• Mature • Catching (Up and Otherwise) [Graded]

[Kasoria]

67th trial, Ymiden, 720
Etzos Prime
Outer Perimeter
Early Morning

"H-Highmark?"

The plan was simple enough: go to someone he trusted to keep quiet, and knew the word on the cobbles. This was a challenge all by itself. Everyone was for sale in Etzos, not just everything. Knowledge and information was bartered, brokered, traded, and sold just as much as narcotics and sex in the underworld. Someone knowing that the Raggedy Man was back in town, asking questions about Sintra... that man suddenly had a commodity on his hands. The only questions he had to answer were "how much is it worth?" and "will I live to spend it?". Fortunately, Kasoria's reputation was enough that most people were so convinced of the latter (the answer being "no") that the first never came up. But it had been a while. Seasons started and ended in the time since he'd left Etzos. So much had changed...

So you you go to people who aren't going to change, he'd told himself as he'd made his plans, making his home in a forgotten room in the Underground. Dusty, musty, remote and thus desired. People who hate the Morties. Who lost much to them. Who won't be fooled by pretty words and empty promises.

Old Slim Jim's rose up ahead of him, lights blazing from the windows, steady trickle of punters coming in and out the door. A blast of noise split the air whenever it opened, revealing revelry in short bursts. Some things hadn't changed, at least. Frenlip still doing a roaring trade, and that meant he'd kept his ears to the ground. More than that... they had a mutual acquaintance who Kasoria knew for a fact would have more than just an ear down there. Both hands and most of his face, he'd wager.

Fucking Oberan, he thought, shaking his head out of sheer habit when the name and face crossed his mind. Wanker that you are, you knew you're stuff. So if Frenlip can't help, then-

"Is... that you?"

Then he heard his rank. The query that came after it. A voice familiar to him even as he frowned and started to turn towards it. Memories fizzled and stirred as he did so. He'd borne that rank only in one place; few souls who used it were left alive. So that should have narrowed it down quite a bit. Yet when he turned around, it was not the face he was expecting. Not even slightly.

"... Ruven?"

A dead man stared back at him from across the cobbles. Ganger tattoo covering half his face, faded with age but still an obvious black smear from a hundred feet away. Yet the clothes betrayed more than a ganger; they were neat, tidy, and clean. All three were unusual in the Oh'Pee. Even as Kasoria's mind fizzled and popped as he tried to understand what he was seeing, that never-sleeping thinking engine observed the colors of bark blue trimmed in black, with grey buttons. Minimalist, some might have said. Camouflage, whispered Kasoria's mind, seeing the uniform for what it was.

Uniform. Whose?

"You died. I saw it."

He knew it was hardly a proper response, but it was all he mind could blurt out for a moment. It was the truth, too. He'd seen Ruven hoisted high on a spear held by a misshapen monster that had once been a man. Spliced and grown and tortured and driven mad in the grotesque altar-surgeries of Rhakros, it had lain waste to a dozen men before massed arrows had killed it. Ruven had been among the first. Spear punching right through his belly, raising him high until he slid down it, spear turning red as his torso painted it from the inside. When the monster was dead, Kasoria had rushed to him. Just in time to feel his last breaths cough wetly against his face, and see his eyes go dull and lightless.

"You died."

The younger man didn't deny it. He just ran a hand through brown hair now streaked with white, and he sighed. It was a dry and dusty sound. "Aye... not quite, as it turned out. Or mebbe I did, but turns out we still had some use t'Etzos."

Kasoria blinked furiously for a few moments. So much said with so little; so much more inferred. He died? Truly died? And came back? Not as a revenant or rotting corpse, but as a true man? Retaining all his mind and... his soul? Was that in there, too? And who had done it? The Council? The Army? Some other faction? Or maybe even...

No. Why would she?

"Wanna drink?"

"Youse drink?"

"'course I do," Ruven said with an amused grimace that Kasoria knew instinctively a passionless corpse could not pull off. "Come. We's got catchin' up t'do..."

[Kasoria]

"Well fuck me runnin'."

"No thanks, an' me name ain't 'Well'."

Frenlip didn't so much as spare a scowl for his nephew. That was enough of a sign. Didn't even toss a rag his way or hurl a muttered curse. A second sign. He just kept staring at the table in the corner, now occupied by two quietly chatting figures. Charone walked over to get their order, and he watched them give it. He wasn't sure of the smaller one. No right away. Just a suggestion, a possibility... then he turned slightly and he saw a flash of black eyes set into a worn, tanned face. He blinked rapidly. Not just because of who it was, but what it meant... and who he was sitting with.

"Why in the fuck would-"

"Need a new cask, Uncle."

"Then fuckin' well tap it, woodjeh?!"

"Fates, sorry..."

