• Graded • To Trouble Their Fathers (Part II)

[Kasoria]

75th Trial, Ashan, Arc 718
Westguard, West of Etzos
15th break

Continued from here



"Why didn't you tell me?"

He'd had eleven years to come up with answers to every question the boy could give him. Long nights and slow days, wondering how his young mind would process the truth, then seek it clarified with his own inquiries. Running the gamut from innocent and obvious, to convoluted and complicated... to the just plain painful. But his first question was what Kasoria expected. A simple demand why he'd been kept out the loop, and denied the most basic of rights for a child: to say with pride and certainty, that he had both a mother and a father.

Kasoria bowed his head and sighed. He'd tried to prepare for this. Rehearsed the lies so many times in the mirror at home, until he could believe it himself. Now he looked up and saw those wide eyes, desperate for knowledge, for the truth he'd been starved of for so long. He was a fool to think his own son would allow the truth to be a mystery to him for so long. Was he any different? Was he any less reckless and willful and... just plain nosy, for answers his elders were unready to give him?

He's your son. What were you expecting?

"My life is dangerous, Martyn," he said, speaking slowly, unwilling to rush words that had waited arcs to arrive at this moment, under this tree, on this hill. "People want to kill me. Or worse than that, they want to make me kill other people for them."

He looked up and saw the boy's eyes go impossibly wider, his mouth drop open in shock. But it was not fear. Not disgust. Had it been, perhaps Kasoria wouldn't have been able to go on. But it was just surprise, which he'd been expecting (that and anger, if he was honest), and continued. But even as he spoke, he felt the lies and deceit of his word seep into his words like poison. Because they were a shield in that moment, not a malevolent deception.

"I work for the Black Guard. You've heard of them, yes? They're the law... no... they keep The Law, in Etzos. That means plenty of people don't much like me, or what I've done."

"People... try to kill you?"

Kasoria nodded, and wondered how young was too young. To find out about death and mortality. Not just find out about it, be aware of it, but know it could come from other people. That there were men so cold and cruel in the world that they would snatch every arc you had left to live, and toss it away like it was nothing. The little man looked away for a moment. Took solace in the town spread below them, ringing with industry and marching feet.

"They do. But I'm not easy to kill." That, at least, was an unvarnished truth. He had the scars to prove it. "But if they knew I had a son, they would try to use you to hurt me, to kill me... or make me do those things for them, instead of the Black Guard. Do you understand?"

"I... I think so."

Kasoria thought that he probably did. He wasn't stupid, and he paid attention... and he was his son, after all. His blood didn't produce many men tall as trees and capable of hefting wagon wheels like rolls of cheese, but it didn't carry any dummies along its line. Something small of white bounced along the fresh grass and out of instinct, Martyn bent down to pet the dog as it went by. Kasoria stared at it a while. He blinked. An idea came to mind. At once he rejected it, monstrous and sick and-

No. He has to learn.

The killer smiled, remembered the karambit at his back, and bid the dog come over to him.

Thanks for Jade for the template

[Kasoria]

The Night Before

"You think he's ready for a dog?"

"He's old enough. Teaches him responsibility. See these hands? Never touched a turd from Rufus. Martyn takes care of him."

She watched Kasoria's eyes jump up his forehead at the news, listened to him snort softly in surprise and faint familiar pride. She needed to remind herself that he only saw the boy for maybe a dozen trials each arc. Etzos was days away and his work... well, she didn't like thinking about the What, but she knew the Who and the How that arrangement came to be. Someone like Bangun Vorund was not about to let Kasoria swan off that far away whenever he liked.

Jessye sighed, feeling some vestige of pity for the little man sitting at her kitchen table, nursing a glass of wine. He was a father that could not raise his son. He wanted to, she could see he did, whenever he was around the boy. But every time he came around, Martyn was bigger and... stranger, to the killer from The Big Rock. Now it was a dog and... the other problem.

We'll get to that.

"Hmm," Kasoria hummed to himself, smile both sly and thoughtful flitting over his face as he took a sip. "I notice you added 'from Rufus' in there. Meaning there are others. Just not from him."

"Yeah, well, sometimes they have me clean out the stables when the boy doesn't turn up-"

"Not what surprises me. It's that you'd even think to-"

"Don't interrupt, Kas."

