16th of Cylus, 718

Everything had to be perfect.

First the swept the floor with an old broom. When the table was already set, and the few chairs ordered from the foot soldiers were delivered and placed around the round table, the cavern looked so much better. With a wet cloth he’d remove...

16th Cylus, 718

They called her ‘the woman’. We don’t like her eyes, they said, for they were sharper than the tip of a blade. We trust no winged women, they said, and yet they swore loyalty to Mongrel. We hear this and that, they said, and repeated distorted canards. The woman stole my coins,...

42nd Trial, Ymiden, Arc 718
Citizen's Market, Outer Perimeter
11th Bell

He didn't remember the sale. Not after a season or two passed. There was no foreboding tingle that burrowed into his mind for arcs after; no fright or shock that scarred it in like depth. It wasn't as if the face was...

Speaking in Rakahi
Speaking in Common
Speaking in Ulehi
Speaking in Ith'ession 25th of Saun, 718
noon

Do you do custom work? Quio asked at the second jewelers he had been to that day.

The first jewelers, a shop in the Commercial Circle, had decided not to deal with a bad-tempered...

25th Trial, Saun, Arc 718
The Commercial Circle
Office of Thumberland Shipping and Importations
16th Bell

Continued from here

I hope... I will not have to visit your home again, sir.

There it was. The killing blow. After the watching and the sneaking and the planning and the stress...

25th Trial, Saun, Arc 718
The Commercial Circle
Office of Thumberland Shipping and Importations
16th Bell

Continued from here

Boring little bastard, I'd wager.

That was Roger Thumberland's first opinion of the little man that walked into his office, led and followed by Clyde and...

21st Trial, Saun, Arc 718
The Commercial Circle
2nd Bell

Continued from here

He shouldn't have been abroad that night. Discovery would mean a fate most dire. If one of Thumberlands human guard dogs were prowling around and found him skulking, they would... well, he preferred not to think...

The 83rd of Ymiden 718
Continued from here

Puzzle or not, Oberan was quite determined to figure the object out. He’d told Tio and Toan that he’d get this thing to work, and so he damn well would. If their first mission rolled around and he had to admit that he hadn’t managed to make any...

The 83rd of Ymiden 718

Oberan stared at the object in his palm, frown still prominent on his face. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been trying to try and get it to work, but it had been a while now. Not that he knew what it should do though. At least, he knew what it could do, more or less, but he...

21st Trial, Saun, Arc 718
The Commercial Circle
2nd Bell

Continued from here

When he was a boy, his mother told him about the shadow men.

Not the Naerikk, those very real monsters from the far southern landmass, over oceans and distances so far they may as well have been creatures of...

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Renegotiation
Ashan 20, arc 718

The mage did not need any sort of attunement tracker to arrive at his conclusion. He could have probably had one made in the two trials since he'd heard that the Venoran noble had returned. But in all honesty, he...

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Foster's Landing, Etzos
41st Zi'da, 717

It was amazing how slowly half a trial could pass when there was something to look forward to in the next one. The sun had risen as usual and made a lazy arc over Etzos, yawning rays of light onto the little...

1st of Ymiden 718

Even knowing that the world was a cruel place, nothing could have prepared her for what was to come as she finally managed to find the place the humans called Etzos. It was a sprawling city in the Tunawa's eyes, though it almost seemed like it was endless slums. Not that she...

/gallery/image.php?album_id=201&image_id=13026 Mid-Ymiden

Gangui finished off his watered down wine and discarded the empty glass bottle on the side of the road. Moseke could go gammok herself for all Gangui cared. Old timers would shift through the castaway material and make profits on his...

25th Trial, Saun, Arc 718
The Commercial Circle
Office of Thumberland Shipping and Importations
16th Bell

Things don't need to get any worse. It's important you understand that, sir.

It was the sir that struck Thumberland most of all. Not... everything else. Because he heard it so...

40th Trial, Zi'Da, Arc 711
Outer Perimeter, South Side
14th bell

Need some help wiv' that, sir?

That I should live long enough to be so damn shamed.

I've got it, thank you.

The boy who'd been sweeping was apparently not convinced. He gave the little man a once over and decided again...

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Zi’da XX 717

Noth often made visits to the Underground territory that many of Al’Angyryls’ soldiers frequented. The reasons for this were typically far different then the reasons that his multitude of scum happened upon the rugged and run-down...

15th Trial, Saun, Arc 718
Outer Perimeter
10th bell

Everyone wanted to live. At least at first. They fought, or they pleaded, or they bargained, and if none of those worked, they ran. Until their veins pumped acid and every breath tore fresh strips of flesh from their lungs. Until they'd...

The 10th of Saun 718

Oberan thought of doing many things, but didn’t act on any idea that popped into his mind. Sure, he could resist and make a scene, he could even escape, but the result would be the same. The merchant was going to frame him for a crime he didn’t commit –though he very well...

Vhalar, Arc 690

Up, you bastards! Time to greet the fuckin' morning!

His mind didn't so much as hear the words as his ears sensed them. It was during the relaying of that noise to his brain that the punctuation to the profanity was given-

-in the form of a door being picked open and the...

/gallery/image.php?album_id=2&image_id=13351 Ymiden 78, 718
He could still see them.

Of course, he had always been able to see them. Ever since he had taken his first life, he had had dreams and visions of those faces at night whenever he lay down to sleep. He had been wracked with guilt and...

/gallery/image.php?album_id=2&image_id=13356 Saun 2nd, 718
Teaching was a prospect the half-breed was rather unfamiliar with. She'd never actually taught anyone else before. So it was a fair bit uncomfortable when she realized that being back in The Roost meant that she was going to have to start...

/gallery/image.php?album_id=2&image_id=13356 Saun 1st, 718
The half-breed could feel the winds messing with her hair as she looked towards the sky, her expression vexed. With a heavy sigh, she shook her head. Saun was never one of her favorite seasons. In fact, she very well despised the way the...

24th Trial, Ymiden, Arc 718
South-East Outer Perimeter
21st break

Continued from here

There was nothing fair or chivalrous about it, and that was sort of the point, really. It was just a matter of perspective. To a noble warrior from Rharne or the Eternal Empire, where even those...

Believe In Dark Wings

Ymiden 2, 718

The arrow whistled through the air, its shriek not altogether indifferent from the howl of a predator before it pounces upon an unsuspecting prey, a primitive warning indicative of a bloody and violent affair. After merely half of a trill, the haunting...