The Mark of the Omeness; a six-pointed star drawn with a single line. Madwen could draw it in her sleep. From the age of womanhood, every Omeness had been trained to recreate the symbol to symmetric perfection. Where it to be slightly crooked, lopsided, or unevenly spaced, the seal would simply break. Madwen was on her third attempt etching the ancient rune into a clay vase. Only magic could achieve such precision. She had dropped the veil of light that previously sparkled in the room. She simply had no concentration to spare.
Madwen took in a deep breath and reached into the high neckline of her blouse, retrieving a both simple, yet complex, metal necklace. A thin, black thread looped through a Dara knot; an ancient, woven symbol made of intertwining curves like knotted roots in dense forests. With eyes closed, Madwen traced the intricate pattern that made hers unique, and stared down the vase before her.
A single point of white-hot energy began outlining an omen star into the curve of the glazed pottery. Small puffs of smoke wisped into the air as the clay sublimated beneath the immense power of the Omeness’ magic. Madwen could again feel the weight of her exhaustion that tapped incessantly at the barriers of her mind.
Tap-tap-tap.
Madwen’s focus wavered, but she kept on.
Tap-tap-tap.
Something shifted within the shadows that surrounded her, but Madwen continued.
TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP!
The stone beneath her feet quaked; flakes of dust dancing on it’s surface like sand on a beaten drum. The barrier was faltering. Flashes of intense pain plagued her psyche. Images streamed across her vision: a young boy’s smiling face, a handsome man’s fury, hands reaching for the sky. Madwen clenched her eyes shut. In an instant, she felt the anguish of a desperate soul and unleashed it into the ceramic.
TICK!
Madwen opened her eyes. The rumbling had stopped, the shadows were gone, and the pain forgotten. The vase was no more, instead, on the table before her, sat a small ceramic marble wearing the same colour. With a heavy sigh and sunken shoulders, Madwen rolled the dense marble, heavy as a sword, toward the other two. Perhaps Worne was right. She felt useless in her current state.
Madwen left the dark cellar, shedding it’s confinement like clothes before a bath, and emerged behind the tavern bar from the cellar door.
“Oh! Didn’t see ya there, Omen-woman!” The tavern keeper’s presence was so bright as to make Madwen squint, more so than even the sun streaming through the arched tavern windows.
“Just, ‘Madwen,’ darling.”
“Then you can call me, ‘Carlina,’” the taverness smirked.
“Hmm yes, very well then. Lady Carlina, I think it’s come time to request that fine room of yours, should it still be available,” said Madwen. The taverness hurried with food in hand, squeezing past Madwen’s thin build which juxtaposed her own full frame. Midday had come, and with it, hungry patrons.
“Aye,” said Carlina. “Figured you’d emerge from that damp cellar eventually. Thought it might be sooner, mind you.” Carlina threw a cleaning cloth over her shoulder and unclasped a ring of keys from her hip. Madwen followed the taverness, not to the second floor, but to a third.
Fascinating, Madwen thought. Building’s several stories tall were a rare sighting outside the capital cities. It truly was a marvel that Gildaun had somehow gone unnoticed.
The private room was cramped, but comfortable, with golden wood floors and walls, and a bed so fluffy and white, Madwen almost drifted to sleep at the very sight of it. The tavern keeper handed Madwen a thick iron key and held Madwen’s hand for a moment as she passed it.
“That there big fella, he’s not your fella, is he?”
A wide smile grew on Madwen’s face as she failed to contain a wicked belly laugh.
“By all means,” she said, “have at him! Please. It might do him some good for once.”
Carlina squeed, giddy with excitement, and left Madwen to rest. In an instant, Madwen had stripped herself of her over-clothes and collapsed into the billowing, soft bed. Her silver bracelets jingled as she curled the blanket half around herself and immediately slipped into the abstract realm between consciousness and unconsciousness.
There were sparkles in the vision behind her eyelids; a sign that her sleep would be long and deep. Finally, the rest that eluded her had come at last.
Tap-tap-tap.
Within the recesses of Madwen’s mind, the images lingered.
Tap-tap-tap.
Thin grey flesh twitched and spasmed wildly.
TAP-TAP-TAP!
