The tavern was relatively quiet, with only a few die-hard drinkers sitting at the bar, which Valryn attended with his customary buisness-like manner. Illiam took the opportunity to give the place a thorough cleaning, and with the help of a few tenants and waitresses, was busy getting the booths and tables ready for the evening rush. MacSairlen and Amilie had already been asked to move twice in order to accommodate the cleaning, but Aleksei had avoided the issue entirely by sitting at the bar and being a good sport- otherwise known as taking on three drinking contests at once. Udala, meanwhile, was busy moving her things out of her room, cleaning various pieces of it as everything was cleared out of the area.
"Cer'ain fee canno' stand anofer hand, yeah?" Illiam asked, her radiant red eyes focused on the well-splinted Halfling.
"I'll live, trust me," Udala smiled, hobbling her way back through the tavern toward her old room. "You know I've never had much."
"Sure," Valryn smirked. "Just your oils, your knives, your hammers, your fifteen to twenty chisels..."
"Keep it up," Udala warned, glaring at him over her shoulders. "I'll go get my staff- and take the ribbons off first."
MacSairlen, pretending not to notice Amilie's focus on Udala's progress, closed the log he had been skimming, sat it on top of the pile on his left side and picked up the last log on his right. "Damning stuff. An I were a ranking official of the land, I'd not waste a moment in skelping whatever creature's left in this operation."
"They took Cormites too," Amilie commented, taking her focus away from Udala and crossing her arms over her chest. "This isn't just someone else's problem."
"Aye, aye, lass," MacSairlen soothed, realizing that he'd inadvertently hit a bitter spot. "I can see the Cormites, and even if there were nane, this is- a larger scrape than I think Nithraz realized."
"He knew about this?" Amilie hissed at once. "And did nothing about it?"
"Well, thou durst not whether he's done naething or nae," MacSairlen replied simply. " 'Tis like that he's done plenty, only that thou seest it not. Why bring this to me, and not himself?"
"I was told you were an honourable man," Amilie huffed. "Though I wonder, having met you."
"Honourable, to be sure," MacSairlen laughed, lifting his eyes from the log. "Which is why Voyonov keeps looking at me over his flagon."
"If he stares at Udala too hard," Amilie sighed, "she'll know that he's worried about her ability to get all of her things out- especially her tools. I can't look at her at all, or it'll be a good argument, so he's doing me a favor."
Choosing to ignore the accidental indication that Udala would take more offense at Amilie's attention than Aleksei's, the Purple Dragon looked up sharply. "He strikes me as one accustomed to cutting favors," he snorted, closing the log and laying it in front of him. "With streetwalkers. Thieves. Killers- said he would find the Rooftop Reaver, and not only has he nae found him, he has nae so much as given a proper name."
"If you're thinking he's keeping secret information, he's not," Amilie replied, frustrated. "He pointed out that the Drow that log is talking about is the Reaver you're looking for- which, for the moment, makes him a victim. First of all, he can't go reporting to his cowardly commander when he can hardly stand. That poison took hours to run its way out of him; he almost died. Second, nobody can prosecute the Reaver at all if some Drow coterie has him."
For whatever reason, one of the drinkers at the bar attempted to get away from it, only to collapse to the floor. Aleksei, who figured that would happen, calmly finished his drink, put his flagon down, and easily picked the soused man up. After a quiet word, the two went outside together. Udala, who had just began to bring her heavier toolbox out of her room, instead walked back toward her room to wait for the situation to clear.
"Mi'ishaen Lucien-Azaroth, which he decided to call by his own name, is a peck of trouble of her own," MacSairlen continued. "He's supposed to be searching for her as well, and surprise, there he goes- drinking himself into an early grave."
"No, I doubt that- he handles it well," Amilie mused, remembering the morning after the night she'd met him. "Remembers everything you tell him- even things you may not want him to."
"Then it's definitely choice, nae the fault of the drink, that instead of doing his duty, he's sitting here, peering at me over his eighth pint," MacSairlen scoffed. "I should clap the man in irons this second."
Aleksei re-entered the tavern, his hair bound up in his leathery tendrils- which indicated that he'd had to get too physical to allow his blond locks to remain free. Realizing that Valryn was giving him a concerned look, he relaxed the tendrils and allowed them and his hair to fall into their natural places. He seemed to give him a short explanation, which was followed by a sharp nod from the dark Elf and another drink. Illiam didn't even bother to look up, continuing to scrub at a stubborn spot on the floor. Udala peeked around the corner, and seeing the relaxation, felt free to carefully heft her equipment out.
"I've heard tell, through his people, of an Elf who is dedicated to turning a bunch of renegade, drug-using thieves and run-aways into a tribe truly worthy of the name," Amilie replied defensively. "He isn't the only one with that kind of heart. The Dragonborn- whose obvious drinking habit seems to him to be the least of his worries- might really want to try his hand at reshaping the Tiefling and the Drow. Maybe it's some self-inflicted punishment for a crime too hideous for him to talk about. Maybe it's a gods-given quest. Maybe it's an unhealthy infatuation that will wind up putting him at the wrong end of a set of daggers or a poisoned drink, but you can't seriously think that the creature responsible for nearly single-handedly wiping the Stinger's influence out of the Dark Quarter is the type who would withhold necessary information from the defenders of justice?"
