[OOC: Sorry for the delay, folks, but the bard went and stuck me with another
long-winded one, again! But this should more or less wrap up the thread, apart from a closing letter Crow'll leave for Kingsley ... unless you want to show how the Borcan responds to the 'puzzle', that is, Moral.
]
***
Hmph. Touchy, touchy, are we…? The Borcan’s social camouflage was improving, as was his capacity to rein in that roiling temper, but he had a long way to go before the bard would cease to see right through his false poise. Buchvold would surely never approach
Kingsley’s artful finesse, where such psychological skirmish-tactics were concerned; still, at least the man’s ploys demonstrated ample
spirit, if little originality.
Like those dryly-snide criticisms he’d voiced earlier, about Crow’s Listening Coin spell –
And I suppose having some wretched ghostly ear
floating in the middle of the dining hall, for all to see, would’ve been an improvement? You’d think a Fraternity illusionist
might at least begin
to appreciate subtlety, if any wizard could… – or the all-too-predictable “surprise” that his reluctant ally had indeed stuck him with another errand. (Granted, that he’d been dispatched to Liffe
was a surprise … but only because he’d been planning to drop by the island, anyway. The musician had been roaming in Darkon for four weeks straight – long enough to imperil the meager decade of memories he
could lay claim to, should he tarry any further in the lich-king’s realm – and the mere thought of
riding to a terrestrial border made his ill-treated ankle throb
sforzando.) Or the pompous way the nobleman had impugned the bard’s competence, by questioning his judgment in steering the Paridoner – a base slandering of the spy’s tradecraft, that offended him far more deeply than bloody
Buchvold would ever know – then blamed his nation’s
probate courts for his own tardiness in delivering Taroyan’s journals. As if Crow didn’t know perfectly well that no FoS member’s
real personal documents would be allowed to slip into the hands of prying government bureaucrats!
Or the stratagem the VRS spy had been
expecting Buchvold to try, sooner or later, ever since he’d first made a note of the Borcan’s chronic fondness for invisibility. In a way it was almost
cute, that the man did such obvious things, without noticing how predictable his clichéd tactics made him. The hackneyed traditions of
opera, clearly, had a lot more than bigotry to answer for, in the merchant-mage’s character.
The impishness in Crow sparked as he shucked off his stockings, but he firmly quashed its impulse – he’d done
enough impetuous risk-taking for one day, thank you – and tossed the wadded-up socks at the closed door of his suite: a wordless expression of scorn for his “departed” ally. Wordless, because the
persona he’d revealed to the man in November was as short-spoken as “Brother Crow” was, garrulous … and because he was
listening, with a trained eavesdropper’s practiced attention. No sound rewarded his effort, but he’d seen for himself how the wizard was capable of holding his tongue – or his breath – if circumstances made it prudent: overheard breathing or the like would have
substantiated the bard’s suspicion, but silence constituted no proof of absence.
Really, did the Borcan
honestly believe him so stupid? Or did his grudging “ally” have his
own sort of game in mind? Either way, the bard had no objection to being underestimated; it was precisely what much of his con-artist’s repertoire of strategies relied upon.
(In truth, the bard held no
lasting grudge against Buchvold. Interrogations were a hazard of his calling he’d long ago made his peace with, and he’d sought payback for the beating in Lechberg for
principle’s sake – such brutality cried out for justice, irregardless of whether or not its target happened to be him – not revenge. Granted, stinging the Borcan’s pride was a hell of a lot of fun, but he’d have to ease off the pestering before
too much longer, lest their working relationship suffer unduly: galling and aggravating though it was, Crow had too much use for the man to risk losing him.
(Still, tossing his stockings at the vacant patch where he was
fairly certain the invisible illusionist yet stood – near enough to the door to have opened and shut it without telltale floor-creaks or footsteps; far enough aside not to find himself trampled, if Crow chose to set his garments out for the hotel’s washerwoman – had been awfully tempting….)
Oh, just stop
it. Grow up a bit, already: even if you did
slip badly with Kingsley, you’ve more professional pride than this!, the bard mutely berated himself, pinching the bridge of his nose out of irritation at his own petulance.
The man may be an overbearing boor, but he’s hardly in a position to turn the tables at this
stage of the game – apart from all else, his own Frat-brothers would vivisect him on the spot if they suspected a tenth
of what he’s told a non-member by now – and some tasks actually require
a sledgehammer’s approach.