It was the way she said his name, more than the words, and the tone. He'd dealt with sharp-tongued whores before, and despite what people may have thought, he'd known a relationship that was more than paid for. But when she heard Jessye say his name, dragging out his nickname with the "zz" of a buzzing bee rather than the "s" of a hissing snake, it took him back. Back and far away from that time and clean, woodsy place. To cobbles and alleys and smoke in the air. When he'd been a "regular" of hers and under no illusions as to what they were to each other, but still... you kept things around if they served a purpose. If they made you happy.

Then she told him her bleeding was late. She was terrified and looked far older than her twenty-two arcs when she told this man, this murderer, this notorious assassin, that she was with his child.

Kasoria remembered the look on her face when he reached out, patted her hand, and told her to get rid of it.

"I... Yeah. Sorry."

"Strange thing for the Legendary Kasoria to say."

"Not legendary out here. Not legendary at all."

"No? In business going on twenty-five arcs. Tell me someone else who's lasted that long in the South Side."

"That don't make you a legend," Kasoria said, words becoming rueful, even tinged with bitterness. "Just too stubborn to die."

"Uh-huh..."

Kasoria smirked at her words that weren't even words. Yeah. She'd smacked him around the face and told him to hell with his male bullshit, that was her kid too, and she wasn't having some crone with a hooked wire or a special potion take it from her. Kasoria couldn't remember the last time he'd let a woman touch him like that without breaking her arm afterwards. Probably his mother, or sister. Bur she'd seen the sheer, unassailable conviction in Jessye's eyes, and he knew she wouldn't be swayed.

Perfect mother material, really. And she doesn't buy any of your shit, either.

"Three thousand."

"What was that?"

He set the purse on the table just as she sat down opposite him. Now it was her turn to pop her eyes as a package that seemed to shake the wood down to the floor was placed in front of her. Three thousand gold nels was hardly a small amount, after all, and men like Kasoria didn't trust promissory notes. He wasn't a merchant, and the people he dealt with... well, suffice to say, readily-spendable currency was far preferred.

"Thank you."

"No need," he said, finishing his glass and speaking again without looking at her. "Not for you, is it?"

Jessye's jaw tightened for a trill, just the one, then relaxed. It still hurt, when he tossed those occasional barbs at her. Reminded her that in his eyes, she was still a whore. Just happened to be the unlucky bitch that popped out his son, was all. If it wasn't for that single fact, she doubted they'd still be seeing each other. Probably wouldn't even nod to each other on the street. But for the sake of that boy - that cocky, snarky, shitty, wonderful little bastard - they were oddly tied to each other.

But it was never more than that. Jessye looked away and a man with less ice in his soul might have senses her fleeting pain. But Kasoria did not; he just filled his glass back up.

"Tell me what he did," he said, passing the bottle over to her. "The letter you got sent, that had you write one to me. What the hells did that boy do?"

Jessye sighed, ran a hand through her thick brown hair, and leaned back far enough that she was talking to the ceiling.

"... he stole a fucking sword."

"He what?"

"He's been surrounded by soldiers for arcs, Kas. He wants to be one someday. But he's too young for a sword or armor, and I've already tanned his hide for nicking my cutlery. So he snuck into the smithy's across town and took one of his old ones. Almost got out before Tony came back and caught him."

"Gave him a hiding, too, didn't he?"

Jessye swallowed a little more of her wine than she was intending to. She knew that tone. Low, dangerous. Controlled in the same way a leash controlled an animal bred for killing. The words came out a little too clipped and careful. Like he was acting more the educated man to throw people off the scent. Might have worked for others, but not Jessye. She still remembered how it smelled when Kas went off the leash. She didn't want that nightmare coming to the town her son lived in.

"Wouldn't you have?"

"He's my son, Jess."

"Mine too, unless you've forgotten," she shot back, knowing that you didn't get anywhere with someone like Kasoria by being retiring. "And I gave him much the same as soon as he got home. But... you know how he is. How boys are at that age. He just scowled at me the whole time and didn't talk for a trial."

Kasoria took a deep breath and let it out through his nose. Eyes barely visible through the frown crushing them. "So... this Tony. He said he'd go to the... garrison commander, right?"

