Post by moralhazard on Mar 13, 2019 13:43:35 GMT
Mintar
Miri crouched on the edge of the low flat roof, shortbow held lightly in her left hand.
‘He’s coming out now,’ Evy’s voice echoed in her mind, tinged as usual with a faint trace of amusement.
Miri grinned, shifting her position. Her right knee tucked beneath her, left leg bent, foot pressing flat against the roof. She rose, just enough to leave space for the bow, and set an arrow to the string, notching her fingers around the fletched end and the string.
One... two... three.
The man Evy had marked with a bit of red cloth dangling from his back pocket emerged from the inn, face ruddy with drink, looking noticeably worse for the wear.
Miri squinted, then drew the string back and fired in one easy, fluid motion.
The arrow thudded squarely into the mark’s shoulder. He glanced around, wildly, then took off running.
‘We’ve got a runner!’ Evy’s mental voice was almost gleeful now.
‘Losing your touch with those drinks?’ Miri teased, slapping her bow into the holster on her back and vaulting over the edge of the roof. She slid down a hanging over the shop below, flipping off the edge and landing in a crouch on the ground. Then she was up and running, sprinting through the crowded streets, eyes locked firmly on the little bit of red fluttering from her quarry.
The man was weaving and stumbling, but still steadily covering ground. He glanced back over his shoulder, slowing slightly, then picked his pace back up at the sight of Miri in pursuit.
Miri grinned wider, white teeth flashing in her dark face. Her purple collar jutted out over the edge of her leather armor, and her sturdy heeled boots thumped easily against the dusty street.
The man stumbled past a stall, reaching out and toppling two barrels to block the path behind him.
Miri shifted course, pushing off a crate with one foot for leverage and effortlessly clearing the barrels.
The man was stumbling more now, pace steadily slowing. He kept glancing back over his shoulder at Miri. Amateur hour, Miri thought cheerfully. Every glance back only slowed him down and made him stumble just a little more.
The man finally fell, tripping over a crate and sprawling flat out on the ground, the arrow snapping off in his shoulder and leaving him screaming in pain.
Miri knelt on his back, one knee holding him firmly into the dust. “Don’t bother,” she said when he began to thrash. Her right hand pressed the point of a dagger into his neck; her left pulled out her cuffs, securing his wrists behind his back.
Evy came strolling up, grinning, just in time to help Miri haul the man to his feet by his elbows.
“What took you so long?” Miri raised an eyebrow, jamming an elbow into the man’s ribs when he hesitated. “Walk, scumbag! Bounty doesn’t specify we need you alive.” Actually there was a bonus for it, but they’d be paid either way.
Evy grinned, a coin purse dangling from her fingers for a moment before she slipped it into her pocket. “What, I should’ve just let that card shark slip away?” She smiled at Miri. “Besides, I knew you had it under control.”
“So,” Evy slipped an arm around Miri’s shoulders as they exited the guard station, both with coin purses a little heavier than they’d been before. “Any ideas on celebration, gorgeous?”
Miri grinned, fingers reaching up to give Evy’s cheek a stroke. “Oh, I’m sure I’ll think of something.”
Evy balled her hands on her hips, glaring at Miri from across the room. “I’m bored,” she announced.
“I can’t take you seriously dressed like that,” Miri grinned at the other woman, crouched in front of her trunk. She looked back down, back to tossing shirts and pants out onto her floor around the trunk.
“I mean it, Miri,” Evy said, firmly. “We’ve been here two weeks already. What is this meeting?”
“My business,” Miri pulled out a dark purple top, flipping the trunk closed. She slid on the shirt, adjusting the high purple collar and the long slit that ran down nearly half the front of the shirt, then pulled on a pair of leather pants tight enough to resemble a second skin.
“I get that,” Evy flopped back down on the bed, where she’d been before all this started. “Just - how much longer will it take?”
“Be good, darling,” Miri rose, catlike, strapping on her daggers and hanging her rapier from her belt. She glanced at her reflection in the dirty half mirror on the wall, flicking her fingers through her hair to adjust the tight curls. “With luck, we’ll leave tomorrow.”
Evy pushed herself up on her elbows, surveying the clothing-strewn room. “Really?”
