(These events take place after The Linhir Ripper - Epilogue 2 - Xan's Humble Chronicler.)
With Eduwige’s help Leon prepared Caine’s body, gathering the man’s belonging and wrapping him in a old cloak of cream and silver from his gear. His proper cloak, the one he had worn when he arrived in Linhir, was around Addie’s shoulders. He had given it to her after rescuing her from a mob in town, and she had not had the chance to return it.
The two women were clearly disturbed, Addie more than Eduwiges by far, and he quietly observed the two before studying the dead man, though he did not know him. His expression was smooth, untroubled and the body had been found with his blades still sheathed on his belt. He had been taken unawares, from behind, by someone he had not thought was a danger. Leon sighed softly, whispering an old saying from Angmar, “The truth of Death is Deception.”
He hefted the body with Eduwige’s help and laid it across the back of his mule and secured it well, pausing to scratch the animal between the ears...."There, there Mordirith, he can't weigh all that much....I know it would make more sense to consign his remains to Cinder, but we must do things the Stonelord way for now….”
Addiela kept her gaze turned to the ground, she couldn’t bring herself to even look at Caine's corpse. Once the body was secure, Eduwiges looked at the old man. “Mordirith? You named your mule after the False King?” Leon nodded. “Why?” she asked, confused. Was the False King not revered in Angmar?
Leon shrugged as he took the reins. “Seemed like a good idea at the time….” And led the animal near to where Addie already waiting on horseback. "I have never walked these roads before...you will need to show me where this village of yours is.'
Eduwiges shook her head in and let it go then checked Nik's bandages before swinging up onto her horse. 'It will be all right Addie. It will be ok...' she said reassuringly then when she thought Addie wouldn’t notice, reached a hand to her face to feel if her eyebrows were still there.
They were, and Addie noticed.
Nik was still whimpering softly, sitting in front of Edu on her horse, and chewing, a bit of lizard tail sticking out of one corner of his mouth.
Addiela nodded in thanks to them both but didn’t speak; she turned her horse towards the road and set off at a slow trot.
Walking next to Edu’s horse, Leon peered curiously at Nik. "So that is a halfling, eh? Not as fierce looking as I had heard...and where is the tail where it stores its venom?”
Eduwiges chuckled, 'That is not a halfling, that is a, well, I am not sure what Nik is.”
Leon sighed. "So many things I am not sure what exactly they are…C'mon Mordirith, I imagine you can get someone to eat when we reach this Stonelord villiage.'
Addiela looked back to the man at hearing the word 'someone' but then she turned her head back forward, assuming she had heard wrong.
Leon smiled at Addie. "So when did you first become a conduit of Cinder?' The old man noted Edu looking a bit roasted, and reached into a pack on the mule, handing her a small stone jar. He did so with his left hand, and Edu winced a bit as she noticed most of the fingers on that hand seemed fused together, like wax that had melted and dried. "Here, this should help...” he said. “Don’t use too much or you will grow stupid for a time...use more than that, and you will be scented by things."'
Eduwiges gave Leon a strange look when he said 'scented by things' and gingerly took a very small amount of the cream and dabbed it on her burns. Immediately the pain receded. She replaced the lid and handed it back to Leon who tucked it away again.
Addiela raised a brow in question toward the man. "I have never heard of this 'Cinder' you speak of, but since I assume you speak of the fire... almost a year ago now."
Leon shrugs..."You may have never heard of Cinder, but Cinder has clearly heard of you. As for becoming a conduit, you may not have known it, but that is what you did...what happened?'
Addiela's gaze remained ahead as she spoke, her voice tight. These were not matters she was comfortable talking about, but for some reason, she felt it was important that so did. "One that called himself a loremaster took interest in me and gifted me an essence. He said that he saw a gift in me and encouraged me to ask the essence for aid when I needed it."
Eduwiges listened quietly, surprised that Addie was speaking of her past and eager to learn something new about her secretive friend.
Leon tilted his head and pulled out a bit of what seemed to be jerky from his pouch, chewing on it as he scratched his graying beard. "An essence...not sure what this Master would have meant by that....What be this Essence?'
Addiela didn’t quite know how to respond to Leon's question, especially since she wouldn't say the name of that which she held dear or expose it. It had served to help her realize what had always been gifted to her and aided her until she unlocked that potential, which she wished she hadn't. Addie looked over her shoulder at him and just shrugged. 'There's a lot I do not know or understand.'
