It had now been three years since Mallorkan had died, but for Plageiorath it still felt as if Mallorkan’s body had just been encased in its tomb. He knew that this wasn’t the case, of course, but he still felt it all the same. He quickly got up out of his bed and dressed in his finest attire, brushed his teeth with a charcoal mixture, and even ran his hair through with a comb, something he only did on very special occasions. Today was a very special occasion indeed, as he would finally get an audience with the captain of the guard and, with hope, join their ranks and protect his home town. Plageiorath was sixteen years old now, an adult in the eyes of the elders, and just barely old enough to join the Florhaust guard, both his and Mallorkan’s dream.
After getting almost completely ready, Plageiorath raced out of the door to his family’s cottage, accidentally leaving his dagger in the process. It was the middle of the night, and while the night sky was usually completely dark in the Bloodied Plains region of the empire, tonight the moon shone almost as bright as the sun, filling the sky with its brilliance. Under this light Plageiorath walked to the town guard barracks, thinking about the exciting threats he would face and adventures that he may go on while protecting the people of his community as a member of the guard. It wasn’t a very far walk to the barracks, just a few meters at the most, but for some reason that he could not quite figure out, Plageiorath found himself slowing down and taking time to observe his surroundings constantly. It seemed as if there was something watching him, waiting, as if it were preparing an ambush.
Every time that Plageiorath looked around though, he couldn’t see anyone on the streets, or any sign that someone had ever been there. Continuing in this same fashion, Plageiorath eventually got to the barracks and even with all of the stopping to look around he still made great time. Plageiorath could hear all of the familiar sounds of merriment coming from inside, probably from the guards that had just finished their shift patrolling outside of the town’s wall and gates. Plageiorath pushed the door open and his eyes and ears were filled with wonderful sights and sounds. There was the warm light of the crackling fire, there were off-duty guards gathered around a table telling stories that delivered much laughter from their peers whilst drinking their bottles of mead, and more groups of guards, many of them doing the same thing, all around the room.
There seemed to only be one or two of them that seemed to be calm and sober enough to actually be able to hold a serious conversation. Plageiorath walked up to the first of these that seemed to still have full control of his mental capabilities and asked him where the captain was. “He’s upstairs,” the guard said, “looking for any sign of an invasion. I think he’s just a little paranoid.” Plageiorath then thanked the man and while he went on to spark a conversation with some of the other guards in the room, Plageiorath went up the only set of stairs in the barracks until he got to the top floor.
The top floor of the barracks had four walls that were completely open for observation and a roof that just sat upon the four wooden posts that were set in each corner of the room and was only accessible via a trapdoor in the middle of the room. Between each post there was a guard rail that ran around the entire outside edge of the room to allow the guards a small bit of rest while on duty. There were also two chairs sitting side by side. Valmor, the captain of the guard and former leader of the Dranquinn clan, when there was one, sat on one of them facing the gates of the town, with his scope held up to his eye. “Have you seen anything interesting yet?” Plageiorath asked him, hoping that there might be something for him to do.
“No, not unless you think trading caravans are interesting,” Valmor said, lowering his scope and turning to face Plageiorath. “I was wondering when you were finally going to show up,” he continued, and then gestured to the chair next to him, “Go ahead and have a seat. We probably have some time for that interview that you requested.”
Plageiorath sat in the chair next to Valmor and Valmor asked him, “Do you work well with other people when it comes to combat situations?”
“Yes,” Plageiorath said, “most definitely.”
“Do you have your own blade that you would be willing to use to protect the people of Florhaust?” Valmor asked.
“Well I do, but it’s just a dagger,” Plageiorath answered.
“Hey,” Valmor said, “some of the best assassins only use daggers.”
“Well,” Plageiorath said, “I’m not exactly looking for a position as an assassin.”
“Then what position are you looking for exactly?” Valmor asked.
“Hopefully a member of the town guard,” Plageiorath replied.
“Well,” Valmor said, “I’m afraid you may not get that chance then.”
“What! Why?” Plageiorath asked in surprise.
“Sadly,” Valmor answered, “we don’t have any more openings for members of the guard, as the last spot was just filled up yesterday.” He then looked at Plageiorath’s face to see that he was a little upset by this information and realized that he was definitely going to be able to persuade Plageiorath to enter the position that he wanted him to go in. “But,” Valmor continued, “I do have a spot for a new special position that I wanted to try.”
“You do?” Plageiorath asked, looking at him with interest, “What is this new special position?”
“We need someone to go out and hunt down some criminals that have escaped capture by leaving the city,” Valmor said, “We all need to stay here to protect the city from invasions from bandits so we can’t go ourselves.”
“So you want me to be an assassin? Isn’t that illegal?” Plageiorath asked.
“No,” Valmor replied, “not at all. I don’t want you to kill the targets that you hunt down. Instead, I want you to collect their bounties from them or capture them and bring them to the emperor and place them in the dungeon. We’ll pay you ten gold pieces per criminal that you can collect on.”