And besides, you know it’s really
not his attitude that’s irritating you. It’s that you were so looking forward to his reaction, when you told him about that little prank
you’d pulled on his colleagues in the Brautslava cell: how some unscrupulous cad’s been spreading baseless rumors all over Darkon that the Institute’s student honor society – or was it a fraternity,
perhaps? rumors can be so
deceptive and contradictory at times, particularly if they involve party-starved college students… – was paying five times the going rate to hire an orchestra’s-worth of musicians
for their post-Solstice “Dawn After Darkest” end-of-term bash! Thought for sure he’d pick up on that “gaffe” in your tale to the professor, but he stormed off without bothering to ask why
you said you’d gone there, to be rebuffed in your request for help. Kingsley
spotted it for sure – perhaps she’ll
be amused, to hear the Institute’s staff whine of how they were inundated by vagabond off-season troubadours, wandering the campus in the week before Darkest Night, asking about “the fraternity” – but reading between the lines from a distance doesn’t seem to be Buchvold’s
strong point.
Oh, well. It’d still been a way to keep himself
amused, given that he was roving the length and breadth of Darkon to search for Van Rijn anyway. Irritating the wicked was the closest thing to a
hobby the VRS spy allowed himself – his music could be every bit as functional of a craft as his spy-skills, so couldn’t be classified as purely recreational, however-loved – and while such trivial harassment of Mr. Buchvold had gone about as far as Crow ever intended to take it, his pestering of the Fraternity
itself had scarcely even begun to manifest. He’d work with the malignant organization so long as necessity demanded, but he
didn’t have to
respect it, by any means.
And besides, the ploy
had gotten a hell of a lot more of his fellow-performers out of the
cities – and hence, clear of any potential
second Requiem – than any direct effort to warn others of the
true threat could have. Nine years of abortive doomsayers and unanswered paranoia had long since inured the general Darkonian populace to the prospect of history repeating itself. He might’ve had better luck
next year – not least, because a decade’s span had separated Il Aluk’s demise from the Great Upheaval, and a morbid expectation that the Land of Mists was predestined to suffer yet
another mass cataclysm in 760 was widely promulgated by the ranting-streetcorner-lunatic set – but for the Solstice just past, nobody wanted to hear it. And even the best lies he could devise wouldn’t persuade the average, sedentary
civilian to abandon home and hearth, and run for cover into the black depths of Darkest Night … not on the word of a passing stranger who couldn’t afford to
linger, and continually reiterate his story, anyway.
Luckily, a hefty majority of his
bardic compatriots led nomadic lifestyles anyway, and those of vast Darkon, especially so. While doom-and-gloom predictions would’ve only made them laugh, the prospect of easy work and easier coin had been more than sufficient to set a goodly number of his more poverty-stricken colleagues on the road to Stagnus Lake, even in December. Nor would getting tossed off the campus by the Institute’s
security-stewards be an unprecedented experience for most: it wouldn’t be the first time a rumored employment-opportunity proved ephemeral. Crow hoped that Brautslava’s guardians were wise enough not to have broken
many bones or instruments – while
individual bards were far from inviolate, it wasn’t considered good business-sense to needlessly antagonize the Core’s unofficial information-network
as a whole – or that, if they
had employed excessive force, his fellow-entertainers had done the sensible thing and retreated. He wouldn’t want the retaliatory
trashing of the Institute’s reputation to be
so severe, the school would be forced to shut down due to loss of revenue: the VRS spy liked knowing where the Fraternity’s primary Darkonian branch was headquartered.
Whatever the outcome of his “prank”, he’d shielded his fellow
musicians as best he was able. His personal obligation to Art had been fulfilled, without imposing any appreciable delay upon his mission. Given how folklore and Van Richten Society reports alleged that entertainers’ talents were
mutilated by undeath – how their creativity was smothered by bitter despair and all native joy and passion were leached from performances gone hollow – the bard couldn’t have brought himself to do any differently:
dying for his Society’s cause, Crow had likewise made his peace with, but the prospect of having to lumber about
afterward repulsed him even
more profoundly than it did, most of his VRS associates! The spy would save a
child from becoming Slain before he’d rescue another
musician from such a ghastly fate, but not many others rated higher on his personal priority-list. The loss of one’s
gifts would constitute a whole additional dimension of torment, a bereavement that would vastly compound all the others.
