I’m glad I was able to draw him back in. Gricrir is usually solid. Something must really be bothering the ol’ oaf. I’m sure it’s nothing some elven wine and a nice shark steak can’t fix. Regardless, I better get this meeting going. Time to be somewhat serious I suppose. Not my favorite stance to say the least. Hmmm. I can’t wait until I can get another recruit and then I can take more of a background roll. Urberer thought to himself.
Urberer’s sits up, his voice fills the space as he started the meeting “Each of us most likely has at least one major thing to share. We will share those major items and primary issues of focus. We follow up with secondary and tertiary items. This should keep us on tasks.”
Urberer shifts his head to Gricrir “that keeps us in order, as you asked old friend. Fair?”
“Fair,” Gricrir responds.
“Dune, it means you’ll get back to your ladies and your work faster. Fair.”
“Yes, yes. Hurry, hurry.” Dune waves his fingers at Urberer, his blue hands marked with talon like-nails, sharp, white, and with no blemishes.
Cracking-a-half smile, “Great and you both owe me for making me be the adult here.”
Dune rolls his eyes. Gricrir crosses his arms and grunts.
“You guys really need to learn how to loosen up. A round of eleven-wine for the both of you down stairs latter. Now onto business. This morning I was awaken from my slumber-“
“Drunken-slumber” Gricrir chips in.
“My somewhat inebriated rest. This was not plan.”
“Dune knows no one he plans to pass out in street drunk.”
Urberer lets out a sigh, placing a hand on his forehead. “This is the last time I’m being serious again. Anyways,” choose to dismiss their ongoing jabs, “I ended up in that spot after running away from someone, or, more so, someone’s who were trailing me.”
“Hallucination from hard-drink?” Gricrir asks.
“Hit head from too much drink and have bad dream?” Dune asked.
Urberer frowns. “You guys really, really are pain.” He lets out another exhale, leading into this sentence “And no … their skill sets were advanced. I masked my efforts by drinking hard-drink and parading as drunk.”
“Let the enemy think they’re chasing a weak opponent?”
“Exactly. And perhaps go away if they think I’m too weak.”
“You run away?” Dune asked, seeming quite surprised.
“Nothing wrong with it. I’ve seen my share of honorable people. And I’ve seen my share of honorable people dead because they didn’t know when to retreat. The battle field and forces dictate a lot of things. My stalkers whoever they were…”
“Stalkers?” Gricrir asked?
“Yes, stalkers.”
“That’s more than just being followed,” Gricrir responded.
“That’s my point. Whoever this was, was able to follow from the rooftops. They were near silent in their approach.”
Gricrir looks down at the table in thought. Dune even begins to tap the table, considering the words, his nail making a clicking sound on the table.
“As you all know, moving from rooftop to rooftop is difficult in of its own. In that area’s the roofs are different sizes. Furthermore, whoever was there, had been there waiting. In all truth, it it were for my life on the battlefield I would have missed that they had even been there. There was just enough of a distUrbererance in the air for me to pay more attention. And even then, I could barely hear them.”
“Have you angered any nobles?”
“While I do enjoy putting them in their place, I understand the value of my role in gathering information from their confessions and the value of their trust. I might be late. I may not show to a house for a few days past the requested time; once or twice. I might even call them out within the privacy of their home. But I don’t do anything that will truly put me on their bad side. It’d not just hurt me. But hurt our operations here.”
“Stole ladies hearts, maybe?” Dune asked.
“As many as there are rays of the sun. But I’ve always given them back.”
“Nice phrase. I borrow for future, please.” Dune grabs a small tome from his cloak.
“Sure. Sure. Not the best time to be writing lines of poetry, but sure. Anyways, I’ve not directly done anything that should warrant this. At least not prior to the event. I may have miffed one man today, and left some ladies hearts a flutter and in want below their wast, but that was today and not yesterday.