Frenlip chided himself. Felt a needle of something that could approximately be shame in his gnarled little soul. The boy was a fine worker, good of cheer and with a strong back. He shouldn't snap so at him, but still... he couldn't be distracted. He stood there, watching black meet white, light met darkness, and have a chat over around of stout. Well. One of them, anyway...

"Nod 'avin' any?"

"Er, nah, not anymore."

Kasoria blinked a few times at that. Then a few more. From what he could remember, Ruven was never one to turn down a bevy. Pour me a cup and its twin and its Papa, he could recall the man saying once, shit-faced one night on the march through the jungle. Had to flog the twat in the morning, but he'd said it was worth it. Only complained about still having the headache after. A drunk, but a tough one. A brawler, an Oh'Pee native through and through, fit only for the grizzled "Irregulars"... but Kasoria was having trouble seeing that memory in the present. Could a man really change so much? Well, he had, hadn't he? So that had to mean...

"Doesn't agree wiv' us, y'know?"

Something tingled on the back of his neck. Second time he'd done that. We. Not me, or I. We.

"Ah... well, if yeh dun' mind?"

"Nah, 'course not."

Kasoria enjoyed his tipple, but not too much of it. Already Ruven was putting him on edge. He was so... still, now. Hands clasped in front of him, eyes wide and eager. Too wide. Too eager. Like there was some additional vitality bursting to escape from his body and he was barely keeping it in. It was still warm outside, muggy in the way a sweaty Ymiden evening could only be, yet there wasn't a bead of sweat on that unmarked brow. There was no twitching or wincing when he moved. No trips to the privy to ease a bladder not working properly anymore. Nothing to suggest he'd had most of his guts ripped out and-

He died. You watched it happen.

"So... gonna tell me why y'ain't dead?"

"Well, I came bloody close, sir. Woke up in the healer's tent. Torn to shite, wrapped in bandages... but I was alive. Don't know how." The man flicked a thumb absently against his clay mug of water. "Mebbe somethin' was watchin' out for me, eh?"

Kasoria felt the gorge rise in his throat but bid it down. His eyes were alight with curiosity now, masked and steeled by a distrust that was practically palpable. He'd heard of men surviving injuries that beggared belief. He'd even believed some of them. But not a man who'd had the contents of his belly yanked out and skewered on a spit in front of him. Not a man who'd spat and gasped out his last words into his face. Not a man he had seen die, eyes dead, face slack, sure as a chicken getting strangled.

"Took an arrow to the chest, lad." He said finally, voice slow and measured, eyes unwavering. "Two more inna' back. I turned yeh over and youse were already dead."

There was only a brief pause. He tried to study the man's face for some deception. Some confusion. But the words came swiftly, with a shrug and a shake of his head. Kasoria frowned. This was... not what he'd expected.

"I was lucky, I suppose. The Fates didn't want me to die. When I came to, torn to shite-" Second time he's said that. Like he read it somewhere. "-all I knew was that it bloody well hurt, and I was out of act for the rest of the war. Came back here, found... work."

Only now did he look nervous. As if there was something shameful in what he did now to fill his purse and his belly. Kasoria noticed that, but didn't jump on it. He was too busy processing what he'd just heard. A man wouldn't know how he'd died, if it was in the manner he'd seen. He wouldn't mistake a spear for an arrow or a quick death for the lingering, miserable thing it had been. So what did that mean? That he'd forgotten? Unlikely, and even if he had, Kasoria had thrown him a wild guess. Surely he'd have corrected him? So if his mind wasn't paste, he was lying.

Why?

"S-Sir? Highmark? Can yeh hear me?"

"Uh? Oh. Aye. Sorry, lads, miles away."

"Not boring you, hope."

Ruven was never this fucking polite, either.

Kasoria blinked and focused on the man. But even as he did, a last thought slithered through his mind.

That's the problem, isn't it? This doesn't sound like Ruven. Just someone that's wearing him...

Then he heard the words "Web Guard", frowned even deeper, and by the time Ruven had finished explaining what that was, he was clutching his cup so hard it was on the verge of cracking.

[Maltruism]

Ruven's words were accompanied by a look of veiled scrutiny as he described his oath of loyalty, taken with his admittance into Sintra's private guard. A taut silence rode the gazes that locked between the two men's eyes. Even as Kasoria's thoughts extended to the blades hidden within his attire, Ruven's eyes twitched in the direction of the arm that had not yet even begun to move to grip them.

A slip of a smile spasmed upon Ruven's lips; a sparkle returning to his eyes as he suddenly roared back in laughter, his hand slapping the table loudly enough to draw a few brief looks and shakes of other patrons' heads. "Had you goin' there, I did, eh, sir? he burst, barely able to enunciate amid guffaws, but managing to coat the last word with friendly mockery.

He spun in his seat, demanding a bottle and a single glass, the glass being stated to be for Kas, while the bottle would be his own. "Ahh, me old pal, for all yer insight, you couldn'a read a joke writ' 'cross yer own mirror in yer own piss! I'm not here to sign you up in Her guard, but you squeeze that glass any harder you really will need a new glass. Mebbe a new hand to boot!"