(The bard’s
wrists itched at the thought, and he clenched his teeth to suppress the impulse to scratch. Again, no
weakness, no inadvertent admissions to invisible Buchvold.)
Work, he
had to work, and to rest his body in readiness for same. He could afford no careless
mistakes with the Borcan, no lapses of self-discipline as there’d been with Kingsley. He’d gotten
carried away, that’s all – that must be it,
had to have been it – and let slip “Pavel” out of the sheer intoxication of the chase, the heady thrill of a duel well-fought. Their dialogue had been such
fun, had roused his faculties and challenged his wits like no discourse he’d savored in months, that he’d subconsciously
resisted having it come to an end, and must have let the name slip to ensure that their
next encounter would be no less tense or intellectually stimulating. Naturally that was it,
of course it was! It
must be!!!
It couldn’t possibly – couldn’t conceivably – simply be a sign that Crow was lonely, always interacting through and in and behind his intricate defensive framework of lies…
(The bard was
very good at lying, even that unique brand of deceit that his subconscious imposed on himself. Trouble was, his training and experience at spycraft had made him exceptionally good at
spotting lies, as well! The dark-curled musician would have a great deal to think about in Mortigny, not all of it to do with either Gertrude Kingsley
or his own forgotten past.)
Shaking off his pensive digression, Crow realized he’d
not veiled his tightness of jaw, so he covered his tension with another irritated look, and barked aloud a scatological critique of the twenty-odd generations of
Buchvolds who’d ever afflicted the Land of Mists with their presence. He snatched up the page the illusionist had laid on the bedside table, next to the reclaimed Tao forgery, squinted at it in the dimness of the sealed-up room. Face fuming, he lit the hurricane lamp at the bedside – damned if
he was going to flounder across the room and crack open the shutters, in front of the bloody
mage – and committed the Liffe contact’s address to memory, then rolled up the note and slid it into the lamp’s open top, to blaze up and incinerate within the glass chimney’s confines.
Again, the bard doubted if anyone but an undertaker (if not a zombie-hunting adventurer) would ever lay eyes upon
Jeffery Terrence in this world, again. Three chances in five, he’d lay odds it was a case of mistaken identity – the physical description of the sorcerer which Buchvold had circulated to his informants was hardly unique to the turncoat alone, and Crow knew well how easily a fugitive’s guise could be changed, with or without magic; besides, who’s to say Terrence showed the Fraternity
his real face at the Manoir, any more than the bard had? – and one in five that it was some manner of trap, whether engineered by Van Rijn himself, or by some other faction (Kargat, maybe? They surely knew that
something grim was afoot within the FoS’s ranks by now…) seeking insight into the loyalists’ counteroperations. The last one-in-five was either a lie on the contact’s part – he’d warned the Borcan not to make the reward for information
too large, but since when did the noble listen to the likes of
him? – or a genuine sighting of the sorcerer, quite possibly on the run from
Van Rijn as well as the Fraternity. If Terrence
was alive, it was either because the lich had a clear, concrete need for his catspaw to
stay that way (were there
more living-member-keyed booby traps out there, at other secured FoS sites? Nasty thought!), or because the sorcerer had caught on to just how
expendable he truly was, and scampered.
If the latter were the case, perhaps Crow
would have cause to search for the fugitive, after all.
Not just to reconnoiter his movements on
Buchvold’s behalf, but to pump Terrence for information on both the lich
and the Fraternity of Shadows, itself … and then eradicate all memory of their encounter, so whichever faction eventually caught up to the sorcerer wouldn’t learn who
else had been keen on what the traitor had to reveal. Sabotaging the recollections of a lightning-hurling
mass murderer would scarcely be grounds for any moral qualms on the bard’s part; he’d employed the technique on such proven villains before, to good effect.
Just because Crow was working
with Buchvold didn’t mean he was working
for him, no matter how he’d let the wizard’s smug conceits convince him otherwise. The Borcan didn’t need to know
everything that Crow did, and the bard had more extracurricular shenanigans in mind than his annual visit to the Sorrows. That Buchvold was chasing off to
Sithicus only made things easier, from the VRS spy’s perspective.
