"Time flies Faster when you're looking backwards"

"It's like watching paint dry" Derek sighed as he lounged against the side of an old brick three story piece of property near the Merchant district. "Still the quiet's nice" he murmured as his eyes followed the couple across the street as they meandered between merchant stalls laughing as they talked. From the outside it always seemed so innocent. A common observer would never even guess that there's was anything other than a happy couple. But underneath the happy carefree exterior lurked a deep and dark secret. 

At least that's what Derek's client was hoping to find out. And that dark secret would probably turn out to be an affair. Derek sighed again before using his shoulder to shove off the wall he leaned against and follow the couple unnoticed by the other occupants of the promenade. In fact most wouldn't notice Derek at all. It wasn't because of his nondescript appearance. Derek was tall with a wide jaw and piercing green eyes. At times it would feel like he would stair into your soul. He was the kind of person who you would notice walking by on the street with his wavy brown hair tousled by the wind. Maybe you'd lock eyes for a moment and find yourself looking back. There was a gravity to his stair.

But no one looked now in fact they looked anywhere but at him. He seemed to be an outcast, a remnant of some bygone age the world had forgotten. But that was to be expected since that was exactly the working he had wrought. He'd rather not be noticed doing something as tedious as finding out if a partner was faithful or not, but hey bills to pay.

It wasn't even an incredibly complicated working of mage craft. It couldn't even rightly be called a spell. No it was just a turning of his will towards the story he desired. The occupants of the city didn't want to see me. I'm better left avoided. So they didn't. "It's the simple things." Derek had known many a mage who worked their will upon the world losing themselves in complex workings and obsessing over incredibly finite minutia. Didn't they realize that the best. The greats, the magi of note understood the simple truth. The simplest way is often the best. 

That's why Derek walked behind the couple at a sedate pace instead of doing something like attempt a working of sight and scry on the wrongdoers as they... ahem did the deed. Not very respectful although it would be the evidence a client was looking for, and Derek didn't want to be known as some sort of Voyeur for hire... He also didn't want to attempt the complicated process of breaking the ward that the young lady carried with her. It was too much work. And he liked to walk. So that was that.

The happy couple continued unaware as they strolled down the lane. The man plucked a rose from a bush that had grown a little wall. He bowed with a flourish as he presented this small token to the Lady. The lady laughed and coyly responded in a tone that spoke of promise even though the words could not be made it out at this distance. Derek snickered in derision and made a mental note to try that with a future date if he ever found the time to do something other than work. The two grew closer after wards and Derek made another mental note to really find some time to stop working and meet someone.

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It continued like this for almost an hour. The bells rang signaling dusks approach. It was late spring and the days were beginning to last longer and longer. But tailing two lovers on a night on the town was like watching paint dry. They would go for dinner and drinks afterward Derek thought. He was proven right on the dinner as they eat on the Veranda of a nice place on the eastern side of the merchant district as Derek watched from the other side of the small river that flowed through the city of Miran. Not right on the drinks ("thank goodness this was taking too long") as they decided to call it in for the night and begin the...fun. 

So there Derek sat legs crossed perched on a window awning 3 stories up. He wasn't peeping... definitely not. He hadn't even kept the working of hiding up as it was dark and no one could see him sitting in the shadows as he ascertained proof of the young nobles misdeeds. It was all too common in the young nobility, but rarer that a newly wed wife would actually do something about it. Miran was a somewhat under developed town in the fact that male nobility still thought they were smarter than their wives and their wives were content enough to let them. 

Derek's client on the other hand was not. She wasn't going to take a slight like this laying down. "Good for her" Derek thought to himself as observed the young Lord 5th son of Duke Coggleshard or something with some glorious history in some battle 200 years ago that everyone would have forgotten except for the fact that 5th sons of dukes wouldn't let them. 

Derek still could remember the young noble (his name is Mark by the way) bragging to his wife's (Amelia) friends at a previous gathering just a few nights ago where Derek had started surveilling him. He was loud, and brash, and somewhat stupid. That didn't mean that Derek thought him worthy of Death. But apparently someone did.

AHHHHHHH!!!! BANG!!!! A scream and a crash shattered the peaceful quiet night in late spring as Derek felt a tendril of power slither threw the weave of the world. His instincts honed over years of training and service kicked in and before he could think the silence shattered once was shattered again with the sound of breaking glass and a low boom of displaced matter. 

Derek flew threw the window propelled by strands of power summoned into being by his will. This too was not true magecraft nor was it the simple working before this was a power all its own. Derek landed in a low crouch his emerald eyes blazing missing nothing. The room a small library with a low desk and soft backed leather chair was empty but the sounds from the other room destroyed any hint of normalcy. Screams of terror and pain intermixed with tearing and shredding emanated from the end of the hallway from what might be the masters suite. Derek moved from one end of the hallway to the other in a few seconds. Just as he reached the door the noises stopped all together. 

Sweat trickled down his brow, his heart was racing. He slowly turned the knob of the door. "CREAKKK!"

It swung forward as the hinges protested showing a gruesome scene. Mark Coggleshard 5th son of the duke lay dead on the bed torn to pieces his blood had been strewn across the walls feathers from pillows and blankets falling lazily like snow amidst a bloodbath. He stood there taking in the scene. It's gruesome canvas burned into his mind. The blood dripped down the wall as Derek sat starring. "It's like watching paint dry." Derek muttered a bleak irony in his words. This was going to be a long night.