Madwen’s body thrusted through the cool air, a darkness receding into the corners like roaches to the light. Time had passed; she couldn’t know how long, but the sun’s light was whiter, higher in the sky. She’d felt this tapping in her mind before, but never to such an extent.
This place, Gildaun, it reeked of a curse, its scent perverting the air like smoke. Madwen collected herself at the edge of the bed. Her head rang and her eyes ached. Since her arrival, sleep had alluded her like a woodsprite. It was easy enough at first to find blame for it, but as the days continued, Madwen’s desperation and defeat increased. But today’s rest, however fleeting it was, would sustain her if only for a few hours more.
The walls that surrounded her were stifling, as beautiful as they were. Madwen needed free air for once. She quickly dressed, splashed water from a wash basin in the corner of the room, and ventured outside the tavern for the first time since her arrival.
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Madwen made a note of the sign attached to the tavern as it swayed in the wind. It depicted an elk with large antlers. “The Elk’s Head?” she wondered. It’d never occurred to her to ask the name of the establishment in which she stayed, but that felt like it’s natural name.
The tavern was not in the Gildaun’s centre, but rather near to the main gate. From the voices that carried into the tavern’s cellar, Madwen had gathered that many people frequented outside the city walls to visit the numerous surrounding hamlets, and the tavern acted as the perfect checkpoint. Most Clistetíran cities tended not to see such mobility among their citizens, if not simply for their lack of safety beyond the walls.
The streets were as busy as any city of Gildaun’s size, yet something tugged at her—something was out of place. An old woman and a guard smiled and chattered. Children chased one another about, grabbing an apple from a stall owner as he laughed at their playful antics. Was it so bizarre to see such joy amongst a people? If there was a curse about that tarnished sleep, then it certainly did not seem to plague the people before her. Perhaps the afflicted stayed indoors and were thus invisible to the public? Madwen needed answers.
“You there!” she called to a passing guard. “How long have you lived in Gildaun? I wish to know of its history.”
The guard stiffened his back, shifting in his over-sized green and yellow gambeson. “Erm… my lady… perhaps, I think, that might be a better question for the Lord Daithi. I can escort you to him at your request, should you desire to speak with him.”
Madwen had a habit of correcting folk who called her “Lady,” but the young guard’s refusal to help piqued her interest.
“Do you have orders to do so? To escort me to your lord should I have any questions?”
The guard fidgeted with his helmet strap. “I… I think I should speak with my captain—”
“You are speaking to me,” Madwen pressed. She could see the hesitation in the guard. With such a peaceful life, the duty of a guard must have been easy. This young man, almost a child, had likely never faced resistance in his obviously short career.
“I’m an Omeness, young man. Do you know what that means?”
The young guard started to curl in on himself, like a spider before death.
“It means,” Madwen continued, “that I am a direct servant of the High Crown. Would you disobey the High Crown?”
“Never, my lady! But I cannot disobey my lord!”
“So, then you have been ordered to withhold information from me? I see.”
The guard’s eyes shot open wide. Never had he been so quickly outwitted. In any other city, a city guard would fight to assert their power, but it seemed the naive folk of Gildaun simply froze like rabbits before a wolf.
“I imagine your lord wouldn’t appreciate knowing one of his own so easily exposed his orders to an outsider. Perhaps if I were told something else—something more interesting—I may forget this conversation entirely.” Madwen assumed a sudden interest in her nails and bracelets.
The guard’s shoulders dropped with his jaw. A thousand thoughts raced through his still-maturing mind. He’d taken a position with the watch to protect his beloved city, and already he had forsaken it. Were his captain, his lord, or even his family to discover his failure…
“I see. Perhaps I would like to be escorted to see this Lord Daithi after all. I’ve suddenly thought of a thousand things I wish to speak about.” Madwen tugged at the shoulder puffs of her white blouse, untucking them from beneath her leather vest. The guard said nothing.
“No? Well, I can see the castle from here, I’m sure—”
“Wait! Please! I’ve nothing more to tell, I swear it on me mum’s life! Gildaun is a peaceful place. There hasn’t been a secret in the city since you and those other two arrived. I nearly felt sick when my captain—”
“Other two?” Madwen interrupted.
“…Yes. You, your large friend, and the dark-skinned fella.”
“Who’s the dark-skinned man? When did he get here?”
