Fantasy RPG Forum - Standing Trials

73rd of Ashan, 718

"Tell me about the men from Ne'haer," Quio told the bartender.

Quio was in his third bar of the day. His search for the pirates who had attacked him in Saun had turned up little. He had known the people of Foster's Landing would not give up anything the pirates wouldn't want them to give. But he'd thought they'd give up more than they had.

So, Quio had thought to pursue a different line of questioning.

The bartender looked at him obliquely. It was a look that said never something for nothing, and Quio tapped the bar to order a drink.

When the bartend had poured it, Quio slid it back to him across the counter. The man took the glass into hand, though he didn't yet lift it. He fixed Quio with another long stare. Then, expertly, he knocked the drink back.

"The men from Ne'haer," Quio repeated.

"I know of 'em," the bartender said. It should have been a surprise that the man knew them, except that trial-last Quio had come across another man, another barfly, who had also known of the men. People in Foster's Landing, it seemed, were at least aware of them.

"And?" Quio said.

"Don't know nothing much. Know they lost their ship to the Bloodlass," the bartender said.

The Bloodlass was the captain of the pirates who had come after Quio in Saun, though Quio had never met her himself. Still, he had known that the pirates had taken the men's ship.

"Know anything else?" he asked. He paid for another drink. The bartender poured it, and again Quio slid the drink back to the man.

The bartend knocked the second drink back.

"Couple of 'em been 'round these parts since Saun, abouts. Don't know where they are now, just know they been around," the bartender said.

"How do you know of them?" Quio asked. After an inquiring tilt of the head, he took the bottle from the bartender's hand and refilled the empty glass again himself. He set out another couple of coins, which the bartend collected.

This time the man nursed the drink, trying not to drink so much so fast as to get drunk. It was midday, and the man still had to work, and no doubt he wanted to keep his wits.

"There was a woman looking 'round for them," he said. "Didn't tell her nothing, really, 'least not what she ain't already know."

"And the woman?" Quio offered to pour again, but the bartender held out a hand.

"Don't know 'er personally. Just know what she look' like and that she kept asking 'bout those men."

"And?" Quio prompted again.

"She were dark-haired and pretty," the bartender said. He paused to glance at Quio's face for a trill, judging him. "'Round your age. Human or mixed. Had a scarred eye and a stern face that didn't give nothing. Strong-looking thing."

"Anything else?" Quio asked. The bartender shook his head.

"Ain't gonna rat on the girl, 'least not more 'n I already have," he said. He finished the double Quio had poured him. "'Sides. We're done. I ain't want more drink."

With that the bartend started wiping down the counter. He cleaned the glass he'd used with a rag. He glanced back at Quio with raised eyebrows, and like the man had said, Quio knew the conversation was over.

He nodded his thanks, and stayed and had an ale. When the ale was finished he left the bar.

He headed to the next bar over for another round of questioning.

---

Foster's Landing had a lot of pubs. Quio heard many accounts in the pubs of the person they called the one-eyed woman. She had asked around for the men from Ne'haer up through Cylus. That was the only reason why the men were of any interest to anyone now. Then, abruptly, she had stopped asking after them.

Quio wasn't sure what he himself wanted with the one-eyed woman. It was clear that she had some connection to the men from Ne'haer, which meant she was of interest to him. He thought maybe if he could find her, if he could see her, he might recognize her. He guessed that if he did recognize her, it would be from Ne'haer. And if he did recognize her, perhaps he might better understand her motivations.

So on the 74th he set up a watch for the woman in one of the pubs he'd been told she had frequented. The deal was that if the woman was sighted, the bartend would send a runner to the docks where Quio had been working. Quio paid the bartend gold in advance.

A few days later, he got a hit.

The runner ran up to him as he was playing a man at the docks for more information. They had set up a game of dice and cards. If Quio's opponent won he got gold. If Quio won, he got questions answered. He set down the cards in his hand and listened as the runner, a kid just eight or nine arcs old, whispered that the woman had been spotted on the streets.

Quio ran from the docks to catch her, leaving the cards on the table and a handful of coin that his opponent would most definitely take.

The kid ran beside him. They hurtled crates in alleys and used a shortcut the kid knew. By the time they got back to the bar, the woman was out of sight. But, the bartender said, "She went towards the bay." Quio ran back the way he'd come, the kid on his heels, and caught a glimpse of her two streets down as she turned a corner. "There she is!" the boy exclaimed, and he made to follow her but Quio held him back.

