From alt.pub.dragons-inn Wed Feb 23 10:26:30 1994 Xref: netcom.com alt.pub.dragons-inn:7057 Path: netcom.com!netcomsv!decwrl!doc.ic.ac.uk!warwick!pipex!howland.reston.ans.net!newsserver.jvnc.net!igor.rutgers.edu!dziuxsolim.rutgers.edu!gandalf.rutgers.edu!jcp From: jcp@gandalf.rutgers.edu (Jonathan Petersen) Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn Subject: [Inn] Zebron gets more than wine Message-ID: Date: 22 Feb 94 17:15:42 GMT Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J. Lines: 153 [It's me, Jak, forwarding a post from Keresh, at kjb52830@vax1.utulsa.edu, because of posting problems. Since it involves my character, Zebron, I've added comments in brackets.] ~From: KJB52830@vax1.utulsa.edu To: jcp@gandalf.rutgers.edu Message-Id: <940222102255.206b0a89@vax1.utulsa.edu> ~Subject: Ride with me, Zebron! "There you are, sir. One blood wine," says the young serving man as he sets down the drink you ordered. [The young man put the glass down, taking care not to spill a drop. Blood wine was a drow delicacy, made from real blood. The special stock at the Dragon's Inn had been procured by Zebron himself, at great personal expense, for Littlefair. It was made from the blood of only truly evil creatures, most of them slain by the dark elf's own hand.] "You know, it's too bad you weren't here last night to see the fuss. And that woman," he winks his left eye at you as if you two shared some common knowledge, "she's not one to mess with. Who she was noone really seems to know. With her dark braided hair and smooth, oblong, earth-colored face, she looked like she might have come from the northern frontier, where small bands of barbarians still sing their songs and chase wild horses. No jewelry. Some people around here insisted she was a trader, having come here--as those barbarians sometimes do--to sell leather goods. But they don't know what their talking about; as a trader she would have been more visible, wanting to be seen and even being sought out by merchants of Generica. "She'd been here for over a week, staying at that cheap establishment, the Drift Inn," the eloquent young serving man adds with a smile as a few coins are set out near his right arm. He picks up the coins, slips them into a vest pocket, takes the towel from his belt, and begins to wipe the hopelessly set stains on the hardwood table. "Over a week," the young, fair-looking man repeats, masking yet betraying his own uncertainty. He isn't even sure if she's been her a week. Apparently she hadn't made a big scene of her arrival as those heroes often like to do; the young man's seen them do it over and over again, timing their first entry into the Dragon's Inn so that the setting sun behind them makes them visible first only as a silhouette. She hadn't burst in, grunted or walked brazenly through a gauntlet of appraising eyes; she hadn't picked a fight or made an everlasting friendship. She just came her to complete her business, and then she left. And she is looking forward to leaving this place. Walking around this filthy city during the day and sitting in that narcotizing bar every night until it closes. The stench, the crowds, the noisy animals and carts blocking the already too narrow streets and leaving them strewn with even more shit; she will later describe all this as a leper colony, after someone informs her that such a thing exists. Suffering she knows and knows well, but not leprosy nor the isolation of those most in need. Family, community, her people: these remain important to her even after having left them behind forever. They have put this task into her hands; she has been sent to kill a man, an ancestral enemy, a man she has never met. And she must do this with full knowledge that the violence she commits against him may soon return back upon her. She came here alone for that reason, equipped with only a set of daggers (the battle- axe, she thought, might be too conspicuous), her stealth and wits, and a few simple charms of healing and protection that are common among her people, the proud bands of the Ydonai who have preserved their heritage, refusing to settle down in the dirty cities of Ydoine and rejecting their cold stone tombs in favor of tents, open sky, and the blessings of the gods. Those nights of waiting alone at the corner table of the inn are what she hates most. The place has an oppressive atmosphere about it; the spell on this place, for it must be magic, blocks the violent thoughts and anger that have given her strength to complete this long journey. The spell leaves her with nothing but anxiety. The same thing night after night: she drums the table- top with her long fingers, then shifts her left hand to the daggers hidden at her side and sips on the large mug of local beer, drinking enough each night to take the edge off her nerves and to keep the inn's owners happy. Finally, one night, she sees him walk through the door of the inn. He is a tall man, evidently wealthy, middle-aged and still quite handsome (but handsome in a somehow brutal way). Following him is a larger man, the ugly, muscled type who enjoys