After bidding farewell to Finch and Lif so that the pair could ride ahead in search of the drunken witch, the rest of the group waited for the cover of night to depart from the Forsaken Inn for Bree. The hope was to slip into the town unnoticed while the majority of its people slept, but they had not expected for the beaten path to be so deserted, so quiet. They could feel that something was off; this night held an eerie tension in its silence.
As they reached the south gate, they could see that several bodies had been stacked in a neat pile along the outside of the wall, as though they were the town’s garbage waiting to be disposed of. Nethrida furrowed her brow at the sight. "This seems to be a little troublesome..." Upon taking a closer look at the bodies, she heaved a sigh. “They appear to be highway men… Blackwolds… I’ve had several encounters with them here.”
Addie stared at the corpses and her face paled a little at the memories that the sight of such folk brought back for her. “Well… these will not be causing any more trouble for this town.”
Eduwiges adjusted herself in the saddle as she looked around, curiously but alert. “It looks like the watch has moved from watching to doing. Do you think that they were attacked?”
"It appears that Bree is under new management,” Xanderian stated as she pointed to the scene just inside the gate. Several of the stocks from the town jail had been moved so that anyone entering Bree could easily see them, and half a dozen of the town’s biggest nuisances were locked in their grasp, each bearing a sign below the wooden restraint that declared their ill-doing.
Calidis raised a brow and straightened her back. "Good management or bad management?"
"Just… new." Xan replied with a smile.
Daedre sauntered back over to the group after checking the pile of corpses, lightly tossing a small bag of coins from hand to hand. She chuckled as she read out the offenses listed on the signs. "Malcontent… Adulterer… Drunkard… Thief… Lady of easy virtue...? This quaint, little town never fails to amuse me... with its men that seek to play the part of the white knight for the helpless little lady in distress... and its lasses that are quick to lift their skirts for any lad that tosses a few flowery words their way… like sheep to the slaughter, they entice them back to their rose-scented beds to steal, kill, or destroy… Oh how I missed this place!”
Edu shook her head. “It’s not all bad, mother… the barmaids are very friendly here and the grog’s good.”
Pocketing the pouch of coins, Dee walked over and patted Edu on the head. “Do be careful here, my girl…” and to the others, she said, “And you lot as well; the ale-stained lads here are sure to take notice of such a pretty group of guppies."
Cal wrinkled her nose, not liking what she was called. "I beg your pardon..." she mumbled under her breath.
“Mother, we are not guppies!” Edu bristled back in reply, her mood already dark from walking into such a scene.
Dee ignored the sour looks and kept on smiling at the group. "My dear girl, guppies are beautiful and are sought after to fill the courtyard ponds of the stuck-up city nobles."
Before any of them could respond, two men of the watch approached the group. The pair seemed to be all business and didn’t appear to mind interrupting whatever conversation was going on. “You lot are expected and wanted in the city hall.”
Dee tensed up at their approach and Annabette frowned as she eyed the two watchmen; but it was Cal that replied first, "I beg your pardon?"
The guard that spoke pulled a piece of paper from a pocket in his uniform and held it up to show the group. "We have orders here to be on the lookout for a group of men and elves, mostly female…” He looked around to each person in the group, seeming to be checking them off with the descriptions he had on this list. “I don’t see all of you, you seem to be missin’ a small lad and a loud elf with a sword taller than she is, but…” his gaze then lands on Xan, “the description about you was very specific- an elf that’s dressed in purple and carryin’ a sparkly bow. He said that you lot would be arrivin’ here tonight.”
“You lot?” Edu grumbled. “A bit of respect would be nice. What's going on around here anyway?”
The guard shrugged. "I am just doing what I am told... You are awaited in the city hall.”
“By whom?” Anna inquired with some measure of a displeased bite to her question.
Both guards appeared to be unfazed by the tone and neither seemed as though they were willing to give up any more information. “You’ll find out when you get there,” the first replied and then motioned for them to follow. “Now… come with me.”