As he reached to extinguish the hurricane lamp – and leaned over its ash-flecked chimney as if checking the note had burnt up completely, so the invisible illusionist wouldn’t see his eyes dart to the crumpled
stockings, noting each detail of
how they lay strewn at the door’s edge – Crow softly chuckled to himself. Making things easier for the bard seemed an inadvertent hobby on
Buchvold’s part … like the way he’d ordered Crow, explicitly and sternly and in full, never to steal anything “whilst I’m not present”. Again, it was almost
cute, how the man’s cunning consistently outsmarted itself.
Granted, the total number of coins he’d filched from Buchvold’s own
pockets in the past month – not to mention the twin Skulls he’d mooched for his surveillance-spell today, or various other tidbits of currency he’d borrowed, then “forgotten” to return the change for – wouldn’t even add up to the cost of the
outfit the illusionist’s nephew had lent him! But it was the
principle of the thing: whoever or whatever the bard
really was, he was
not a man to let others – be they respected VRS associates or the despised, unseen bastards themselves – tell him what to do, or think, or be, without
some show of defiance.
(Oh, and seventeen pens. It was childish in the extreme, but something in Crow just could not resist nicking Buchvold’s
pens, every chance he got! The bard chuckled again, as he imagined how they would look on display in his off-Core hideaway’s trophy-case, when –
if – this over-lengthy mission ever came to a close.)
Perhaps triggered by his moment’s calming flight-of-fancy, a
genuine yawn seized hold of the spy’s physiognomy – he wasn’t sure how many hours of sleep he’d grabbed on the hotel room’s floor last night, while the wizard hogged the bed, but it sure-as-perdition
hadn’t been enough to make up for his last weeks’ hellish riding and quest – and both his eyelids abruptly felt about ten pounds heavier. For all that his hyperactive wit and drive conspired to conceal the fact, Crow wasn’t as
hardy a man as his svelte bearing and agile mannerisms implied: he’d run his body into the ground on missions many times before, and recognized the signs of an impending ‘crash’, that would make sleep mandatory with or without his approval. Maybe Buchvold’s brusque “departure” wasn’t such a bad thing, after all: he’d have felt a right
fool, had his recent exertions caught up with him in mid-argument.
Nothing to be done about it, the bard grudgingly allowed. He’d have liked to mess with the Borcan’s dignity a little longer, so long as the invisible wizard’s pretended “absence” restricted the other’s freedom to retaliate – to compose, aloud, a ditty about snotty Lechberger banking-brats whose
servants did all their thinking
for them, perhaps? – but Crow doubted he’d stay alert long enough to finish its
chorus, let alone concoct any good verses. Instead, he settled for unwrapping the copper coin from his knotted handkerchief (an entirely
unenchanted chip-piece, though he’d led Kingsley to presume it was dark-enspelled), and held it up to his ear, features composed as if listening intently.
This particular chip wasn’t enchanted as a
receiver, either. If Crow’d wanted to monitor
Buchvold in such a manner, he’d hardly have revealed his spell’s workings to the man, by inviting
him to listen in on this morning’s charade! But the bard had to allow the dour mage
some notion of his capabilities, to keep the Borcan convinced of his usefulness. He needed the wizard to be as much
partner as patsy, if their mutual aim of Van Rijn’s downfall and the plans’ recovery was to be achieved … not to mention keeping the bard’s lack of valid FoS membership concealed, for the
illusionist’s own safety now (for the Fraternity was hardly in a mood to mollycoddle the loose-lipped, these days) as much as Crow’s.
Still, picturing the Borcan’s blanch at the dawning realization that the bard
could have been planting such Listening Coins on
his person, all this time (!), was a pleasant image for the spy to call it a day on. Not to mention how the wizard would frantically search his own
body for such a coin, once he really
did exit the room, dumping out change from his pockets and inspecting the currency via Detect Magic, all the while
trying to be silent. All right, granted the mage wasn’t visible at the moment, so his
reactions wouldn’t be visible, either … even so, it was a notion to be prized.