killing with his bare hands. Always watching the two men, Keresh (for that's what she calls herself; even in their thoughts, the "barbarians" never use their true names) stays seated in her corner of the inn. The one she came for sits at one of the far tables and talks with a third man, a generic unsavory type, and then prepares to leave with his bodyguard. Anxiously, Keresh rises and follows at some distance. Walking across the threshold of the inn and into the city night, she feels the anger slowly returning to her body, flowing outward from her torso to her extremities, scorching, skin electrified, sheets of flame across the brain. Without conscious thought, she unsheathes the two daggers, the grips fitted perfectly to each hand, and follows the shadows of the two men as they make their way across the deserted little square just outside of the inn. She springs forward, sinking her daggers into the sides of the bulkier of the two men. Mind and body function separately; the body kills, and the mind considers the action. To kill from behind, to gain victory through one surprise blow, Keresh's mind thinks as the daggers penetrate the unsuspecting man, is not honorable, but honor yields to the gods, and the gods themselves yield to Necessity. She withdraws the cruel blades as the corpse falls to the ground with a low moan and a thud. She straightens up to face the remaining man, who appears admirably defiant. Keresh throws him one of the daggers and issues her challenge. Now is the time to be thinking of honor. "Angry words were exchanged, words just loud enough to be heard by the last few patrons of the inn, but not loud enough to be understood. You could just see them if you leaned out through the open windows of the inn, two figures in the darkness, circling for a moment, then lunging, pulling back, and circling again. One shadow then drew back, staggered, and fell to the ground with a deep cry. At first we couldn't tell who it was, lying there motionless on top of that metal sheet in the middle of the sqare. The other figure must have disappeared down one of the many dark side streets. "One of the drunkest patrons, a real foolhardy one, wandered out there, exclaimed his surprise, and returned to the inn with a beautiful necklace he had taken off the corpse of the rich man. 'Imagine that,' I distinctly remember him saying, 'here she goes and kills a man and all that and then runs off. She don't even think about taking the dead man's necklace, which I'm sure 'll fetch a pretty price.'" As the young man makes this last comment, he looks straight into your sparkling emerald eyes, smiles, then adds: "You wouldn't be interested in that necklace, now would you? I might happen to know where it could be found. No? Too bad." "One never really knows what to believe," the young man cautiously adds after his eyes have scanned the room, "but at least two other people who come in here regularly have said to me personally that the man she killed, a merchant and member of one the oldest known families in this area, was earning a bad reputation for his involvement with a ring of thieves and assassins. His murderer, that barbarian woman, has become both a criminal and a hero in these parts, but noone's heard much of her since. Some people say she's left the city for good, while others thinks she's taken up with dwellers in the Buff'. I don't know, but I really wish you could have seen her," he adds with another wink. Luckily, this eloquent youth is called around by a boisterous group on the other side of the inn, and you are left in peace with your glass of dark wine to think about what you've just heard. [Zebron took this all in, and decided that if anyone could help someone who was both hero and criminal with the same act, it was he. Calling for parchment and quill he penned a note to his friend on the city watch, Brent, to let him know if she was found. Not bothering to sign it, he included a simple playing card. He left the note at the bar, and then walked to the serving boy. "You know more than you let on. Let her know I can - I will - help," the dark elf whispered as he placed a silver coin and another card into the young man's hand. The boy looked at it as Zebron returned to his table. It was a Jack of Spades. Zebron sat down at his table and was soon joined by some others and they swapped stories. All of a sudden, Dusk cried out, then the drow leapt from his table to the bar, had a few words with Littlefair, and rushed upstairs, drawing a blade.] ___ Zebron, your armor caught my eye. Leather is the best, and the pattern reminds me of a pet I once had as a child. Let's ride together! I don't think our philosophies are all that different: "trust, acceptance, freedom, and honor." Also, I need your help. I've never really understood technology and am having some difficulties in writing myself into existence, namely I cannot yet post to the Dragon's Inn newsgroup. Can I post through you until I have taken care of this little problem? (It shouldn't take too long.) Please let me know your response. Keresh, at kjb52830@vax1.utulsa.edu -jak