"What the fuck," Quio muttered. He tried to get another look but the woman was out of sight again.

"What is it?" the boy asked. The kid still looked like he wanted to catch up to her, but Quio didn't let him.

"I recognize her." And she wasn't from Ne'haer.

The woman was a mercenary from Rynmere. "She's dangerous," Quio said. He grabbed hold of the boy and held him by the shoulders so the kid would be sure to look at him. "If you see her again, never approach her. Not ever without someone else." He made the kid promise. What Quio remembered of the woman was that she did beatings, robbery. She had threatened to chop Tristan Venora's fingers off. Quio looked down at his own three-fingered hand.

Rynmere happened to be the only place, other than Etzos, that the authorities likely knew that Quio was a yludih. And the woman was from Rynmere, or at least she had worked in Andaris, and she was violent. And Quio had crossed her in the past.

And somehow, she knew the men from Ne'haer.

Quio curled his damaged right hand into a fist and kept looking down the street like she might come back, though she didn't.

But what did she have to do with the men? he had to ask.

---

On the 77th of Ashan, Quio set up a new watch. He paid multiple businesses good coin to keep track of the woman. He wanted to keep informed of her activities. He wanted to know if she ever displayed any odd behavior. Anything out of the ordinary would be reported to him. In the meantime, he began investigating in earnest who the woman was.

In eight days he found nothing about her. He didn't give anyone the information he had, that she was connected to Rynmere, because he felt he had to be careful about it. No one else had any other information. The best he got was that some folks seemed to think she was foreign. There were rumors she was involved with one of the Black Guard, but those were just rumors. Rumors or not they made Quio apprehensive, considering that members of the Black Guard also knew what he was.

Then, on the 85th of Ashan, Quio got another hit.

He was at the docks again when a runner came bounding up and said, "The one-eyed woman has been sighted leaving the Landing in favor of the wildlands."

"Which way did she go?" Quio asked.

"North," the boy said, and Quio sent him away with a piece of silver for his effort.

Quio made sure he was willing to confront the woman armed only with the small pocketknife he had. If it came to a fight, he knew he would be at a disadvantage, but so be it. He wanted his questions answered. The best information came from the source, and since his investigations hadn't learned him anything, he needed to question the woman herself. He would determine if she was an ally of the men, and if she knew anything useful about them.

So he went to the gates and he waited. The woman had gone to the north into the wildlands. If she was heading towards Etzos, she would have gone along the road or the river to the west. She hadn't, and Quio knew from experience that Foster's Landing was the only thing around for days' worth of travel. All he had to do was wait.

He estimated that by the end of the trial, the woman would be back.

---

It was as Quio was watching the gates, waiting for the woman to return, that it happened. He saw a group of men leaving Foster's Landing. As soon as he saw them, all thought of the one-eyed woman fled.

Because it was the men from Ne'haer.

Quio was slouched against a storefront, catercorner from the gates. He made up his mind as soon as he saw them. He turned his back on the men in case they looked over. Then he pushed from the wall he was leaning against, and walked until he found a suitable place to shift.

A street down he stepped into a deserted alley. He shifted forms from Korim Nji'ra to Earnest Freeman. Then he went back to the gates and, carefully, very carefully, he followed the men.

They were going north from Foster's Landing, and it didn't even register that that was the same direction the woman had gone before them.

It was strange, but Quio felt nothing, really, as he followed the men with the intent to kill them. There was no anger or hatred. He should have been afraid. But he wasn't. Or at least if he was afraid, he was aloof from it.

Thirty bits passed and he continued to follow them. If anything, he felt as he did when he was netting a fish, or how he had felt when he had gone hunting as a kid.

He felt focused. White deer, he remembered.

The men came to a stop a break into the wilderness.

Five of the men stayed together; three others continued to the north. The five conferred with one another and with a piece of paper they unfolded-- Quio guessed it was a map.

The three who went north had ranged weapons. There was an area of thicker forest northward, and Quio thought that must be where they were headed.

He thought about going after the three, but Quio preferred to have eyes on the majority. He only had the pocketknife still, and as the three lost themselves from sight, he got it out.

