(To all reading, sorry it took so long. To all reading, sorry its written so long. To all reading, there are apologies to go around. To those who have a hard time focusing, I know your pain, and still don't care. ^_^)
You could call it an obsession, if sobriety was in your heart. You could call it love, if love was surrender. You could call it malevolence, if nothing good could be said about. You could call it destiny, if you knew fate was dictated by a god. All of these things could be could be true, and the sad fact is, they were. Not to the extent that they were all true all the time, as nothing in life is so certain, but that they were true parts and on layers. Such is the psychology of a criminal or priest, but just the same, our current example is of the more artfully arranged variety.
The balcony of the citadel overlooked the best of Radasanth’s bourgeoisie population, a sleepy cityscape of peeked roofs, two stories buildings doubling as shops that beckoned to the public and home for those who had yet to make the most of their ambitions. The shops were closing up shop, and the scents of eternally fresh leather, day old bread, and the ashes of previously extinguished fire remained hanging in the air. It was a view of rising opulence; it was rising so fast the rest of the world seemed to have been left behind. Even the stone cobbles were clean, the streets that had never known the embrace of a dead man’s body.
All of this was forgotten was like the day, a passing which mattered to other people, and over the steam and stench of coffee and alcohol. The combatants, whether they roosted in the apartments or entered from abroad, drank and ate well. The splendor of Radasanth’s offered, secretive as it was, tempting as it was, every hand that could hold a knife a place to call home, and the company of associates if never friends.
“So, what keeps a man like you in a place like this? Ain’t you got some girl you’re sweet for?” Viciere Sandervalce, asked the question with a moral bent that spoke volumes, and hinted at tales, of such extreme hypocrisy, that such personal questions could be asked and received with laughter and smiles all around. He was a man whose every feature was broad and hulking, and whose appetite left six plates empty of all but grease and bone.
On the other side of the table, grinning through a mouthful of mutton, the whole he had ripped it from mounted on a stick, and sometimes through Viciere himself, was Ace Mandelo. Since his arrival, this man of middling height, unimpressive size, and hardly acceptable age had proved himself nothing if not insolent. “Eh? You ask me to talk about myself and this is what you come up with?” Did he think less of them for asking the question? Well, contempt was almost always imperceptible, hence why it had gone unnoticed by all.
Ace played at the being pressed by some terrible decision, and slamming his meat lined fork onto the plate he came to his decision. “All right, set aside your dishes, I’ll tell you the state of things.” He said it, and was met by the applause of silverware (steel) being set aside.
Around the table, welcoming smiles grew on those whose hearts were lighter never mind their faces and manners, and leaned forward to hear for what their associate had to say of himself. If nothing else besides impudent, ill-mannered, he had demonstrated himself to be well versed in smooth tongued wizardry.
“It’s the state of things and the story, lads,” when he addressed them all, he looked between the two ladies of their group, who head in hand expected apologies the gender demanded, having made sure he had made no mistake, Ace continued, “Radasanth is dead.” At his pronouncement, the summer winds ceased, and a casual brow was raised among all those who heard or cared. “The streets are filled with ghost; the cemeteries have only mourners; the church knows only the undead; hence why every philosopher, and soul after his time, declares this world as pale and imitation.”
“And this is why you haven’t had a woman on your arm or in your bed?” Justine asked, a tempting smile mocking him as it mocked every man. She was thin, coquettish to obsession, and dressed for a party among people dressed for travel, combat, and sleep. Attentive to airs, aware of actuality, she always did her best to teeter on the edges of love and hate with everyone. In the face of all this, she found only a kind indifference to every caress and barb.
Ace raised his glass, and downed its burning tang contents, continuing as though nothing had changed, and nothing mattered. “There are paler corpses out there than you, Justine, they might smell more fare, look three times as beautiful, but at the heart, you’re all almost the same.” Were there a few laughs at the joke? Well…there were more at the victim, a victim likely regretting that knives were forbidden outside the arenas. “Besides, love is something that finds other people--story book people--that said, I’ve lived that life. As villain or hero, well, some dreams must die to fulfill others. Better dead as an unfortunate hero who fought the good fight than alive as one of those ghouls. At least when I leave this place, it’ll be with monuments to my name, statues or graves.”
“Don’t let the fame fool you; you might not think the scars last longer than the wave of those monks’ fingers.” Similar in age, but darker and younger by degrees of attitude and tragedy, Havelock answered in somber tones, his ambient sobriety backed up by a past that spoke of humility, and how often he had been laid low. “Gods of the market place, will of the people, if you’re here, it’s best to stay until you can find someplace better to be.”
“None in sight.” Ace threw one arm over the wooden back of his chair, fully aware that his views on life were at best less than anyone else’s; they came with sincere notes of deceit. Drinking, laughing, smiling, and fighting, these were the ways he lived his life. “Think about it like this, matrimony, politics, and the higher services every man can pay to the gods of the market place all come in their due time.”
So saying, half-man, half-child, a look toward the door with a nature all too wild, Ace took to his feet, and took his leave, waving and speaking without turning to at least do these things over his shoulder, “And my due time has come, check out the show.”
_____________________________!Intermission Isertion!___________________________________
They are wonderful monks, those who live as druids first.
Existing to supplant the seeds of nature, reworking the Thayne made earth.
Famine in curiousity, they break the rules that bind them.
Lusting after mystery, they are beyond any alignment.
Audacious as the renegade gods, have made travel to the moon real.
Pious to occult lives, they have made mountains kneel.
Now all these things are very good, they have gathered many gifts,
But arrogance reigns among the wealthy, and among the religious, thrift.