“Someone from your past life? A solider or a soldiers wife sent them to track you down?
Urberer’s eyes narrowed. It had not occurred to him one of the more obvious choices; a relative to his failed mission. Granted here, in Bridenbourgh he should new safe.” I don’t know Gricrir. That’s a good question; one worth exploring a bit.” He paused for a moment, and in a defense to the pit that started to form in his heart, he responded cheerfully “And after all this time, may I still have an admirer. Maybe some fine lass who heard of my exploits. A fan of my worker.”
“Technically would that not be a -“ Gricrir began.
“Stalker.” Dune stated.
“Yes. A stalker sending stalkers to find me. See. I am popular among the ladies.” He forces a smile, yet his mind remained distracted. I had hoped that my past would remain there, in the past. Hm. Perhaps it is revenge. Perhaps someone has come for my head finally for my failure. And ...
He looked at his colleagues. A sense of fatigue washed over him and quiet acceptance, like the onset of sleep on a cozy day in front of the fire place. A quiet coming over his internal world. And I would be fine with that. These guys can take care of the rest. Urberer thought to himself.
“Dune, doubts Urberer have stalkers. Assassins yes. Stalkers not. Urberer not suave enough, not like Dune. Dune has stalkers. Dune also has ladies.”
Urberer slaps his hands together; breaking his own shadow of thoughts and returning to the present. “In comparison to you I’m as suave as a magical carp; my smile may be shiny but my words are vastly ineffective in comparison. We all should take lessons from you. Isn’t that right Gricrir.”
“I refuse to answer an obvious question.” Gricrir responded.
“Moving on. These not-so-friendly stalkers could have been anyone. And there are too many people moving through the city right now for me to keep track. In addition, and this is for later on, I’ve got a lot of work to catch up on. I’ve been, not so invovled in uptown and high-priest is putting me to work.”
“I’ll go next Urberer.”
“Go ahead.”
“We will speak on this part more later, but per Urberer’s point, the city has more people than my patrols can handle. As for you Dune,” he gestures a hand towards him, “I don’t know how your ‘eyes’ in the field have been doing. But I know that we are loosing track of the coming and goings.
The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Ah this must be why he’s being so distracted. Simple warfare. He knows the terrain of the battlefield, knows his troops, but the conditions are shifting too much for him to keep up. I wonder - Er I’m sure he’s overworking. I’m wondering how that’s going with Daisy and little Angel. Urberer thought to himself.
Gricrir continues “More importantly, “he pauses, his voice dropping “people are starting to show up missing.”
“People no show up missing. Simply missing. Use good common Gricrir,” Dune said, with a sagacious nod.
Gricrir frowns.
That’s hilarious. Look at Gricrir’s face. It’s like a boy with peach fuzz for a beard trying to teach him how to shave. Dune is correct though. His verbal control of the language is getting better.” Urberer thinks to himself, stifflings a chuckle. Urberer then attempts to stop the conversation from being derailed, “Yes. Please do continue Gricrir.”
His words sounding annoyed “Regardless of my gramattical errors, the fact is that I’ve been informed that a young lady has gone missing.”
“What? People just don’t go missing around here Gricrir. Who’s to say she just didn’t run from home? Many a youth have done it before. Maybe she found the love of her life? Maybe her parents were annoying?”
“I do not think so. The young man that brought it to my attention seemed like he was telling the truth to me.”
“Young man? Maybe he just wanted to find his girlfriend and they’re on the rocks. Or maybe she is one of the good gals at the red light district -“ Urberer stops, seeming to have forgotten the corpse in the room. “Oh.” He eyes the corpse and then his eyes shift to Dune. “The Red Light district, Dune’s territory, where we just captured that very cold fellow over there. Sorry. Continue Gricrir. Just not usual for people to not disappear unless they want to. And you don’t often trust people’s words.”