“Really,” Miri promised. “Be a dear and pack for us?” With that, she left, the door latch clicking shut behind her.
“From what you say, it has been many years,” the man said, squatting next to the brazier and stirring the glowing coals with a long, burnt stick. Steam hissed and spat, rising up into the air. “One loses memories over time. If too much is gone, the drug cannot restore it. It only... changes your perspective.”
“I know this,” Miri stood a few feet away, eyes locked on the smoke. The memories would be there; she had every confidence in it. She had been over them often enough in her mind, searching for a clue. Inside, she was antsy and anxious; this was her third visit, and if the old man wouldn’t make her his brew today, Miri would - her hands flexed at her side, and she crossed her arms over her chest.
“And if the memories are there?” Miri asked.
The man looked at her, long and hard. “We have spoken of this.”
“Tell me again,” Miri relaxed her grip on her forearm, flexing her fingers.
“You will travel back to your memories, rewinding time itself, but as if you were watching, not experiencing,” the man intoned, almost ritually. “It is a sacred experience to see yourself so, and it can provide great clarity. Nothing will change, but perhaps you will see better. You understand?”
“I understand,” Miri thought of the small fortune in gold coins she had left with the man. She had better understand.
“Good.” The man reached to the side, running his fingers over a set of clay pots before settling on one. He rose, crossing to the shelves across the room, scooping pinches of what looked like herbs from different little pouches into a heavy stone mortar. He mashed at them with a pestle, slowly and steadily, the clack mingling with the hissing brazier in the otherwise silent room.
After what felt like an age and a half, the man poured the crushed herbs into the clay pot, and added a long stream of a clear liquid from a small bottle. He returned to the brazier, setting the clay pot down on it. They both stood, watching, waiting, until the faint hiss of boiling liquid joined the crackle of the brazier, and the dark billowing smoke began to turn a bright white.
“Kneel,” the man murmured, indicating a threadbare prayer rug on the packed dirt floor. The smoke was reflected in his eyes, or perhaps it was the magic; they were white and brilliant, with no sign of his pupils.
Miri knelt, slowly, her eyes locked on the white cloud of smoke.
“Focus on the memory you wish to visit,” the man intoned, lifting. He seemed to catch a bit of the smoke in his hands, cupping them around it and pulling away from the cloud. “Give blessings for the miracle you will witness, the chance to go back and see yourself as you were seen. Seek only to see, never to interfere. Focus on the memory - close your eyes and immerse your mind in it. When you are ready, open your eyes and you shall be in the past.”
Miri closed her eyes, willing her mind to focus. She could almost see the dusty in her mind, could also feel the gnawing of hunger in her belly, could almost hear him -
Her eyes snapped open, and the last thing Miri saw was the man opening his hands before her face, an entire cloud of white smoke billowing from them to envelop her.
Miri felt the hot wind whistling through her, the sun beating down and casting the world in vicious, bright shadows. She glanced down at herself, still dressed in purple and leather, strong black hands flexing open and closed against the street, and looked up. Crowds of people were steaming past; their gazes seemed to slide past Miri as if she wasn’t really there. She watched them pass anyway, marking each one: gray robes, black shirt, brown tunic, brown robes with a stain across the front, red shirt with gold braid.
Red shirt turned to look across the street, and Miri turned with him.
A little girl stood there, a filthy scarf covering her wiry black curls, hands cupped out to passing strangers. She was filthy, her clothes ragged and smeared with dirt, and small and thin for ten years old. A smaller, younger boy stood behind her, equally filthy.
Miri crossed the street to them, just a few steps away. Neither seemed to see her, the girl’s gaze passing straight through her once, twice.
“Miri, can’t we take a break?” The boy whined. “It’s too hot...”
“We haven’t earned even enough coin for a sip of water, stupid,” the little girl spat. “Go sit in the shade, if you’re so tired.”
Miri watched the little boy walk back towards the wall behind them. The girl never even looked back, busy scanning passer-byers. The little girl took a few steps forward after a moment, dirty hands clasping onto the hem of a man in a fancy, expensive shirt. “Please sir,” she begged, “spare a few coins for two orphans?”