He had always planned to make the men's deaths quick and merciful. He had thought he might even kill them as they slept. If he did that, if he killed them in their beds, there would be no fear and little pain, no realization that he had come for them; they just wouldn't wake up. The men from Ne'haer didn't deserve quick deaths, not any of them, but Quio was not like them and he killed efficiently when he could.

He didn't think of killing them as revenge, more as a preventative measure. If he didn't kill them, he was certain they would go on to torment someone else. The only reason to kill them slow was if he wanted information. For instance, the men had planned to sell him. Quio had always wanted to know who the buyer was.

But, he thought, as he watched the five set up an ambush, the men would die quickly today. He wouldn't be going after information. He hadn't planned for it, hadn't planned any of this, and he knew there would be little opportunity for it. Killing all eight of them would be tricky. Killing them without dying himself would be even trickier. Perhaps, if he made it that far, he could linger with the last man and have a nice talk. But making it that far was a big if.

His best chance was to pick the men off one by one.

Quio couldn't fight eight or five or three of them at once; with his bad arm, he thought it likely he couldn't even fight two. But he thought he could fight them one on one if he had to. If he managed to separate them and attack each man alone, he felt even with the injured shoulder that he had an equal chance of killing them. He was faster than them and, he thought, smarter. The men as far as he knew weren't big on skill or strategy; they relied on numbers. He just needed to separate them out, and--

--and as he was about to continue his planning, an arrow flew from the trees to the north and struck one of the men in the eye, and the man fell down, dead.

It was tumult after that.

Quio had a split-trill to think that one of the men who had gone north had seen him and shot at him and hit the wrong person. Then the rest of the men scattered, spooked like rabbits, and this was it, this was his best chance. Quio sprinted after them.

Two of the men ran straight north towards the forest; two of them ran to the northwest. The men to the northwest were also heading for the trees, but they would be out in the open longer, and Quio thought he would be able to catch them before they made it. One of them ran quite slowly, and Quio went after him.

Perhaps the man caught a glimpse of him in his peripheral because he turned towards Quio and let out a shout.

Quio closed the remaining distance to the man fast.

The pocketknife drove deep into the man's throat, literally cutting the shout off. With all his strength Quio brought the blade out sideways. The knife, small but sharp, ripped through airway and artery and nerve and vein, and the man fell first to his knees, then to his back.

The dying man brought one hand up halfway to his throat and then lay still. The one who had been shot through the eye before had instantly perished. That was two.

There were six left. Quio stepped forward towards the next man.

The two men who had run straight north had disappeared already into the forest. The man left with Quio had an ax. He'd stopped running when his buddy had fallen. He looked at the dead man, throat severed, lying in his blood in the grass, and brought his eyes up to Quio's face. "Who--" the man said, voice choked, unable to get the rest out. Who are you?

"White deer," Quio said.

OOC: -100gn for information on/keeping track of Yana. Totally worth it.

Also, just in case it's confusing: from Quio's POV there are six men left bc he doesn't know Yana already killed three (the three Quio saw go to the north). Really, Yana has killed four of them and Quio one. So there's only three left alive.

White deer is a reference to something the men called Quio as a boy when they were hunting him.

Quio saw recognition come to the man's face.

"White deer," the man repeated, blankly, and then all of a sudden he knew. He knew. "You piece of shit murdering filth," he rasped out, not in shock-- in fury. Face white and full of rage, he came at Quio with the ax.

Somehow, Quio managed to duck the first swing that should have taken his head off.

It was a small pocketknife against the ax, and obviously the ax had the advantage. Quio dodged again, dancing back, as the man came at him. The man was angry, so angry, and Quio should have felt something, fear at least, but he felt nothing still. The man swung wildly; in three or four swings he only managed to graze Quio on the forearm. Red blood ran from a shallow cut halfway up from his wrist, and Quio waited for the man to swing wide again, and then he lunged in.

The pocketknife hit something hard in the man's chest, collarbone or rib, and shunted to the side, cutting a wide swath. But the wound wasn't deep, wasn't deadly, and Quio leapt back. Just in time-- he heard the ax as the man swung and missed.

The man screamed out his rage and pain, blood coming in a sheet down his front. Full of pure fury he swung again and Quio turned and ran towards the forest. Again he heard the swing of the ax as it swept by, inches from his back. "Come back here you murdering dog!" the man screamed, and gave chase.

Quio could have run much more quickly to the forest, but he didn't. He paced the man, keeping just ahead of him, until he got within twenty feet of the trees. Then he put on speed.

