Telling Heaven from Hell

[The Wall]

He hadn't expected it to take a full day to get to the small Salvarian village of Anchorhome in the caravan. Then again, it had been a long time since he'd left his home in Northstar. He'd forgotten how truly north it was, and there were times when the longer stretches of day and night that you saw that far north just seemed normal. You woke up to light or dark that didn't fit the time and just assumed that every other person out there was experiencing it too. In the end, David Waters was grateful for the time spent. He'd been a country man for too long, and the world was not the same he'd known as a young man.

For one, this was the first time he was hearing of the civil war that was tearing his land apart along the line of church and state. In all the anger, innocent people were killed by the state for their faith, and innocent people were attacked by the church for paying their taxes before their tithing. It only made the inventor more relieved to find that he would soon be gone from the news that sent a chill down his spine. Surely Fallien would be better for his disposition than this place.

It was evening when he was dropped off at the docks. They were full, men carrying off and on what supplies they could before the sun set. There were more patrols now than he remembered seeing as a boy, their eyes distrusting and cruel. He had also remembered standing upon the cobbled docks as a child and watching people milling about. Now it was bare all but for the state patrols and uniformed workers. Not a single sailor cavorted around, looking for a short skirted girl to escort him to a nearby tavern. The lanterns were burning, though more than a few of them had their glass broken out and poles riddled with sword scratches, as if more than one skirmish had come here.

As David looked around, he noticed one ship that still had it's boarding plank set up. The ticket master stood near it, taking long pulls from a loosely rolled cigarette. Seeing him made David reach in his pocket for his pipe, the familiar wooden curve of it making him sigh with relief as he strode towards the ship. Almost too late did he notice two of the crew leaning over the side to pull in the plank.

"Wait! Please!" he called, breaking into a careful jog, trying as he might not to rattle the box on his back too much. It was a difficult task; with every stamp on the stone street he could hear the clank and rattle of iron on oak behind him. His shout made the sailors pause, looking down at the ticketmaster for permission. Behind them, several patrons were drawn to the side of the ship, peering down at the commotion. They were dressed almost identical, two in robes of white and purple, and one in a tailored black suit with a collar of white at his throat.

"This ship go South?" David managed to pant as he leaned his hands down upon his knees, peering at the ticketmaster from a tired squint. It was only then that he noticed that the master was wearing the uniform of the King's city watch. His dark eyes moved from the guard before him to the boat above. The sailors seemed to be regarding him with a sympathetic eye, the priests watching with the cold regard one might give to a disdainful exerpt of sacreligious text. They didn't care for him, and they would judge him as easily as they would breath the salty evening air.

"This ship isn't taking....civilians." the guard stated, as he eyed the box upon David's hunched and heaving back.

"Please," the man begged, cursing his aching bones for taking the turning seasons and weather so badly, for wanting to go to sleep at such an early hour. "I'm of a need to leave tonight. I'll pay double price for a ticket." Later, the photographer thought that it would have been better to have just found an inn for the night. He could see the suspicion turn to flat out paranoia on the guard's face the moment the emotions changed.

"What business do you have with the Church?" the guard demanded, pulling David closer by the scruff of his shirt. While the northerner was taller, the guard was far more muscled, his fists more like honeyed hams than actual human implements. He glared at David for a moment like that before shaking him as if he were a rag doll who would only spill secrets with rough handling.

"I've no business!" the older man managed to gasp, "I only need to go South, to Fallien! I've never been to church in my life!" While his confession granted his release, now he saw that the priests were leaning ever closer. I hadn't been his wisest moment, becoming suspicious to both sides. Now the guard was prodding, poking at the box upon the photographer's back. With ever shove and turn, David was spun around, clanking and banging coming from behind his ears. He hoped that the search only sounded violent. He wasn't quite sure what he would do if the box was broken any more than what the orcs had done to it.

"What's this?" he heard the man mumble, and David whirled around. All along, it had been his intent to merely explain what the large contraption upon his back was. He really hadn't meant to bean the guard in the face with it. As the dazed man sunk to the ground, he glared as well as he could at the inventor. David shrank away, apologizing, even as the guard shouted out, "Seize him!"

And from the docks, the patrols came and seize him they did.

[The Wall]

The jail was a two story place not far from the docks. It had been converted soon after the port had been established from what had once been a warehouse topped with sets of offices. Now the main floor was torn between the east side, which had crates of weapons and "evidence" and the west, where a small lounge and hearth had been set up for the patrolmen who came in for breaks. Patrolling the docks was hard, where the wind could toss water to land and make any weather worse. In the summer the heat made the smell of fish that had come up on the banks farther from the deep port and the brine soaked ship wood resemble something out of a well too long stagnant. Storms had been known to sweep a guard or two right off their feet and into the churning waters.

The offices on the second level of the building had been quickly changed to cells, rubble from walls that had been knocked down still swept into far corners here and there. The windows had been filled in with brick and mortar, the iron bars that comprised the cells left in disrepair. One one cell door beneath a leak in the roof had rusted so badly that the door would no longer open. The man within, who had only been sentenced to ten years was now facing life for his charges. It was perhaps for the best. He'd gone mean from the isolation, pale from the lack of sunlight. He used the rocks he found to smash in the skulls of any rat unfortunate enough to scurry close to him, and made an altar of Denebriel out of their bones and rotting fur. As David watched him gleefully ripping apart his latest catch, flicking bloody meat across at an older man who was dozing against the iron door of his confines, he wondered if he would be here long enough to go that far over the edge as well.

Already he must have been in the cell for an hour, cuddled onto a cot that was secured to the wall by steel chains. It was hard, a board instead of the mattress that he'd grown accustomed to sleeping on his long years, and the blanket that had been given him was little more than a tatter of rags. No one had ever said how long he would have to stay here for mysterious crimes against King and Country, but guessing from the quiet demeanor of everyone confined, as well as his shrouded and ill-lit bunkmate, it would be quite the long wait.

"What's brought the newcomer in?" the gruff sailor who'd been pretending to sleep against a door down the way finally said, breaking the silence that reigned in the space between the rat king's demented laughter. David sat up a little, looking across at the profile of the wizened man. His nose was crooked, his beard full but still dark. His hands were weathered, his face dark with what looked to be stains of blood. All in all, the photographer didn't see what good would come out of ignoring him.

"I don't really know. It had to do with some equipment I had on me, I believe. I wasn't told in detail what my crime was." His confession was only met with a low chuckle.

"These days," the sailor said, shaking his head. "No one ever is."