Out of Character:
Though the temperature was mild, the world seemed frosty, cold stone on cold stone, with little green to soften it. This was the capital of his homeland, Leander reminded himself, again and again, but the harsh rigidity of Knife’s Edge was nothing like the Salvar he had grown up in. The hodgepodge of buildings felt constricting, in a subconscious, disturbing kind of way. That the majority of them were ramshackle in addition to hodgepodge didn’t help – he could hardly stop from hearing his father’s criticisms of such wastefulness in his mind. Cities, if they were going to be enclosed and inorganic, should at least be ordered about it. There was a sense of madness that permeated the buildings of the town, of chaos and violence about to spill out into the rest of the world. Knife’s Edge truly felt like a town balanced precariously against the edge of a knife, razor sharp and full of promised harm.
However, Leander had a task to carry out. Nestled safely within his satchel, he carried a number of bundled herbs, wrapped and carefully deposited several days ago on the bequest of an herbalist a few fiefdoms over, who had complained heartily to him about the dismantlement of the church’s portal system by the government. Leander had agreed to the man’s arguments that it would inconvenience folks, and could understand the herbalist’s worry over these time-sensitive herbs – the closing of the portals had even made his source of income less constant, though the extra running it allowed Leander over the course of his deliveries was a silver lining to an otherwise grim thunderhead.
As for the church and state themselves – here, Leander was more conflicted. While he understood that in some locals, the local Lords and Ladies of the fiefs might be harsh and uncaring, the king himself, Leander knew, was not apathetic to the plight of his people. However, this did not make the Church of the Ethereal Sway any less a force of public good as well, and while it’s individual priests might be more or less power-hungry, it was the same, in Leander’s mind, as the failings of the state – both were good establishments, but both were plighted by individuals of a less than upstanding demeanor.
Leander passed a pair of guards, leaning against a large garrison that looked as if it had taken slightly more than its share of abuse in the past few days. The two of them gave him a look as he passed, their attention strangely fixated on the red messenger’s sash he wore across his chest. Ignoring the guards, Leander gazed up at the various signs denoting the shops in the area, before finally finding the mortar-and-pestle logo that he had been told to look for. Tentatively, he pushed the door open, finding the dark interior of the shop inside. Plants occupied every available space, except for a small work area directly in front of the entrance. Behind the alchemist’s tools that occupied the space sat an aged woman, powerful in build despite the weathered gray that dominated her hair, the tight bun she wore it in almost proudly displaying the pale roots. A dark and worn eyepatch tried but failed to cover the large scar that worked its way down the left half of her face, stopping just shy of her mouth. Her expression was irritated, her one good eye looking grimly up from her work to observe Leander’s entrance. Suddenly reminded of his relative youth, Leander squirmed slightly under her gaze, forfeiting his chance to make the first move.
“You got a package for me, boy?” the older woman practically growled, her short-temperedness even more evident than before. “Make it fast, boy – open warfare on the streets may be good for business, but it sure ain’t good for my free time.” Seizing a handful of one of the herbs nearby, she threw it into a half-full mortar and began grinding it into the green mess already within it with a frustrated vigor. “Stupid folks all go and get themselves cut up, and then expect me to provide salves for the entire lot,” she continued, hardly pausing as she worked away at the mortar. “Next thing you know, and they’ll be wanting me to go out and bind all their little cuts and scrapes too. You gonna deliver that message, boy, or what?”
Still cowed, Leander nodded mutely, and pulled the carefully wrapped herbs from his pouch, placing them carefully on one of the few clear spots on the workbench. Looking away from her grinding momentarily, the grizzled apothecary reached out to seize the package – although her manner was rough, her grip on the package showed a careful finesse – and returned her hand with a small pouch of coin, which Leander gratefully received. Before there was even time for the woman to mutter “Be off with you, then.” Leander had executed a quick bow and an even hastier retreat. Stumbling out the door and into the city outside once again, he practically ran headfirst into the roughly burnished breastplates of the guards from earlier. Muttering a quick apology, he dodged around the pair, seeking to put as much distance between the frightening apothecary and himself as possible.
“Halt, there!” one of the guards called after him, raising a gloved hand as if that gesture in and of itself would drag Leander to a stop. “You are a messenger?” he continued, his voice more commanding that querying.
Leander turned back to face the two, stepping back into conversational range. “Aye, that I be,” he responded, curious and wary of the pair. “You need a message sent?”
“Then, by the order of the King himself, you are to come with us.”
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