Collecting a Debt (Navisya)

[Tetreka]

Noon. Spring 58, AV 512

"Gortka, you know what day it is! Come out!" Tetreka stood outside a small brewery, javelin in hand, shouting up at an open window in Arumenic.

Out the window came a small coin purse. Catching it, Tetreka opened it, cursed under his breath, and continued shouting, "This looks like fourteen copper mizas. You either come down here with another hundred thirty-four gold ones, which we both know you don't have, or you grab your good clothes and we walk at the market." Gortka shouted down something about being out there very shortly, and a minute later, Tetreka could hear a door flying open on the side of the building and then a short, scrawny Eypharian man came sprinting out of the alley, freezing when he got to the street and realizing he had run through the alley in the wrong direction.

"Gortka. Everyone wants a personal brewer. You'll be the best treated slave this side of - Why are you runni - Gortka!" The small four-armed man stumbled every third step, was tripping on the smallest cracks in surfaces, and was just generally doing a piss-poor job of escaping. Tetreka took up a slow jog after him, his long legs and ability to not fall down making it easy to keep up with the smaller man.

At first, Tetreka figured on just jogging after the man until he tuckered himself out, but after following him down a few alleys and sidestreets, Tetreka realized just where the small man was running - to his brothers. Gortka was the second of four sons, and while Gortka himself had eventually turned a passion for drink into a (terminally underfunded) brewery, the other three made a living by cutting throats and looting the dead. Tetreka figured it out moments too late though - as he sprinted to tackle the brewer, the brewer was shouting for his brothers, and a moment later, the brothers were shouting back, all three of them pouring out of an alley a ways down the street, and another two partners in crime of no blood relation followed. Choosing at the last minute not to try tackling his debtor, Tetreka instead planted his feet steady and readied the javelin in his hand.

He shouted at the five of them in Common, because while he wasn't positive the race of the two partners, they only had two arms a piece, "My business with Gortka is sanctioned by the Pressorah herself. Either pay his debt or stay back!" The Pressorah had never heard of Tetreka, he ventured, but he had taken the time to submit notice with the guard that he'd be collecting a debt that day; If they were okay with it, he doubted the Pressorah objected.

The five men didn't seem to care one way or another. One of the non-eypharians, a bow in hand, reached for his quiver; at the same moment the arrow was notched, the archer found himself with javelin jammed into his shoulder, the the tip of it lost somewhere in the meat between the lungs and stomach. The archer regarded the projectile curiously for a moment, touching where the wood stuck out of his flesh, slouched over, fell, and ceased breathing.

Drawing two javelins and brandishing one in a hand on each side of his body, Tetreka shouted at the approaching interlopers again, "You'll notice I don't have any problem destroying anyone who isn't merchandise." The brothers didn't seem to be deterred by his declaration - the fourth man did, unmotivated to die for somebody elses family, and took a few steps backwards before beginning to run the opposite way.

The three brothers weren't poorly armed; one held a halberd, another khopesh and shield, and the third a greatsword - The three were close enough now, that even if he launched both javelins at once (he wasn't skilled enough to make that an option), the third would be close enough to lay into him before he could draw more weapons. They stopped after a few steps closer, aware that he would absolutely do his best to skewer them if he got closer; they didn't seem to want to chance it that badly. "Now, you can forget this debt, forever, and keep your life, or, I collect your head." The halbredier was apparently trying to scare Tetreka off now.

The slaver wasn't having any of it.

Reaching into his robes with one of his free hands, he produced a coin purse, held it high, and jingled it. "I'll give three gold Mizas to anybody who slays this man!" The street had quickly and quietly cleared itself when armed men started brandishing ranged weapons at each-other, but, a few mirage addicts in alleys poked their heads out of windows and beggars contemplated carefully of they might get a sneak on the man - three gold could buy a lot of bread.

They would have to move fast though, because the brother with the halberd was raising his weapon to strike.