Jess was hardly a lazy woman, but she knew when a story could be told better by a different source. Without a word she got up, rifled through some parchment on a shelf, and came back with the letter. Kasoria read it in silence. Twice. Shook his head at the end of it and then nodded, giving it back to her.

"What are you going to do?"

"Talk to them. The boy and the smithy. Straighten out the kid and make the man see sense."

"How're you gonna do that?"

Again, he was silent. Studying his drink. Thinking away in that quiet, careful way he'd had even back when she first met him. A different man, but still with that same clinical approach to problems like this. Kasoria may not have considered himself anything to whisper about in the alleys, but even after eleven arcs away from Etzos, Jessye still knew how things worked. The rough, loud killers with talent and speed and no bloody brains, they didn't last. Etzos didn't chew them up and spit them out: it consumed them whole and didn't even bother to swallow. Arc after arc they came forth, swaggering and strutting and Fates, she'd had plenty of the ego-spewing morons between her legs. But the ones that lasted? It was cunning, as much as ability with a blade or your fists.

Twenty-five arcs, and there he sat. Still thinking his way out of the problem.

"I'll talk to Martyn tomorrow. Reach some kind of... I dunno, understanding. Got an idea or two about how to do that."

"And the smithy?"

"I'll talk to him. Make it plain it won't happen again, and he doesn't want to take it any further."

"Kas, you can't-"

"I'm not killing anyone here, Jess," he said, cutting her off and daring her to say anything about it. That time, she didn't. "I ain't that stupid."

"I know..."

The silence that followed was one of a conversation that had run its course, and now awaited new subjects. But there was little to be had. They were not lovers, or friends, not really. Just two people that had created another person, and loved him enough to work together to raise him. So it was with some surprise that Kasoria's gaze snapped to Jessye when he started to rise and she said-

"You going to stay the night?"

... fuck does she mean by that?

He stood and regarded her for long moments. Her moist eyes, wavering between looking away but still determined to keep his gaze. The way she didn't seem to be breathing. How her hands were folded, as if calm and composed, but her thumbs were twiddling with each other and Fates, he didn't need this extra... ingredient added to this bloody mess. So he fell back on the tried and tested and shook his head.

"Nah... not tonight. It's late as it is, it'll confuse the boy, finding me here in the morning."

"He's probably still awake. Reading that book you gave him last time."

"Lent him," Kasoria corrected her, grimacing at her impish grin. "I've got another one for him. Bloody well want it back, too."

"So, ah... we'll see you tomorrow?"

"Yeah, sure. Be after midday, but I'll be over."

Crisis averted. No more awkwardness as she escorted him back to the front door and then out of it into the night. But Kasoria's ear twitched as he walked by the stairs. Sure that he heard the sound of metal clinking on metal... like a door being closed from above, and by someone determined not to be noticed. He was proud, his boy being so stealthy and quiet, and then that pride was driven away by a fresh thought, and the cold night air.

He's too much like me, he thought as he started to walk home. Too much like I was...

Receipt

-3000gn to NPC Jessye, for the upbringing of Kasoria's son, Martyn

Thanks for Jade for the template

[Kasoria]

The dog wasn't part of the plan, but plans change as opportunities arise. Kasoria always liked sticking to them if they were solid enough, but sometimes a factor came along that worked in your favor, and you didn't ignore that. Kasoria didn't have much time for Fates, and nothing but contempt for Immortals... but he knew when life was sending him a message. The question was what it was saying, and how you used it.

Rufus waddle-walked over in that bumbling, serious way that puppies always do, and he scooped him up like he weighed nothing. He turned to his son, still smiling in the sunlight, and watched his smile fade when he saw the look on his father's face.

Intuition. We lose that, as we get older. They have to rely on it, because they don't have age, or wisdom. They know when things are going to go bad. They can smell it on people.

"Um... why are-"

"You love this dog, don't you?" Martyn's eyes flicked down to Rufus, wriggling uselessly in the arms of the man he now knew to be his father. Knowing that wasn't helping. Something was very wrong. "If you could, you'd do whatever you were told to stop him from getting hurt."

