A Wolf Among Sheep, Part IV

The Fox's Den -  -
 * Though somewhat cramped as all Tavern Inn rooms often are, the room that is known as the Fox's Den is one of those rooms that shouldn't exist within an establishment such as the Lightholder Tavern. Located at one of the ends of the tavern, the room overlooks the central crossroads exchange via a large window with glass as clear as water.


 * The floor, though composed of wooden planks that creak with age, has been mostly covered with a rug of deep scarlet. The bed is also unusual in that it's somewhat larger than the standard fare, quilted with velvet sheets and evidently suited to nobility rather than the usual bards and couriers that spend the night in rooms such as these.


 * A steel-bound oak chest rests at the foot of the bed, while a small rack for weapons and bags rests across from that in turn. A wash basin with running water rests to the side of the bed to the right of the small desk that sits beneath the window.


 * Reading between the lines it becomes very easy to assertain what this room is: a safe house. Judging by the crest that hangs over the head of the bed - that of a black eagle clutching a sunwheel - one might equally ascertain that which funds it.

-

The Fox's Den is a rather insulated room, befitting its nature as a safe den for those that might have more needs from a room than simple rest out of the weather.

Yet at the moment it's being put to a somewhat more mundane use. Insulated from the other rooms, an oversized scarecrow of a man in Pathfinder's garb is...practicing on a wondrous lute with seraphite strings. A beautiful melody, haunting and delicate...but hardly tavern fare, melancholy yet powerfully reverent.

Outside the door, there is an unsettling thump. It is followed up by a second, far louder thump, the sound of someone collapsing against the door. The handle jiggles, rattling helplessly for a handful of seconds before the portal yawns open, depositing a bloodied Pathfinder onto the soft scarlet rug. She is riddled with arrows.

Taran is at least quick on the uptake. Lute is set quickly aside, the giant moving at once to pull the other Pathfinder inside and close the door. He pauses, putting his hand against it with his eyes closed, evidently listening. Apparently satisfied with what he does or doesn't hear, he then turns to the bloodied Pathfinder. "Hold still. I can get the arrows out."

An ironic turn of events, the onetime Archon aiding the onetime Torchbearer. It's a woman, this wreck of a ranger, with hair like honey and moonbeams and a twisted grimace that contorts milk-white features into a textbook example of agony. "I were na-- were na--" she grates out, clawing at Taran's arms with red-stained fingers. "--were na seen."

Taran winces briefly, studying the woman carefully as he lowers her into a position where he can ease the arrows out. "You will find that people who want to believe will behave as if you have already told them," he says. "And those who do not will see nothing even if it is under their noses. I would try a trick of Shadow to ease your pain, but if I got it wrong the price would be too high. Hold to the Light then, because getting these arrows out of you is going to hurt."

Not like a word of that is actually comprehended, though it has to be said that she is taking her present situation like a trooper. Closer inspection reveals that while the arrows are the worst of her troubles, they are not the only ones present: a blade has bit through the flesh of her neck and left arm, and a faint hint of smoke clinging to her person suggests that perhaps other problems may yet remain unseen.

Taran blows out a slow breath as he comes to comprehend the extent of the damage, and then...gets to work. His pack is fetched and the basic healer's kit from it. A basin of water, and another pitcher beside, the room's contents investigated for spare bandages. And as he begins his work in earnest, drawing out blades and arrows, stanching the flow of blood, removing damaged clothes and stitching torn flesh together...he sings. Softly, but with incredible skill and beauty, the song he'd been playing on his lute given words.

"I heard there was a secret chord that Talus played that pleased the world but you don't really care for music, do you? well it goes like this the fourth, the fifth the minor fall and the major lift the baffled king composing hallelujah...."

There's something in the Shadow, something in the song, something in the bard's careful ministrations that puts the gravely wounded ranger at ease. Though there's no stopping the yelps of pain, or the way dirty nails dig fiercely into the plush carpet, she somehow remains inexplicably conscious.

Taran says nothing, as that would interrupt the song...but no magic there save music itself. Something to listen to and focus on that isn't pain, for all the minimal good it does. He sings as he cleans and stitches the wounds and sets dressed bandages in place, as if voice and hands belonged to two different people.

"Well your faith was strong but you needed proof you saw her bathing on the roof her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you she tied you to her kitchen chair she broke your throne and she cut your hair and from your lips she drew the hallelujah..."

And as he finishes, he settles back and lets the music end with a sigh. "Well. I think we can put you to bed now, madam."

"R-Reese," she supplies brokenly, voice and body as weak as a kitten. "Reese F-F-Firelight." Limp as a discarded puppet, she has no way of resisting Taran's wishes. Sweat rolls in buckets down her pale face. "Th-thank ye."

"I remember you," he says quietly. "Several things have changed since our last encounter, it seems." He scoops her up, then, and...well...puts her to bed, before getting a clean cloth to dip in water to pat away sweat. "I can put together a painkilling potion, but in your present state I think a glass of strong wine will do as well."

'' ~*~ The next morning... ~*~ ''

It's a pleasant noontide, in the Den today. More or less. The mess has been cleaned up, bandages put away, medicines either set out carefully or tucked into their storage places. And the bard has taken over a chair, leaned it against the wall, and sits with a window view, playing contemplative melodies on his lute - nothing loud, nothing boisterous, but simple meditative music to aid thinking or dreaming.

