Light rain began to patter down from the sky as I stood with the two humans in the alley. Blood from my face started to combine with the water and run down my neck, further sullying my clothing. The irony of a human of this world lecturing me about how things would be if there was no magic, I thought, not bothering to suppress a half smile. Even my body, or perhaps my subconscious mind, was amused by the situation. Still, it's odd, to think that she can't do magic at all, it seems impossible, I thought, even animals can do basic magic here, and she can heal, so...
“You can’t even manage a flame?” I asked. Vaozey scowled at me and squeezed the handle of her mace again.
“I’ve changed my mind,” she replied, “Naomay, get out of here, I’m going to kill this idiot.” The man named Naomay looked up at me, then went from a crouching position into a dead sprint out of the alley. I looked around and saw my sword lying nearby, then calmly walked to pick it back up. Vaozey watched me examine the blade for damage, of which there was thankfully little, and put it back into its sheath.
“Why would you bother protecting someone you obviously hate?” I asked, pretending that I wasn’t observing her out of my peripheral vision. “I simply don’t understand why he came back here, or why you came with him. The rest of the situation I can pretty much figure out.”
“I hate Rehvites more,” Vaozey replied. “Though Naomay is a disgusting little kaobeyv, I will grant you that.”
“You hate them because they did that to you?” I asked, finally making eye contact with her and gesturing to her face. “The scarring is rather extreme, and it almost hides the brand. I fail to see the point of it.”
“The point of what?” Vaozey snapped.
“All of it, actually,” I replied. “If they dislike people like you so much, why would they not kill you? Why bother with branding you and letting you live?”
“Even Rehvites need workers to clean up their shit and piss,” Vaozey spat. “Despite what they’d have you believe, they’re still human just like we are. Just less human.” Interesting that she views magical skill as a point of inferiority, I thought.
“So, are you going to attack me again?” I asked. “I believe we would both gain more by talking. I’d rather not have to kill you, but I will if you force me to. I could have done it several times before we stopped earlier.”
“Why did you really kill those kids?” Vaozey asked, hand still on her mace. She was ready to fight, but her posture said she wasn’t going to try to take me by surprise. If I give her the right response, she should calm down, I intuited.
“I told you, they attacked me,” I replied.
“No, I want the real reason,” Vaozey insisted, her eyes locked on mine with palpable intensity. “They were Rehvite trash, but if you could fight me and live you could easily have captured and interrogated them. You even said the girl didn’t want to answer your questions.” I stared back at her, just as intensely. The truth, then, I thought.
“The boy, the one with the knife in his skull,” I began. “He threatened to inform his father about me. I had no idea who his father was, but I couldn’t take that risk because of the implication that he was a man of importance. The rest were killed because they were with him, and witnesses.” Vaozey looked at the knife boy’s face, then made a grunting noise. “Also, I just didn’t like them,” I added, recalling the feeling of being electrocuted. Vaozey looked back at me, and I could tell she was scowling or grinning from the position of her cheeks.
“Serves them right,” she growled, her hand leaving her mace. “Was it painful for them?”
“The boy with the knife died instantly,” I said. “The second boy experienced a brief period of his brain being cooked from the inside before dying, and the girl was barely conscious after the torture. I killed her in the same way that I killed the second boy.” I let my answer hang for a moment. “I have no idea if the latter two suffered, but I would assume that they did.” Briefly, at least, I thought, I have no idea why humans care so much about this.
“Good,” Vaozey said. She took a breath, then exhaled slowly. “Are you a mercenary?” Suddenly much more friendly, I noted.
“I am,” I replied. In a sense, I added silently.
“You should follow me,” she advised sternly. “Someone is bound to come looking for these three, and we made a lot of noise during the fight. You don’t want to be here when they show up.” Without another word, or confirming that I was following her, she began walking down the alley Naomay had sprinted away through.
