projectile, but the hemorrhage was stopped and that meant the trip through the dreamland slowly shifted to backtracking. She spoke something about a fever, her large black eyes sympathetic and pathetic and sweet enough to give a man cavity, but the sullen warrior just waved his hand weakly. He managed to put his healthy hand to use, pushing himself backwards just enough to sit and lean his back on the wooden wall behind him. The effort took so much of his already severely depleted energy that his eyes rolled back, thought about staying there for a second, then returned to the girl in front and her inquiry.

Before he managed to tell her that he’s fine and that she should go, a barbaric looking man that fought during the onslaught came forth. He was a savage apparition, muddy and bloody and as trustworthy as a Lavinian thief, but he was healthy enough for the task Malagen had for him. The perfectly placid and emotionless face of the fallen Dram peered at the man and his queer magic for a couple of seconds before summoning the man closer, close enough he could whisper into his ear without the benevolent girl to hear. “You take her out of here right now. Irregardless of what she says. Drag her out of here if you have to.” he spoke to the man, his voice frighteningly cold and indifferent given the situation. Malagen’s eyes were dauntless, resolved, as movable as a mountan range as he looked into the man’s eyes. He turned to the raven-haired lass next.

“I told you that you should not tarry here. Go, get away from here.” he spoke in the same flat voice. But she just kept staring at him, and he knew she would take some convincing to do what she should have done the second he released her from the cage. “I’ll be fine. I know these people. They trust me and they will believe whatever story I serve them.” It was a flat-out, prime time lie and he had the perfect face for it. Nothing could see beyond its ironclad mask, no secret revealed by his tranquil eyes. “Now you two get out of here before the law arrives. I’ll cover for you. I am their man after all.”

His hand felt its way through the muck of his own blood mixed with dirt and reached one of his scimitars, wrapping around the hilt meekly. With the last ounces of his energy he lifted the sword and pointed it to the girl. His face shifted from the perpetual calm mask, an uncanny occurence to say the least, and it was frowning. “GO! Go before I change my mind and turn you all in!”

[Daedalus]

As rapidly as his intentions had been overrun and subverted by his own monstrous instincts, Banazîr withdrew from his trance-like rampage tenfold as swiftly. It evaporated like the morning dew as the last slaver's soul flew from his open mouth, leaving the boy to deal with the carnage he had created. A sack of bricks would not have sufficient weight to serve as a metaphor for what happened next. The only appropriate expression would be this: Banazîr's mind stopped.

Often, people say of something that it is "unbelievable", or "inconceivable". They do not mean this literally, but as an expression of surprise. Banazîr, however, was not surprised. To him, the terms mentioned apply more literally: he did not, would not, could not believe what he had done. It was the ultimate denial, not only of his own memory but of what all his six senses were reminding him every instant: that he was a killer. It was a denial, ultimately, of himself.

But if a person's mind and spirit will not perform their functions, the body, as it always does, has a replacement—a backup. Banazîr's paralyzed soul was pushed aside, ignored, as the body asserted control of itself. His head swung stiffly upward, his mouth gasped for air, his lifeless limbs mobilized, and he turned to look upon the man whose slaughterous actions had provoked his insanity. Beside him were a mud-streaked, blood-soaked man Banazîr could barely recognize as the maniac he had fought alongside and a raven-haired girl wearing a tattered crimson tunic.

Banazîr merely stood there, watching them. His body had nothing better to do, after all—not until its master regained his senses, at least.

[Zerith]

No matter what you say or do, regardless of how much important you put on something it always seems to happen. There’s always that one woman who does the exactly opposite of what you ask them. It could probably be a matter between life and death and still she will ignore your concern and do what she thinks she should do. Sure enough Ren just had to be that one woman, ignoring Zerith’s suggestions of finding cover and instead running into the chaos to help that one man that told Zerith to take Ren far from here.

“Way to go, idiot,” Zerith mumbled to himself as he slowly made his way to join them, dragging his feet behind him. “Way to go and get the job done.”

Trying to look on the bright side Zerith noted that all the people that would’ve done harm to the woman were either dead or running for their lives. Was it luck that more strangers protected the girl? Especially that one man, the one who stood in the cage when Zerith climbed into it earlier. Did he protect Ren for the sake of being able to sleep better at night or did he actually care for her? Hell, was he feeling proud of what he did as he lay on the ground dying? Whatever his motives were he did help Ren and Zerith, the least thing the youth could do was see if there was anything he could do to help.

“GO! Go before I change my mind and turn you all in!” the injured warrior ordered.

Was what Zerith saw real? This man, laying in the dirt had enough strength to lift one of his swords and point it at the girl who was trying to save his life. Why the hell would he do something like that? Did he think that he didn’t need anymore help? Or perhaps he was still trying to protect her even as he lay dying. Either way he did give Zerith a task to complete and the youth had every intention of completing it.

“He has a point,” Zerith spoke up as he joined the others around the fallen warrior. “We have to get out of her now before the authorities arrive. If not you’ll end up behind another set of bars Ren. Besides, I’m sure that whoever comes looking for us will treat the rest of this man’s wounds. He’s not going to let us stay here either. So let’s just go!”

Heading in the opposite direction all the shouts were coming from Zerith stopped briefly and turned around. His eyes stared at Ren, “NOW! We can’t afford to wait any longer. I swear that if you don’t come now I will drag away from here!”

[Storm Veritas]

The brave soldier lay on the ground, a mess. He was slowed, weak, a clearly beaten man. In his eyes, Storm could see a sort of courage, a type of ferocity that he had seen rarely before. A brave warrior, another soldier type he sailed with. That same passion, that same fateless bravery. It existed in another man, another fellow with the same sad, tired eyes. The man he had traveled with before, a man he thought was one of a kind.

Letho Ravenheart.

He wanted to run, wanted to respect the wished of a dying man, but couldn't bring himself to do it at first. Leaning down over the wounds, he felt that same shivering buzz in his hands, and watched the electric heat dance before his fingertips. It singed a large wound on the man's chest, the smell of burning flesh both putrid and satisfying. If nothing else, he knew it would help the man, slow his death, ease the transition.

"Relax, my friend, and trust me."

The wound would heal if the man did, and Storm laughed at his words. None of these people were his friend, not the girl or the other two strangers that he had come to fight beside. Fate had brought them together, a duality of duty and coincidence. When one suggested they run, Storm decided that it was time to answer the call of the man who reminded him of an old friend, now lost.

The townspeople wouldn't dare bother him now. He easily lifted the girl over his shoulder, despite her pleas. He turned from the others, a half smile and a nod. They had helped him, perhaps saved him. He would take the girl to town, perhaps back to Corone or Raieria. It didn't matter, he just would bring her somewhere free. Somewhere that she could be a person again. She bucked on his shoulder, but her attempts were futile. She wouldn't have to trust him; she didn't have a choice.