Dreaming is precisely what Reese has been engaging in, sleeping stiff as a board in the oversized bed. Bandaged and broken, the younger of the Firelight siblings stirs slightly, groaning in painful discovery of just how bad an idea moving really is. She draws up one leg beneath the blankets, trying to readjust her position.

Taran doesn't pause his playing, but he does chuckle lightly. "Rest helps, but I would hardly tell someone who comes in here not to move. Foolishness is part of us or we would do something else with our lives, no?"

Gently, carefully, Reese rubs the crust from her eyes, blinking away the last tendrils of sleep and re-entering the waking world. She regards Taran, dimly at first, icy blue eyes slowly bringing his massive figure into focus. "Ye--" Her voice breaks into a strangled croak. Clearing her throat does no good, nor does massaging it with weak fingers. "Wa-- water. Please."

Taran nods, and now the music pauses - as he sets the Lute aside, to get a glass and fill it from a pitcher, and bringing it to the bed. "Usually women who land on me while I am playing are not bleeding quite so much," he says lightly. "At least - it's been a while."

Caprice slurps it down greedily, gulping noisily and ignoring the steady dribble of the clear, sweet liquid down her chin. She finishes it in one go, gasping out a grateful breath and mopping her mouth with the back of a fist. "Thank ye," she offers, after a moment.

Taran chuckles. "No need. You did rather drop in on me. My apologies that I did not try to ease the pain, drawing out your arrows. My skill at that is not yet good enough to justify the risk. You seemed somewhat short on time."

"Yer a brother," Reese observes wonderingly, looking at the man as if seeing him for the first time. "Yer th'-- y' were th' Archon."

Taran nods. "I was the last Archon," he agrees. "But I was given this," and he taps his ringmail, "long before that."

Reese shakes her head slightly, as much as the bandaging wrapping her shoulder blades will allow. "I'm soorry, aye. If I'd knoown afore..." She trails off, letting the sentiment hang in the air, but dismisses the train of thought with a sharp gesture of her free hand. "Ne'er min' 't. I owe ye m' life."

Taran shakes his head. "I do believe coming through that door," and he indicates the door to the room, "means there is no debt. I don't suppose you can tell me how you managed to substitute yourself for an archery target? I haven't pulled so many arrows out of a Pathfinder since a group of wildlanders apparently took exception to Vhramis' backside."

That comment wins a chuckle, though there's no mirth behind it. "I were chasin' a feloon 'n Shadow Distric'," Caprice explains, setting the glass on the bedstand and folding her wounded arm across her midsection. "T'were an amboosh lai' oop fer me in a chapel, whit when I cornered hi'." She flicks that haunting gaze Taran's way. "He's dead. Th' chapel be ashes."

Taran sighs. "Ah," he says. "Well...I suppose fortune has saved me the trip. I have a few friends in the Shadow district still. More fires worried me, so I came with the intent of going to see what was up." He tilts his head. "An ambush? Mmm. I suppose I can't really chide anyone about going in alone. I would have."

"Na victims boot th' rogues," Reese assures him. "I ma' certain oof tha', aye." Her brows darkens, and she takes sudden interest in the texture of the blanket. "Ne'er saw 't comin'. T'were sloppy."

Taran lipquirks. "Everyone is at times. You survived, and you will mend. Call it a victory, then. But why did you not leave the felon to the Watch?"

Caprice's slim fingers continue to pick idly at the fabric for a moment, before snaking up to rub at the bandage at the nape of her neck. "A Shadowbeast frightened Dooke Driscool 'n th' Glade," she recounts, nothing if not brutally honest with a fellow Ranger. "T'were ma broother. Hi' Grace wants hi' dead. I needed... I needed a dead mage."

Taran tilts his head. "So you...found someone it would be just to kill, to present the duke with a body you could blame?"

"Dead men donnae prootes'," Reese points out, ever blunt. "Kael I wi' deal wi' m'sel'."

Taran sighs. "Your intent I cannot fault, but I do not know that it will save Kael much trouble. He is too well known as a wolf-form shapeshifter. Few know anyone else it could have been."

One corner of Caprice's mouth twists into an unhappy frown while she considers the bard's observation. "If noothin' else," she notes, "I ken Kael kin make hissel' disappear, an' I mayhap bough' hi' time."

Taran nods. "Peculiar, really...people die and disappear, but it's the wolf that everyone talks about. People are rather easily led astray by appearances."

Something wry appears in the faint ghost of a grin that plays upon Reese's pale features. "T'is sommat we oof all people shoul' be thankfool fer, aye?" One brow arches, almost playfully, at the giant.

Taran grins. "For all that there are people who will act as if they know. I generally prefer to ignore that, myself." He purses his lips. "Should I check on Kael, then? I have some prior commitments this evening, but I could stop in tomorrow..."

Reese skims the perimeters of the room, eyes stopping on Vice, then at the pieces of armor removed for the sake of wound-tending. "Woul' be greetfool," she responds, "as 'f m' gratitoode 's na fool ta floodin' where 'r stands." Swiping a hand through her hair, she takes on a look of purpose. "I moost needs take th' boody ta Dooke Driscool. Wi' na be loong 'fore 'tis found."

- ''Return to Season 7 (2008)