"The creature responsible for that near-lethal bit of vigilante work's also responsible for threatening and putting a heavy choke hold on his patrol partner," MacSairlen replied sourly. "in public. If the followers of Tiamat- who lay claim to his soul- had any questions about his being radge, he proved every one of them in front of a major spiritual leader."
"There's evidence of major illegal activity in front of you- guard-sanctioned coterie kidnappings and executions- and you're stopping to quibble with me about a male whose life choices are hardly any of my business," Amilie charged fiercely. "Are you going to do anything about the documentation in front of you, or shall I take it to someone in a higher post?"
And at just the moment that the word left her mouth, Udala hustled back into the room. Although she said nothing, the concern in her gaze zagged into Amilie's heart like a radiant bolt of lightning. Five steps behind her appeared Nithraz, Trelwynen, and four other guards, swords drawn.
"Amilie Bejart, Udala Njenkoru and Guardsman Aleksei Voyonov, by the authority of the sovereign independent state of Urmlaspyr, I command you to come with us, accused of aberration," the half-Orc pronounced, ostensibly standing just inside the door of the tavern while the rest of the officers fanned out around him. Illiam, who had just begun to work on the bloodstain at the foot of one of the booth benches, looked up at him as though he were mad, and only catching Valryn's calm first finger resting on his own lips kept her from immediately voicing her opinion.
"Here is your armor," Aleksei replied without even turning away from the bar. "Take it, and me. But these ladies are innocent, not doing anything unless I am asking. Leave them alone."
"You were all seen cavorting with each other in an inappropriate manner," Nithraz replied grimly, glaring at the Dragonborn's back. "And you have additional charges for doing so while you were supposed to be defending the people of Urmlaspyr."
"Which 'e done," Illiam squawked, sitting up on her knees and the tops of her feet. "'E done wha's clear you wouldn've, clearin' out fem Stingers. We'd've all been dragged to gods-knows where if 'e'd no' taken feir 'eads off 'em, an' fem women ain't abberashuns. Udala's a healfy gurl, I ken- fere's loads o' men wha's 'ad feir go wif 'er, wif naery a peep o' abberashun."
"Sir, take your woman in hand, won't you?" Nithraz asked, looking to an astounded Velryn. "She's spoken quite enough, considering she's not been spoken to."
"I beg your pardon, sir," Velryn replied with an even voice and a fierce glare, "but it's you and I who would be beaten beyond recognition, according to my rearing. And the woman- whose name is Illiam, please note- is right. I have never seen Udala commit an aberrant act, and she's lived here for nearly as long as Illiam has owned this place. What proof have you of your accusations?"
"The eye witness of every thing that moves in Pete's Peppered Pots," Nithraz shot back bitterly. "They saw these two women together, cavorting with this male."
"Fere's not 'alf a brain 'twixt fe 'ole lot o'fem," Illiam crabbed, "Fe way I 'eard it, fe sport were runnin' fe Stingers from feir door just like 'e done 'ere, and fis is 'ow fey pays 'im- wif rat tongues. Plague an' balefire take fe lot."
"I say again that these ladies are not before doing wrong," Aleksei sighed, turning away from the bar and standing. "It is me who is tempting them, like devil-"
"That's not completely true," Udala began, stepping forward.
"Aye, 'tis," MacSairlen whispered while staring directly at Amilie. "The accused was also supposed to be searching for nae one, but twa criminals."
"This is true," Aleksei admitted. "I am failing to find Mi'ishaen and the Reaver. I make no excuses for how I am acting. As the Wyrmkeeper is saying, I am having history of doing same thing. And as I am walking toward destruction, I am taking others- innocents, who are not doing wicked things if I am not encouraging them."
Nithraz looked from Aleksei to Udala, whose glower was unmistakable, but Amilie's look of terror made him wonder at her. "What have you to say about this?" he demanded, draining all the remaining color from her face.
Unable to think of anything at all to say, she simply burst into tears. Udala immediately thought to move toward her, but was shocked into stillness when Aleksei suddenly moved forward and picked Trelwynen up by his throat. Illiam, similarly surprised by the movement, got up from where she was and darted to the other side of a center table.
"Why make those who you are protecting to act like this?" Aleksei demanded in a throaty rumble worthy of a dangerous brute. "I am doing much worse things than choking Elves for the crying of a woman. Take me now, while you are still having chance of fair fight."
"No," Amilie managed through sobs, nearly unheard. MacSairlen kept his eyes steady on her, not allowing himself to weaken- he could sense that any crack from him would prompt her to defend him more vocally. Illiam moved toward her, wanting to be supportive without knowing just how close to comfortably get.
The Dragonborn closed his functional eye, dropping Trelwynen out of the air with a step backward. "Do not pray now," he breathed, turning his blind side toward Amilie. "Wait until I am going to gallows."
"Arrest him," Nithraz commanded, not stepping forward to help the old Elf to his feet. The four guards kept an uncomfortable distance, knowing they were little match for the creature they were supposed to be arresting. Aleksei turned back to the bar table to pick the armor up, walked up to Nithraz and slapped it into his chest, pushing him back two steps- which meant he was outside. Standing to his full height and striding proudly away, he left the winded half-Orc, the struggling Sylvan and the timid guards to follow him.
Above him, unable to be seen against the dark sky, a rogue with black leather armor turned away.
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