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Edited by Merribor: 9/9/2022 4:52:16 PM
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Solitha Chapter 14: The Deal

When Reke awoke, he was swinging lightly back and forth, and he felt a severe tightness in the back of his neck. He knew the feeling well; he had slept upside down, on his head again. The ground beneath him bounced as he rolled onto his belly and stretched his neck as far to the side as it could go before the pain became too much, then did the other side. Trying to stand up, he braced his hand against the wall, but it sunk inward, the rough, hide walls bending against his hand. Then, these all-too familiar feelings suddenly made sense through his groggy mind: he’d been bagged. All things considering, Reke didn’t feel that bad. He had the list, so now all he had to do was get out of here, wherever “here” was, hitch a ride with a merchant or adventurer, and deliver said list to the mayor. It didn’t seem very promising, but, if there was anything Reke was good at, it was worming out of situations he had idiotically gotten himself involved into without having to face the consequences. He’d miss Nona, though. He was completely oblivious most the time and kinda annoying, but there was an enthusiasm about him that Reke could use right about now. Oh well. Nona was fine, and maybe it’d pay to have a friend as a wizard. Who knows, he’d probably get Nona to summon him a giant pastry one day or something. It had been a rough day, yesterday. At least he thought it was yesterday. That little dark hole in the top of the bag wasn’t very good for telling time. But, more to the point, he had been caged, shaken, trampled, hung upside down, brandished like cat toy, dropped, and now bagged. Of all of it, the bagging was his favorite; at least he could relax for a while before he was taken to his destination. He could stretch his neck, rest, recuperate, and not worry about what is to come next until he was un-bagged. Then, suddenly, a hand grabbed the bottom of the bag and tipped it over unceremoniously, spilling Reke out onto a battered wooden keg. He was sitting in darkness, brushed to the side in a large, dark, circular room lit only by one yellow lantern hanging down from the center of the ceiling. Directly below the light was a terrified toadie, still in his pajamas, cowered beneath a woman sitting in a raised, cushiony chair. Shadows hugged her frame as her blood-red dress flowed loosely off her shoulders. She wore a wide-brimmed hat, tilted slightly down to wreathe her face in darkness, showing nothing but small lips, curved slightly up in a cruel smirk. Her blonde hair hung down until it gently rested on her milky-white shoulders, perfectly framing her gentle chin. “And if you think about opening your mouth again, you can say goodbye to breathing!” she sneered at the terrified toadie. A jubilant cry raised from the darkness as two burly thugs emerged from shadows, throwing a bag over the toadie’s head and dragging their flailing victim off into the darkness. Reke’s barrel was pushed into the center of the room, right where the poor toadie had been. Reke whipped around, looking for his unseen barrel-pusher, and Jerome’s smiling face stared back at him. It was not the most encouraging smile he had ever received. “What have you brought me now, Jerome?” she asked. He bounded up to her, gave a jaunty little bow, then made hand signals in front of his back, which Reke could not see. Not like he could understand any of it. But, clearly this lady was his boss, probably the one Keeblie called the Dame. He was glad he was paying some attention while being flapped around by that detestable runt. She nodded along with Jerome’s “speech”, then lazily flicked her hand in dismissal. Jerome stepped to the side, the leaned against the armrest of her chair, half-sitting, half-standing against it. The Dame turned her head towards him, her mouth curving in disapproval. Jerome glanced back at her, that stupid, ever-present, innocent smile on his face. She sighed, then gave him a two-handed push off the chair. It wasn’t a very forceful push, but Jerome collapsed anyway, falling off the side of the chair and rolling into the band of darkness that surrounded her. She then turned her head towards Reke, staring at him silently, gently rolling her fingers along the edge of her armrest. The room seemed to hush with her silence, impressions of figures flitting through the shadows caught Reke’s peripheral vision, but he never caught a glimpse of what or who was actually there. Their short conversations dropped down to a whisper, and even footsteps were muted as the Dame’s men rustled all around him. Reke fidgeted under her silent, measuring impasse, and eventually looked away, into the shadows. He squinted into the dark, and he could have sworn he caught sight of Keeblie, so he stuck his tongue out in that general direction, hoping that little runt got the message. Then the Dame snapped, bringing Reke’s attention straight back to her. “You have something I want, and I’m prepared to deal for it--” She began. “--Look Lady, I’ve been through a lot recently, and I have literally nothing except for these pants. If I’m being honest, I think you’ve got the wrong lizlai; you know, we can be hard to tell apart, especially for bigger folk that can’t see us that well. Really, I just wanna get out of here, you know, and, um, these pants are really comfortable, and they’re the only thing I have to show for my trip here, so I doubt there’s anything you could offer that would get me to trade them to you anyway. Also, they don’t even fit you, so there’s that, and—”