“You are right. I do not trust most things I am told on teh streets. But his casual approach was so matter of fact, it was hard not to believe it. No different than running a meeting using Marytn’s Ettiquettes on Discipline.”
“Strange.”
“Yes. Nonetheless. He said that a young girl by the name of Abigail was missing. And that others from the orphanage were missing too.”
“Oh damn it,” Urberer said as he places both hands on his face. “This is so bad. I hadn’t been to the orphange in quite a while. I’ve had no idea.”
“Stop drinking and you have idea,” Dune smirked.
Urberer’s face turned a shade of red. Damn it. Now I know how Gricrir felt. “Oh you wound me sir, you wound me. Like a jellyfish sting.”
Dune nods, “Good. Do better.”
“Don’t you start to lecture me either.” He drops his hands and points at Gricrir, “Nor you. This is my third lecture today. Even high priest got on me-“
“Well if you just -“
“Not another word Gricrir or I’ll go to your house and put all your training equipment out of order.”
“You wouldn’t!”
“I sure would. Now, to summarize. We have stalkers after me. We have a girl, and other numbers of people missing from the orphanage. And we had that guy, and whoever his buddies were trying to snatch women.”
“Yes.” Gricrir said.
Dune nods.
“I really, really don’t want to have to deal with this right now. What about you all?”
“Dune prefer to focus on projects and ladies.”
“I’m still training Tony and Griff. They need to be ready to succeed me.”
“And healing nobles as annoying as it is, is much easier,” Urberer said. Her lets out a sigh, gathering his resolve. “Well we are candles in the darkness. Wanderers in the night, but never lost. I ask, despite how much of a pain this will most likely, almost guarantedely be, are you all in this with me, mind, body, and spirit.”
“Of course.”
“Yeah.”
“Well at least this city keeps things interesting. Dune, is there anything else you can tell us about the man you “aprehended”.
“Yes. Strange coins. Had both Bridgebourgh coin and other lands coins.” Dune grabs a sack of out his and drops it on the table. The weight of the pouch hitting the table forces it open and coins run out.
Urberer grabs a few coins and inspects them. “Yes, this is not our currency. Which is not all of itself to strange since this is a trade destination of sorts.”
“But there are so many coins from so many places.”
“And the orphanage and the Red Light districts as targets.”
“Sounds like someone who preys upon the weak.”
“Sounds like to me, the trafficking of people,” Urberer says. A cold chill goes through his body, that even causes his hands to become cold. They forbid these behaviors a long time ago. It’s against empirical law, and that other countries.
“I feared something to that point. Punishment for trafficking is high. Do you really think that is what we have on hand?”
“Of course,” Dune interrupted excitedly. “Your people always strike at the weak for coin or control. Your people teach much.”
“Dune-mud, my people-“
Urberer puts up a hand, stopping the potential bickering. “We can bicker later on gentlemen. Dune, have your eyes in the world seen anything? There’s been too many people for me to keep note. At most I saw some men with cloaks on at the Inn. That said, they could be anyone.”
“Dune’s eyes see many things. But nothing sure. More gossip among merchants. More imports. More money exchanges. More men at red light. Can’t say orphange area. Bird-shits scared away all eyes. Eyes saw Gricrir get in fight with drunks. Funny fight. Gricrir protect self more, Dune thinks.”
“Interesting,” Gricrir stated.
“How’s that Gricrir?” Urberer asked.
“The mid-town guards were supposed to do rotations patrolling that area. The young man I ran into told me they were not there at night. When I brought this up to the Captain of the Guard, he did not dispute the fact.”
That’s odd, Urberer thought, raising an eyebrow. “Since when do mid-town guards actually do anything? Running off beggars and the homeless, from inside low-town at that?”
“Annoying it is!” Replied Dune.
“And interesting that -“ he caught himself. And its interesting that this would conviently lead to no witnesses. Gricrir is already distracted. I don’t want to add suspension of his superior onto his plate.