Frowning as if in disappointment, Crow set the coin aside on the bedside table – no need to
mark it, to see if Buchvold would attempt a swap; he’d already covertly scored the soft copper’s rim with his thumbnail, whilst executing his sleight-of-hand display for the professor – and slipped his weary frame under the bedcovers. Sparing in its refinements or not, the Riverview Rest
wasn’t lax in its provision of linens. The aristocratically-bred Borcan had grumbled uncharitable remarks as to the sheets’ low quality, but to the VRS agent – long accustomed to napping on rickety cots or in bedrolls laid over floorboards, although his
higher-toned missions occasionally saw him bedded down amidst brushed velvet and satin – the crisp, fresh-laundered fabric was luxury.
Pity the Borcan
was almost certainly still in the room, as the bard’s usual preference was to sleep ‘in the raw’. Not a penchant popular
or reputable in the staid and prudish Core, where few wedded couples of rank so much as shared a bedchamber, though he’d heard that standards differed in at least some of the farther-flung realms.
He’d picked up the shocking habit in the course of a prior investigation … one which had tested the spy’s
versatility as an infiltrator to new heights. (That true-born
werewolves could instinctively distinguish humans from their own kind was a proven fact, and had bloodily stymied all documented attempts by monster-hunters past to penetrate their social order. The
druid who’d assisted his prep-work for the mission, however, had been as good as her word: the minor clan of Stonebreakers Crow’d targeted had included no shaman, so none of the lycanthropes were equipped to detect that the “orphaned”
wolf cub they’d freed from a trapline and reverently adopted was nothing of the sort. The actual
polymorphing had stung like a hive-full of wasps, but his rational mind and aptitude for ‘fitting in’ had been spared him. His insider’s report on the weres’ pack dynamics had been invaluable to the Society’s other, more conventional field-agents, and well worth the risks entailed … even if Crow never,
ever, ever wanted to taste venison again, no matter
how thoroughly cooked.)
Granted, the bard didn’t give a damn what Buchvold thought of him … but again, there were his
scars to conceal. And if some Mist-bound realms were
less stringent than the Core,
Paridon was anything but! The bard didn’t
seriously expect Kingsley to disturb his rest – not for any reason short of the hotel’s catching fire, at least; it would be rude, and Milady Scalpel simply didn’t
do rude – but sleeping unclad after talking to
her seemed downright crass, an unfitting epilogue to their ever-so-mannerly conversation.
In any case, the spy didn’t want to get
too comfortable, fine linens or not. The longer he held off sleep, the more he’d learn of Buchvold’s intentions … and of the illusionist’s
abilities, which was the
real reason he’d invited the Borcan into his scheme for the day. Even if Buchvold was working
with him now, he couldn’t assume that their armistice would last, no matter
what precautionary measures Crow might engineer, to avert such a breakdown! The Borcan
did act the fool at times, but ‘foolish’ and ‘stupid’ weren’t – quite – the same thing. The bard would have to watch, and be prepared, for inevitable shifts in the fragile state of
truce he’d foisted upon the man: a truce he well knew that Buchvold
still intended to violate, soon as the wizard were to deem it both convenient and logistically-feasible.
Sledgehammers were clumsy and crude and brutal compared to, say, scalpels. But if they
did manage to hit you – even glancingly – a second blow was almost never necessary.
And it wasn’t
himself, alone, whose welfare he most feared for, nor either those innumerable innocents he fought to shield.
A wistful recollection from the dining-hall –
Kingsley’s face, worry flashing across her features and then hidden in a heartbeat, as her concerns touched upon the welfare of that fortunate
spouse whom she loved and feared for so deeply – brought a twitch of a smile to the bard’s still-masqued visage. Crow didn’t
have a spouse to safeguard – at least, no wife his
amnesia had spared to his recollection, though he’d sometimes wakened from dreams with the dwindling traces of a
protective impulse fading from his awareness; whether it was felt for a bride, a child or parent, or even for this “Pavel” he only
suspected to be himself, the bard’s subconscious refused to offer up that clue – but he could
relate to the dread and dilemma suffered by the professor, on
another’s behalf, nevertheless.
Buchvold
didn’t know about
Tiahn: had neither seen the guitar itself, nor heard the bard playing, even from afar.
No one knew of
Tiahn, not even the audiences who’d witnessed their duets; Crow’s disguise-spells had ever-painstakingly guarded
her anonymity, no less than his own. And the Borcan
would never know of the guitar, if
Crow had any hand or say or influence in the matter.