He looked back at Addie, and something in his gaze seemed comforting to her. "Nothing wrong with knowing nothing and admitting it...most dangerous men I ever met knew nothing, but thought they knew everything....and that is the difference.'
Eduwiges chuckled as the trio passes through the gates into Linhir
Leon smiled. "As for knowing something, first and most important thing you need to learn, that everything else depends on and flows from, are the Three Laws.'
Addiela looked over her shoulder at him and raised a brow in question.
Leon continued. “The Three Laws of Divine Combustion, every child learns them before they so much as bring up a smoker...Law one, Flame Begins....Law two, Flame Transforms...Law three, Flame Ends. Once you truly understand how those laws flow from Cinder to the living world and back again, you will be well on your way to being a proper Spark.'
Eduwiges thought 'magic talk', rolled her eyes and turned back forward, urging her borrowed horse forward to the square. Addiela however shook her head, "And what if I do not wish to be this spark that you speak of?"
Leon nodded as if anticipating her question. "Well, what would happen if tomorrow you woke up and decided that all of this breathing nonsense was too much of a burden, so you refused to do it anymore?'
Addiela offered him a weary smile. "I do not think you know how accurately you speak.. because I am still breathing and am still 'gifted'... 'cursed'.. whatever you wish to call it... with this ability, I shall always be a burden and a harm to others.
To her surprise Leon nodded. "You will be as long as you seek to lock it away and learn not how to invoke the second two rules.... eventually it will kill everything and everyone you hold dear, just out of spite. Cinder is like that.
Addiela frowned, "Curse it is.. and probably placed on me by that witch of a mother, I wouldn't be surprised if it were."
Leon looked at Addie long and hard. "I don’t know your mother but I doubt she had that power. I am not sure anyone or anything does. You were BORN a Conduit...a holy connection to Cinder...you can become a Spark and learn to control yourself, or let it run wild and become a pyroclasm. Either way, you are a living manifestation of the First Rule, as am I.'
Eduwiges tilted her head. “What’s a pyroclasm.”
Leon looked down and scowled. “It…it is a portal to Cinder that has broken free of its conduit, usually by destroying them and anyone else it can reach. Unless someone wrests control of it, it will burn forever, inexhaustible…eventually it would make this entire world Cinder and Cinder this entire world.”
Eduwiges was silenced by the dark emotion suddenly on the genial old man’s face, but Addie continued on her own train of thought. 'Then why did it just now care to show itself? After nineteen years of my life?'
Leon shook his head as if dispelling something,] then smiled and as he spoke, it had the tone of scripture, learned by rote long ago. "Cinder is born of itself, dies of itself, and exists as all things, at all times, as it desires. It is Cinder."'
As they rode into the town square of Linhir, both Lif and Kraddock rose....and Kraddock stared for a moment, seeing the shape wrapped in cream on the back of the mule, then looked away. He had been a soldier long enough to know what that meant, and had lost enough men under his command to know the time for grief would come later.
Addiela had been about to say more when she saw Kraddock up ahead; she lowered her head and her gaze to the reins in her hands and remained silent, the cloak feeling as if it weighed a thousand pounds on her shoulders.
Eduwiges pulled up to the fountain and saw the others milling around. She dismounted and gently lifted Nik, who had fallen asleep. She walked over to Lif and held him up to her. 'He's hurt pretty good, but he will live. No thanks to that bastard Mans...'
Xandilif glanced over at Finch."See, told ya the little ratsucker would be fine.
Finchley stood when Lif did and looked relieved. "Addie! Edu! You found Nik! And--... Oh, no..." Her expression immediately turned downcast when she saw the form on the mule and put two and two together.
Ordan rose as well and looked saddened...but something about Edu carrying Nik seemed to remind him of something and he nodded. "Old fool, your mind is going at last I suppose...'
Eduwiges looked questioningly at Lif, 'I’ve bandaged him up do we have a place he can rest?'
Finchley held out her hands. "Give him here. I got him."
Eduwiges handed Nik over to Finch then walked over to the fountain and dunked her head in it allowing the cool water to chill her face and wash away the lingering scent of burning flesh. She stood back up, tossing her wet hair and sat, staring off into space.
Finchley held poor Nik protectively in her arms and mumbled something about him needing to get a new hobby other than getting hurt as she looked about the place. "...You didn't bring Neth's mother back but..." She then turned her green gaze to the older newcomer.