[Navisya Curare]

The halberdier would only recall hearing the flight of an arrow hiss behind him before he was laid flat on the ground. His weapon clattered beside him soon after, his hand forced open, but it remained within reach. The man coughed, winded, and then cried out in pain and surprise when he realized that something long and sharp was lodged into the back of his thigh. He rolled to his side, pulling at the arrow, but daring not to yank it out. His brothers turned to find the narrow form of a Symenestra perched on a nearby rooftop, another arrow nocked and ready, and probably aimed at one of them. A crimson cloak draped her shoulders, protecting her from the beating sun, its gold-rimmed hood pulled over her head and barely containing shoots of whitish wisps, stiffly blowing in the warm breeze. Her long, black-nailed fingers—the most telling sign of her race—were steady as she held the bow, the string once again pulled back. A voice like rich velvet, unbecoming of her slender build, rolled from her grayish lips. "How much will you pay for all three?" Not one to miss out on an exciting scene, Zlynge scrambled up beside the woman in all his canine grace, hesitating at the edge of the roof as he unleashed a hail of furious barking. He was attuned to the sounds of arrows, and what it meant when his master fired them. Usually, some small animal or a goat would be felled in the nearby distance—he didn't quite know what to make of an arrow sticking out of an Eypharian. It didn't look like food. So as he always did when he was confused, Zlynge made a lot of noise and refused to stop until Navisya told him something reassuring. To help make her presence a little more formidable, she did no such thing. Navisya hoped that none of them would notice her hesitation. She had chosen not to kill the man, and she didn't want to kill the other two either. The Symenestra hunter was a killer, yes—but of animals only. Unlike her older sister, she was not brought up to bring death to other sentient beings. Tevander, her father, had told her that in venturing to the violent world outside Kalinor, she would inevitably find herself in a dire situation, and he bade her not to cling to moral scruples if her survival was at stake. Presently, she did not find herself in serious enough danger to warrant becoming a murderer—especially for only a handful of coins. Viratas would frown on the unnecessary spilling of blood. She feared she had acted rashly in her monetary desperaton. The Symenestra was an outsider in an Eypharian city, and she had assaulted an Eypharian. If anything like this had happened in Kalinor, the outsider would be promptly and forcibly removed from the cavern. If an outsider killed a Symenestra in Kalinor, he'd likely be tossed into the gorge as retribution. She would worry about it later. For now, she was ready with another arrow, and hoped the handsome man in the center would seize this opportunity and take advantage of his enemies' confusion. Meanwhile, Zlynge kept barking.

[Tetreka]

"All three? You haven't managed to kill the first! Put down this one with the shield, and I'll pay you the three gold miza and whatever bit the two arrows cost you." Tetreka shook the coin purse for effect, "Can you buy only two arrows? I'll buy you a set." As absolutely petty as it was to be bargaining over a few gold mizas saving a life or not, there Tetreka was trying to haggle the lowest possible murder price.

As expected, the man with a shield and khopesh turned towards her and took up a perfect stance for avoiding arrows - The ballistics of it were perfect, though Tetreka didn't know enough about shields to deduce that. What he did deduce was that the man wasn't holding up the shield in a very good place to deflect a javelin. Leaping forward, Tetreka plunged the Javelin right between where the man's two arms on the sword side of the body - hopefully, they'd both be rendered unusable. Using the Javelin in the other hand, he took a huge arcing swing to land the tip just in the man's throat - the other man, unfortunately, was very easily able to get his great sword in the way via minor movements from the default stance, the wood of said javelin getting stuck and halfway split on the sword's edge. Letting go of the javelin still embeded in the shielded man, then stepping close and putting four hands on the still retained weapon let him push the arc out of his way as the great-swordsman swung, though the steel tip was removed from the weapon, leaving it a foot shorter with a jagged wood tip.

This wasn't the first time it'd happened to Tetreka - a man thought his weapon was useless without the sharp part, and just like the last time it'd happened, Tetreka stepped in close and jabbed the jagged wood piece right below his aggressors ribs.

Completely differently from the previous time, the brother with the sword was wearing chain mail under his robes, and it totally absorbed the blow from the jagged wooden handle.

Still with one hand on the coin purse, Tetreka brought it up high to bring it down hard on the swordsman's head before he could recover from the huge swing.

At the same moment he thought he was going to bring it down though, the edge of a shield came crashing into the side of his face - not only did Tetreka gain air, hit the ground, and bounce once before his body came to a rest, but his moment of ragdolling dislodged the Javelins from his quiver, the two remaining in it rolling in two different directions that were equally difficult for him to get to. There was a moment where he thought that the shield brother was going to leap upon him and crack his head open right there, but he instead fell to just behind the sword brother, holding up his shield in the hopes that he might be able to get it between either himself or the sworded one, when and if the next arrow came.