The grin drooped to seriousness as he crossed his arms upon the table, "Is it really that hard to imagine that I'd feel an obligation? After what she did for me?" He recounted his death upon a Rhakrosian spear, now making no mention of arrows, nor suggesting that they'd ever been brought up, joke or otherwise. His tale turned to a vague recollection of a phantom existence, his memory of details becoming a confession of uncertainty as to what had lain beyond the veil.

The veil became a door through which he'd walked, or floated, or swam, to find his body forming around him in some dark chamber of what turned out to be the Underground. Disorientation had hobbled every attempted thought or movement for the next break or two as Her Grace's words calmed his reentry into the realm of the living. Other guardsmen had been there to encourage him as well, as his nerves were reborn in the agony of the restoration process.

"But it don't matter now. I'm back! She promised me she could, and she DID! I think joining her ranks, to safeguard those who've relaxed their anti-Immortalism from those what try to keep clingin' to a violently outdated past, is the least I could do."

He paused a moment to give Kasoria a chance to respond, a hint of sad resignation deepening his eyes as the conversation waned. "Yeah, I get it. 'Never trust a Morty' We all lived by that old adage. But times are changin' my friend. You can't keep gettin' by rejecting all the mos' powerful beings in the world. Some day you gotta line up, or lie down, with one of 'em."

His look started to wander, as did his words, "Can't fault me fer...fer hopin' my old pals would...uh...give it a chance...HER!...a chance. I don't...uh...don't know if you've had any...meet her...chance! to meet her. She ain't as bad as...all that."

His gaze still wandered, resting briefly upon the bottle he'd not yet touched. "Shit, my mind is comin' loose on me." he chuckled unconvincingly, "I've had too much to drink, I'd best be goin'. Got duty in another break."

[Kasoria]

Things would have been different, a few arcs ago. They wouldn't be having a chat. Kasoria wouldn't be listening. Ruven would have unwound just enough verbal rope for Kasoria to hang him with, and that would have been that. Frenlip's little tavern would have been stained bloody and then he would have left, without a backward glance or a hint of remorse. Fucking Morty-lover. Fucking traitor.

The last part hadn't changed. But Kasoria was not so... tempestuous, as before.

Tried that tack last time, didn't you? Scratched a Marshal and what did it get you? New scars and no change. Spider Bitch still in control, and a new pawn moved right on up to fill the gap you made.

Gotta start thinking beyond your blades, old man.

"Aye... very funny, Ruven." The words were delivered in a tone that suggested the opposite, but Ruven had never known his old Highmark to be a jovial sort. He took a few fingers from the bottle and stared stonily. Listening. Learning. "Not too hard t'figure youse think yeh owe... her-" Fates, but how hard was it not to say "it" instead? "-but dere's always a price, aye?"

Ruven kept talking, and Kasoria learned about the transaction, if not the cost. It sounded oddly familiar. Like being born, but when you were conscious enough to understand what was happening. Drifting from a place formless and indistinct, without the strange vitality of the Ether. That strange veil between not just waking and dreaming, but life and death. The Web Guard's face grew shiny with sweat as he recounted the tale, words as fervent and amazed as a one would expect a zealot's to be. He had been dead. Beyond all help or healing. Yet this creature, this lady, this god, had restored him. Kasoria was silent as stone, words washing over him. Occasional sips of liquor and shallow rise of his chest the only proof he was still even alive.

He blinked slowly at Ruven's last words. Like a cat being lectured by a mouse. It wasn't a plea, just a statement. Kasoria could understand it. He'd always had few hard rules, but saving his life? Sure way to get into his good books. Even those he'd been charged to murder had, on few enough occasions that he could count them on one hand and have fingers left to use, escaped his wrath for that very reason. He was not an ingrate, and within his scarred breast was still some semblance of honor.

But this was different. This was the Immortals. The Eternal Enemy of Etzos. The slave-masters and mutant-monsters that sought to make all his species puppets or cattle.

"Etzos needs no gods," he said eventually, words seeming to come from the pit of his stomach. "We never 'ave. Still dun'. Never seen one a' those things give boons wiv'out wantin' somethin' back, an' more'n what they gave. Ain't heard a' them seein' us as more'n tools, or beasts... or feed." He finished his drink. Sharp crack of thick glass on polished oak marking his words. "Those'ut think diff'rent are welcome to... jus' not 'ere. Not in Etzos. There are no gods, and no immortals. Just free men, monsters, and slaves."

Hearing that ancient Etzori axiom, Kasoria swore he saw Ruven's face twitch slightly. As if something was crawling under his flesh for a moment, struggling to emerge, before being beaten back down. He leaned forward a little but the sensation did not return. The man was speaking again, prattling on and on about choosing sides and embracing change and all the usual dreck he'd heard before when it came to treason. There were a thousand justifications for it; just like there were even more for murder. No-one knew that more than Kasoria.

