Private Tales Scorched Earth

[Raigryn Vayd]

Even when events were not of his business, Raigryn felt an innate urge to scratch below the surface and get involved.

Fife most definitely was his business. Over time becoming less of his charge and more of an equal. A line he had irrevocably blurred through his own weakness.

He wanted to make this better. He did not know how. She was off-kilter, swinging back and forth. Just these thoughts were enough to quickly tire him out. Before making any progress on how he could make this better, he had drifted into a shallow sleep.



Jenna did not leave them alone for long. She was under strict instruction to interrupt them if Fife did not seek her out. A soft knock came at the door after just an hour.

 

[Fife]

She slept about as well as one might expect in the short window given to her. It was shitty, and she probably spent more of it rolling than actually sleeping. Feeling sorry for Raigryn, she rose when the knock came. So much for the rest Lawrence had prescribed.

It was just as well. Fife pulled on her jacket and her boots, then sat beside Raigryn to sign.

I will be back soon, she said slowly, accommodating his slower cognition.

She scooped up his hand and lifted it. She closed both hands around his, squeezing tight and closing her eyes as she touched his warm fingers to her cheek. It was a simple connection, nothing more than the reassurance of I am here. This was where she wanted to be. The Steel Coin had separated them enough, but this would be the last time.

When she opened her eyes, her mind did so, too. She was an entire rainbow at once, shimmering with color and thought and emotion. Today it was sorrow and joy that held hands to form a very strange mood. Fife smiled. If she didn't, she might cry again. Nothing could be worse than more crying.

I love you. In the present state of her mind, that was one of the few truths she believed wasn't waging a war of reason against the weighted swing of her tempers.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

It seemed as if he would not reply for the longest time. He nodded and let it all sink in but it seemed as if he would let her go without question or comment.

"I love you too," he said to her back when she was reaching for the door.



"A slightly higher dose this morning," Lawrence informed the servant preparing Raigryn's meals.

It was a happy accident that they had discovered it could be given with food now. Raigryn was their test subject. It allowed Lawrence to shift his plans. They were no longer giving Raigryn the injections, but his condition was about to deteriorate whilst Fife was away.

The only logical conclusion for Fife: that the damage had been permanent.

 

[Fife]

There was a pause. Fife waited, waited… waited. When it became obvious he wasn't saying it back, her eyes slid away and she rose with a tight, sick feeling. It was one thing knowing a fact and another experiencing it. She was certainly experiencing the worst of his apathy right now. She felt awkward and disheartened and awful -- so awful.

Fife walked across the room, barely holding back an onslaught of tears as sadness overtook any other feelings she had harbored. Being in the same room as him right now was suffocating. Lawrence was still winning his stupid game. She retreated, not even pausing as her hand reached for the door.

He finally answered and Fife stopped, her hand lingering on the handle. After a beat she turned back and a smile slowly drew over her features. What might have normally been a small reminder, a moment of comfort when she needed it the most, surged up to take command as her new ruling Aspect. There was still no truth to the words, no real weight to it, but it was enough. It was more than enough.

Lawrence wasn't winning. Raigryn would be back to normal soon. Bolstering her resolve and pulling herself up by the bootstraps, she waved a simple goodbye.

Jenna was waiting and Fife met her with a cheery smile on the edge of laughter. Her happiness had nothing to do with her, but it bled through regardless. She pulled the door closed behind her and waved to the healer like they weren't going on a trip to get supplies to fix what their organization had broken. It was strange, feeling resentment for the guild and being aware of the task at hand and why it was even necessary, yet being unable to feel any anger at all. It was worse than after her sprint back to Belgrath.

It was funny. Falling into line to follow Jenna, it was all very funny.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

Elbion was not as she remembered it. Neither the underside of the city she had known before, nor the broken landscape they had fled from weeks before.

The first difference was that chunks of rock were no longer floating above the towers. Then were the wooden scaffolds around the areas of the wall that had been brought down by the dragon.

There was a standing force of soldiers camped beyond the wall. Clearly, they had decided the city was vulnerable. They were protecting the city. The poor and vulnerable were probably the last they had thought about.

Despite the blade on Fife's back, the guard spared one glance for Jenna and let them through.

"We're going down to the docks," Jenna said. It wasn't a nice place where the assassins purchased their reagents and poisons.

 

[Fife]

What had once been her hometown and entire world was no longer left in any of the ways she remembered it. Still, as they passed the guards at the gate, the walled city of Elbion was much the same. It would seem that not even calamity could really change it.

Fife did not ponder the implications of the ease with which Jenna entered the city. She wasn't going to waste her attention wondering how strong the Steel Coin's hold on the city was.