(The VRS spy needed Buchvold’s help, and badly. Other consequences aside, he really,
really didn’t want to have to cut loose from – or to
kill – his only certain asset within the FoS’s ranks. But if
Tiahn were threatened – his songbird … his soul … his sweet-voiced anchor to sanity and the only
real testament he had to his elusive, erstwhile identity’s capacity for sentiment – he might not have a choice.)
As the bard settled himself, and reached down to snag one of his shed boots from the floor – nope, wrong one; he stretched to grab the other – he discreetly avoided letting his line of sight drift anywhere
near the guitar-case, where the one
tangible love of his post-amnesiac life waited, mute and patient, sealed safely beyond any foe’s grasp or detection in the case’s extradimensional vacancy. Safe, but
unreachable for now, so long as Crow suspected
Buchvold lurked nearby, be it here in this very room or elsewhere in the hotel.
Forgive me, sweet bird, the bard’s silent thoughts softly pled to the cherished instrument. Words of contrition he’d spoken so often, and so falsely, to Kingsley, were now weighted with as much honesty as the silver-tongued infiltrator was capable of offering.
We can’t
dance, not now,
not as we should –
your strings, my hands, our serenade – to calm my disquiet and beckon the snobbish, icy elf-hearts of this town to thaw or to break. I can’t risk that viper’s glimpsing
you, my beauty, or even overhearing. The man is a bounder and a tone-deaf thug, dearest, a brute unworthy to touch one of your
spent strings. Stay safe,
my treasure – stay hidden,
still your song just a little longer, at all costs keep away from him! – for my peace’s
sake as well as your own protection.
(Intellectually, Crow knew it was folly, directing such warnings to Tiahn. The decorated guitar was
not sentient, was not even enchanted; his beloved instrument’s only claim to ‘magic’ lay in what it – what
she! – meant to
him. But what could he do? The bard had
spurned the gods for abandoning the world’s suffering innocents, wasn’t convinced there
were gods truly
worthy of their stature or the reverence afforded them by mortals. He wasn’t even certain that “gods”, in
this ever-so-haunted Land, wasn’t just a more-fawning synonym for “Watchers” or “Dark Powers”: terms which – by
his reckoning and experience – were equally synonymous with “bastards”! He couldn’t
pray for Tiahn’s continued safety.)
Soon, love, I promise you that. Tonight, if I’m sure
he’s gone; tomorrow on shipboard if needs must. We’ll play then, play for hours,
I pledge you. Mortigny
soon, too; you’ll like
that, Tiahn-my-sweet, I know you will.
(The bard beamed inwardly. In his heart, the crow-painted
guitar was every bit as warm and gracious a
lady as Gertrude Kingsley … and no lady could help but be pleased, when a paramour remembered the precise place where first they’d met.)
Crow made a mental note to pick up another jar of that premium
wood-sealant in Claveria, that had worked so well in the torrid climate of Sri Raji. If anything, spring in Souragne was yet
more humid than the dry season in Muladi had been; his songbird would need the very best protection from moisture that money could buy. His
own money too, legitimately earned via performances between missions,
not Buchvold’s grudgingly-rationed or pilfered funds. The bard didn’t delude himself that he was a man of strict scruples – he’d start obeying the law and heeding socially-imposed morality on the day he saw proof that the authorities who
wrote those laws and
promulgated those morals were any less corrupt than the
monsters his Society endeavored to quash; indeed, Crow’d seen enough of his world to know the monsters and authorities in question were
the same individuals, more often than not – but he drew the line at spending the wealth which his missions made accessible to him on anything
but his ongoing work. Hence, his close personal acquaintance with carpets as sleeping-pallets.
(Besides, it would make a nice
anniversary present for his treasure. Ladies liked it when their suitors remembered
that, as well.)
Feeling first his eyelids, then his head, grow heavier-still – the
crash, looming inexorably – the bard shoved the morning’s turmoil and uncertainty to the back of his mind, for later analysis (
Lonely? Me? Surely there’s more to it than that…), and slipped his hand into the boot’s interior before long-belated exhaustion robbed him of the dexterity to work the toe-toggles.
Left boot, of course. While his lamed ankle didn’t provide as solid a support to stand upon, whilst delivering a surprise mule-kick if cornered, his limp tended to draw others’ attention away from his
sound leg’s maneuvers. And the shrewder pursuers who
did anticipate his response generally didn’t expect him to sacrifice a firm stance for a
tottering one, even if they were well acquainted with the existence and deployment of
snap-blades; they, too, usually trained their suspicious eyes at his
bad leg, not his beweaponed one.