Doing his best to scramble away from the two brothers faster than they could approach him and retain the benefit of their shield, Tetreka was essentially on his back and pushing desperately with every elbow, hand and foot he possessed, afraid that a brief slowdown in flipping over and standing up might get him lopped in half.

[Navisya Curare]

"Save your orders, azo. I will decide strategy, and you'll pay me twenty pieces." The situation was quickly unraveling in the clatter of steel and the splintering of wood. What before was an amusing display of back alley drama was now a fight to the death—and she was not excluded from the fray. Navisya should have never involved herself at all, but she could not take back her arrow. Her moral conundrum was becoming a liability, and Zlynge's mad barking was making it hard to think. But the Symenestra was a cold, logical thinker. It was strategy that won hunts, not pity or remorse. The truth of the matter quickly became obvious to her: You've chosen a side in this conflict, Navisya. Commit to it. The alternative was likely her own death, if her newly made ally lost the battle. "Viratas, forgive me," she whispered to herself as she closed one eye to aim. Her fingers released. The halberdier had just recovered his senses, and began slowly reaching for his weapon to join his brothers in the fight. An arrow aimed for his head instead embedded itself in his shoulder, and he fell back to the ground and curled into himself. His cry of pain turned the head of the taller swordsman, and made Navisya wince. Stomaching her quandary, she pulled another arrow from her quiver and carefully took aim at the swordsman, bent on exploiting his distraction. She was too slow. The arrow lodged itself in a shield. The swordsman turned his attention back to his quarry. It would seem he was well guarded—but their brother wasn't. Her conscience bit at her severely as she turned her bow back to the man on the ground. An arrow loosed. Her resolve wavered, unwilling to take the life of an incapacitated man, and the arrow snapped against the dusty ground near his pained body. Although it had done no harm, it caused enough concern in one of the brothers—the one with the shield and oddly shaped sword—to make him run and provide his injured sibling some protection. The remaining Eypharian with a sword made an easy target as he pulled back his weapon to strike their aggressor down. He was still just long enough for Navisya to take aim. An arrow hummed. The sword fell out of his hands, and gasping hoarsely, its handler fell too. He crumbled to the ground, demobilized by the arrow protruding from his back, buried in his lung. A name was called out, and the battle seemed to end. The last brother standing was now stricken with both grief and fear. Understandably, with now two allies dead, one fled, and another with a few new holes. Now he was at a disadvantage. "Must four men die today for one coward's debt?" Navisya called down, her voice deceptively steady. She couldn't take her eyes off the dying swordsman. "It would be a great waste. Pay the man already, won't you? Is your life worth—what do they owe you, again?" She turned her head toward the debt collector, but her golden eyes remained fixed. I shouldn't have come to this city, she thought ruefully. It was only fleeting regret, but still her hands were shaking—which she tried to hide from onlookers. What on Mizahar will I tell Father…? Zlynge was finally silenced with the thwap of her bow and a quick, toothy hiss.

[Tetreka]

Once the swordsman was down, Tetreka scrambled to his feet and made a b-line to the nearest downed Javelin. Picking it up and holding it in an overhand grip like he meant to throw it, he took up a steady jog towards the shielded brother, let out a short war-cry and lept into an attack.

The man held his shield up to block the javelin, but rather than striking with it, Tetreka just let his whole weight smash into the man and the awkwardly angled shield, knocking the man to the ground and giving Tetreka a stumble when he landed. He started jabbing down at the man with his weapon, each time hitting the shield, eventually knocking it aside - Tetreka stepped on the man's bicep to keep it from being raised again. He leaned over the man, leering into his eyes - there was a gash in the side of the slaver's head from being knocked with the shield, and standing over the man now, the the cut leaked slowly but surely down into the other man's face.

"Drag your brothers to a healer. Perhaps they'll live. Perhaps you will live." That was all Tetreka had to say about that, stepping away from the downed man to collect Gortka.

Who was nowhere in sight.

He turned up to the woman on the roof. "The man owes me either one hundred and thirty five gold mizas, or his life in servitude to make good on a debt. Can your dog track him?" He took a moment to wipe blood off his face, though the stream continued a moment later anyhow - he was aware that head wounds tended to bleed more severely than the wound actually was, and while he probably should have sought medical attention anyways, he was really much, much more concerned about tracking down the brewer and turning him into money.