Summer 60th, 514 AV - The Streets
There had been mutterings and whisperings, a song had reached her ears of an exotic creature that had stepped out of the unknown and onto the streets of the city. Apparently they had tried to disguise their true identity, a wise move all things considered. Foreigners were exotic enough to kill for, to enslave and otherwise brutalize in a myriad of ways. The people of Sunberth were suspicious indeed, especially of what they did not understand. Magic, now magic was a classic example. The hunt for their kind was now well underway and a multitude of innocents had already been cast aside as broken husks or piles of ashes. She doubted an of them were truly mages, a mage would like as not kill instead of be killed in her experience. She had managed to slip through the net herself, her own talents were impossible to discern though she had no doubt some of her enemies would try to entrap her in the web of the mage hunts.
Still, the song had been sung to her and that much made it clear it would not be a secret for much longer. There would be an attempt to snatch, to take what was not theirs by right. From one group or another. Normally her curiosity would have been sated by merely observing and taking advantage but this time it was different. This woman had come to the city with a man suspiciously accurate as a description of her new employer - Kvist. Would he just sit by if he knew she had known and done nothing, no. He was a warrior and a paying client of relative wealth. Those reasons alone would have been enough incentive coupled with threat. Yet he was also seeking the death of slavers and that called to her further. As such she was walking the streets, searching.
New comers would use the popular through fares, the dirt tracks of the major streets. They wouldn’t be so foolish as to blindly walk into unknown alleys. That has narrowed the possible regions considerably and yet…still a large area indeed. Damned developing honour and decency… she muttered to herself internally.
It had been a long journey towards her current mental state, her philosophies challenged immeasurably by the time and tides of fate. There had been a time, seemingly distant now, that she had been alone. It had been lonely but she had found strength from her independence. She had been a force unto herself, no consideration beyond her own advancement. She had gained much and then lost it all without allies. Then had come the wandering of the world, or a portion of it. The Spires, Nyka, Sahova. And then she had met Fallon, tempting her back to Sunberth to begin anew her quest for power. Not to abuse it but this time to use it for the betterment of the city itself. That had taken a different perspective, difficult to adopt but she had done so willingly. It had given her purpose.
Now though, now it had transformed into something more. She was more than a contradiction now. She killed easily, tortured where required and was not above picking someone apart piece by piece to get what was needed. Yet she had morals now, she didn’t do such things to just anyone. Not because it was pointless but because she was beginning to see it as morally bankrupt. She had been hollow before, now she was filling with…something. There was a strength to her hatred of the darker activities now. It had been there before, slumbering. Now it was rekindled anew and she was its manifestation for vengeance. For justice, for want of a better word. Not the justice of law and order. Street justice, brutal and direct. No questions, no mercy, no regretful angst. She kept her eye open and shifting as she searched for the right description in the crowd.
“Don’t have time to do this all day, but what choice is there? He doesn’t know this city like I do. Whilst he is off searching his own agenda they’ll just drag this prize into and alley and collar her neatly. Or worse. At least virtue is still valued in coin…” she talked to herself as she kept her fingers loose and shifting at her waist.
This was taking too long, each moment bringing the inevitable ever closer and she didn’t even have a true location. They moved frequently apparently and that curiosity would be their undoing. She had to find them…and fast.
There had been mutterings and whisperings, a song had reached her ears of an exotic creature that had stepped out of the unknown and onto the streets of the city. Apparently they had tried to disguise their true identity, a wise move all things considered. Foreigners were exotic enough to kill for, to enslave and otherwise brutalize in a myriad of ways. The people of Sunberth were suspicious indeed, especially of what they did not understand. Magic, now magic was a classic example. The hunt for their kind was now well underway and a multitude of innocents had already been cast aside as broken husks or piles of ashes. She doubted an of them were truly mages, a mage would like as not kill instead of be killed in her experience. She had managed to slip through the net herself, her own talents were impossible to discern though she had no doubt some of her enemies would try to entrap her in the web of the mage hunts.
Still, the song had been sung to her and that much made it clear it would not be a secret for much longer. There would be an attempt to snatch, to take what was not theirs by right. From one group or another. Normally her curiosity would have been sated by merely observing and taking advantage but this time it was different. This woman had come to the city with a man suspiciously accurate as a description of her new employer - Kvist. Would he just sit by if he knew she had known and done nothing, no. He was a warrior and a paying client of relative wealth. Those reasons alone would have been enough incentive coupled with threat. Yet he was also seeking the death of slavers and that called to her further. As such she was walking the streets, searching.
New comers would use the popular through fares, the dirt tracks of the major streets. They wouldn’t be so foolish as to blindly walk into unknown alleys. That has narrowed the possible regions considerably and yet…still a large area indeed. Damned developing honour and decency… she muttered to herself internally.
It had been a long journey towards her current mental state, her philosophies challenged immeasurably by the time and tides of fate. There had been a time, seemingly distant now, that she had been alone. It had been lonely but she had found strength from her independence. She had been a force unto herself, no consideration beyond her own advancement. She had gained much and then lost it all without allies. Then had come the wandering of the world, or a portion of it. The Spires, Nyka, Sahova. And then she had met Fallon, tempting her back to Sunberth to begin anew her quest for power. Not to abuse it but this time to use it for the betterment of the city itself. That had taken a different perspective, difficult to adopt but she had done so willingly. It had given her purpose.
Now though, now it had transformed into something more. She was more than a contradiction now. She killed easily, tortured where required and was not above picking someone apart piece by piece to get what was needed. Yet she had morals now, she didn’t do such things to just anyone. Not because it was pointless but because she was beginning to see it as morally bankrupt. She had been hollow before, now she was filling with…something. There was a strength to her hatred of the darker activities now. It had been there before, slumbering. Now it was rekindled anew and she was its manifestation for vengeance. For justice, for want of a better word. Not the justice of law and order. Street justice, brutal and direct. No questions, no mercy, no regretful angst. She kept her eye open and shifting as she searched for the right description in the crowd.
“Don’t have time to do this all day, but what choice is there? He doesn’t know this city like I do. Whilst he is off searching his own agenda they’ll just drag this prize into and alley and collar her neatly. Or worse. At least virtue is still valued in coin…” she talked to herself as she kept her fingers loose and shifting at her waist.
This was taking too long, each moment bringing the inevitable ever closer and she didn’t even have a true location. They moved frequently apparently and that curiosity would be their undoing. She had to find them…and fast.