He was opening his mouth to reply when it happened. Ruven seemed to... sputter. Like a solid candle of flame, unswerving and still, suddenly flickering uncertainly. His eyes blinked rapidly and his words slurred. Now Kasoria could get a good look at it. The confusion that swept over the younger man like a wave from nowhere. Robbing him of that fervor as his mind seemed to war with itself, finding words now hidden from it. But what did the hiding? It wasn't a drunkard's lack of wits; nor the trauma of old wounds. It was something else. Something a blunt object like the Raggedy Man couldn't guess, but the more he looked, the more he listened...

What's wrong with him?

"What, yeh jus' gonna scamper like dat?"

The sheer, inconguous tone of Kasoria sounding wounded was enough to stall Ruven. The Web Guard paused in mid-rise from his seat and saw Kasoria spread his arms across the table.

"Break's plenty of time t'take a drink. C'mon, ain't even touched yer bottle-" Aye, and you think you've had too much. Forget that too, did you? "-an' I'm two cups ahead of ya. C'mon. Fer the lads we left behind in the jungle..."

He poured himself another cup and handed the bottle to Ruven, instead of just planting it in front of him. He summoned all that rough, unpolished leadership he'd shown during that bloody siege and bid his old comrade sit down. Then he summoned yet more and managed to spew out the words, "Siddown an' tell me more 'bout yer new job. Ain't seen too many a' youse... Web Guard, about. Keepin' busy?"

He listened close to what Ruven had to say, but only with half his head. The other half was studying the alleys and streets and sewers and vacant buildings for a few hundred yards around the Speckled Jim. It was dredging up the memories of associates and allies and even enemies, just in case they were mentioned or could be linked to what he had to say. It was piecing together the cycles and seasons he'd lost in Etzos, trying to remake a timeline for him to better understand the whole jigsaw, not just the pieces he'd glimpsed.

Keep him talking. Keep learning. Then deal with him.

[Maltruism]

There are times when the very smoothness of conversational recovery is suspicious in itself. Ruven's expression veiled a hint of some sense of triumph as he turned back to face Kasoria. "You know what? You're right! Another break isn't going to throw the town into any chaos worse than it already is!" A scowl was suppressed as Ruven finished his phrase, hidden behind tightening cheek muscles. One might guess that it signified which side of the political struggle this Ruven blamed for this chaos.

"For those left behind!" he toasted, getting a few responses from patrons outside of their little bubble as well. "But let's enjoy it at the bar, What do you...whatta ya say?" There it was again, an odd catch in pronunciation, as if Ruven was watching his own accent. He tried to disguise the slight gaffe by imposing a few coughs between the two different takes on the phrase, trying to ensure that it followed what Kasoria would know of the traditional Etzori inflections and cadence.

While accurate, it was starting to sound cultivated...forced...

Ruven was already halfway to the bar, motioning for Kasoria to follow him there. Whatever else Kasoria may have had doubts spring into his mind from, there were two suspiciously convenient empty stools, side-by-side, at the bar. Thinking back, the Raggedy Man would recall that they had been empty the entire time he'd been inside the tavern.

At another time and another place, he may have felt they'd been left open out of respect and honor, or even fear. There was something different about this. When Ruven took his place on one of the stools, the man now beside him did not so much as turn to look at him, or to wave him off for the place being reserved. It did not fit.

Ruven turned to face the bar, making one last wave to Kasoria before the barkeep took his order. He held up two fingers to suggest he'd bought Kasoria a drink as well. When the barkeep poured the drinks, it would be easy enough to see that the bottle it was being poured from was not a variety Kasoria particularly liked.

Ruven would know better....

From such small details do mighty warnings grow. Yet, if a plot was afoot, it became swiftly obvious that Kasoria would not discover what it was without going to the bar and taking the empty seat apparently left open for him.

[Kasoria]

It was like noise. A clarion call. An alarm bell, clanging distantly and rising in pitch and power as if you were speeding towards it. Not all notes were for the ears; many were for the eyes, and even the nose, if you had senses sharp enough. With every one he heard, the volume rose a notch. Since he'd seen the man he'd known to have died, then listened to his patchwork accent and rambling story, seen the evidence of a mind at war with itself or not entirely his own...

Kasoria blinked slowly as an accent utterly alien to Etzos called out, clear as a silver bell, wrapped around the words "whatta ya say"? As obvious and startling to an Etzori as a bark suddenly coming from a cat.

It was deafening now. Undeniable. The alarm. The warnings. The whispers that told him it was not just his usual precaution and paranoia. Something was wrong, not just with this... thing, but more than that.

Busy pub yet no-one takes the chairs. I don't touch brandy, and he knows it, but he buys it for me anyway. The man at Ruven's right, being too obvious, too careful not to look at him. The man next to the empty stool...