Eduwiges looked at Finch with sorrow and a bit of horror upon hearing her ask about Ynna. The tall woman’s silence was enough of an answer to satisfy Finch at the moment, and she focused on checking the bandage on the kobold’s head.
Captain Kraddock of Elendil’s Vanguard approached the mule and gently touched the body secured to the back, nodding to himself. "Had a feeling something had gone bad...he should have been back long ago.
Addiela didn’t wish to hear them speak of Caine's demise and so, she took the two horses they had used and walked them back to the stables.
Finchley looked sympathetically to Addie and gave the odd newcomer a small wave. Leon for his part was looking around like a tourist. "It is very...plain. This is the first Stonelord villiage I have actually entered.'
As she returned from leaving the horses where Edu had “borrowed” them from, Addiela looked completely helpless and lost in the moment, not even attempted a smile toward Finch. "The others are well at least? Neth, Anendyl and Miss Ryn?"
Finchley nodded to Addie. "Mhmm. Well, as okay as they can be. They're in the Barge. Who's your... friend?"
Leon smiled, knowing the girl was referring to him. "I am Leon....just Leon.
Finchley tried to keep down a gigglesnort at Leon's introduction. "Nice to meet you, Mister Leon. I'm Finchley. Just Finchley."
Leon paused...his head tilting."Finchley?” He sat by the fountain, deep in concerned thought, no longer seeming to enjoy the new sights.
Kraddock strode across the square to Addie, his expression and voice tightly controlled. Xandilif was close behind him. "Where is the old woman?' He demanded, with blood in his eye.
With a sigh, Addie turned and faced the one-eyed Knight, "Her bonds were cut and she was gone. She was the one responsible for... what happened to Caine and Nik. Not her, but the one that possesses her now."
Xandilif spat."Dammit...we been foxed again.”
Finch looked to Addie and her expression fell again as she moved beside Xandilif, the odd newcomer forgotten for the moment. "So Ynnabeth is gone? Or rather, Mans is wearin' her and took her away?"
Addiela nodded and her gaze turned back down to the ground. Eduwiges growled, 'Aye, the bastard has her. I don't even know what to say, first Ane, now Ynna...' she looked down at her hands.
Finchley gasped, holding Nik just a bit tighter, but not tight enough to aggravate his wounds.
Nik ouched loudly. "Finchbutt....no squishies'
Finchley winced in concern, 'Sorry, Nik. Do you want a nice, soft pillow? Or something to e--... What have you got in your mouth?'
Nik had completely forgotten about the lizard he had been chewing since the set out from the tower, and now swallowed. "Nuthin....'
Finchley frowned. "Maybe just the pillow for you then..."
Kraddock sighed as Finch carried the wounded Nik towards the Inn. "The old woman could be anywhere by now...and we will need to get his body back to his kin in the White City...that will not be a joy.'
Addiela nodded at Kraddock and suddenly unfastened her cloak clasps as she walked toward him. She held out Caine's cloak, the one he had draped around her shoulders that night in the alley. "I am sure that they will want this returned as well."
Kraddock shook his head gruffly. "Keep it, he gave it to ya...'
Addiela protested, close to frustrated tears, 'But he barely knew me.. I am sure his family would want such a memento back."
Captain Kraddock shook his head again, but more gently, moved by the woman’s distress. "House Palaniel won’t give two damns about a momento, but maybe you will...keep it. I think he would like that.”
Addiela frowned at those words but reluctantly fastened the cloak back around her shoulders, though she knew she would stubbornly insist on paying a visit to Caine's family and offering them the cloak personally along with her condolences. "I shall accompany you to speak with his family then." She lifted her head and looked in the direction of the tavern. "I suppose we need to tell Nethrida… as gently as possible."
Finchley looked to her toes. "So... we'll tell her. And then we'll cry and grieve and then we will get some rest. And then we'll go home and come up with a plan to get Ynnabeth back." She looked to Xandilif. "Right, Lif?" Her voice took on a desperate urgency. ".....Right?"
Xandilif nodded gently and patted the woman’s hair. "Don’t see as we have much choice, babygirl.”
Addiela nodded once at the Champion’s words. “No choice at all…” then gathering a dead man’s cloak around her slim frame, she stalked into the Rusty Barge on a cloud of rage, to tell Nethrida the bad news so they could begin seeking justice.