Tasked with escorting Jenna, she kept her head on a swivel and had her mind and senses open. It had been a boring ride. Unsurprisingly, being mute didn't entice folks to engage her in conversation. At least their destination proved more entertaining, even if it was a part of town she hated.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

Eyes followed them. They were not dangerous stares, nor the furtive glances of the pickpocket. Beggars watched them from the sides of the broken streets.

Hundreds of homes had been lost. Being inside the walls was safer than outside. Even for those without a roof or more than a handful of coins.

"Lawrence said you might want to go past shops too?" Jenna asked. "We'll go somewhere nicer after business is done."

 

[Fife]

While the name of her magic was Empathy, it was not empathy that had brought Fife to adulthood. She had lived ruthlessly before Raigryn's single act of kindness, but not without her share of guilt and pity. She spared only passing glances at the beggars and homeless, but her thoughts lingered on them longer.

Fife was not entirely unsympathetic. She regretted that the only coin she carried was excessive. It wasn't like she could parse out a gold coin to all of them.

What would Raigryn have done? In the cloud of emotions swirling around her and within her, she wasn't sure.

Jenna spoke and Fife pulled her gaze back to her. She nodded, mostly because that was the only appropriate way to answer her.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

The shop was below a board walk that wound around the docks. It was a miracle the wooden beams had survived. Jenna certainly glanced upwards a few times as the wood creaked overhead as people walked overhead.

Their destination barely looked like a shop. A plaque made of a black wood had a black flower painted into it. One would have to look very closely to see what the sign was showing.

"This is where mages come for reagents when they don't want to be observed. Or registered," Jenna explained. She was here for ingredients that could be used for healing but also to make potent toxins.

Jenna pushed open the door. It was dark and dreary inside. A sweet scent of incense tried to cover the mix of herbs.

"Don't touch anything," Jenna said, nodding firmly towards a set of shelves half filled with glass jars. The jars held a rather wide variety of preserved organs.

 

[Fife]

It was no surprise that Fife had neither been here nor even known about the place. She walked in much the same as she entered all new things: half curiosity, half caution. Jenna's warning was appreciated but unnecessary. Fife had her arms pressed tight to her side as she stepped through the door and viewed the oddities on the shelves.

There were always rumors about where people went when they disappeared, and in a city like Elbion, a lot of those rumors included shops like this one. More things Fife wasn't thinking about.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

"You're not going to let me leave."

Lawrence stiffened. Raigryn was looking directly at him, with more understanding in his eyes that he had seen in weeks. It made him regret reducing the dose.

Well fuck you, he thought to himself as he placed down a tray laced with triple the usual dose.

---

Jenna waited for another customer to leave. They were the only ones inside the shop. The woman pulled her hood tightly around herself. She looked ashamed to be in the room.

The door closed softly. It was strange how the door creaked on the way open, but not as it closed. A minor enchantment of the hinges to keep the owner well informed of arrivals.

"You don't need any reagents for your magic?" Jenna asked Fife as she stepped up towards the counter. She was not wise to the dangers of revealing what Fife could do.

 

[Fife]

Fife was aware of the customer as soon as they entered, only giving her a single glance to glean what her mind didn't already reveal. Appearing to mind her own business was easy when she could read a person without ever looking at them. One could easily imagine why doing business here might feel taboo. She didn't spare her a second thought after her departure. The door was more interesting.

Instead, she met Jenna's gaze. It was an innocent question that there was no harm in asking or being answered. Fife shook her head and, with a small smile, tapped her temple. It was all up there. Not that she could explain to Jenna that all an Empath needed to practice was a relatively clear mind.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

"Well then we need Larpwort, noxus..." Jenna started listing. The man behind the counter scribbled on a sheaf of paper. There were no words for Fife to skim, everyone was a form of symbolic shorthand commonly used by alchemists.

"And we need porellia leaf and ground hallissa," Jenna finished, turning to Fife. "Those are for Raigryn."

A flash of nerves. She had questioned Lawrence on whether those would even help Raigryn, but he had been insistent. Jenna didn't have a mind for working through complex plots but she could tell this was more for show for Fife's benefit. She forced a thin smile and reached for the coin pouch at her belt.

 

[Fife]

Jenna took her turn at the counter, and Fife fell into the role of looking around while she waited. There were no other customers to watch, but there was plenty on the shelves. She listened idly to the list Jenna rattled off. As reluctant as she was to like anyone in the Steel Coin, the healer certainly was well versed in her trade. Fife could respect that.

Addressed, she looked back at Jenna. She smiled and Fife mirrored one back with a cart nod of her head. Jenna was nervous. Fife logged that fact away, but returned to her survey of the room. A few thoughts came to mind regarding the flutter of nerves. It was frustrating that she couldn't lead her in any sort of questioning on their way back to find out what about this made her unsure.

It made her miss Raigryn more. She missed her partner, her friend. She was one half of a thing that, without him, didn't fully function. The space between them felt impossibly far. Her mind turned sad and wistful as her eyes scanned toward the door. Soon, but not soon enough.