"Um... yes, I mean, he's my fr-"

His words stopped dead when he saw the blade. He knew right away that it wasn't one a hero would wield in daring battle. It wasn't the straight, thick, noble broadswords of knights. One look at the strange curve of it, the immaculate keenness it radiated, and a hundred inherited memories of claws and lithe, hungry predators raced through Martyn's mind. There was fear in his eyes now, thick and rank and Kasoria forced himself to go on.

To teach the lesson.

"What if it was your mother?" Martyn gasped as he touched the blade to the puppy's throat. It started to wriggle and writhe and keen low in its throat. Its struggles barely noticed. "And they told you to kill someone, or they'd kill her? What would you do?"

"M-Mister Kas, you're-"

"Answer me!"

"Please, you're hurting-"

Kasoria rose like a tidal wave and the sight of him moving so fast and so close shut the boy up sure as any words. Suddenly he was just there, with his wide raptor eyes and Rufus tiny and helpless and terrified and that knife, that awful, ugly knife almost cutting through his puppy. Tears sprang into his eyes and Kasoria reached deep into that outhouse he called a soul. Called up and grasped the cold, dark iron he used every day, and hoped he'd never have to rely on in this place.

"Answer. Your. Father. What would-"

"Anything! I'd do anything, now stop it, just-just... please, you're hurting him...!"

It occurred to Kasoria to go further than he already had. To go to the very end of the lesson. To show his son, in that definite, irrevocable, undeniable way, just how fragile life really was. How easy it was to be taken, and how easy your love for it could be made into a weapon against you. One twitch of his wrist, a few ounces more pressure... and Martyn would never forget. Never doubt. Then, maybe, he would understand.

Had it been anyone else gripping his wrist, begging with him, tears dripping down his cheeks... well... that had never stopped him before. But this was different. A low, pleading whine issued from his hands, and he blinked. He felt the sun and the wind on his face. He heard the bleating of sheep down the hill and the hiss of leaves above them. He looked down and saw his son... so frightened of him.

"... that's why I never told you." He handed back the puppy and he was forgotten for a few trills, Martyn too busy hugging his best friend and whispering to him how it would be all right. "That's why you can't tell anyone else."

[Kasoria]

Earlier That Trial

"I help you?"

"I'm here to talk about Martyn. Jessye's boy."

The snort. The sneer. The glower. All three on that ruddy, bearded face told Kasoria he was wasting his time with words. He didn't even need to hear any of the smithy's, rough and rude though they were likely to be. That seemed to be a trait among his people, as he'd known them in Etzos: unyielding, inflexible, pigheaded... pick any two.

"Ain't got shite to say about him to anyone but the commander," the man said as he pushed passed his smaller visitor, going through all the usual activities of bringing a forge back to life. "And I'll be doing that in a trial or two. Now, unless you got anything you want mended..."

"I'm sure we can come to an arrangement. An understanding."

Antonin Rael's eyes narrowed as he turned to face the man fully. Typical city bastard. Nice, clean, neat clothes. Shoes smelling of dry dirt and not cow shit. Probably with a pocket full of coin from working half as hard as he did, for a quarter as long. He took a long, steady gulp from the clay bottle he'd brought with him. Kasoria watched his hair-spattered throat work back and forth and he could smell the booze from where he stood. But when the man walked over to him, there was no weakness or tremble in his gait.

Smithy's. Tough sods, to a man.

"Fuck did you learn that one from, eh, city boy? Some play you went to-"

"Sir, I'm fond of Jess and her son, and I only want-"

"To get in those knickers, eh?" Tony's face twisted into cruel mirth, yellow teeth, and wafting halitosis. "'ey, from what I hear, name the right price and she's yours. Won't even need to bother me."

"That won't help with keeping the boy out of trouble."

"Ah, I see," Tony said, and Kasoria sighed inwardly, knowing he clearly did not. "So you're playing the long game, eh? Want to get in good with her, show you're father material? So you look after the little cunt-"

knuckles to the throat, stop him crying out. boot to his balls, double him over. take his eye out with thumb, show him this is real

"-and she knows you're going to hang around for more than a quick fuck? Think you're overthinking this, mate..."