Kasoria peered at the man through the broken, fractured reflections in the glasses behind the bar as he walked over. Just flashes. Snapshots of a face and eyes and mouth... but enough. There was sweat on his brow. Worry in his eyes. A tightness in the way he sat, how he held his glass...

Why so nervous, mate?

Ruven frowned minutely as the little man sat on the seat next to him. That sounded... almost resigned, didn't it? Of course, he had to think a little longer than usual to be sure of that. It wasn't easy, deciphering complex ideas or notions, with his mind being more... crowded, than it used to be. But he rallied swiftly. He always did. Faster and faster, these trials. The Spider Queen had given him life again, and the cost was... bearable. He just had to adjust. He had to spread the word, and when necessary, handle those that simply could not be reasoned with.

"You know," he started to say, as Kasoria mulled over his drink, one hand gripping the cup, another palm-down on the wooden bar. "It's a shame you won't change your mind about the whole Sintra business, old son. Change is coming, Kas. Like the weather. Like a storm. And if you-"

"Whoever y'are... y'talk too much."

It was like dropping a stone in a still pond. The ripples shuddered out from his mouth and seemed to change everyone around him. Frenlip's eyes darted to him, wet and scared. Kasoria met his gaze... then saw the bartender very pointedly look behind Kasoria. Something shuffled and moved there. A new arrival? A fourth problem for him to deal with? Kasoria factored that into his plan while the ripples were still spreading, and Ruven got his chance to end himself.

Won't get the truth unless he thinks he's already won, he reminded himself, breathing deeply and summoning something from the pit of his soul. So... let him think that.

As his hand started to warm the wood on the bar, he turned to Ruven... and found his old "comrade" grinning. Confident. Victorious without even fighting.

"Your kind never learn," the Web Guard said, in a voice that was Ruven yet not Ruven. "But your body may still be useful."

"Did Ruven really die in Rhakros?"

"Ruven" snorted and Kasoria used the handful of extra trills. He could feel his ether swimming through the wood of the bar. Spreading out across it, shivering under the hard surface as his Spark eagerly digested all it needed to know about it. Once it was where it needed to be, Kasoria sighed. He wasn't quite at Mathias' level yet... but he wouldn't need to be. Not for what was coming. Just one, simple thing.

"Do you really care?"

"No," Kasoria said, blunt answer making Ruven and his trio of accomplices frown at the same time. "Jus' needed a bit more time."

"For wh-"

SHUNK

Spear.

Kasoria gave the Spark the order, and it obeyed. The fifty-arc old cedar the bar was made of briefly morphed and shimmered in front of the man sitting on the other side of Ruven. The light from the change drew the undercover Web Guard's eye and even as he opened his mouth to scream Kasoria's Shapecrafting command manifested-

-as a spike of wood thick as three fingers, spearing through the man's chest and obliterating his heart. The impact ripped through his back, keeping him suspended in mid-air, a foot above the bar, feet kicking weakly as he died spitting blood and disbelief-

-Kasoria was moving the instant he heard the crunch, knowing the damage was done. Spinning around and slamming the cup of brandy into the face of the other Web Guard seated next to him. The man was already pulling a dagger, too late and too slow, before the improvised weapon smashed into his face. Choking, stinging liquor exploded into his eyes, his nose, his mouth, blinding and agonizing, and before he could fight back-

Last chance. Then it's up to the other one.

-with a barbarian yell Kasoria lashed out with his left hand. A short, savage punch into the man's throat, all knuckles and bone and killing energy. He felt something pop under them as his hand seemed to vanish and inch or two into the man's throat. Face still streaming with brandy, his eyes popped open and he fell back, clutching at a throat no longer working properly.

Two down. Out of four. But the two left were close enough to get their own digs in. He could already hear them moving, grasping, lunging, striking-

Shield.

With a snarl Kasoria called on his Abrogation. A Spark far older and more like him than Transmutation. It was much more like him, too. Always paranoid. Always watching and waiting and expecting that distrust to be rewarded with treachery. It never really went away. It was always just under his skin, not trusting even its host to protect them from a hostile world that hated them both. So when he gave the mental command, rising from his seat as Ruven and the last man behind him started to move, it took but a blink for his will to become its action-

-and whatever hammered against Kasoria would smash against a shimmering barrier of Abrogation instead.

[Maltruism]

Was it not being employed in an attempt to kill him, Kasoria would have appreciated the military discipline displayed by the man he'd seen fall to the floor, clutching his ruined throat. In such dedication to an objective were successes gained from causes considered lost moments before. Kas had seen such heroism in Rhakros, and it was a bitter shame to see it so misguided now.

Regardless of the coming end to his life for lack of oxygen, this man knew he had a bit or two before he lost consciousness, and then life. Instead of wasting time in fruitless anguish over his pending demise, the man rolled over and clutched both arms about the Raggedy Man's legs, unexpectedly upsetting his balance. This effort was to be his death legacy and nothing was going to unwrap him. Go ahead and put a spike through his chest; he was dead anyway.