Despite the bad arm, Quio was fast. In a way he thought yludih were made for endurance, for out-surviving and out-spiting and outlasting their enemies; but while Quio was a yludih, he could also sprint. He broke into a series of jagged sprints, left and right, just fast enough to lose the man behind him, putting trees and rocks and distance between him and the murderous man who followed.

Out of the corner of his eye Quio thought he saw figures --maybe three of them-- in the forest to the left. He didn't know if they'd seen him, so he cut to the right and kept going.

A bit or so later, he slowed and risked a glance over his shoulder.

Though he could still hear the man pursuing him, Quio could no longer see him-- which meant the man could not likely see him, either. Abruptly, Quio looped to the side and pressed flat to a tree. He held completely still, like stone, or crystal.

When the man eventually passed him by, he didn't see Quio, not at first. That was all Quio needed. He lunged again.

This time the pocketknife cut a matching slice down the back of the man's shoulder into the middle of his back. The man twisted and bent and flinched away. The knife hadn't hit spine, Quio knew that, and the man, still bent haphazard, swung the ax and missed. Quio stung him again on the backswing, this time slicing deep into the upper arm.

"Fuck you!" the man screamed, shaking, and Quio jogged out of the way. His adversary bent double, bleeding from multiple places now, and tried to catch his breath. "I will kill you," he swore.

Quio didn't say anything. He just waited for the other to gather himself. When the man finally lunged out for him, Quio turned again and ran.

The endurance of yludih came, Quio thought, from not needing to breathe; as the man panted and swung and wore himself out, Quio kept just ahead of him. He ran the man until he was fatigued, and the man grew fatigued easily because he was bleeding and overexcited and in pain.

When Quio had said white deer, he had seen recognition come to the man's face. Now he saw when the wooziness hit. The man stopped running and Quio stopped with him, still just out of range. He bent again and put his hands on his knees. "Fuck-- fuck--" the man wheezed out, but couldn't finish the sentence. Quio stepped close and made to slash at him again--

And the man sprang at him, in one final burst of energy, and caught him unawares with the ax.

The ax clipped Quio on the side and caught. With a grunt of pain he clamped his elbow down over it, pinning it in place. Before the man could yank it back Quio grasped the handle of the ax and ripped it from the other's hands. It came easily enough; the man's hands had gone weak.

Quio wasn't sure how bad the wound was. It was in his right side and it hurt, it hurt, but he was still on his feet. If he was on his feet then the wound must not be debilitating. He knew a debilitating wound would have dropped him.

Blood wetting his side he lashed out a foot and caught the man in the leg. The man fell to his knees, gasping, and Quio lashed out again and caught him in the belly and chest, kicking him to the ground. The man lay on his back, still gasping, and Quio stood over him to see if he would try to get up. He didn't, and so Quio simply stepped back and waited.

He had bled the man from many wounds that, if singular, would not have been deadly. But altogether they were too much for the man's body to take, and along with all the running, they had exhausted him. Quio could see the color draining from his opponent's face. The man's eyes rolled and fluttered as he tried to stay awake. But soon enough he lost consciousness.

Quio wiped the pocketknife on his shirt to put it away clean. With the man no longer a threat, he did a perfunctory check of the wound in his side, hissing at the sight of his own blood. He had always hated the sight of his blood, and he tried to appraise the injury without letting himself get woozy.

The wound was messy and bleeding, ugly, the skin cut from his ribs. But there was no shine of light from it. Quio was relieved to be able to look away quickly. No light meant that it must not be very deep. Still, he took a moment to make sure he was okay to go on.

Then, with one hand holding his wounded side, and the other hand on the bloodied ax which he rested against his bad shoulder, Quio limped very quietly back through the forest in search of the rest of the men.

Two of the men he found dead on the ground in the leaves and the dirt. One of them had been shot through the neck, the other through the head. Another man he found with his throat slit, staring up at the trees. Quio had incapacitated two men and four more had been killed by someone else. Two men were left, somewhere, though it was possible they too were already dead.

And, somewhere nearby, was whoever had been killing them.

Quio held the ax ready to attack in his blood-wet right hand. Very very cautiously now, he continued his search.

The next man he found was shot full of arrows. He thought maybe that one was not yet dead. But he wasn't able to check, because it was then that he saw the woman.

It felt like his mind did a backflip as he tried to reorient.