“It is also poorly acted upon. He took no responsibility of their evening disappearances. Perhaps he figured they really did deserve a break. Their workload” he considered his next words “is not as hefty as ours. I imagine for their pace it must have been some effort.” He closes his mouth, it forming a tight flat line across as if he parted it just a bit he wouldn’t be able to stop his true thoughts coming out.
Dune laughs. “Bird shits working? Gricrir, you funny.”
Choosing not to respond, Gricrir adds “and now I am responsible for the area, with no access to his members, no additional funds to pay, and the incomplete cases he had pilling up for an undetermined, but clearly lengthily time.”
“Oh?” Urberer asked. “Well my friend, it seems like there is going to be a lot on your plate.” And that I should not add anything more. They are asking too much of him as it is.
“Yes we are,” Gricrir eyes drift off to the side, “going to have to dip into family funds to help pay. And I’ll be running patrols by myself. I’ll go look for this Abigail tonight, and see what the cleric knows.”
Look at him. The fatigue shows in his eyes. Urberer thought. “What does Daisy think about this?”
“She, she is fine.”
Just what I thought. She’s not fine. I best move this along so that he can get home. Plus I still have a number of people I must heal. Damn. “Great, Gricrir. Well your tell her I said hello when go home after this. I’ll do the investigation at the orphange.”
“Urberer, that’s my job to do.”
“Yes. But my responsibility. I should have been there. Plus you’ll have your share of time away from home. I’m sure Daisy and Angelica would prefer you home, at least for a night, right?”
“I suppose.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll get names and descriptions. As for funds, Dune is there anything you can do?”
“No, no. I could not ask Dune for funds.”
“Of course you could not. That’s why I’m asking for you.”
“Dune. Money? That sweet, sweet gold coinage. Do you have some you think you can give?”
“Dune always have money. Dune guess he give. Give Dune few days and will have money for you. Dune has meetings and time with ladies first.”
Gricrir nods his head in quite gratitude.
“Fantastic. Dune, do you think can get some more eyes on the bridges?”
“Dune can.”
“And do you think your ladies would help?”
“How?”
“Information gathering?”
“Ladies can ask for Dune, about whereabouts. Men tend to give them information once they are relaxed or in pain.”
“Great. Gricrir. Go home. Get rest. We’ll help you. Dune, I’ll get you information as soon as I can. Let’s reconvene in a few days.”
“Urberer, there is still a lot to cover. THe impact of the celebrations on trade and crime. What info you’ve gained on nobles form their confessions. And there is still this body that I have to someone how smuggle out of here.”
Urberer stands up. “Yes. All very important things. All important for later my friend. You go home get rest. Dune, go to your ladies, keep them safe.”
“And the body Urberer?”
Urberer looks at Dune, “Can you handle this? I need to get a drink before I get back to work.”
“Dune handle,” and he snaps his fingers. The image of the body begins to shimmer like heatwaves. It’s image begins to have large ripple effect as color washes over it. Then the body morphs into a pile of wood.
Illusion magic. Surely it’s useful.
“You could do that the whole time? Why did you not say that in the begining Dune? Or do it, so that we did not have to look at a corpse the entire time.”
“Because Gricrir did not ask.”
“And at that sassy comment, we are adjourned.”
Everyone stands up.
They turned to a large plaque that hung near the cots. The plaque was made of wood; but only enough to hold the sheet of silver that took up the majority of the plaque. At the top of that rectangle of silver, was a sizable circle. The circle had the engraving of a lit candle fighting back the darkness. Below that were tenants of their unnamed order. It was followed then by the initials of their founder, SSN.
They placed a hand over their hearts, saying words that would help them distinguish a friend from a foe. In say in unison “Candles in the darkness. Wanderers in the night. Never lost. We help bring the light. A triple bind in kind of heart, body, and mind.”
Good. Now I won’t have to worry about them getting in the way. Urberer thought, a smile crossing his face.