“Get off me!” The man slapped at her and the little girl stumbled back, holding her cheek. Miri looked away, turning her attention back to the boy. She didn’t need to see the kicks the merchant would land in the little girl’s ribs; she could remember those well enough, if she so chose.
The little boy had been crouched against the wall, in what little shade it provided midday. He surged to his feet when the merchant hit his sister, starting forward at a run.
Then - the man with the red shirt was there, scooping him up, one hand covering the boy’s mouth to muffle his screams. He fought and kicked, flailing, but to no avail.
Miri just watched. The memory seemed to slow down as the little girl sprinted past her, screaming, chasing after the man in the red shirt. Miri didn’t follow; there was no need. She remembered well enough the chase, the moment when she had lost the bright red shirt in the crowd. She remembered hunting through the city all that day, the next, the one after, until she came across her brother’s body flung across a garbage heap in the River District, maggots squirming in the open sockets where his eyes had been.
“Good.” The old man’s voice echoed through the memory. “Now, follow my voice back...”
“No.” Miri inhaled deeply, breathing in the dust of the road, and pushed the memory back, stepping backwards herself, towards the road. The girl reappeared first, running backwards down the road, the man behind her. Then the girl was back on the ground, shielding her face from the merchant’s kicks and the man in the red shirt was setting the little boy down and walking back away from him with slow, deliberate steps. The boy was crouching back down against the wall, then rose and turned, marching backwards back to his sister.
“You can’t do this!” the old man howled, his voice cutting through the air. “Stop - stop it -”
Miri ignored him. She turned her gaze back to the crowd, plunging into them. The first person she brushed seemed to ignore her, as if she didn’t exist. Miri focused, remembering: the bite of the dust as the wind whipped it into her face, the hot sting of the sun on her bare arms, the smell of sweat and garbage mingling together. The next man she brushed glanced after her.
Miri angled herself through the crowd, skirting past the red-shirted man, quick fingers darting out and tugging a sheath of papers from his pocket. She gripped them tight in both hands, reading through them as fast as she could. The memory seemed to almost fade around her, insubstantial members of the crowd literally walking through her. Off to the side she was just barely aware of the thumps as the merchant hit the little girl, the screams as her chase began -
“You cannot!” The old man roared, and Miri felt his hands grasp her shoulders, yanking her bodily back out of the memory.
Miri laughed, kneeling on the rug once more. She tasted spicy metallic blood in her mouth, and spat it out on the floor next to the old rug.
The old man was shaking and howling. His eyes were burnt white, every vein on his body standing out into the air, blood dripping from his nose and eyes, staining his teeth as well.
Miri wiped her nose on her hand, glancing down at the dark blood. She spat off the rug again, wanting the taste of blood and smoke out of her mouth.
“What have you done!” The old man cried, stumbling back into the brazier. It tipped, spilling coals onto the ground. The clay pot pitched off, cracking open against the ground and spilling a smoking white mixture against the floor.
Miri grinned, rising to her feet. “Wasn’t it obvious?” She spat again. The rush of energy and purpose seemed to fill her limbs, pushing out the sensation of being overstretched, like a bit of rubber pulled taut and snapped back. She tilted her head from side to side, blinking away the last of the drops of blood in the corner of her eyes, and left the room, the old man moaning and clutching his head behind her.
“Maarlith?” Evy asked. “I thought we were going back to the sword coast after this,” she stared at Miri from her position atop the larger of the two packed trunks.
Miri grinned. “Come on, Evy, where’s your sense of adventure? We’re halfway across Faerun - why not go all the way? Do you really want to go back to Calimport?”
“I -“ Evy paused. “I suppose not,” she grinned, suddenly, a sparkling smile that lit her tan face and sent sparkles into her blue eyes. “Why not!”
Miri grinned wider. She tasted a last bit of blood on one back molar and ran her tongue over it, swallowing. “Good. I’ve booked us passage with a caravan leaving tomorrow.”
Evy laughed. “Am I so predictable?”
“Who doesn’t like a bit of adventure,” Miri grinned. “Come on, we’d better say goodbye to Mintar in style. First whiskey’s on me!”
Miri crouched on the edge of the low flat roof, shortbow held lightly in her left hand.