Kasoria was silent for longer than he needed to be, to formulate a response. But he needed the time to wait out the inferno that wanted to fill his limbs and take this pompous wanker apart with his bare hands... and then have a go with some of these tools. All blunt and heavy and metal and lined up oh-so-neatly, just begging him to try. He let his eyes flit over them and took a breath... let the breeze cool and clarify... then he began again.

"Mister Rael. I'm not looking to get my cock wet-" little crudeness, show him you're his kind of bloke... namely, a cunt "-or play the long game. I'm a friend of the boy's father, and he's... not around anymore. He passed some arcs ago. I told him I'd check in on them, and Martyn... well, you and I both know he's a wild one. But I'm trying to get him in line-"

"Little late for that, mate-"

"I disagree. I think there's still time to-"

"The fuck do you think you are?!"

Whatever hope Kasoria had for a peaceful resolution died when Tony reared up to his full height, towering over the little man. Almost thumping his chest with his fists, face red and ugly, veins about to pop, nostrils flared like caves set into his face. Kasoria looked up without a word and struggled to keep the smile off his face. He told Jess he wouldn't kill this man, and he meant it. Murder was... problematic, in places like this. Garrison towns with some many soldiers milling about, everyone watching each other.

"Coming into my forge, with your fucking city airs and fancy words, telling me you fucking disagree?! After that little cunt broke in, ruined one of my windows, and tried to steal my goods?!"

The word didn't gouge at his anger like it did before; mainly because the sweet, black anticipation of what would follow reassured it. Kept the beast quiet and restrained with promises of what was to come. Kasoria looked around the bigger man and noted the door with a single, square pane of glass, high above the handle. The windows, high on the walls. The gate for deliveries, still closed and locked from the inside.

"I let him get away with that, then every fucking scrote in this town will be sniffing around, looking to nick me blind, you understand? So yeah, I don't give a fuck if you disagree, and no, I ain't got shit else to understand."

A sausage-broad finger poked Kasoria in the chest. He wondered how many ways he could break it before the man even started speaking again.

"Sir... I can replace the window. I can compensate you for the sword. I can guarantee that the only time you will every see Martyn again will be as you pass on the street or as a paying customer, if we could just-"

Tony picked up a hammer. Kasoria stopped talking. The man hefted it like it was part of himself, and Kasoria made a note not to allow this man to grab one of his tools again. The master of the forge flexed his shoulders and pointed to the door behind his "guest" with his free hand.

"You need to fuck off, mate. I'm done listening."

"I understand, sir," Kasoria said with a short, respectful bow. "Have a good day."

Tony just snorted as the prim-and-proper wee fucker turned on his heel and walked away without another word. Typical city wanker. All fancy words and throwing money at you, no sense of what it took to keep a business safe... and not stomach for a fight, when it came down to it, either. Bolted like a rat from a trap with nary a look over his shoulder. He chuckled to himself and took another pull from his bottle.

City cunts. Pah. I shit 'em.

Continued here

[Doran Cooney]

Kasoria of Etzos

Knowledges
Deception: Lying to a Child
Detection: Noting Careful Use of Language
Discipline: Teaching a Hard, Cruel Lesson
Intimidation: Threaten That Which They Love
Persuasion: Offering Compensation to Avoid the Authorities Getting Involved
Tactics: Know When to Fight, and When to Talk

NPC Martyn: Watchful and Not Stupid (Like his Father)
NPC Martyn: Budding Thief
NPC Jessye: Not Afraid to Stand Up to Kasoria
NPC Tony: Westguard Blacksmith

Loot: N/A
Injuries: N/A
Renown: N/A

Points 10

---

I was really looking forward to this next part, and you didn't disappoint. Firstly, your time jumps are really effective. I would say that they're a little bit confusing, but really they add into this kind of erratic timeline of events that get me asking questions and pull my interest in deeper each time a new question pops up. The build-up with the puppy was so good. I was so nervous he was going to kill it, and while you only touched on the emotions, they really popped out and were made all the stronger by the rhythm of your writing in that scene. Same with the blacksmith, where you laid down that heavy, terrifying foreshadowing without actually acting on it. There's a storm brewing, and you're an amazing painter of clouds. I'm certain the downpour will be just as exciting!

Please edit your grade request, thank you!