As ever,
misdirection was the
real trade-secret, not just aimless prevarication with no context. Be it as a bard concealing his tuneful casting-style to pass as a wizard at the Manoir, a spy “exposed” as a thief in Lechberg, or now a
fake member posing as a duped, off-the-books
half-member at the Riverview, another old swindlers’ maxim remained Crow’s watchword:
Never try to convince someone you’re innocent. Make them believe you’re as guilty as sin … but of something else.
(Loneliness? Was it really
that simple a problem…?
(Was it really that
impossible a
solution…?)
Feeling fatigue sweeping in to claim him – he wouldn’t be able to listen for the Borcan’s invisible doings, after all, but no matter: he’d ensured he’d still learn what he needed to – Crow set his fingertips to the
triggers embedded on either side of his footwear’s interior, which he’d previously depressed with his toes after reciting the motto of the Fraternity, for Kingsley’s ears. This time, he used his
fingers, and indulged in a moment’s sly editing for Buchvold’s:
“Cogito ergo …
ludifico.”
The retractable snap-blade popped out at the back of the boot’s heel, as designed – “
snap-blade” was a bit of a misnomer in this case, as he’d had the apparatus padded to mute the mechanism’s noise as thoroughly as mundane engineering allowed – and the chamber was again plunged into inky blackness. Cloaked by the darkness, Crow at last permitted himself a rather vicious grin, that the morning’s dialogue had transpired so very well, his lone slip at the end nonwithstanding. Having Buchvold apply his
own sigil’s darkness-calling effect to the hidden blade in advance
wasn’t a ploy the men could’ve relied upon, at a
real Fraternity gathering; after the prior debacle at the Manoir de Penombre,
magic-detection was sure to be part of any future meeting’s security-measures … and while the bard knew how to
hide such a pre-made item’s aura of evocation from cursory inspection, that was
one weapon in his bilker’s arsenal he
didn’t care to reveal to the Borcan. To be caught carrying such a pre-cast Darkness effect was a lapse truly
guaranteed to expose his FoS “membership” as a fraud! But for dealing with Kingsley, the gimmick had been ideal, all the more so in that his coin-play had ensured his
hands never left her plain view.
She’ll trust I’m a member
now, whatever other
suspicions she’ll harbor about the rest of my story … but have I spoiled my chances of her ever trusting me, by deluging
her with such fabrications? I’ll have to stand her up for dinner,
of course – no way I can strategize today,
I’m too done-in, and it’ll take a LOT of thought to plan my next approach, after that
slip-up! – but did she opt not
to refuse my invitation on the spot because I’ve won her interest as a potential friend,
or because she sees me as an enemy
holding her husband’s life hostage to blackmail? Damnation, there’s got to be SOME way to earn her trust!
Perhaps there was. And yet … did
he really deserve to
have her trust, after exploiting her
better nature as he had? The professor wasn’t his usual caliber of ‘mark’, deceived through the spy’s shrewd manipulation of their greed or paranoia or cruelty;
she’d succumbed due to her loyalty and graciousness, not through inherent flaws of character! Crow’d not fully appreciated that Kingsley was a better person at heart than her brethren, until
after they’d begun talking – he’d been pretty sure that her
good manners were a front, but not that the prickliness and grudges she nurtured
behind them were largely that, as well – by which point, he’d already fallen into the routine of molding his strategies to fit her
reactions, not his own ethics. By all rights, he
should have eased off the pressure once he ascertained she
wasn’t the courtesy-camouflaged she-viper he’d been expecting, but he truly
had gotten too caught up in the game….
Perhaps he
did owe Professor Kingsley a
real apology, at that.
(And real
trust? If never about his
mission, then at least about
himself: his thoughts; his doubts; his long-deferred, long-denied need for someone
real to talk to…?
(Could he really stretch his “Brother” Crow persona far enough to
allow for that,
without jeopardizing his imposture by admitting to sentiments the callous
Fraternity rejected out-of-hand? And dared he attempt such a venture with
Gertrude Kingsley, whose incisive discernment and intensity of character had harmonized so well with his
own nature, yet who
for that very reason was most likely of all to
penetrate his façade?