It was her, the one-eyed woman. The merc from Rynmere. The one he'd thought might have been working with the men. He thought she had seen him, too, and if not he didn't want to startle her to violence. So he didn't retreat or try to stealth, just stood where he was.

His mind was still flipping into place. All he could think was that she had killed so many of them. She had killed so many, and he hadn't seen it, and he hadn't heard it. Quio kept a tight hold on the ax, but held up his good hand. It was a gesture that said don't attack me and I won't attack you.

He didn't want her to attack him. Even armed with the ax, he knew that was a losing fight.

"What are you doing here?" he asked the woman, though he wasn't sure if he was asking or demanding it. He couldn't make sense of this. "Why--" He was almost at a loss for words, but he made himself ask again. "Why? Aren't you an ally of theirs? Why did you kill them?"

The eighth and final man from Ne'haer lay at the woman's feet. Quio could see the man's throat was slit. One of his hands was separated from his body.

He was definitely dead.

The woman's good eye lingered on Quio's face. Her expression was flat, and as the bartender had said, her face gave away nothing. Even so, Quio thought she might be confused. He knew she didn't recognize him because, as far as he knew, she hadn't seen him in this form. He had been in his biqaj form in Andaris when they had met.

Usually he would have considered superior knowledge an advantage over a possible assailant. Against this woman, he didn't know if her lack of recognition would give him an advantage at all.

She was much better equipped than he was, and as she cleaned her blade he stepped sideways as if to circle her. He didn't step any closer, not until she put the sword and shield away, and reached for a quiver and bow. He made an abortive half-step forward then, not wanting to let her arm herself with a ranged weapon, knowing his chances of survival, should she fire at him, were slim. She was an excellent marksman. He had seen her work on four of the men's bodies. Three of them had been shot precisely to kill. The last had been peppered through.

But she looked up again, bow in hand, and he came no closer, recognizing an opportunity lost. He winced. That had been his only chance of catching her off guard, and he sensed from her stare that he wouldn't get another.

The woman fixed him in her gaze, the bow held loose but ready, an arrow nocked. If she didn't draw on him, Quio would continue his slow circling, watching her hands and face and feet, trying to resist the temptation to glance around and check for nearby cover. He didn't want to take his eyes from her, not even for a trill.

He remembered what he'd said to the boy in the streets of Foster's Landing. She's dangerous. She was more dangerous than he'd thought. She'd expertly killed six men, and had not, to his sight, earned a scratch. Meanwhile, Quio was hurt. He wasn't hurt so badly that he couldn't run, but he certainly wouldn't be able to run as fast nor as far as he normally would. Shit, he thought. "Who are you?" the woman asked.

"I used to have a shield just like the one you have there," Quio said, still circling ever so slightly if she would let him. He nodded his head at the shield she had slid onto her back. "Along with this--" he yanked the seashell necklace from his shirt and held it up so she might see, "--I recieved the shield from U'frek, nearly two years back." The alderwood shield U'frek had given him had had a specific design, which her shield shared. "But I don't remember you on that ship," he mused, looking closely at her.

If she had truly been working with the men, the shield she wore now might very well be proof of it-- it might be Quio's. The men could have gotten hold of it when they captured him, and she could have, in turn, gotten it from them. It wouldn't surprise him, had they taken it. They had taken everything else from him.

But if she had worked with them, why had she killed them? Quio kept coming back to that again and again. Why? He could only think she had worked with the men and that the deal, whatever it was, had gone wrong. But what betrayal would be worth their deaths?

Who are you? she'd asked him.

"My name is Freeman," Quio said. "I hail from Rynmere. I remember you from Andaris. You're a mercenary." She didn't seem surprised when he said he recognized her, though he was still confident she didn't recognize him.

"I had a grievance with these men," he said. That wasn't a lie. He held up his three-fingered hand. "They wronged me. Nearly killed me. Were going to sell me into slavery. I didn't let them." There was the brand on his cheek, and he didn't know if it would add any significance to what he was saying. He shrugged, the movement stiff because he could only use his one good shoulder.

"I have no quarrel with you," Quio said. That was only half the truth-- if she had indeed worked with the men, he would have to hurt her. Or he'd have to try. "You could kill me but I think we've spent enough time here, on these men. I've been in this area, and you never know when to expect the watchers in the woods."