This was not the only unexpected downturn in what should have evened the odds. Kasoria knew that the efforts to end two of his opponents had left him somewhat open to the remaining two, the false Ruven one of them. He felt confident of the shield he'd raised behind him to eliminate the immediate threat from that quarter as he faced his deluded, or more likely brain-washed, friend.

But it was not to be....

What he did not know; and for that matter what even the barkeep himself did not know, was that the new score of wooden chairs he'd recently ordered were partially constructed of Livlos wood. Barfights were common enough, and chairs needing replacing fairly often. These had been in place for no more than a ten-trial period.

The slowly-building effect of this rare wood was one only felt by users of magic, and the relatively light percentage used in the carpentry was such that it could easily go unnoticed if a mage's mind was on something else as ether was drained from them. It took a several bits for a significant effect to occur, bit those bits had passed a while ago.

A mere touch through cloth as one sat on such a chair was to have one's level of expertise to be slowly reduced. No mage would lose the use of an ability, but it would be as if they'd lost some power in it. The resting of a bare hand on a surface of such wood allowed overstepping to be reached more quickly than usual. Both of these events had already been achieved. Kas' shield formed as expected, but it was much weaker than it should have been.

Kasoria too, would find himself more taxed than he should have been, the onset of mild overstepping rearing it's head at the same moment that two arms assailed him through a shield that should have stopped them. One wrapped around his neck, wrenching his head back, while the other seized his right arm at the elbow.

"Ruven" had no real trouble parrying any strike his old friend threw his way, particularly as its aim was thrown off by the upending effects of the two men now grappling him. Ruven added a final shove to Kasoria's chest to send him to the floor. The man at his legs held tight as he added a few gasps on his way to ultimate silence. The man behind Kas adjusted his position and hold as his target fell, to set his weight upon Kasoria's right arm. Ruven did the same to his left, with the only change being the blade he put at his old friend's throat.

"How the mighty have fallen, eh, old buddy?" he sneered, now making no attempt to conceal his accent, one heard commonly enough, if not definitively enough, in Yaralon. "You were supposed to be the best. But a bit too much reliance on magic has left you bit less...practiced...in the true wielding of arms. Take away that magic and you're just another thug with a blade."

A sudden loss of focus passed through the eyes of Ruven, even as his partner advised an end to both further talk, and Kasoria. It may have been the actual speaking of his name that did it. Ruven's eyes seemed to clear and then took on a look of shock as he focused on the blade, it's location, and who was beneath him.

"H...Highmark?...what the fuck?..." he puzzled as the surprise caused him to lean back slightly, greatly reducing the pinning effect on Kas' left arm. Kas would also feel the loss of gripping effort by the man holding his legs, as he finally lost consciousness.

[Kasoria]

Of all the fucking ways to go...

Kasoria's anger at being overpowered was eclipsed only by his confusion that it was even happening. Within the space of a trill his ether had gone from potent and crackling to weak and... befuddling. Like his senses were wrapped in cloth and he'd just sprinted a league in the snow. Fates, he was fucking panting when they brought him down, Shield useless, Spark groaning and retreating-

-until that throat latched around his throat and he wasn't. Then he was just an little old man dragged down to the floor, arms pinned at his sides and his legs wrapped up by a man who believed so strong or hated so deep he was willing to die completing his task. Even with a wooden spike through his chest and blood dribbling out his mouth.

Aye, he might have been impressed. But right then, he was too busy being fucking furious.

"How the mighty have fallen, eh, old buddy?"

Bastard wasn't even bothering with the accent anymore. Someone in Ruven's skin was speaking to him now, getting in a good little gloat before opening his throat. Kasoria doubted he'd drag it out too long: anyone savvy enough to arrange this little ambush wouldn't be bothering with a long speech, or taking him alive. He strained against the weights on his arms but he couldn't even budge.

This is it. This is the moment.

He felt that hand on his shoulder again. Raged and roared and spat against it. But it wouldn't leave him.

Floor of some grog shop in the Oh'Pee. That fits.

"H...Highmark?...what the fuck?..."

Then the blow didn't come. The sneer, the sadistic glint in the eyes, all of it slid away from Ruven's face... and his voice came back. His true voice. The accent that stank of rain on cobbles and watered ale and smoke and horse shit. The man started to rise. Voice confused. Shaking his head and Kasoria could feel the pressure loosening on his arm-

"Hey? Hey?! The fuck're you playing-"

Whatever else the second man had to say was drowned in Kasoria's roar. Seizing on the only opportunity he knew he'd get, he yanked his left arm free and pushed Ruven as hard as he could... in the crotch. With a yelp the man went toppling back and the Raggedy Man was already groping for one of the things he could feel under him.