‘He’s coming out now,’ Evy’s voice echoed in her mind, tinged as usual with a faint trace of amusement.
Miri grinned, shifting her position. Her right knee tucked beneath her, left leg bent, foot pressing flat against the roof. She rose, just enough to leave space for the bow, and set an arrow to the string, notching her fingers around the fletched end and the string.
One... two... three.
The man Evy had marked with a bit of red cloth dangling from his back pocket emerged from the inn, face ruddy with drink, looking noticeably worse for the wear.
Miri squinted, then drew the string back and fired in one easy, fluid motion.
The arrow thudded squarely into the mark’s shoulder. He glanced around, wildly, then took off running.
‘We’ve got a runner!’ Evy’s mental voice was almost gleeful now.
‘Losing your touch with those drinks?’ Miri teased, slapping her bow into the holster on her back and vaulting over the edge of the roof. She slid down a hanging over the shop below, flipping off the edge and landing in a crouch on the ground. Then she was up and running, sprinting through the crowded streets, eyes locked firmly on the little bit of red fluttering from her quarry.
The man was weaving and stumbling, but still steadily covering ground. He glanced back over his shoulder, slowing slightly, then picked his pace back up at the sight of Miri in pursuit.
Miri grinned wider, white teeth flashing in her dark face. Her purple collar jutted out over the edge of her leather armor, and her sturdy heeled boots thumped easily against the dusty street.
The man stumbled past a stall, reaching out and toppling two barrels to block the path behind him.
Miri shifted course, pushing off a crate with one foot for leverage and effortlessly clearing the barrels.
The man was stumbling more now, pace steadily slowing. He kept glancing back over his shoulder at Miri. Amateur hour, Miri thought cheerfully. Every glance back only slowed him down and made him stumble just a little more.
The man finally fell, tripping over a crate and sprawling flat out on the ground, the arrow snapping off in his shoulder and leaving him screaming in pain.
Miri knelt on his back, one knee holding him firmly into the dust. “Don’t bother,” she said when he began to thrash. Her right hand pressed the point of a dagger into his neck; her left pulled out her cuffs, securing his wrists behind his back.
Evy came strolling up, grinning, just in time to help Miri haul the man to his feet by his elbows.
“What took you so long?” Miri raised an eyebrow, jamming an elbow into the man’s ribs when he hesitated. “Walk, scumbag! Bounty doesn’t specify we need you alive.” Actually there was a bonus for it, but they’d be paid either way.
Evy grinned, a coin purse dangling from her fingers for a moment before she slipped it into her pocket. “What, I should’ve just let that card shark slip away?” She smiled at Miri. “Besides, I knew you had it under control.”
“So,” Evy slipped an arm around Miri’s shoulders as they exited the guard station, both with coin purses a little heavier than they’d been before. “Any ideas on celebration, gorgeous?”
Miri grinned, fingers reaching up to give Evy’s cheek a stroke. “Oh, I’m sure I’ll think of something.”
Evy balled her hands on her hips, glaring at Miri from across the room. “I’m bored,” she announced.
“I can’t take you seriously dressed like that,” Miri grinned at the other woman, crouched in front of her trunk. She looked back down, back to tossing shirts and pants out onto her floor around the trunk.
“I mean it, Miri,” Evy said, firmly. “We’ve been here two weeks already. What is this meeting?”
“My business,” Miri pulled out a dark purple top, flipping the trunk closed. She slid on the shirt, adjusting the high purple collar and the long slit that ran down nearly half the front of the shirt, then pulled on a pair of leather pants tight enough to resemble a second skin.
“I get that,” Evy flopped back down on the bed, where she’d been before all this started. “Just - how much longer will it take?”
“Be good, darling,” Miri rose, catlike, strapping on her daggers and hanging her rapier from her belt. She glanced at her reflection in the dirty half mirror on the wall, flicking her fingers through her hair to adjust the tight curls. “With luck, we’ll leave tomorrow.”
Evy pushed herself up on her elbows, surveying the clothing-strewn room. “Really?”
“Really,” Miri promised. “Be a dear and pack for us?” With that, she left, the door latch clicking shut behind her.