“He got here a day or two ago, supposedly. Killed a whole village! The big fella should know. He walked in not an hour before they arrived. They would’ve passed each other on the king’s road.”
Madwen watched the young guard shaking in his bulky armour. Deep footsteps sounded amidst the buzz of the street and a shadow grew from behind Madwen, looming over her. The already terrified young man before her nearly cowered. She almost felt sorry for him.
“Consider our conversation forgotten,” said Madwen. “On your way then.” She gestured, and the young guard quickly backed away, large, watery eyes locked on the approaching mass.
“You’ve really seemed to make an impression on the taverness.” Madwen turned, then hesitated. “Oh, what’s gotten you in a bother?”
To any passerby, Worne’s familiar scowl would seem just the same as any other day, but Madwen knew better. Like any of the beasts she’d faced, Madwen had come to study Worne. She had even made mental notes on some of his bizarre behaviors: his curious accent, his utter disregard for mystical creatures, his hunger for battle, the list went on.
“I told you, not so good with speaking. Didn’t go well.” Something more stirred inside Worne, an anger unfamiliar to Madwen.
“Perhaps I should have seen him when I first arrived after all. Did he mention anything we should be aware of?”
Worne remained silent for a moment, feeling a churning in his gut. “Didn’t say nothing.”
“Hmm, did you pick up on anything then? See anything strange?”
Worne casted his gaze beyond Madwen, to the few guards that maintained their distance, but also their sight lines on the pair.
“…Nothing, ‘cept that smokeless flame. Lord says he’s looking to meet you though. Said he’d host us as honoured guests at a feast tomorrow and that if we don’t find anything by then, we’re gettin’ the boot.”
“And you think we should take him up on this?”
“Can’t see any more reason to stay.”
“Not even the prisoner?”
“…Prisoner?”
“Yes, the one you saw on your way here. You didn’t care to mention that?”
Madwen had never pressed Worne. He didn’t care for being on the opposite side of her pointed questioning.
“Didn’t think it needed mentioning. What’s one murderer in a city as big as this?”
“They say he killed a whole village.”
“Seen the kinda men that kill villages. He ain’t one of ‘em.”
“I still think it’s worth investigating.”
“Take a look around Madwen.” Worne loomed closer over her, his gravel timbre growling further. He would never harm Madwen, but still the rage sat hot in his blood. “Just a bunch o’ folk who don’t want none around.”
Madwen’s neck craned to meet Worne’s light eyes. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but if anyone thinks they can stop me, that’s what you’re here for.”
“Expect me to take on a whole city? You flatter me.”
“I expect you to do as I say. Now go. Find that village and tell me anything that’s worth noting. Anything. Take out your anger on some sorry city guard if you must. Gods know you need it.” Madwen rested her hands on her hips. She did not fear Worne, but she had never seen him stirred to such an extent. Were he to direct his fury towards her, she’d rather not have to deal with him so publicly; the ensuing mess would surely send the entire fiefdom down upon her.
Worne’s nostrils flared like the bull folks said he was. Any guard within sight that previously feigned disinterest had given up any subtlety and nearly leaned toward the heated conversation. Without a word, Worne huffed and stormed toward the city gate from which he entered, ready to unleash his anger into the first sodded fool who question him.
Worne’s sudden shift in emotion concerned Madwen. He was a surprisingly calm man otherwise, despite his outward appearance.
If he returns with an attitude, I’ll press him further, she thought. She’d felt first hand the darkness of the city closing in on her, perhaps Worne had been affected too, only differently.
Regardless, with the recent rest still lightening the load on her mind, Madwen had one more experiment to complete. The lord Daithi wanted her and Worne gone after the next day’s night, and with the gradually decreasing weight around her wrists, she may not have a choice.
Once more, Madwen attempted an Omeness’ mark on the last spare vase she could find in the dark cellar. She’d spare Carlina an extra gold coin to make up for the damage later. With great effort, she twisted her palms and curled her fingers. Again, the glazed clay vaporized at the singular point of her magic.
Tap-tap-tap.
She felt the barriers of her mind tested, but resist.
With a deep, labourious breath, the single line of the Omeness’s mark finally connected with itself. She examined her work. Pure precision. Now for the last step.