The last time Quio had been north of Foster's Landing the pirates had come, and then Valance and his shadowhound Butcher, and then the Etzori escort Valance had meant to meet up with. He knew these woods were not as quiet as they seemed. If anyone was around, he didn't particularly want to be caught red-handed-- literally. He wouldn't be going into custody willingly.

"So if you don't mind I'll check the bodies and be on my way. I wanted one alive, but--" he shrugged again. "Most likely they're gone."

He thought the man dead at the woman's feet was Tedrik. Tedrik was the man who had had Quio's mother's ring --the ring made from the crystal they'd stripped from her before they'd killed her-- and Quio wanted that back, so he could bury it. He pointed. "If that man has a ring, I want it. It's mine. One of them might also have a pearl sea shell. That's also mine and I want it back."

"Other than that, you can have anything you find on them. I don't care about their blood money. I'm done." He realized, belatedly, that his hands had started to tremble. He tried not to let the woman see.

It was starting to sink in that it was over. The men from Ne'haer were dying or dead. They couldn't hurt him again. They couldn't hurt anyone. Quio let out a shaky breath.

"They're done," he corrected. Another shaky breath. "It's over, at least for them."

That he had been on the Humble Son puzzled her, and he had to concede that she might, actually, have been there. It had been a tallship like she'd said, and the shield was proof of it, if it wasn't his after all. If she had been on the ship it also made sense that she didn't recognize him from there. She wouldn't recognize Freeman. On the Humble Son, Quio had been in his biqaj form. His biqaj form was the only form she would recognize.

He was doing his utmost not to look weak. The woman had a quick eye, and he was worried she would notice that he was having trouble controlling his breath. His side hurt, ached like fire and glass, and eventually he had to stop circling her or he would start limping again. Though he wanted to take a rest he knew he couldn't as long as she was there. She could kill him in an instant.

She had chuckled when he had said she could kill him, and it had been a dead laugh, empty-faced and --to his ears-- threatening. But something had stopped her. Instead of attacking, she merely motioned to the body at her feet, the one called Tedrik. Quio waited until she had stalked away, to another of the bodies to collect arrows, before he stepped over to the dead man's side.

He had noticed before that she had slit Tedrik's throat, and Quio could not help but remember that he had had the chance, as a boy, to kill Tedrik much the same way. But he had not. He had let the man go and it had been a mistake. Tedrik had been the worst of these men. A murderer and rapist. Quio knelt, breathing against the wet pull in his side, and riffled through the man's pockets --no shell-- before looking at his hands.

Tedrik only had the one hand now. The other lay severed from his body, and it was upon that pinky finger that Quio found the ring. He brushed his good shoulder against his face as if to wipe away sweat, and wrestled the ring from the man's finger. Like his breathing, his hands were quickly losing control. They were shaking very badly now.

His hands were shaking enough that Quio almost dropped the ring when he got it off, and his body rushed with some approximation of adrenaline, much much too late. He glanced up to keep eyes on the woman, and she was looking at him, and something about her posture screamed anger. Quickly now he got the ring in his pocket. As he did, he was distracted by another ring, this one on Tedrik's ring finger. He recognized it instantly, how humans would recognize bone from rock.

It was yludih crystal. Another ring made with yludih crystal.

They had shorn the fingers from his hand.

His stomach lurched and momentarily, he forgot about the woman's anger. He was trying so hard not to look weak and he didn't know what to do with this information. What was he supposed to do? Take the ring. Leave it. He looked up again for the woman, just so he could take his eyes away from the ring--

And saw her pointing an arrow at him. He stumbled up to his feet, off-balance, side pulling, and the arrow whizzed past his head and embedded in the tree next to him.

He was running.

Towards her. Quio was running towards her.

She had said something, and he swung out at her with his fist. He had dropped the ax when he had seen the crystal rings, and it was only the last word that broke through, beqluh. Stone man or stupid man, in the language of the yludih. He pulled the punch, and saw it probably wouldn't have landed anyway, and his fist met only air. He took a few staggering steps back. Trying to bring to mind what she had said in full. Snarling in reaction to the arrow she had shot at him.

"Who are you?" he spat out, in Ulehi, and then, like when he had first seen her in the forest, his mind jumped backwards and suddenly he knew. "Yanahalqah?" he said.

It was her.