“From what you say, it has been many years,” the man said, squatting next to the brazier and stirring the glowing coals with a long, burnt stick. Steam hissed and spat, rising up into the air. “One loses memories over time. If too much is gone, the drug cannot restore it. It only... changes your perspective.”
“I know this,” Miri stood a few feet away, eyes locked on the smoke. The memories would be there; she had every confidence in it. She had been over them often enough in her mind, searching for a clue. Inside, she was antsy and anxious; this was her third visit, and if the old man wouldn’t make her his brew today, Miri would - her hands flexed at her side, and she crossed her arms over her chest.
“And if the memories are there?” Miri asked.
The man looked at her, long and hard. “We have spoken of this.”
“Tell me again,” Miri relaxed her grip on her forearm, flexing her fingers.
“You will travel back to your memories, rewinding time itself, but as if you were watching, not experiencing,” the man intoned, almost ritually. “It is a sacred experience to see yourself so, and it can provide great clarity. Nothing will change, but perhaps you will see better. You understand?”
“I understand,” Miri thought of the small fortune in gold coins she had left with the man. She had better understand.
“Good.” The man reached to the side, running his fingers over a set of clay pots before settling on one. He rose, crossing to the shelves across the room, scooping pinches of what looked like herbs from different little pouches into a heavy stone mortar. He mashed at them with a pestle, slowly and steadily, the clack mingling with the hissing brazier in the otherwise silent room.
After what felt like an age and a half, the man poured the crushed herbs into the clay pot, and added a long stream of a clear liquid from a small bottle. He returned to the brazier, setting the clay pot down on it. They both stood, watching, waiting, until the faint hiss of boiling liquid joined the crackle of the brazier, and the dark billowing smoke began to turn a bright white.
“Kneel,” the man murmured, indicating a threadbare prayer rug on the packed dirt floor. The smoke was reflected in his eyes, or perhaps it was the magic; they were white and brilliant, with no sign of his pupils.
Miri knelt, slowly, her eyes locked on the white cloud of smoke.
“Focus on the memory you wish to visit,” the man intoned, lifting. He seemed to catch a bit of the smoke in his hands, cupping them around it and pulling away from the cloud. “Give blessings for the miracle you will witness, the chance to go back and see yourself as you were seen. Seek only to see, never to interfere. Focus on the memory - close your eyes and immerse your mind in it. When you are ready, open your eyes and you shall be in the past.”
Miri closed her eyes, willing her mind to focus. She could almost see the dusty in her mind, could also feel the gnawing of hunger in her belly, could almost hear him -
Her eyes snapped open, and the last thing Miri saw was the man opening his hands before her face, an entire cloud of white smoke billowing from them to envelop her.
Miri felt the hot wind whistling through her, the sun beating down and casting the world in vicious, bright shadows. She glanced down at herself, still dressed in purple and leather, strong black hands flexing open and closed against the street, and looked up. Crowds of people were steaming past; their gazes seemed to slide past Miri as if she wasn’t really there. She watched them pass anyway, marking each one: gray robes, black shirt, brown tunic, brown robes with a stain across the front, red shirt with gold braid.
Red shirt turned to look across the street, and Miri turned with him.
A little girl stood there, a filthy scarf covering her wiry black curls, hands cupped out to passing strangers. She was filthy, her clothes ragged and smeared with dirt, and small and thin for ten years old. A smaller, younger boy stood behind her, equally filthy.
Miri crossed the street to them, just a few steps away. Neither seemed to see her, the girl’s gaze passing straight through her once, twice.
“Miri, can’t we take a break?” The boy whined. “It’s too hot...”
“We haven’t earned even enough coin for a sip of water, stupid,” the little girl spat. “Go sit in the shade, if you’re so tired.”
Miri watched the little boy walk back towards the wall behind them. The girl never even looked back, busy scanning passer-byers. The little girl took a few steps forward after a moment, dirty hands clasping onto the hem of a man in a fancy, expensive shirt. “Please sir,” she begged, “spare a few coins for two orphans?”
“Get off me!” The man slapped at her and the little girl stumbled back, holding her cheek. Miri looked away, turning her attention back to the boy. She didn’t need to see the kicks the merchant would land in the little girl’s ribs; she could remember those well enough, if she so chose.
