Recent content by Vandor Colton

Turned out there was a band in this establishment to keep frowns upside down. Trust a bunch of bards to play their part from the lute to the harp, the drum to whatever other instrument was introduced as the tavern turned to music from the heart. Intensity in her frame like the strike of a...

Features were everything in this scene. Any subtle hint could mean trouble the next instant. Eyes into eyes. His vision didn’t drift. His gaze never wavered. Only from their corners did he take in this tavern. As for him? He didn't shift in his seat. Didn’t flinch. He just measured her words on...

Ever quick, whatever her tongue was, not that Vandor was one to discriminate with language, dialect and accent. She caught onto his occupation and that was enough. She liked to brag a bit about how proficient she was but that was fine. In this mercenary’s opinion, she had since demonstrated her...

Vandor watched her movements without shifting his gaze from hers. One could glimpse many things just from the corner of the eye, such as the bartender on his left taking a rag to a glass, or the dwarf laughing at a table on his right with beer in his beard. “My people have a similar way.” He...

Still as a statue, Vandor just sat and listened. Sure, his sense of humor could be appreciated as much as irritate others, but she wasn’t. She was quick with her wit and it made his lips split into a grin. She was also quick with her fists as proven. For her opponents to fail at putting her in...

Strong, she was, as proven. Misguided by false gods and prophets, she was not, as far as he had viewed it. Anger delivered, yet her gesture was not given in any insincere way; was not taken for anything more than a misbegotten inhabitant of culture and custom; or any less for a woman who had...

Sea of Grass. Aha. Whether he knew it already, the No’rei were the people of the Sea of Sand and Grass native to the Aberressai Savannah. Theirs wasn’t so much an ocean as a grassland with a collection of clans that shifted with the wind and the waves and no mistake. “Stronger is just about...

At that, she ate. Alas, he had no plate. He had already eaten anyway. The ale served its purpose, a malty aftertaste, and the pipe was a fine finish with chocolate notes in the tobacco. He sat as relaxed as he was when his back was to the wall. The subtle difference was, if she managed to pick...

Some folks came to taverns simply to eat, drink, kick back and relax with a pipe between their fingers, exchange conversation, or even for live music. There wasn’t much of the latter but plenty of the former. Others? They came for a different kind of entertainment altogether. Vandor hadn’t...

The drunken patron and poor excuse for a man just watched and listened to this woman who spoke back to him, as if the uncanny thing had just happened, and he could not particularly conceive of such a turn in this conversation. It was as if his very attempt to win her over was swept away like a...

Vandor's lips, hidden under a cloak of shadow, didn’t shift from his tobacco pipe’s bit. His eyes, though, glowed under the burn and the smoke. Her lips were a rigid line as her eyes glimpsed his. The woman witnessed the man that was watching her. It was obvious, like the flame of the...

These swamplands were not pretty to the eyes. Not in the way some might think, at least. They were dark and dreary like today’s rain, no less grey, and the frames of structures were as treacherous as last night had proven. The water was no ocean, and the mosquitos might suck your blood like a...

A sellsword, this sellsword had since sworn he could tell, had learned to determine a person based on their appearance. Yet, this wasn’t in the sense of judging a book by its cover, for he had read some rather romantic trash wrapped in red leather as much as highland adventure and swordsmanship...

He watched her, spotted that she wanted to roll her eyes if not toss that tankard at him altogether, but she did not. Instead, she obliged and, when you occupied a position like his, that’s all that mattered. Was it a test on his part? A jest? Questions and answers weren’t for the bodyguard...

It definitely wasn’t every day that a hedge-sleeper managed to find his way inside a cave of which to spend the day and night away. This one was no hedge knight in definition, not by any means, though there was some similarity. They both slept under hedges when they could find them, yet the man...