So these mighty monks have graced us men:
The grocer now knows his own, and baker too beside him,
Radasanth's veins flow with chromatic golds, and the fortuneless soon find them.
The cost doesn't matter, for those men of science beyond their race
Who do as they please, acting as gods, kings, and Justice.
All tis in their power, we accept this to be true.
All of us are cowards, but none would call us fools.
For safety as animals warms us, against them we can only lose.
So we set our morals aside and trust, letting true virtue's corpse cool.
Without judgment they give each villain and his foul blooded kin,
their rightful place with and without regard for their sins.
The thief is made a guard, and paid to sate his thirst.
The harlot made a servant, of whom all visitors have claimed to see first.
And those who take life, and with weapon preserve
their selfish selves, and kill with reckless nerve,
hold the fate which Thayne and Philosopher so rightly deserve.
For it is the cheer of masses vicious killers must endure.
Proving to the youth, the truth and value of evil's lure.
Unmaking their fellows for a day’s wage,
Proving that at day’s end the rogue is still slave,
But never it be said that such monks were kind,
because they are men, and in their nature is one goal in mind.
To study and learn, with ambitious bent,
till all the worlds secrets have been twice met,
And the condition to which all humanity is born,
is pondered and dissected,
monuments to academic lusts, built and burned.
Never meet those terrific monks, with their great glittering eyes.
Never do deals with them, all profit ensures that more people die.
Never lie to them, when they gaze into your face.
Never speak to them your mind, for any question drives them to the chase.
Never show them disrespect, or they will show you the same.
Never go to the citadel, never play their games.
If you should ever meet, those strange little men,
Nod to them, quickly, bow your head.Ace would be lying if the poem did not come to mind, memory from a life not his own feeding him lines with a focused care, the voice of a lesser but more beautiful soul accompanying the words with perfect recitation. Longinus, a long dead scholar who had traveled the world two hundred years to gather the world in one book had not been wrong. In the red headed youth’s past, there had been every evidence of that nothing was beyond Radasanth’s monks. Set atop a shooting star, hurled onto burning ships at sea, the fact of the matter was, no matter how disturbing the Citadel was, it was the place to be.
~ Longinus Du Knave on his first visit to the citadel.
“Ah, and my pet arrives to do his master justice!” The voice was old, and ancient, and nothing like its usual tones, which worried Ace more than he knew. There beside the final door, sitting in a stone alcove, stone freshly hewn into a seat, was the flaring hood with its almost impenetrable darkness, protruding gray beard. Aged had tinged the man with dementia, Az-ram, terrifying as he was, was simply more so. Ace could handle the capricious, but who could handle the insane?
“Stop staring, stupid dog, I’m only here to cheer for you.” The old man said, his chuckles echoing through the torch lit, stone lined corridor, much as they did they in his own mind. He met Ace’s banter with an unusual acceptance, but when Ace passed, the old man seized Ace’s arm, and in spite of the boy’s momentum and more than human strength, he could proceed.
Turning, Ace gazed into that dizzying darkness with a watchful worry, his expression for once real, and the change was so apparent that Ace was clearly gone. “I don’t know what keeps a man like you alive, but don’t tell me you want to test it?” Afraid, certainly, but underneath that young exterior was the usual, casual, and calculating Law. His fingers flexed, a spasm running through them as the monster was about to attack, but the second passed, and neither fiend said anything until they were both certain that there was nothing to fear.
“I’ve seen the like of you, maybe none so advanced or smooth, but I knew you when you first crawled into the Dansdel.” An owlish quirk of the neck surveyed the room from both monk and liar scanned the room for unmade corpses, reflexively though they both new they were alone. When Az-ram turned his infinite and eyeless gaze back up to Ace, and looked through him, it was with the air of familiarity, the tone of a friend. I knew you when you were first deciding who you wanted to be, for what it’s worth, I’ve got a word of praise for you.”
A tug on his arm brought Lawrence in closer, the act set aside, though the face remained dark with disdain, the scent of decaying fungi wafted through what had been cool air, “You’ve come far, and I’ve enjoyed your performance immensely,” the old man whispered, and finished harshly with, “so don’t fuck this up, demon or not, failure is in your blood.” With that, Lawrence wrenched his arm free, and turned with the kind of resentment that screamed for violence, and would be vented later.
Entering into the arena, though the day had only just been done, rays of light splashed down about him, and the grandeur of his next arena came into play. With a keen eye that dilated in both shock and awe, Ace gazed into the noir obsidian forest set fifty yards into a canyon that could only have been made by magic’s means.
The grass appeared to be lush in its gray ashen state, fields of black blades motionless in the warm wind, crumbling to ashes underfoot. Every foot step Ace took raised trails of floating darkness in his wake. He took no notice of this though, because he could only look skyward.
The trees were much the same, lined with vines which looked like veins, monoliths in the shape of trees towered one hundred stories high, and through them, between, in ever more complex circuits a highway of stone ran through the ten dozen of them, not simply connecting to each other, but into the rock walls above, and there too, those roads clearly did not end. “What wonderful men…” Ace said to himself, impressed to the point of feeling small, and aware that the ultimate enemy of his current plan made all of Ace’s opponents pale and weak by comparison.
Proceeding onto the highway, and into the branches that obscured them, Ace never saw the rustling thorns or the great bristled limbs of the underbrush as its veins snaked below. They would come into play soon, and until then, the monk’s would not need the plant’s hunger, or its hatred, or fear. Its growth would explosive soon, it would be fruitful, and it would multiply. Soon the sun would be put back to its rightful place, and the Noir Woods would breathe and teem with life.
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