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  • Edited by Merribor: 9/9/2022 4:53:38 PM
    “Enough!” the Dame snapped. The whole room bristled with tension as soon as she raised her voice, and all conversations stifled. Multiple goons edged closer to the edge of the light, their hands gripping unseen weapons tightly. “I don’t care about your pants,” she continued exasperatedly, “The human. You know him, don’t you?” Reke gulped. “Erm, which human would that be?” he asked tentatively. “The only human to go through those walls in years. He goes by the name of Nona, and word has it he’s been admitted into the Mage’s Guild somehow. You know him, don’t you?” “I might.” “Good, now we’re finally getting somewhere. Our last contact in the Guild has recently been… uncooperative, so we need a way in.” “Sorry, but I’m not interested in being your spy.” “I’m not asking you to be a spy. I just need to get one of mine in those sparkly towers, and then we can both part ways for good.” “Oh, so you’re only asking me to use my friend in order to smuggle a criminal into the headquarters of one of the most prominent organizations in the entire Empire? And what am I supposed to get out of this?” “Everybody has their price, little lizlai. With a wave of my hand, I could make you rich. Or, if you’re not after money, there must be something… or someone… you’re looking for.” Reke mulled it over. Could she really know where Lusahn was? So many people come in and out of the City, right through the Outskirts, and Lusahn would have left at least three months ago. Even if she did once know where he might have gone, surely she would’ve forgotten by now. Reke doubted that these rabble-rousers had any sort of record keeping information. But, she was very confident in her promise. Then again, a con man would be very confident in their promises. Reke supposed it couldn’t hurt to test the waters a little bit. “Let’s pretend, for the moment, that I am looking for a very specific person who would have left some months ago. How can I be sure that you have the information? And you promise me riches, but where is this grand wealth you supposedly have? I highly doubt anybody with money is going to live with being stuck here, grubbing about in the mud with these ruffians.” Reke challenged with false bravado. The figures in the dark bridled once again, edging closer and closer to Reke’s barrel. He glanced around uneasily, tensing his legs in case he needed to make a quick exit. Maybe openly deriding the Dame wasn’t the best idea. But she seemed completely unconcerned by his slight. She raised a hand, and her crew settled down, drawing back into the shadows. “You make a fair point, little lizlai, but my business is information. Nobody of importance enters or exits those giant walls without me knowing about it. ‘Specially a high-up elvish Healer that spends little of their time in the City and just so happens to be one of the Archmage’s personal rivals. Sound familiar?” How did she even--? The Dame clearly knew he was looking for Lusahn, but he wasn’t so sure about rival of the Archmage stuff. It was hard to image Lusahn being the rival of anybody; he was always so tranquil. Reke never was very sickly, so he didn’t know Lusahn super well, but he couldn’t recall the Healer mentioning anything about his business in the City. Maybe he only ever talked about the Archmage during all those late nights Lusahn spent with Grak at Lydia’s. After all, nobody else back home, except for maybe the mayor, would care much for Imperial affairs. “And if the information isn’t what you want, I’ve got money. Just look around; you think all this muscle comes cheap?” a coarse ripple of laughter echoed from the shadows. She continued: “Our operation relies on close contact with the City, but those pampered sops don’t appreciate what we do here. The Outskirts allows us to conduct our more… unsavory business without distractions. Do this job, and you’ll get the money or the information, but not both. Have we a deal?” Reke took a deep breath. It was very likely if he refused, he might not leave this room alive. Then again, he could accept the coin, and then ditch the Dame and her “operation”. This was all City business, stuff that didn’t concern the likes of Reke. But, if the Dame was right, Lusahn was very much involved in City business, and if he wanted to find Lusahn’s last connections here, Reke would have to dive right in. He replayed the past few days in his mind, drawing on every scrap of information he had. Jerome, who was working for the Dame, led them to Ahsante, who was very shady about Lusahn’s whereabouts. Made sense, considering his company. So, that must be how the Dame figured out he was looking for Lusahn, but, then how did she know he got in the Guildhouse in the first place? Well, she knew Nona was able to get in, but did she know he was smuggled in as well? Probably not, which means she wouldn’t know about the Healer’s list. If she tried to double-cross him by giving Reke a false location, he could use the list to find out. There weren’t that many locations on the list, so it’d be difficult for her to pick one at random, especially if the Dame is hazarding a guess anywhere in the Empire. One job, which couldn’t take more than a few days, for confirmation on Lusahn’s exact position sounded like a nice deal to Reke. He wasn’t afraid of getting his hands a little dirty; he wanted this adventure. “Alright, I’ll do it for the information. What now?” Reke decided. “I’m glad you were able to make the wise choice. We’ll hash out the details later. For now, consider yourself a part of the crew,” she said, rising from her seat, her confident smirk widening under the shadow of her hat. She snapped at Jerome, somewhere among the gang in the darkness, and the assassin came bounding forth. She jerked her head at Reke, then glided off into the shadows behind her throne, her thick blonde hair swishing behind her as she disappeared. Jerome snatched up Reke, and the buzz of conversation rose, as the thieves resumed their activities they had held off for the Dame. Jerome was about to drop Reke in another pouch, but Reke stopped him, exclaiming, “Wait, stop! If you’re going to drop me, do it tail first, not headfirst.” Surprisingly, Jerome actually waited, then cheerfully turned Reke over again, dropping him tail first into the bag. As Reke settled into his pouch, he couldn’t help but wonder what he had gotten himself into. … Next Chapter: Previous Chapter: https://www.bungie.net/en/Forums/Post/261580007?sort=0&page=0

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  • Not much critique here. You tend to write good dialogue, and that was most of what this one was. Very nice!

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