Not wanting to dwell on things and refusing to sniffle for no reason, Fife rallied her thoughts to more neutral territory. Rations and tinder boxes and blankets -- things that didn't make her feel so forlorn.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

With particular care Jenna packed away their cargo in a wicker basket. She lined it with cloth and then placed a few loaves of bread she had apparently been carrying on top. It gave slippery fingers something else to grab, though she expected Fife might give her a warning before that happened.

If Fife had ever risked a soldier's boot to the backside to visit the wealthy shopping districts of Elbion then she would find their next destination had changed a great deal.

Cracks in the road had been filled in with loose shingle and stone. Entire buildings had been collapsed. Rubble was strewn in the space between two shops where a third had been. There was no bustle to these streets any more. There was a sense of weary apprehension.

"The signs...those still standing...they show what the shops sell," Jenna explaining, having little on Fife's background. "I'll follow wherever you need to go."

 

[Fife]

Jenna concluded her business and they finally departed for the second half of their journey here. Fife passed a final glance across the morbid display of preserved organs on their way out and promptly put it out of her mind; whoever they belonged to couldn't be helped now.

Scanning the signs, she only turned back to Jenna once, and only to make eye contact with a kid not even as tall as she was as he approached the healer. He promptly changed his course and, her presence a little more validated, Fife went back to hunting for the right place.

The city was almost unrecognizable. Almost. Fife still spotted familiar pieces, whether unscathed or repaired. There was an odd sentimental value to it, even if she held only a few positive memories. In her current state, however, that bitter sentiment felt as real as her grief over Raigryn's missing lunasloth. She also hated it more than she had ever hated anything, loathed it for being the place she had been left and where every terrible thing had happened to her. Yet the sight of a single inn made her heart flutter at the thought of how much her life had changed because of one botched robbery.

By the time Jenna stopped in what was still very clearly a trade district, Fife no longer knew how she felt. Her moods were jockeying for control with every passing thought. It briefly occurred to her that Lawrence was monitoring the wrong Empath.

Right. She had seen Raigryn do this plenty of times. She could handle it, too. She could handle independence.

Doing her best not to think about Raigryn and the past while also drawing on them for reference, it was not difficult to decide which business to start with; there was something specific she needed if she was going to accomplish anything.

The stationer's sign boasted a book and quill. It was easily found, as Elbion was (she presumed) still the home of a prominent college. Fife knew exactly what she wanted and walked confidently up to the counter. After only a little frustrated gesticulating, she had a small slate and a pouch of chalk sticks.

The most important purchase made, she breezed past Jenna and set off the way they had come. She stopped by a smith and used her slate to scratch out what she needed clearly for him. A godsend, because she could not have made up a bullshit sign for tinderbox. She found a weaver and purchased a few heavy blankets to ward off the late winter chill. A supply of rations because she had no idea where they were going when they left.

What had felt daunting at first suddenly felt easier, more accessible. A few short stops later, she had the things she thought they needed. If it wasn't enough, there would be another town down the road to get that thing. Looking at the pack, Fife felt… proud. She had done it. A smile crept onto her. She was looking forward to telling Raigryn about it. The slate wouldn't work everywhere, but it was a small feat of progress for Fife.

Returning to the street, she smiled at Jenna, nodded, and stepped aside to let her lead the way back.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

Raigryn was worse. It wasn't a remarkable shift back to his most vacant state, but he was far less cogent than he had been in the morning.

Jenna tried to suggest he would improve as she fed him a tea of crushed roots that she knew would do nothing for the conditions. As far as she knew, Lawrence was just trying to give Fife some hope by trying out these remedies for other problems.

Lawrence made similar promises. He told Fife that Raigryn would by 'up and down' but he would certainly be well enough to leave within a few days.

And then he asked her to meet him before nightfall.

Fife was left with the choice. She could spend the rest of the evening with Raigryn, as painful as that might be with how little attention he paid her, or get the conversation with Lawrence over with.

 

[Fife]

Fife had lived most of her life without words. It was fitting that, when she was feeling raw and untethered, they fled her. Reduced to a silence in her mind that shaped no constructs like language, she was governed only by the nameless emotions she barely understood. They had names now -- some of them.

They were heavy. They were a burden, a weight she didn't want to feel anymore.

Raigryn was not better. She had been so happy and hopeful when she and Jenna had returned. The promise of departure and her eagerness to see his progress were immediately squashed. He had relapsed into a state of torpor. Fife might as well have been another wall in the room for all he knew her.

Jenna had been nervous again making her recommendations for treatment. Was this what she had been nervous about at the market as well? Was there more to this than they were telling her? Did they even know how this would work?