“Ten gold!” Plageiorath said in surprise, “You must be out of your mind!”
“So you’ll do it?” Valmor asked.
“Well, yeah,” Plageiorath answered, “of course I’ll take that position!”
“Very well then,” Valmor said, rubbing his hands together, “we’ll get you a proper weapon and start your personal training tomorrow. But right now, you should go home and get some rest as your training will start when the sun starts to come above the horizon.”
On the way back to his cottage, Plageiorath didn’t have that feeling that someone or something was stalking him. Either he just felt a little creeped out because nobody really goes out during the night, or the thing that was stalking him had finally left the streets. When he got to the door of his home though, Plageiorath immediately knew that something was wrong. There was no light coming from inside of the cottage, which wouldn’t have been that weird because his parents always left an oil lamp on in the main room of the cottage and they had a tendency to burn out, but the door was also already open, and it didn’t look as if someone had unlocked it because the wood on the inside of the frame had been thrown out from where the lock was, it was definitely forced open. He then slowly pushed open the door to reveal… nothing.
There was nothing else different about the main room from when he had first left the cottage that night, and when he checked all of the other rooms Plageiorath could again find nothing out of the ordinary. So, believing that there was never really an intruder in the first place and the door frame might have just cracked from years of use, he walked back to the door to close it and just use the secondary locking system. Since the door opened towards the inside of the home, they had added a way to bar the door from the inside by sliding a board into a slot on the other side of the door. Plageiorath used this locking system and then went to the back of his cottage to sleep until morning. When he entered his room he took off his overcoat, hanging it on the hook by his door, and then moved to the bed, took off his shoes, and layed down on it.
Plageiorath fell asleep almost instantaneousley once his head hit the cloth filled with straw that he used as his pillow and he slept surprisingly well, dreaming of the fantastic adventures he would go on come morning, not realizing that his adventures that are so soon to come will be much darker than he ever could have imagined.
It came out of its slumber, screaming out in pain because of the large slash across its chest. This pain was not the normal burning or throbbing that you might expect to get from a cut, but rather a strange stinging sensation that you get from an injection of some venom or medicine. The creature that carried the slash upon its chest was quite strange as well. It was neither animal nor man, but something somewhere in between. It had the large, curved, horns of a mountain goat, the attentive ears of a cat, the eyes and muzzle of a wolf, the hide of an ox, and the structure of a human. There was no way to tell what this creature was, where it came from, or even whether it was from this world or not, but one thing was for sure. This was most definitely not a man or animal, but a beast.
The beast was in the center of a wooden room with a dirt floor and no windows. As soon as the beast had gotten over the pain from the cut across its chest, it stood up and strained against the chains that kept it confined inside of this prison. The chains creaked and the logs they were attached to groaned, but no matter how much the beast strained against its chains, neither the chains nor the wood would budge. “Well, well, well,” a voice came from the shadows, “the once so great Beast of Fahrendal has finally submitted to its new master.” At this, the beast let loose a bloodcurdling roar and lunged at the voice in the dark, straining at its chains with renewed strength.
“It’s alright, my pet,” the voice said, “in time you’ll learn.” Then a red light bloomed out of the darkness and a new cut appeared above the beast’s left brow. The blood from the wound did not begin to drip towards the ground, but instead went straight inside of the source of the red light.
Plageiorath awoke the next morning a little bit before sunrise. He quickly got ready for his first day of training for his new position in the town guard, remembering to grab his obsidian dagger and store it within his cloak this time. He then exited his room of the cottage and walked out into the main living space, where he beheld a very surprising sight. A man, dressed entirely in black robes sat at the wooden table in the center of the main living quarters. The man then gestured towards the seat across the table from him and urged Plageiorath to sit in it.
Once Plageiorath had seated himself the man spoke, “I understand that you have recently accepted the new position in the town guard that Valmor has created, have you not?”
Plageiorath nodded at this and said, “Yes, yes I have.”
“I urge you to reconsider accepting this opening,” the man began, “it was created in quite the rush, and many of the people on the list are types that a young boy such as yourself should not be messing around with. They do not play games kid, they will kill without hesitation.”
“I understand your concerns,” Plageiorath said, “but I accepted this position of my own free will and won’t give it away so soon. I’m only just beginning to start it today.”
At this the man stood up and said, “If I cannot change your mind, then I’ll give you a word of advice. Choose the second assignment Valmor presents to you and if you value your life at all, do not accept the third,” and with that the man walked out of the door, hopefully to never be seen again. While walking towards the barracks, once again Plageiorath could not shake the feeling that he was being watched. The cobblestone streets were bustling with people running around to their shops in order to prepare them for possible future customers later in the day.
The crowds would most definitely be able to provide ample cover for someone to follow and watch a man, especially when nobody was paying very close attention to either of them. After taking a glance around, Plageiorath shrugged off this feeling as paranoia brought on by the man in the black cloak from earlier that day.
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