Ol' Frenlip hadn't known about the magical (rather, anti-magical) qualities of Livlos wood. He'd simply seen a brace of chairs going cheap, and had bought them. They were good enough, he supposed. But they weren't quite as solid as the cedar and oak and pine ones he usually preferred. So when Kasoria and the others went toppling back, he'd felt the wood snap and break under him. Splinters dug into his back, but he'd felt the bulk of the chair's back break off into segments-

Long, jagged segments, one of which he grasped like a dagger-

-lunging across his chest and over his shoulder with it, knowing where the second man would be by the sound of his aggravated, disbelieving half-sentence-

-plowing it straight into the man's eye.

The scream was something to behold. Loud and long and piercing and speak of absolute agony. Kasoria felt something pop under the impact; felt his fist become suddenly sticky and warm with someone else's juices. With a feral snarl he twisted the makeshift weapon, driving it harder, until the man reared back and collapsed away from him, pawing at his face-

-giving him the room he needed to kick himself free from the dead man at his legs, rolling backwards with a jerk of his knees pulled up to his chest. The tavern swam and blurred as he went ass over head, nausea from the Overstepping worsening-

Focus! Don't lose it now!

When he landed, it was on his feet, in a low crouch. He snatched the karambit from its back sheath before his body had come to a complete stop. Taking in the scene in a single, gory snap shot. The chest-pierced man now dead in front of him. The second men howling and wailing and cursing with blood and ichor pouring from his eye, to his right. Ruven at his left, swearing and righting himself-

-and the words coming from his mouth were that same, treacherous, contemptuous accent as before. Glaring at Kasoria with utter hatred, "Ruven" was treated to a grin that would have blinded another man with rage.

"Shoulda' jus' done it, wanker," he said, tone matching his smirk as his muscles bunched and primed for a lunge, or an evasion. "Gotta say, poor cunt whose body yeh stole would never a' been that stupid."

[Maltruism]

It is often said of this or that sport, that it is "a game of inches". This is true of combat as well. And it is not just the depth in inches to which a blade sinks into enemy flesh, though that CAN be a relative analogy. This time, the adage came into play regarding line of sight.

"Ruven's" position was more or less flush with his now-one-eyed cohort. Not even an inch closer to Kasoria than was the other. That slight difference in perspective might have prevented the occurrence of a drawback regarding the giving of a signal starting a count upon which the two would launch a simultaneous attack on The Raggedy Man. They could see that he was suffering overstepping. The replacement of some of the bar's chairs with those spiked with Livlos Wood had been done for that exact purpose.

It had not been they themselves that had arranged the purchase, but a discrete message had informed them when the deal had been made. It took no master's eye to tell new chairs from worn ones. There was no need of anything more to tell which were the ones that would rob Kasoria of the better part of his power. It only took a bit of maneuvering to ensure that one or more of the new chairs would be available for the assassin to rest his backside on when he arrived.

And the tactic had worked well. If not for the faulty hold Sintra's agent had ended up with regarding Ruven's restoration, the grimy little bugger would be dead right now. But Ruven's unwelcomed partner-in-flesh, a once-dead mercenary named Sterncrest, from Yaralon, now gave the signal to his partner, a silent count of three, as taken from the pre-agreed swing of a certain wall clock's pendulum.

But outside of the likelihood that one of them would surely die, if not both, as they took out the hated anti-Sintra assassin, there were two things they had NOT counted on...

The first was that, while Kasoria had arrived at a time where the effort to maintain the availability of the Livlos chairs would never be realized by him, the barkeep, Frenlip, had noticed it. And while he was not necessarily on the assassin's short "friends" list, he was loathe to find himself on his "enemies" list. He could not discount the possibility that the assassin would figure him to have been a part of the set-up. And he knew what that meant.

Steel through his guts and a line through his name....

The second item of importance recalled the aforementioned "game of inches". Sterncrest only looked back to the point where he could see his bloody-eyed partner, a hired local named Koolie, nod in acknowledgement of the pending count. Had he been just a few inches further forward, he'd have had to turn his head a few degrees further to confirm the signal, and would have seen Frenlip's stealthy approach from Koolie's now-blind side.

If you think a stout pewter mug is not a serious weapon, the forthcoming exposed cracks in Koolie's skull, where the skin was torn away by the impact, would gave ample testimony to the contrary. Even as the slight forward lean of bodies heralded the charge, the loud THOONK heralded the culling of Koolie from the forces that charged Kasoria, who now had only a single attacker to deal with.

Not to settle only for this contribution, Frenlip asserted his innocence, "Kasoria, I had nothing to do with this!" Even as the name was voiced, the true Ruven found his body once again, a body whose hostile actions Kasoria had already answered....