(Was he even
capable of extending trust, anymore? Had he
ever been…?)
His wrists
itched again: warningly, accusingly.
Stop. It. Stop. Thinking. Sleep! Now! Save it. Mortigny…
Perhaps already half-sleeping – perhaps, even, teetering on the brink of one of the unbreathing
fugues that claimed him under the worst extremes of stress, albeit momentarily and seldom – the bard withdrew his hand from the boot, then dropped his blade-bearing footwear into the narrow gap between bed and wall, out of the wizard’s reach. A little
puzzle for invisible Buchvold, to try to exit the suite
without flooding the hallway with Deeper Darkness. Either the Borcan (assuming he was in here, at all) would dismiss his sigil-ring’s effect – and then not be able to
restore it, without disturbing and waking up Crow in his search for the concealed boot – or he’d employ his
own scrying-magics to look into the hallway and check for any witnesses before opening the door – in which case, the dropped
socks wouldn’t be in the same position as before – or he’d still be
in the room, trapped by his own ill-considered attempt to outfox the ‘dog-fox’, when the bard awoke.
Or maybe he wouldn’t.
Between the copper coin (switched or not … and if Buchvold
was still here, he’d be
sure to try it: the man had too much to hide
not to), the socks (disturbed or not), and the snap-blade’s Darkness-effect (dismissed or not), Crow was
fairly certain that by the time he checked himself out of the hotel,
he’d know whether or not the illusionist could Teleport. Buchvold’s current chattiness about the
Fraternity’s secrets was wonderful – that
pride in his vaunted organization’s capabilities at work, again; that, and the wizard’s oft-avowed confidence that
Crow’d not survive the coming counterstrike against Van Rijn, once the lich’s hiding place was smoked out – but where the scope of the Borcan’s
own power was concerned, getting so much as veiled hints out of the man was like pulling teeth.
And if the bard was, indeed, going to
destroy the stolen Doomsday Device plans, instead of merely recovering them as he’d pledged to do, he needed to know the full extent of the Borcan illusionist’s mobility. Crow might have made his peace with the
price his work demanded of him – and given the stakes, a suicide mission
was a price worth paying, if it rid the Land of the menace of a second Requiem – but that didn’t mean he relished the prospect: if he were still
capable of fleeing afterward, he’d damn well do his best to elude the aristocratic wizard’s wrath.
It was
that not-so-comforting thought that ushered the bard to sleep, unable to fend off the heaviness any longer. Not that it mattered, really, whether his wakeful mind’s closing thoughts were ominous or pleasant: the
nightmares came upon him either way of late, and no doubt would continue doing so until the city-killing plans were eradicated. Then again, the amnesiac musician’s dreams had been… troubling… in one way or another, for as far back as his truncated memories stretched. It didn’t really bother or impair him anymore; for years, the bard had been
numbed to his darker dreams’ unique, albeit somewhat repetitive, brand of terror.
Were it
just a matter of chronic nightmares, the ever-adaptable spy would have long since learned to live with it.
But Crow hadn’t dreamt of
her for months, now. The nightmares had displaced his
other style of dream from his sleeping psyche. And to lose
those dreams – the only
other evidence he had, however intangible or dubious its source, that his former self had once been capable of sentiment, of compassion, of
love – was beyond enduring.
Whatever dreams or terrors his subconscious might hold in store for him, a
crash couldn’t be forestalled, be it by willpower or worry. Seconds after the dropped boot hit the floor, Crow was out like a light.
(Sleeping, vulnerable and oblivious, in the presence of a bitter
enemy had never posed a problem for the bard, either. He could hardly have functioned so well as an infiltration-agent, had he let
that distress him! It wasn’t the
first time, nor would it be the last, that he’d lain helpless in the company of men who called you “Brother” with feigned politeness, yet schemed to sink a dagger in your back. Deny it though he might, Crow really
had been about his work, in driven and obsessive solitude, for far longer than was emotionally or psychologically prudent.
(If the bard had ever stopped to
think about it, he’d realize how such precarious, dire circumstances were starting to feel unnervingly-much like
home, to him…)
[OOC: "ludifico -are, dep.: to make game of , deride, delude, cheat, frustrate." Looks like the
bard's found himself a motto now, too!
]