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Vaozey led me through the streets, drawing stares from the people nearby as we walked quickly to her destination. As I observed their faces, I noted that some had clear burn marks on their cheeks in the shape of the mark of ire. Some also had the same mark, though created through slicing wounds instead of burning. A few just had a large patch of scar tissue where they presumably cut the mark off. Vaozey said nothing to me as we twisted and turned through the rain, eventually coming to a small windowless wooden house along the eastern wall. Vaozey roughly shoved the door open, lumbered inside, then looked back at me.
“Just know that if you try anything in my ‘home’, I’ll kill you even more slowly than I was going to in the alley,” she warned. I entered behind her without any reaction and scanned the interior of the house. It was a single room, stove in the back left corner, made-up bed in the back right, with a carpet covering the middle of the floor. A single lantern hanging in the middle of the room lit the entire house. Not a single table or chair was present, and Vaozey simply turned around to face me and sat down on the rug. “Sit,” she commanded. This is too clean to have been lived in, I noted, It's probably a temporary safehouse of some kind.
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“What is this about?” I asked, sitting down across from her. Slowly, she removed her helmet and mask then pulled back her chainmail coif, revealing her short, black hair. The burns on her face wrapped around the sides of her head, fusing the bottoms of her ears to her head and preventing hair from growing for a few centimeters behind them. The burns go all the way down her neck, into the armor, I observed.
“The Rehvites are going to want to kill you when they figure out what you did,” she said, stating the obvious.
“Plenty of people want to kill me,” I responded. Vaozey scowled, then rolled her eyes.
“I’m sure, but they’re not like the Rehvites,” she said. “In case you haven’t figured it out, Rehvites control this city. The entire leadership of this place worships Rehv, and has for about five years now. If they find you, and believe me they will, you are going to suffer an excruciating death, and that's if you’re lucky.”
“I assumed as much,” I shrugged, “was that all?”
“Are you a traveler?” Vaozey asked. “Are you planning to leave?”
“I don’t have to tell you anything,” I responded flatly.
“The Rehvites control the gates,” Vaozey told me. “If you haven’t been here for a while, you probably noticed the extra security on the way in. It’s to keep non-Rehvite Luwahriy out.” Oh, so the exchange Zaovrao’er made with the guard was to confirm that we were Rehvites, I realized, That makes a lot more sense.
“And naturally, to also keep them in unless they have a good reason to leave,” I intuited. “However, I am not Luwahriy, and thus they will likely not stop me from leaving. Since they don’t know my face, they have no reason to keep me here.”
“You hate them too,” Vaozey said, looking deep into my eyes. “I can see that you hate them. Nobody can do what you did in that alley without hatred. You took pleasure in killing them.” While I know the definition, I’m not sure I've experienced hatred, I thought.
“I don't hate them,” I replied. “Those adolescents threatened to obstruct my goals, so I removed them. If more Rehvites oppose me in the future, I will do the same for them. Regardless of their affiliations, if someone isn’t in the way of my objectives, I don’t care what they do.” Vaozey looked to be watching me for some sign of deception, but I knew she would find none. After a moment, she sighed and her face loosened up.
“I want to hire you,” she said.
“No,” I replied. Vaozey scowled at me again.
“You’re a mercenary,” she stated, as though it was a point of argument.
“I am not interested in any work that does not get me closer to the noypeyyoyjh in the east of-” I began, but then I stopped. At the mention of the word noypeyyoyjh, Vaozey’s entire body jolted and her hand went to her weapon. “Calm down,” I growled.
“You ngaazmayjh,” she swore. “What could you possibly want with a Rehvite holy site if you aren’t one of them? Is this some kind of trick?” Her calm demeanor from just moments ago had vanished into barely-contained rage.
“I just need to get there,” I replied to placate her.
“On a seytoydh pilgrimage,” Vaozey snarled. Her pupils are dilated to an extreme degree, I observed, it’s like she’s under the influence of a drug, just from being angry.