[Kasoria]

There was only so many things one could do in a single trill. Kasoria knew that covering all bases, seeing all angles, was impossible. When the brawl was in full swing, and your enemies were on every side, you only had so many options. Usually, you had just the one choice. If you'd lived long enough to be a gnarled old salt like him, you had room for two, maybe three if you could buy yourself an extra sliver of time. But you had to accept the fact that even at your best, even with all your skill and wit and ability wrung out and applied, you were going to miss something. You just had to try and make sure it wasn't a something that would kill you.

His eyes were on the man in front of him, although "man" was a term he was less comfortable using to describe "Ruven". He could hear movement behind him, and not just the hasty scrambling away of the tavern's other patrons. No, someone was getting into position... and since when last he checked, One-Eye was still breathing, he assumed it was him. Well. Something else to factor in. But for now, when Ruven lunged-

THOONK

He could have looked to his front, or cast a look behind. Out of instinct, he looked to the noise-

-just in time to see One-Eye go down with a grunt, eyes glassy, head a bleeding mess-

"Kasoria, I had nothing to do with this!"

"Fu-"

Then he turned and Ruven was on him-

-fist lashing out to crack Kasoria around the jaw and he went with the blow, even as his head swam and his vision danced, skittering back a few steps, buying time, room, another chance to-

-Ruven roared again, sound bellowing out in two voices it seemed, one hateful and furious, the other tortured and inhuman, hurling himself towards Kasoria with a dagger out and the Raggedy Man-

Made his decision. His friend was dead. This thing was all that was left.

Heedless of the hideous injury he'd just inflicted, Frenlip flinched when he saw Kasoria's arm become a blur in front of him. A silver blur, as his karambit slashed once, twice, three times-

-but arcing crimson burst into the air in the wake of each blow. Exploding from Ruven's arm, ripping through tendons and muscle, robbing him of his blade. Then ripping across the side of his neck, slashing his thigh open. Blood splattered on Kasoria as the third blow punched into Ruven's chest, and with a snarl he ripped the blade up, tearing through intestines and guts and organs until the man's breastbone stopped him and then he was face to face, so close he could smell the rot in Ruven's mouth-

"K... Kas?"

Close enough to see the parasite soul in the man's eyes shriek away from control. Ruven was there again. Just Ruven. Shocked and wide-eyed and not understanding. Looking down at the mortal wound done to him by his old Highmark, his comrade, the man he'd admired so much when they fought a righteous war together. There was a choked sound that could have been a sob, and for a moment, Kasoria felt like a dagger was in his own breast.

"Wh... What... Why...?"

His legs died under him. Kasoria bore him down. Letting go of the blade still buried in Ruven's chest. Holding his face in both hands as the dying man awkwardly fell down onto his back. Blood pooling under him on the cheap floorboards. Tears pooling from his eyes as blood dribbled from his mouth. He was trying to speak. Words spilling over each other, of family and pain and fear and Kasoria didn't know what to do.

He didn't know what to do. And he was afraid, in that moment.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, as the light started to die in Ruven's eyes. "Yer... Yer free, now."

The words would haunt him for the rest of his life. Because they were both truth and lie. Ruven would be no monster's puppet any longer. He would go to his Crossing and find his love, his kin, his friends who died in that fucking siege. But he had still killed him. Still gutting the boy who'd followed him with shining eyes even as their war became grim and bloody beyond belief. And when the time truly came, Kasoria could not save him. He died not in that war but in the sneaking cutthroat power games that Sintra had trapped him in.

"Fucking... insect..."

Then that voice returned. For the last trill of two of life Ruven's body possessed, the creature squatting in his soul returned. Kasoria felt rage, bright and choking and trembling, overpower his grief and his horror. His hands shook and turned into claws. With a shriek of pure hatred he gripped the sides of the possessed man's skull and-

CRACK

Ruven, and Sterncrest, died with a single, shattering snap of spinal bones. Half the tavern flinched as they heard it. Then they watched as Kasoria, panting and huffing, slowly got to his feet... and turned slowly to Fenlip. The bartender was stammering excuses, still holding the pewter tankard on his hands. He clutched it to his chest as Kasoria approached, little man casting the shadow of a daemon from the hells as he did. But even as he spoke, as he begged, he realized the man was not focused on him.

Instead he grabbed a groaning Koolie by the throat and yanked him against the bar, strength belying his short frame now fully on display. He had no desire to hide it anymore. No desire to moderate anything now. Not with the blood and viscera of his friend still staining his tunic. One hand holding him steady, the other pressed under the groggy, skull-split man's eye, and he waited until that single orb focused on him before speaking again.

"I know yuz can hear me," he rasped, voice raw and savage. "I can speed yeh on, or I can keep yeh alive an' screamin' fer a long, long time. Yer choice. But you will tell me what he was-" he nodded to Ruven's corpse "-an' what in the fuck youse were doin' huntin' for me, an' who fuckin' sent ya."

Another half-pound of pressure. Enough to draw blood, and wonderfully focus a truculent mind.

"Start. Talkin'."