She had shot at him. He had tried to strike her. There was a mix of emotions on her face that he couldn't read, and he had never seen her face before. He had never seen her face. He took the couple of steps forward and, if she let him, he would grab her into a fierce, one-armed hug, holding it for as long as she allowed. He hadn't seen her, hadn't seen anyone he trusted not to kill him, since Saun last year.

When he pulled back from the hug, he shifted to the form she would most recognize, his biqaj form. It hurt to shift when his ribs were cut up, but it was only right that she see the form she would recognize. His biqaj form was true to his age, a decade or so younger than the form of Earnest Freeman, and his hair had been shortened since she had seen him in Andaris. The short hair made him look younger still. His biqaj eyes swirled, red and purple and pink, startling in their intensity. "What are you doing here?" he asked. "How did you find me?"

She had said something before, you couldn't have popped in, and finally he responded, as if her words had only now caught up to him, "I'm sorry-- I couldn't contact you. I tried. I tried but something's wrong and I can't--" He shook his head. He couldn't get to the Uleuda, and he didn't know why. "I can't." And his damn hands were still shaking.

The ring felt heavy in his pocket, and the other ring was still on Tedrik's hand. Tedrik had worn a piece of him. They had crippled Quio, nearly killed him, and how many rings would they have made of him if he had died? Yanahalqah had seen him in the Uleuda, seen his suffering, and offered to end it. He remembered the spear of light in her hand. But he had gotten away-- from the despair that almost killed him, and from the men who had tried. And she had killed them for what they had done. She had come here, and she had killed them. For him.

"You-- thought I was dead," he realized. "I'm sorry." How many rings would the men have made, if something had gone wrong today, and they had killed the both of them? What if she had gone after them alone, and against all odds the men had killed her?

"I need to sit down," he muttered, probably not loud enough for her to hear.

Slowly, with a hand to his side, he dropped into a crouch. He had known her as the mercenary from Rynmere before he had known her as herself, and that didn't feel right. But it was her. Yanahalqah. She had been the Leader, and she had saved his life again today. How many times had she saved his life? Was that the third time?

"You came here and killed them," he said, and looked up at her. "Thank you. Thank you. I only wanted for them not to be able to hurt anyone again."

As Yana looked away from him, Quio looked her over briefly, feeling as if he had missed something but not knowing exactly what he'd missed. His eyes swept Yana from head to foot as if to search for injury-- though it appeared that she wasn't hurt. Just in case he looked her over again, more carefully this time, trying to really see. Nothing. She was not wounded. Still, something didn't feel right.

She had been reluctant to let go of him before. As he'd thanked her, she had looked away.

She had muttered that she was only keeping her promise.

He could remember the last time they had met. It had been nearly an arc ago, and they had had to say goodbye. He could remember clearly because it had been important. I thank you, he had said. Thank you, Yana. This is twice now you have saved me. That meant it was three times, today.

This is it, then.

Yana had said, “And if you don’t get back… I’ll travel to Ne’haer and finish the job myself. And that is a promise.”

I was only keeping my promise. She had been angry, when she'd realized it was him.

Back then she'd said, “I’ll see you soon, Quiome.”

But he hadn't come back, he hadn't, and now here they were.

"Are you alright?" Quio asked, still looking up at her. It was clear she was not injured, and his eyes searched her face as if he would finally detect whatever it was he couldn't quite see.

"It's alright--" he said. I'm alright, he almost added, but didn't. Despite needing more time to properly recover he grimaced and, wobbling only a little, started to rise from the crouch. When she offered her hand he took it. Once he was on his feet he stood sturdily enough. His eyes continued to search her face.

She had asked if he had reclaimed everything they had taken from him and Quio didn't know how to answer. Finally he gave a simple shake of the head.

Wordlessly he offered her the crystal ring that had been in his pocket. As she looked at it, he headed over to Tedrik's body and removed the other ring from the man's ring finger. He walked back and offered that ring for Yana as well to see.

"My mother's," he said, indicating the first ring. When her gaze fell on the second ring, he held up his three-fingered hand. "Trophies," he said. "I'll be right back." After a hesitation he held out his hand in a manner that suggested she could walk with him if she wanted. Otherwise, he would meet up with her again in a bit.

Quio stalked from fallen man to man, moving as quickly as his hurt side would let him. None of the men had the seashell U'frek himself had given him, and Quio swore under his breath.