Xan canted her head curiously to the side as she watched the first guard turn to lead the way. “Well… town hall, I suppose.”
Edu instinctively checked her weapons and eyed the street before following behind Xan. “I have a bad feeling about this…” she whispered to the group.
Addie’s concern was written all over her face and she hesitated for a moment before quickening her pace to catch up with Neth. She lowered her voice to a volume that she thought the guards wouldn’t be able to overhear. "Surely our bounty hasn't reached Bree, has it?"
Neth shrugged a bit and also lowered her tone to reply. "I do not believe they'd be asking us to go to City Hall if it had..."
"Unless this is the sentencing..." the blonde woman replied in a barely audible voice, still seeming to be very uneasy about the whole ordeal.
Cal’s elven hearing picked up on the concern and she looked over to Addie. “But what would we be sentenced for? We have not killed anyone here... recently. And the Prancing Pony is still intact I believe.”
"We get arrested a lot, it seems...” Xan sighed out.
Edu cracked her knuckles and then placed her hand on the dagger in her belt. “They will not be arresting anyone today!” she proclaimed with a bold confidence, not caring if the guards heard her or not.
“If we were to be arrested," Anna interjected, "they would have done so by now.” She was still angry from not getting a direct answer from the guard earlier, but she was also a woman of logic and reason.
Ranamellon nodded in agreement. "There has been many times where we could have been arrested. This does not feel like such a case."
"I agree…” Neth replied. “This is something else. Not that it allays my unease by a whole lot."
The group continued to discuss why they might have been summoned as they made their way up the cobblestone streets and toward the town hall, but none of them had noticed that Dee was no longer with them. The Shadowslip, true to her name and very skilled at giving the law the ‘slip’, had quietly lagged behind until the opportunity presented itself for her to disappear into the shadows.
Once they reached town hall, the guards opened the door and ushered them in. Cal cringed as they entered the building and she tried to avoid brushing up against anything; her previous experiences with the town had shown it to be a filthy place, full of dirt and grime. However, to her delight, the interior of this building was unusually clean, especially compared to the tavern and the appropriately named ‘mess hall’. One of the sentries, who could often be found sleeping at his desk, was sweeping urgently as though his life depended on it; and around his neck was a sign that said, “Slacker.”
Across the room and standing on either side of the stairs to the mayor’s office were two rather large guards- even though they wore the cloaks of the Bree watch over their plate armor, these two men had a greater stature than that of the average Breelander, and both had pale, patrician features. Edu looked at them and cursed under her breath. Catching her eye-contact, the guard on the right nodded to her and then to the rest of the group and said, "The Captain is upstairs… go on up.”
Addie’s face paled even more as she caught sight of how intimidating the guards looked and she tried to hide between Neth and Rana as the group proceeded up the stairs. A firm, brisk voice with a pronounced Gondorian accent greeted them when they walked through the door of the Mayor’s office. “What did you do, take the scenic route from Belfalas?”
Anna sighed when she couldn’t see who the voice belonged to; the man had his back turned to them and all what they could see was the back of the large ornate chair behind the desk. The chair then spun around to reveal an imposing silver-armored figure with close-cropped black hair and a cobalt cloak that was fluttering in a breeze, even though there was no draft.
"Dramatic." Anna muttered.
Upon seeing who it was, Neth immediately straightened her posture and a stunned, "By Elendil..." escaped from her lips.
“Bloody hell...” Edu growled out as her entire body tensed up. Xan stepped forward and placed her hand on Edu’s shoulder in an attempt to keep her calm.
“You have got to be joking...” Cal sighed out as she crossed her arms and regarded the man with thinly veiled distaste.
Rana’s head canted to the side in curiosity as he not only observed the man behind the desk, but also how the group had responded to him. “I take it that you are acquainted with this man?”
Addie nodded as she glared daggers at the well-armored man. “His name is Gareth... Captain of the Hounds of Anarion…”
(Continued in The Occupation of Bree- Part 2)