The little boy had been crouched against the wall, in what little shade it provided midday. He surged to his feet when the merchant hit his sister, starting forward at a run.
Then - the man with the red shirt was there, scooping him up, one hand covering the boy’s mouth to muffle his screams. He fought and kicked, flailing, but to no avail.
Miri just watched. The memory seemed to slow down as the little girl sprinted past her, screaming, chasing after the man in the red shirt. Miri didn’t follow; there was no need. She remembered well enough the chase, the moment when she had lost the bright red shirt in the crowd. She remembered hunting through the city all that day, the next, the one after, until she came across her brother’s body flung across a garbage heap in the River District, maggots squirming in the open sockets where his eyes had been.
“Good.” The old man’s voice echoed through the memory. “Now, follow my voice back...”
“No.” Miri inhaled deeply, breathing in the dust of the road, and pushed the memory back, stepping backwards herself, towards the road. The girl reappeared first, running backwards down the road, the man behind her. Then the girl was back on the ground, shielding her face from the merchant’s kicks and the man in the red shirt was setting the little boy down and walking back away from him with slow, deliberate steps. The boy was crouching back down against the wall, then rose and turned, marching backwards back to his sister.
“You can’t do this!” the old man howled, his voice cutting through the air. “Stop - stop it -”
Miri ignored him. She turned her gaze back to the crowd, plunging into them. The first person she brushed seemed to ignore her, as if she didn’t exist. Miri focused, remembering: the bite of the dust as the wind whipped it into her face, the hot sting of the sun on her bare arms, the smell of sweat and garbage mingling together. The next man she brushed glanced after her.
Miri angled herself through the crowd, skirting past the red-shirted man, quick fingers darting out and tugging a sheath of papers from his pocket. She gripped them tight in both hands, reading through them as fast as she could. The memory seemed to almost fade around her, insubstantial members of the crowd literally walking through her. Off to the side she was just barely aware of the thumps as the merchant hit the little girl, the screams as her chase began -
“You cannot!” The old man roared, and Miri felt his hands grasp her shoulders, yanking her bodily back out of the memory.
Miri laughed, kneeling on the rug once more. She tasted spicy metallic blood in her mouth, and spat it out on the floor next to the old rug.
The old man was shaking and howling. His eyes were burnt white, every vein on his body standing out into the air, blood dripping from his nose and eyes, staining his teeth as well.
Miri wiped her nose on her hand, glancing down at the dark blood. She spat off the rug again, wanting the taste of blood and smoke out of her mouth.
“What have you done!” The old man cried, stumbling back into the brazier. It tipped, spilling coals onto the ground. The clay pot pitched off, cracking open against the ground and spilling a smoking white mixture against the floor.
Miri grinned, rising to her feet. “Wasn’t it obvious?” She spat again. The rush of energy and purpose seemed to fill her limbs, pushing out the sensation of being overstretched, like a bit of rubber pulled taut and snapped back. She tilted her head from side to side, blinking away the last of the drops of blood in the corner of her eyes, and left the room, the old man moaning and clutching his head behind her.
“Maarlith?” Evy asked. “I thought we were going back to the sword coast after this,” she stared at Miri from her position atop the larger of the two packed trunks.
Miri grinned. “Come on, Evy, where’s your sense of adventure? We’re halfway across Faerun - why not go all the way? Do you really want to go back to Calimport?”
“I -“ Evy paused. “I suppose not,” she grinned, suddenly, a sparkling smile that lit her tan face and sent sparkles into her blue eyes. “Why not!”
Miri grinned wider. She tasted a last bit of blood on one back molar and ran her tongue over it, swallowing. “Good. I’ve booked us passage with a caravan leaving tomorrow.”
Evy laughed. “Am I so predictable?”
“Who doesn’t like a bit of adventure,” Miri grinned. “Come on, we’d better say goodbye to Mintar in style. First whiskey’s on me!”
“Deal!” Evy hopped up to her feet, leading Miri out of the room. “Let’s stop in Yallasch on the way - it’s been years since I’ve been there!”
((Word count: 2257))