She had been too upset to ask. A part of her wanted to know. Needed to know. But a much more frightening thought had stayed her hand: what if this was permanent? What if she never got Raigryn back? It was growing more difficult by the hour to convince herself this was still the better choice, and Fife wasn't sure she could handle a revelation like that.

The overwhelming swirl of stolen Aspects circled her apprehension and fear like hunters closing in on their prey. She felt like her head was going to burst and the only person who could have helped her hardly seemed aware of her hands signing in front of him. Fife was exhausted and her control was wearing thin. She couldn't do this. She needed sleep. She needed release. She needed Raigryn.

Lawrence's summon was an excuse and she took it. She could not feel any worse about herself than she already did, to be thankful for a reason to step away from Raigryn. At worst, Lawrence was already waiting for her and this walk was pitifully short before she had nothing else to do but go back to Raigryn or make another excuse -- like running. She could absolutely run off this problem for a while. Burning up some of her spare Aspects might do her some good. At best, she would have some time to breathe before Lawrence came to talk about… Well, before he came to talk.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

A single tear rolled down Raigryn's cheek. It kept pausing, apprehensive at its journey, tickling his cheek. He tried not to acknowledge it; he did not know how closely they were watching.

It hurt, it hurt so very much to sit and stare at the wall when Fife was struggling so much. They had increased his dose and if they hadn't he might not have been able to keep a straight face. They were lacing his food now. The fog was always the most dense after his morning and evening meals.

He couldn't think through it to form any kind of plan. Raigryn had arrived at just one thought. They had made it stronger because he became too aware of himself. If he pretended to get much worse then they might lessen the dose. Hopefully before he entirely lost himself to it.

He didn't know what else to do. If he warned Fife they might kill her. He didn't even know if he would recover his wits at all, let alone in time to be of use.

---

Lawrence was already waiting patiently. He had never been a talented assassin because he was skilled with magic or able to strike the killing blow. He manipulated people and was exceptionally patient about it. He took calculated risks.

"I have a problem you could help me with Fife," he called out as she emerged. He was perched on a smooth rock, watching the light play with the shadows on the cliffs above them.

 

[Fife]

The walk was short, made shorter by the quick pace of anxious feet. She slowed, however, when he spoke and stopped close enough to hear but not so close as to be social. Apprehension clearly crossed her face and she held her hands loose at her sides.

A problem. More of her help. She waited for his reply, offering nothing but at least listening to him for now.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

"There is a very dangerous woman in Elbion. She used the chaos to get back inside the walls despite the price on her head."

A rival assassin. Available for private hire and working on their territory. They had used their contacts to put the price on her head.

"I could use your help in dealing with her before she kills again."

 

[Fife]

Fife listened to everything he had to say, unmoving. He wanted her help again with another job. A job in Elbion this time, but another nonetheless.

After a moment, Fife shook her head. A quiet, firm refusal. Blunt when not accompanied with any excuses or reasons why -- a fact she was well aware of and yet did not move to lift the small slate at her belt.

Lawrence had already ruined so much of their lives and still had the audacity to ask for more. Now, of all times, with a request that would take her away from Raigryn. She didn't want to be in Elbion if he caught a moment of clarity. She was afraid of coming back to something worse every time she left him.

Shame, however, blazed bright in the color across her face as that emotion swelled beyond its normal confines. Fife knew herself well, having had plenty of time in her own mind to become uncomfortably acquainted. The idea of getting to skip this part of Raigryn's recovery was tempting and that reality in herself was jarring.

She had come here for an excuse to be away, hadn't she?

Not privy to the thoughts in her head, Lawrence would only see her pause for a moment before shaking her head a second time more firmly. No. She was not doing another job. As soon as she was sure Raigryn could sit in a saddle again, they were leaving.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

"Of course you owe me nothing," he replied calmly. "I know that much."

This was a tight rope walk. On one side the carrot, the other, the stick. Too much of either would bring this crashing down. First a nudge towards temptation and if that did not work then it would have to be the most subtle warning. A threat wouldn't work. Not directly, anyway.

"You'd be paid, of course. Well paid at that. We will look after him. He won't be any worse off for you being away."

And being away meant that he could try and refine the dosing properly. It was gambling, rather than alchemy right now. Lawrence knew Raigryn had deteriorated more than expected again.

 

[Fife]

He pressed, friendly in a way that held no warmth. She didn't want to help him. She was not going to risk coming back to an even worse Raigryn. No matter how bad it seemed, this wasn't the worst he could be. She clung to that bitter reminder.

This wasn't about money. It wasn't about helping him. They were not her friends and she was not doing them any more favors. Fife stepped back and shook her head again in a firmer rejection.

 

[Raigryn Vayd]

"You should be careful," he said, tone becoming cold.

"In this part of the world...if people found out I was harbouring a pair of empaths...it could get dangerous."