The man Quio had sliced up and bled wasn't where the yludih had left him, and Quio followed a trail of blood and mussed grass to where the man was slouched on the ground not far away, his back against a tree. As Quio stepped closer, though, it was clear that the man had perished. He didn't react when Quio hunkered down next to him, and there was no sign of life or breath.

Quio reached out and checked the man's pulse at his wrist, but there was nothing. He pressed two fingers to the man's neck, but there was no heartbeat. The man's eyes were closed, his chest still. His expression was peaceful despite the manner in which he had died.

For a moment the yludih could do nothing but look at him. Anger welled within Quio like hot water, but there was no use for it; the man was dead, and Quio could not hurt him more. He roughly searched his pockets instead. The man didn't have the seashell either, and Quio stood. The anger had worsened-- it radiated from him like steam. If Yana had come with him he would turn to her and nod his head that they could get going. If she had stayed back, he would return to her before doing the same.

He hadn't staunched the bleeding in his side or even managed to still the tremors that seemed a backlash of the fighting they'd done. But Quio had had worse pain, and had traveled farther than he needed to today under far more dire straits.

He was okay. Angry, so angry that he dared not speak, but alright to walk.

For a handful of bits Quio limped close by Yana's side, getting used to the horrible stitch in his ribs as he mulled over the men's deaths. He hadn't managed to collect any information from them, and he had thought he would be alright with that but he wasn't. He was infuriated. Worse yet, the peaceful look on the final man's face kept coming back to mind.

He knew it was stupid to be angry at dead men. He knew it, but he just couldn't stop.

Though he didn't want to, he made himself take deep, calming breaths. After a bit or so, his eyes, which had become near-black and wrathful, bled to brown and a softer, lighter grey. He looked over at Yanahalqah. For a moment his expression turned stricken, as if with great pain or sorrow. Then he took another deep breath as they continued to walk, and he began quietly to speak.

His voice was low but steady as he recounted everything that had happened since she had last heard of him. How he had escaped the men's ship, and washed up on an unknown shore. The hardships he'd faced trying to figure out where he was, and how he had followed a pair of ships --including the men's ship-- southward, where he came across Foster's Landing. How, outside of the Landing, a band of pirates had tracked him and how he had nearly been captured --again-- before the watchers had found and helped him. From there, the Black Guard had taken him north along the river towards Etzos.

Quio had come to the city of Etzos with little, in poor shape --wounded, marked, and outed as a yludih-- and with no money and nothing, no one. The kindness of a man he'd met in the mill town outside Etzos had allowed him to survive that first season, until he was healed enough to find temporary work. With one bad arm, though, and the mark of an immortal, finding employment had not been easy.

It was only earlier in the season that Quio had finally felt strong enough to go back to Foster's Landing. He had wanted to find the people who had wronged him. Both the men from Ne'haer, and the pirates.

"I hope it doesn't cause you trouble," he said, "But I had you surveilled once I started looking for the men from Ne'haer. I wanted to figure out your connection to them." It had only cost nearly all of the money he had saved up since coming to Etzos, but he thought it must be worth it. Had he not paid for the surveillance, he would not have met up with Yana again. "I'll call the surveillance off once we get back to town," he said.

He was quiet for a moment, then he added, "And should it come back on us, I'll take the blame for this. I'm the one who's been hurt; I'll say I went after the men on my own. If I tell them the truth about what they did to me--" The words caught. "Maybe they'll let me off for wrongs righted." He shook his head.

Should they come across a stream while wandering back towards the Landing, Quio would stop to clean his hands, arm, and shirt of blood as best he could. No amount of water, however, would wash the blood from his shirt completely, especially as he was still bleeding-- silver blood now, instead of human red. After a consideration he shucked the shirt and left it near the stream. He had picked up the ax and brought it with, and he rinsed that of blood-- and his pocketknife for good measure. He dried the metal very carefully so it wouldn't rust.

He thought it apparent that he and Yana would need to enter the city separately. Yanahalqah wouldn't need an excuse to get in, and it was better she not be seen with him. Quio was injured; he would likely be questioned at the gates. As they drew closer to the city he murmured, "I'll tell them there was an accident while I was out cutting wood. That I tripped and fell on my ax."

With that, he stopped walking as if to let her go ahead of him. It would be easier for her to get into the city if she went before him, especially if the guards stopped him. He didn't expect the guards to press, but if they did he supposed he'd figure out what to do as he came to it.

After all.

That was what he always did.