“No,” I denied, “my objective has nothing to do with religion. If your mission has nothing to do with leaving this city and moving east, we have nothing to talk about.” I pushed myself with my hands, standing back up on the carpet, while Vaozey stared me down. “If the Rehvites are going to be after me, perhaps you should look out for yourself,” I suggested in an effort to distract her. “You were also at the scene of the crime, and considering your disposition an investigator would suspect you over me as the perpetrator of said crime.” I turned around to leave, but then stopped when I heard muttering from behind me. She didn’t get up, I thought, in that armor, I would have heard it.
“Don’t you have any decency?” Vaozey said, so quietly that I could barely hear it. I stopped walking and turned around to face her.
“I don’t know what that means,” I answered honestly. I knew the word and the concept, but not what she meant when she said it.
“Are you just an animal then?” she exploded, bursting to her feet and shouting in my face. “Do you not care that those teylmseyt lawmzao are running around burning and mutilating people? Do you not care that they forced half the city into a ghetto, and run a pogrom through it every month, making sport of killing anyone caught outside? Do you not care that they won't even allow us to leave the city and are slowly starving us to death? What kind of jhoytvahz man are you?” The volume of her voice was loud enough that I was sure it could be heard outside her home. She's quite tall for a Luwahriy, I noted, as her eye level was the same as mine.
“Attempting to use guilt, or perhaps some sense of social duty to compel me to action won’t work,” I told her flatly. “The affairs of your people aren’t any of my business, and they don’t concern me unless they affect me somehow.” Vaozey reared back and punched me in the face with her gauntleted hand. A bit of blood spilled into my mouth, and I spat it on the floor. I could have avoided the blow, but I wanted to make a point.
“Go on then, draw your weapon,” she taunted. Instead of doing as she requested, I used my full strength along with force magic to punch her in the gut through her armor, lifting her off the ground by a few centimeters from the impact and sending her stumbling into the wall to her left, where she knelt down. The bones in my fist shattered on impact, but my healing magic was more the sufficient to fix them. Vaozey, meanwhile, gagged a few times before continuing to speak. “Do you even know where it is?” she coughed out.
“To the east,” I replied. I assume that as I approach, the location will be common knowledge I can acquire, I thought.
“Of course you don’t,” Vaozey snarled, sharply inhaling and pushing herself back to her feet. Her breastplate had a new dent near the bottom from my fist, but not a very deep one. “I know who does,” she continued. “I know how to find that information, and much, much more about that disgusting noypeyyoyjh. Things like how many Rehvites guard the place, what kind of armaments they have, and how to get in without fighting them. Is that worth something to you?”
“You lie,” I replied, glaring at Vaozey and watching for signs of deception. She cracked a grin, showing off silky-white teeth, and started to laugh. “Where?” I demanded.
“Oh no, not that easily,” Vaozey taunted. “You’ve made me very angry with you, so now you’re going to pay for my help.”
“How much?” I asked, pulling out my money pouch. Again, Vaozey laughed, growing almost hysterical as I started pulling out coins and placing them into my hand.
“You think I care about seytoydh money?” she cackled. “I live like an animal in this city, and you think I care about money? I can't even spend it except in the slums. No, no if you want what I know you’re going to have to pay me with something that actually matters to me.” I put my coins back in their pouch, and narrowed my eyes. My exhale turned into a growl, and I had the urge to just torture Vaozey until she gave me the information I wanted. Torture isn’t a good way to get accurate information, I reminded myself, this woman is spiteful enough to lead me on a blind chase even for no gain.
“Then what do you want?” I demanded.
“Oh nothing much,” Vaozey hummed, “I just want you to help me break into a Rehvite temple, maybe burn some things with that fancy magic of yours, torture a few tawtzeytoydh Rehvite lawmzaob to death, that sort of thing. If you want to know what I know, you’re going to help me make those yeyhhayseytayb regret ever coming to Owsahlk. That's the price.”